What! Peace, Christian—and may Jew and Mussulman Stickle for being Jew and Mussulman, And must the Christian only drop the Christian? SALADIN (_more solemnly_). Peace, Christian! TEMPLAR (_calmly_.) Yes, I feel what weight of blame Lies in that word of thine pent up. O that I knew how Assad in my place would act. SALADIN. He—not much better, probably as fiery. Who has already taught thee thus at once Like him to bribe me with a single word? Indeed, if all has past as thou narratest, I scarcely can discover Nathan in it. But Nathan is my friend, and of my friends One must not bicker with the other. Bend— And be directed. Move with caution. Do not Loose on him the fanatics of thy sect. Conceal what all thy clergy would be claiming My hand to avenge upon him, with more show Of right than is my wish. Be not from spite To any Jew or Mussulman a Christian. TEMPLAR. Thy counsel is but on the brink of coming Somewhat too late, thanks to the patriarch’s Bloodthirsty rage, whose instrument I shudder To have almost become. SALADIN. How! how! thou wentest Still earlier to the patriarch than to me? TEMPLAR. Yes, in the storm of passion, in the eddy Of indecision—pardon—oh! thou wilt No longer care, I fear, to find in me One feature of thy Assad. SALADIN. Yes, that fear. Methinks I know by this time from what failings Our virtue springs—this do thou cultivate, Those shall but little harm thee in my sight. But go, seek Nathan, as he sought for thee, And bring him hither: I must reconcile you. If thou art serious about the maid— Be calm, she shall be thine—Nathan shall feel That without swine’s flesh one may educate A Christian child, Go. [_Templar withdraws_. SITTAH (_rising from the sofa_). Very strange indeed! SALADIN. Well, Sittah, must my Assad not have been A gallant handsome youth? SITTAH. If he was thus, And ’twasn’t the templar who sat to the painter. But how couldst thou be so forgetful, brother, As not to ask about his parents? SALADIN. And Particularly too about his mother. Whether his mother e’er was in this country, That is your meaning, isn’t it? SITTAH. You run on— SALADIN.