АМИНТА
AMINTA: Oh Dafne,
you truly had pitiless pity
when you stayed my dart;
my death, however,
will be as much more bitter as it is late.
And now why do you vainly lead me
through such diverse streets and through such varied
arguments? What do you fear?
That I might kill myself? You fear for my good.
DAFNE: No despair, Aminta,
for, if I know her well,
only Silvia's embarrassment, not cruelty,
moved her to fly.
AMINTA: Oh alas, let despair
by my health,
since hope has only
been my ruin; and yet, oh alas,
hope tries to germinate within my breast
solely because I live, and what is a greater ill
than the life of a miserable wretch such as I?
DAFNE: Live, miserable one, live
in your misery, and this state
endures only in order to become happiness,
whenever it might come. The reward of hope might be,
if you keep living and hoping,
that which you saw in her beautiful nakedness.
AMINTA: It did not seem enough to Love and to Fortune
that I was full of misery, unless I was shown the full extent
of what was denied me.
NERINA: Then I am fit to be the grim
bearer of most bitter news.
Oh Montano, now forever and always miserable,
what will be your state of mind when you hear
the harsh case of your only Silvia?
Old father, blind father, ah, father no more!
DAFNE: I hear a gloomy voice.
AMINTA: I hear the name
of Silvia striking my ears and heart.
But who is it that names her?
DAFNE: She is Nerina;
with such beautiful eyes and such lovely hands,
and ways so handsome and gracious,
she is a gentle nymph very dear to Cynthia.
NERINA: It is indeed better that he know of it and try to recover the unhappy relics,
if anything remains of her there. Ah, Silvia! Ah, your harsh,
infelicitous fortune!
AMINTA: Oh woe! What does this girl say?
NERINA: Oh Dafne!
DAFNE: What are you saying to yourself? Why do you name Silvia and then sigh?
NERINA: Ah! What reasons
I have to sigh over her case.
AMINTA: I hear, I hear
that which freezes my heart and closes on
my spirit. Is she alive?
DAFNE: Tell me fully the cruel misfortune you hint at.
NERINA: Oh God, why am I
the messenger? And just so, I must tell it.
Silvia came to my dwelling, naked--
and you might know the reason for that.
After she dressed again, she begged me to accompany her,
if I wished, in the hunt that was ordered
in the wood bearing the name of the Eliceto.
I complied with her. We went and found many nymphs gathered;
and shortly afterwards,
lo and behold, from where I do not know, a wolf leapt forth,
huge beyond measure, and from his lips
dripped a slather of blood.
Silvia fit an arrow to the string
of a bow I had given her and drew and hit him
on the top of his head; he entered the forest again,
and brandishing a dart, she followed him into the woods.
AMINTA: Oh highest grief! Alas, what end
is already announced to me?
NERINA: With another dart
I followed their tracks, but at some distance,
for I started far too late. As I went
deeper into the woods, I did not see them again;
but in the thickest, loneliest part of the forest
their tracks circled about and overlapped one another,
and there I found Silvia's dart in the ground
and not much further away the white veil
with which I myself had wrapped her hair; and as
I looked around, I saw seven wolves
licking the blood-covered ground
and a few bare bones scattered about.
Luckily I was not seen
by them, so intent were they at their meal;
thus, filled with fear and pity,
I turned back. And this is as much
as I can tell you of Silvia, and here is the veil.
AMINTA: Does it seem to you that you have said little? Oh veil!
Oh blood! Oh Silvia! You are dead!
DAFNE: Oh miserable one!
He is senseless from grief and perhaps dead!
NERINA: He just barely breathes. This might be
a short fainting spell. See, he comes to.
AMINTA: Grief, you so torment me,
why do you not now kill me? You are too, too slow!
Perhaps you leave that office to my hands?
I am, I am content
to take care it will be done
since you refuse to or can not.
Ah me! If I now need no more
proof of my loss,
and I need nothing more
to fulfill my misery,
what do I care? For what more do I wait? Oh Dafne! Oh Dafne!
For this bitter end you saved me,
for this bitter end!
Beautiful and sweet would death have been then
when I sought to kill myself.
You denied it to me, and the heavens, to whom it appeared
that by dying I might be forestalling the grief
that was prepared for me,
denied my dying in peace.
DAFNE: Stay your death
until you better understand the truth.
AMINTA: Oh me! What do you wish me to wait for?
Oh my, I have waited too long and heard too much.
NERINA: Oh, would that I had stayed mute.
AMINTA: Nymph, I pray you, give me
that veil which is
the sole and miserable remainder of her
so that it might accompany me
through this brief distance
that remains to me on the road of life,
and with its presence
I will increase that martyrdom
that is indeed a little martyrdom
if I need aid for my death.
NERINA: Must I give it or deny it?
The reason for which you ask it
means that I must deny it.
AMINTA: Cruel! So small a gift
you deny me at this extreme point?
And so too in this my fate
is shown to be malign. I give up, I give up,
keep it with you. And you stay here too,
for I go, never to return.
DAFNE: Aminta, wait! Listen!
Oh dear, he departs with such fury!
NERINA: He goes so quickly
that it would be vain to follow him; it is surely best for me to pursue my journey,
and perhaps it would be better
if I were to be silent and say nothing
to the miserable Montano.
Chorus
No need for death,
For to wring two hearts
First faith sufficed and then love.
Nor is that which one looks for
So difficultly found
By one who follows Love well,
For love is merchandise and bought with love,
And searching for love one often finds
Immortal glory to lie close by.
Intermedio III
We are divine, who in the eternal serenity
Among celestial sapphires and beautiful crystals
Where summer never is, nor winter,
Lead perpetual dances,
And now here below immortal grace
And high fortune are seen in this beautiful image
Of the theater of the world
Where among so many lights obscured by night
We make in a round a new dance
Both delightful and charming
To the clear harmony of another music.
(прев. Малколм Хејворд 1997)