Exeunt
Scene V. Edinburgh. A Room in the Provost’s House
Enter Maitland and Provost
MAITLAND.
Are the gates fast?
PROVOST.
Ay; but the street yet seethes
With ebb and flow of fighting faces thronged
And crush of onset following on her heel
Where she came in and whence at her own call
You drove them off her; and above the ranks
Flaps the flag borne before her as she came
Wrought with the dead king’s likeness; and their cry
Is yet to burn or drown her. It were but
A manlike mercy now for men to show
That she should have some woman’s hand of hers
To tend her fainting who should be nigh dead
With fear and lack of food and weariness.
MAITLAND.
Nay, if she die not till she die for fear,
She must outlive man’s memory; twice or thrice
As she rode hither with that sable flag
Blown overhead whereon the dead man lay
Painted, and by him beneath a garden tree
His young child kneeling, with soft hands held up
And the word underwritten of his prayer
Judge and avenge my cause, O Lord - she seemed
At point to swoon, being sick with two days’ fast,
And with faint fingers clung upon the rein
And gaped as one athirst with foodless lips
And fair head fainting; but for very scorn
Was straightway quickened and uplift of heart,
And smote us with her eyes again, and spoke
No weaker word but of her constant mind
To hang and crucify, when time should be,
These now her lords and keepers; so at last
Beneath these walls she came in with the night,
So pressed about with foes that man by man
We could but bring her at a foot’s pace through
Past Kirk of Field between the roaring streets,
Faint with no fear, but hunger and great rage,
With all men’s wrath as thunder at her heel,
And all her fair face foul with dust and tears,
But as one fire of eye and cheek that shone
With heat of fiery heart and unslaked will
That took no soil of fear.
PROVOST.
What shall be done
When sentence shall pass on her?
MAITLAND.
By my will
She shall not die nor lose her royal name,
Wherein the council only shall bear rule
And take to its own hand the care to wreak
On her false lord now fled our general wrong,
Who being but overtaken of its sword
Shall be divorced at once from her and life.
PROVOST.
But this shall not content the common will,
Nor theirs who bind and loose it with their tongues
And cry now for her blood; the town is loud
With women’s voices keener than of men
To call for judgment on her and swift death
Sharp as their anger.
MAITLAND.
Ay, the time is mad
With noise of preachers and the feminine spleen
That of mere rage and blind mobility
Barks in brute heat for blood; but on these tongues
The state yet hangs not, nor the general weal
Is swayed but by the violent breath of these.
Here sits she safe.
PROVOST.
I would I knew it; her mood
Is as a wind that blows upon a fire,
And drives her to and fro: she will not eat,
But rages here and there and cries again
On us for traitors, on her friends for help,
On God for comfort of her cause and crown
That of his foes and hers is violated,
And will not stint her clamours nor take rest
For prayer nor bidding.
MAITLAND.
I will speak with her
Ere I go hence; though she were mild of mood,
The task were hard with Knox for opposite
To bend the council to such policy
As might assure her but of life, which thus
She whets the weapon in his tongue to take.
Exeunt.
Scene VI. Another Room in the same
The Queen and an Attendant
QUEEN.
Wilt thou be true? but if thou have not heart,
Yet do not, being too young to sell man’s blood,
Betray my letter to mine enemies’ hands
Where it should be a sword to smite me with;
If thou lack heart, I say, being but a boy,
Swear not and break thine oath; but if thou have,
Thou shalt not ask for this mine errand done
The thing I will not give thee. At Dunbar
Bring but this letter to my husband’s hand;
Spare for no speed; if it were possible,
I would it might be with him ere day dawn
On me condemned of men. I have no hope,
Thou seest, but in thee only; thou art young
And mean of place, but be thou good to me
And thou shalt sit above thy masters born
And nobles grey in honour. Wilt thou go?
Have here mine only jewel, and my faith
That I plight to thee, when my hand may choose,
To give thee better gifts. Haste, and so thrive
As I by thee shall.
Exit Attendant.
Though thou play me false,
Thou dost no more than God has done with me
And all men else before thee: yet I could not
But write this worthless one word of my love
Though I should die for writing it in vain,
And he should never read it.
Enter Maitland
Come you not
To tell me of my commons and your friends
That by their will despite you I must die?
It were no stranger now than all things are
That fall as on me dreaming.
MAITLAND.
Madam, no;
I come to plead with you for your own life,
Which wrath and violent mood would cast away.
QUEEN.
What is my life to any man or me
As ye have made it? If ye seek not that,
Why have ye torn me from my husband’s hand,
With whom ye know that I would live and die
With all content that may be in the world?
MAITLAND.
For your own honour have we sundered you;
You know not him, who late writ word - myself
Can show this letter - to the Lady Jane,
She was his wife and you his concubine,
No more but sport and scandal in his sheets,
And loved for use but as a paramour
And for his ends to rise and by your lips
Be kissed into a kingdom; and each week
Since they were first but as in show divorced
And but of craft divided, on some days
Have they held secret commerce to your shame
As wedded man and wife.
QUEEN.
There is one thing
That I would ask of even such friends as you -
To turn me with my lord adrift at sea
And make us quit of all men.
MAITLAND.
For yourself,
You drive on no less danger here of wreck,
Seeing for your life if England take no care
France will nor strike nor speak; and had you not
In your own kindly kingdom yet some friends
Whose hearts are better toward you, these wot well
You had none left you helpfu
l in the world.
Yet what we may will I and all these do
To serve you in this strait; so for this night
Let not your peril, which can breed not fear,
For that breed anger in you; and farewell.
Exit.
QUEEN.
None but such friends? O yet my living lord,
O still my comfort, hadst thou none but me
As I save thee have no man, we would go
Hand fast in hand to dreadless death, and see
With such clear eyes as once our marriage-bed
Fire, or the sword’s light lifted to make end
Of that one life on both our lips that laughed
To think he could not sunder them who smote,
Nor change our hearts who chilled them; we would kiss,
Laugh, and lie down, and sleep; but here in bonds
I will not tamely like a dumb thing die
That gives its blood and speaks not. If I find
No faith in all this people, yet my curse
Shall through this casement cry in all their ears
That are made hard against me. - Ho there, you,
All that pass by, your queen am I that call,
Have I no friend of all you to turn back
The swords that point on this bare breast, the hands
That grasp and hale me by the hair to death,
By this discrowned rent hair that wore too soon
The kingdom’s weight of all this land in gold?
Have I no friend? no friend?
VOICE WITHOUT.
Ay, here was one;
Know you yet him? Raise up the banner there,
That she may look upon her lord, and take
Comfort.
A WOMAN.
What, was not this that kneels the child
Which hung once at that harlot’s breast now bare
And should have drunk death from its deadly milk?
Hide it for shame; bind up the wanton hair,
Cover the poisonous bosom; here is none
To kiss the print of that adulterer’s head
Which last lay on it.
ANOTHER VOICE.
Whither is he flown,
Whose amorous lips were bloody, and left red
The shameless cheek they fed on as with shame?
Where is your swordsman at your back to guard
And make your sin strut kinglike? where his hand
That made this dead man’s child kneel fatherless
And plead with God against you for his blood?
Where is your king-killer?
QUEEN.
The day shall be
That I will make this town a fire, and slake
The flame with blood of all you: there shall stand
No mark of man, no stone of these its walls,
To witness what my wrath made ruin of
That turned it first to smoke, and then put out
With all your blood its ashes.
Enter Provost
Hear you, sir,
How we are handled of our townsfolk there,
Being yet in ward of you? but by my head,
If now by force it fall not, you as these
Shall buy this of me bloodily, and first
Shall bleed of all whose lives will pay not me.
PROVOST.
Madam, as you desire to see that day,
Contain yourself; this flame whereon you blow
Will fasten else untimely on your hand
And leave it harmless toward us. I beseech you,
Though but for hate of us and hope to hurt,
Eat, and take rest.
QUEEN.
I will not; what are ye
That I should care for hate of you to live
Who care not for the love’s sake of my life?
If I shall die here in your hateful hands,
In God’s I put my cause, as into them
I yield the spirit that dares all enemies yet
By force to take it from me. Die or live
I needs must at their bidding; but to sleep,
Eat, drink, weep, laugh, speak or keep silence, these
They shall not yet command me till I die.
Exeunt.
Scene VII. The High Street
A crowd of Citizens
FIRST CITIZEN.
Who says she shall not die?
SECOND CITIZEN.
Even he that stands
First in this city, Morton; by his doom,
Death shall not pass upon her.
FIRST CITIZEN.
Will he say it?
Yet is this man not all the tongue or hand
That Scotland has to speak or smite with.
THIRD CITIZEN.
Nay,
When he so spake against their honest voice
Who called for judgment, one arose that said -
I know not who, but one that spake for God -
That he who came between God’s sword and her
Should as a stayer of justice by the sword
Be stricken of God’s justice.
FIRST CITIZEN.
What said he?
THIRD CITIZEN.
No word, but frowned; and in his eye and cheek
There sprang a fire and sank again, as ‘twere
For scorn that anger should have leave to speak,
Though silently; but Maitland writhed his lip
And let his teeth grin doglike, and between
There shot some snarling word that mocked at God,
And at the servants of his wrath, who wait
To see his will done on her, and men’s hands
Made ministers to set it forth so broad
That none might pass and read not.
SECOND CITIZEN.
Why, by this
Part hangs of it already in men’s sight;
I have word here from Dunbar of one that was
An officer of Bothwell’s, and alive
Laird of Blackadder, whom they seized at sea
Flying from death to deathward, and brought back
To be nigh rent in pieces of their hands
Who haled him through the streets to hang, and left
Not half a man unbroken or unbruised
To feel the grip o’ the gallows.
FIRST CITIZEN.
They did well;
Shall we do worse, that have within our hand
The heart and head of all this evil, her
By whom all guilt looks guiltless till she die
A whore’s death or a murderer’s, burn or drown,
And leave more free the common doom of man
To pass on lesser sins? While she doth live,
How should it speak for shame to bid men die
For what sin done soever, who might say
She lives and laughs yet in God’s face and eye
And finds on earth no judgment as do these
Whose bloodiest hands are whiter than her soul?
Let her die first.
THIRD CITIZEN.
Ay shall she, if God put
Upon those lips that never lacked it yet
His fire to burn men’s hearts, and make that tongue
His sword that hath been ever. Yesternight
Came Knox to Edinburgh, and here should speak
By this among us of the doom to fall
On us or her, that if it bruise her not
Must glance aside against us.
SECOND CITIZEN.
He is here.
Draw nigh, but make no noise.
Enter John Knox
FIRST CITIZEN.
Nay, all the press
Heaves round about him silent.
OTHERS.
Sirs, give place;
Make way for Master Knox to stand and speak
Here in your midst; here is it higher; give way.
Make room to hear him. Peace there, and stand still.
JOHN KNOX.
What word is this that ye require of man?
Ye that would hear me, what speech heard of mine
Should lift your hearts up if they sit not high,
If they lack life, should quicken? for this day
Ye know not less than I know that the Lord
Hath given his enemy to you for a prey,
His judgment for a fire; what need have ye,
Or he what need of other tongues to speak
Than this which burns all ears that hear on earth
The blast of this day’s justice blown in heaven -
As where is he that hears not? In your hand
Lies now the doom of God to deal, and she
Before your face to abide it, in whose mouth
His name was as a hissing; and had I
The tongues in mine of angels, and their might,
What other word or mightier should I seek
Than this to move you? or should ye wax cold
What fuel should I find out to kindle you?
If God ye hear not, how shall ye hear me?
Or if your eyes be sealed to know not her,
If she be fit to live or no, can I
With words unseal them? None so young of you
But hath long life enough to understand
And reason to record what he hath seen
Of hers and of God’s dealings mutually
Since she came in. Then was her spirit made soft,
Her words as oil, and with her amorous face
She caught men’s eyes to turn them where she would,
And with the strong sound of her name of queen
Made their necks bend; that even of God’s own men
There were that bade refuse her not her will,
Deny not her, fair woman and great queen,
Her natural freedom born, to give God praise
What way she would, and pray what prayers; though these
Be as they were, to God abominable
And venomous to men’s souls. So came there back
The cursed thing cast forth of us, and so
Out of her fair face and imperious eyes
Lightened the light whereby men walk in hell.
And I that sole stood out and bade not let
The lightning of this curse come down on us
And fly with feet as fire on all winds blown
Delphi Complete Poetical Works of Algernon Charles Swinburne (Illustrated) (Delphi Poets Series) Page 233