University of Virginia Library

ACT V.

SCENE I.

A Room in Whitehall Palace. King Henry and Jane Seymour.
Jane Seymour.
Nay, my sweet Henry, shrink not for a thought.
Wisdom is Janus-faced, and boldly looks
Not only at dead acts of bygone times,
But, in the very front of coming years,
Stands forth, a prophet, to foretell events.
Why should we dream upon the harmless past,
If not to shape the future of our lives
By its dear-purchased knowledge?

King Henry.
True enough.

Jane S.
See then what follows. Should Queen Anne die,
And no male issue bless your majesty,
Elizabeth, your so-called daughter, reigns.—
So-called, I say; for where is your warranty
To deem her truer than her faithless dam?

King H.
Right, by my soul! I'll disinherit her;
My Parliament shall set her claim aside:
We'll have no bastards on our English throne,
To mock our justice.

Jane S.
Ah! the Parliament!
But what it does, it can undo again.

King H.
Ay, ay; 't were safer to divorce the queen,
And so, as in our daughter Mary's case,
Cut off Elizabeth.

Jane S.
'T will trouble you,
For many a weary day, if the bold queen
Should stand up stiffly for her royal rights,
Nor yield to you.

King H.
Nor yield?—'ods wounds! she shall!
I'll have each tittle of my liberty,
Ere we break quits. Why, it were monstrous, base,
To offer our good subjects her vile sprout
By way of queen! 'T was rumored, at her birth,
That Bess was not my own.
(Enter Duke of Norfolk.)
In good time, Norfolk—
How proceeds our cause?

Norfolk.
Slowly, my liege.

King H.
Push on, push on!

Nor.
Ha, ha! my royal hound,
Do you scent blood at last? (Aside.)
Mark Smeaton now
Will swear to anything beneath the moon;
But all the others are intractable.
When of their common guilt we question them,
Rochford but gives a melancholy smile;
Weston stares at us with his great bright eyes,
As if he doubted of our sanity;
Brereton, scowling, fumbles for his sword;
And Henry Norris has gone virtue-mad:
He raves and swears about his innocence,
And vows he never will accuse the queen,
Whom in his conscience he believes most pure.

King H.
Hang him up, hang him up, then!

Nor.
Wonderful!
He grows blood-thirsty. 'T was but yesterday
He saved a fly from drowning, and so talked,
And moralized so sweetly on this theme,
As nigh re-drowned the insect in his tears.
[Aside.]
Yes; but before he hangs, could we succeed
In throwing him, or one of gentle blood,
Into the balance 'gainst her majesty,
'T would show her light as air.

Jane S.
You doubt her guilt?

Nor.
Not I, my lady; but opinion weighs
No atom in the jealous scales of law.

King H.
We'll suit the triers to the evidence.
She is false, without debate; then wherefore, sir,
Should we be nice about the means we use?
A band of angels, sworn upon our side,
Could not increase her guilt.

Nor.
Doubtless, my liege;
But 't would convict her to the common mind:
For, as we stand, this base-born, wavering groom
Is our sole witness; and we lose respect
By such a tottering basis to our cause.
The people—

King H.
Furies seize them, root and branch
Here comes that bugbear of a timid court,
That noisy nothing, to assail our ears!
Sir, I more reverence a flock of geese—
Being a Roman in that one idea—
Than all the banded folly of the earth.
Is there more wisdom in a million fools
Than one alone? Shall folly gain respect
By bare addition?

Jane S.
Please your majesty,
His grace but cares for your committed honor
In this regard.

King H.
I know his loyalty:
But shall a monarch answer to a mob
For private deeds? Lord, save their silliness!
'T is scarce a twelvemonth since they howled at us,
“We'll have no Nanny Boleyn for our queen!”
And now they saint her! Norfolk, look at them
As on a crowd of human weathercocks,
That ever point right in the teeth of power,
Howe'er it veer. Join me anon, your grace;
I fain would hit upon some speedy scheme
That may annul my marriage with the queen.
Sweetheart, come walk.

Nor.
I will attend your highness.
[Exeunt King Henry and Jane Seymour.]
So all this pother, all this hanging men,
Divorcing wives, and chopping off of heads,
Is for mere happiness—an endless chase!
As if a man, so stuffed with memories
Of the dark path that led him to his hopes,
Could taste enjoyment if he reached his wish!
Good Lord, a king may be a royal fool!
This outdoes alchemy.—I 'd rather fight
'Gainst nature for the boon of endless life,
And hope to turn God's purpose upside down—
Chase the horizon till I found the spot
Where heaven meets earth, and, with that blissful kiss,
Rains joy celestial on the duller land—
Run down the rainbow to the golden spring
Of its bright arch—believe a poet's dream—
Do any shallow thing, but set sound wits
Upon a chase for phantom happiness.
Ha, ha! king motley! Give me power, power, power!

[Exit.]

SCENE II.

The State Apartments in the Tower. Queen Anne alone.
Queen Anne.
Ye rugged walls, how often have ye heard
The weary moans of prisoned innocence,
By bondage plundered of its cheerful spirit,
Broken in will, bankrupt in energy;
And when at last thought has so preyed on thought
As to debase the judgment's faculty,
Robbed of that God-sustaining power of right
Which lifts the soul above calamity!
O woe! O woe! shall I become at length
A mental wreck, a chaos of despair,
With scarcely strength in my enervate mind
To see the conscience-drawn dividing line
That marks the boundary between right and wrong?
Alas! I fear it; for I cannot tell
What high prerogative, that once was mine,
I would not barter for mere liberty.

(Enter, behind, Lady Boleyn and Mrs. Cosyns.)
Lady Boleyn.
Still lost in thoughts.

Mrs. Cosyns.
I'll warrant them not good.

Lady B.
Then stand aside. If she should utter aught,
Above a whisper, we can catch its sense.

Mrs. C.
Then to his grace, and so unto the king.
Good luck! my lady, it is merry, this,
To be familiar with their majesties—
To be the very spirit of the words
That go between them.

Lady B.
Hush! the queen begins.

Queen A.
This awful pause—this quivering of the beam
That balances my hesitating fate—
This watchful agony of rigid sense,
Bending all faculties in one fixed stare,
That hangs upon the dial of events,
And counts the passing moments, without power
To urge or slacken their relentless course—
Would make a faith in settled destiny
Far preferable to chance. Then stolid force
Might brazen out the frowns of hopeless fate,
And learn to suffer what it could not change.
But, O, the thought that we, the rulers born
Of time and fortune and opposed events,
Can be so meshed in outward circumstance
As to lose influence o'er our very lives,
Gives to adversity its bitterest pangs,
And takes from will its living soul of hope!

Lady B.
That 's rare philosophy, I question not,
But it is bad religion.

Mrs. C.
Terrible!

Queen A.
Avenging Heaven, and I deserve it all!

Lady B.
That 's broad confession.

Mrs. C.
Shameless! How she dared
The wrath of Heaven, in her stout impudence!

Queen A.
Yes, I deserve it; but 't is double pain,
To feel the chastisements of angry Heaven
Meted to me in seeming punishment
For that whereof I am guiltless.

Lady B.
Heard you that?

Mrs. C.
Nay, I'm a little deaf.

Queen A.
O Wolsey, Wolsey!
I, whose ambitious footstep thrust aside
Your tottering age—I, who with crafty toil
Climbed to the seat of patient Katharine—
Feel every pang with which I tortured you!
My power is gone; another cunning maid
Plays o'er my part of heartless treachery.
O More and Fisher—blood, blood!—save my wits!—
If fate like theirs should close my history,
To make Heaven's doom complete! Why shrink at that?
For 't is but one, among a thousand ways,
Of stepping from the world. And what were life,
Declining by degrees of misery
To chill oblivion?—Queen of yesterday—
The rabble's pity—an old doting crone,
That some fool's grandsire, “Marry, knew as queen!”
Rattling her toothless jaws in silly prate
About herself—“And how they crowned her once,
With a great crown all full of shining stones;
And what brave velvet farthingales she wore;
And how she reigned; and, well-a-day, how fell!”
Pah! it sets death a-laughing. Gracious Heaven,
But grant my sinfulness one little prayer—
'T is all I ask—drive on the lagging days,
And bring this matter to its fated end;
For there are seeds of madness in my grief
That must o'ertop my reason!

(Lady Boleyn and Mrs. Cosyns advance.)
Mrs. C.
Please you, lady.

[To Queen Anne.]
Lady B.
Your majesty.

Mrs. C.
She hears us not.

Queen A.
Well, well!
But Rochford, ay, and all my noble friends,
Crowded together in a general doom;
As if my enemies had sworn to leave
No vestige of me. Bitter, bitter hate!
My father next—

Mrs. C.
Yes, please you, he is well.

Queen A.
Who spoke?

Mrs. C.
Your servant.

Queen A.
Service without love.

Lady B.
You wrong her much.

Queen A.
You too, false kinswoman?

Lady B.
Marry, and if your highness had not held
Such high opinion of familiar friends,
You 'd ne'er been here. 'T is a good worldly rule,
As treachery harms more than enmity,
To tell no tales but what we tell our foes.

Queen A.
Deep in the world, but shallow in the heart.
What brings you here?

Lady B.
The welfare of yourself,
And the deliverance of your noble brother,
With all his prisoned friends.

Queen A.
When owls can sing,
I'll listen, cousin.

Lady B.
Scold, but credit me.

Queen A.
What is the price? If it involve my life,
I'll coin my heart's blood, to the utmost drop,
But I will pay it.

Lady B.
'T is that you agree
To offer no obstruction to the king
In his proposed divorce.

Queen A.
Dare you insult—
Nay, nay, forgive my haste. Is it the king
Who wills his daughter's shame? who barters life
On terms that blacken mercy's reverend hand,
And sink her calling to mere brokery?
Is this divorce his wish?

Mrs. C.
It is, your highness;
I had it from his lips.

Lady B.
'T will but oppose,
And not defeat his plan, if you refuse.
Denial carries death to all; when you,
By bare concession, gain a pregnant hope.

Queen A.
Hope, hope for me! O God, what mockery!—
I wish for nothing. Show me, beyond doubt,
That 't is the king's command, and I will yield.

Mrs. C.
A wise conclusion.

Queen A.
Spare your comments, madam;
My duty tutors better than your tongue.
The very vileness of this proffered trade
Gives it the lie. O, 't is far past belief,
To deem a father so unnatural:
Sure 't is but trial of my patient love
The king intends.—Why, glimmering hopes seem born
From the sheer blackness of surrounding things,
Like little stars at midnight. [Aside.]


Mrs. C.
Bless my soul,
Her highness smiles!

Queen A.
Why not?

Lady B.
Be still, you fool!
Her subtle mind is twisting in a net
Of its own flimsy thoughts. [Apart to Mrs. Cosyns.]


Mrs. C.
I am not your wench!
What the king orders me, I will perform,
Though all the Lady Boleyns in the land
Cry “Fool, and fool!” [Apart to Lady Boleyn.]

If it would please your highness,
Now, while this candid mood possesses you,
To make confession to us of the crimes
For which you suffer; and so spare the king—

Lady B.
The loose-tongued idiot! [Aside.]


Queen A.
Out! you heartless wretch!
Are you a woman? Have you borne a child?
And would you snatch it from your wolfish breast,
To stamp the bastard on its baby brow?

Mrs. C.
I have no child.

Queen A.
Heaven keep you barren, then,
You shameless slanderer of your mother's sex!
Dare you to traffic for my chastity—
The natural patent of all womanhood—
That more becomes my naked innocence
Than the great ring of jewelled royalty?
O! had I lost it, I would barter crown,
And queenly dignity—yea, life itself—
To wear it but one hour of agony,
Then hand it spotless to posterity.
Fie! you are rank, if you have never felt
Your sex's instinct!

Mrs. C.
Lady, let us go:
Her majesty so storms—

Lady B.
Yes, slink away,
You wretched marplot! [Apart to Mrs. Cosyns.]


Queen A.
Get to your prayers—go!
Send to your heart each drop of modest blood,
That ever mustered in your virgin cheeks,
At wanton thoughts, to wash away this shame!

Mrs. C.
Come, come; she'll rail again.

[Exit with Lady Boleyn.]
Queen A.
This killing doubt!
What can it mean?—where am I?—is it real?
For I have read how some have seemingly
Passed ages in a dream; have died and risen;
Have wandered on through shadows limitless,
And passed the radiant gates of Paradise,
To dwell for days unnumbered with the Saints;
Have woke at last, and found the blazing sun,
That shaped the fancies of their lengthened vision,
Just peeping from the east. Is life a dream?
Is time a mere illusion of the mind?
And shall we waken from our restless sleep,
To see the glory-beaming face of God
Smile in our eyes a summons to that life
Where all is real? What to my endless soul
Is this flat pageantry of days and years?
Events, not hours, are measurers of our lives,
And I in deeds have far outlived my term;
While sorrows, heavier than three-score and ten
May often totter under, bow my head,
That only needs the hoary badge of time
To make old age complete. Why should I stand
And dally thus with my kind landlord, Death,
Upon the threshold of his narrow house,
While all without is dark and shelterless,
And all so bright within? Why fear to leave
The fickle favors that mankind bestow,
For the sure bounties of Omnipotence?
O God, I know not! but my startled heart
Rises in loud rebellion at the hint
Of that chill power whose torpid tyranny
Shall still its play forever. Love, fame, power—
Ay, all, all, everything, the uttermost!—
Have vanished in the shadow of my wrongs;
And yet I gripe life's load of misery,
As if there were a hope beyond my loss!

[Exit.]

SCENE III.

The Gate of the Tower, surrounded by a crowd of Citizens, endeavoring to enter, who are kept back by a guard of men-at-arms. Enter, from the Tower, First Citizen.
Citizens.
What news, what news?

First Citizen.
What news can you expect?

Second Citizen.
The queen's deliverance.

First C.
Nonsense! where the king
Is chief accuser?

Third Citizen.
Ay; but justice, sir.

First C.
Speak not so loud ere the lords might overhear,
And lose their loyalty.

Third C.
What mean you, friend?

First C.
Her highness is prejudged, and, save in form,
Doomed ere her cause be heard.

Second C.
Made she defence?

First C.
O yes, most eloquent and strongly knit:
Beauty and truth came hand in hand together,
To breathe their essence in each modest word.—
But what avails an angel's purity
Where devils judge? 'T is a bare legal form,
This solemn meeting of her enemies,
Disguising hate in ermined justice' gown.

Second C.
This is blunt talk.

First C.
But true.

Third C.
But dangerous,
To speak and hear.

First C.
What are state trials now,
More than the whetting of the headsman's axe?
We English people have forgot the rights
Which God and nature give to every man:
Our common justice is a common drab—
A pliant doxy, openly deboshed—
That winks beneath her twisted blind at lords,
Doffs it for kings—

Citizens.
Forbear, forbear!

First C.
Pshaw, sirs!
I am a careless, melancholy man,
Who would not change a notion for my life.
I sought this trial of her majesty
To escape myself for a brief interval;
But, as I live, it crowded in such thoughts
Upon my proper griefs, that I would rather
Be damned to wear the memory of a fiend,
Than witness such another.

Third C.
Friends, away!
This man is vile, upon his own confession.
Lord, sirs, what words were these!

First C.
Slink, cowards, slink!
Get to your slavish homes! Brush up your caps!
Practise your loyal lungs! Make ready all
To startle Heaven, when good Queen Anne dies,
With “God preserve Queen Jane!”

Third C.
This man is mad.

Second C.
Nay, sirs, but simple.

First C.
O! that all of you,
Two-legged crawlers to ignoble graves,
Were half so mad as I!

[Exit.]
Third C.
Poor soul, poor soul!
Where is his keeper? He may come to harm.

Second C.
Let us take the fool's advice, and hurry home;
For there 's no chance of entrance to the Tower.

[Exeunt.]

SCENE IV.

The Great Hall of the Tower, arranged for the Queen's trial. On one side are seated Dukes of Norfolk, Suffolk, and Richmond, Marquis of Exeter, Earl of Arundel, and other Peers, as Lords Triers, with Officers, &c.; on the other, Queen Anne, in the custody of Sir William Kingston, Ladies, Attendants, Guards, &c.
Norfolk.
Are we agreed? [To the Lords.]


Suffolk.
Here is our verdict, sir.

[Hands a paper.]
(Richmond and Suffolk talk apart.)
Richmond.
I hope, your grace, I have damned my soul enough
To please the most fastidious father.

Suf.
Stuff!

Rich.
Yes, “stuff!” substantial, downright villany,
That I shall bear upon my aching heart
Till death unload it.

Suf.
Come, be cheerful, sir.
It ill becomes heroic minds to shrink
From the first blood of triumph. You are young
And dainty-minded; time will strengthen you.

Rich.
Courage but adds deformity to crime.
A wicked heart, though placid as a lake,
Girt and controlled by rigid barriers,
Can but reflect each blessing of sweet heaven,
And every bordering virtue of our earth,
All topsy-turvy. I am hardened, sir;
If not by years, at least by sinfulness,
That wrinkled register of ill-spent days,
Who scars his moments on the erring heart,
While yet the brow is smooth!

Suf.
The saints look down!
This pretty sermon must have washed you clean.
Hist! hear the sentence.

Nor.
Lady Anne Boleyn,
Marchioness of Pembroke, sometime England's queen—
Though most unworthily, as the strict course
Of equal justice has so clearly proved—
Arise. (The Queen rises.)
Lay off your crown and vestured marks
Of royal dignity, to hear from me
The solemn finding of this high tribunal.

(Queen Anne puts off her crown and robe of state.)
Queen Anne.
Your grace's first commands, though harshly meant,
Are merciful indeed.

Nor.
Be silent, madam!
Upon each several charge, whereon you stand
Indicted by the law, we do pronounce
Your guilt most clear; and therefore do condemn you,
At such time as his majesty may name,
To suffer death by burning at the stake,
Or by beheading, as may please the king.—
God give you patience to endure your doom!

Queen A.
I doubt it not. O Father, O Creator,
Who art the way, the life, the truth, Thou know'st
If I deserve this death!

Rich.
O! base, base, base!
This pardons Herod in the eye of Heaven.

[Aside.]
Nor.
Marchioness of Pembroke, have you aught to say
Touching the judgment of this court?

Queen A.
My lords,
I will not say your sentence is unjust—
Presuming that my reasons can prevail
Against your firm convictions;—I would rather
Believe that you have reasons for your acts,
Of ample power to vindicate your fames;
But, then, they must be other than the court
Has heard produced: for by the evidence
I have been cleared, to all unbiassed minds,
Of each offence 'gainst which that proof was brought.
I have been ever to his majesty
A faithful wife: O! could I say as truly
That I have shown him the humility
His goodness, and the honor he conferred,
Deserved from me! I have, I do confess,
Had jealous fancies and suspicious thoughts—
In which, perchance, I wronged him—that had I
Been more discreet and anxious to conceal,
I had been more the queen, but less the wife.
God is my witness, that in no way else
Have I e'er sinned against him.
Think not, my lords, I say this to prolong
My heavy life; for God has fortified
My trust in Him, and taught me how to die.
Think me not so bewildered in my mind,
As not to lay my chastity to heart,
Now in my last extremity; for I
Have held its honor far above my crown,
And have maintained no queenly dignity
More pure from vulgar stain. I know my words
Can naught avail me, save to justify
My chastity, so perilled by your doom.
As for my brother, and those constant friends
With me unjustly sentenced, I would die
A thousand deaths to save their guiltless lives:
But since it has so pleased his majesty,
I will accompany them, most willingly,
Through death to heaven, through pain to endless peace.
I have said all.

Nor.
Remove the prisoner.

(Queen Anne bows to the Court, and is led off by Sir William Kingston. Then exeunt all but the Lords Triers.)
Rich.
We are damned forever!

Nor.
Poh, poh! saved, I think.
While she held power heads flew like tennis-balls.

Arundel.
Why did she touch so lightly on the king?

Exeter.
'T was for a cause no deeper than the heart,—
She loves him yet.

Arun.
The sentimental fool!

Rich.
Have you no grosser phrases? “Fool,” forsooth!
There 's the last blow to greatness!—Arundel
Claims her as kindred!

Nor.
Gentlemen, away!
Our sun of power is burning in mid air;
We waste the daylight. Come, let us seek the king.
Hug every Seymour that you chance to meet!

[Exeunt.]

SCENE V.

The State Apartments in the Tower. Queen Anne alone.
Queen Anne
There 's not a pang remains; there 's not a wound,
That hate can give, at which my nerveless heart
Would shrink appalled The storm of life has blown,
And rent my prospect into countless shreds,
Chaotic, undistinguished, featureless—
Without a point, before me or behind,
On which a once familiar eye may rest—
And all is calm again. Calm, very calm,—
An utter desolation fixed and grim,
And barren as the sand. No queen, no wife—
Ebbed to the lowest. O Elizabeth,
My helpless child, whose rights were all in me,
How could a mother blast her memory,
Even in thy eyes, by yielding to her foes
Thy royal heritage? Thou 'lt hate me, love;
Thou 'lt say thy mother wronged thee, eking out
Her worthless days with treasures stolen from thee;
Unweeting how thy uncle and my friends
Owed life to thee. Why must I wander down
All coming time to pick new sorrows out?—
(A bell tolls. Queen Anne rushes to the door.)
Whose knell is that?

Sentinel.
(Without.)
Lord Rochford's.

Queen A.
Duped, duped, duped!
O God! my brother!—Is there such a one
As an avenging God to look on this,
And not launch fire like rain? O! shameless men!—
Men with God's raiment on their placid limbs—
Who almost swore his life should be preserved,
If I opposed not this divorce. O nature!—
Thou who dost send the harmless race of flowers,
And dews, and sunshine, and all gracious things—
What creatures hast thou sent to people earth,
And blot thy fair creation? Cut them down!
Or make this globe a dusty wilderness,
Fit for their habitation! Man, O man!
Thou art the only thing in nature's scheme
That seems disjointed from the harmony,—
The latest thought and worst!

(Enter Mary Wyatt.)
Mary Wyatt
Your majesty—

Queen A.
I prithee mock me not. I am no queen,
Nor wife, nor maid—I know not what I am!

Mary W.
What has disturbed you?

Queen A.
Did you hear that bell?

Mary W.
Pray, pray forgive me!

[Kneels, weeping.]
Queen A.
Nay, I'll kneel to you,
If I have vexed you.
[A distant shot is heard.]
Rochford!
[Another shot.]
Norris!
[Another shot.]
Weston!
[Another shot.]
And Brereton! Why stop your cannon? Shoot!—
Shoot on, till half the world shall suffer death;
For you have slain the noblest part! No, no;
The next shall be my own!

Mary W.
Alas! alas!

[Weeping.]
Queen A.
Why weep you, girl? My brother was in heaven,
Ere you could hear the noisy cannon-shot
Tell his departure.

Mary W.
Would your highness fly,
If I could ope these hideous prison-doors?

Queen A.
Not for the world.

Mary W.
My brother has a plan
To raise the common people in revolt—

Queen A.
Hold, if you 'd live! I yet am so much queen
As to protect my realm from traitor's arts.
How dare you plot these treasonable designs
Against the safety of his majesty?
Name it again, and, as I live, the king
Shall know your thoughts!

Mary W.
'T was but our love for you—

Queen A.
How! love for me, and plotting 'gainst the king!

Mary W.
Strange, very strange!

[Aside.]
(Enter Sir William Kingston and Guard.)
Queen A.
My time has come, Sir William?

Kingston.
It has, my lady.

Queen A.
You delayed my death:
I should have died some hours ago. 'T is cruel
To dally with my life.

Kings.
'T was not my fault.
The Council feared a rising of the commons,
And therefore changed the hour.

Queen A.
Ha! ha! how weak!
[Laughing.]
Who cares about my death? Is Smeaton dead?

Kings.
He is.

Queen A.
And made he no amends to me?
Did he not own his monstrous perjuries?

Kings.
Not that I heard.

Queen A.
The impious, heartless wretch!
To dare o'erleap the doubtful gulf of death,
With such a fearful load!

Mary W.
His death was just,
Even had he done no wrong,—the inborn felon!

Queen A.
Nay, Mary, chide no more. Alas! poor Mark,
I fear thy soul is suffering for thy tongue.
Can I not see my daughter?

Kings.
'Tis forbidden.

Queen A.
Well, I suppose the human frame can bear
More than I suffer—very little more!

Kings.
My lady.

[Bell tolls.]
Queen A.
That speaks plainer, sir. I am ready
I hope 't will be but death, not butchery.

Kings.
The pain is short.

Queen A.
They call the headsman skilled;
And I—ha! ha!—see, good Sir William, see—
[Laughing.]
I have a little neck!

[Clasps her neck.]
Kings.
Why, is she mad?
I in my time I have seen full many die,
But ne'er before saw one who laughed outright
At the mere thought of death.

[Aside.]
(Bell tolls.)
Queen A.
Come, Mary, come:
We keep death waiting.

Mary W.
Heaven preserve her mind!

[Aside.]
Queen A.
Set on, Sir William! You shall see, ere long,
How, like a bride, I'll meet this ugly death,
And make a triumph of my funeral!
Pray tell his majesty, in my behalf,
How much I thank him for his many favors.
He from a lady made me marchioness;
And from a marchioness he raised me up
To the full top of earthly power, a queen:
And last, his graces overrunning life,
He crowns my innocence with martyrdom.
My name is set above the reach of time,
A mark for men to carp and wonder at;
And some hereafter will believe me false,
Some think me true; bear witness, sir,
That with my latest breath I still declare
My perfect purity. (Bell tolls.)
Set on, set on!

[Exeunt.]

SCENE VI.

The Tower Green At the back of the stage is a scaffold, hung with black, on which are the block, Headsman, Attendants, Guard, etc. The citizens gradually assemble in front of the scaffold. A bell tolls at long intervals.
First Citizen.
I'll watch all day, but what I'll see her die.—
Let them change hours, I care not. Come along.

Second Citizen.
Here's a good stand.

Third Citizen.
Yes; if 't is good to stand,
And see our poor queen mangled.

First C.
“Poor queen,” sooth!

Second C.
You are a scholar, neighbor Marmaduke;
I pray you, was there e'er a queen before
Who graced a scaffold?

Third C.
Ne'er before in England
Did monarch dare so try his people's patience.

First C.
We are in luck.

Third C.
Fie! fie! you bloody knave!

First C.
Marry, and if a king cannot behead
His own liege wife, whom can he?

Third C.
Monstrous dolt!

First C.
What were the good of treason, then, if we
Could have no executions?—Mistress Maud,—
Hey, hey! you brought the children?

[To a woman.]
Woman.
Yes, indeed;
They cannot see a queen die every day.

Third C.
You tiger-hearted woman, do you love
The sight of blood?

Woman.
Nay; the example, sir.

Third C.
Lord, Lord! who ever caught a woman yet
Without pretexts in thousands!

First C.
'T is a shame
To keep us honest people waiting so.

Citizens.
(Without.)
The queen! the queen!

First C.
Move nearer.

Citizens.
Make way there!

Solemn music. Enter Duke of Norfolk, Duke of Suffolk, and other Noblemen; Queen Anne in custody of Sir William Kingston; Mary Wyatt, and other Maids of Honor; Guards, Attendants, etc. They mount the scaffold. Then enter, below Thomas Wyatt.
Wyatt.
One look, no more. O! wondrous, wondrous fair!
Death has made treaty with thy loveliness,
To hide the horrors that invest his state.
These spiteful clouds of earth-born misery
But add a glory to thy going down.
Slander, disgrace, fraud, legal infamy,
Imprisonment, this hideous form of death,
Each gains a splendor from its touch of thee
That robs regret of tears. How bright, how calm!
There is a voiceless sermon in that face,
To cheer the lonely heart of martyrdom,
And make it court its fate. O, Anne, Anne!
The world may banish all regard for thee,
Mewing thy fame in frigid chronicles,
But every memory that haunts my mind
Shall cluster round thee still. I'll hide thy name
Under the coverture of even lines,
I'll hint it darkly in familiar songs,
I'll mix each melancholy thought of thee
Through all my numbers: so that heedless men
Shall hold my love for thee within their hearts,
Not knowing of the treasure. 'T would be sin
To keep so fair a flower from paradise,—
That, in the very flush of earthly bloom,
Felt mildew blown on every ruffian wind,
And canker at the heart. Go, go,—farewell!
The sun that seems departing, to our eyes,
Is but arising on another land;
Thy death to us is the short, painful birth
That ushers in thy taintless soul to heaven.—
Go, go! I would not raise a hand to keep thee here.

[Exit.]
Third C.
Be silent! Hear her majesty.

Citizens.
Hush, hush!

Queen Anne.
Good Christian people, I am come to die,
According to the judgment of the law;
And therefore it would ill become me now,
After my doom is past, to censure it.
I am come hither to accuse no man,
Nor to say aught upon the many things
Whereof I am accused: for well I know
That my defence doth not pertain to you,
Nor from your favor could I hope for grace.
I am come here to die, to yield myself
To the king's will, with all humility.
I pray God save him, and extend his reign;
For he has been a gracious prince to you:
To me—I doubt not but his goodness went
Beyond my slender merit. I but ask,
Should you hereafter judge my luckless cause,
The best of each man's judgment. Now, farewell,
To you and to the world! Forget me not,
In the still places of your earnest prayers
Attend me, maidens.

Mary Wyatt.
O! not yet, not yet!

[Weeping.]
Queen A.
Well, I have played the waiting-maid before,
In happier hours. Alas! poor head, thou 'lt roll
In a brief time amid this scaffold's dust;
As thou in life didst not deserve a crown,
So by thy doom is justice satisfied,
And her great beam repoised.
[Removing her collar and coifs.]
And ye, my damsels,
Who whilst I lived did ever show yourselves
So diligent in service, and are now
To be here present in my latest hour
Of mortal agony,—as in good times
Ye were most trustworthy, even so in this,
My miserable death, ye leave me not.
As a poor recompense for your rich love,
I pray you to take comfort for my loss—
And yet forget me not. To the king's grace,
And to the happier one whom you may serve
In place of me, be faithful as to me.
Learn from this scene, the triumph of my fate,
To hold your honors far above your lives.
When you are praying to the martyred Christ,
Remember me, who, as my weakness could,
Faltered afar behind His shining steps,
And died for truth, forgiving all mankind.
The Lord have pity on my helpless soul!

[Kneels at the block.]
(As the curtain falls, a peal of ordnance announces the death of Queen Anne.)