Nor did his
appearance bely his character. To all other beings, whether of the
terrestrial or the invisible world, his temper was hard, impracticable
and remorseless. To Rodogune alone, a similitude of minds, and a
congenial ferocity of heart had attached him; and the attachment had
descended to her son; though not equally destitute of every agreeable
and every plausible quality. He therefore beheld the affliction of
Roderic with sympathy and compassion.
"Wherefore," cried Medoro, modulating a voice, that nature had made up
of dissonance and horror, into the most gentle and soothing accent of
which it was capable, and hanging over his couch, "wherefore this
sorrow? What is it that has seemed to mar a happiness so enviable? Art
thou not possessed"--"Talk not to me of possessions," exclaimed Roderic,
with a tone of frenzy, and starting from his posture, "I give them to
the winds. I banish them from my thoughts for ever. Oh that the earth
would open and swallow them up! Oh that unburdened from them all, I were
free as the children of the vallies, and careless as the shepherd that
carols to the rising day. I had not then been thus entangled in
misfortune, thus every way closed in to remediless despair. I had not
then been a monument of impotence and misery for the world to gaze at.
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