Two Scholars come in.
FIRST SCHOLAR.
Monte Cassino, then, is your College.
What think you of ours here at Salern?
SECOND SCHOLAR.
To tell the truth, I arrived so lately, I hardly yet have had time to discern.
So much, at least, I am bound to acknowledge: The air seems healthy, the buildings stately, And on the whole I like it greatly.
FIRST SCHOLAR.
Yes, the air is sweet; the Calabrian hills Send us down puffs of mountain air; And in summer-time the sea-breeze fills With its coolness cloister, and court, and square.
Then at every season of the year There are crowds of guests and travellers here; Pilgrims, and mendicant friars, and traders From the Levant, with figs and wine, And bands of wounded and sick Crusaders, Coming back from Palestine.
SECOND SCHOLAR.
And what are the studies you pursue?
What is the course you here go through?
FIRST SCHOLAR.
The first three years of the college course Are given to Logic alone, as the source Of all that is noble, and wise, and true.
SECOND SCHOLAR.
That seems rather strange, I must confess, In a Medical School; yet, nevertheless, You doubtless have reasons for that.
FIRST SCHOLAR.
Oh yes For none but a clever dialectician Can hope to become a great physician; That has been settled long ago.
Logic makes an important part Of the mystery of the healing art; For without it how could you hope to show That nobody knows so much as you know?
After this there are five years more Devoted wholly to medicine, With lectures on chirurgical lore, And dissections of the bodies of swine, As likest the human form divine.
SECOND SCHOLAR.
What are the books now most in vogue?
FIRST SCHOLAR.
Quite an extensive catalogue; Mostly, however, books of our own; As Gariopontus' Passionarius, And the writings of Matthew Platearius; And a volume universally known As the Regimen of the School of Salern, For Robert of Normandy written in terse And very elegant Latin verse.
Each of these writings has its turn.
And when at length we have finished these Then comes the struggle for degrees, Will all the oldest and ablest critics; The public thesis and disputation, Question, and answer, and explanation Of a passage out of Hippocrates, Or Aristotle's Analytics.
There the triumphant Magister stands! A book is solemnly placed in his hands, On which he swears to follow the rule And ancient forms of the good old School; To report if any confectionarius Mingles his drugs with matters various, And to visit his patients twice a day, And once in the night, if they live in town, And if they are poor, to take no pay.
Having faithfully promised these, His head is crowned with a laurel crown; A kiss on his cheek, a ring on his hand, The Magister Artium et Physices Goes forth from the school like a lord of the land.
And now, as we have the whole morning before us, Let us go in, if you make no objection, And listen awhile to a learned prelection On Marcus Aurelius Cassioderus.
They go in.

Enter Lucifer as a Doctor.
LUCIFER.
This is the great School of Salern! A land of wrangling and of quarrels, Of brains that seethe, and hearts that burn, Where every emulous scholar hears, In every breath that comes to his ears, The rustling of another's laurels! The air of the place is called salubrious; The neighborhood of Vesuvius lends it Au odor volcanic, that rather mends it, And the building's have an aspect lugubrious, That inspires a feeling of awe and terror Into the heart of the beholder.
And befits such an ancient homestead of error, Where the old falsehoods moulder and smoulder, And yearly by many hundred hands Are carried away in the zeal of youth, And sown like tares in the field of truth, To blossom and ripen in other lands.
What have we here, affixed to the gate?
The challenge of some scholastic wight, Who wishes to hold a public debate On sundry questions wrong or right! Ah, now this is my great delight! For I have often observed of late That such discussions end in a fight.
Let us see what the learned wag maintains With such a prodigal waste of brains.
Reads.
"Whether angels in moving from place to place Pass through the intermediate space.
Whether God himself is the author of evil, Or whether that is the work of the Devil.
When, where, and wherefore Lucifer fell, And whether he now is chained in hell." I think I can answer that question well! So long as the boastful human mind Consents in such mills as this to grind, I sit very firmly upon my throne! Of a truth it almost makes me laugh, To see men leaving the golden grain To gather in piles the pitiful chaff That old Peter Lombard thrashed with his brain, To have it caught up and tossed again On the horns of the Dumb Ox of Cologne! But my guests approach! there is in the air A fragrance, like that of the Beautiful Garden Of Paradise, in the days that were! An odor of innocence and of prayer, And of love, and faith that never fails, Such as the fresh young heart exhales Before it begins to wither and harden! I cannot breathe such an atmosphere! My soul is filled with a nameless fear, That after all my trouble and pain, After all my restless endeavor, The youngest, fairest soul of the twain, The most ethereal, most divine, Will escape from my hands for ever and ever.
But the other is already mine! Let him live to corrupt his race, Breathing among them, with every breath, Weakness, selfishness, and the base And pusillanimous fear of death.
I know his nature, and I know That of all who in my ministry Wander the great earth to and fro, And on my errands come and go, The safest and subtlest are such as he.
Enter PRINCE HENRY and ELSIE, with attendants.
PRINCE HENRY.
Can you direct us to Friar Angelo?
LUCIFER.
He stands before you.
PRINCE HENRY.
Then you know our purpose.
I am Prince Henry of Hoheneck, and this The maiden that I spake of in my letters.
LUCIFER.
It is a very grave and solemn business! We must nor be precipitate.

Does she Without compulsion, of her own free will, Consent to this?
PRINCE HENRY.
Against all opposition, Against all prayers, entreaties, protestations, She will not be persuaded.
LUCIFER.
That is strange! Have you thought well of it?
ELSIE.
I come not here To argue, but to die.

Your business is not To question, but to kill me.

I am ready, I am impatient to be gone from here Ere any thoughts of earth disturb again The spirit of tranquillity within me.
PRINCE HENRY.
Would I had not come here! Would I were dead, And thou wert in thy cottage in the forest, And hadst not known me! Why have I done this?
Let me go back and die.
ELSIE.
It cannot be; Not if these cold, flat stones on which we tread Were coulters heated white, and yonder gateway Flamed like a furnace with a sevenfold heat.
I must fulfil my purpose.
PRINCE HENRY.
I forbid it! Not one step further.