SALADIN, _the Sultan_ SITTAH, _his sister_ NATHAN, _a rich Jew_ HAFI, _a Dervish_ RECHA, Nathan's _adopted daughter_ DAYA, _a Christian woman, companion to_ Recha CONRADE, _a young Templar_ ATHANASIOS, _Patriarch of Palestine_ BONAFIDES, _a friar_ ACT I SCENE I.--_Jerusalem. A hall in_ NATHAN'S _house_. NATHAN, _in travelling dress_. DAYA _meeting him_. DAYA: 'Tis he, 'tis Nathan, thanks to God, returned, At last! NATHAN: Yes, Daya, thanks; but why "at last"? 'Tis far to Babylon, and gathering in One's debts makes tardy journeying. DAYA: Oh, Nathan! How near you came to misery; when afar, The house took fire, and Recha, 'mid the flames, Had all but perished. NATHAN: Recha, O my Recha! DAYA: Your Recha, _yours_? My conscience bids me speak---- NATHAN: See what a charming silk I bought for you In Babylon, and these Damascus jewels. DAYA: I shall be silent. NATHAN: Say, does Recha know I am arrived? DAYA: This morn of you she dreamed; Her thoughts have only been with you and him Who saved her from the fire. NATHAN: Ah, who is he? DAYA: A young knight Templar lately captive ta'en, But pardoned by the sultan. He it was Who burst through flame and smoke; and she believes Him but a transient inmate of the earth-- A guardian angel! Stay, your daughter comes! [_Enter_ RECHA. RECHA: My very father's self! Oh, how I feared Perils of flood for thee, until the fire Came nigh me. Now, I think it must be balm To die by water! But you are not drowned: I am not burned! We'll praise the God Who bade My angel _visibly_ on his white wing Athwart the roaring flame---- NATHAN (_aside_): White wing? Oh, ay. The broad white fluttering mantle of the Templar. RECHA: Yes, visibly he bore me through the fire O'ershadowed by his pinions--face to face I've seen an angel, father, my own angel! NATHAN: A man had seemed an angel in such case! RECHA: He was no real knight; no captive Templar Appears alive in wide Jerusalem. DAYA: Yet Saladin granted this youth his life, For his great likeness to a dear dead brother. NATHAN: Why need you, then, call angels into play? DAYA: But then he wanted nothing, nothing sought; Was in himself sufficient, like an angel. RECHA: And when at last he vanished---- NATHAN: Vanished! Have you not sought him? What if he-- That is, a Frank, unused to this fierce sun-- Now languish on a sick-bed, friendless, poor? RECHA: Alas, my father! NATHAN: What if he, unfriended, Lies ill and unrelieved; the hapless prey Of agony and death; consoled alone In death by the remembrance of this deed. DAYA: You kill her! NATHAN: You kill him. RECHA: Not dead, not dead!