Delphi Complete Poetical Works of Algernon Charles Swinburne (Illustrated) (Delphi Poets Series)
Page 179
That sees his house burn, such am I. My God!
Were it not sweeter to be finished well
Than still hold play with hangman anger?
Enter the Queen-Mother.
Ca.
Leave us, girl.
[Exit Attendant.
Nay, sit; this reverence hath no seed in you;
Sit still.
Den.
Madam —
Ca.
Good lady, will you sit?
Den.
So you be come to bind more shame on me,
I can well bear more shame.
Ca.
You are still foolish;
How have I set this anger in your face?
I make no parcel of these tears of yours;
No word that gets upon your lips to weep
Have I given use for.
Den.
Ay, no use you say?
But I dream not that hold this hand in that,
But I dream not that take your eyes with mine;
But I dream not I am that very thing
That as a taint inside the imperilled flesh
Have made corruption of the king’s close will,
Put scarlet treason on his purpose, marred
The face of confidence, plucked words from trust,
Taught murder to walk smooth and set his feet
Upon the ways of faith; I am that thing,
I would it were some other.
Ca.
Have you yet done?
Den.
Yea, I have done all this.
Ca.
I do believe you;
And though your thoughts ungently look my way,
I have such sorrow for you sown at heart
As you should reap a liberal help thereof
Would you but pay thin thanks.
Den.
No, I’ll no thanks;
Yea, though I die, I will not thank you; no;
For I can hold my breath into my lip,
Or twist my hair to choke my throat upon,
Or thrust a weak way thus to my rent heart
Even with these bare and feeble fingers here,
Making each nail a knife; look you, I’ll do’t.
Ca.
You talk too wide; I came to do you good.
Den.
That were good news indeed; things new, being good,
Come keener to put relish in the lip;
I pray you let me see this good i’ the face,
Look in its eyes to find dead colours out,
For deadly matters make up good for me.
Ca.
Nay, you shall find my favour large as love;
I make no talk of gold, no costly words,
No promise, but this merely will I say,
You holding by me grapple to a hold
Full of all gracious office and such wealth
As love doth use for surety; such good riches
As on these latter lips of womanhood
Are sweet as early kisses of a mouth
Scented like honey. Keep but fast my side,
No time shall hew the planted root away
That faith of your dear service sets in me,
Nor violence of mistempered accident
Cleave it across.
Den.
I would I were clear of you.
What would you get? You are a great queen, grave soul,
Crown-shaped i’ the head; your work is wonderful
And stoops men to you by the neck, but I
Can scantly read it out. I know just this —
Take you this patience from my wretched lips,
Pluck off this evidence of the bolted steel,
Make wide the passage of my chambered feet
And I will take a witness in my mouth
To set the cries of all the world on you
And break my shame to lead your neck with half
Like a thief’s neck.
Ca.
You are slower than weighed lead
To use my speech aright. But though you be
Twice dull or thrice, and looser of your lip
Than that swift breath that outwings rumour, yet
No babble slipt upon my purposes
Could manage me a peril, no tongue’s trip
Cross me between. Who puts belief to speech
Grown from some theft, that stains me with report
From mine own lips caught like infection? Look,
Though you could preach my least word spoken out
To the square in Paris where noise thickens most,
It hurts me nothing. ’Tis not that populous tongue
That savours insolence and raw distaste
Can riot out my will. Nay, keep your cheeks:
I would not kill the colour past all help,
For I have care of you; and liberal fruit
Shall you reap of it, and eat quiet bread
When white want shrinks the rest.
Den.
I will not do it.
Nay, though I were your foolish workwoman,
There is no room for good to do me good;
That blessed place wherein love kissed me first
Is now waxed bare enough. I might ask alms
Of meanest men, being by mine own repute
Made less than time makes them; I am not good nor fair,
For the good made on me by love is gone,
And that affection of the flattered blood
Which fills this holy raiment of the soul
With inwrought shapeliness and outside rose
Keeps now no tide in me; the unpulsed sense
Hath like a water settled and gets flat
As dead sands be at utmost ebb that drink
The drainèd salt o’ the sea. Nay, to talk thus
Is foolish as large words let out in drink;
Therefore I am not wise; what would you have of me?
Ca.
Nay, nothing but your peace, which I’ll assure
Beyond large time’s assault. Yet I’ll do something with you,
Put sudden bitter in your sweet of lips,
A knife’s edge next your throat, that when you drink
Shall spill out wine i’ the blood — something like this;
Feed you upon the doubt, and gnash and grieve,
Feeling so trapped. You’ll show fierce teeth at me,
Take threats of me into your milky mouth?
You’ll maim my ruined patience, put me out
Of sober words and use of gravities?
Den.
Yea, I can read you are full-tempered now;
But your sharp humours come not in my fear.
Ca.
Yea so? high-tempered said she? yea, true, true —
I’m angered — give me water to cool out
This o’er-tongued fever of intemperance.
Bid one come in and see how wroth I am;
Am I not angered now? see you — and you —
Do not I chafe and froth the snaffle white
With the anger in my mouth? see, do I not?
— Thou hast the tender impotence of talk
That men teach daws; a pitiful thing — in sooth
I am not so chafed; I have something in my will
That makes me chide at thee, my plaything; look,
I do half choose to chide at it, sweet wretch,
It almost chafes me such a daw should live.
Den.
It chafes me too; I will not be forgiven;
If shame go smooth and blood so supple it,
Kingdoms will turn from the grave word of man
To side with hoofèd herds: I were best die
And get no grace of God.
Ca.
“No grace” it said?
Dost thou make such a gracious dunce of God
To look thee out in the time’s jarring sum,
Choose thy room forth and hearken after thee
God’s no such bat to be at pains for this.
Pray now, go pray; speak some wise word or two
To pluck his mercies back your way. God’s name!
It marvels me how any fool i’ the flesh
Must needs be sure of some fore-facing help
To make him fragrant means for living well,
Some blind God’s favour bound across his head
To stamp him safe i’ the world’s imperilling.
Pardon thy sin? who blabs thy pretty slips
I’ the ear of his broad knowledge, scores thy stains,
Makes him partaker of all times and rooms
Where thou hast made shuddering occasions
To try Eve’s huskless apple with thy teeth?
Doth such care dwell on thy breath’s lean reserves,
Thy little touches and red points of shame?
I tell thee, God is wise and thou twice fool,
That wouldst have God con thee by rote, and lay
This charge on thee, shift off that other charge,
And mete thine inward inches out by rule
That hath the measure of sphered worlds in it
And limit of great stars. Wilt thou serve yet?
Den.
Not you herein at all; though you spake right,
As it may be this speech does call truth kin,
I would not sin beyond my ancient way
And couple with new shame.
Ca.
This is your last;
For the sad fruit that burgeons out of this
Take your own blame, for I will none. — You, there,
You that make under uses of the door,
Leave off your ear-work and come in; nay, come;
Enter Yolande.
Here’s use for you; look well upon this girl,
Count well the tender feet that make her flesh
And her soft inches up; nay, view them close;
For each poor part and specialty of her
You hold sharp count to me; I’ll have you wise;
You that are portress shall be gaoler — you,
Mark me, just you — I would not have you slip;
Come not into my danger; but keep safe,
I do you good indeed.
Yol.
I will do truly.
Ca.
Farewell, sweet friend;
(to Denise)
I am right grieved that you
Will mix my love with your impatience.
Though I more thinly fare in your esteem,
Fare you yet well for mine, and think of me
More graciously than thus; so have you peace
As I do wish you happily to have.
God give you sleep. — Look heedfully to her
As you would have me prosperous to you.
[Exeunt severally.
Scene III.
The Marshal’s House.
Enter two Captains.
1 Cap.
May this be true that we are bidden so?
2 Cap.
I think it is.
1 Cap.
Did the king speak with you?
2 Cap.
No, the lord marshal.
1 Cap.
He is hot on this;
But did he tell you to be forth to-night?
2 Cap.
Before the chime of twelve.
1 Cap.
Why then we have
A broken four hours’ work upon us yet
Between this time and that most bloody one.
There is a yellow point upon the sky
Where the last upper sun burns sideways out,
Scoring the west beneath.
2 Cap.
I see the mark:
It shines against the Louvre; it is nigh gone.
1 Cap.
Yea, the strong sun grows sick; but not to death.
Which side have you to take?
2 Cap.
The south side, I.
1 Cap.
I to the west. Would this were really through.
2 Cap.
Who gave you news o’ the office?
1 Cap.
Maurevel.
2 Cap.
O, he that hurt the admiral some days back?
That plague-botch of the Guisards?
1 Cap.
Yea, the same:
I had a mind to strike him in the mouth.
2 Cap.
Why had you so? you have the better place.
1 Cap.
O, sir, in such hard matters he does best
Who does not most. I had rather be a dog,
One half unleashed to feed on bitten orts
Than have his post herein.
2 Cap.
Whose? Maurevel’s?
1 Cap.
Even his; for he has carved him a broad piece
Out of the body of this wounded town.
2 Cap.
What, does the work so startle you? for me,
I hold it light as kissing a girl’s head.
1 Cap.
If they should face us, well; but to put knives
Into their peaceable and sleeping beds —
2 Cap.
You talk too like a fool. I loathe so far
Their slow lank ways of envious gravity,
Their sparing pride and lavish modesty,
Cunning so tempered with hot insolence
As in that Pardaillan — in him or him —
I say I do abhor them, and in my soul
I think there’s no priest half so glad as I
To rid them out of wrong doing. We are
Most kind to them; for give their sin more space,
Each year should heap up hell upon their backs
And leave them hotter; whereas we rid them now
And they just die half-damned.
1 Cap.
You are merciful.
2 Cap.
I would be so; for him whose spleen is thick,
Made bitter and side-clogged with cruel use,
I hate as much as these.
1 Cap.
The marshal tarries;
I doubt there will be nothing done.
2 Cap.
You doubt?
Say you desire it; if you pray for it,
Shame not to answer your own hope.
1 Cap.
I do not;
I should be glad if all went out in speech
And never smutched our hands with smoke thereof.
2 Cap.
This is your poor and barren piety
That mercy calls offence, and law doth put
Rebuke upon. I do not praise it in you.
1 Cap.
Do you mislike it?
2 Cap.
If I should say I did —
1 Cap.
What then?
2 Cap.
I did you nothing less than right.
1 Cap.
You will not say so.
2 Cap.
By your head, I do;
I will and do.
1 Cap.
This will take time to mend.
2 Cap.
Mend it your way; take time to patch it with;
My hand shall not be slack. Here comes the marshal.
Enter Tavannes.
Tav.
Now, sirs, how are your men disposed? have you
Had pains with them?
1 Cap.
Mine gave no pains at all.
Tav.
Why, well; I would the temper of such men
Were made the habit of all France. Sir, yours?
2 Cap.
I may say better of them; I could not
So eagerly give tongue to my desire
But they did grasp it first; such emulous haste
To jostle speech aside with the push of act
I have not known.
Tav.
Good; they do hunger, then?
2 Cap.
Sir, most impatiently.
Tav.
Their galls are hot?
2 Cap.
Enough to burn out patience from the world.
Tav.
Such I would have; good dogs, keen in the feet,
Swoln in the spleens of them; ’tis very good.
Your presence flags, sir.
1 Cap.
Mine, my lord?
Tav.
Ay, sir.
You have the gait of an unmaiden’d girl
That carries violence in her girdle. Humph!
I do not relish it.
1 Cap.
My lord —
Tav.
Ay, what?
Speak your own way; make answer; nay, be swift.
1 Cap.
My lord, you have not known me blink or blench
In the red face of death; no peril hath
Put fear upon my flesh, altered the heat
That colours on my cheek the common blood
To a dead sickness or a bruise of white;
Nor doth it now.
Tav.
No, doth not? are you sure?
1 Cap.
You do not think so.
Tav.
Nay, there’s no peril in’t.
But you had more; make out the worst; get on.
1 Cap.
Truly I have a motion in my blood
Forbidding such a matter to receive
Smooth entertainment there; I would be fain
To shift the service off; my fellow here
Knows I regard it something loathfully.
Tav.
Ay, do you, sir?
2 Cap.
Indeed he said so.
Tav.
Said?
2 Cap.