University of Virginia Library

Scene IV.

—The Forest. Leofric carving a piece of wood. Wilfrith digging.
Leofric.
A horn!
Methinks the forest hath another use
These precious hours of morning, when the world
Is at some process of its perfecting
'Twere well to learn the trick of. Wilfrith toils,
Tearing yon fibre from the ground a-sweat
With effort; while for me!—my eyes are full;
I have no want; the world is excellent;
There is no prickle in the holly wrong.
How bossily it clusters! Fool to try
Reckon its notches;—a few sturdy twists
With strength of mid-rib chronicles the type—
The burly spread of the wall-building tree,
Its bristling leaves compact, well to the fore;
Behind, the rampart's azure secrecy.
Well, Wilfrith, are you satisfied?

Wilfrith.
If now
I might go in hot from my work and pray.
O brother, tell my father of my need.
I'm bidden to the cloister. What is wrong
Is in our souls; we suffer for our sins,
And must afflict ourselves.

Leofric.
Oh, do not think
We travel so untreasured in resource
We needs must earn the bread of every joy
By sweat of soul. If life 's a desert—ah!
There's manna in the waste; it lies about,
And the wise idle soul is satisfied.—
What is 't? An adder curled upon the bough?
You stare and shake.

[A spectre passes.
Wilfrith.
Brother, you saw it pass ... ?
A mist with bony outlines ... and an eye
Cross'd by a bloody streak.

Leofric.
Such often glide
About the coloured stems or twist around
The blank tree-shapes of midnight.

Wilfrith.
Oh, we live
Within accursèd bounds; the insolence
Of pleasure hath unsanctified the Church,
Unbuilt the home, ungirdled field from field,
And made this tract an uncouth wilderness
Where demons jeer and sooty spectres hunt
With flamy-visaged hounds. I must escape;
The very air is sinful.

Leofric.
In God's time
I'll range the dirty faces of these ghosts
About His tow'r, that men may see their foes
And know them. So I'll turn to righteousness
What poisons you. There's one that's half a cat,
With human eyes and howling fringe of teeth
About its monstrous yawn; one, rough and plump
As knarl upon an oak, is animate
With jollity; one hangs his fiendish jaw
Demure and lustful; one through chink of lid
Gloats on the holy sky. I've learnt them all,
And men shall see them in eternal stone,
And fear and watch.—Here wend no sprites of Hell,
Our uncle and our father.

[Enter Purkis and Godric.]
Wilfrith.
Grave and slow.

Godric.
My sons, my sons, the very Church herself
Gives but uncertain shelter. I am cast
Forth from my house of Twynham, sent to find
A strange asylum for my agèd grief.

Wilfrith.
Never!

Godric.
Alas! 'tis wicked Flambard's will,
That torch of God that brands on us our sins
With flaming judgment.

Wilfrith.
How my heart is sore!
There was sure healing in the holy place
You kept in righteousness across the bounds
Of this sin-blighted purlieu.

Godric.
Comfort lies
A placid child on every sorrow's breast;
It wakes to laugh us into hope again.
All will be well with me. I have no fear.
The homeless in their land are ever watched
By ministers of Grace. Take heart, my son.
At my entreaty, as my parting charge,
The new dean will receive you to the peace
And blessedness of holy brotherhood.

Purkis.
Ay, Wilfrith, never quake and hang your head.
For shame! Become the monk, lad, like a man.

Wilfrith.
I am unworthy. ...

Purkis.
Pooh, it was thy wish.
There's no brave muscle in that puny thought
That makes a man unworthy of his aim.

Wilfrith.
I cannot speak: good uncle, come to me;—
The ruined chapel—there I will give thanks.

[Exit.
Godric.
They think my church is mean; they have proud souls
That will not stoop in pray'r nor rise in chant
Save under mighty column and jagged arch.

Leofric.
The church to be re-built?

Godric.
And you are named
To work its stones to shape of beast and plant,
To twist the column, to endue the wall
With dragon's flinty scales.

Leofric.
I will transplant
The forest and its phantoms to the church.
I'll make our ivy's locked and solid stems
Grip and o'erspread the pillar.

[Enter Harold and Beowulf from another part of the forest.]
Purkis.
Grand-dad comes,
Half-fog, half-thundercloud his poor blurred face.
Why, Harold, you are hot.

Harold.
There's feast to-day
At Minstead; the good buck that Malf may carve
Once in the year is served. Heav'n choke the churl!

Purkis.
He ever loved good dishes. Have you heard
Flambard is lord of Twynham?

Leofric.
And the church
To be re-built.

Godric.
The canons dispossessed
Of the revenue.

Beowulf.
There they christened me—
In the old church of Twynham. It's washed out.

Harold.
Grandfather, do not mind your christening.
Edwin and Aldric both are dead
For shooting at a stag, like Malf, who now
Is chewing at his savoury haunch unhurt.
I loved them. Oh, the sweet, big, comely boys!
Such giants they were growing.

Godric.
Let us go
And learn if we may bury them.

Purkis.
Kind soul!

[Exeunt Godric, Purkis, and Leofric.
Beowulf.
The air has been a-milking; it smells sweet
As a lass fresh from the udders. The young trees
Shoot up; the king grows over-fond of it,
The fatal mazy place, Prince Richard's grave.
Ay, there's a noise of tears. What, Harold, lad!
[Feeling him.]
His sturdy hair.

Harold.
I'll take to woman's work.
To be a man has no significance.

Beowulf.
Eh! But there's change of weather in your voice.
Who suffers? Are they mutilated?

Harold.
What!
You have been deaf and imbecile? You're dull.
I've heard you eloquent.

Beowulf.
These troubles, lad,
Are over-pressing me; I'm like an old
O'erladen cart that cracks beneath the sheaves.
They put too much upon me. In the wood,
Under the oak-boughs they are hanging them?

Harold.
Oh, you have mighty memories to climb;
Away in the great passes you are safe.
There's no remembrance in my youth's routine,
No sweet denial for fair freedom's sake,
No passion-hoarding for the prodigal
Spendthrift fulfilment of a great desire;
No fine asperities of hope, no thrill,
Awe, and exhilaration of a joy
That toils a-hung'ring towards its blessedness.
You cannot know the pang, the helpless love
For my own England that has cast me off,
That will not have me live or die for her.
What is one's country? The sole woman-child,
Rosy and prattling daughter of a Past
Too winnowed in experience, too grave
For blood's desire to mix with reverence;
While she, in tender prime, no grace of youth
Awanting to her, ravishes the heart,
And teaches wisdom in the ecstasy
Of nuptial consummation. Oh, to breathe
The name that she hath taught with her own lips,
To know it is the Norman's heritage,
To know that she herself will change! Before
She plays the harlot, I will seal my soul
From agony; the beasts in spotted heaps
I'll slay, and cast their corpses o'er the fence
Of Malf, the Saxon guardian of the deer.
I'll rot before his eyes, hung on the oak
That branches toward his door. I'll spoil the edge
Of his slave's appetite. Minstead no more
Shall cook and eat its mess of felon's meat;
There shall be some recoil.

[Breaks through the boughs.
Beowulf.
He'll put it down,
This fattening on the people's provender.
There's nothing done except at cost of life.
My lad ...
His voice rang free, a bird upon the wing,
The lark's victorious pinion in the trill
Of his young note. The linnets on the twig
Jar me with insect twitter. By-and-by
I'll sit beside the gallows; I've the time.

[Exit.