cerns not thee nor me. Be thou
Sure that my will and power to serve it live.
Lift now thine eyes to look upon thy lord.

Compare these lines with the lines which end the fourth act:

ALMACHILDES.

I cannot slay him
Thus.

ROSAMUND.

Canst thou slay thy bride by fire? He dies,
Or she dies, bound against the stake. His death
Were the easier. Follow him: save her: strike but once.

ALMACHILDES.

I cannot. God requite thee this! I will. [_Exit._

ROSAMUND.

And I will see it. And, father, thou shalt see. [_Exit._

In both these instances one sees the quality which is most conspicuous
in this play--a naked strength, which is the same kind of strength that
has always been present in Swinburne's plays, but hitherto draped
elaborately, and often more than half concealed in the draperies. The
outline of every play has been hard, sharp, firmly drawn; the characters
always forthright and unwavering; there has always been a real precision
in the main drift of the speeches; but this is the first time in which
the outlines have been left to show themselves in all their sharpness.
Development or experiment, whichever it may be, this resolute simplicity
brings a new quality into Swinburne's work, and a quality full of
dramatic possibilities. All the luxuriousness of his verse has gone, and
the lines ring like sword clashing against sword. These savage and
simple people of the sixth century do not turn over their thoughts
before concentrating them into words, and they do not speak except to
tell their thoughts. Imagine what even Murray, in _Chastelard_, a
somewhat curt speaker, would have said in place of Almachildes's one
line, a whole conflict of love, hate, honour, and shame in eight words:

I cannot. God requite thee this! I will.

Dramatic realism can go no further than such lines. The question remains
whether dramatic realism is in itself an altogether desirable thing, and
whether Swinburne in particular does not lose more than he gains by such
self-restraint.

The poetic drama is in itself a compromise. That people should speak in
verse is itself a violation of probability; and so strongly is this felt
by most actors that they endeavour, in acting a play in verse, to make
the verse sound as much like prose