University of Virginia Library

Scene ii

The Same. A Room in the Castle.
Enter Derby and Audley, meeting.

Derby
Thrice-noble Audley, well encounter'd here:
How is it with our sovereign and his peers?

Audley
'Tis full a fortnight since I saw his highness,
What time he sent me forth to muster men;
Which I accordingly have done, and bring them hither
In fair array before his majesty.
What news, my Lord of Derby, from the Emperor?

Derby
As good as we desire: the Emperor
Hath yielded to his highness friendly aid
And makes our king lieutenant-general
In all his lands and large dominions:
Then via for the spacious bounds of France!

Audley
What, doth his highness leap to hear these news?

Derby
I have not yet found time to open them;
The king is in his closet, malcontent,
For what, I know not, but he gave in charge,
Till after dinner, none should interrupt him:
The Countess Salisbury, and her father Warwick,
Artois, and all, look underneath the brows.

Audley
Undoubtedly then something is amiss.
[Trumpet within.

Derby
The trumpets sound; the king is now abroad.
Enter King Edward.

Audley
Here comes his highness.

Derby
Befall my sovereign all my sovereign's wish!

King Edward
Ah, that thou wert a witch, to make it so!

Derby
The emperor greeteth you:
Presenting letters.

King Edward
Would it were the countess!

Derby
And hath accorded to your highness' suit.

King Edward
Thou liest, she hath not ; but I would, she had!

Audley
All love and duty to my lord the king!

King Edward
Well, all but one is none:—what news with you?

Audley
I have, my liege, levied those horse and foot,
According to your charge, and brought them hither.

King Edward
Then let those foot trudge hence upon those horse
According to our discharge, and be gone.—
Derby,
I'II look upon the countess' mind anon.

Derby
The countess' mind, my liege?

King Edward
I mean the emperor: leave me alone.

Audley
What's in his mind?

Derby
Let's leave him to his humour.
Exeunt Derby and Audley.

King Edward
Thus from the heart's abundance speaks the tongue;
Countess for emperor; and, indeed, why not?
She is as imperator over me;
And I to her
Am as a kneeling vassal that observes
The pleasure or displeasure of her eye.—
Enter Lodwick.
What says the more than Cleopatra's match
To Cæsar now?

Lodwick
That yet, my liege, ere night
She will resolve your majesty.
Drum within.

King Edward
What drum is this, that thunders forth this march,
To start the tender Cupid in my bosom?
Poor sheep-skin, how it brawls with him that beateth it!
Go, break the thund'ring parchment-bottom out,
And I will teach it to conduct sweet lines
Unto the bosom of a heavenly nymph:
For I will use it as my writing-paper;
And so reduce him, from a scolding drum,
To be the herald and dear counsel-bearer
Betwixt a goddess and a mighty king.
Go, bid the drummer learn to touch the lute,
Or hang him in the braces of his drum;
For now we think it an uncivil thing,
To trouble heaven with such harsh resounds
Away.—
Exit Lodwick.
The quarrel, that I have, requires no arms
But these of mine; and these shall meet my foe
In a deep march of penetrable groans:
My eyes shall be my arrows; and my sighs
Shall serve me as the vantage of the wind,
To whirl away my sweet'st artillery:
Ah but, alas, she wins the sun of me,
For that is she herself; and thence it comes
That poets term the wanton warrior blind;
But love hath eyes as judgment to his steps,
Till too-much-loved glory dazzles them.—
Re-enter Lodwick.
How now?

Lodwick
My liege, the drum that struck the lusty march
Stands with Prince Edward, your thrice-valiant son.
Enter Prince Edward. Lodwick retires to the door.

King Edward
I see the boy. O, how his mother's face,
Modell'd in his, corrects my stray'd desire
And rates my heart and chides my thievish eye
Who being rich enough in seeing her,
Yet seeks elsewhere: and basest theft is that,
Which cannot cloak itself on poverty.—
Now, boy, what news?

Prince Edward
I have assembled, my dear lord and father,
The choicest buds of all our English blood
For our affairs to France; and here we come,
To take direction from your majesty.

King Edward
Still do I see in him delineate,
His mother's visage; those his eyes are hers,
Who looking wistly on me make me blush;
For faults against themselves give evidence:
Lust is a fire; and men, like lanthorns, show
Light lust within themselves, even through themselves.
Away, loose silks of wavering vanity!
Shall the large limit of fair Brittany
By me be overthrown? and shall I not
Master this little mansion of myself?
Give me an armour of eternal steel;
I go to conquer kings; and shall I then
Subdue myself and be my enemy's friend?
It must not be.—Come, boy, forward, advance!
Let's with our colours sweet the air of France.

Lodwick
My liege, the countess with a smiling cheer
Desires access unto your majesty.
Advancing from the door, and whispering to him.

King Edward
Why, there it goes! that very smile of hers
Hath ransom'd captive France, and set the king,
The Dauphin, and the peers, at liberty.—
Go, leave me, Ned, and revel with thy friends.
Exit Prince.
Thy mother is but black; and thou, like her,
Dost put into my mind how foul she is.—
Go, fetch the countess hither in thy hand
And let her chase away those winter clouds;
For she gives beauty both to heaven and earth.
Exit Lodwick.
The sin is more to hack and hew poor men,
Than to embrace in an unlawful bed
The register of all rarieties
Since leathern Adam till this youngest hour.
Re-enter Lodwick, with the Countess.
Go, Lodwick, put thy band into my purse,
Play, spend, give, riot, waste; do what thou wilt,
So thou wilt hence a while and leave me here.
Exit Lodwick.
Now, my soul's playfellow! art thou come,
To speak the more than heavenly word of yea
To my objection in thy beauteous love?

Countess
My father on his blessing hath commanded—

King Edward
That thou shalt yield to me.

Countess
Ay, dear my liege, your due.

King Edward
And that, my dearest love, can be no less
Than right for right and tender love for love.

Countess
Than wrong for wrong and endless hate for hate.
But,—sith I see your majesty so bent,
That my unwillingness, my husband's love,
Your high estate, nor no respect respected
Can be my help, but that your mightiness
Will overbear and awe these dear regards,—
I bind my discontent to my content,
And, what I would not, I'll compel I will;
Provided that yourself remove those lets
That stand between your highness' love and mine.

King Edward
Name them, fair countess, and, by Heaven, I will.

Countess
It is their lives, that stand between our love,
That I would have chok'd up, my sovereign.

King Edward
Whose lives, my lady?

Countess
My thrice-loving liege,
Your queen, and Salisbury my wedded husband;
Who living have that title in our love
That we can not bestow but by their death.

King Edward
Thy opposition is beyond our law.

Countess
So is your desire: if the law
Can binder you to execute the one,
Let it forbid you to attempt the other:
I cannot think you love me as you say
Unless you do make good what you have sworn.

King Edward
No more; thy husband and the queen shall die.
Fairer thou art by far than Hero was;
Beardless Leander not so strong as I :
He swum an easy current for his love;
But I will through a Hellespont of blood
To arrive at Sestos where my Hero lies.

Countess
Nay, you'll do more; you'll make the river, too,
With their heart-bloods that keep our love asunder,
Of which my husband and your wife are twain.

King Edward
Thy beauty makes them guilty of their death
And gives in evidence that they shall die;
Upon which verdict, I, their judge, condemn them.

Countess
O perjur'd beauty! more corrupted judge!
When to the great star-chamber o'er our heads
The universal sessions calls to count
This packing evil, we both shall tremble for it.

King Edward
What says my fair love? is she resolute?

Countess
Resolv'd to be dissolv'd ; and, therefore, this,
Keep but thy word, great king, and I am thine.
Stand where thou dost, I'll part a little from thee,
And see how I will yield me to thy hands.
Turning suddenly upon him, and showing two daggers.
Here by my side doth hang my wedding knives:
Take thou the one and with it kill thy queen
And learn by me to find her where she lies;
And with this other I'll despatch my love,
Which now lies fast asleep within my heart:
When they are gone, then I'll consent to love.
Stir not, lascivious king, to hinder me;
My resolution is more nimbler far
Than thy prevention can be in my rescue,
And, if thou stir, I strike : therefore stand still,
And hear the choice that I will put thee to;
Either swear to leave thy most unholy suit,
And never henceforth to solicit me ;
Or else, by Heaven, kneeling
this sharp-pointed knife
Shall stain thy earth with that which thou wouldst stain,
My poor chaste blood. Swear, Edward, swear,
Or I will strike and die before thee here.

King Edward
Even by that Power I swear, that gives me now
The power to be ashamed of myself,
I never mean to part my lips again
In any words that tends to such a suit.
Arise, true English lady, whom our isle
May better boast of, than e'er Roman might
Of her, whose ransack'd treasury hath task'd
The vain endeavour of so many pens:
Arise; and be my fault thy honour's fame,
Which after-ages shall enrich thee with.
I am awaked from this idle dream;—
Warwick, my son, Derby, Artois, and Audley,
Brave warriors all, where are you all this while?
Enter Prince and Lords.
Warwick, I make thee Warden of the North:
Thou, Prince of Wales, and Audley, straight to sea;
Scour to Newhaven; some there stay for me:—
Myself, Artois, and Derby, will through Flanders
To greet our friends there and to crave their aid:
This night will scarce suffice me, to discover
My folly's siege against a faithful lover;
For, ere the sun shall gild the eastern sky,
We'll wake him with our martial harmony.
Exeunt.