University of Virginia Library

Scene I

—Holyrood; a distant apartment: Mary Seton and Mary Livingstone
Mary Seton
She is changed
As the dead change the morning and the eve
Of the first day. I bent to take her hood,
When we received her at the Castle-gate
After her guarded journey from Dunbar,—
Then dropped my hands and left her.

Mary Livingstone
Noisily
The earl dismissed us, with his truculent
And frowning carriage. Fast he drove his business,
And, being new-divorced from Lady Jane,
Announced himself the bridegroom of our queen,
With threats compelled the kirk to read their banns;
Then spent two straining hours of trouble lost
To win the English queen's ambassador
To look upon their union; at the council
He sat as king—

Mary Seton
Our mistress puts her hand
To any paper, will remit and pardon
The worst offences with a face as dull
And unconcerned as if men's good and evil
Were one to her.

Mary Livingstone
My rebel eloquence
Has kept the palace ringing with her wrong;
Traquair and Erskine listen with a blush
Across their brows, and Lady Lethington
Hints there will be deliverance. Could I fan you
Into my flame!

Mary Seton
I saw her first again
When late in afternoon she made him Duke
Of Orkney and the Shetlands, on the vigil
Of her reputed marriage-day. She gave
Her head a sportive and capricious arch,
As she were playing queenship and no queen;
Yet, when he entered, with a heaving bosom
She kept her ground so regnantly he bent
Irresolute, subjected.

Mary Livingstone
He is careful
To show the deference of bonnet off:
She laughs, I verily believe she laughs
When he uncovers.

Mary Seton
But the marriage-day!
There is no midnight in these summer nights;
It was not one o'clock when I awoke
To dress her for the dismal rites of dawn;
And, thridding the white darkness to her door,
Swung open ’gainst the bed, I found her wrapt
In her black widow's weeds from head to foot,
But yet apparelled in a sort of joy
That frightened me. To-day there will be feast
I broke out, prompted to the erring word:
Then she, the strangeness in her eyes and lips
Of one who is admonished to his death,
Answered, To-day there is no festival.
Where the tree falleth, Marie, it must lie;
It falls to northern dolour, stricken north—
Inclining south, to life and blessedness.
Thus in no jewels but her shining tears
She passed to her mock marriage.

Mary Livingstone
Worst of all
Was her consent to marry Protestant,
With preaching, not the mass.

Mary Seton
She took no heed
Of anything they said, and when the sermon
Was ended, as a creature from its sleep
Rises to wander through the night, with eyes
Vacant, unflickering, fearful, she stood up,
And paced of her own motion through the door.
No games nor any pastime! Not a flower
Was gathered to breathe forth its parable
Of Hymen's hours o'maying. Nature seemed
To turn aside, man to recoil, and time
To slight the circumstance. The very stars
Shone round the sky like candles at a wake.
Could you have borne it?

Mary Livingstone
Not as she has done;
But then she is a queen, and by surrender
She saves her title's honour—so was lofty
Through all the farce, and, withering at its rites,
She yet adorned them. How these Protestants
Have wrecked her like an abbey, and enslaved
Her altar to their schism, and yet she draws
Around such blasphemies compulsive grace
Lent by the true religion. Policy,
Great pride, and custom—not her conscience—vouched
This marriage; it will be annull'd, and then,
Sweet name-fellow, we two shall find a place
Beside her first approachable distress,
So much we love her still.

Mary Seton
So much? Ah, more,
With sorer love. If I might take her soul
And shroud it tight forever from her God!
He must not see her tarnish.—And these things
Are prattle of the court.

Mary Livingstone
Our earls and nobles
Troop northward to the cradle of the prince,
And arm themselves at Stirling.

Mary Seton
There is wrath
That does not move abroad as vengeance doth,
But perfects wickedness until it drop:
’Tis so she must be loosened of her curse.