University of Virginia Library

SCENE XV.

Choir of Canterbury Cathedral: to the left St. Benedict's Chapel.
Becket's Corpse on a bier. Crowds of visitors, some gazing at the death-place, some at the body, or paying it veneration by kneeling around it, touching it, kissing the Primatial robes, insignia, &c.
John of Salisbury. Bosham. John of Oxford.
John of S.
Lo! how the multitude flock in!—'Tis strange
This thing so soon was known; Bosham and I
Were too heart-sick to speak of it; and Gryme
Is in a trance of agony even yet,
Through loss of limb and lord.

John of O.
When did it happen?

John of S.
Near about Vesper time.

John of O.
Methinks the news
Spread with the curfew knell over all England,
Even in a moment: 'twas miraculous!
I heard it scarce more late at London Tower;
And deem'd it that strange mockery of sound
Which oft its echoing shell makes of our ear,
Or yet more strange intelligence presaged
By what we dread is true;—but every face
Round me was pale-struck also, each foot stopt
Howe'er precipitate, hands were half raised,
Or placed to still the beatings of the heart,
As if some thunderous blare had rent the sky
And all drew breath to hear the Doom-word follow.

John of S.
Most strange! Both town and country are afoot;
You'd think an earthquake of the total Isle
Had roused them from their beds. See how they troop,
Jostling with fear, haste, and confusion.

John of O.
The place will be a pilgrimage ere long,
So reverenced was this man.

John of S.
And is the more
That Death enrolls him now among the Martyrs.
Some royalty has enter'd, to do honour,
Or mourn with us—alas! alas!

John of O.
The Queen.

Eleanor approaches hastily, and kneels at the foot of the bier.
John of S.
How very white her Highness looks!

John of O.
Nay, haggard;
She must be wayworn sadly. Hark! she mutters:
Does she forget she's in a crowd and church?
Not at her priedieu?

Eleanor.
O most holy Becket!
Pray for me, make my peace with ireful heaven,
Thou who hast now such influence o'er the Saints
As new amongst them, and above them all
Rank'd by thy bleeding crown of Martyrdom!—
Eleanor is uneasy in her soul:
Give me some sign of favour, and thy tomb
I'll circle with an orb of golden urns
Flaming perpetual incense! Tell me how
To quell this troublous spirit.

[The Shade of Rosamond rises at the head of the Bier.
Shade.
Pitiless Queen!
How canst thou hope repose unto thy spirit,
Denying it to my unhappy clay!

Eleanor.
Help to the Queen of England!—Guards there!—help!
Stand between her and me! Let her not gaze
So ghastly on me thus!

John of S.
Who is it offends
Your grace!

Eleanor.
She!—she!—that fixes on me there
Her marble eyes.

John of S.
'Tis but the statued form
Of a young Martyress.

Eleanor.
I know it well,
Hate's martyress and mine!—Fair Rosamond!
Art thou not she?

Shade.
Rosamond once called Fair!
Poor Rosamond who never wish'd thee harm!
Thy husband loved thee not, and 'twas 'gainst thee
Small crime, that faith, thou nor preserved nor prized,
Plighted itself to me.—My death was merciless
Beyond all need or measure: that fierce drink
Which rack'd me inwardly and warped my form
Unseemliest to behold, might have been spared,
For thy fierce words had slain me.

Eleanor.
'Twas not I
Prepared the drug—false Geber, the physician!

Shade.
Is this pale presence dreadful as the fear
Of that grim fiend thou brought'st to torture me
Before my time in hell?

Eleanor.
The fiend-like creature
Work'd me to work thy death—I was her slave!

John of S.
List how to her own fearful Fantasy
She shrives herself!—'Tis a sad self-exposure.

Shade.
I am fate's herald here: Thy name shall stand
A breviary of all abhorr'd in woman;
Thy memory shall be made eterne on earth
By the immortal hatred of mankind.
Thou shalt be still the slavish tool of those
Who serve, to mock thee; and thy wickedness
Shall be the womb of what shall breed thee woe.
Thy Eldest Son,—his nature weak, by thee
Distempered,—shall die ere his prime; thy Second
In it, by death ignoble, after a flourish
Glorious though brief, and spirit gall'd with chains;
Early and sadly shall thy Third Son perish,
Thy Grand-child too, earlier, sadder still,
Blasting the hopes of England in their flower.
Thy Fourth, thy other self in manlike form,
Thine idol, because thine own image true,
Shall live as miserable from his crimes,
His mean, low, lustful, jealous, coward heart,
As thou from thine; and meet a similar death
To that thou wrought'st for me, but wretcheder still,
Unpitied his by all the world, as mine
By thee alone!

Eleanor.
I am relentful now!—
Thy corse shall virginly be deckt—be borne
With richest care to Godstowe, and interr'd
Like an apparent sovereign, as thou wert
In thine own chapel—so thou wilt not haunt me!

Shade.
Let decent rite and ceremonial due
Be paid, even to the lowliest form of dust
That Heaven's breath sanctified though sin defiled,
As to the mightiest. 'Tis a solemn claim
Humanity has upon humanity;
And thou wilt do no worse fulfilling it,
Than offering base obeisance to this clay,
A servile adoration and absurd,
Dishonouring those who render and receive it.—
Prosper as thou deserv'st. I leave thee now.

[Vanishes.
John of O.
The Queen faints: bear her to the open cloister!

[She is borne off.
John of S.
My friend, and my heart's Daughter, in one day
Lost to me, both!—I have done some great wrong,
And will repent for it, though I know it not.
O what will say the King? He 'll be the sufferer,
First in himself, then through his people all;
His penance will be bitterest that e'er man
Endured for weetless sin or wilful crime.

Scene Closes.