No More Learning

no, it cannot be! _50
Horrible things have been in this wide world,
Prodigious mixtures, and confusions strange
Of good and ill; and worse have been conceived
Than ever there was found a heart to do.
But never fancy imaged such a deed _55
As. . .
[PAUSES, SUDDENLY RECOLLECTING HERSELF. ]
Who art thou? Swear to me, ere I die
With fearful expectation, that indeed
Thou art not what thou seemest. . . Mother!

LUCRETIA:
Oh!
My sweet child, know you. . .
BEATRICE:
Yet speak it not:
For then if this be truth, that other too _60
Must be a truth, a firm enduring truth,
Linked with each lasting circumstance of life,
Never to change, never to pass away.
Why so it is. This is the Cenci Palace;
Thou art Lucretia; I am Beatrice. _65
I have talked some wild words, but will no more.
Mother, come near me: from this point of time,
I am. . .
[HER VOICE DIES AWAY FAINTLY. ]

LUCRETIA:
Alas! What has befallen thee, child?
What has thy father done?

BEATRICE:
What have I done?
Am I not innocent? Is it my crime _70
That one with white hair, and imperious brow,
Who tortured me from my forgotten years,
As parents only dare, should call himself
My father, yet should be! --Oh, what am I?
What name, what place, what memory shall be mine?