RISTIAN:
Oh! I take them back!

CYRANO:
Roxane expects a letter.

CHRISTIAN:
Woe the day!

CYRANO:
How?

CHRISTIAN:
I am lost if I but ope my lips!

CYRANO:
Why so?

CHRISTIAN:
I am a fool--could die for shame!

CYRANO:
None is a fool who knows himself a fool.
And you did not attack me like a fool.

CHRISTIAN:
Bah! One finds battle-cry to lead th' assault!
I have a certain military wit,
But, before women, can but hold my tongue.
Their eyes! True, when I pass, their eyes are kind. . .

CYRANO:
And, when you stay, their hearts, methinks, are kinder?

CHRISTIAN:
No! for I am one of those men--tongue-tied,
I know it--who can never tell their love.

CYRANO:
And I, meseems, had Nature been more kind,
More careful, when she fashioned me,--had been
One of those men who well could speak their love!

CHRISTIAN:
Oh, to express one's thoughts with facile grace!. . .

CYRANO:
. . .To be a musketeer, with handsome face!

CHRISTIAN:
Roxane is precieuse. I'm sure to prove
A disappointment to her!

CYRANO (looking at him):
Had I but
Such an interpreter to speak my soul!

CHRISTIAN (with despair):
Eloquence! Where to find it?

CYRANO (abruptly):
That I lend,
If you lend me your handsome victor-charms;
Blended, we make a hero of romance!

CHRISTIAN:
How so?

CYRANO:
Think you you can repeat what things
I daily teach your tongue?

CHRISTIAN:
What do you mean?

CYRANO:
Roxane shall never have a disillusion!
Say, wilt thou that we woo her, double-handed?
Wilt thou that we two woo her, both together?
Feel'st thou, passing from my leather doublet,
Through thy laced doublet, all my soul inspiring?

CHRISTIAN:
But, Cyrano!. . .

CYRANO:
Will you, I say?

CHRISTIAN:
I fear!

CYRANO:
Since, by yourself, you fear to chill her heart,
Will you--to kindle all her heart to flame--
Wed into one my phrases and your lips?

CHRISTIAN:
Your eyes flash!

CYRANO:
Will you?

CHRISTIAN:
Will it please you so?
--Give you such pleasure?

CYRANO (madly):
It!. . .
(Then calmly, business-like):
It would amuse me!
It is an enterprise to tempt a poet.
Will you complete me, and let me complete you?
You march victorious,--I go in your shadow;
Let me be wit for you, be you my beauty!

CHRISTIAN:
The letter, that she waits for even now!
I never can. . .

CYRANO (taking out the