University of Virginia Library

ACT IV.

SCENE I.

The Lists at Greenwich, prepared for a Tournament. Flourish. Enter King Henry, Queen Anne, Lords, Ladies, Attendants, Men-at-arms, etc. The King and Queen seat themselves under the cloth of state. Then enter the lists Viscount Rochford and other Knights, as Challengers, with Heralds, Squires, Pages, etc. Trumpets sound a challenge. To them enter Sir Henry Norris and other knights, as Defenders, with Attendants, etc. Flourish. Rochford, Norris, and their respective Knights, engage. Norris and his party are driven back.
Queen Anne.
I pray your highness, let them breathe a while;
Their sport grows earnest. Ill may come of this:
Rochford is dangerous when his blood is up.

King Henry.
Poh! poh! mere bruises. Would you rather see
Rochford or Norris wounded?

Queen A.
Neither, neither!—
Good sir, 't is frightful.

King H.
Ha! so kind to both?
Then love admits not of relationship.

Queen A.
Sound, herald, sound!

(Trumpets sound a retreat, and the combat ceases.)
King H.
Now, by the holy rood!
[Starts up.]
If we were speechless, Heaven had been most kind
In sending one to exercise our function.

Queen A.
I feared, my liege—

King H.
O, this is nothing new:
You have governed England, me amongst the rest,
Since God knows when!—You thing of painted cloth,
When next you blow without your king's command,
Look to your tabard.—Is our queen our tongue?
[Queen Anne, in her terror, drops her handkerchief. Norris picks it up, kisses, land returns it.]
Monstrous, by Jove! What, in our very presence!—
Shameless adulteress! Let the tilt be stopped!
We are as patient as most ill-used men,
But this we cannot bear. Set on, before!
Was ever king thus openly defied?

[Exit with Courtiers]
Queen A.
O! horror, horror!

[She faints, and is borne off.]
Rochford.
Norris, did I hear?
Or am I singled from among you all,
To bear the terrors of this fantasy?

Norris.
Alas! your senses serve too faithfully:
Would I could doubt you sane!

(Enter Thomas Wyatt, hastily.)
Wyatt.
Fly, Rochford, fly!
And you, Sir Henry Norris, if you 'd live.

Nor.
I fly! and wherefore?

Wyatt.
Ask not, but away—
Away to Scotland; nor till every inch
Of English ground has vanished from your sight,
Draw rein or spare the spur!

Roch.
O! I am stunned
With mere intensity of present grief;
No after blow, that cuts my torpid soul
Loose from its clay, can bear a pang for me!
I will not fly to live. I have beheld
A sight to force me into league with death—
The most unkingly, meanest, foulest deed
That brother's eyes e'er saw.

Wyatt.
Now 't is too late.

(Enter an Officer and Guard.)
Officer.
Lord Rochford and Sir Henry Norris, yield;
I do arrest you for high treason, sirs.
Give up your arms, and follow to the Tower.

Roch.
Yes, yes. Come, Norris; for I make no doubt
What was our virtue has become our guilt:
Love to the queen is treason to the king.
When the great fall the little must be crushed.

Nor.
Wyatt, what means this? I accused of treason!

Wyatt.
Ay, 't is a royal charge!

Nor.
Ha! say you so?
Had you this order from his majesty,
Or from the Council?

[To the Officer.]
Offi.
From the king direct.
Come, gentlemen; my office stands in peril
By my indulgence to you.

Roch.
Farewell, Wyatt!

Nor.
My lord, be not down-hearted. This affair
Will soon blow over.

Roch.
Yes, to other men;
But I much fear that on my latest day
It will have reached its climax.

Offi.
Come, sirs, come!

Wyatt.
Heaven send your innocence a quick release!

Roch.
With death to bear the warrant.

[Exeunt Rochford, Norris, Officer, and Guard.]
Wyatt.
So I fear,
Doomed victims of a ruthless tyranny.
O, coming shape of English liberty,
Have my desires played wanton to mine ears;
Or do I hear the faint prophetic sound
Of thy approaching footsteps echoing through
The mists of coming time? Ye noble souls,
Grim heroes of the field of Runnymede,
Showing more glorious in your iron arms,
On peaceful deeds, than in successful wars—
Inspire the souls of your too slothful race!
Must all the liberty your courage won
Slip from the hands to which you rendered it;
Till the supineness of our base neglect
Sink us to slaves? Is there no man alive—
No heaven-marked hero, from the people sprung—
To lead the roaring multitudes of earth
Along the fated pathway they must tread,—
Ay, though they cross the throne, and trample out
The sacred name and dignity of king?
Has man no rights but what a tyrant doles?—
No fate above his will? no claim on justice?
Then doth God wrong His own dread sovereignty,
And free us from allegiance. And she has fallen,
Sole star amid this night of tyranny!
How low I know not; but what eye e'er saw
The falling star remount and shine again?
I feel my weakness to support her cause,
Against this pampered monster of a king—
This frightful idol of the people's will,
Throned on the superstitious reverence
Of the poor fools that glut his savage maw.
O, what a curse to have an honest heart,
Hemmed in and cramped by the fixed frame of things,
That, were it free, might move the stubborn world,
And hang its glories on the brow of time!

[Exit.]

SCENE II.

A Room in the Palace of Whitehall. Enter King Henry.
King Henry.
Too late, too late! I charged her openly;
The issue now lies between her and me,
And not between her innocence and guilt.
I am a villain, or the queen is false,
Since I became accuser of her truth:
If she escape conviction, on the crown
Descends the infamy of calumny,
And through our person England will be shamed
Before the jealous powers of Christendom.
So, so! we owe it to our people, then,
To prove our charge, or by conviction sure
Seem to attest it.—This is plain enough.
Besides, in what regard stands common life
Before our kingly honor? Julius said
That Cæsar's wife must be without a taint;
And, but suspecting, put Pompeia by.—
Wise Cæsar! 't was a solemn precedent
That kings should follow. Wherefore halt I now?
A limping purpose never reached its mark,
Though justice pointed. Should her guilt be proved?—
Should an impartial court of noble peers
Condemn her too? O, woful, woful thought!
How shall I pardon her gross treachery?
Their candid verdict will stop pity's ears,
And force conviction to my doubting mind.
She shall have trial, fair and open trial—
No honest men would wrong the innocent;
And if they do?—her blood but swells their crimes;
I escape stainless.
(Enter Sir Henry Norris in custody of Officer and Guard.)
Officer, withdraw;
But stand in hail. (Exeunt Officer and Guard.)
Ah! Norris, Henry Norris,
You have abused that open confidence
In which we held you.

Norris.
I! and how, my liege?

King H.
Nay, strive not, sir, to hide your secret guilt
With artful candor and affected starts.
Sin can put on the guise of innocence;
Nor ever cheats us with its ugliness,
But with its seeming beauty.

Nor.
On my life,
I know not to what sin your tongue directs.

King H.
Have you not wronged me?

Nor.
Wronged your majesty!

King H.
Yes; have you not, to swell your amorous triumphs,
And make yourself an envied libertine,
Seduced the virtue of our fickle queen?

Nor.
Your grace is merry. [Laughing.]


King H.
Merry! are you mad?
I say it can be proved.

Nor.
Proved! Set the hound
That howled this lying folly in your ears
Within the reach of my chastising sword,
And if I send him not to fiery hell,
With his foul tattle warm upon his lips,
Rack me to powder!

King H.
Acted to the life!

Nor.
O, no, my liege; 't is but the natural heat
That would boil over every English lip,
To hear their queen traduced.

King H.
Be calm, Sir Harry.
So much we hold the honor of our realm
Before the vengeance due to private wrongs,
That we have vowed to bury our own grief,
And grant free pardon to whatever man—
Even though he were her fondest paramour—
Will fix the crime upon her guilty head.

Nor.
I am not he. I thought, until this hour,—
Ay, and still think, and will, despite report,—
Our queen as loyal to your majesty
As the chaste moon is to her regal sun,
Drinking no other beams. What though she shine
Upon the darkness of our grateful earth,
To cheer the spirits of night-foundered men?—
That which she gives, she borrows from yourself;
Fruitful to her, but, when it falls on us,
The calm, cold splendor of reflected light.

King H.
Norris, beware! you carry this too far:
If you confess not, instant, shameful death
Awaits your stubborn spirit.

Nor.
Be it so:
I'll rather add a thousand stings to death,
Than give one pang to suffering innocence.

King H.
Then be it so, you contumacious boy!
Have I embraced you in my trusting heart,
To be denied when I demand return?

Nor.
Ha! do I hear? What saw your majesty,
Even in so poor a man as Henry Norris,
To make you hold me for a supple tool
To work your bloody purpose? You must go
A step below a knight and gentleman,
To find a villain fitted to your wish.

King H.
Poh! poh! coy virtue, is it villanous
To show obedience when your king commands?

Nor.
Is there no power in every honest breast,
Above the terrors of your threatening will,
'Neath whose fixed look my guilty memory
Shall cower in horror?

King H.
You must do this deed.—
Nay, I adjure you.

Nor.
O, my gracious liege—

King H.
No words, no words!

Nor.
Avaunt, damned hypocrite!
I here defy your utmost reach of wrath:
The cruelest death, your wickedness can shape,
Would be a joy to what you offer me.
Stretch your base tortures through all coming time,
And in the end they can but kill my clay;
But you would turn my hand to impious use,
And make me, like a frantic suicide,
Stab at the life of my eternal soul—
That, by God's blessing, shall outlast your hate,
And reign triumphant when your crown is dross!

King H.
Hold, villain, hold! or I will let the breath
Out of your treacherous body! [Draws.]


Nor.
Do, my liege,
And join assassination to the crimes
That blot your monstrous heart.—I will not hold:
I see you are bent upon destroying me,
And, as a reckless man, I'll know your worst.
O, woe to England, when this sinful king,
Grown hard in crime, shall reach the fearful height
That evil points him! Then shall—

King H.
Brazen traitor!
Dare you invoke our vengeance on your head?
Without, there! (Reënter Officer and Guard.)
See your prisoner to the Tower.
If he escape, you 'd better hang yourselves
Than live to tell it. Out, malignant traitor!
[Exit Sir Henry Norris, in custody of the Guard.]
O, the ingratitude of fickle man!
The shifting sand that tumbles in the tide,
Taking new form from every wanton surge,
Is not more changeful than his rootless heart.
He is a bark upon an angry sea,
Unballasted, yet ever crowding sail;
Careening now to passion's fiery gust,
Now to the other side prostrated flat
By self-styled reason's icy hurricane;
Yet never sailing on an even keel—
Ever extreme, and no extreme the best.
Who that had seen the favors I have showered,
As thick and prodigal as Spring's warm sun,
Upon the head of that remorseless wretch,
Could have foreknown the desert barrenness
Of his rude heart!—Pah! I am sick of it.
O, the ingratitude of wicked man!

[Exit.]

SCENE III.

The Queen's Apartments in the Palace. Queen Anne and Mary Wyatt.
Queen Anne.
No audience, said you?

Mary Wyatt.
None, your highness, none.

Queen A.
But are you sure his majesty refused
To read my letter?

Mary W.
Very sure; or whence
The new-sprung insolence of every groom?
They passed me by, for nigh a weary hour,
Without observance. When at length I spoke,
Demanding audience in your highness' name,
They almost thrust me from the ante-room,
With taunts and sneers. One knave, a malpert page,
By you presented to his majesty,
Said, with his arms akimbo, in a style
That mimicked the king's bearing, “Mistress Mary,
When we desire to know of blubbering spells,
At your sad corner of our merry house,
We'll come to seek them;—till that time, adieu!”
At this his fellows grinned, like tickled apes,
And winked, and leered at me; till I, abashed—
More that such things were human, than for fear
Of any shame their insults might provoke—
Came sadly here, my mission unachieved.

Queen A.
I blame you not: I trusted in your zeal.
Knowing its failure set all hope aside
Save that which harbors in myself. Must I
Again go begging for his chary love,
After the public shame he put me to?
Must I go whimpering like a stricken cur—
I who am wronged, and should demand redress—
And pray, in mercy to my feebleness,
This blow may be the last? Degrading thought!
Were I the housewife of his lowest clown,
Caned to obedience by a drunkard's hand,
My woman's heart has in it pride enough
To burst ere bear this last humility.

Mary W.
If pity move him—

Queen A.
Pity! there 's a shame,
More fearful in its furious rebuke,
That follows threatening on the heels of wrong—
An earthly hell in which the conscience writhes,
And lashes round its fiery barrier,
Till suffering purify the tortured soul;—
This he must feel, ere meek-eyed Pity's hand
Will ope the silver gates of penitence,
And through forgiveness show the way to peace.

Mary W.
O, may he feel it!

Queen A.
Feel it! he is human.

Mary W.
Yes; but before some heavier injury
Make pity useless.

Queen A.
Pray, speak plainly, girl!
I see your heart is full with mystery.
What new misfortune is about to fall?

Mary W.
None, as I hope.

Queen A.
Nay, this is churlishness:
You have some secret that may profit me.
If I am ignorant of coming ills,
How shall I guard me with expedients
Against their wrath? The man by death assailed
Is last to know the danger he is in.
I make no doubt, but half the palace lackeys
Have drawn a surer presage of my fate,
From buzzing rumor, could more truly tell
What will befall me for a year to come,
Than I, with my own lot to outward seeming
Within my grasp, could compass by design.
So hangs our fate upon the breath of all,
That oft a rumor shapes the destiny
Of feeble wills.

Mary W.
'T would but fatigue your ears,
Not profit you, to hear the thousand woes
That fools predict upon your majesty:
But there 's much comfort in the croak of folly.

Queen A.
O, merely thus? naught in particular?
Well, let them rail; the gale is adverse now,
I must expect this dash of saucy spray
Full in my face: anon the wind will change;
Then they'll come tripping to my very heels,
Sparkling with joy, and glad to decorate
My rearward path.

Mary W.
Heaven guard your cheerful mind!

Queen A.
Actions begun in cheerfulness display
The merry herald that foreruns success.
The smile that lights an earnest countenance
Seems as a gleam from some vast mental fire
That burns within, and ever flashes out,
Like tropic lightning on a summer night;
Harmless, indeed, yet hinting of a power
That, moved to wrath, might shake the seated earth
To sulk at sorrow dulls the edge of will,
And half unfits us for prosperity;
Much more for danger, where each faculty
That gives us sway is needed at its full.

Mary W.
When took your highness to philosophy?

Queen A.
Ha! you malicious elf! When heavy griefs
First leaguered my poor heart, through it I found
A path to wander from perplexing fears
That lost in speculation dismal self.
Sorrow makes many a deep philosopher.

Mary W.
Great minds may carry a great load unbowed.
Ah, me! it brings me to my woman's part,
To hear these strains of sweet philosophy
Rise from her injured spirit. (Aside, weeping.)
Sure the God
Who suffers mischief to afflict you thus,
Gives you the strength to bear it.

Queen A.
Doubtless, doubtless.

(Enter Thomas Wyatt.)
Mary W.
My brother, please you.

[Retires.]
Queen A.
Ah! good master Wyatt,
What news abroad? Why do you shake your head?
Why wear that funeral face? It seems to me
That all my friends would plunder me of grief.
Came you alone? Where are my other friends?

Wyatt.
Gone with the summer flies. The day is dark;
And they that erewhile revelled in your light,
Now sluggish hide in close obscurity,
And prophesy of falling weather soon.

Queen A.
But Rochford? he is true in sun or shade.

Wyatt.
Ay, by my soul! And know you not?

Queen A.
Not I.

Wyatt.
Indeed?—That I should bear the intelligence!

Queen A.
These dread inductions to ill-omened news,
Pitch swift imagination far below
The heaviest fact. Out with it, tender sir!
What ever saw you like a fear in me?

Wyatt.
Lodged in the Tower.

Queen A.
A prisoner! on what charge?

Wyatt.
A charge as common now as larceny,—
High treason.

Queen A.
Treason! who is loyal, then?
O! what a shallow matter for arrest!
Poor Rochford!—This is strange.—How bears he it?

Wyatt.
As innocence e'er bears calamity,—
Suffering in body, but content at heart.

Queen A.
I'll to the king. Are not my wrongs enough,
But that my foes must vex my kindred too?
For Rochford's sake, I'll quell my stubborn pride,
And ask the justice I deny myself.

Wyatt.
Ah! would you might! See you yon sentinel
Who counts his steps along the corridor?
That knave has orders from his majesty,
On no account to let your highness pass.

Queen A.
Good sir, what augurs this? I feel it here—
Here at my heart—a quaking like the step
Of some advancing doom. 'T is terrible,
To be environed by an enemy
Whose very aims are hidden. Give me light!
O, Wyatt, show me but my coward foes,
Though they are numberless as Egypt's plagues—
Let me but see the weapons in their hands,
Though they can daunt the angry Thunderer,
And I'll confront them! But to be assailed
By arrows that seem raining from the clouds—
To see my tribe, like Niobe's, cut down,
Nor know what time my breast may be transfixed—
To feel myself the cause of all this woe,
Without the chance of offering stroke for stroke,
Is next to madness!

Wyatt.
All I know is this,—
Lord Rochford, Norris, Brereton, and Weston,
As the most noted followers of your highness,
Have been arrested, charged with secret treason.
In what particulars their guilt consists,
Even wakeful rumor has not been informed;
Nor are the prisoners wiser than the world.
That popinjay, Mark Smeaton, too, has had
Some private hearings in the council-room,
After a tampering which he underwent
At Suffolk's house.

Queen A.
No more of him;—he 's harmless.
All these brave hearts to suffer for my sake!
O! deadly cowards! to remove these props,
Whose sturdy valor might have long upheld
Even the structure of a tottering cause!

Wyatt.
Whatever scheme your enemies have formed,
Is now converted to a state affair:
Your highness therefore must expect a blow,
Not from lords Suffolk, Norfolk, and their friends,
But from the Council.

Queen A.
Let them only come!
My heart is aching to begin the fray:
I vow, the conquered shall not fight again!
What of the king?

Wyatt.
His majesty is silent,
Gloomy and sad, and given to muttering;
Flying at pleasures with an eagerness
That crushes out the dainty soul of joy:
As one a cup of rich, untasted wine
Might crack with furious bacchanalian haste,
And spill its fruity treasures.

Queen A.
So I thought:
His love is wrestling with an agony,
By fancied justice thrust upon his mind.
When through this fire of malice I have passed—
Whose purifying ordeal he allows,
Only to prove the temper of my heart—
Look, Wyatt, look to see my enemies,
Drossy with crime, hurled headlong in the flame,
To show the baseness of their earthy souls!
Kings should be just.

Wyatt.
Ay, should be just.

Queen A.
How now?
Would you arraign his royal qualities,
Because my foes have led his mind astray
With seeming justice? Ah! be careful, sir,
Not to malign him, in your zeal for me!

Wyatt.
She hugs her ruin. (Aside.)
Mistress Seymour says—

Queen A.
Out, wizard, out! Dare you to summon up
The horrid phantom that pursues my steps,
And ever shadowy flits before my eyes,
Veiling the sun, and deepening deepest night?
O! Wyatt, Wyatt, would you mock me too?
O! would you rend the feeble barrier
That hides my anguish from the gaping world,
And show me in my naked wretchedness,
Without a rag of pride to cover me,
For prying fools to carp on? Cruel leech,
To probe this wound, even though my tortured heart
Might work salvation out of agony!
Begone, begone!

Wyatt.
I meant not—

Queen A.
I forgive you.
Go, go, in mercy! If you love my health,
Never again recall that fearful name!
[Exit Wyatt.]
'T is hard, 't is hard!—but it must be endured.
O! vanished peace, that with my girlish hours
Shook hands and parted, as they proudly strode
Down the dark paths of untried womanhood—
Return, return! Ah! couldst thou bring again
Those pleasant days, when at the source of life
My spirit sat, and heard, with nature's tones,
The blended music of a higher life
Mix and flow on in one grand harmony;
When every sense, content with what it felt,
Longed not for action, never-ending action,
That once embraced makes us its slaves till death.
Death, death! There is more sweetness in that name
Than I e'er knew of. Does thy pallid hand
Unite the two extremes of human life,
Linking our earliest with our latest days,
In one unbroken circle? Art thou she,
The meek-faced peace of childhood, changed in name,
But undistinguished in thy quality,
Come from afar to lead us back again
From where we started? Ah! I know not now,
Nor can I till I pass, beyond recall,
The narrow lintel of the voiceless grave.—
O God! O God! I am weary of the day!

[Scene closes.]

SCENE IV.

Another Room in the Palace. Enter King Henry and Jane Seymour.
King Henry.
Poh! 't is too late for pity.

Jane Seymour.
Pity, sir!
I feel no pity for her wantonness:
'T is for yourself, so wickedly abused,
So unsuspecting till the common voice
Thrust its belief in your reluctant ears.
The hand of justice is in everything:
How strange it was our budding love put forth
Just as her impious crimes had reached their full!
Showing how Heaven may visit secret guilt
In an avenging form of innocence,
That sadly marvels at its own result.

King H.
Yes, very strange.

Jane S.
What proof can be produced?
A mind so subtle in committing sin,
Must be adept in masking stratagems.

King H.
That 's Norfolk's part. His grace has pledged himself
To bring more evidence before the court—
Uncircumstantial, downright, stubborn proof—
Than it will hear. And let him look to it:
For if his charge prove slander to our queen,
And she escape, untainted in her fame,
I'll hang him like a thief—by Heaven, I will!

Jane S.
Sweet hypocrite! (Aside.)
But if his charge be proved?

King H.
Our realm has laws; too much we honor them,
To stand between the culprit and their doom.
Talk not of this.

Jane S.
Here comes the noble duke,
Sending a smile before his onward path
To ask a welcome.

(Enter Duke of Norfolk.)
Norfolk.
All looks fair, my liege.

King H.
Looks foul, I say! Cannot I teach you, sir,
That this discovered treachery of the queen
Irks me to credit? Is it not enough
That the dear honor of my father's throne
Is sullied in the eyes of Christendom,
And I am made the laughing-stock of time,
Without this giggling at my sorry plight?

Nor.
A virtuous mood! (Aside.)
Pardon the clownish haste
That has disturbed your majesty's deep grief.
You set me to pursue a wily chase;
And if I feel the huntsman's eager flush—
More from pursuit than wish to strike my game—
The heat of triumph should excuse my air.

King H.
Well, well, what news?

Nor.
So ho! king weathercock!
[Aside.]
I fear 't is too much for your majesty
To hear the worst confirmed.

King H.
Ha! say you so?
For to drift on upon a level sea
Of settled woe, is better than to toss
Between the heights of my delusive hopes
And the deep gulfs of bottomless despair.
Rest, Norfolk, rest from my o'erwhelming thoughts,
Even in a port of quiet wretchedness,
Would be a pleasure to this storm-tossed soul.

Nor.
I 'd give a barony for one free laugh.
[Aside.]
There is not a circumstance nor shade of proof,
By law demanded to convict the queen,
But I can summon to outface her tongue.
This is blunt truth, ungarbled by a phrase
To smooth its meaning in a dainty ear;
And though you shrink, your royal dignity
Calls out for vengeance on her traitorous head.

King H.
Be well prepared: your life hangs by a thread.

Nor.
I see your snares, sceptred duplicity;
I am fairly entered, far beyond retreat;
I know the issue is her death or mine.
Thank Heaven, I do not need fear's ragged spur
To drive me onward in my willing course.
[Aside.]
Trust to my zeal; I hold my sovereign's honor
Above the selfish dread of common death.

King H.
What of this spinnet-player?

Nor.
Ah! the knave!
He wavered sadly since his first confession:
Now he 'd confirm the paper which he signed,
And now he 'd suffer death ere swear to it.
When strict imprisonment had cowed his mind,
I by persuasion won him to my wish.

King H.
By what persuasion? Make no promises;
The wretch shall hang.

Nor.
O! merely by the rack.

King H.
Most delicate inducement!

Nor.
Yes, my liege,
It oft unclasps the rigid jaws of guilt.
The pangs of death have many a time disclosed
The murderer's secret; and the rack can bring
A dying anguish, without fear of death.
'T is a most potent questioner.

Jane S.
My liege,
Pray come away; for I am sick at heart,
Hearing details so awful. Please, your grace,
To keep such horrors for your private thoughts.
Come, Henry, come!

King H.
To please you, love. Adieu,
Good Norfolk; slack not in your zealous care.

Nor.
Heaven keep your majesties!

Jane S.
Pshaw! trifler.

[Exeunt King Henry and Jane Seymour.]
Nor.
“Pshaw!”
But did I tickle you, my demi-queen?
So delicate, so royal in your tastes!
Cannot endure the thoughts of brutal racks;
And yet would kill a queen to wear her shoes!
'Sdeath! when you are crowned, our manly swords must rust,
Butchers lose traffic, and your tender court
Browse, like Assyria's king, on bloodless weeds;—
Ay, but our daggers shall be kept on edge,
To stab our kind! Well, you are happily matched:
A squeamish king who circumvents two lives,
To urge his purpose to its bloody end,
Vowing that justice shall have one of them,
And a meek queen who shudders at the means,
Yet at the end grapples with furies' claws.
You crocodiles can blubber o'er your prey,
If a stray infant should fall overboard,
And cry that drowning is a sorry thing,
Ere you together gorge it! What a life,
So comforting to conscience, you may lead
When Hymen yokes you!—Damn hypocrisy!

(Enter Thomas Wyatt.)
Wyatt.
So say I too, under your grace's oath.

Nor.
Ha! ha! Sir Poet, 't was a pious oath.

Wyatt.
Of sure fulfilment.

Nor.
Pray what brings you here?

Wyatt.
A moth to light, a poet to a prince;
Thus is it ever. I would see the king.

Nor.
He just retired.

Wyatt.
'T is but a small affair;
I'll come again.

Nor.
Can I not aid you, sir?

Wyatt.
I merely wished to see a prisoned rogue—
One fellow Smeaton, caged for stealing geese,
Or some such matter. Has your grace a pass?
The careless knave had my last madrigal,
To set for music. 'T is my only copy;
And if he is hanged, my immortality
Loses a hope. Now, Reynard, play the fool!

[Aside.]
Nor.
So, ho! my railer at hypocrisy,
How smooth we lie! (Aside.)
Confound this gosling thief!
The king has ordered—why, I cannot say—
That none, except the Council, shall have leave
To see the fellow.

Wyatt.
Well, there is little lost.

Nor.
O, much, much, much! I honor poesy;
And vow to succor your brave madrigal.—
I'll make especial business of this matter.

Wyatt.
As deep as hell! (Aside.)
Nay, trouble not yourself;
Perchance the knave, among his prison griefs,
Has lost remembrance of my trifling song.

Nor.
I will refresh him. 'T would amaze you, sir,
To know how much I reverence your art.
Each genuine poet, in each poem, forms
What neither he nor any other man,
Though he were equal in capacity,
Can shape again. The moods of poets' minds
Are, like the colors of chameleons,
Seen in the same particulars but once.
That combination of your shifting thoughts,
Which you have pictured in a madrigal,
Should make its due impression on our time.
I would not see your chaplet lose a leaf:—
Believe me, 't is a duty.

Wyatt.
Shrewd dissembler,
With what a relish he pursues intrigues!
[Aside.]
I thank your grace, in poesy's sweet name,
For this regard. Pray, can you tell me, sir,
Upon what charge my friend, Sir Henry Norris,
Will be arraigned?

Nor.
On many many, sir.
The gravest, I believe, is robbing goose-ponds:—
He is involved with Smeaton.

Wyatt.
Ah! indeed?
'T is an odd charge! But I observe of late
How our good king takes the most famous geese,
This realm produces, 'neath his royal wing.
Adieu! your grace.

[Going.]
Nor.
Ho! scion of the muse!
I have a little scandal for your ear.

Wyatt.
For mine, your grace?

[Returns.]
Nor.
Yes; 't is a trifling thing,—
No greater in my eyes than songs in yours.
They say you read too many madrigals
In the attentive hearing of the queen.
Look to it, sir: his majesty is loth
His royal consort should give up her time
To so much poetry.

Wyatt.
The sneering wretch!
I dare not brave him, for her highness' sake.
[Aside.]
An idle rumor.

Nor.
But it put your songs
In fearful jeopardy. The king nigh swore
To hang all future poems by the neck,
In your good person. He hates poesy.
The royal opposition on this point
Is stranger than the patronage of geese.

Wyatt.
'Sblood! I must burst, if I remain to hear
This cynic's gibes. (Aside.)
Farewell! once more.

Nor.
Remember,
No private readings to her majesty
Of the lost madrigal, when I restore it.

Wyatt.
God shield the queen! for human aid is vain. [Aside.]


[Exeunt severally.]

SCENE V.

The Queen's Apartments in the Palace. A table spread. Queen Anne, Maids, and Attendants, at the back of the scene.
Queen Anne.
(Advancing.)
Ah, me! what fearful difference 't is, to view
The self-same object unattained, and won!
For memories are the shadows of our hopes,
That ever lengthen as our day declines,
Till death's oblivion wraps them both in night.
When, from the lowly vale of common life,
Ambition points us to the sunny tops
Of the great hills of power, whose even sides,
Ascending smoothly through the golden haze,
Appear like stepping-stones from earth to heaven—
Ah! who could tell the peril of the road
That must be braved to reach their eminence?
What stony paths—what thorny barriers—
What humble crawling under threatening rocks—
What dizzy ledges, wooing nerveless fear
To swift forgetfulness—what hungry chasms,
That picture death within their roaring jaws,
And stagger reason on his solid throne—
Must be o'erpassed, ere on the toppling heights,
Amidst the region of perpetual storms,
We stand alone in chill supremacy!
(Enter Thomas Wyatt.)
Quick, Wyatt, quick! have my poor friends a hope?

Wyatt.
But in the mercy of your enemies,
Or the most tardy justice of the king.

Queen A.
Is this your zeal? O, apathetic man!
Can you see Rochford, noble, loyal Rochford—
Your friend, your playmate—one who ever bore
His gathering honors with such humbleness
That my hot pride has chid him—can you see
George Boleyn pining in a dreary cell,
While May's warm sunshine fills the universe?
Bethink you, Wyatt, of those faithful men,
Weston, and Brereton, and Henry Norris,
Whose days, like fetters, gall their manly souls,
In the cramped limits of a prison-house,
While you are slack to free them!

Wyatt.
Gracious Heaven!—

Queen A.
Deeds would be better, sir, than windy oaths.
Lend me your manhood for a little day,
And, by my soul, I'll breach their prison doors,
Or light a blaze in England that shall scare
These skulking enemies of theirs and mine
Into a frenzy! Heaven can testify
How much it grieves me that their doleful fate
Seems woven with the tissue of my own!
For, were it not, their wrongs would muster friends,
And Heaven would launch an angry squadron down
To succor virtue such as they possess.
But I—O, God! I stand here all alone,
Shunned by mankind, and tossed by careless chance
To glut the appetite of enmity—
A helpless woman, full of wrongs and grief,
With nothing left me but the conscious power
By which the guiltless bear their martyrdom!

Wyatt.
O, woful day!

Queen A.
Have you but vain regrets?

Wyatt.
Hear me, your highness.

Queen A.
Words, and nothing more!
Has innocence no power? has justice fled
The side of right? or is it mere romance,
To prate with poets of a heavenly might
That nerves the weakness of a righteous cause?
Fie! dreamer, fie!

Wyatt.
I ask you not to laud
My wakeful labor, day and night bestowed,
Without a thought of safety for myself,
Upon this hopeless matter; all I ask
Is thankless justice for a pure intent.
I grant my efforts were of no avail—
I grant some other and more skilful hand
Might have achieved a work beyond my power;
But yet, believe, all intellectual strength,
All hidden cunning, and all bold resource,
That nature gave me, were employed in vain
Ere I despaired.

Queen A.
What was this mighty work?
Had you the labor of a Hercules,
That you so groan? Upon my life, I think
This wondrous malady will heal itself
Without your aid.—Shake not your solemn head.
The king still loves me:—I have faith in love.

Wyatt.
Ha! have you faith? then see my very heart.
My memory reaches not that early day
When I first loved you. Since remembrance threw
The bright reflections of my childish thoughts
Into the gloom of manhood's troubled hours,
There is not a gleam, howe'er remote and dim,
But owes its splendor to my love for you;
There is not a hope—

Queen A.
Hold, traitor, on your life!
Are you conspiring with my subtle foes?
My maids observe us.—Would you ruin me?
Is my last friend corrupted? Dare you, sir,
Prattle this nonsense to your queen? O, base!
Thus to presume on my defencelessness;
Implying frailty which, a week ago,
You had better died than barely hinted at!

Wyatt.
You thought me lukewarm.

Queen A.
No; I only meant
To whet the edge of blunted zeal.

[Noise without]
Wyatt.
How now?
Prophetic fear!

(Enter Duke of Norfolk, Duke of Suffolk, and other Lords of the Council, with Sir William Kingston and Guard.)
Queen A.
Good welcome, gentlemen!
Bear you a message from his majesty?
[A long pause.]
What, not a word?

Suffolk.
We do.

Queen A.
Do what, your grace?

Suf.
Bear you a message from the king.

Queen A.
Ha! ha!
[Laughing.]
Your answer lagged so far behind my query,
As quite to rupture sense.

Norfolk.
Come, Suffolk, come;
No faltering now! [Apart to Suffolk.]


Suf.
The king has ordered us
To see the person of her majesty
Placed in your hands, Sir William, until he
Makes such disposure of her as may suit
His further pleasure.

Queen A.
Back, ye urgent tears;
I'll never pay your tribute to my foes! [Aside.]

If 't is the pleasure of his majesty
To change my present lodgings for the Tower,
Like a true subject, I obey.

Wyatt.
Brave, brave!
Nature created thee from royal clay! [Aside.]


Kingston.
I will await your highness' preparation

Queen A.
I need none, sir.

Nor.
Away, away, Sir William!

Queen A.
Well said, good uncle.

[Exeunt all but Wyatt.]
Wyatt.
Now, were I a beast,
And Norfolk but another, I would tear
The bitter heart out of his spiteful breast!
But as a man—O, as a gentleman,
A Christian gentleman—I thank his grace
That he allows my littleness to crawl
'Neath God's own light, and fret my weary soul
With gazing on his huge monstrosity!
What next? what next?—Divorce! And then, poor queen,
She'll sit her down, like injured Katharine,
And feed her heart with sorrow, till the bane
Of cankering grief has poisoned every spring
That pulses life along her shattered frame;
And then she'll lapse, by scarce perceived degrees,
Into her grave; and then—why, then the world
Will roar and scramble o'er her resting-place,
And play the same stale antics which she saw,
And dash its brimming tides of ruddy life
Across her tomb, without a care for her.—
O, should we laugh or weep at human fate?
There goes to shame the only mortal thing
I ever loved, with all a poet's love,
And I ask that, in mockery of myself!

[Weeps.]
[Scene closes.]

SCENE VI.

Before the Gate of the Tower. Enter Queen Anne, in custody of Sir William Kingston and Guard, Duke of Norfolk, Duke of Suffolk, and Lords of the Council.
Queen Anne.
Pause here a moment.

Norfolk.
Tut, tut! move along!

Queen A.
Did you not, sir, insult your queen enough,
Before the Council, with unmanly taunts
And slanders, rivalled in their gross excess
But by the words in which you uttered them,
Without disgracing thus your victory?

Nor.
It ill beseems my noted chastity
To hold discourse with ladies of your stamp
Stop, if you list; I 'd rather grant your wish
Than parley with you.

Queen A.
Aid me, gracious Lord,
To bear unmurmuring! (Aside.)
Listen, gentlemen.
'T is the last time, perchance, that I may stand
Beneath the open blessings of the sky;
And here, before the majesty of heaven,
Gazing unshaken in the face of God,
I solemnly avow these horrid crimes,
With which my enemies have vested me,
To be most foul and baseless calumnies;—
Or God forsake me in my strictest need!

Nor.
What monstrous perjury! I dare not hear
This woman's self-damnation.

[Going.]
Suffolk.
Come, my lords;
Our part is done.

[Exit with Norfolk and the Lords.]
Queen A.
Their scorn foreshows my doom:
I am convicted ere the court be met.
Think you I shall have justice?

Kingston.
Without doubt:
The poorest subject of the king has that.

Queen A.
Ha! ha! poor man! (Laughing.)
Loyal credulity!
O, yes, at last—in heaven. Where go I, sir?—
Into a dungeon?

Kings.
No, your majesty;
You lie in the state chambers.

Queen A.
In which rooms?

Kings.
Where you were lodged on Coronation-Day.

Queen A.
This is too cruel!

Kings.
Is splendor cruelty?

Queen A.
O, you are gracious! They are far too good
For such a wretch—so abject, so forlorn,
A prisoned felon;—were it not that they
Will taunt my memory with a pleasant dream,
That there once practised on my facile hopes,
While reason slept. Alas, alas, for me!
Time, like a mocking showman, turns the picture,
To teach on what coarse stuff my fancy wrought.

Kings.
Time may relent, and make all well ere long.
Your slight constraint shall not seem bondage to you.

Queen A.
It matters not, if we are prisoners,
Whether our walls be marked by feet or miles:
I may be cramped and tethered in my will,
While my clay roams the starry universe;—
What but free will is freedom?

Kings.
Shall we enter?

Queen A.
Your pardon, sir, if I have wearied you
With my complaints. But you have heard to-day
Things that might break a prouder heart than mine.
I do confess, my slanderers have wrought
More on my spirits than I once believed
Mere malice could.—Was it not vile?

Kings.
Poor queen, poor queen! (Aside.)
I cannot judge, your highness.

Queen A.
I should not ask you to o'erstep discretion.
Where is the king?

Kings.
At Whitehall, I believe.

Queen A.
Will you convey his majesty a note?

Kings.
I cannot.

Queen A.
Cannot! but a message, then?
Tell him—

Kings.
Indeed, I dare not.

Queen A.
Then, good sir,
Pray bear a letter to the Chancellor.

Kings.
I am prohibited.

Queen A.
Are you a tool?

Kings.
Ay, but a feeling one.

Queen A.
Forgive me, pray!
Sir, you are kind, most kind! My hasty spleen
Must be abated to my present state.
Come, let us in. I may be dull, perchance;
But, as I live, I cannot realize
That he, the father of my little child,
Could so far banish all regard for me
As to afflict me with deliberate wrong.
No, no; I have been schooled to fearful thoughts,
But this, this cannot enter Come, set on!

[Exeunt into the Tower.]