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Oh, if my head but ached, or fev'rish sleep,
Or the more potent secret cause forced from me
One groan or sigh, what tones of kind alarm!
And the soft pressure of her gentle hand
In mute affliction, till I smiled again!
Here, on my bursting heart I feel it still,
Though cold and changed she be.

(After a gloomy pause.) Perhaps some awful and mysterious power

Within these fated precincts doth for me

Love to aversion turn.

ROVANI.

What dost thou mean by a mysterious power?

And but ev'n now methought I heard thee name
A potent secret cause.—Thou hast been wont
Freely to make me sharer of thy thoughts—
Of all thy secret wishes.

GARCIO.

So I have:

Nought for thy good to hear or mine to utter,
Have I conceal'd from thee.—I hear a noise.

ROVANI.

No; I hear nothing.

GARCIO.

But my ear is quick;—

Too quick, perhaps, in fancying sounds that are not.