Mistress of his castle and his servants,
  But wedded to a man who's old enough
  To be her grandsire! Had he been a gallant--
  Yet his money's good. Humph! I suppose I must. [_Exit slowly; counting her money._


SCENE II.--_The Ravine. Time: Sunrise. Don Pascual sleeping. The Gipsy
Queen standing near, watching him. The Gipsy Camp in the background._

  D. PAS. (_In his sleep._) Oh, Inez, Inez! (_Waking with a start._) Ha! was that a dream? GIP. Q. He wakes. D. PED. Oh, that I had thus slumbered on,
  Feeling her soothing presence, and so died,
  Rather than waken to this cold, bleak, world. GIP. Q. (_Aside._) How I do long to open all my heart! Unmask this stern exterior, and make
  Him master of the secret of his birth. His wound's but slight, I think he'll bear the news. I'll try. (_To Don Pascual_) Young man! Say, how goes it with thee? D. PAS. I thank thee, mother, I have soundly slept;
  My wound's already healed. The gipsy balm
  Hath wrought a miracle. GIP. Q. (_Aside._) He calls me mother. See how the native gipsy blood's instinct
  Speaks through the lips of half-unconscious sense. I'll wager he already half divines
  His occult parentage. D. PAS. (_Looking around him._) Mother, where's Inez? GIP. Q. (_Aside._) Mother again; but Inez fills his thoughts. Hast thou no mem'ry, youth, of last nights fray? [_Aloud._

  D. PAS. But little, mother; all is still confused. GIP. Q. Then be thou patient, for I've much to tell. But say, how is't, thou ever call'st me mother? D. PAS. In faith I know not how my careless tongue
  Could shape a word so tender to thee, Queen,
  Who art a stranger to me. Yet I feel,
  And felt from the first moment that I gazed
  Upon thy dusky brow, a mother's heart
  Did beat for me within that hardy breast. Why I know not. I, too, who never knew
  A mother's love, whose infant steps were led
  By other than a mother's hand. A good
  Kind lady, long since dead, adopted me,
  And dying, left me all her patrimony,
  Which hitherto has been doled out to me
  By guardians, until I should come of age. One Father Miguel, whom I seldom saw,
  Paid my expenses at the seminary;
  But when I asked him questions of my birth
  I never got intelligent response,
  So that I long have thought some mystery
  Doth underly the subject of my birth. GIP Q. I knew the Lady Angela, and loved her. D. PAS. Good Heavens! What, that name! The lady who----

  GIP. Q. Adopted thee and Father Miguel too. D. PAS. And Father Miguel! GIP. Q. Does that surprise thee? I could tell thee more. D. PAS. More than that! Ay, then
  Who knows thou may'st not discover
  The secret of my birth. GIP. Q. Secrets as strange
  Have often been discovered by gipsies. Am I not a gipsy? Can I not read
  The destinies of all, mapped out for thee
  By the great heavenly bodies? Think'st thou that
  Our meeting was not fashioned by the stars
  And known to me beforehand? D. PAS. Even that! GIP. Q. Ay, and your meeting with the Lady Inez. D. PAS. That, too! Nay, tell me more. I fain would hear. GIP. Q. Not so fast. Thou'rt o'er excitable. Calm thyself first an thou wouldst hear more
  Of that young damsel. But of her anon. D. PAS. Weird and mysterious being, as I read
  Thy mystic brow a whisper seems to say
  I've seen thee once before. Say, art thou not
  That crone who ever haunts me in my dreams,
  Known in my youth, who once gave me this ring? GIP. Q. The same, the same! I've watched thee from a child. D. PAS. And by that ring thou knowest me. GIP. Q. 'Tis true. D. PAS. Ay, now I know thee. Tell me now, O Queen,
  Why tookest thou an interest in my fate? GIP. Q. The tale is long and sad, but thou must hear. Be patient and lend an attentive ear. Know, then, that in Grenada's lofty range
  There stands a twin-peaked mountain doubly-crowned,
  With two grim feudal castles, old, yet strong. The owners of these fortresses of yore
  Were aye at feud, until at last the one
  Subdued the other. Ever since that day
  The victor's star in the ascendant seemed,
  For though in later times they turned to friends,
  Who had been foes, and were allied together
  In skirmishes with castles neighbouring,
  In which they came off gainers, still, the one--
  The larger and the richer one, I mean,
  The whilom victor of the other peak--
  Did e'er with haughty overbearing sneer
  Upon his humbler neighbour, and would bind
  The poorer lord with obligations strong,
  For favours often granted, till at last
  The lesser lord became dependent on
  The greater one, and ever poorer grew
  And more dependent, and so stands the case. Things will not long be thus. A change will come. The Fates predict it, and the proud one's star
  Already's on the wane. D. PAS. In sooth, good Queen! But tell me what has this to do with me? GIP. Q. Peace! It concerns thee much, as thou shalt hear. The father of the present owner of
  The richer castle, Don Fernando height,
  I do remember well when but a child. A warrior proud was he, like all his race. His son, the present lord, is like him. He
  Whose name I've vowed shall ne'er more pass my lips. D. PAS. Ha! GIP. Q. Interrupt me not. Thou soon shalt hear. This lord, who shall be nameless, in his youth
  (He now is old) did love a gipsy maid,
  Who, in the freshness of her virgin heart,
  Returned his passion, being but a child,
  Whilst he, the villain, was a full-grown man
  Of forty years and over. Still he bore
  His years so lightly that he younger seemed. With passion fierce he wooed the gipsy maid,
  And pleaded in such moving tropes his love,
  That the young gipsy's heart--not then of stone,
  Though long since turned to flint--did melt, and he,
  Seeing his prey secure, did plot her ruin. But the child had a father, old and wise,
  Of royal blood, too, known as King Djâbel,
  And proud, too, of his lineage and his race. He thought it lowering to true gipsy blood
  To mate with pale-faced Christians, even though
  'Twere to a Christian king and by the church,
  Drawn up with legal document and signed
  In all due form, and when he heard that I
  Did to a Christian's love lend listening ear. D. PAS. You? _You_, O Queen, then, were the gipsy maid. You're speaking of yourself. I understand. GIP. Q. (_Starting_) My tongue has tripped, and traitor turned. Why
      then
  Pursue my tale under false colours? Aye,
  Know that I, Pepa, was the gipsy maid
  Once beloved of that false Don Diego. D. PAS. Don Diego. GIP. Q.     Ha! My tongue has tripped again. I vowed that name should ne'er more pass my lips. Well, this false lord, with subtle wiles and arts
  Did so win my young heart, that King Djâbel,
  Furious at first at what he deemed a stain
  Upon his lineage, threatened me with death,
  And would have killed me, had I brought dishonour
  On his fair name. But deem not that I fell. I loved him--and how dearly! But he found
  That the proud gipsy maid, though young, would not
  Barter her honour. Not for wealth untold.