University of Virginia Library

ACT IV.

Scene I.

A Room in Eliduke's Castle at Yveloc.
Roland and Walter meeting.
Rol.
Well met, Sir Walter! If my memory serve,
I have not seen you since the busy day
We scotched those rascal Picards. By my faith,
The knaves showed fight too! Come you from the court?

Walt.
Yes, my good lord, from Nantes; where, I may tell you,
You fill men's mouths still with your gallant deeds
That singly turned the fortune of the day
And propped the tottering safety of the realm.

Rol.
I came but second to your Eliduke,
The crest of noble blades, my friend and brother.

Walt.
You are equal stars and peers of valorous action;
The courtiers' brains were sorely put to it
When you two, whose skilled conduct in the war
Had closed our dangers with a prosperous peace,
Put by preferment that was pushed upon you,
And scorning the gilt humours of the court
And burden of the King's precarious favour,
Chose rather here to rest upon your oars,
And let life's tide go by. Runs it smooth here?
Lord Eliduke still loves his wife, my lord?

Rol.
What is't you say?

Walt.
Nay, I am sad, my lord.
Do you love Castabel?

Rol.
Sir, when you name her,
Whose title I dare scarcely bless my lips with,
Use a more reverent form! I do not love her.
Common hearts love and dote on common things;
But she that is the finest work of Heaven
And gathered garland of all excellence,
Framed to show men that there are higher things
Than their dull-paced imaginations frame,—
She claims a clearer-spirited devotion
Than that which mingles in the medley love.
I serve her, then, with grief, and not with love,
Which interferes not in a husband's rights;
Not idle pinings and such boyish show,
But with a deep and silent melancholy,
Because my earthly hopes and happiness
Are all closed up in her, and here on earth
Can never shoot again.

Walt.
Do you not see,
Or, always seeing her, have overlooked,
How pale she grows, and what an anxious eye
From under her drawn brow looks sadly out?
Since last I saw her, the slow pen of care
Has written change upon her sunken cheek!
Alas! I know the cause.

Rol.
Tell me the cause!
I know her cheek is sunk; her brother's death
And Blancaflor's deep grief weigh thus with her.

Walt.
It is not that:—yet why should I lay bare
What she within herself wraps up so close,
Nor even breathes it, I dare well be sworn,
In the dark ear of secret-keeping night?
It is so terrible and sad a thing,
That to her central soul she tells it not,
Only she feels it draining all her comfort.

Rol.
What is this thing?

Walt.
Eliduke loves her not;
Loves her no more, but with a foreign passion
Feeds his changed heart.

Rol.
What a pure devil are you,
That with an unchanged cheek and solemn tongue
Can vent such an abominable lie!
What! do you come to me, and dare you think,
Because I with a chaste and clear devotion
Affect this lady, you can hope to make me
A credulous instrument to some vile end
Your base brain hammers at? Let me look on you!
You are not Walter! O man, get you gone!
Honesty's less than it was! I am not angry,
So much do I disdain your paltry tale!

Walt.
Do you think this?

Rol.
Fine counterfeit amazement!
Sir, this grows tiresome! Look! The ladies come!
Make your fool's faces elsewhere!

Walt.
Let time show;
I'll touch no more in't. Is not Eliduke sad?

Rol.
Yes, sir, he is. D'ye think by patching up
Your petty circumstance you still can move me?
Begone, or I shall chafe!

Walt.
Remember this.

[Exit.
Rol.
What a knavish ape is this, slandering his lord!
Sir Walter, too! The court hath spoiled a man.

Enter Castabel and Blancaflor.
Cast..
Oh, take comfort!

Blanc.
Forgive me, sister; I forget myself.

Cast..
Too long you feed your sorrow with these tears.

Blanc.
Indeed I know that to the lookers on
Sorrow seems often tedious. Pray forgive me;
I will go weep alone.

Cast..
Not that,—not that,—
Not because I am tired, dear Blancaflor,
But that you hurt yourself. Why, how should that be?
I own as deep an interest in this grief
As thou canst do,—cherish as grave a sorrow.

Blanc.
As I? Oh, no! or I should shame myself,
As yet I may do, not to learn of you
A placider deportment: you have children
Whose tiny tongues prattle away your grief,
A loving husband in whose clasping arms
You harbour your tossed heart. I!—

Cast..
O sweet sister!

[They embrace in silence.
Rol.
Oh, what an angel aspect sorrow wears,
Being housed in such bright souls! I were unworthy
To see these tears, but that a kindred grief
Stirs in mine own full heart. These, and the boy
Late snatched by death, sure are not earthly stock,
But heavenly seed, by the kind hand above
Flung to renew our breed, and with our blood
To mix the clear and crimson element
Rolls in their finer veins. She lifts her head.

Blanc.
Let's talk of him. They are poor comforters
That snatch away the memory of the dead,
Our sweet most healing salve. Do you remember,
When he was very little, how we sate
Under the unpleached hedges in the fields,
And with green briony and honeysuckle
Circled his laughing hair? Do you remember?

Cast.
Dear childish days, never to come again!

Blanc.
And now he's dead, and far over the sea
Lies buried by the shore, that should have lain
In some green plot i' th' woods, where I'd have planted
His favourite flowers, and watered them with tears.
The daisy, spring's rathe herald, columbine
Nodding her purple head, anemone
Star of the grass, crowsfoot and celandine,—
All April's children,—these should have coverletted
His ivory body, while his unfleshed soul,
Lingering for me upon the edge of heaven,
Should with a liquid smile look down the blue
To see me tend his grave.

Cast..
How gentle was he,
And in men's hearts anchored himself how deeply!
Sir Walter, when he told his death's sad story,
Changed the stern aspect of a war-soiled soldier
For a piteous child's, and shook the frequent tears
From his rough cheeks in showers. My husband too
Waters a planted sorrow in his breast;—
Oft in the midst of some kind word to me,
Or dear caress, shot with keen recollection,
Stops suddenly, and turning his blanched cheek
Gives silence to the air. Thus, long he stands—
Ah! with so sad a face!—Oh, my good lord,
[To Roland.
We two sad sisters are poor company,
And I do ill in my untutored grief
To cover up the courtesy due to you!

Rol.
Your sorrow's the best courtesy, telling me
I'm fit to share your grief; and so I am
In this, that I much loved him.

Blanc.
You say you loved him?

Rol.
Most dearly for himself! and more than that,
He was your sister's brother.

Blanc.
I mistook you,
Because you wept not for him, and my tears
Were bitterer to make up the lack of yours.

Rol.
I am schooled in grief, and sorrow shows not in me,
Being deeper buried. Yet this grief's not much,
The boy being dead, and, with the bloom upon him,
Plucked for the court of heaven. Death's a sharp knife,
Whose wound heals up; but there's a bruising sorrow
That rankles comfort. Death being duly mourned,
The past looks greener for the tears shed in it;
But there's a grief within whose heavy hand
The future is crushed up, and all our virtue
Turned into constancy.

Blanc.
How are such sorrows shown?

Rol.
Not shown at all.

Cast..
How solemnly you speak, as if you felt them!

Rol.
Because I do, and therefore marvel not
I have no tears for death, who seems a crown
In the black hair of shrouded Melancholy
Which I would gladly win, but that I must not
Stretch mine own hand for't.

Blanc.
Such grief's hard to bear,
And looks not through the chambers of the eye,
But lays a cold hand on the heart within!

Rol.
You speak it feelingly.

Blanc.
Alas, poor Harry!

Enter Page.
Page.
My lord asks for you, sir.

Rol.
I'll see him straight.

Cast..
You'll give my absence leave then, my good lord.
[To Blanc.]
Come, you shall go with me. I am almost
Joyful again to see your tears dried up.

[Exeunt Castabel and Blancaflor.
Rol.
Alas, they flow inwardly! some deeper sorrow,
I know not what, sits at the spring of her heart.
So young, and yet a gathered hopelessness
Marbles her cheek! What can it be but love—
Lost, unreturned love? No other sorrow
Can strike so deep. Come, lead me to your lord.

[Exit.

Scene II.

A Room in the Castle at Yveloc.
Eliduke alone.
Eli.
O cherub-featured fiend, unholy love,
Thou train'st my soul astray! Where can I fly,
The image of Estreldis more prevailing
In my soul's vision than things sensible
To the outward faculty? With the thin air
I suck in passion, and the still noontide
Seems heavy with her memory. Vaunted absence
Doth but digest this searching draught of passion
Into my changed soul's substance. That slow liking
In my green days I felt for Castabel
Was but a fire that under the hot sun
Of real love has smouldered into ashes
And died away. The words, “sweet Castabel,”
Bring but the smile upon Estreldis' lips.
From her endearments and the soft grasp of her arms
I shrink in terror, they accord so ill
With my changed heart. Oh, I can stand no more;
Beneath this load of love my virtue breaks!
I'll back to Cornwall. I am bound by oath,
And must not break it. Ay, that virtue's easy
That sits with inclination. It ill becomes me,
That to my virtuous wife intend this wrong,
To breathe the name of virtue. 'Tis like one
That with a bought kiss on his unwashed lips
Tastes his chaste mistress' breath. Alas, sweet wife!
Dear loving heart! kind angel Castabel!
I well remember, when I went away,
She kissed my lips, and said, “Dear love, be true!”
And I have been most false.

Rol.
(within).
In here, d'ye say?

Servant
(within).
That door, my lord.

Eli.
Here comes the noble Roland.
I dare not call him friend that go about
To make him hate me deadly.

Enter Roland.
Rol.
Good day, my lord;
You sent me word that you would speak with me.

Eli.
(aside).
And know not what to say.

Rol.
So sad? still sad?
Why do you keep this melancholy brow?

Eli.
I'll tell you why. What think you of my state?

Rol.
As of a man's who holds in his full grasp
All mortal heart can covet. Fame adorns you;
For, like a hunter, you have run her down,
And bear her spoils about you. Fortune aids you,
And through the currents of a soldier's life
Hath steered you into safety. You have riches,
Health, and, to crown the whole, a wondrous wife,
Whose sole possession should, lacking all else,
Out of the heart of misery pluck content.

Eli.
Let be awhile. I'll show you what my state is.
D'ye see this ring that sits upon my finger,
Wreathed of bright gold, and by the curious framer
Chased and embossed with various workmanship,—
What credits most his art,—yet this alone
Makes not its value. 'Tis this diamond,
Whose sparkling eye set in the front of it
Riches and graces the circumference.
I'm such a ring,
Bright in my reputation, wrought by Fortune;
But the rare gem, without whose clear adornment
All is but marr'd, the sole essential,
The jewel of my happiness, I lack.

Rol.
Why, that should be your wife.

Eli.
Should be, and is not.

Rol.
And is not!

Eli.
Oh, mistake me not; she is
All excellence, and I might safelier
Chide at the angels than find fault in her:
And yet she's not this jewel.

Rol.
Why, what is then?

Eli.
To win it, I must cast away my wife;
To win it, I must cast away mine honour,
Tread virtue down, your friendship and opinion
(Which I protest I hold most sovereign)
Break and throw by, bar up the gates of heaven,
Fellow with infamy, and be indeed
The co-mate of contempt and ignominy.

Rol.
I'm glad you lack it, then.

Eli.
And I for it
Would fling to air this idle reputation,
Forget my home, give up my dearest friends,
Barter mine honour, break mine honesty,
Go hand in hand with shame, and for this pottage
Would sell my dear inheritance in heaven;—
I would, and will.

Rol.
Why then you are not virtuous;
And yet I know you do but jest with me.

Eli.
Whom call you virtuous?

Rol.
Him whose good acts
Tread close on his intents,—these virtuous.
Good deeds with bad intent are wickedness,
And good intents unacted ciphers merely.

Eli.
But by the standard of his good intent
You shall mete out the man. Oh, what low aims
Distract the common world! Here sensual good
Stands throned,—a beast, a goddess. Idiot throngs,
Yet more insensate than their painted filth,
Barter their intellect for barren gold,
Prouder to handle earth than tread in heaven.
Here weakness lifts a puny passing arm,
Making a clutch at slippery command,
Ill 'titled power.
And there's another end fond men call virtuous,
A selfish striving for a seat in heaven;—
Casting the odds up;—“Here's an hour of pleasure;
Why that's soon over, and the self-denial
Will bring more bliss in heaven; let it go;”—
Driving a penny bargain with their God,
Sound-headed saints! Oh, there's a higher end,
A deeper spring of action, to please Heaven;
To fix our love, our hopes, our exultations
Only in the approving eye of God;
And he's most virtuous whose high-lifted soul
Fosters the loftiest thoughts and noblest ends;
He's the true man.

Rol.
You're wrong; for that's a gift,
Measured by the discerning hand of Heaven.
He's the true man
That, with whatever seed high Heaven hath sown him,
So tends and cultivates his springing soul,
So digs about it with true resolution,
So waters it with penitential tears,
That it spreads forth a worthy flower of action,
Best of his kind, though from a richer soil
A brighter blossom springs. He's the true man,
That, having weighed by his best faculties
What's worthiest in his poor estimation,
Fixes a steadfast eye on that alone,
And by its aid treads the thin verge of virtue
Over the giddy world. Imaginations
Wanting a steadfast purpose are but stars
To the vexed eye of the storm-shattered sailor
Left rudderless upon the wayward waves.
Noble desires, unless filled up by action,
Are but a shell of gold, hollow within.

Eli.
I'm wrong, my lord, indeed. Oh, less unworthy
Are sacrifices made with unwashed hands,
Than lofty thoughts and high imaginations
With an untutored heart. Such men there are
Who, bearing dazzling prospects on their tongues,—
Ay, in their hearts too,—yet in act fall from them,
And forge a weapon for the hands of fools
To strike at virtue.—Such a man am I!

Rol.
Either you jest, or else you fail in health,
And falling short of your high-pitched desire,
As all men must, your sick distempered fancy
Paints you in these bad colours, ill deserved.

Eli.
You'll not believe, because you are yourself
Pillared in honesty. I must to Cornwall.

Rol.
To Cornwall?

Eli.
Ay, my lord; bound by an oath.

Rol.
Some quarrel, then? Have you an enemy?

Eli.
Ay, and a fatal.

Rol.
And hath wronged you?

Eli.
Foully.

Rol.
Why, then I'll help you kill him.

Eli.
Draw, and do so!
Strike here! For I am my worst enemy,
And foully go about to wrong myself.

Rol.
You're mad, sure. Tell me! What's this heinous act
You feign to contemplate?

Eli.
If I should tell you,
You'd strike me dead.

Rol.
Listen to me, my lord!
If there be such an act as this you name,
And you in earnest to go through with it
(Which I'll not think until I see the proof of't
Written in shame upon you), we no longer
Are friends, but stand estranged. Nay, pardon me,
If your sad face makes me believe you serious,
That all the while are mocking.

Eli.
I am serious;
But if I do this act shall never more
Look in your eyes, or see my native land.
By this night's tide I quit the Bretagne shore,
Prepared, if't be for ever.

Rol.
And your wife?

Eli.
Why, think me dead, and marry her yourself!

Rol.
He's mad! I'll hear no more!

[Exit.
Eli.
Go, honest man!
And thou, lost slave of passion, to thy work!
I'll do it! I'll do't! Conscience, I hear thy voice,
That with an eloquent trumpet shak'st my soul.
“Thou dost betray thyself.” I know I do.
“And in this sin stiflest those aspirations
That outsoared common mortals' pitch of virtue.”
I know I do, and thence the greater villain.
There is no murderer so foul and stained
That he can match with me, and yet I'll do't!
Walter shall go with me; he is light-hearted;
Scoffs too at women, and makes light of love:
He will not read this act's enormity.
And yet I know not; I think Harry's death
Sticks in his throat yet. Well, I'll move him to't.
The sun drops down; I must aboard to-night.
Estreldis, from thy Cornish coast look over,
And thou shalt see, gilt with the rising sun,
A bark deep laden with love upon the sea.
Thy true affection shall— Stop! what if she
Should prove as false—as I to Castabel?
Ha!
Oh, room for my swoln heart! I suffocate!
Terrible retribution and most fitting,
If I, that have used falsehood to obtain her,
Should find her false to me! I think she will be.
Yet she believes me true. Alas! if she
Should find how false a beast she hath preferred
Into her heart, I should indeed become
The castaway of scorn.

[Exit.

Scene III.

A Hall in the Castle.
Enter Eliduke and Walter.
Eli.
Leave me? go home?
Tut, tut, man! you are passionate, and know not
What 'tis you ask. I say you shall not go.

Walt.
My lord, I must and will.

Eli.
I say you shall not;
What idle freak is this? Come, you are angry.
I have been too hasty. What, man, we are friends still?

Walt.
Once when you said so I esteemed the title
Above my other honours; did I so now,
I would not cast it for a hasty word.

Eli.
Do you think I am not grateful? You shall try me.
Do you lack gold? Ask. I was never niggard.
Has any wronged you? I stand here engaged
To right you with my sword and countenance.
Is this your grief because I am not grateful?

Walt.
Not that, my lord.

Eli.
What then? Pish! you are changing!

Walt.
Shall I tell you, then? Because you are not noble,
And the intent you hold, and ask my aid in,
Bad and dishonourable.

Eli.
Ha! you can speak, then!

Walt.
Ay, boldly; and I say your honest seeming
Discords with what's within. You are not true!
Does it become you, being dedicated
By the close tie of wedlock to a lady,
Whose beauty and whose worth are only matched
By her deep love to you, to cast that off,
And that which was her due, your true affection,
To yield a foreign breast? Does it become you
To train this princess from her father's court,
And teach her young and unpolluted ears
A title of dishonour? I was wrong
That egged you on in making love to her,
And thought it but the pastime of the hour
To rifle women's hearts. Look what it grows to.

Eli.
Grow where it may, I will go through with it.

Walt.
Oh, reckon up how many wrongs you heap
To build yourself a monument of shame!
You wrong your wife,—your chaste, your wedded wife;
You wrong the lady whom you swear to love;
You wrong the King who housed and did you honour;
Wrong hospitality, wrong confidence.
You wrong yourself to stir in such a cause;
You wrong your friends to ask their aid in it;
You wrong the day that looks on such a wrong;
You wrong the darkness that must cover it;
You wrong all good deeds by their opposite;
You wrong all former wrongs to lessen them.
Stay here, and move not in this enterprise.

Eli.
Now, though a hundred such sick consciences,
Set in the breasts of idiot-witted fools,
Stood in my way, I would not stir one jot from't!

Walt.
Why, then, go on!

Eli.
And will; for who shall stay me?

Walt.
Not virtue, for your eager tongue to speak her
Outgoes your acts.

Eli.
Beware! beware! beware!

Walt.
Not honour, for the part you had in her
Is gone since the black day you told a lie,
A hideous lie, making the boy believe
The favour that he fought for was his sister's.
What! must the boy die for't? Could you not
Defend your wanton's glove? A coward too!
A liar and a coward! Add to that
A foul adulterer! Take the sum of it!
[Eliduke rushes at him with his sword.
A murderer too!

Eli.
Out, man! Thy life runs short!

Walt.
Out, then! look to your own too!

[Eliduke strikes the sword from the hand of Walter, throws him to the ground, and plants his foot on his breast.
Eli.
Ha! you dog!

Walt.
Strike, and fill up your crimes! I fear you not.
Dare you not strike?

Eli.
Away, thou murderous fiend!
Mak'st my soul itch for blood!
[Flinging his sword away.
Hence, instrument!
Let your life buy your silence. Get you up.
Pick up your sword. I'll go alone. There's gold.

[Flinging it on the ground.
Walt.
Even yet, my lord—

Eli.
Peace, peace! I am not for you!
[Exit Walter, leaving the purse lying.
What, ho! within there!
Enter Page.
How runs the tide? Give me my sword lies yonder.

Page.
Nigh to the full, my lord.

Eli.
Pooh! keep the gold!
Part it among the house. Where's Castabel?

Page.
Within, sir.

Eli.
Knows my going?

Page.
I think no, sir.

Eli.
Get me my cloak. Are all the sailors ready?
Attend me to the boat. The moon's at change.
Pray Heaven the weather hold! What say the sailors?

[Exeunt.