drew to the coast
of Ireland. In it a sick and suffering man, in woful plight, at
the point of death...." She tells the story of her recognition in
this Tantris of Tristan; of her resolve to take immediate vengeance
upon him; of the look which disarmed her, her dismissal of him,
healed, that he "might go home and burden her no more with the
look of his eyes!"--"Oh, wonder!" breathes Brangaene. "Where were
my eyes? The guest whom I once helped to nurse...?"--"You heard
his praise a moment ago! 'Hurrah for our lord Tristan!' He was
that unhappy man. He swore a thousand oaths of eternal gratitude
to me, and truth. Now hear how a hero keeps his word. He whom I
dismissed unknown as Tantris, as Tristan comes boldly back. On
a proud tall ship he draws to land, and desires the heiress of
Ireland in marriage for the worn King of Cornwall, for Mark, his
uncle. In Morold's lifetime who had ventured to offer us such an
affront? To sue for the crown of Ireland for the King of the
tribute-owing Cornish!... Oh, woe is me! It was I, I, who in secret
prepared for myself this shame! Instead of smiting with the avenging
sword, weak, I let it drop. Now I am the servant of my own vassal!"
Brangaene, when all is told, does not apparently recognise in the
situation cause for so much bitterness. "When peace, reconciliation,
and friendship were sworn on all sides," she says wonderingly, "we
all rejoiced to see the day. How could I suppose it was a source
of affliction to you?" The point then appears of that bitterness,
which would hardly in reality have been a point but for a sentiment
not among those which Isolde confesses to her confidante. That
what she kept silent the other should reveal! That what he could
only know and live to report through the weakness of her woman's
heart, he should publicly make use of, to his own glory and his
relative's advantage! She paints his attitude, as she imagines him,
victory-flushed, hale and whole now, pointing at her and saying
in loud, clear tones: "There were a treasure for you, my lord and
uncle! What do you think of her as a wife? The pretty Irish-woman
I will bring to you here. By roads and by-paths well known to me,
give the sign, I fly to Ireland: Isolde is yours! I delight in
the adventure!" The picture goads her to very madness, and, with
a cry for its mingling of ferocity with anguish like the roar of a
baited and wounded lioness, she breaks into maledictions upon his
head, calling down vengea