ALVARADO Yes, raise the curtain of this maiden world! Now, shall we find the halls of El Dorado, Where princes make an almshouse of their mines, And paupers plate their lumber-shacks with gold.
SANDOVAL See where the jungle frowns against the shore: A burial-ground of bright, backwater wealth. Might there the Seven Enchanted Cities lie, Where opals roll like pebbles in a brook?
Enter ESCUDERO.
ESCUDERO My failing eyes still seek the Fount of Youth. What waste is it to search for sixty years When one charmed beverage shall reset my clock? If I should find this spring, then- like Apollo- I’d shrug at heaven’s everlasting souls, And strut till doomsday on a deathless earth.
Enter MARÍA DE ESTRADA and GARRIDO.
MARÍA DE ESTRADA A premiere world!
GARRIDO The theme of long-lost songs.
MARÍA DE ESTRADA Are there tall tribes of savage Amazons, Who bend their husky bows with coppery arms, And lop their milkless ******* to aid their aim?
GARRIDO Are there foul-featured men- if men they be- Whose ox-like trunk supports two partnered heads? Or, floppy-eared and dog-faced manikins, Who live (they say) on but the scent of blooms? And yet, if in this thicket dwell such men As dark as they who cheered me at my birth, We’ll call you Spanish but a schoolboy’s tale. And what a pretty picture that will make!