Vashti. 
     So.  Go back,
Tell the King I have hearkened to his message,
And tell him I will not come.

Messenger.  What sickness shall I say has lighted on thee, So that thou canst not come?

Vashti. 
     Thou weariest me. 
Say this to the King, Vashti will not come.  Are they not plain, my words?  Canst thou not learn them?

Messenger.  Give me some softer speech.  Must I not fear I shall earn whipping if I take these words?

Vashti.  I pray thee, go.  Thou art a trouble here; Seest thou not how all these feasting women Pause, and the pleasure is distrest in them?  Thou hast thy message:  say, She will not come.—­ Back to the King, now!

Messenger. 
     I am whipt for this.

     [He goes.

Vashti.  It seems, my sisters, we have changed our moods.  But now, my mind was heavy, you were blithe; And in a moment, you, behold, are fixt Gazing like desperate things, while I rejoice.

1st Woman.  Rejoice! thou dost rejoice? then madness does.

Vashti.  I know not that:  but certainly I know A mind, that has been feeling for long time The greatness of some hovering event Poised over life, will rejoice marvellously When the event falls, suddenly seizing life:  Like faintness when a thunderstorm comes down, That turns to exulting when the lightning flares, Shattering houses, making men afraid.  And this is my event:  I am its choice.  Yea, not as a storm, but as an eagle now It stoops on me; and, though I am its prey, I am lifted by majestic wings, my soul Is clothed in swiftness of a mighty soaring.

3rd Woman.  What glory can her wondrous eyes behold?

4th Woman.  Seemeth her flesh to glow! and her throat pants As one who feels a god within her, come Out of his heaven to enjoy her.

2nd Woman. 
     Ay,
Now it is true, the Queen is beautiful;
She could, so looking, enrage love in one
Whose blood a hundred years had frozen dry.

1st Woman.  Ah, but I fear thee, Queen:  this dreadful mood Will break the pleasantness of friendship thou Hast kept for me, as a ship in a gale is broken.

Vashti.  Ay, very like:  and the event will rouse Such work in the water where your comfort sails, More than my fortune will to pieces blow; You too I think will get some perilous tossing From what proves my destruction.

2nd Woman. 
     And, so knowing,
For mere insane delight in violent things,
Wilt thou awake in the fickle mood of men
Again that ancient ignominy which once,
Till beauty freed them, loaded the souls of women?

3rd Woman.  Truly, long time will work what now thou doest.

Vashti.  I know not rightly what I here begin; No more than one, who stands in midst of wind On a tall mountain, knows what breaking down The earth must have ere the wind’s speed is done, And it hath drawn out of the drenched soil The clinging vapours, and made bright the air.