University of Virginia Library

ACT V.

Scene I.

—The New Forest. Beowulf (restlessly pacing to and fro). Enter Purkis.
Purkis
[aside].
There's alteration in the face. His brow,
That had the quiet of a leaguered town,
Growing a little stiller day by day,
Is now a blaze of sortie and assault.
[Aloud.]
Why, dad, you're looking busy; what new scheme
Are you hatching? Is your sight come back again?

Beowulf
[pulling down a bough of acorns].
One fell down on my head; they're growing ripe.
Where is the king? Does he have quiet rest?

Purkis.
Don't shake like a conspirator.

Beowulf.
It's come;
It's at the doors, and I must witness it.
I was at Senlac. Look you well about—
I must not miss it; I must see him fall;
I saw King Harold.

Purkis.
Well-a—well-a-day!
We'll to the show and you shall lead me on,
Unfold me how the players gib and mince:
You are the seeing man.

Beowulf.
Let's walk about.
What is the time of day?—The August gules ...

Purkis.
You're mixing things.

Beowulf.
What was it that I wrought?
We must not one be idle. I must help.—
I'm young again: my boy, it's coming back,
My sight is coming—at the set of sun.

Purkis.
This is fresh prodigy; he's radiant.
There's very twinkle in the leaden sky
Of his old eyes; but let them out of cell,
He'll be a maniac.—Come, come, to-bed!

Beowulf.
I'll sleep when it is dark; it's shining now,
And I must watch. I am a sentinel;—
Ay, that's the word; all things are pressing back.
A watch; they chose me for my piercing sight
By the hoar apple-tree ... I built the fence.
Where is the place? I can't see clearly yet.
Let's feel the trunk.

Purkis.
It's supernatural.
I'll haul him to the oak: he's riveted
To this one bark.—We will encamp here, dad.

Beowulf.
There's a great prospect, even over sea.
Ay, it stands well.

Purkis.
One looks to Pevensey;
The sea is glist'ring.—Now he's dulled again.

Beowulf.
Another time; that was another day.
It's overspread with leaves—a better light,
And not too dazzling. I will guard the wood.

Scene II.

—Twynham. The Church completed. Enter Leofric, meeting Old Man.
Old Man.
Ah, sir, your face is full of happiness;
But should they knock that down [pointing to the tower]
like the old church?

Leofric.
Nay, when a mother sees her perfect babe,
She thinks not of the doomed calamity
To strike his hoary head. Come now, confess
It is a goodly pile.

Old Man.
Ay, a fair heap
Of masonry. Young man, you've done your best;
I'll not deny it—and the rest is slow.
God and the winds must care for it; it needs
To be thick-planted with the dead before
It will look old enough for worshippers.
The Lord Himself, they say, will make all new;—
I marvel at Him; but He's fit to judge.—
Our forefathers lay still; men had good thoughts
In the old place: it seemed a heathen thing
To hack it up.

Leofric.
Nay, it was rough and plain;
Not better than a homestead.

Old Man.
Well, you see
God had been there; He did a deal for it.
You rumbled up the dead. When there's more graves
It will be better. I shall make one soon.
You must not think, young man, you do it all.
We do our part just rotting in the ground;
The saucy urchins feel it's wonderful;
We frighten 'em. I do not think the walls
Do much; it's what's outside and what is in,
Plenty of living sorrow and a Past,
Makes one look up.—You will excuse me, sir,—
There's a little girl I buried years ago
Here, where the nettles press. I let it be
While they were building; now I'll put it right;
That's what I'm come for. It is difficult;
The weeds so intermix.

Leofric.
We'll find it out.
You have no headstone: I will carve you one,
If you would care. Then you will not mistake.

Old Man.
My little lass was shy of strangers, hid
Behind the chair, if they but looked at her.
I'll keep her to myself.

[Disappears.
Leofric.
It's useless toil.
The people come here to reclaim their dead,
Or just to mass.

[Enter Flambard.]
Flambard.
Good even, Leofric.
Fair news, my cunning craftsman, do you hear?
Your uncle Godric I will reinstate,
And all—except the beauty of this church—
Wear its old form. Nay more, my bonnie lad—
I am translated to a northern See;
And, hark ye! good St. Calais brought him plans
From Normandy, by which we'll raise a church;
Ay, Leofric, a dominant, dark pile,
That shall express the State's stability,
And keep the fortress in its very mould;
A mighty, militant, majestic mass.
You shall notch out the saint, the populace
Outside, the grinning devil and vile beast,
Who sets his paw-mark on the simpleton
Living for this world's praise.—I'm altering,
My Leofric; Zaccheus from the fig
Came down at summons and restored his gain,
Ill-gotten, to the poor. I will provide
Good hospitable lodging for the Lord,
And you shall furnish it with ornament.

Leofric.
There is no joy ... oh, my lips fail like tools
Blunt-edged; I cannot carve the words I would.
This sudden surety of a noble toil,
Not unimmortal like the labourer's,
Good as the earth to the Creator's eyes,
And excellent as nature unto man,
Is better to me than a promised wealth,
More even than a marriage.

Flambard.
[looking at Leofric]
Ah, to say
Let there be summer in a human face,
And straightway there is summer, gives a man,
In sooth, an inkling of omnipotence
Not to be scorned. Here comes a malcontent.
[Enter Wilfrith.]
I ever shunned such; you may deal with him;
Cheer him with my departure. Leofric!
[Aside.]
He's lost. How happy are these artists—well!

[Exit.
Leofric.
A minster-church, a pile to block the air,
And throw steep shadows on the tiny roofs;
It's built now. I behold it.

Wilfrith.
Leofric,
I had a dream, a cruel, ghastly dream,
An apparition. I must see the king.

Leofric.
What ails you?

Wilfrith.
God will bring deliverance,
And yet by fearful means. The instrument ...
But what has happened? You have surely seen
A comfortable vision, for your eyes
Look as they never more could shed salt tears.
Give me your message.

Leofric.
Wilfrith, you are scared.
Listen, good uncle Godric is restored,
And dear routine will give you back the health
That days uneven agitate.

Wilfrith.
The king—
You do not seem to care—deliverance;
We shall be free.

Leofric.
The devil gave you dreams,
And in imagination you are bond.
What want you with the king? At Malwood Lodge
He earns his daily feast of venison.
Let be, and listen to my saner news:
Flambard is Durham's bishop, and I go
To build—

Wilfrith.
What boots it I am hounded on
Of fiends? I cannot tell what it portends,
I am distracted; but you have your art—
It's nothing to you.

Leofric.
Wilfrith, it is less
To be possessed of devils that are dumb,
Than dwell the mate of undelivered power,
A stricken thing divine, another self,
Kingly and crippled as great David's son.

Wilfrith.
All that is fantasy; these fearful dreams
Are real. Yet, if England in his death
Gain freedom—

Leofric.
It's the spirit that is free.
Wilfrith, you cannot know, when first I took
These logs of wood and stared at them, it was
As God Himself lay captive at my heart,
And I must burst His withes and worship Him,
His jailer, who could give Him prison-bread,
Not liberty. I perished in His chains:
I could not speak;—now He has utterance,
And all my nature subjugate to joy
Of His authority, I am at peace.
You have religion; let it make you bold
To bear the strange convulsions of the world.
Be happy in your consecrated thoughts;
Look on the church; in its vicinity
You shall spend blameless years, till 'neath its stones
You sleep in death's immured tranquillity.

Wilfrith.
No, no. I'll to the king to save his soul.

[Exit.
Leofric.
And I'll to Durham to my lattice-work.

[Exit.

Scene III.

—Castle Malwood. The King's Chamber.
Rufus
[starting from sleep].
Maria! Light! Help, help!

[Enter Chamberlains.]
1st Chamberlain.
A fearful cry!
My lord, what is 't?

2nd Chamberlain.
His eyes like shooting-stars
Blaze all about.

1st Chamberlain.
And dew is on his brow.
Speak, speak! My lord!

Rufus.
Bring me the candle, close—
Near, near!

1st Chamberlain.
'Twill fire the bed.

Rufus.
There hangs my cloak—
My hunting horn. And who are ye, black louts?
Those yonder are my boots? I must have dreamt;
Nearer, the light!—the comfortable light,
The earthly light, the light that shows me life.
And who are you?

2nd Chamberlain.
Your faithful chamberlains.

Rufus.
Show me your faces; they are dim and red.—
My dreams are bloody.—Ha! your pimpled nose
And your slant eye-lid, I have known them ere
I went to sleep. You are my chamberlains,
My common servants, born as other men,
And subject to like terrors with myself;
So do not leave me. Sit on either side,
And watch my pillow. Varlets, if you stir
Your haunches from each side of me, the day
Shall never dawn for either.

1st Chamberlain.
We will stay.

Rufus.
Hath the cock crowed? Ay! now his throat's at work.
You'll never hear that when your blood is shed;
'Tis of the earth and waking to the sun;
There is no clarion of judgment in 't.

1st Chamberlain.
A pleasant household noise! The day is near;
She's melting the cold east.

2nd Chamberlain.
And shadows wane
How fares my liege?

Rufus.
It was a sleep diseased.
I'm well.—This heart is full, and yet they drew
Medicinal red drops; they bled me, and—
Snuff the light, villains! Do you see, 'tis dull,
And ruddily the flame's obscured! Now sit—
For as they bled me, lo! my blood gushed up
To Heaven and put out the light of day.—
Maria!

2nd Chamberlain.
O my lord!—he calls again.
There is damnation in his face.

Rufus.
Look, look!
Out through the window is my blood, it glows
Across the sky, incarnadines the clouds,
And there is day behind it. Red, red, red!
Gules! Oh, blood-red!

1st Chamberlain.
It is the sunrise.

Rufus.
No!—
Is my heart rushing out?

2nd Chamberlain.
My lord, my lord!
Thus daylight comes. You've heard of rosy morn?
'Tis here. Indeed, the colour of the sun
Envermeils all the east.

Rufus.
Not mine, not mine?
It renders me my dream.

1st Chamberlain.
Yea, like the sun
You'll lift on high the scarlet of your reign,
That it will clothe the Heavens with its pride
And quite outdo yon Phœbus.

2nd Chamberlain.
So I think.
Such my interpretation of your dream.

Rufus.
Ha, ha! you teach me reason. From my heart
The ruby stream of empire shall expand
Until it dyes the vision of the world
With glory yet beyond.—I'll raise myself.
Ah! now I see the tree-tops, dingy, dun,
With just a spot of foliage down there
That's lurid with high blush from off the sky.
It's earth, familiar outlook, just the wood
Where I shall hunt to-day; I'll lie and rest;
I have a heavy head-ache. Who comes here?
Hamon!

[Enter Robert Fitz-hamon.]
Fitz-hamon.
Good day. You have a haggard look;
I fear that sleep hath been unmerciful,
As all soft wantons can be.

Rufus.
I have dreamt,
Have been appalled and shaken by a spark,
Until I called it doomsday.

Fitz-hamon.
Very strange.
Dreams multiply. Did aught of death invade
Your slumbers?

Rufus.
Ay, such hovered through the fog
Like Jack-o'-lantern. But these cunning knaves
(As nimble Joseph cheered the Court of Nile)
Make me a merry prophet.

Fitz-hamon.
Pray you, keep
From hunting in the forest. There's a load
This morning on my spirits.

Rufus.
It is hot;
And August weather makes a fool of you.
[Enter the Ætheling Henry.]
Well, Harry, shall we hunt?

Ætheling Henry.
So please you, yes.

Fitz-hamon.
I pray him not—for portents are about,
And I have waked uneasy.

Ætheling Henry.
Do not, then.
If Crœsus had attended to his dream
(The golden king of Lydia), he ne'er
Had lost his son, the hunter, from the dart
Of the young man's own friend.

Rufus.
Now none of that,
Your clerkly nonsense, Harry. Ay, we'll hunt,
But after meat. The fore-noon we'll devote
To business, for I plan a march to Rome.
I'll go where Anselm journeys—not with scrip,
But ringing shield, no staff, but ready spear.
Bring me cold water—I must freeze my head
To have it cool for projects! 'Tis full day.
Harry, the sun is after you, I'll swear
You stand a man of gold.—Get out, I'll dress.

[Exeunt.

Scene IV.

—Castle Malwood. The Banqueting-hall.
Enter Servants with dishes.
1st Servant.
The feast is ready. Flagons glow with wine
Hotter than summer's veins.

2nd Servant.
The steam of joints
Is dense across the breath of basking noon.
The feasters come.

3rd Servant.
Hast noted how the king
Falls into silence after each brave speech,
And is so noisy certain that he'll hunt
Before the day is out?

1st Servant.
Yet puts it off,
And plunges into business recklessly.

2nd Servant.
The chamberlains at cock-crow heard him call
The Holy Name.

1st Servant.
I'll swear he never did;
He scoffs at all religion.

2nd Servant.
Ay, my son,
A mocker is a mendicant at pinch.

[Enter the King, the Ætheling Henry, Walter Tirel, Robert Fitz-hamon, William of Breteuil, and others.]
Rufus.
A goodly meal,
A fat repast. Be seated, gentlemen.
My hearty Tirel, lean you to my right,
I'll have you served with primest venison;
For, gentlemen—be patient with my freak,
It is not worth your jealousy, good lads—
I'm smitten with this Tirel, and my love
Must have him near, at meat and in the chase.
For ere the sun is slanting through the glades,
And taming with its soft decline the brutes
That range these woods, we'll hunt—

Tirel.
We will, we will!
I'll bring to earth rich quarry.

Rufus.
So thou shalt.—
I wish I did not love thee.— [To Attendants.]
Serve him well.
Drink, pot-companions, to my sovereignty.
I'll hold my court at Poitiers next Yule.
The Hall I've built at Westminster is nought,—
A pigmy temple for my empire's shrine.
Drink, compeers, to our revels in the south,
Where Christmas shall be hot as is to-day.
A rouse! Lift up thy cup, thou fool of France.

Ætheling Henry.
Is Walter tame with this blank airless noon,
Or will he flash retort?

Tirel.
Talk, talk, all talk!
The way is clear. Breton and Angevin
Bow to his sway, and yet he nothing does
But wag his forward tongue.

Rufus.
Ho! saucy mate!
We'll be across the Alps and back again
Before our belfries ring the old year out.

Tirel.
If ever they submit to English rule,
An evil death may every Frenchman die!

Ætheling Henry.
A patriot! He's flame and vinegar.
Drink to our merry sport. These beechen glades
And golden mossy plots, where shadows lie
Asleep like satyrs, will be exquisite
In mellow warmth of sun-down ere we start.

Fitz-hamon
[to the King].
You still incline to hunting?

Rufus.
Hunt I will.
My brain is dull and clotted with affairs;
The evening will be cool.

Tirel.
Oh, very cold.

Rufus.
Why say you so?

Tirel.
Sooth, as a flatterer
I magnify your language, for you prate
Like a big tyrant. You say cool—I, cold.

Rufus.
My bosom-friend!

[Enter Wilfrith.]
Breteuil.
Who's here? A staring monk,
With sooty rings about his fevered eyes?

Wilfrith.
Where is the king?

Breteuil.
He crowns the feast up there.

Rufus.
More venison, you niggards! Wine, I say!
I will not hunt till I am full of meat,
And jocund with the madding blood of grapes.
Pour! serve!—I pledge you, Walter.

Tirel.
In red wine
I challenge you.

Breteuil.
This monk has had a dream.

Rufus
[aside].
Cursed be these visions and these haunting sights
That fool my health to qualms. Let's hear this trance.
We have no jester at the feast to-day.
We will make merry with this cowled buffoon.

Wilfrith
[to the King].
Hither, my lord, I've travelled through the sun
To reach your living feet and hold them back
From the dark threshold of your coming doom.
I saw the throne of Judgment, and the night
Flared to annihilation, while the beams
Of moonlight gathered round a kneeling form,
A woman, lily-vestured, sad and white,
The Church that grieved most sorely to her Lord.
I looked and saw a coal-black figure rise,
With grizzly raiment, scintillating darts—
A man, the swarthy witness to his forge.
One shaft the mystic Hand omnipotent
Took, turned, and pointed earthwards.—Oh, my lord,
The bow is bent.

Rufus.
Ho, ho! He is a monk.
Monk-like, he dreams for money. Give him coins—
A hundred shillings.

Wilfrith.
O my lord, my lord ...
I will not take a penny for my pains.
Only believe my words.
Oh, look not on me with hot merry face
That Death may strike to stone and kill with cold
At any wretched moment. [Enter a Smith.]
Heaven! Christ!
'Tis he—the sable minister. Good Lord,
Have mercy!—for the darts are in his hand,
And death becomes reality. Dark man,
Did you not walk along God's hall last night?

Smith.
The monk is crazed. I am an honest soul
Who wrought last night these arrows for the king.
He makes me fear that I am marked to die.

Wilfrith.
Not you.

Rufus
[to Smith].
Approach. How many dost thou bring?

Smith.
Six, my good lord.

Rufus.
They are not for the bow,
You mean them for the deadly arbalest.
They're finely wrought, most cunning Master Smith.
Four I will keep; and two I'll give to thee,
My Walter, for 'tis meet that sharpest steel
Be gift to him who dealeth deadly strokes.
[To Smith.]
My thanks, and praise.

Wilfrith.
There is a further doom.
The murky hands are empty. All is vain.
Woe, woe!

[Enter a Messenger.]
Ætheling Henry.
Your news?

Messenger.
A letter, gracious king,
From Abbot Serlo.

Rufus.
Harry, read the scrawl.
What says it?

Ætheling Henry.
That another monk hath dreamed
Such things as this.

[Pointing to Wilfrith.
Rufus.
Is every brain a cave
Of silly visions? So the Church complains
Among the clouds as well as on the earth.
Walt, do thou justice, even with the things
Which thou hast heard.

Tirel.
I will. Ha, ha! I will.

Rufus.
I wonder at Lord Serlo's fantasy,—
A good old abbot, but a simple soul,—
When I am torn with business and great cares,
To send this nonsense of his snoring monks.
What! Am I like the English, who are scared
From deed and office of necessity
By any whining crone who nods her head?

Ætheling Henry.
The sun declines, and still you linger on.

Tirel.
You are afraid.

Ætheling Henry.
Fie! fie! I think you are,
You have such craven hold upon your chair.
By Jupiter, I swear you will not hunt;
But break your promise to the forest-ways
To make them rich with sport.

Tirel
[aside].
He drinks again,
As if he'd weary Time from tempting him
With what he fears to act. [Aloud.]
A coward! Ay,
Thy liver blanches, though thy cheek's afume.
Fie, thou art fearful of the bunchèd trees,
And the deer startle thee.

Rufus.
I'll hunt, I say.
But I am sick and sad a hundred-fold,
More than ye wot. The end is come—I mean
The feast is over! Rise. I do not think
I stuck more closely to my mother's teat
Than to this table. Nay, I will not go.

Tirel.
He's mocking!

Rufus.
It's a heavy air. ... The dogs
Are baying with a pleasant vulgar sound
That shames my inner strangeness. Seat, farewell!
I feel as I should fall!—All's right. We'll go.

[Exeunt.

Scene V.

—The New Forest: a Glade. Enter the Ætheling Henry, William of Breteuil, and Gilbert of Clare.
Ætheling Henry.
We're solitary.

Clare.
Ay, these tangled brakes
Confuse companionship.

Ætheling Henry.
Their giddy boughs,
Like sirens' hair, enwind the charmèd sense
Until it lose its function. Let us on.

Breteuil.
We have encountered little sport.

Ætheling Henry.
Rich chance
Wait on our sundered friends, for we to-day
Are not Diana's favourites.

Clare.
Methinks
I hear across the air the chime of dogs
Rejoicing the green distance.

Breteuil.
I hear nought.

Ætheling Henry.
There leaps a squirrel! 'Tis too small a goal
For arrow's flight. Contemptuous is Fate
To send us such small prey. Beat down the fern!
I caught the glimmer of a couchant side
Gold in the evening beam. A deer! To chase.

[Exeunt.
[Enter from the other side, Robert Fitz-hamon and Gilbert of Laigle.]
Fitz-hamon.
Where is the king?

Laigle.
I cannot even guess.
I saw him turn about a clump of oak
In company with Tirel; when I reached
The spreading corner he was gone.

Fitz-hamon.
The pack
Is just below. But we are in a maze,
And there's no thread to guide us. I will blow
My horn.

Laigle.
Stay! Yonder is a grazing herd,
Soft victims for our onslaught.—Where the dell
Stoops to a stony brook, I hear response.
We have not far to seek.

Fitz-hamon.
Within a wood
We're far and near; perchance may never meet.

Laigle.
We'll work to share our favours with the rest,
And call the dogs around us. In this shade
The air is cloistered. It is very hot.

[Exeunt.

Scene VI.

—Another part of the Forest: a Glade below Malwood. Enter the King and Walter Tirel.
Rufus.
Tirel, I am a man again; these leaves
Breathe life; the rattle of the quiver shakes
My heart to palpitation and sharp joy.
This freedom makes each throbbing art'ry bold,
And clears my blood of phantasy. I stand
The jolly hunter, with my steadfast bow,
And bosom unconfined with secret thoughts
That girdled my good spirits to this hour
And kept them tight at dinner.

Tirel.
You were sad.
But who could help rejoicing, that is lord
Of these deep forests!

Rufus.
Every inch of ground
Is mine; yon wide-set beeches, mine; the deer
All mine, my father's heritage. Like him
I love them—to the death. One comes. Soft! soft!
I'm ready—now!

[Shoots, and slightly wounds the deer.
Tirel.
It runs.

Rufus.
The light is broad;
It blinds me.

Tirel.
'Tis the setting of the sun.

Rufus.
I'll shade my eyes.—He's there!

Tirel.
See, see, my lord!
Another one!

Rufus.
Shoot, in the devil's name!

[Tirel shoots—the arrow glances from an oak, and pierces the King.
Tirel.
God save me! He is falling on the dart.
It breaks; he grasps the fragment with a groan
And pulls out death from hiding in his breast.
Christ! He hath found his doom. Wretch, wretch am I!
[Coming up to the King.]
For mercy's sake, lift up thy face! The lips
Are speechless; but there's vision in the eyes—
Their egress nearly dumb—and yet they say:
“Pain is my portion; all is lost.” I'll seize
These flow'rs and herbs; perchance the Lord above
Will hold them for a sacrament. He's gone.
Too late! He's clay, and lifeless. I could think—
He looks so stout and proof against his fall—
He'd rise again, and bend once more his bow,
Bend it to slay his murderer. I'll fly.
They'd call it murder though I did it not.
The tree, the oak, was Nimrod in this chase,
And mightily hath hunted.—I am chilled;
There is a wind as if the woods breathed free. ...
There is a terror round me and this man,
A gathering of voices through the shades,
A vengeful trooping of screened witnesses,
A judge's tension in the very air,
As it would aim a sentence 'gainst my soul.
God! I must fly. If I escape with life,
To Holy Land I'll bear my ransomed blood.—
Cold image of dead fellowship, good-bye!—
I dare not pause; so fearful is the spot.
To horse!

[Exit.
[Enter on the other side Robert Fitz-hamon and Gilbert of Laigle.]
Laigle.
Ho, ho! We shall not meet this eve.
There's Friar's lantern unseen in the wood,
Or we should never wander thus like fools.
The sun is down; dew falls and shadows grow.

Fitz-hamon.
What's that—yon heap with glitter on the grass?
Some hunter sorely hurt.—Alas!—the king!
And dead as what he lies on. Ah, too true
The visions swelled around the banks of sleep;
He would not see the warning. Now he lies
In dreamless slumbers that will never wake
Till every night is done.

Laigle.
Alas! alas!
His hands were full of gifts.
[Enter William of Breteuil and Gilbert of Clare.]
Look here and see
Our fortune dead!

Clare.
The king!

Breteuil.
Lift up his bulk.

Fitz-hamon.
Too late. The dart hath scattered all his breath,
And we are ruined.

Breteuil.
Let us to our holds
And gather booty in!

Clare.
Whose deed is this?

Fitz-hamon.
Some churl's offence.

Laigle.
'Twas Tirel rode with him.

Breteuil.
Tirel I saw at gallop even now,
As if the fiend were hindmost.

Clare.
Curse the fool!
We'll follow to revenge this regicide.
Off, off, and after!

[Exeunt Clare and Laigle.
Breteuil.
Nobles of the land,
This is a pause of moment in affairs.
You all declare for Robert. I'll away
And seize the hoard at Winchester.

[Exit.
[Enter the Ætheling Henry.]
Ætheling Henry.
Well met.
I've had my bow-string mended where a dame,
As brown as Earth, was full of prophecy—
Jove! What is this?

Fitz-hamon.
Your royal brother dead.

Ætheling Henry.
Who knows?

Fitz-hamon.
Some three. De Breteuil's on his way
To Winchester.

Ætheling Henry.
I am your king—He's gone.
[Fitz-hamon rides off.
The king that is, left with the king that was,
Both the crowned fruit of one imperial womb.
William, I'll be a wiser prince than thou,
And yet as proud.—My coming fate must have
The heels of Atalanta.—English oaks,
Farewell; ye've crowned the Ætheling. Now I'll race
To Winchester, where all the gold is bright.

[Exit.
[Enter Purkis and Beowulf.]
Purkis.
A sunny eve. I'll prop you 'neath this trunk
You know the girth of, while I gather clods
For the oven.—How his face works! Does he smell
The hunters here about? There is no sound.

[At a little distance he perceives the body of Rufus.
Beowulf.
What do you stand so still for?

Purkis.
Farther off!
[Kneeling before Rufus, and speaking low.]
The very crown of England in the dust;
Those royal eyes sunk in the savageness
Of death! My king—what, no retainer here?
They say thy father lay upon the floor:—
That was in Normandy. We Englishmen
Have awe. Well, well,—a freeman and no churl
Shall bear you to your burial. All soaked
With blood—the very Earth! A majesty
Is on him, and my heart's allegiance
Is his. 'Tis pity that he broke with God.
Such quarrels have one ending. I will kneel,
And humbly as the meekest chamberlain
Put thee to rest, and kiss and fold thy hands
Cross-wise,—the posture's good for judgment-morn,
It turns the Lord's eye off to Calvary
To come back moist with mercy.—How to lift?
Dad can't assist.

Beowulf.
I will have charge of him;
Give him to me. It was the oak that struck;
He wounded it; it gathered up the wrongs
Of generations in its storied pile,
And for the people hath poured out revenge.
The Earth shall leper him; each trampled blade
Of grass shall bear a drop of blood for dew;
Nature shall part the spoil; the gallows fowl
Must not be left unsummoned, the maimed dogs
Must mutilate the quarry.

Purkis.
Father, hush!
Satan has hold of you; you would not curse
A murdered man. I'll fetch the cart to bear
His bones to Winchester; he must be laid
'Mid the old royal tombs.

Beowulf.
Is he not damned?

Purkis.
We are poor folk, and he has rated us.
God 's king; He'll have a fellow-feeling like;
No vengeance in His heart. Leave Him to judge.

Beowulf.
Yea, bear him through the woods like a gashed boar,
Present him dripping to your angry God;
He may not be implacable. In haste
Cloak the foul thing beneath the minster tow'r;
Heap soil on him; choke your rememberance
Of his unnat'ral crime; establish him
In the untaxed dominion of a grave;—
Earth will unhouse him from his tenement;
He shall be dispossessed. The crumbling tow'r
Shall spread in ruins over him: his vault
Shall crack her walls, and open up her roof
To let foul, rushing weather on the clay
That shall rot down with refuse and be lost,
The land-mark broken down, the boundary
And guarding hallowed precinct of a tomb.

Purkis
[aside].
La! he is terrible. I cannot doubt
He's some great advocate to press his wrongs.
It's odd now I should tremble to entrust
A dead man to the keeping of a blind.
Great king, you're in the clutch of Destiny!
Death looks a strong-ceiled house; ah me! I fear
It is a sorry sanctuary from sin.
There's much remains. Some hoary influence
Sits at the chimney-corner of our lives,
Holding a rightful end in store for all.
There's little we can alter. All the same
It's simple we must give him burial.
I'll fetch the cart with Wilfrith.

[Exit.
Beowulf
[carefully feeling the corpse].
There are worms
About his darkness. I am satisfied.
[Leaving the body, he props himself against the oak.
Earth, Earth, O Earth! the tyrant is struck down.
Thou drew'st the arrow from Fate's sluggish hand;
Thou sped'st it mortally. Though thy blind sons
Dishonour thee, seeking the younger love
Of Country, swayed by her caprice, to strive
For law or liberty, while thou art bond,
Far off thou hearest Freedom's yeanling cry,
Orphaned, necessitous; thy motherhood,
O Earth, is prophecy! Thou wilt prevail.