I know it, ah! too well-nor madly dote.
That eloquence, the self-same burning words
That seize the awe-struck soul, when weakest, thrill'd
Her vainly-deaf averted ears-Oh, Heaven!
I thank thee that I cursed her not, nor him.
Jane Seymour, like a sister did I deem thee;
But what of that? Thou 'rt heaven-ordain'd to visit
Her sins upon the head of her that dared
To love, to wed another's lord. Mayst thou
Ne'er know the racking anguish of this hour,
The desolation of this heart! But thou,
Oh! thou, my crime, my madness! thou on whom
The loftiest woman had been proud to dote,
Had he been master of a straw-roof'd cottage!
Was 't just to awe, to dazzle the young mind,
That deem'd its transport loyal admiration,
Submissive duty all, till it awoke
And found it thrilling, deepest woman's love!
Too late, too early disabused-would Heaven
That I were still abused! Long, long I've felt
Love's bonds fall one by one from thy pall'd heart.
Oh! the fond falsehoods of my credulous soul!
War, policy, religion, all the cares
Of kingdoms, Europe's fate within thy hands,
I pleaded to myself to justify
Thy cold estrangement.
Well, 't is o'er, and I
Must sit alone on my cold eminence,
All women's envy, mine own scorn and pity.
And all the sweetness of these virgin lips,
And all the pureness of this virgin bosom,
And all the fondness of this virgin heart,
Forgotten, turn'd to scorn-perchance to loathing.
Heaven! was no way but this, and nope but He
To scourge this guilty heart? Thy will be done.
I've still a noble Father, and a Brother,
And, Powers of grace! my Mother-kill her not,
Break not her heart,-for sure it will break to hear it.
My child, my child, thou only wilt not feel it:
Thy parent o'er thy face may weep, nor thou
Be sadder for her misery; thou wilt love me
Though thy false father scorn and loathe.
Mother-
Oh! ne'er before would I have fled thy presence:
Betray me not, my tear-swoln eyes.
QUEEN, LADY WILTSHIRE.
I come to task thy goodness: thou must use
That witching influence none e'er resists; That, with a sweet and pardonable treason,
The power! thou'st ever been The rainbow o'er the awful throne. The King,
Makes the King's Grace thy slave, nor leaves him That lives but in thy presence, ne'er disdain'd
To think or speak but at thy pleasure
Each word wrings blood from my torn heart.
There never lived who could refuse thee aught;
For thou wert never known to ask amiss.
But, thou 'rt all tears.
Thy righteous supplication. Oh! great Queen,
Our cause, the Gospel cause, the cause of Christ,
Is spotted o'er with shame. Rude sacrilege
Usurps the name of godly Reformation,
And revels in the spoil of shrine and altar.
Men have cast down the incensed heathenish image
To worship with more foul idolatry
The gold of which 't was wrought; and all the blood
The too relentless Law for Treason sheds,
Attaints our blameless faith of direst cruelty.
QUEEN (aside).
More woe, more woe-to know these holy hopes,
This noble trust, misplaced and frustrate all!
Your Grace o'ervalues our poor influence,
Such as it is.
LADY WILTSHIRE.
The King!
I'll know the worst.
Dear mother, leave us. Come contempt or shame,
She must not witness it: but he the rather
Will seek to compensate the heart's deep wrongs
By outward graciousness. Wretch, wretch myself,
I may relieve the wretchedness of others :-
Be 't as it may, the world shall never know
Through me the secret of his sin, his falsehood,
But deem him by my love the gentlest husband
As the most noble Monarch upon Earth.
Refuse our mandate-shut their Abbey gates
Against our Pursuivants-refuse our oaths-
Now, by St. Paul, not one of them shall wear
His shaven crown on his audacious shoulders!
CRANMER.
Your Majesty will hear your faithful servant.
I'll none of it-their heads or their allegiance.
God's death! have all our Parliament and Peers,
Our Rev'rend Bishops, given their hands and seals,
And shall we thus be mock'd and set at nought
By beggarly and barefoot monks? Archbishop,
Out of our love to thine own reverend person,
We do refuse thy most unwise petition.
Good foolish man, not one of them but urged
What the King gives, the King may take away-
Who raised up one from dust, may raise another.
Look to thyself, I say-thou mayst have cause;
Look, and be wise-be humble. For your Grace
We've business in our Council-not a word-
Our Queen's our subject still.
The flower of the world's chivalry, most courtly
Where met the splendour of all courts! When Europe
Sent its three Sov'reigns to that Golden field,
Who won all eyes with liberal noble bearing?
Who charm'd all ears with high and gracious speech?
Who made all hearts his slaves by inbred worth
But English Henry? by his pattern all
Moved, spoke, rode, tilted, shaped their dress, their
language,
And he that most resembled England's King
Was kingliest in the esteem of all. This he
That lay whole hours before my worshipp'd feet,
Making the air melodious with his words?
So fearful to offend, having offended
So fearful of his pardon, not myself
More jealous of my maiden modesty ;
The bridegroom of my youth, my infant's Father!
Ah! me, my rash and inconsiderate speech,
My pride, hath wrought from his too hasty nature
This shame upon mine head: he 'll turn, he 'll come
My prodigal back to mine heart—if not,
I'm born his subject, sworn before high Heaven
His faithful wife; then let him cast me from him,
Spurn, trample me to dust-the foe, the stranger
That owns no law of kindred, blood, or duty,
Is taught, where every word is Heaven's own truth,
To love where most he 's hated. I will live
On the delicious memory of the past,
By that old Priest of the Seven Hills would burn us, And bless him so for my few years of bliss,
Body and soul. We'll have no Kings but one,
None but ourself.-Tut. not a word. How now?
What, Nan? what blank? what all a mort? Thy jests.
And thy quaint sayings, and thy smiles—
My lips shall find no time for harsh reproach;
I'll be as one of those sweet flowers that, crush'd
By the contemptuous foot, winds closer round it,
And breathes in every step its richest odours.
I have; with zeal so fatal, with success
So manifest, mine inmost soul recoils
At the base service.
In Lady Wingfield's hand?
LADY ROCHFORD.
Inexorable!-must I show no mercy?
The fangs of Conscience tearing at thy heart,
Thy tossing, feverish, spectre-staring midnights,
Would seem remission, peace, delight to years
Interminable-
LADY ROCHFORD.
Oh! my soul! my soul!
And I have taught thee how to merit favour
From those to whom the eternal keys are given-
Tinged your black desperation with the hue
Good! good! Of hope-Away! back to thy duty-watch!
And those who weigh in the everlasting scales
Service against rebellion, and obedience
Against transgression, may at length strike down
The balance, and pronounce thee what thou darest
Must crime be still atoned by crime? Oh! think,
She is my husband's sister-his, the bridegroom
Of my fond youth—
Ha! what need of words to thee,
That readst the inmost depths of this dark heart
More clearly than myself—I hate that husband,
For that I've injured him so deeply; hate
Her virtue that reproaches mine own shame :
But yet to slander her pure fame-
Erewhile you doubted her yourself.
Oh! her voice-it will not cease-
It sounds within my ears, within my heart.
And thou, my harp once loved, but now a treasure
Which kingdoms will not buy; of her sweet tones
Thou 'It keep the perfume, as the Arabian air
The smell of spices.
Mark, thou 'rt strangely moved
Speak to me-keep from her no jealous secret,
From her who loves thee with so whole a heart:
Nor thy unkindness, were 't in thy soft nature-
Nor-sorrows, they would but endear thee more-
Nor even thy sins, if that way I could fear thee-
Could e'er estrange-
The Queen! the Queen! my sister
She sent for me-she made me sit before her.
As my hand trembled on my lute, she smiled
With gracious playfulness-oh! what a store
Of precious memories I've treasured up-
Look, motion, word, like relics have I shrined them
In the heart's sanctuary, where all my thoughts
Shall come in daily pilgrimage devout
Till I am dust and clay. I miserable,
With such a refuge! sinful, with the power
Of her controlling holiness about me!
Oh! brother, brother, my misgiving heart
Recoils, it knows not why, from words that sound
Like dangerous profanation: I have forsworn
All love but that of holiest cloister'd maids
Before the bleeding crucifix; but yet
I feel that there is sin in thy wild language,
Sin, no less deep in thought because in deed
Impossible.-Lo! Father Angelo.
This awful man again!-must we ne'er meet
But his appalling look, inscrutable
Yet scrutinizing all, must cite to judgment
Each passing thought, each word, each wish
Do any but the guilty dread the presence
Of holiest men? He comes to visit here
The mother of my youth, whose outcast age
Hath none but me, of all our scatter'd convent,
To smooth her dying pillow, watch her wants;
And none but Father Angelo t' attend her,
So constantly as though no soul but hers
Needed his zealous function.
Our prophecies fall true-thou 'rt i' the sunshine.
Last eve, I ask not, if the dangerous song
Beseem'd a son of Holy Church—that sin
Be theirs, not thine.
That take in charge th' eternal souls of men
No ways of knowledge to the vulgar eye
Inscrutable, our task were ill fulfill'd.
So tell me, youth, and look that thou speak truth,
Truth to the word, the letter, even the tone-
Fell no peculiar private passages,
Nor word, nor sign, nay, nor familiar motion,
Emphatic tone, nor more expressive pause,
Between thyself and the Queen's Grace?
Of note scarce higher in her royal court
Than thou in England's-so, once more beware.
There is no price man's enemy will not pay
For one immortal soul. Now, the good Abbess-
Daughter, advance-how fares it with your charge!
Sir, longing for your presence, as the blind
For light your holy words breathe deeper calmness
O'er all her frame, than medicine's opiate drugs;
Her only fear of death is lest she want
Your parting benediction.
Will he not warn me not to wing the air,
Lest I should fly too near the parching Sun,
And shrivel into dust ?-To doubt his wisdom
Were to impeach man's general estimate;
T'arraign his charity would give the lie
To a whole life of painful sanctity,
And slur th' anointed Priesthood with contempt.
Yet her of her to speak, to think, t'imagine
Less than the purest, chastest, holiest, best—
An Angel, but without an Angel's wings,
Lest, weary of this tainting world, she fly
Untimely to her native skies; and I,
A poor, unknown, a homeless, friendless boy-
The more I think the wilder grow my thoughts,
And every thought is stamp'd with her bright image;
She is my world of fantasy, each sound
Is as her voice, each gleam of light her look,
And midnight hath no vision but of her.
SIR HENRY NORREYS, SIR FRANCIS WESTON, SIR WILLIAM BRERETON, MARK SMEATON.
Your Majesty will grace the tilt to-day?
The King so wills it: mine obedience rather Than mine own humour sways my choice.
I had dared To hope that he, your Grace has deign'd to name Your Knight, being Champion of the ring, your Highness
Had given him victory by your presence.
Trust me, I wish thee all that proud success Thy valour and thy truth deserve.
Is triumph-and my vaunting adversaries Are strewn already at my feet.
The deepest, darkest, most infuriate pit,
Th' abyss of all abysses, blackest blackness,
Where that most damning sin, the damning others,
With direst, most remorseless expiation,
Howls out its drear eternity, arouse
The myriad voices of your wailing; loud
As when the fleshly Luther, or the chief
Of his cursed crew have one by one gone down
To tread your furnace chambers!-Rise! prepare
The throne of fire, the crown of eating flames!
She comes-the Queen, the fatal Queen, whose beauty
Hath been to England worse, more full of peril,
Than Helen's was to Troy, hath seal'd for death,
For death eternal, irremediable,
Whole generations of her godless sons,
And made her stately church a heap of ruin!
I am no heretic: why keep me thus Upon the rack?
When slightest accidents Lead to effects that change the doom of nations, Dost thou not read the visible hand of Heaven? GARDINER.
Why then behold-adore it! My Lord, we're wise and politic, but yet
A foolish kerchief falling to the ground
Shall more advance our high and righteous cause
Than months of subtlest craft.
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Within the tilt-yard, not to take delight
Carnal, unpriestly, in the worldly pageant:
Though, Heaven forgive me! when the trumpets blew,
And the lists fell, and Knights as brave, and full
Of valour as their steeds of fire, wheel'd forth,
And moved in troops or single, orderly
As youths and maidens in a village dance,
Or shot, like swooping hawks, in straight career;
The old Caraffa rose within my breast-
Struggled my soul with haughty recollections
Of when I rode through the outpour'd streets of Rome,
Enamouring all the youth of Italy
With envy of my noble horsemanship.
But I rebuked myself, and thought how Heaven
Had taught me loftier mastery, to rein
And curb with salutary governance
Th' unmanaged souls of men. But to our purpose;
Even at the instant, when all spears were levell'd,
And rapid as the arblast bolt, the Knights
Spurr'd one by one to the ring, when breathless leant
The Ladies from their galleries-from the Queen's
A handkerchief was seen to fall; but while
Floating it dallied on the air, a Knight,
Sir Henry Norreys, as I learnt, stoop'd down,
Caught, wreath'd it in his plume, regain'd his spear,
And smote right home the quivering ring: th' acclaim
Burst forth like roaring waters, but the King
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