Part 3 (1/2)

My beloved is gone from the garden.... But I am his and he is mine. He feedeth his flocks among lilies.

(_Enter_ SOLOMON.)

(_The_ SHULAMITE _looks scornfully at him._)

SOLOMON

Thou art beautiful as Tirzah, my love, and comely as Jerusalem, but terrible as an army in battle. Turn thine eyes away. They trouble me....

THE SHEPHERD

(_from without._)

There are sixty queens, eighty favorites, and numberless young girls.

But among them all my immaculate dove is unique, she is the darling of her mother. The young girls have seen her and called her blessed. The queens and the favorites have praised her.

THE CHORUS

(_astonished at the_ SHULAMITE'S _scorn of the King._)

Who is it that is beautiful as Tirzah but terrible as an army in battle?

THE SHULAMITE

(_impatiently turning her back, and relating again her abduction._)

I went down into the garden of nuts, to see the green plants in the valley, to see whether the vine budded, and the pomegranates were in flower. But before I was aware of it, I was among the chariots of my princely people.

THE CHORUS

Turn about, turn again, O Shulamite, that we may see thee.

A DANCER

What will you see in the Shulamite whom the King has compared to an army?

SOLOMON

(_to the_ SHULAMITE.)

How beautiful are thy feet, prince's daughter,... How fair and how pleasant art thou....

THE SHULAMITE

(_impatiently as before._)

I am my beloved's and he is sighing for me.