University of Virginia Library

Scene V

—Crichton Muir; a wild, marish country, lighted by glow-worms, in the distance a saddled horse
The Queen enters, dressed as a cavalier, and throws herself on the grass
I have lost,
Quite lost my way, and with it every grief.
Ah, here is freedom, here is quietness;
Myself's own mystery closes round my soul
Once more, and I am healed. I have no prayer,
Nor any hopes or fears. To penetrate
Still further on, to learn more of this June,
This deep, midsummer midnight! I have touched
The roses, and have felt the fanning wind:
There is a kingdom where these royalties
Are more than faintly dreamed. Oh, if what stirs
In sleep, what palpitates with blessedness,
Would carry me away in trancèd arms!
(She puts her hands through the turf)
I have no mind for death. What gaiety
There is across the banks—a showery track
Of glow-worms; the whole grass is full of them,
And on beyond they thicken toward the moor.
I can be very wakeful with delight,
And watch the change and flitting of these lamps,
The passing and re-passing to and fro,
A luminous, slow load. How heavily
One drags behind, and now they all are gone.
One, two—I cannot count them.
(She sleeps)
[OMITTED] (Waking)
Day-break—ho!
The hills are built again,
And yonder is a castle. God, it seems
The sullen country that I saw before,
As I had made an orbit in the dark,
And come round to my starting. Silently
The light is creeping through; from point to point
It passes and gives judgment: on the verge
The barren hills expose their solitude,
The marsh yields up its rank and heavy pools,
While at my feet these silky filaments
(Gathering sedges)
Shake their untarnished tufts athwart the wind.
In this hard dawn I find no comforter;
It is too just, it spreads impartially,
Shooting no dazzling signature across
The wide, accessible, untrodden ways.
I cannot choose or wander any more,
I can but bow me to my misery,
And take the pensive journey of a spirit,
That walks from hollow torture to its tomb,
To clothe itself in flesh that shall receive,
Foster, prolong, diversify its pangs.
There is a tramp of footsteps.

(Turning, she sees Bothwell close to her)
Bothwell
Marie!—What,
You wanton! But you flitted for my sake
Across the brae?

Queen
No matter—for we meet.

Bothwell
Ho, lad! This change of vesture almost might
Win manhood to adopt you; yet, my faith!
We have no room among our qualities
For wild, exciting pallor, and such gaze
As would make civil war within our sex,
If once admitted . . . . Why, there is a change—
Turn me your face!—there is a change beyond
The youngster's cap about your wrung-up hair,
The boots and spurs. I madden! If you mean
To punish me you could not use me worse
Than mumming in these clothes with face of sorrow,
And climax of strange loveliness that makes me
Half-dread you are a spirit in disguise,
And mine no more.

Queen
Where are we, on what road?

Bothwell
She wanders still. Black Castle stands to left
That hid me in my flight. Ah, you are changed!

Queen
A terrible perfection has been growing
In every sense of good and pain I feel.
No wonder I turn lovelier—I am young,
Not adverse as the old are toward their griefs,
But lithe to chastening.

Bothwell
Talk less foolishly.
My Thespian, O my buskined love, this stage,
This moor, is not for interludes. The foe
May any moment seize us. I was sick,
Short-tempered when we parted.

Queen
You are wrong,
We did not say goodbye.

Bothwell
O pardon!

Queen
Whither
Does foredoom take us?

Bothwell
Hasten to Dunbar
With me: then are you safe.

Queen
Not to Dunbar!

Bothwell
Why, 'tis the only refuge.

Queen
(Apart)
Back to Hell
God's power dismisses lost ones on the day
Of their accompt; back, back to Hell—Dunbar!

Bothwell
You speak with half a voice and hollowly.
Come, you are not yourself and must be led;
I sweep my arm around your shoulders, boy!
I am the stronger man, and shall prevail
If you entice my sinews into work.
And yet the deepness of your eyes affrights,
And is unlawful. I forbid the folly
Which thus delays escape.

Queen
Yes, I must come;
It is my sentence.

Bothwell
What, you are offended?
Then let me kiss the frown away.

Queen
No, no!
Shame not my venturous gait.

Bothwell
You shall no more
Pause in a gleaming stupor, but enlinked
Fly to your husband'e castle, and there pay
The sweet embraces due to him. On oath,
I will not plague your lips, my traveller,
Till you have altered guise.

Queen
You do not well
To take me to your sea-fort, with my clear
Aboding that we go there to divide
Who left it to be wedded: 'tis the end,
A bare, unblest extreme.

Bothwell
The damps have entered
Your health, the fiendful desolation driven
Your wits into the moon.—You have not slung
Your sword aright. As fair as beaten gold
Your neck shines out above the heavy wrap;
There's no imperfect place in you, except
This error of accoutrement.

Queen
Dunbar!

Bothwell
You shall not speak it on a burning pant.
Its red towers are not answerable for
The rare effects that bind us. By God's blood,
We must put in for haven from revolt
There where my cannon are, my guns, and strength.
At last an army gathers.

Queen
Oh, to spend
Warlike, not over-solitary hours!
To toil, inspire, and marshal. Will you promise
An army?

Bothwell
By my life, I will.

Queen
Lead on!
There are affairs to settle by the sea:
Waves welter and cry out, but I shall hear
The press of faithful squadrons. (To Bothwell)
Loose my neck,
Then I will follow.

Bothwell
(Apart)
She is changed. O fate,
Re-make her into woman once again,
For she is gone from underneath my hand.

(Exeunt)