SCENE VI.--LONDON. A ROOM IN THE PALACE.

LORD PETRE _and_ LORD WILLIAM HOWARD.

PETRE. You cannot see the Queen. Renard denied her,

Ev'n now to me.

HOWARD. Their Flemish go-between

And all-in-all. I came to thank her Majesty

For freeing my friend Bagenhall from the Tower;

A grace to me! Mercy, that herb-of-grace,

Flowers now but seldom.

PETRE. Only now perhaps.

Because the Queen hath been three days in tears

For Philip's going--like the wild hedge-rose

Of a soft winter, possible, not probable,

However you have prov'n it.

HOWARD. I must see her.

_Enter_ RENARD.

RENARD. My Lords, you cannot see her Majesty.

HOWARD. Why then the King! for I would have him bring it

Home to the leisure wisdom of his Queen,

Before he go, that since these statutes past,

Gardiner out-Gardiners Gardiner in his heat,

Bonner cannot out-Bonner his own self--

Beast!--but they play with fire as children do,

And burn the house. I know that these are breeding

A fierce resolve and fixt heart-hate in men

Against the King, the Queen, the Holy Father,

The faith itself. Can I not see him?

RENARD. Not now.

And in all this, my Lord, her Majesty

Is flint of flint, you may strike fire from her,

Not hope to melt her. I will give your message.

[_Exeunt_ PETRE _and_ HOWARD.

_Enter_ PHILIP _(musing)_

PHILIP. She will not have Prince Philibert of Savoy,

I talk'd with her in vain--says she will live

And die true maid--a goodly creature too.

Would _she_ had been the Queen! yet she must have him;

She troubles England: that she breathes in England

Is life and lungs to every rebel birth

That passes out of embryo.

Simon Renard!

This Howard, whom they fear, what was he saying?

RENARD. What your imperial father said, my liege,

To deal with heresy gentlier. Gardiner burns,

And Bonner burns; and it would seem this people

Care more for our brief life in their wet land,

Than yours in happier Spain. I told my Lord

He should not vex her Highness; she would say

These are the means God works with, that His church

May flourish.

PHILIP. Ay, sir, but in statesmanship

To strike too soon is oft to miss the blow.

Thou knowest I bad my chaplain, Castro, preach

Against these burnings.

RENARD. And the Emperor

Approved you, and when last he wrote, declared

His comfort in your Grace that you were bland

And affable to men of all estates,

In hope to charm them from their hate of Spain.

PHILIP. In hope to crush all heresy under Spain.

But, Renard, I am sicker staying here

Than any sea could make me passing hence,

Tho' I be ever deadly sick at sea.

So sick am I with biding for this child.

Is it the fashion in this clime for women

To go twelve months in bearing of a child?

The nurses yawn'd, the cradle gaped, they led

Processions, chanted litanies, clash'd their bells,

Shot off their lying cannon, and her priests

Have preach'd, the fools, of this fair prince to come;

Till, by St. James, I find myself the fool.

Why do you lift your eyebrow at me thus?

RENARD. I never saw your Highness moved till now.

PHILIP. So weary am I of this wet land of theirs,

And every soul of man that breathes therein.

RENARD. My liege, we must not drop the mask before

The masquerade is over--

PHILIP. --Have I dropt it?

I have but shown a loathing face to you,

Who knew it from the first.

_Enter_ MARY.

MARY (_aside_). With Renard. Still

Parleying with Renard, all the day with Renard,

And scarce a greeting all the day for me--

And goes to-morrow.

[_Exit_ MARY.

PHILIP (_to_ RENARD, _who advances to him_).

Well, sir, is there more?

RENARD (_who has perceived the QUEEN_).

May Simon Renard speak a single word?

PHILIP. Ay.

RENARD. And be forgiven for it?

PHILIP. Simon Renard

Knows me too well to speak a single word

That could not be forgiven.

RENARD. Well, my liege,

Your Grace hath a most chaste and loving wife.

PHILIP. Why not? The Queen of Philip should be chaste.

RENARD. Ay, but, my Lord, you know what Virgil sings,

Woman is various and most mutable.

PHILIP. She play the harlot! never.

RENARD. No, sire, no,

Not dream'd of by the rabidest gospeller.

There was a paper thrown into the palace,

'The King hath wearied of his barren bride.'

She came upon it, read it, and then rent it,

With all the rage of one who hates a truth

He cannot but allow. Sire, I would have you--

What should I say, I cannot pick my words--

Be somewhat less--majestic to your Queen.

PHILIP. Am I to change my manners, Simon Renard,

Because these islanders are brutal beasts?

Or would you have me turn a sonneteer,

And warble those brief-sighted eyes of hers?

RENARD. Brief-sighted tho' they be, I have seen them, sire,

When you perchance were trifling royally

With some fair dame of court, suddenly fill

With such fierce fire--had it been fire indeed

It would have burnt both speakers.

PHILIP. Ay, and then?

RENARD. Sire, might it not be policy in some matter

Of small importance now and then to cede

A point to her demand?

PHILIP. Well, I am going.

RENARD. For should her love when you are gone, my liege,

Witness these papers, there will not be wanting

Those that will urge her injury--should her love--

And I have known such women more than one--

Veer to the counterpoint, and jealousy

Hath in it an alchemic force to fuse

Almost into one metal love and hate,--

And she impress her wrongs upon her Council,

And these again upon her Parliament--

We are not loved here, and would be then perhaps

Not so well holpen in our wars with France,

As else we might be--here she comes.

_Enter_ MARY.

MARY. O Philip!

Nay, must you go indeed?

PHILIP. Madam, I must.

MARY. The parting of a husband and a wife

Is like the cleaving of a heart; one half

Will flutter here, one there.

PHILIP. You say true, Madam.

MARY. The Holy Virgin will not have me yet

Lose the sweet hope that I may bear a prince.

If such a prince were born and you not here!

PHILIP. I should be here if such a prince were born.

MARY. But must you go?

PHILIP. Madam, you know my father,

Retiring into cloistral solitude

To yield the remnant of his years to heaven,

Will shift the yoke and weight of all the world

From off his neck to mine. We meet at Brussels.

But since mine absence will not be for long,

Your Majesty shall go to Dover with me,

And wait my coming back.

MARY. To Dover? no,

I am too feeble. I will go to Greenwich,

So you will have me with you; and there watch

All that is gracious in the breath of heaven

Draw with your sails from our poor land, and pass

And leave me, Philip, with my prayers for you.

PHILIP. And doubtless I shall profit by your prayers.

MARY. Methinks that would you tarry one day more

(The news was sudden) I could mould myself

To bear your going better; will you do it?

PHILIP. Madam, a day may sink or save a realm.

MARY. A day may save a heart from breaking too.

PHILIP. Well, Simon Renard, shall we stop a day?

RENARD. Your Grace's business will not suffer, sire,

For one day more, so far as I can tell.

PHILIP. Then one day more to please her Majesty.

MARY. The sunshine sweeps across my life again.

O if I knew you felt this parting, Philip,

As I do!

PHILIP. By St. James I do protest,

Upon the faith and honour of a Spaniard,

I am vastly grieved to leave your Majesty.

Simon, is supper ready?

RENARD. Ay, my liege,

I saw the covers laying.

PHILIP. Let us have it.

[_Exeunt_.

ACT IV.

SCENE I.--A ROOM IN THE PALACE.

MARY, CARDINAL POLE.

MARY. What have you there?

POLE. So please your Majesty,

A long petition from the foreign exiles

To spare the life of Cranmer. Bishop Thirlby,

And my Lord Paget and Lord William Howard,

Crave, in the same cause, hearing of your Grace.

Hath he not written himself--infatuated--

To sue you for his life?

MARY. His life? Oh, no;

Not sued for that--he knows it were in vain.

But so much of the anti-papal leaven

Works in him yet, he hath pray'd me not to sully

Mine own prerogative, and degrade the realm

By seeking justice at a stranger's hand

Against my natural subject. King and Queen,

To whom he owes his loyalty after God,

Shall these accuse him to a foreign prince?

Death would not grieve him more. I cannot be

True to this realm of England and the Pope

Together, says the heretic.

POLE. And there errs;

As he hath ever err'd thro' vanity.

A secular kingdom is but as the body

Lacking a soul; and in itself a beast.

The Holy Father in a secular kingdom

Is as the soul descending out of heaven

Into a body generate.

MARY. Write to him, then.

POLE. I will.

MARY. And sharply, Pole.

POLE. Here come the Cranmerites!

_Enter_ THIRLBY, LORD PAGET, LORD WILLIAM HOWARD.

HOWARD. Health to your Grace! Good morrow, my Lord Cardinal;

We make our humble prayer unto your Grace

That Cranmer may withdraw to foreign parts,

Or into private life within the realm.

In several bills and declarations, Madam,

He hath recanted all his heresies.

PAGET. Ay, ay; if Bonner have not forged the bills. [_Aside_.

MARY. Did not More die, and Fisher? he must burn.

HOWARD. He hath recanted, Madam.

MARY. The better for him.

He burns in Purgatory, not in Hell.

HOWARD. Ay, ay, your Grace; but it was never seen

That any one recanting thus at full,

As Cranmer hath, came to the fire on earth.

MARY. It will be seen now, then.

THIRLBY. O Madam, Madam!

I thus implore you, low upon my knees,

To reach the hand of mercy to my friend.

I have err'd with him; with him I have recanted.

What human reason is there why my friend

Should meet with lesser mercy than myself?

MARY. My Lord of Ely, this. After a riot

We hang the leaders, let their following go.

Cranmer is head and father of these heresies,

New learning as they call it; yea, may God

Forget me at most need when I forget

Her foul divorce--my sainted mother--No!--

HOWARD. Ay, ay, but mighty doctors doubted there.

The Pope himself waver'd; and more than one

Row'd in that galley--Gardiner to wit,

Whom truly I deny not to have been

Your faithful friend and trusty councillor.

Hath not your Highness ever read his book.

His tractate upon True Obedience,

Writ by himself and Bonner?

MARY. I will take

Such order with all bad, heretical books

That none shall hold them in his house and live,

Henceforward. No, my Lord.

HOWARD. Then never read it.

The truth is here. Your father was a man

Of such colossal kinghood, yet so courteous,

Except when wroth, you scarce could meet his eye

And hold your own; and were he wroth indeed,

You held it less, or not at all. I say,

Your father had a will that beat men down;

Your father had a brain that beat men down--

POLE. Not me, my Lord.

HOWARD. No, for you were not here;

You sit upon this fallen Cranmer's throne;

And it would more become you, my Lord Legate,

To join a voice, so potent with her Highness,

To ours in plea for Cranmer than to stand

On naked self-assertion.

MARY. All your voices

Are waves on flint. The heretic must burn.

HOWARD. Yet once he saved your Majesty's own life;

Stood out against the King in your behalf.

At his own peril.

MARY. I know not if he did;

And if he did I care not, my Lord Howard.

My life is not so happy, no such boon,

That I should spare to take a heretic priest's,

Who saved it or not saved. Why do you vex me?

PAGET. Yet to save Cranmer were to serve the Church,

Your Majesty's I mean; he is effaced,

Self-blotted out; so wounded in his honour,

He can but creep down into some dark hole

Like a hurt beast, and hide himself and die;

But if you burn him,--well, your Highness knows

The saying, 'Martyr's blood--seed of the Church.'

MARY. Of the true Church; but his is none, nor will be.

You are too politic for me, my Lord Paget.

And if he have to live so loath'd a life,

It were more merciful to burn him now.

THIRLBY. O yet relent. O, Madam, if you knew him

As I do, ever gentle, and so gracious,

With all his learning--

MARY. Yet a heretic still.

His learning makes his burning the more just.

THIRLBY. So worshipt of all those that came across him;

The stranger at his hearth, and all his house--

MARY. His children and his concubine, belike.

THIRLBY. To do him any wrong was to beget

A kindness from him, for his heart was rich,

Of such fine mould, that if you sow'd therein

The seed of Hate, it blossom'd Charity.

POLE. 'After his kind it costs him nothing,' there's

An old world English adage to the point.

These are but natural graces, my good Bishop,

Which in the Catholic garden are as flowers,

But on the heretic dunghill only weeds.

HOWARD. Such weeds make dunghills gracious.

MARY. Enough, my Lords.

It is God's will, the Holy Father's will,

And Philip's will, and mine, that he should burn.

He is pronounced anathema.

HOWARD. Farewell, Madam,

God grant you ampler mercy at your call

Than you have shown to Cranmer.

[_Exeunt_ LORDS.

POLE. After this,

Your Grace will hardly care to overlook

This same petition of the foreign exiles

For Cranmer's life.

MARY. Make out the writ to-night.

[_Exeunt_.

SCENE II.--OXFORD. CRANMER IN PRISON.

CRANMER. Last night, I dream'd the faggots were alight,

And that myself was fasten'd to the stake, I

And found it all a visionary flame,

Cool as the light in old decaying wood;

And then King Harry look'd from out a cloud,

And bad me have good courage; and I heard

An angel cry 'There is more joy in Heaven,'--

And after that, the trumpet of the dead.

[_Trumpets without_.

Why, there are trumpets blowing now: what is it?

_Enter_ FATHER COLE.

COLE. Cranmer, I come to question you again;

Have you remain'd in the true Catholic faith

I left you in?

CRANMER. In the true Catholic faith,

By Heaven's grace, I am more and more confirm'd.

Why are the trumpets blowing, Father Cole?

COLE. Cranmer, it is decided by the Council

That you to-day should read your recantation

Before the people in St. Mary's Church.

And there be many heretics in the town,

Who loathe you for your late return to Rome,

And might assail you passing through the street,

And tear you piecemeal: so you have a guard.

CRANMER. Or seek to rescue me. I thank the Council.

COLE. Do you lack any money?

CRANMER. Nay, why should I?

The prison fare is good enough for me.

COLE. Ay, but to give the poor.

CRANMER. Hand it me, then!

I thank you.

COLE. For a little space, farewell;

Until I see you in St. Mary's Church.

[_Exit_ COLE.

CRANMER. It is against all precedent to burn

One who recants; they mean to pardon me.

To give the poor--they give the poor who die.

Well, burn me or not burn me I am fixt;

It is but a communion, not a mass:

A holy supper, not a sacrifice;

No man can make his Maker--Villa Garcia.

_Enter_ VILLA GARCIA.

VILLA GARCIA. Pray you write out this paper for me, Cranmer.

CRANMER. Have I not writ enough to satisfy you?

VILLA GARCIA. It is the last.

CRANMER. Give it me, then.

[_He writes_.

VILLA GARCIA. Now sign.

CRANMER. I have sign'd enough, and I will sign no more.

VILLA GARCIA. It is no more than what you have sign'd already,

The public form thereof.

CRANMER. It may be so;

I sign it with my presence, if I read it.

VILLA GARCIA. But this is idle of you. Well, sir, well,

You are to beg the people to pray for you;

Exhort them to a pure and virtuous life;

Declare the Queen's right to the throne; confess

Your faith before all hearers; and retract

That Eucharistic doctrine in your book.

Will you not sign it now?

CRANMER. No, Villa Garcia,

I sign no more. Will they have mercy on me?

VILLA GARCIA. Have you good hopes of mercy!

So, farewell.

[_Exit_.

CRANMER. Good hopes, not theirs, have I that I am fixt,

Fixt beyond fall; however, in strange hours,

After the long brain-dazing colloquies,

And thousand-times recurring argument

Of those two friars ever in my prison,

When left alone in my despondency,

Without a friend, a book, my faith would seem

Dead or half-drown'd, or else swam heavily

Against the huge corruptions of the Church,

Monsters of mistradition, old enough

To scare me into dreaming, 'what am I,

Cranmer, against whole ages?' was it so,

Or am I slandering my most inward friend,

To veil the fault of my most outward foe--

The soft and tremulous coward in the flesh?

O higher, holier, earlier, purer church,

I have found thee and not leave thee any more.

It is but a communion, not a mass--

No sacrifice, but a life-giving feast!

(_Writes_.) So, so; this will I say--thus will I pray.

[_Puts up the paper_.

_Enter_ BONNER.

BONNER. Good day, old friend; what, you look somewhat worn;

And yet it is a day to test your health

Ev'n at the best: I scarce have spoken with you

Since when?--your degradation. At your trial

Never stood up a bolder man than you;

You would not cap the Pope's commissioner--

Your learning, and your stoutness, and your heresy,

Dumbfounded half of us. So, after that,

We had to dis-archbishop and unlord,

And make you simple Cranmer once again.

The common barber dipt your hair, and I

Scraped from your finger-points the holy oil;

And worse than all, you had to kneel to _me_;

Which was not pleasant for you, Master Cranmer.

Now you, that would not recognise the Pope,

And you, that would not own the Real Presence,

Have found a real presence in the stake,

Which frights you back into the ancient faith:

And so you have recanted to the Pope.

How are the mighty fallen, Master Cranmer!

CRANMER. You have been more fierce against the Pope than I;

But why fling back the stone he strikes me with?

[_Aside_.

O Bonner, if I ever did you kindness--

Power hath been given you to try faith by fire--

Pray you, remembering how yourself have changed,

Be somewhat pitiful, after I have gone,

To the poor flock--to women and to children--

That when I was archbishop held with me.

BONNER. Ay--gentle as they call you--live or die!

Pitiful to this pitiful heresy?

I must obey the Queen and Council, man.

Win thro' this day with honour to yourself,

And I'll say something for you--so--good-bye.

[_Exit_.

CRANMER. This hard coarse man of old hath crouch'd to me

Till I myself was half ashamed for him.

_Enter_ THIRLBY.

Weep not, good Thirlby.

THIRLBY. Oh, my Lord, my Lord!

My heart is no such block as Bonner's is:

Who would not weep?

CRANMER. Why do you so my--lord me,

Who am disgraced?

THIRLBY. On earth; but saved in heaven

By your recanting.

CRANMER. Will they burn me, Thirlby?

THIRLBY. Alas, they will; these burnings will not help

The purpose of the faith; but my poor voice

Against them is a whisper to the roar

Of a spring-tide.

CRANMER. And they will surely burn me?

THIRLBY. Ay; and besides, will have you in the church

Repeat your recantation in the ears

Of all men, to the saving of their souls,

Before your execution. May God help you

Thro' that hard hour!

CRANMER. And may God bless you, Thirlby!

Well, they shall hear my recantation there.

[_Exit_ THIRLBY.

Disgraced, dishonour'd!--not by them, indeed,

By mine own self--by mine own hand!

O thin-skinn'd hand and jutting veins, 'twas you

That sign'd the burning of poor Joan of Kent;

But then she was a witch. You have written much,

But you were never raised to plead for Frith,

Whose dogmas I have reach'd: he was deliver'd

To the secular arm to burn; and there was Lambert;

Who can foresee himself? truly these burnings,

As Thirlby says, are profitless to the burners,

And help the other side. You shall burn too,

Burn first when I am burnt.

Fire--inch by inch to die in agony! Latimer

Had a brief end--not Ridley. Hooper burn'd

Three-quarters of an hour. Will my faggots

Be wet as his were? It is a day of rain.

I will not muse upon it.

My fancy takes the burner's part, and makes

The fire seem even crueller than it is.

No, I not doubt that God will give me strength,

Albeit I have denied him.

_Enter_ SOTO _and_ VILLA GARCIA.

VILLA GARCIA. We are ready

To take you to St. Mary's, Master Cranmer.

CRANMER. And I: lead on; ye loose me from my bonds.

[_Exeunt_.

SCENE III.--ST. MARY'S CHURCH.

COLE _in the Pulpit_, LORD WILLIAMS OF THAME _presiding_. LORD WILLIAM

HOWARD, LORD PAGET, _and others_. CRANMER _enters between_ SOTO _and_

VILLA GARCIA, _and the whole Choir strike up_ 'Nunc Dimittis.' CRANMER

_is set upon a Scaffold before the people_.

COLE. Behold him--

[_A pause: people in the foreground_.

PEOPLE. Oh, unhappy sight!

FIRST PROTESTANT. See how the tears run down his fatherly face.

SECOND PROTESTANT. James, didst thou ever see a carrion crow Stand

watching a sick beast before he dies?

FIRST PROTESTANT. Him perch'd up there? I wish some thunderbolt Would

make this Cole a cinder, pulpit and all.

COLE. Behold him, brethren: he hath cause to weep!--

So have we all: weep with him if ye will,

Yet--

It is expedient for one man to die,

Yea, for the people, lest the people die.

Yet wherefore should he die that hath return'd

To the one Catholic Universal Church,

Repentant of his errors?

PROTESTANT _murmurs_. Ay, tell us that.

COLE. Those of the wrong side will despise the man,

Deeming him one that thro' the fear of death

Gave up his cause, except he seal his faith

In sight of all with flaming martyrdom.

CRANMER. Ay.

COLE. Ye hear him, and albeit there may seem

According to the canons pardon due

To him that so repents, yet are there causes

Wherefore our Queen and Council at this time

Adjudge him to the death. He hath been a traitor,

A shaker and confounder of the realm;

And when the King's divorce was sued at Rome,

He here, this heretic metropolitan,

As if he had been the Holy Father, sat

And judged it. Did I call him heretic?

A huge heresiarch! never was it known

That any man so writing, preaching so,

So poisoning the Church, so long continuing,

Hath found his pardon; therefore he must die,

For warning and example.

Other reasons

There be for this man's ending, which our Queen

And Council at this present deem it not

Expedient to be known.

PROTESTANT _murmurs_. I warrant you.

COLE. Take therefore, all, example by this man,

For if our Holy Queen not pardon him,

Much less shall others in like cause escape,

That all of you, the highest as the lowest,

May learn there is no power against the Lord.

There stands a man, once of so high degree,

Chief prelate of our Church, archbishop, first

In Council, second person in the realm,

Friend for so long time of a mighty King;

And now ye see downfallen and debased

From councillor to caitiff--fallen so low,

The leprous flutterings of the byway, scum

And offal of the city would not change

Estates with him; in brief, so miserable,

There is no hope of better left for him,

No place for worse.

Yet, Cranmer, be thou glad.

This is the work of God. He is glorified

In thy conversion: lo! thou art reclaim'd;

He brings thee home: nor fear but that to-day

Thou shalt receive the penitent thief's award,

And be with Christ the Lord in Paradise.

Remember how God made the fierce fire seem

To those three children like a pleasant dew.

Remember, too,

The triumph of St. Andrew on his cross,

The patience of St. Lawrence in the fire.

Thus, if thou call on God and all the saints,

God will beat down the fury of the flame,

Or give thee saintly strength to undergo.

And for thy soul shall masses here be sung

By every priest in Oxford. Pray for him.

CRANMER. Ay, one and all, dear brothers, pray for me;

Pray with one breath, one heart, one soul for me.

COLE. And now, lest anyone among you doubt

The man's conversion and remorse of heart,

Yourselves shall hear him speak. Speak, Master Cranmer,

Fulfil your promise made me, and proclaim

Your true undoubted faith, that all may hear.

CRANMER. And that I will. O God, Father of Heaven!

O Son of God, Redeemer of the world!

O Holy Ghost! proceeding from them both,

Three persons and one God, have mercy on me,

Most miserable sinner, wretched man.

I have offended against heaven and earth

More grievously than any tongue can tell.

Then whither should I flee for any help?

I am ashamed to lift my eyes to heaven,

And I can find no refuge upon earth.

Shall I despair then?--God forbid! O God,

For thou art merciful, refusing none

That come to Thee for succour, unto Thee,

Therefore, I come; humble myself to Thee;

Saying, O Lord God, although my sins be great,

For thy great mercy have mercy! O God the Son,

Not for slight faults alone, when thou becamest

Man in the Flesh, was the great mystery wrought;

O God the Father, not for little sins

Didst thou yield up thy Son to human death;

But for the greatest sin that can be sinn'd,

Yea, even such as mine, incalculable,

Unpardonable,--sin against the light,

The truth of God, which I had proven and known.

Thy mercy must be greater than all sin.

Forgive me, Father, for no merit of mine,

But that Thy name by man be glorified,

And Thy most blessed Son's, who died for man.

Good people, every man at time of death

Would fain set forth some saying that may live

After his death and better humankind;

For death gives life's last word a power to live,

And, like the stone-cut epitaph, remain

After the vanish'd voice, and speak to men.

God grant me grace to glorify my God!

And first I say it is a grievous case,

Many so dote upon this bubble world,

Whose colours in a moment break and fly,

They care for nothing else. What saith St. John:

'Love of this world is hatred against God.'

Again, I pray you all that, next to God,

You do unmurmuringly and willingly

Obey your King and Queen, and not for dread

Of these alone, but from the fear of Him

Whose ministers they be to govern you.

Thirdly, I pray you all to live together

Like brethren; yet what hatred Christian men

Bear to each other, seeming not as brethren,

But mortal foes! But do you good to all

As much as in you lieth. Hurt no man more

Than you would harm your loving natural brother

Of the same roof, same breast. If any do,

Albeit he think himself at home with God,

Of this be sure, he is whole worlds away.

PROTESTANT _murmurs_. What sort of brothers then be those that lust

To burn each other?

WILLIAMS. Peace among you, there!

CRANMER. Fourthly, to those that own exceeding wealth,

Remember that sore saying spoken once

By Him that was the truth, 'How hard it is

For the rich man to enter into Heaven;'

Let all rich men remember that hard word.

I have not time for more: if ever, now

Let them flow forth in charity, seeing now

The poor so many, and all food so dear.

Long have I lain in prison, yet have heard

Of all their wretchedness. Give to the poor,

Ye give to God. He is with us in the poor.

And now, and forasmuch as I have come

To the last end of life, and thereupon

Hangs all my past, and all my life to be,

Either to live with Christ in Heaven with joy,

Or to be still in pain with devils in hell;

And, seeing in a moment, I shall find

[_Pointing upwards_.

Heaven or else hell ready to swallow me,

[_Pointing downwards_.

I shall declare to you my very faith

Without all colour.

COLE. Hear him, my good brethren.

CRANMER. I do believe in God, Father of all;

In every article of the Catholic faith,

And every syllable taught us by our Lord,

His prophets, and apostles, in the Testaments,

Both Old and New.

COLE. Be plainer, Master Cranmer.

CRANMER. And now I come to the great cause that weighs

Upon my conscience more than anything

Or said or done in all my life by me;

For there be writings I have set abroad

Against the truth I knew within my heart,

Written for fear of death, to save my life,

If that might be; the papers by my hand

Sign'd since my degradation--by this hand

[_Holding out his right hand_.

Written and sign'd--I here renounce them all;

And, since my hand offended, having written

Against my heart, my hand shall first be burnt,

So I may come to the fire.

[_Dead silence_.

PROTESTANT _murmurs_.

FIRST PROTESTANT. I knew it would be so.

SECOND PROTESTANT. Our prayers are heard!

THIRD PROTESTANT. God bless him!

CATHOLIC _murmurs_. Out upon him! out upon him!

Liar! dissembler! traitor! to the fire!

WILLIAMS (_raising his voice_).

You know that you recanted all you said

Touching the sacrament in that same book

You wrote against my Lord of Winchester;

Dissemble not; play the plain Christian man.

CRANMER. Alas, my Lord,

I have been a man loved plainness all my life;

I _did_ dissemble, but the hour has come

For utter truth and plainness; wherefore, I say,

I hold by all I wrote within that book.

Moreover,

As for the Pope I count him Antichrist,

With all his devil's doctrines; and refuse,

Reject him, and abhor him. I have said.

[_Cries on all sides_, 'Pull him down! Away with him!'

COLE. Ay, stop the heretic's mouth! Hale him away!

WILLIAMS. Harm him not, harm him not! have him to the fire!

[CRANMER _goes out between Two Friars, smiling; hands are

reached to him from the crowd_. LORD WILLIAM HOWARD _and_

LORD PAGET _are left alone in the church_.

PAGET. The nave and aisles all empty as a fool's jest!

No, here's Lord William Howard. What, my Lord,

You have not gone to see the burning?

HOWARD. Fie!

To stand at ease, and stare as at a show,

And watch a good man burn. Never again.

I saw the deaths of Latimer and Ridley.

Moreover, tho' a Catholic, I would not,

For the pure honour of our common nature,

Hear what I might--another recantation

Of Cranmer at the stake.

PAGET. You'd not hear that.

He pass'd out smiling, and he walk'd upright;

His eye was like a soldier's, whom the general

He looks to and he leans on as his God,

Hath rated for some backwardness and bidd'n him

Charge one against a thousand, and the man

Hurls his soil'd life against the pikes and dies.

HOWARD. Yet that he might not after all those papers

Of recantation yield again, who knows?

PAGET. Papers of recantation! Think you then

That Cranmer read all papers that he sign'd?

Or sign'd all those they tell us that he sign'd?

Nay, I trow not: and you shall see, my Lord,

That howsoever hero-like the man

Dies in the fire, this Bonner or another

Will in some lying fashion misreport

His ending to the glory of their church.

And you saw Latimer and Ridley die?

Latimer was eighty, was he not? his best

Of life was over then.

HOWARD. His eighty years

Look'd somewhat crooked on him in his frieze;

But after they had stript him to his shroud,

He stood upright, a lad of twenty-one,

And gather'd with his hands the starting flame,

And wash'd his hands and all his face therein,

Until the powder suddenly blew him dead.

Ridley was longer burning; but he died

As manfully and boldly, and, 'fore God,

I know them heretics, but right English ones.

If ever, as heaven grant, we clash with Spain,

Our Ridley-soldiers and our Latimer-sailors

Will teach her something.

PAGET. Your mild Legate Pole

Will tell you that the devil helpt them thro' it.

[_A murmur of the Crowd in the distance_.

Hark, how those Roman wolfdogs howl and bay him!

HOWARD. Might it not be the other side rejoicing

In his brave end?

PAGET. They are too crush'd, too broken,

They can but weep in silence.

HOWARD. Ay, ay, Paget,

They have brought it in large measure on themselves.

Have I not heard them mock the blessed Host

In songs so lewd, the beast might roar his claim

To being in God's image, more than they?

Have I not seen the gamekeeper, the groom.

Gardener, and huntsman, in the parson's place,

The parson from his own spire swung out dead,

And Ignorance crying in the streets, and all men

Regarding her? I say they have drawn the fire

On their own heads: yet, Paget, I do hold

The Catholic, if he have the greater right,

Hath been the crueller.

PAGET. Action and re-action,

The miserable see-saw of our child-world,

Make us despise it at odd hours, my Lord.

Heaven help that this re-action not re-act

Yet fiercelier under Queen Elizabeth,

So that she come to rule us.

HOWARD. The world's mad.

PAGET. My Lord, the world is like a drunken man,

Who cannot move straight to his end--but reels

Now to the right, then as far to the left,

Push'd by the crowd beside--and underfoot

An earthquake; for since Henry for a doubt--

Which a young lust had clapt upon the back,

Crying, 'Forward!'--set our old church rocking, men

Have hardly known what to believe, or whether

They should believe in anything; the currents

So shift and change, they see not how they are borne,

Nor whither. I conclude the King a beast;

Verily a lion if you will--the world

A most obedient beast and fool--myself

Half beast and fool as appertaining to it;

Altho' your Lordship hath as little of each

Cleaving to your original Adam-clay,

As may be consonant with mortality.

HOWARD. We talk and Cranmer suffers.

The kindliest man I ever knew; see, see,

I speak of him in the past. Unhappy land!

Hard-natured Queen, half-Spanish in herself,

And grafted on the hard-grain'd stock of Spain--

Her life, since Philip left her, and she lost

Her fierce desire of bearing him a child,

Hath, like a brief and bitter winter's day,

Gone narrowing down and darkening to a close.

There will be more conspiracies, I fear.

PAGET. Ay, ay, beware of France.

HOWARD. O Paget, Paget!

I have seen heretics of the poorer sort,

Expectant of the rack from day to day,

To whom the fire were welcome, lying chain'd

In breathless dungeons over steaming sewers,

Fed with rank bread that crawl'd upon the tongue,

And putrid water, every drop a worm,

Until they died of rotted limbs; and then

Cast on the dunghill naked, and become

Hideously alive again from head to heel,

Made even the carrion-nosing mongrel vomit

With hate and horror.

PAGET. Nay, you sicken _me_

To hear you.

HOWARD. Fancy-sick; these things are done,

Done right against the promise of this Queen

Twice given.

PAGET. No faith with heretics, my Lord!

Hist! there be two old gossips--gospellers,

I take it; stand behind the pillar here;

I warrant you they talk about the burning.

_Enter_ TWO OLD WOMEN. JOAN, _and after her_ TIB.

JOAN. Why, it be Tib!

TIB. I cum behind tha, gall, and couldn't make tha hear. Eh, the wind

and the wet! What a day, what a day! nigh upo' judgement daay loike.

Pwoaps be pretty things, Joan, but they wunt set i' the Lord's cheer

o' that daay.

JOAN. I must set down myself, Tib; it be a var waay vor my owld legs

up vro' Islip. Eh, my rheumatizy be that bad howiver be I to win to

the burnin'.

TIB. I should saay 'twur ower by now. I'd ha' been here avore, but

Dumble wur blow'd wi' the wind, and Dumble's the best milcher in

Islip.

JOAN. Our Daisy's as good 'z her.

TIB. Noa, Joan.

JOAN. Our Daisy's butter's as good'z hern.

TIB. Noa, Joan.

JOAN. Our Daisy's cheeses be better.

TIB. Noa, Joan.

JOAN. Eh, then ha' thy waay wi' me, Tib; ez thou hast wi' thy owld

man.

TIB. Ay, Joan, and my owld man wur up and awaay betimes wi' dree hard

eggs for a good pleace at the burnin'; and barrin' the wet, Hodge 'ud

ha' been a-harrowin' o' white peasen i' the outfield--and barrin' the

wind, Dumble wur blow'd wi' the wind, so 'z we was forced to stick

her, but we fetched her round at last. Thank the Lord therevore.

Dumble's the best milcher in Islip.

JOAN. Thou's thy way wi' man and beast, Tib. I wonder at tha', it

beats me! Eh, but I do know ez Pwoaps and vires be bad things; tell

'ee now, I heerd summat as summun towld summun o' owld Bishop

Gardiner's end; there wur an owld lord a-cum to dine wi' un, and a wur

so owld a couldn't bide vor his dinner, but a had to bide howsomiver,

vor 'I wunt dine,' says my Lord Bishop, says he, 'not till I hears ez

Latimer and Ridley be a-vire;' and so they bided on and on till vour

o' the clock, till his man cum in post vro' here, and tells un ez the

vire has tuk holt. 'Now,' says the Bishop, says he, 'we'll gwo to

dinner;' and the owld lord fell to 's meat wi' a will, God bless un!

but Gardiner wur struck down like by the hand o' God avore a could

taste a mossel, and a set un all a-vire, so 'z the tongue on un cum

a-lolluping out o' 'is mouth as black as a rat. Thank the Lord,

therevore.

PAGET. The fools!

TIB. Ay, Joan; and Queen Mary gwoes on a-burnin' and a-burnin', to get

her baaby born; but all her burnin's 'ill never burn out the hypocrisy

that makes the water in her. There's nought but the vire of God's hell

ez can burn out that.

JOAN. Thank the Lord, therevore.

PAGET. The fools!

TIB. A-burnin', and a-burnin', and a-makin' o' volk madder and madder;

but tek thou my word vor't, Joan,--and I bean't wrong not twice i' ten

year--the burnin' o' the owld archbishop'll burn the Pwoap out o'

this 'ere land vor iver and iver.

HOWARD. Out of the church, you brace of cursed crones, Or I will have

you duck'd! (_Women hurry out_.) Said I not right? For how should

reverend prelate or throned prince Brook for an hour such brute

malignity? Ah, what an acrid wine has Luther brew'd!

PAGET. Pooh, pooh, my Lord! poor garrulous country-wives.

Buy you their cheeses, and they'll side with you;

You cannot judge the liquor from the lees.

HOWARD. I think that in some sort we may. But see,

_Enter_ PETERS.

Peters, my gentleman, an honest Catholic,

Who follow'd with the crowd to Cranmer's fire.

One that would neither misreport nor lie,

Not to gain paradise: no, nor if the Pope,

Charged him to do it--he is white as death.

Peters, how pale you look! you bring the smoke

Of Cranmer's burning with you.

PETERS. Twice or thrice

The smoke of Cranmer's burning wrapt me round.

HOWARD. Peters, you know me Catholic, but English.

Did he die bravely? Tell me that, or leave

All else untold.

PETERS. My Lord, he died most bravely.

HOWARD. Then tell me all.

PAGET. Ay, Master Peters, tell us.

PETERS. You saw him how he past among the crowd;

And ever as he walk'd the Spanish friars

Still plied him with entreaty and reproach:

But Cranmer, as the helmsman at the helm

Steers, ever looking to the happy haven

Where he shall rest at night, moved to his death;

And I could see that many silent hands

Came from the crowd and met his own; and thus

When we had come where Ridley burnt with Latimer,

He, with a cheerful smile, as one whose mind

Is all made up, in haste put off the rags

They had mock'd his misery with, and all in white,

His long white beard, which he had never shaven

Since Henry's death, down-sweeping to the chain,

Wherewith they bound him to the stake, he stood

More like an ancient father of the Church,

Than heretic of these times; and still the friars

Plied him, but Cranmer only shook his head,

Or answer'd them in smiling negatives;

Whereat Lord Williams gave a sudden cry:--

'Make short! make short!' and so they lit the wood.

Then Cranmer lifted his left hand to heaven,

And thrust his right into the bitter flame;

And crying, in his deep voice, more than once,

'This hath offended--this unworthy hand!'

So held it till it all was burn'd, before

The flame had reach'd his body; I stood near--

Mark'd him--he never uttered moan of pain:

He never stirr'd or writhed, but, like a statue,

Unmoving in the greatness of the flame,

Gave up the ghost; and so past martyr-like--

Martyr I may not call him--past--but whither?

PAGET. To purgatory, man, to purgatory.

PETERS. Nay, but, my Lord, he denied purgatory.

PAGET. Why then to heaven, and God ha' mercy on him.

HOWARD. Paget, despite his fearful heresies,

I loved the man, and needs must moan for him;

O Cranmer!

PAGET. But your moan is useless now:

Come out, my Lord, it is a world of fools.

[_Exeunt_.

ACT V.

SCENE I.--LONDON. HALL IN THE PALACE.

QUEEN, SIR NICHOLAS HEATH.

HEATH. Madam,

I do assure you, that it must be look'd to:

Calais is but ill-garrison'd, in Guisnes

Are scarce two hundred men, and the French fleet

Rule in the narrow seas. It must be look'd to,

If war should fall between yourself and France;

Or you will lose your Calais.

MARY. It shall be look'd to;

I wish you a good morning, good Sir Nicholas:

Here is the King.

[_Exit_ HEATH.

_Enter_ PHILIP.

PHILIP. Sir Nicholas tells you true,

And you must look to Calais when I go.

MARY. Go? must you go, indeed--again--so soon?

Why, nature's licensed vagabond, the swallow,

That might live always in the sun's warm heart,

Stays longer here in our poor north than you:--

Knows where he nested--ever comes again.

PHILIP. And, Madam, so shall I.

MARY. O, will you? will you?

I am faint with fear that you will come no more.

PHILIP. Ay, ay; but many voices call me hence.

MARY. Voices--I hear unhappy rumours--nay,

I say not, I believe. What voices call you

Dearer than mine that should be dearest to you?

Alas, my Lord! what voices and how many?

PHILIP. The voices of Castille and Aragon,

Granada, Naples, Sicily, and Milan,--

The voices of Franche-Comte, and the Netherlands,

The voices of Peru and Mexico,

Tunis, and Oran, and the Philippines,

And all the fair spice-islands of the East.

MARY (_admiringly_).

You are the mightiest monarch upon earth,

I but a little Queen: and, so indeed,

Need you the more.

PHILIP. A little Queen! but when

I came to wed your majesty, Lord Howard,

Sending an insolent shot that dash'd the seas

Upon us, made us lower our kingly flag

To yours of England.

MARY. Howard is all English!

There is no king, not were he ten times king,

Ten times our husband, but must lower his flag

To that of England in the seas of England.

PHILIP. Is that your answer?

MARY. Being Queen of England,

I have none other.

PHILIP. So.

MARY. But wherefore not

Helm the huge vessel of your state, my liege,

Here by the side of her who loves you most?

PHILIP. No, Madam, no! a candle in the sun

Is all but smoke--a star beside the moon

Is all but lost; your people will not crown me--

Your people are as cheerless as your clime;

Hate me and mine: witness the brawls, the gibbets.

Here swings a Spaniard--there an Englishman;

The peoples are unlike as their complexion;

Yet will I be your swallow and return--

But now I cannot bide.

MARY. Not to help _me?_

They hate _me_ also for my love to you,

My Philip; and these judgments on the land--

Harvestless autumns, horrible agues, plague--

PHILIP. The blood and sweat of heretics at the stake

Is God's best dew upon the barren field.

Burn more!

MARY. I will, I will; and you will stay?

PHILIP. Have I not said? Madam, I came to sue

Your Council and yourself to declare war.

MARY. Sir, there are many English in your ranks

To help your battle.

PHILIP. So far, good. I say

I came to sue your Council and yourself

To declare war against the King of France.

MARY. Not to see me?

PHILIP. Ay, Madam, to see you.

Unalterably and pesteringly fond! [_Aside_.

But, soon or late you must have war with France;

King Henry warms your traitors at his hearth.

Carew is there, and Thomas Stafford there.

Courtenay, belike--

MARY. A fool and featherhead!

PHILIP. Ay, but they use his name. In brief, this Henry

Stirs up your land against you to the intent

That you may lose your English heritage.

And then, your Scottish namesake marrying

The Dauphin, he would weld France, England, Scotland,

Into one sword to hack at Spain and me.

MARY. And yet the Pope is now colleagued with France;

You make your wars upon him down in Italy:--

Philip, can that be well?

PHILIP. Content you, Madam;

You must abide my judgment, and my father's,

Who deems it a most just and holy war.

The Pope would cast the Spaniard out of Naples:

He calls us worse than Jews, Moors, Saracens.

The Pope has pushed his horns beyond his mitre--

Beyond his province. Now,

Duke Alva will but touch him on the horns,

And he withdraws; and of his holy head--

For Alva is true son of the true church--

No hair is harm'd. Will you not help me here?

MARY. Alas! the Council will not hear of war.

They say your wars are not the wars of England.

They will not lay more taxes on a land

So hunger-nipt and wretched; and you know

The crown is poor. We have given the church-lands back:

The nobles would not; nay, they clapt their hands

Upon their swords when ask'd; and therefore God

Is hard upon the people. What's to be done?

Sir, I will move them in your cause again,

And we will raise us loans and subsidies

Among the merchants; and Sir Thomas Gresham

Will aid us. There is Antwerp and the Jews.

PHILIP. Madam, my thanks.

MARY. And you will stay your going?

PHILIP. And further to discourage and lay lame

The plots of France, altho' you love her not,

You must proclaim Elizabeth your heir.

She stands between you and the Queen of Scots.

MARY. The Queen of Scots at least is Catholic.

PHILIP. Ay, Madam, Catholic; but I will not have

The King of France the King of England too.

MARY. But she's a heretic, and, when I am gone,

Brings the new learning back.

PHILIP. It must be done.

You must proclaim Elizabeth your heir.

MARY. Then it is done; but you will stay your going

Somewhat beyond your settled purpose?

PHILIP. No!

MARY. What, not one day?

PHILIP. You beat upon the rock.

MARY. And I am broken there.

PHILIP. Is this a place

To wail in, Madam? what! a public hall.

Go in, I pray you.

MARY. Do not seem so changed.

Say go; but only say it lovingly.

PHILIP. You do mistake. I am not one to change.

I never loved you more.

MARY. Sire, I obey you.

Come quickly.

PHILIP. Ay.

[_Exit_ MARY.

_Enter_ COUNT DE FERIA.

FERIA (_aside_). The Queen in tears!

PHILIP. Feria!

Hast thou not mark'd--come closer to mine ear--

How doubly aged this Queen of ours hath grown

Since she lost hope of bearing us a child?

FERIA. Sire, if your Grace hath mark'd it, so have I.

PHILIP. Hast thou not likewise mark'd Elizabeth,

How fair and royal--like a Queen, indeed?

FERIA. Allow me the same answer as before--

That if your Grace hath mark'd her, so have I.

PHILIP. Good, now; methinks my Queen is like enough

To leave me by and by.

FERIA. To leave you, sire?

PHILIP. I mean not like to live. Elizabeth--

To Philibert of Savoy, as you know,

We meant to wed her; but I am not sure

She will not serve me better--so my Queen

Would leave me--as--my wife.

FERIA. Sire, even so.

PHILIP. She will not have Prince Philibert of Savoy.

FERIA. No, sire.

PHILIP. I have to pray you, some odd time,

To sound the Princess carelessly on this;

Not as from me, but as your phantasy;

And tell me how she takes it.

FERIA. Sire, I will.

PHILIP. I am not certain but that Philibert

Shall be the man; and I shall urge his suit

Upon the Queen, because I am not certain:

You understand, Feria.

FERIA. Sire, I do.

PHILIP. And if you be not secret in this matter,

You understand me there, too?

FERIA. Sire, I do.

PHILIP. You must be sweet and supple, like a Frenchman.

She is none of those who loathe the honeycomb.

[_Exit_ FERIA.

_Enter_ RENARD.

RENARD. My liege, I bring you goodly tidings.

PHILIP. Well?

RENARD. There _will_ be war with France, at last, my liege;

Sir Thomas Stafford, a bull-headed ass,

Sailing from France, with thirty Englishmen,

Hath taken Scarboro' Castle, north of York;

Proclaims himself protector, and affirms

The Queen has forfeited her right to reign

By marriage with an alien--other things

As idle; a weak Wyatt! Little doubt

This buzz will soon be silenced; but the Council

(I have talk'd with some already) are for war.

This the fifth conspiracy hatch'd in France;

They show their teeth upon it; and your Grace,

So you will take advice of mine, should stay

Yet for awhile, to shape and guide the event.

PHILIP. Good! Renard, I will stay then.

RENARD. Also, sire,

Might I not say--to please your wife, the Queen?

PHILIP. Ay, Renard, if you care to put it so.

[_Exeunt_.

SCENE II.--A ROOM IN THE PALACE.

MARY, _sitting: a rose in her hand_. LADY CLARENCE. ALICE _in the

background_.

MARY. Look! I have play'd with this poor rose so long

I have broken off the head.

LADY CLARENCE. Your Grace hath been

More merciful to many a rebel head

That should have fallen, and may rise again.

MARY. There were not many hang'd for Wyatt's rising.

LADY CLARENCE. Nay, not two hundred.

MARY. I could weep for them

And her, and mine own self and all the world.

LADY CLARENCE. For her? for whom, your Grace?

_Enter_ USHER.

USHER. The Cardinal.

_Enter_ CARDINAL POLE. (MARY _rises_.)

MARY. Reginald Pole, what news hath plagued thy heart?

What makes thy favour like the bloodless head

Fall'n on the block, and held up by the hair?

Philip?--

POLE. No, Philip is as warm in life

As ever.

MARY. Ay, and then as cold as ever.

Is Calais taken?

POLE. Cousin, there hath chanced

A sharper harm to England and to Rome,

Than Calais taken. Julius the Third

Was ever just, and mild, and father-like;

But this new Pope Caraffa, Paul the Fourth,

Not only reft me of that legateship

Which Julius gave me, and the legateship

Annex'd to Canterbury--nay, but worse--

And yet I must obey the Holy Father,

And so must you, good cousin;--worse than all,

A passing bell toll'd in a dying ear--

He hath cited me to Rome, for heresy,

Before his Inquisition.

MARY. I knew it, cousin,

But held from you all papers sent by Rome,

That you might rest among us, till the Pope,

To compass which I wrote myself to Rome,

Reversed his doom, and that you might not seem

To disobey his Holiness.

POLE. He hates Philip;

He is all Italian, and he hates the Spaniard;

He cannot dream that _I_ advised the war;

He strikes thro' me at Philip and yourself.

Nay, but I know it of old, he hates me too;

So brands me in the stare of Christendom

A heretic!

Now, even now, when bow'd before my time,

The house half-ruin'd ere the lease be out;

When I should guide the Church in peace at home,

After my twenty years of banishment,

And all my lifelong labour to uphold

The primacy--a heretic. Long ago,

When I was ruler in the patrimony,

I was too lenient to the Lutheran,

And I and learned friends among ourselves

Would freely canvass certain Lutheranisms.

What then, he knew I was no Lutheran.

A heretic!

He drew this shaft against me to the head,

When it was thought I might be chosen Pope,

But then withdrew it. In full consistory,

When I was made Archbishop, he approved me.

And how should he have sent me Legate hither,

Deeming me heretic? and what heresy since?

But he was evermore mine enemy,

And hates the Spaniard--fiery-choleric,

A drinker of black, strong, volcanic wines,

That ever make him fierier. I, a heretic?

Your Highness knows that in pursuing heresy

I have gone beyond your late Lord Chancellor,--

He cried Enough! enough! before his death.--

Gone beyond him and mine own natural man

(It was God's cause); so far they call me now,

The scourge and butcher of their English church.

MARY. Have courage, your reward is Heaven itself.

POLE. They groan amen; they swarm into the fire

Like flies--for what? no dogma. They know nothing;

They burn for nothing.

MARY. You have done your best.

POLE. Have done my best, and as a faithful son,

That all day long hath wrought his father's work,

When back he comes at evening hath the door

Shut on him by the father whom he loved,

His early follies cast into his teeth,

And the poor son turn'd out into the street

To sleep, to die--I shall die of it, cousin.

MARY. I pray you be not so disconsolate;

I still will do mine utmost with the Pope.

Poor cousin!

Have not I been the fast friend of your life

Since mine began, and it was thought we two

Might make one flesh, and cleave unto each other

As man and wife?

POLE. Ah, cousin, I remember

How I would dandle you upon my knee

At lisping-age. I watch'd you dancing once

With your huge father; he look'd the Great Harry,

You but his cockboat; prettily you did it,

And innocently. No--we were not made

One flesh in happiness, no happiness here;

But now we are made one flesh in misery;

Our bridemaids are not lovely--Disappointment,

Ingratitude, Injustice, Evil-tongue,

Labour-in-vain.

MARY. Surely, not all in vain.

Peace, cousin, peace! I am sad at heart myself.

POLE. Our altar is a mound of dead men's clay,

Dug from the grave that yawns for us beyond;

And there is one Death stands behind the Groom,

And there is one Death stands behind the Bride--

MARY. Have you been looking at the 'Dance of Death'?

POLE. No; but these libellous papers which I found

Strewn in your palace. Look you here--the Pope

Pointing at me with 'Pole, the heretic,

Thou hast burnt others, do thou burn thyself,

Or I will burn thee;' and this other; see!--

'We pray continually for the death

Of our accursed Queen and Cardinal Pole.'

This last--I dare not read it her. [_Aside_.

MARY. Away!

Why do you bring me these?

I thought you knew better. I never read,

I tear them; they come back upon my dreams.

The hands that write them should be burnt clean off

As Cranmer's, and the fiends that utter them

Tongue-torn with pincers, lash'd to death, or lie

Famishing in black cells, while famish'd rats

Eat them alive. Why do they bring me these?

Do you mean to drive me mad?

POLE. I had forgotten

How these poor libels trouble you. Your pardon,

Sweet cousin, and farewell! 'O bubble world,

Whose colours in a moment break and fly!'

Why, who said that? I know not--true enough!

[_Puts up the papers, all but the last, which falls.

Exit_ POLE.

ALICE. If Cranmer's spirit were a mocking one,

And heard these two, there might be sport for him. [_Aside_.

MARY. Clarence, they hate me; even while I speak

There lurks a silent dagger, listening

In some dark closet, some long gallery, drawn,

And panting for my blood as I go by.

LADY CLARENCE. Nay, Madam, there be loyal papers too,

And I have often found them.

MARY. Find me one!

LADY CLARENCE. Ay, Madam; but Sir Nicholas Heath, the Chancellor,

Would see your Highness.

MARY. Wherefore should I see him?

LADY CLARENCE. Well, Madam, he may bring you news from Philip.

MARY. So, Clarence.

LADY CLARENCE. Let me first put up your hair;

It tumbles all abroad.

MARY. And the gray dawn

Of an old age that never will be mine

Is all the clearer seen. No, no; what matters?

Forlorn I am, and let me look forlorn.

_Enter_ SIR NICHOLAS HEATH.

HEATH. I bring your Majesty such grievous news

I grieve to bring it. Madam, Calais is taken.

MARY. What traitor spoke? Here, let my cousin Pole

Seize him and burn him for a Lutheran.

HEATH. Her Highness is unwell. I will retire.

LADY CLARENCE. Madam, your Chancellor, Sir Nicholas Heath.

MARY. Sir Nicholas! I am stunn'd--Nicholas Heath?

Methought some traitor smote me on the head.

What said you, my good Lord, that our brave English

Had sallied out from Calais and driven back

The Frenchmen from their trenches?

HEATH. Alas! no.

That gateway to the mainland over which

Our flag hath floated for two hundred years

Is France again.

MARY. So; but it is not lost--

Not yet. Send out: let England as of old

Rise lionlike, strike hard and deep into

The prey they are rending from her--ay, and rend

The renders too. Send out, send out, and make

Musters in all the counties; gather all

From sixteen years to sixty; collect the fleet;

Let every craft that carries sail and gun

Steer toward Calais. Guisnes is not taken yet?

HEATH. Guisnes is not taken yet.

MARY. There yet is hope.

HEATH. Ah, Madam, but your people are so cold;

I do much fear that England will not care.

Methinks there is no manhood left among us.

MARY. Send out; I am too weak to stir abroad:

Tell my mind to the Council--to the Parliament:

Proclaim it to the winds. Thou art cold thyself

To babble of their coldness. O would I were

My father for an hour! Away now--Quick!

[_Exit_ HEATH.

I hoped I had served God with all my might!

It seems I have not. Ah! much heresy

Shelter'd in Calais. Saints I have rebuilt

Your shrines, set up your broken images;

Be comfortable to me. Suffer not

That my brief reign in England be defamed

Thro' all her angry chronicles hereafter

By loss of Calais. Grant me Calais. Philip,

We have made war upon the Holy Father

All for your sake: what good could come of that?

LADY CLARENCE. No, Madam, not against the Holy Father;

You did but help King Philip's war with France,

Your troops were never down in Italy.

MARY. I am a byword. Heretic and rebel

Point at me and make merry. Philip gone!

And Calais gone! Time that I were gone too!

LADY CLARENCE. Nay, if the fetid gutter had a voice

And cried I was not clean, what should I care?

Or you, for heretic cries? And I believe,

Spite of your melancholy Sir Nicholas,

Your England is as loyal as myself.

MARY (_seeing the paper draft by_ POLE).

There! there! another paper! Said you not

Many of these were loyal? Shall I try

If this be one of such?

LADY CLARENCE. Let it be, let it be.

God pardon me! I have never yet found one. [_Aside_.

MARY (_reads_). 'Your people hate you as your husband hates you.'

Clarence, Clarence, what have I done? what sin

Beyond all grace, all pardon? Mother of God,

Thou knowest never woman meant so well,

And fared so ill in this disastrous world.

My people hate me and desire my death.

LADY CLARENCE. No, Madam, no.

MARY. My husband hates me, and desires my death.

LADY CLARENCE. No, Madam; these are libels.

MARY. I hate myself, and I desire my death.

LADY CLARENCE. Long live your Majesty! Shall Alice sing you

One of her pleasant songs? Alice, my child,

Bring us your lute (ALICE _goes_). They say the gloom of Saul

Was lighten'd by young David's harp.

MARY. Too young!

And never knew a Philip.

_Re-enter_ ALICE.

Give _me_ the lute.

He hates me!

(_She sings_.)

Hapless doom of woman happy in betrothing!

Beauty passes like a breath and love is lost in loathing:

Low, my lute; speak low, my lute, but say the world is nothing--

Low, lute, low!

Love will hover round the flowers when they first awaken;

Love will fly the fallen leaf, and not be overtaken;

Low, my lute! oh low, my lute! we fade and are forsaken--

Low, dear lute, low!

Take it away! not low enough for me!

ALICE. Your Grace hath a low voice.

MARY. How dare you say it?

Even for that he hates me. A low voice

Lost in a wilderness where none can hear!

A voice of shipwreck on a shoreless sea!

A low voice from the dust and from the grave

(_Sitting on the ground_).

There, am I low enough now?

ALICE. Good Lord! how grim and ghastly looks her Grace,

With both her knees drawn upward to her chin.

There was an old-world tomb beside my father's,

And this was open'd, and the dead were found

Sitting, and in this fashion; she looks a corpse.

_Enter_ LADY MAGDALEN DACRES.

LADY MAGDALEN. Madam, the Count de Feria waits without,

In hopes to see your Highness.

LADY CLARENCE (_pointing to_ MARY).

Wait he must--

Her trance again. She neither sees nor hears,

And may not speak for hours.

LADY MAGDALEN. Unhappiest

Of Queens and wives and women!

ALICE (_in the foreground with_ LADY MAGDALEN).

And all along

Of Philip.

LADY MAGDALEN. Not so loud! Our Clarence there

Sees ever such an aureole round the Queen,

It gilds the greatest wronger of her peace,

Who stands the nearest to her.

ALICE. Ay, this Philip;

I used to love the Queen with all my heart--

God help me, but methinks I love her less

For such a dotage upon such a man.

I would I were as tall and strong as you.

LADY MAGDALEN. I seem half-shamed at times to be so tall.

ALICE. You are the stateliest deer in all the herd--

Beyond his aim--but I am small and scandalous,

And love to hear bad tales of Philip.

LADY MAGDALEN. Why?

I never heard him utter worse of you

Than that you were low-statured.

ALICE. Does he think

Low stature is low nature, or all women's

Low as his own?

LADY MAGDALEN. There you strike in the nail.

This coarseness is a want of phantasy.

It is the low man thinks the woman low;

Sin is too dull to see beyond himself.

ALICE. Ah, Magdalen, sin is bold as well as dull.

How dared he?

LADY MAGDALEN. Stupid soldiers oft are bold.

Poor lads, they see not what the general sees,

A risk of utter ruin. I am _not_

Beyond his aim, or was not.

ALICE. Who? Not you?

Tell, tell me; save my credit with myself.

LADY MAGDALEN. I never breathed it to a bird in the eaves,

Would not for all the stars and maiden moon

Our drooping Queen should know! In Hampton Court

My window look'd upon the corridor;

And I was robing;--this poor throat of mine,

Barer than I should wish a man to see it,--

When he we speak of drove the window back,

And, like a thief, push'd in his royal hand;

But by God's providence a good stout staff

Lay near me; and you know me strong of arm;

I do believe I lamed his Majesty's

For a day or two, tho', give the Devil his due,

I never found he bore me any spite.

ALICE. I would she could have wedded that poor youth,

My Lord of Devon--light enough, God knows,

And mixt with Wyatt's rising--and the boy

Not out of him--but neither cold, coarse, cruel,

And more than all--no Spaniard.

LADY CLARENCE. Not so loud.

Lord Devon, girls! what are you whispering here?

ALICE. Probing an old state-secret--how it chanced

That this young Earl was sent on foreign travel,

Not lost his head.

LADY CLARENCE. There was no proof against him.

ALICE. Nay, Madam; did not Gardiner intercept

A letter which the Count de Noailles wrote

To that dead traitor Wyatt, with full proof

Of Courtenay's treason? What became of that?

LADY CLARENCE. Some say that Gardiner, out of love for him,

Burnt it, and some relate that it was lost

When Wyatt sack'd the Chancellor's house in Southwark.

Let dead things rest.

ALICE. Ay, and with him who died

Alone in Italy.

LADY CLARENCE. Much changed, I hear,

Had put off levity and put graveness on.

The foreign courts report him in his manner

Noble as his young person and old shield.

It might be so--but all is over now;

He caught a chill in the lagoons of Venice,

And died in Padua.

MARY (_looking up suddenly_).

Died in the true faith?

LADY CLARENCE. Ay, Madam, happily.

MARY. Happier he than I.

LADY MAGDALEN. It seems her Highness hath awaken'd. Think you

That I might dare to tell her that the Count--

MARY. I will see no man hence for evermore,

Saving my confessor and my cousin Pole.

LADY MAGDALEN. It is the Count de Feria, my dear lady.

MARY. What Count?

LADY MAGDALEN. The Count de Feria, from his Majesty

King Philip.

MARY. Philip! quick! loop up my hair!

Throw cushions on that seat, and make it throne-like.

Arrange my dress--the gorgeous Indian shawl

That Philip brought me in our happy days!--

That covers all. So--am I somewhat Queenlike,

Bride of the mightiest sovereign upon earth?

LADY CLARENCE. Ay, so your Grace would bide a moment yet.

MARY. No, no, he brings a letter. I may die

Before I read it. Let me see him at once.

_Enter_ COUNT DE FERIA (_kneels_).

FERIA. I trust your Grace is well. (_Aside_) How her hand burns!

MARY. I am not well, but it will better me,

Sir Count, to read the letter which you bring.

FERIA. Madam, I bring no letter.

MARY. How! no letter?

FERIA. His Highness is so vex'd with strange affairs--

MARY. That his own wife is no affair of his.

FERIA. Nay, Madam, nay! he sends his veriest love,

And says, he will come quickly.

MARY. Doth he, indeed?

You, sir, do _you_ remember what _you_ said

When last you came to England?

FERIA. Madam, I brought

My King's congratulations; it was hoped

Your Highness was once more in happy state

To give him an heir male.

MARY. Sir, you said more;

You said he would come quickly. I had horses

On all the road from Dover, day and night;

On all the road from Harwich, night and day;

But the child came not, and the husband came not;

And yet he will come quickly.... Thou hast learnt

Thy lesson, and I mine. There is no need

For Philip so to shame himself again.

Return,

And tell him that I know he comes no more.

Tell him at last I know his love is dead,

And that I am in state to bring forth death--

Thou art commission'd to Elizabeth,

And not to me!

FERIA. Mere compliments and wishes.

But shall I take some message from your Grace?

MARY. Tell her to come and close my dying eyes,

And wear my crown, and dance upon my grave.

FERIA. Then I may say your Grace will see your sister?

Your Grace is too low-spirited. Air and sunshine.

I would we had you, Madam, in our warm Spain.

You droop in your dim London.

MARY. Have him away!

I sicken of his readiness.

LADY CLARENCE. My Lord Count,

Her Highness is too ill for colloquy.

FERIA (_kneels, and kisses her hand_).

I wish her Highness better. (_Aside_) How her hand burns!

[_Exeunt_.

SCENE III.--A HOUSE NEAR LONDON.

ELIZABETH, STEWARD OF THE HOUSEHOLD, ATTENDANTS.

ELIZABETH. There's half an angel wrong'd in your account;

Methinks I am all angel, that I bear it

Without more ruffling. Cast it o'er again.

STEWARD. I were whole devil if I wrong'd you, Madam.

[_Exit_ STEWARD.

ATTENDANT. The Count de Feria, from the King of Spain.

ELIZABETH. Ay!--let him enter. Nay, you need not go:

[_To her_ LADIES.

Remain within the chamber, but apart.

We'll have no private conference. Welcome to

England!

_Enter_ FERIA.

FERIA. Fair island star!

ELIZABETH. I shine! What else, Sir Count?

FERIA. As far as France, and into Philip's heart.

My King would know if you be fairly served,

And lodged, and treated.

ELIZABETH. You see the lodging, sir,

I am well-served, and am in everything

Most loyal and most grateful to the Queen.

FERIA. You should be grateful to my master, too.

He spoke of this; and unto him you owe

That Mary hath acknowledged you her heir.

ELIZABETH. No, not to her nor him; but to the people,

Who know my right, and love me, as I love

The people! whom God aid!

FERIA. You will be Queen,

And, were I Philip--

ELIZABETH. Wherefore pause you--what?

FERIA. Nay, but I speak from mine own self, not

him;

Your royal sister cannot last; your hand

Will be much coveted! What a delicate one!

Our Spanish ladies have none such--and there,

Were you in Spain, this fine fair gossamer gold--

Like sun-gilt breathings on a frosty dawn--

That hovers round your shoulder--

ELIZABETH. Is it so fine?

Troth, some have said so.

FERIA. --would be deemed a miracle.

ELIZABETH. Your Philip hath gold hair and golden beard;

There must be ladies many with hair like mine.

FERIA, Some few of Gothic blood have golden hair,

But none like yours.

ELIZABETH. I am happy you approve it.

FERIA. But as to Philip and your Grace--consider,

If such a one as you should match with Spain,

What hinders but that Spain and England join'd,

Should make the mightiest empire earth has known.

Spain would be England on her seas, and England

Mistress of the Indies.

ELIZABETH. It may chance, that England

Will be the Mistress of the Indies yet,

Without the help of Spain.

FERIA. Impossible;

Except you put Spain down.

Wide of the mark ev'n for a madman's dream.

ELIZABETH. Perhaps; but we have seamen.

Count de Feria,

I take it that the King hath spoken to you;

But is Don Carlos such a goodly match?

FERIA. Don Carlos, Madam, is but twelve years old.

ELIZABETH. Ay, tell the King that I will muse upon it;

He is my good friend, and I would keep him so;

But--he would have me Catholic of Rome,

And that I scarce can be; and, sir, till now

My sister's marriage, and my father's marriages,

Make me full fain to live and die a maid.

But I am much beholden to your King.

Have you aught else to tell me?

FERIA. Nothing, Madam,

Save that methought I gather'd from the Queen

That she would see your Grace before she--died.

ELIZABETH. God's death! and wherefore spake you not before?

We dally with our lazy moments here,

And hers are number'd. Horses there, without!

I am much beholden to the King, your master.

Why did you keep me prating? Horses, there!

[_Exit_ ELIZABETH, _etc_.

FERIA. So from a clear sky falls the thunderbolt!

Don Carlos? Madam, if you marry Philip,

Then I and he will snaffle your 'God's death,'

And break your paces in, and make you tame;

God's death, forsooth--you do not know King Philip.

[_Exit_.

SCENE IV.--LONDON. BEFORE THE PALACE.

_A light burning within_. VOICES _of the night passing_.

FIRST. Is not yon light in the Queen's chamber?

SECOND. Ay,

They say she's dying.

FIRST. So is Cardinal Pole.

May the great angels join their wings, and make

Down for their heads to heaven!

SECOND. Amen. Come on.

[_Exeunt_.

TWO OTHERS.

FIRST. There's the Queen's light. I hear she cannot live.

SECOND. God curse her and her Legate! Gardiner burns

Already; but to pay them full in kind,

The hottest hold in all the devil's den

Were but a sort of winter; sir, in Guernsey,

I watch'd a woman burn; and in her agony

The mother came upon her--a child was born--

And, sir, they hurl'd it back into the fire,

That, being but baptized in fire, the babe

Might be in fire for ever. Ah, good neighbour,

There should be something fierier than fire

To yield them their deserts.

FIRST. Amen to all

Your wish, and further.

A THIRD VOICE. Deserts! Amen to what? Whose deserts? Yours? You have a

gold ring on your finger, and soft raiment about your body; and is not

the woman up yonder sleeping after all she has done, in peace and

quietness, on a soft bed, in a closed room, with light, fire, physic,

tendance; and I have seen the true men of Christ lying famine-dead by

scores, and under no ceiling but the cloud that wept on them, not for

them.

FIRST. Friend, tho' so late, it is not safe to preach.

You had best go home. What are you?

THIRD. What am I? One who cries continually with sweat and tears to

the Lord God that it would please Him out of His infinite love to

break down all kingship and queenship, all priesthood and prelacy; to

cancel and abolish all bonds of human allegiance, all the magistracy,

all the nobles, and all the wealthy; and to send us again, according

to His promise, the one King, the Christ, and all things in common, as

in the day of the first church, when Christ Jesus was King.

FIRST. If ever I heard a madman,--let's away!

Why, you long-winded--Sir, you go beyond me.

I pride myself on being moderate.

Good night! Go home. Besides, you curse so loud,

The watch will hear you. Get you home at once.

[_Exeunt_.

SCENE V.--LONDON. A ROOM IN THE PALACE.

_A Gallery on one side. The moonlight streaming through a range of

windows on the wall opposite_. MARY, LADY CLARENCE, LADY MAGDALEN

DACRES, ALICE. QUEEN _pacing the Gallery. A writing table in front_.

QUEEN _comes to the table and writes and goes again, pacing the

Gallery_.

LADY CLARENCE. Mine eyes are dim: what hath she written? read.

ALICE. 'I am dying, Philip; come to me.'

LADY MAGDALEN. There--up and down, poor lady, up and down.

ALICE. And how her shadow crosses one by one

The moonlight casements pattern'd on the wall,

Following her like her sorrow. She turns again.

[QUEEN _sits and writes, and goes again_.

LADY CLARENCE. What hath she written now?

ALICE. Nothing; but 'come, come, come,' and all awry,

And blotted by her tears. This cannot last.

[QUEEN _returns_.

MARY. I whistle to the bird has broken cage,

And all in vain. [_Sitting down_.

Calais gone--Guisnes gone, too--and Philip gone!

LADY CLARENCE. Dear Madam, Philip is but at the wars;

I cannot doubt but that he comes again;

And he is with you in a measure still.

I never look'd upon so fair a likeness

As your great King in armour there, his hand

Upon his helmet.

[_Pointing to the portrait of Philip on the wall_.

MARY. Doth he not look noble?

I had heard of him in battle over seas,

And I would have my warrior all in arms.

He said it was not courtly to stand helmeted

Before the Queen. He had his gracious moment,

Altho' you'll not believe me. How he smiles

As if he loved me yet!

LADY CLARENCE. And so he does.

MARY. He never loved me--nay, he could not love me.

It was his father's policy against France.

I am eleven years older than he,

Poor boy! [_Weeps_.

ALICE. That was a lusty boy of twenty-seven; [_Aside_.

Poor enough in God's grace!

MARY. --And all in vain!

The Queen of Scots is married to the Dauphin,

And Charles, the lord of this low world, is gone;

And all his wars and wisdoms past away:

And in a moment I shall follow him.

LADY CLARENCE. Nay, dearest Lady, see your good physician.

MARY. Drugs--but he knows they cannot help me--says

That rest is all--tells me I must not think--

That I must rest--I shall rest by and by.

Catch the wild cat, cage him, and when he springs

And maims himself against the bars, say 'rest':

Why, you must kill him if you would have him rest--

Dead or alive you cannot make him happy.

LADY CLARENCE. Your Majesty has lived so pure a life,

And done such mighty things by Holy Church,

I trust that God will make you happy yet.

MARY. What is the strange thing happiness? Sit down here:

Tell me thine happiest hour.

LADY CLARENCE. I will, if that

May make your Grace forget yourself a little.

There runs a shallow brook across our field

For twenty miles, where the black crow flies five,

And doth so bound and babble all the way

As if itself were happy. It was May-time,

And I was walking with the man I loved.

I loved him, but I thought I was not loved.

And both were silent, letting the wild brook

Speak for us--till he stoop'd and gather'd one

From out a bed of thick forget-me-nots,

Look'd hard and sweet at me, and gave it me.

I took it, tho' I did not know I took it,

And put it in my bosom, and all at once

I felt his arms about me, and his lips--

MARY. O God! I have been too slack, too slack;

There are Hot Gospellers even among our guards--

Nobles we dared not touch. We have but burnt

The heretic priest, workmen, and women and children.

Wet, famine, ague, fever, storm, wreck, wrath,--

We have so play'd the coward; but by God's grace,

We'll follow Philip's leading, and set up

The Holy Office here--garner the wheat,

And burn the tares with unquenchable fire!

Burn!--

Fie, what a savour! tell the cooks to close

The doors of all the offices below.

Latimer!

Sir, we are private with our women here--

Ever a rough, blunt, and uncourtly fellow--

Thou light a torch that never will go out!

'Tis out--mine flames. Women, the Holy Father

Has ta'en the legateship from our cousin Pole--

Was that well done? and poor Pole pines of it,

As I do, to the death. I am but a woman,

I have no power.--Ah, weak and meek old man,

Seven-fold dishonour'd even in the sight

Of thine own sectaries--No, no. No pardon!

Why that was false: there is the right hand still

Beckons me hence.

Sir, you were burnt for heresy, not for treason,

Remember that! 'twas I and Bonner did it,

And Pole; we are three to one--Have you found mercy there,

Grant it me here: and see, he smiles and goes,

Gentle as in life.

ALICE. Madam, who goes? King Philip?

MARY. No, Philip comes and goes, but never goes.

Women, when I am dead,

Open my heart, and there you will find written

Two names, Philip and Calais; open his,--

So that he have one,--

You will find Philip only, policy, policy,--

Ay, worse than that--not one hour true to me!

Foul maggots crawling in a fester'd vice!

Adulterous to the very heart of Hell.

Hast thou a knife?

ALICE. Ay, Madam, but o' God's mercy--

MARY. Fool, think'st thou I would peril mine own soul

By slaughter of the body? I could not, girl,

Not this way--callous with a constant stripe,

Unwoundable. The knife!

ALICE. Take heed, take heed!

The blade is keen as death.

MARY. This Philip shall not

Stare in upon me in my haggardness;

Old, miserable, diseased,

Incapable of children. Come thou down.

[_Cuts out the picture and throws it down_.

Lie there. (_Wails_) O God, I have kill'd my Philip!

ALICE. No,

Madam, you have but cut the canvas out;

We can replace it.

MARY. All is well then; rest--

I will to rest; he said, I must have rest.

[_Cries of_ 'ELIZABETH' _in the street_.

A cry! What's that? Elizabeth? revolt?

A new Northumberland, another Wyatt?

I'll fight it on the threshold of the grave.

LADY CLARENCE. Madam, your royal sister comes to see you.

MARY. I will not see her.

Who knows if Boleyn's daughter be my sister?

I will see none except the priest. Your arm.

[_To_ LADY CLARENCE.

O Saint of Aragon, with that sweet worn smile

Among thy patient wrinkles--Help me hence.

[_Exeunt_.

_The_ PRIEST _passes. Enter_ ELIZABETH _and_ SIR WILLIAM CECIL.

ELIZABETH. Good counsel yours--

No one in waiting? still,

As if the chamberlain were Death himself!

The room she sleeps in--is not this the way?

No, that way there are voices. Am I too late?

Cecil ... God guide me lest I lose the way.

[_Exit_ ELIZABETH.

CECIL. Many points weather'd, many perilous ones,

At last a harbour opens; but therein

Sunk rocks--they need fine steering--much it is

To be nor mad, nor bigot--have a mind--

Nor let Priests' talk, or dream of worlds to be,

Miscolour things about her--sudden touches

For him, or him--sunk rocks; no passionate faith--

But--if let be--balance and compromise;

Brave, wary, sane to the heart of her--a Tudor

School'd by the shadow of death--a Boleyn, too,

Glancing across the Tudor--not so well.

_Enter_ ALICE.

How is the good Queen now?

ALICE. Away from Philip.

Back in her childhood--prattling to her mother

Of her betrothal to the Emperor Charles,

And childlike--jealous of him again--and once

She thank'd her father sweetly for his book

Against that godless German. Ah, those days

Were happy. It was never merry world

In England, since the Bible came among us.

CECIL. And who says that?

ALICE. It is a saying among the Catholics.

CECIL. It never will be merry world in England,

Till all men have their Bible, rich and poor.

ALICE. The Queen is dying, or you dare not say it.

_Enter_ ELIZABETH.

ELIZABETH. The Queen is dead.

CECIL. Then here she stands! my homage.

ELIZABETH. She knew me, and acknowledged me her heir,

Pray'd me to pay her debts, and keep the Faith:

Then claspt the cross, and pass'd away in peace.

I left her lying still and beautiful,

More beautiful than in life. Why would you vex yourself,

Poor sister? Sir, I swear I have no heart

To be your Queen. To reign is restless fence,

Tierce, quart, and trickery. Peace is with the dead.

Her life was winter, for her spring was nipt:

And she loved much: pray God she be forgiven.

CECIL. Peace with the dead, who never were at peace!

Yet she loved one so much--I needs must say--

That never English monarch dying left

England so little.

ELIZABETH. But with Cecil's aid

And others, if our person be secured

From traitor stabs--we will make England great.

_Enter_ PAGET, _and other_ LORDS OF THE COUNCIL,

SIR RALPH BAGENHALL, _etc_.

LORDS. God save Elizabeth, the Queen of England!

BAGENHALL. God save the Crown! the Papacy is no more.

PAGET (_aside_).

Are we so sure of that?

ACCLAMATION. God save the Queen!

END OF QUEEN MARY.

HAROLD: A DRAMA.

TO HIS EXCELLENCY THE RIGHT HON. LORD LYTTON, VICEROY AND

GOVERNOR-GENERAL OF INDIA.

My Dear Lord Lytton,--After old-world records--such as the Bayeux

tapestry and the Roman de Rou,--Edward Freeman's History of the Norman

Conquest, and your father's Historical Romance treating of the same

times, have been mainly helpful to me in writing this Drama. Your

father dedicated his 'Harold' to my father's brother; allow me to

dedicate my 'Harold' to yourself.

A. TENNYSON.

SHOW-DAY AT BATTLE ABBEY, 1876.

A garden here--May breath and bloom of spring--

The cuckoo yonder from an English elm

Crying 'with my false egg I overwhelm

The native nest:' and fancy hears the ring

Of harness, and that deathful arrow sing,

And Saxon battleaxe clang on Norman helm.

Here rose the dragon-banner of our realm:

Here fought, here fell, our Norman-slander'd king.

O Garden blossoming out of English blood!

O strange hate-healer Time! We stroll and stare

Where might made right eight hundred years ago;

Might, right? ay good, so all things make for good--

But he and he, if soul be soul, are where

Each stands full face with all he did below.

_DRAMATIS PERSONAE_

KING EDWARD THE CONFESSOR.

STIGAND, _created Archbishop of Canterbury by the Antipope Benedict_.

ALDRED, _Archbishop of York_.

THE NORMAN BISHOP OF LONDON.

HAROLD, _Earl of Wessex, afterwards King of England, Son of Godwin_

TOSTIG, _Earl of Northumbria, Son of Godwin_

GURTH, _Earl of East Anglia, Son of Godwin_

LEOFWIN, _Earl of Kent and Essex, Son of Godwin_

WULFNOTH

COUNT WILLIAM OF NORMANDY.

WILLIAM RUFUS.

WILLIAM MALET, _a Norman Noble_.[1]

EDWIN, _Earl of Mercia, Son of Alfgar of Mercia_

MORCAR, _Earl of Northumbria after Tostig, Son of Alfgar of Mercia_

GAMEL, _a Northumbrian Thane_.

GUY, _Count of Ponthieu_.

ROLF, _a Ponthieu Fisherman_.

HUGH MARGOT, _a Norman Monk_.

OSGOD _and_ ATHELRIC, _Canons from Waltham_.

THE QUEEN, _Edward the Confessor's Wife, Daughter of Godwin_.

ALDWYTH, _Daughter of Alfgar and Widow of Griffyth, King of Wales_.

EDITH, _Ward of King Edward_.

Courtiers, Earls and Thanes, Men-at-Arms, Canons of Waltham,

Fishermen, etc.

[Footnote 1: ... quidam partim Normannus et Anglus

Compater Heraldi. (_Guy of Amiens_, 587.)]

HAROLD

ACT I.

SCENE I.--LONDON. THE KING'S PALACE.

(_A comet seen through the open window_.)

ALDWYTH, GAMEL, COURTIERS _talking together_.

FIRST COURTIER. Lo! there once more--this is the seventh night!

Yon grimly-glaring, treble-brandish'd scourge Of England!

SECOND COURTIER. Horrible!

FIRST COURTIER. Look you, there's a star

That dances in it as mad with agony!

THIRD COURTIER. Ay, like a spirit in Hell who skips and flies

To right and left, and cannot scape the flame.

SECOND COURTIER. Steam'd upward from the undescendable

Abysm.

FIRST COURTIER. Or floated downward from the throne

Of God Almighty.

ALDWYTH. Gamel, son of Orm,

What thinkest thou this means?

GAMEL. War, my dear lady!

ALDWYTH. Doth this affright thee?

GAMEL. Mightily, my dear lady!

ALDWYTH. Stand by me then, and look upon my face,

Not on the comet.

_Enter_ MORCAR.

Brother! why so pale?

MORCAR. It glares in heaven, it flares upon the Thames,

The people are as thick as bees below,

They hum like bees,--they cannot speak--for awe;

Look to the skies, then to the river, strike

Their hearts, and hold their babies up to it.

I think that they would Molochize them too,

To have the heavens clear.

ALDWYTH. They fright not me.

_Enter_ LEOFWIN, _after him_ GURTH.

Ask thou Lord Leofwin what he thinks of this!

MORCAR. Lord Leofwin, dost thou believe, that these

Three rods of blood-red fire up yonder mean

The doom of England and the wrath of Heaven?

BISHOP OF LONDON (_passing_).

Did ye not cast with bestial violence

Our holy Norman bishops down from all

Their thrones in England? I alone remain.

Why should not Heaven be wroth?

LEOFWIN. With us, or thee?

BISHOP OF LONDON. Did ye not outlaw your archbishop Robert,

Robert of Jumieges--well-nigh murder him too?

Is there no reason for the wrath of Heaven?

LEOFWIN. Why then the wrath of Heaven hath three tails,

The devil only one.

[_Exit_ BISHOP OF LONDON.

_Enter_ ARCHBISHOP STIGAND.

Ask _our_ Archbishop.

Stigand should know the purposes of Heaven.

STIGAND. Not I. I cannot read the face of heaven;

Perhaps our vines will grow the better for it.

LEOFWIN (_laughing_).

He can but read the king's face on his coins.

STIGAND. Ay, ay, young lord, _there_ the king's face is power.

GURTH. O father, mock not at a public fear,

But tell us, is this pendent hell in heaven

A harm to England?

STIGAND. Ask it of King Edward!

And he may tell thee, _I_ am a harm to England.

Old uncanonical Stigand--ask of _me_

Who had my pallium from an Antipope!

Not he the man--for in our windy world

What's up is faith, what's down is heresy.

Our friends, the Normans, holp to shake his chair.

I have a Norman fever on me, son,

And cannot answer sanely.... What it means?

Ask our broad Earl.

[_Pointing to_ HAROLD, _who enters_.

HAROLD (_seeing_ GAMEL).

Hail, Gamel, son of Orm!

Albeit no rolling stone, my good friend Gamel,

Thou hast rounded since we met. Thy life at home

Is easier than mine here. Look! am I not

Work-wan, flesh-fallen?

GAMEL. Art thou sick, good Earl?

HAROLD. Sick as an autumn swallow for a voyage,

Sick for an idle week of hawk and hound

Beyond the seas--a change! When camest thou hither?

GAMEL. To-day, good Earl.

HAROLD. Is the North quiet, Gamel?

GAMEL. Nay, there be murmurs, for thy brother breaks us

With over-taxing--quiet, ay, as yet--

Nothing as yet.

HAROLD. Stand by him, mine old friend,

Thou art a great voice in Northumberland!

Advise him: speak him sweetly, he will hear thee.

He is passionate but honest. Stand thou by him!

More talk of this to-morrow, if yon weird sign

Not blast us in our dreams.--Well, father Stigand--

[_To_ STIGAND, _who advances to him_.

STIGAND (_pointing to the comet_).

War there, my son? is that the doom of England?

HAROLD. Why not the doom of all the world as well?

For all the world sees it as well as England.

These meteors came and went before our day,

Not harming any: it threatens us no more

Than French or Norman. War? the worst that follows

Things that seem jerk'd out of the common rut

Of Nature is the hot religious fool,

Who, seeing war in heaven, for heaven's credit

Makes it on earth: but look, where Edward draws

A faint foot hither, leaning upon Tostig.

He hath learnt to love our Tostig much of late.

LEOFWIN. And _he_ hath learnt, despite the tiger in him,

To sleek and supple himself to the king's hand.

GURTH. I trust the kingly touch that cures the evil

May serve to charm the tiger out of him.

LEOFWIN. He hath as much of cat as tiger in him.

Our Tostig loves the hand and not the man.

HAROLD. Nay! Better die than lie!

_Enter_ KING, QUEEN, _and_ TOSTIG.

EDWARD. In heaven signs!

Signs upon earth! signs everywhere! your Priests

Gross, worldly, simoniacal, unlearn'd!

They scarce can read their Psalter; and your churches

Uncouth, unhandsome, while in Normanland

God speaks thro' abler voices, as He dwells

In statelier shrines. I say not this, as being

Half Norman-blooded, nor as some have held,

Because I love the Norman better--no,

But dreading God's revenge upon this realm

For narrowness and coldness: and I say it

For the last time perchance, before I go

To find the sweet refreshment of the Saints.

I have lived a life of utter purity:

I have builded the great church of Holy Peter:

I have wrought miracles--to God the glory--

And miracles will in my name be wrought

Hereafter.--I have fought the fight and go--

I see the flashing of the gates of pearl--

And it is well with me, tho' some of you

Have scorn'd me--ay--but after I am gone

Woe, woe to England! I have had a vision;

The seven sleepers in the cave at Ephesus

Have turn'd from right to left.

HAROLD. My most dear Master,

What matters? let them turn from left to right

And sleep again.

TOSTIG. Too hardy with thy king!

A life of prayer and fasting well may see

Deeper into the mysteries of heaven

Than thou, good brother.

ALDWYTH (_aside_). Sees he into thine,

That thou wouldst have his promise for the crown?

EDWARD. Tostig says true; my son, thou art too hard,

Not stagger'd by this ominous earth and heaven:

But heaven and earth are threads of the same loom,

Play into one another, and weave the web

That may confound thee yet.

HAROLD. Nay, I trust not,

For I have served thee long and honestly.

EDWARD. I know it, son; I am not thankless: thou

Hast broken all my foes, lighten'd for me

The weight of this poor crown, and left me time

And peace for prayer to gain a better one.

Twelve years of service! England loves thee for it.

Thou art the man to rule her!

ALDWYTH (_aside_). So, not Tostig!

HAROLD. And after those twelve years a boon, my king,

Respite, a holiday: thyself wast wont

To love the chase: thy leave to set my feet

On board, and hunt and hawk beyond the seas!

EDWARD. What, with this flaming horror overhead?

HAROLD. Well, when it passes then.

EDWARD. Ay if it pass.

Go not to Normandy--go not to Normandy.

HAROLD. And wherefore not, my king, to Normandy?

Is not my brother Wulfnoth hostage there

For my dead father's loyalty to thee?

I pray thee, let me hence and bring him home.

EDWARD. Not thee, my son: some other messenger.

HAROLD. And why not me, my lord, to Normandy?

Is not the Norman Count thy friend and mine?

EDWARD. I pray thee, do not go to Normandy.

HAROLD. Because my father drove the Normans out

Of England?--That was many a summer gone--

Forgotten and forgiven by them and thee.

EDWARD. Harold, I will not yield thee leave to go.

HAROLD. Why then to Flanders. I will hawk and hunt

In Flanders.

EDWARD. Be there not fair woods and fields

In England? Wilful, wilful. Go--the Saints

Pilot and prosper all thy wandering out

And homeward. Tostig, I am faint again.

Son Harold, I will in and pray for thee.

[_Exit, leaning on_ TOSTIG, _and followed by_

STIGAND, MORCAR, _and_ COURTIERS.

HAROLD. What lies upon the mind of our good king

That he should harp this way on Normandy?

QUEEN. Brother, the king is wiser than he seems;

And Tostig knows it; Tostig loves the king.

HAROLD. And love should know; and--be the

king so wise,--

Then Tostig too were wiser than he seems.

I love the man but not his phantasies.

_Re-enter_ TOSTIG.

Well, brother,

When didst thou hear from thy Northumbria?

TOSTIG. When did I hear aught but this '_When_' from thee?

Leave me alone, brother, with my Northumbria:

She is _my_ mistress, let _me_ look to her!

The King hath made me Earl; make me not fool!

Nor make the King a fool, who made me Earl!

HAROLD. No, Tostig--lest I make myself a fool

Who made the King who made thee, make thee Earl.

TOSTIG. Why chafe me then? Thou knowest I soon go wild.

GURTH. Come, come! as yet thou art not gone so wild

But thou canst hear the best and wisest of us.

HAROLD. So says old Gurth, not I: yet hear! thine earldom,

Tostig, hath been a kingdom. Their old crown

Is yet a force among them, a sun set

But leaving light enough for Alfgar's house

To strike thee down by--nay, this ghastly glare

May heat their fancies.

TOSTIG. My most worthy brother,

Thou art the quietest man in all the world--

Ay, ay and wise in peace and great in war--

Pray God the people choose thee for their king!

But all the powers of the house of Godwin

Are not enframed in thee.

HAROLD. Thank the Saints, no!

But thou hast drain'd them shallow by thy tolls,

And thou art ever here about the King:

Thine absence well may seem a want of care.

Cling to their love; for, now the sons of Godwin

Sit topmost in the field of England, envy,

Like the rough bear beneath the tree, good brother,

Waits till the man let go.

TOSTIG. Good counsel truly!

I heard from my Northumbria yesterday.

HAROLD. How goes it then with thy Northumbria?

Well?

TOSTIG. And wouldst thou that it went aught else than well?

HAROLD. I would it went as well as with mine earldom,

Leofwin's and Gurth's.

TOSTIG. Ye govern milder men.

GURTH. We have made them milder by just government.

TOSTIG. Ay, ever give yourselves your own good word.

LEOFWIN. An honest gift, by all the Saints, if giver

And taker be but honest! but they bribe

Each other, and so often, an honest world

Will not believe them.

HAROLD. I may tell thee, Tostig,

I heard from thy Northumberland to-day.

TOSTIG. From spies of thine to spy my nakedness

In my poor North!

HAROLD. There is a movement there,

A blind one--nothing yet.

TOSTIG. Crush it at once

With all the power I have!--I must--I will!--

Crush it half-born! Fool still? or wisdom there,

My wise head-shaking Harold?

HAROLD. Make not thou

The nothing something. Wisdom when in power

And wisest, should not frown as Power, but smile

As kindness, watching all, till the true _must_

Shall make her strike as Power: but when to strike--

O Tostig, O dear brother--If they prance,

Rein in, not lash them, lest they rear and run

And break both neck and axle.

TOSTIG. Good again!

Good counsel tho' scarce needed. Pour not water

In the full vessel running out at top

To swamp the house.

LEOFWIN. Nor thou be a wild thing

Out of the waste, to turn and bite the hand

Would help thee from the trap.

TOSTIG. Thou playest in tune.

LEOFWIN. To the deaf adder thee, that wilt not dance

However wisely charm'd.

TOSTIG. No more, no more!

GURTH. I likewise cry 'no more.' Unwholesome talk

For Godwin's house! Leofwin, thou hast a tongue!

Tostig, thou look'st as thou wouldst spring upon him.

St. Olaf, not while I am by! Come, come,

Join hands, let brethren dwell in unity;

Let kith and kin stand close as our shield-wall,

Who breaks us then? I say, thou hast a tongue,

And Tostig is not stout enough to bear it.

Vex him not, Leofwin.

TOSTIG. No, I am not vext,--

Altho' ye seek to vex me, one and all.

I have to make report of my good earldom

To the good king who gave it--not to you--

Not any of you.--I am not vext at all.

HAROLD. The king? the king is ever at his prayers;

In all that handles matter of the state

I am the king.

TOSTIG. That shall thou never be

If I can thwart thee.

HAROLD. Brother, brother!

TOSTIG. Away!

[_Exit_ TOSTIG.

QUEEN. Spite of this grisly star ye three must gall

Poor Tostig.

LEOFWIN. Tostig, sister, galls himself;

He cannot smell a rose but pricks his nose

Against the thorn, and rails against the rose.

QUEEN. I am the only rose of all the stock

That never thorn'd him; Edward loves him, so

Ye hate him. Harold always hated him.

Why--how they fought when boys--and, Holy Mary!

How Harold used to beat him!

HAROLD. Why, boys will fight.

Leofwin would often fight me, and I beat him.

Even old Gurth would fight. I had much ado

To hold mine own against old Gurth. Old Gurth,

We fought like great states for grave cause; but

Tostig--

On a sudden--at a something--for a nothing--

The boy would fist me hard, and when we fought

I conquer'd, and he loved me none the less,

Till thou wouldst get him all apart, and tell him

That where he was but worsted, he was wrong'd.

Ah! thou hast taught the king to spoil him too;

Now the spoilt child sways both. Take heed, take heed;

Thou art the Queen; ye are boy and girl no more:

Side not with Tostig in any violence,

Lest thou be sideways guilty of the violence.

QUEEN. Come fall not foul on me. I leave thee, brother.

HAROLD. Nay, my good sister--

[_Exeunt_ QUEEN, HAROLD, GURTH, _and_ LEOFWIN.

ALDWYTH. Gamel, son of Orm,

What thinkest thou this means? [_Pointing to the comet_.

GAMEL. War, my dear lady,

War, waste, plague, famine, all malignities.

ALDWYTH. It means the fall of Tostig from his earldom.

GAMEL. That were too small a matter for a comet!

ALDWYTH. It means the lifting of the house of Alfgar.

GAMEL. Too small! a comet would not show for that!

ALDWYTH. Not small for thee, if thou canst compass it.

GAMEL. Thy love?

ALDWYTH. As much as I can give thee, man;

This Tostig is, or like to be, a tyrant;

Stir up thy people: oust him!

GAMEL. And thy love?

ALDWYTH. As much as thou canst bear.

GAMEL. I can bear all,

And not be giddy.

ALDWYTH. No more now: to-morrow.

SCENE II.--IN THE GARDEN. THE KING'S HOUSE NEAR LONDON. SUNSET.

EDITH. Mad for thy mate, passionate nightingale....

I love thee for it--ay, but stay a moment;

_He_ can but stay a moment: he is going.

I fain would hear him coming!... near me ... near.

Somewhere--To draw him nearer with a charm

Like thine to thine.

(_Singing_.)

Love is come with a song and a smile,

Welcome Love with a smile and a song:

Love can stay but a little while.

Why cannot he stay? They call him away:

Ye do him wrong, ye do him wrong;

Love will stay for a whole life long.

_Enter_ HAROLD.

HAROLD. The nightingales in Havering-at-the-Bower

Sang out their loves so loud, that Edward's prayers

Were deafen'd and he pray'd them dumb, and thus

I dumb thee too, my wingless nightingale!

[_Kissing her_.