Julius, nonplussed to see his soldier's air Almost confessing judgment on himself, Skeptic, yet therewithal impressed despite, Imposed on even, by a mock-majesty, The specious counterfeit of virtue wroth But, though wroth, calm in conscious innocence, Couched in the lofty words of Shimei, While by his aspect blatantly belied-- Julius, thus wondering, curious, frowned and said: "Cease from preamble, and forth with thy charge! No further swelling phrases, large and vague; But facts--or fictions--in plain terms and few."
Audience at length prepared, so Shimei deemed, His story, well before prepared, he told: "I lingered late last night upon the deck: Slow pacing up and down for exercise, I strict bethought me how I best might quit The serious task committed to my hands Of seeking sentence on a criminal There at the fountain and prime spring of law And justice, that august tribunal last, The imperial seat at Rome. While I thus mused, The Providence that, dark sometimes and slow, As to us seems, does after all pursue The flying footsteps of foul crime with scourge, Or human vengeance help to overtake, Showed me a light, which, alas, quickly then By envious evil powers in turn was quenched. For it so fell that in the exceeding dark, Unseen, I overheard the prisoner Paul Broach a new plot of bribery and wrong. He promised to the soldier keeping him Large money--earnest offered, and received, I plainly heard it clink from hand to hand." The soldier winced beneath the meaning glance Shot at himself wherewith the subtile Jew Spoke these last words; winced, and sore wished, too late, That, as he first had purposed, he had shown In proof to the centurion Shimei's gold Shoved for a bribe into his hand, but here Adroitly turned to use against himself. What if his captain, prompted by such hint, Should now demand to see that dastard gold! He had been silent touching it because His mere possession of it would, he felt, Look too much like his paltering with a price; But, after Shimei's words, to have it found Upon him! With such disconcerting thoughts, The soldier listened like a criminal, As Shimei with calm iteration said:-- "Thus would Paul buy his keeper to forswear Against the one man he most feared, myself, That I had sought to bribe a soldier's faith, Bargaining with him to fling overboard His prisoner and so rid him from the world. 'Thou sawest,' Paul told the soldier, 'how at Sidon An ample sum was put into his hands By wealthy friends there': he all this now pledged To be his keeper's, no denary short, If but he would traduce me thus, and so Both break the damning power I else could wield Against him, and, besides, my life destroy. Thy soldier yielded: grievous wrong indeed, Yet him I can forgive, for less as bribed He faltered, than as overcome he fell. Paul is the master of an evil art To make his subject firmly hold for true What, free from sorcery, he would know was false. He, in the very act and article Of sketching what his victim was on me To father, the illusion could in him Produce of hearing his own words from me. A trick Paul has of vocal mimicry-- Sleight of longiloquence, whereby he throws To distance, as may like, his uttered words, To make them seem another's, not his own-- Aided him here; I hardly knew, myself, Hearing him speak, but that the voice was mine. Thus I account for it, that, without blame So much to him himself, he being deceived, This worthy soldier, whom I never wronged, Doubtless an honest fellow in the main, Should in effect malign me so to thee.
