University of Virginia Library

Scene I.

The Queen's Closet. Queen alone.
QUEEN.
How great were man without his appetites—
The sensual impulses that brand our nature!
Then were we all intelligence like Angels;
And the enlarged developement of mind
Might grapple with eternal verities;
And virtue be, once more, a primal instinct.
[She takes a paper from a table.
—Why did I leave thee there—thou basilisk—
To fascinate mine eyes?—again I read thee—
O insult upon insult! shame on shame!
What gibbeted in ballads? get thee gone!
[Flings it aside.
Though 'twere the last time, Philip, we must meet:
And my despairing cry shall reach thee yet!

[Rests her head on the table.
Enter Margaret.
QUEEN.
Is it the King?—speak quickly—comes he not?

MARGARET.
The Chancellor; may it please you.

QUEEN.
It doth not please.
Yet hold—I must concentrate thought—recall him!—
This dreaming while awake is dangerous:
I must eschew it; or I shall act dreams;—
Enter Gardiner.
And so men think me mad—All postures tire.
I'll sit me down. This chamber is too small
For one long used to pace and muse. I love
To talk in exercise—come you from the King?—
Build me some gallery full of light and air—
Your purpose?—speak! speak! speak!

GARDINER
[kneeling].
With your permission,
A letter from the Pope, touching my lord
The Cardinal.

QUEEN.
The Cardinal?—fly, Margaret,
And call my friend. Wait till he come.
[Apart.]
This friendship
Doth like a thoughtful builder, course by course,
From a firm base upraise a superstructure
That should endure through time. The fiery passion
Without distinction feeds on flowers and weeds:
But friendship, is select, considerate;
Needs concord of the Reason—I am watched!
[Aloud.]
My lord of Winton, what do you here unbidden?

GARDINER.
I have stated, under pardon, that I hold
Despatches from his Holiness, wherein—

QUEEN.
Now I remember. But the Cardinal
Must be in presence. Bishops can backbite—welcome!
Enter Cardinal.
My hand—no! no! it smells of blood! good Man,
Thou shalt not kiss it!

CARDINAL.
Daughter, calm yourself:
Your pleasure? Good my lord of Winton, speak:
Hath any evil chanced?

GARDINER
[aside].
Missives from Rome;
Which touch your Eminence: she knows them not.

QUEEN.
Speak to your errand.

GARDINER.
May it please your Grace,
His Holiness, hereby, recalls the Legate;
And summons him to answer certain charges.

QUEEN.
What means the Pope? Are we not Queen? Forgets he
Our father? what!—recall the Cardinal,
Our cousin, counsellor; our leave unasked?

GARDINER.
The Cardinal Peyto shall attend your Grace,
Duly deputed with legantine powers.

QUEEN.
Who is this Peyto?—poor, Franciscan friar!—
Legate to us in place of royal Pole?
What is Pole's crime? the King he serves, and Us,
And People, as becomes an Englishman.
This Pope maltreats me. We have, in all things, laboured
To serve the Apostolick See. What dangers
Shall not this Pole's departure loose on England?
It is as though you took from a sick soul
Its best physician. Sir, he shall not go!

CARDINAL.
Some old spite rankles here. No Pope before
E'er dealt with trusted Legate thus. Some charge
Should be set forth, before recall. He knows not
A colourable fault, or he had named it.

QUEEN.
You shall not go—that's flat: nor Peyto come!
Without circumlocution tell them so.
Passion o' God! we'll not be trifled with!

CARDINAL.
My duty as a subject binds me here
To your Grace's will: but to his Holiness
Ecclesiastical subordination
Compels me to respect his interdict,
No more a legate.

QUEEN.
I will have no other.
Let's talk of something else. Lord Chancellor,
Touching this thing, remember we prohibit
The promulgation of the Papal Bull.
And now I do bethink me, let our Attorney
Enquire how far the Papal jurisdiction
Affects this realm. Methinks his Holiness
Hereafter more advisedly shall use us.
[Exit Gardiner and Pole.
No words upon't: retire!—O Margaret!
Sweet cousin, pity me! I am stung and scourged
With piled indignities. But—did not He—
My Saviour, meekly wear his thorny crown?
Why should I murmur?

MARGARET.
Madam, peruse his Word:
And it shall be thy comfort.

QUEEN.
Hush! you know not
All you dare think. Beneath the soul there sleep
The founts of a great Deep. Unseal them not—
Retire, fair girl: I long for silent thought.
[Exit Margaret.
[She paces about: then stops before a veiled picture.
To thee I turn; and not the Virgin Mother!
Forgive me, Heaven! thou canst not hear, O Philip,
My secret sighs: blind art thou to my weeping.
Yet I would kneel to thy insensate image,
And plead for pity. Never, never breathed
A wife more fond and faithful!

PHILIP
[entering.]
Wherefore thus?
Rise from thy grovelling—I help thee not.

QUEEN.
Great God of heaven! look down and judge!

PHILIP.
How, Madam?
Do you impeach me? what is your complaint?

QUEEN.
Strengthen me, Thou, Almighty One! for I
Am very weak and miserable.

PHILIP.
Well:
Ere I go hence, you have besought this visit.
My horse is at the gate, pawing the air;
Impatient, like his master, to be gone.
My sail is on the sea: fair blows the wind:
Prithee, detain me not.

QUEEN.
If not a heart,
Have you no conscience?

PHILIP.
For my confessor.
Alphonse de Castro looks to that.

QUEEN.
Yet, Sir,
You countenance the foreign ribaldries
That offer shame to our pure manners.

PHILIP.
Prude!
Go to! We, Southrons, know the hottest fires
Smoulder beneath the mountain capped with snow.
Vesuvian lava sleeps in English bosoms,
Pure though they seem.

QUEEN.
No such retort you ventured
To my chaste maiden, Lady Magdalene;
Who smote you, as a Dacre knows to smite,
When with licentious arm you clasped her waist.

PHILIP.
I warrant you an Amazon! I' faith!
My error was to judge her by her name;
Deeming she might have earned it.

QUEEN.
This to me?

PHILIP.
Ay, most discreet of dames! and what's to thee
The carriage of your ladies? watch your own.

QUEEN.
I guard my ladies' honour as mine own.

PHILIP.
Then guard yourself.

QUEEN.
I stand in the open day,
A Queen, a loyal wife, before all eyes.
While you, Sir, rove at night, and give occasion
For losel scandal.

PHILIP.
Ha! indeed?—who dares
Whisper of Philip to his wife?

QUEEN.
No whisper!
See here—a ballad jest—“How the King likes
The baker's daughter in her russet gown
Better than Queen Mary without her crown”—

PHILIP.
'Sdeath!—I could stab the knave who—

QUEEN.
Stab this heart—
No more your pillow. I would gladly die!

PHILIP.
Talk you thus, Madam, with the Cardinal?

QUEEN.
O, Philip! I have never breathed my grief
Into another ear.

PHILIP.
With Pole your counsels
Are long—and private.

QUEEN.
Truest—holiest friend!

PHILIP.
In Spain we hold these pious—counsellors,
Ticklish companions in a lady's chamber.

QUEEN.
What is your drift, my lord?

PHILIP.
O nothing—nothing!
I am not jealous of you, my good Queen:
Though you to me have hazarded plain words.
Nay, lady, 'tis not that I trust the nature
Of any woman: but I trust experience.
A fast of forty years is wholesome practice!

QUEEN.
Begone! I must bear insult—I am helpless—
But you pollute my chaste mind with your gibes.
It is enough. I know my fate. Begone!

PHILIP
[after regarding her for some time, scornfully].
For ever!

[He turns from her suddenly and goes.
QUEEN.
[alone].
I submit to God's decree!
Was it for this my maiden liberty
Was yielded?—to be spurned—despised—and still
Bear on without redress? O grief! O shame!
[She approaches the picture of Philip.
Back, silken folds! that hide what was my joy,
And is my torture! Back!—See, I have rent you—
False, senseless idol, from thy tinselled frame.
I wrench thee forth—I look on thee no more!
And thus—and thus—
[She tears up the picture.
I scatter thee from out
The desecrated temple of my heart!—
[A pause.
My brain is hot—this swoln heart chokes my throat.
Yet am I better thus than self-deceived.
Die, wretched Queen! O die, dishonoured wife!
I pant for the cold blessing of the grave!