IV. TERTIUM QUID.
True, Excellency—as his Highness says, Though she's not dead yet, she's as good as stretched Symmetrical beside the other two; Though he's not judged yet, he's the same as judged, So do the facts abound and superabound: And nothing hinders that we lift the case Out of the shade into the shine, allow Qualified persons to pronounce at last, Nay, edge in an authoritative word Between this rabble's-brabble of dolts and fools Who make up reasonless unreasoning Rome. "Now for the Trial!" they roar: "the Trial to test "The truth, weigh husband and weigh wife alike "I' the scales of law, make one scale kick the beam!" Law's a machine from which, to please the mob, Truth the divinity must needs descend And clear things at the play's fifth act—aha! Hammer into their noddles who was who And what was what. I tell the simpletons "Could law be competent to such a feat "'T were done already: what begins next week "Is end o' the Trial, last link of a chain "Whereof the first was forged three years ago "When law addressed herself to set wrong right, "And proved so slow in taking the first step "That ever some new grievance,—tort, retort, "On one or the other side,—o'ertook i' the game, "Retarded sentence, till this deed of death "Is thrown in, as it were, last bale to boat "Crammed to the edge with cargo—or passengers? "'Trecentos inseris: ohe, jam satis est! "'Huc appelle!'—passengers, the word must be." Long since, the boat was loaded to my eyes. To hear the rabble and brabble, you'd call the case Fused and confused past human finding out. One calls the square round, t' other the round square— And pardonably in that first surprise O' the blood that fell and splashed the diagram: But now we've used our eyes to the violent hue Can't we look through the crimson and trace lines? It makes a man despair of history, Eusebius and the established fact—fig's end! Oh, give the fools their Trial, rattle away With the leash of lawyers, two on either side— One barks, one bites,—Masters Arcangeli And Spreti,—that's the husband's ultimate hope Against the Fisc and the other kind of Fisc, Bound to do barking for the wife: bow—wow! Why, Excellency, we and his Highness here Would settle the matter as sufficiently As ever will Advocate This and Fiscal That And Judge the Other, with even—a word and a wink— We well know who for ultimate arbiter. Let us beware o' the basset-table—lest We jog the elbow of Her Eminence, Jostle his cards,—he'll rap you out a … st! By the window-seat! And here's the Marquis too! Indulge me but a moment: if I fail —Favoured with such an audience, understand!— To set things right, why, class me with the mob As understander of the mind of man!