same scene.]

[The King, wrapped in a camel-driver's cloak, sits by Eznarza, a
gypsy of the desert.]

King:

Now I have known the desert and dwelt in the tents of the Arabs.

Eznarza:

There is no land like the desert and like the Arabs no people.

King:

It is all over and done; I return to the walls of my fathers.

Eznarza:

Time cannot put it away; I go back to the desert that nursed me.

King:

Did you think in those days on the sands, or among the tents in the
mornings, that my year would ever end, and I be brought away by
strength of my word to the prisoning of a palace?

Eznarza:

I knew that Time would do it, for my people have learned the way of
him.

King:

Is it then Time that has mocked our futile prayers? Is he then greater
than God that he has laughed at our praying?

Eznarza:

We may not say that he is greater than God. Yet we prayed that our own
year might not pass away. God could not save it.

King:

Yes, yes. We prayed that prayer. All men would laugh at it.

Eznarza:

The prayer was not laughable. Only he that is lord of the years is
obdurate. If a man prayed for life to a furious, merciless Sultan well
might the Sultan's slaves laugh. Yet it is not laughable to pray for
life.

King:

Yes, we are slaves of Time. To-morrow brings the princess who comes
from Tharba. We must bow our heads.

Eznarza:

My people say that Time lives in the desert. He lies there in the sun.

King:

No, no, not in the desert. Nothing alters there.

Eznarza:

My people say that the desert is his country. He smites not his own
country, my people say. But he overwhelms all other lands of the
world.

King:

Yes, the desert is always the same, even the littlest rocks of it.

Eznarza:

They say that he loves the Sphinx and does not harm her. They say that
he does not dare to harm the Sphinx. She has borne him many gods whom
the infidels worship.

King:

Their father is more terrible than all the false gods.

Eznarza:

O, that he had but spared our little year.

King:

He destroys all things utterly.

Eznarza:

There is a little child of man that is mightier than he, and who saves
the world from Time.

King:

Who is this little child that is mightier than Time? Is it Love that
is mightier?

Eznarza:

No, not Love.

King:

If he conquers even Love then none are mightier.

Eznarza:

He scares Love away with weak white hairs and with wrinkles. Poor
li