She dances still, and yet Seems forced in mien and mood. She should be glowing And yet is blanched as though, enchained in musing, She did some other thing, and sleepy-willed Followed the dancing. Then it seems this Judith Brought not her work unanguished to the full. Ay, and the last kiss given by her husband, She here and now disowns with pompous show, Must leave upon her lips the cling of feeling. She’s not yet even seen him dead--She comes! [MARIAMNE _appears again_. ALEXANDRA _and_ SOEMUS _follow her_. ALEX. (_to_ MARIAMNE). I spoke with Titus. [MARIAMNE _suddenly turns and sees her image in a mirror_. MAR. Ha! ALEX. What ails you, then? MAR. ’Twas thus I saw myself but late in dream-- This was the cause, then, why I could not rest me Till that lost ruby came again to light That now casts from my breast such dusky glimmer-- The image had been flaw-marred lacking it! On this the last treads hot---- ALEX. Come to yourself! MAR. Nay, let me be! A mirror just like this, At first with glazy muffle, as o’erbreathed By living lips; then, like the pictures which It showed in linked procession, softly clearing And lastly luminant as polished steel. I saw my life in sum. First I appeared As child in light of roses tender-ambient Of ever redder, ever darker hue. But then the features, though my own, were strange And only in the third-changed scene I knew Myself in such an all too youthful face. And now there came the Virgin and the moment When Herod took me to the flowery garden, Bearing me company, and flattering spoke:-- “There’s none so fair she would not need to pluck The lily of your hand.” Ha, be he cursed That he forgot so full, so full! And then It all grew eerie, and against my will I saw the future, saw me thus and thus And lastly as I stand here. (_To_ ALEXANDRA.) Is it then Not passing strange if dreams step into life? Again the gleaming mirror overmisted, The light grew ashen-coloured and myself, So shortly since a blooming creature, blanched As though beneath the splendour of this garb My every vein had long been stilly bleeding. A shudder gripped me, and I cried “I come now As skull and bones and that I will not see!” And then I turned away-- [_She turns away from the mirror._ VOICES IN THE BACKGROUND. The King! [_General stir._ ALEX. Who? who? SCENE 8 THE SAME. HEROD, _in war accoutrement_. JOAB, _and Retinue_. MARIAMNE. ’Tis Death, Death, Death, has come amongst us, Without announcement, as he ever comes! SALOME.