University of Virginia Library

Scene II.

—A Passage adjoining Westminster Hall.
Many Groups of Spectators of the Trial. Officers of the Court, etc.
1st Spectator.
More crowd than ever! Not know Hampden, man?
That's he, by Pym, Pym that is speaking now.
No, truly, if you look so high you'll see
Little enough of either!

2nd Spectator.
Stay: Pym's arm
Points like a prophet's rod.

3rd Spectator.
Ay, ay, we've heard
Some pretty speaking: yet the Earl escapes.

4th Spectator.
I fear it: just a foolish word or two
About his children—and we see, forsooth,
Not England's foe in Strafford, but the man
Who, sick, half-blind . . .

2nd Spectator.
What's that Pym's saying now
Which makes the curtains flutter? look! A hand
Clutches them. Ah! The King's hand!

5th Spectator.
I had thought
Pym was not near so tall. What said he, friend?

2nd Spectator.
“Nor is this way a novel way of blood,”
And the Earl turns as it to . . . look! look!

Many Spectators.
There!
What ails him? no—he rallies, see—goes on,
And Strafford smiles. Strange!

An Officer.
Haselrig!

Many Spectators.
Friend? Friend?

The Officer.
Lost, utterly lost: just when we looked for Pym
To make a stand against the ill effects
Of the Earl's speech! Is Haselrig without?
Pym's message is to him.

3rd Spectator.
Now, said I true?
Will the Earl leave them yet at fault or no?

1st Spectator.
Never believe it, man! These notes of Vane's
Ruin the Earl.

5th Spectator.
A brave end: not a whit
Less firm, less Pym all over. Then, the trial
Is closed. No—Strafford means to speak again?

An Officer.
Stand back, there!

5th Spectator.
Why, the Earl is coming hither!
Before the court breaks up! His brother, look,—
You'd say he'd deprecated some fierce act
In Strafford's mind just now.

An Officer.
Stand back, I say!

2nd Spectator.
Who's the veiled woman that he talks with?

Many Spectators.
Hush—
The Earl! the Earl!

[Enter Strafford, Slingsby, and other Secretaries, Hollis, Lady Carlisle, Maxwell, Balfour, etc. Strafford converses with Lady Carlisle.
Hollis.
So near the end! Be patient—
Return!

Strafford
[to his Secretaries].
Here—anywhere—or, 't is freshest here!
To spend one's April here, the blossom-month:
Set it down here! [They arrange a table, papers, etc.

So, Pym can quail, can cower
Because I glance at him, yet more's to do?
What's to be answered, Slingsby? Let us end!
[To Lady Carlisle.]
Child, I refuse his offer; whatsoe'er
It be! Too late! Tell me no word of him!
'T is something, Hollis, I assure you that—
To stand, sick as you are, some eighteen days
Fighting for life and fame against a pack
Of very curs, that lie through thick and thin,
Eat flesh and bread by wholesale, and can't say
“Strafford” if it would take my life!

Lady Carlisle.
Be moved!
Glance at the paper!

Strafford.
Already at my heels!
Pym's faulting bloodhounds scent the track again.
Peace, child! Now, Slingsby

[Messengers from Lane and other of Strafford's Counsel within the Hall are coming and going during the Scene.
Strafford
[setting himself to write and dictate].
I shall beat you, Hollis!
Do you know that? In spite of St. John's tricks,
In spite of Pym—your Pym who shrank from me!
Eliot would have contrived it otherwise.
[To a Messenger.]
In truth? This slip, tell Lane, contains as much
As I can call to mind about the matter.
Eliot would have disdained . . .
[Calling after the Messenger.]
And Radcliffe, say,
The only person who could answer Pym,
Is safe in prison, just for that.
Well, well!
It had not been recorded in that case,
I baffled you.
[To Lady Carlisle.]
Nay, child, why look so grieved?
All's gained without the King! You saw Pym quail?
What shall I do when they acquit me, think you,
But tranquilly resume my task as though
Nothing had intervened since I proposed
To call that traitor to account! Such tricks,
Trust me, shall not be played a second time,
Not even against Laud, with his grey hair—
Your good work, Hollis! Peace! To make amends,
You, Lucy, shall be here when I impeach
Pym and his fellows.

Hollis.
Wherefore not protest
Against our whole proceeding, long ago?
Why feel indignant now? Why stand this while
Enduring patiently?

Strafford.
Child, I'll tell you—
You, and not Pym—you, the slight graceful girl
Tall for a flowering lily, and not Hollis—
Why I stood patient! I was fool enough
To see the will of England in Pym's will;
To fear, myself had wronged her, and to wait
Her judgment: when, behold, in place of it . . .
[To a Messenger who whispers.]
Tell Lane to answer no such question! Law,—
I grapple with their law! I'm here to try
My actions by their standard, not my own!
Their law allowed that levy: what's the rest
To Pym, or Lane, any but God and me?

Lady Carlisle.
The King's so weak! Secure this chance! 'T was Vane,
Never forget, who furnished Pym the notes . . .

Strafford.
Fit,—very fit, those precious notes of Vane,
To close the Trial worthily! I feared
Some spice of nobleness might linger yet
And spoil the character of all the past.
Vane eased me . . . and I will go back and say
As much—to Pym, to England! Follow me!
I have a word to say! There, my defence
Is done!
Stay! why be proud? Why care to own
My gladness, my surprise?—Nay, not surprise!
Wherefore insist upon the little pride
Of doing all myself, and sparing him
The pain? Child, say the triumph is my King's!
When Pym grew pale, and trembled, and sank down,
One image was before me: could I fail?
Child, care not for the past, so indistinct,
Obscure—there's nothing to forgive in it
'T is so forgotten! From this day begins
A new life, founded on a new belief
In Charles.

Hollis.
In Charles? Rather believe in Pym!
And here he comes in proof! Appeal to Pym!
Say how unfair . . .

Strafford.
To Pym? I would say nothing!
I would not look upon Pym's face again.

Lady Carlisle.
Stay, let me have to think I pressed your hand!

[Strafford and his friends go out.
Enter Hampden and Vane.
Vane.
O Hampden, save the great misguided man!
Plead Strafford's cause with Pym! I have remarked
He moved no muscle when we all declaimed
Against him: you had but to breathe—he turned
Those kind calm eyes upon you.

[Enter Pym, the Solicitor-General St. John, the Managers of the Trial, Fiennes, Rudyard, etc.
Rudyard.
Horrible!
Till now all hearts were with you: I withdraw
For one. Too horrible! But we mistake
Your purpose, Pym: you cannot snatch away
The last spar from the drowning man.

Fiennes.
He talks
With St. John of it—see, how quietly!
[To other Presbyterians.]
You'll join us? Strafford may deserve the worst:
But this new course is monstrous. Vane, take heart!
This Bill of his Attainder shall not have
One true man's hand to it.

Vane.
Consider, Pym!
Confront your Bill, your own Bill: what is it?
You cannot catch the Earl on any charge,—
No man will say the law has hold of him
On any charge; and therefore you resolve
To take the general sense on his desert,
As though no law existed, and we met
To found one. You refer to Parliament
To speak its thought upon the abortive mass
Of half-borne-out assertions, dubious hints
Hereafter to be cleared, distortions—ay,
And wild inventions. Every man is saved
The task of fixing any single charge
On Strafford: he has but to see in him
The enemy of England.

Pym.
A right scruple!
I have heard some called England's enemy
With less consideration.

Vane.
Pity me!
Indeed you made me think I was your friend!
I who have murdered Strafford, how remove
That memory from me?

Pym.
I absolve you, Vane.
Take you no care for aught that you have done!

Vane.
John Hampden, not this Bill! Reject this Bill!
He staggers through the ordeal: let him go,
Strew no fresh fire before him! Plead for us!
When Strafford spoke, your eyes were thick with tears!

Hampden.
England speaks louder: who are we, to play
The generous pardoner at her expense,
Magnanimously waive advantages,
And, if he conquer us, applaud his skill?

Vane.
He was your friend.

Pym.
I have heard that before.

Fiennes.
And England trusts you.

Hampden.
Shame be his, who turns
The opportunity of serving her
She trusts him with, to his own mean account—
Who would look nobly frank at her expense!

Fiennes.
I never thought it could have come to this.

Pym.
But I have made myself familiar, Fiennes,
With this one thought—have walked, and sat, and slept,
This thought before me. I have done such things,
Being the chosen man that should destroy
The traitor. You have taken up this thought
To play with, for a gentle stimulant,
To give a dignity to idler life
By the dim prospect of emprise to come,
But ever with the softening, sure belief,
That all would end some strange way right at last.

Fiennes.
Had we made out some weightier charge!

Pym.
You say
That these are petty charges: can we come
To the real charge at all? There he is safe
In tyranny's stronghold. Apostasy
Is not a crime, treachery not a crime:
The cheek burns, the blood tingles, when you speak
The words, but where's the power to take revenge
Upon them? We must make occasion serve,—
The oversight shall pay for the main sin
That mocks us.

Rudyard.
But this unexampled course,
This Bill!

Pym.
By this, we roll the clouds away
Of precedent and custom, and at once
Bid the great beacon-light God sets in all,
The conscience of each bosom, shine upon
The guilt of Strafford: each man lay his hand
Upon his breast, and judge!

Vane.
I only see
Strafford, nor pass his corpse for all beyond!

Rudyard and others.
Forgive him! He would join us, now he finds
What the King counts reward! The pardon, too,
Should be your own. Yourself should bear to Strafford
The pardon of the Commons.

Pym.
Meet him? Strafford?
Have we to meet once more, then? Be it so!
And yet—the prophecy seemed half fulfilled
When, at the Trial, as he gazed, my youth,
Our friendship, divers thoughts came back at once
And left me, for a time . . . 'T is very sad!
To-morrow we discuss the points of law
With Lane—to-morrow?

Vane.
Not before to-morrow—
So, time enough! I knew you would relent!

Pym.
The next day, Haselrig, you introduce
The Bill of his Attainder. Pray for me!