John Dryden - Delphi Poets Series

by John Dryden

  Gril. I told him, sir, since you will have it so,

  He was the author of the rebel-league;

  Therefore, a traitor and a murderer.

  King. Is’t possible?

  Gui. No matter, sir, no matter;

  A few hot words, no more, upon my life;

  The old man roused, and shook himself a little:

  So, if your majesty will do me honour,

  I do beseech you, let the business die.

  King. Grillon, submit yourself, and ask his pardon.

  Gril. Pardon me, I cannot do’t.

  King. Where are the guards!

  Gui. Hold, sir; — come, colonel, I’ll ask pardon for you;

  This soldierly embrace makes up the breach;

  We will be sorry, sir, for one another.

  Gril. My lord, I know not what to answer you;

  I’m friends, — and I am not, — and so farewell.[Exit.

  King. You have your orders; yet before you go,

  Take this embrace: I court you for my friend,

  Though Grillon would not.

  Gui. I thank you on my knees;

  And still, while life shall last, will take strict care

  To justify my loyalty to your person.[Exit.

  Qu. M. Excellent loyalty, to lock you up!

  King. I see even to the bottom of his soul;

  And, madam, I must say the Guise has beauties,

  But they are set in night, and foul design:

  He was my friend when young, and might be still.

  Ab. Marked you his hollow accents at the parting?

  Qu. M. Graves in his smiles.

  King. Death in his bloodless hands. —

  O Marmoutiere! now I will haste to meet thee:

  The face of beauty, on this rising horror,

  Looks like the midnight moon upon a murder;

  It gilds the dark design that stays for fate,

  And drives the shades, that thicken, from the state.[Exuent.

  ACT III.

  SCENE I.

  Enter Grillon and Polin.

  Gril. Have then this pious Council of Sixteen

  Scented your late discovery of the plot?

  Pol. Not as from me; for still I kennel with them.

  And bark as loud as the most deep-mouthed traitor,

  Against the king, his government, and laws;

  Whereon immediately there runs a cry

  Of, — Seize him on the next procession! seize him.

  And clap the Chilperick in a monastery!

  Thus it was fixt, as I before discovered;

  But when, against his custom, they perceived

  The king absented, strait the rebels met,

  And roared, — they were undone.

  Gril. O, ’tis like them;

  ’Tis like their mongrel souls: flesh them with fortune,

  And they will worry royalty to death;

  But if some crabbed virtue turn and pinch them,

  Mark me, they’ll run, and yelp, and clap their tails,

  Like curs, betwixt their legs, and howl for mercy.

  Pol. But Malicorn, sagacious on the point,

  Cried, — Call the sheriffs, and bid them arm their bands;

  Add yet to this, to raise you above hope,

  The Guise, my master, will be here to-day. —

  For on bare guess of what has been revealed,

  He winged a messenger to give him notice;

  Yet, spite of all this factor of the fiends

  Could urge, they slunk their heads, like hinds in storms.

  But see, they come.

  Enter Sheriffs, with the Populace.

  Gril. Away, I’ll have amongst them;

  Fly to the king, warn him of Guise’s coming,

  That he may strait despatch his strict commands

  To stop him.[Exit Polin.

  Sher. Nay, this is colonel Grillon,

  The blunderbuss o’the court; away, away,

  He carries ammunition in his face.

  Gril. Hark you, my friends, if you are not in haste,

  Because you are the pillars of the city,

  I would inform you of a general ruin.

  Sher. Ruin to the city! marry, heaven forbid!

  Gril. Amen, I say; for, look you, I’m your friend.

  ’Tis blown about, you’ve plotted on the king,

  To seize him, if not kill him; for, who knows,

  When once your conscience yields, how far ‘twill stretch;

  Next, quite to dash your firmest hopes in pieces,

  The duke of Guise is dead.

  Sher. Dead, colonel!

  Sher. Undone, undone!

  Gril. The world cannot redeem you;

  For what, sirs, if the king, provoked at last,

  Should join the Spaniard, and should fire your city;

  Paris, your head, — but a most venomous one, —

  Which must be blooded?

  Sher. Blooded, colonel!

  Gril. Ay, blooded, thou most infamous magistrate,

  Or you will blood the king, and burn the Louvre;

  But ere that be, fall million miscreant souls,

  Such earth-born minds as yours; for, mark me, slaves,

  Did you not, ages past, consign your lives,

  Liberties, fortunes, to Imperial hands,

  Made them the guardians of your sickly years?

  And now you’re grown up to a booby’s greatness,

  What, would you wrest the sceptre from his hand?

  Now, by the majesty of kings I swear,

  You shall as soon be saved for packing juries.

  Sher. Why, sir, mayn’t citizens be saved?

  Gril. Yes, sir,

  From drowning, to be hanged, burnt, broke o’the wheel.

  Sher. Colonel, you speak us plain.

  Gril. A plague confound you,

  Why should I not? what is there in such rascals,

  Should make me hide my thought, or hold my tongue?

  Now, in the devil’s name, what make you here,

  Daubing the inside of the court, like snails,

  Sliming our walls, and pricking out your horns?

  To hear, I warrant, what the king’s a doing,

  And what the cabinet-council; then to the city,

  To spread your monstrous lies, and sow sedition?

  Wild fire choke you!

  Sher. Well, we’ll think of this;

  And so we take our leaves.

  Gril. Nay, stay, my masters;

  For I’m a thinking now just whereabouts

  Grow the two tallest trees in Arden forest.

  Sher. For what, pray, colonel, if we may be so bold?

  Gril. Why, to hang you upon the highest branches.

  ‘Fore God, it will be so; and I shall laugh

  To see you dangling to and fro i’the air,

  With the honest crows pecking your traitors’ limbs.

  All. Good colonel!

  Gril. Good rats, my precious vermin.

  You moving dirt, you rank stark muck o’the world,

  You oven-bats, you things so far from souls,

  Like dogs, you’re out of Providence’s reach,

  And only fit for hanging; but be gone,

  And think of plunder. — You right elder sheriff,

  Who carved our Henry’s image on a table,

  At your club-feast, and after stabbed it through, —

  Sher. Mercy, good colonel.

  Gril. Run with your nose to earth;

  Run, blood-hound, run, and scent out royal murder. —

  You second rogue, but equal to the first,

  Plunder, go hang, — nay, take your tackling with you,

  For these shall hold you fast, — your slaves shall hang you.

  To the mid region in the sun:

  Plunder! Begone, vipers, asps, and adders! [Exeunt Sheriffs and People.

  Enter Malicorn.

  Ha! but here comes a fiend, that soars above;

  A p
rince o’the air, that sets the mud a moving.

  Mal. Colonel, a word.

  Gril. I hold no speech with villains.

  Mal. But, sir, it may concern your fame and safety.

  Gril. No matter; I had rather die traduced,

  Than live by such a villain’s help as thine.

  Mal. Hate then the traitor, but yet love the treason.

  Gril. Why, are you not a villain?

  Mal. ’Tis confessed.

  Gril. Then, in the name of all thy brother-devils,

  What wouldst thou have with me?

  Mal. I know you’re honest;

  Therefore it is my business to disturb you.

  Gril. ‘Fore God, I’ll beat thee, if thou urge me farther.

  Mal. Why, though you should, yet, if you hear me after,

  The pleasure I shall take in your vexation,

  Will heal my bruises.

  Gril. Wert thou definite rogue,

  I’faith, I think, that I should give thee hearing;

  But such a boundless villainy as thine

  Admits no patience.

  Mal. Your niece is come to court,

  And yields her honour to our Henry’s bed.

  Gril. Thou liest, damned villain.[Strikes him.

  Mal. So: why this I looked for;

  But yet I swear by hell, and my revenge,

  ’Tis true, as you have wronged me.

  Gril. Wronged thee, villain!

  And name revenge! O wert thou Grillon’s match,

  And worthy of my sword, I swear, by this

  One had been past an oath; but thou’rt a worm,

  And if I tread thee, darest not turn again.

  Mal. ’Tis false; I dare, like you, but cannot act;

  There is no force in this enervate arm.

  Blasted I was ere born — curse on my stars! —

  Got by some dotard in his pithless years,

  And sent a withered sapling to the world.

  Yet I have brain, and there is my revenge;

  Therefore I say again, these eyes have seen

  Thy blood at court, bright as a summer’s morn,

  When all the heaven is streaked with dappled fires.

  And flecked with blushes like a rifled maid;

  Nay, by the gleamy fires that melted from her,

  Fast sighs and smiles, swol’n lips, and heaving breasts,

  My soul presages Henry has enjoyed her.

  Gril. Again thou liest! and I will crumble thee,

  Thou bottled spider, into thy primitive earth,

  Unless thou swear thy very thought’s a lie.

  Mal. I stand in adamant, and thus defy thee!

  Nay, draw, and with the edge betwixt my lips,

  Even while thou rak’st it through my teeth, I’ll swear

  All I have said is true, as thou art honest,

  Or I a villain.

  Gril. Damned infamous wretch!

  So much below my scorn, I dare not kill thee;

  And yet so much my hate, that I must fear thee.

  For should it be as thou hast said, not all

  The trophies of my laurelled honesty

  Should bar me from forsaking this bad world,

  And never draw my sword for Henry more.

  Mal. Ha! ’tis well, and now I am revenged.

  I was in hopes thou wouldst have uttered treason,

  And forfeited thy head, to pay me fully.

  Gril. Hast thou compacted for a lease of years

  With hell, that thus thou ventured to provoke me?

  Mal. Perhaps I have: (How right the blockhead hits!)

  Yet more to rack thy heart, and break thy brain,

  Thy niece has been before the Guise’s mistress.

  Gril. Hell-hound, avaunt!

  Mal. Forgive my honest meaning.[Exit.

  Gril. ’Tis hatched beneath, a plot upon mine honour;

  And thus he lays his baits to catch my soul: —

  Ha! but the presence opens; who comes here?

  By heaven, my niece! led by Alphonso Corso!

  Ha, Malicorn! is’t possible? truth from thee!

  ’Tis plain! and I, in justifying woman,

  Have done the devil wrong.

  Enter Alphonso Corso, leading in Marmoutiere.

  Alph. Madam, the king

  (Please you to sit) will instantly attend you.[Exit.

  Gril. Death, hell, and furies! ha! she comes to seek him! —

  O prostitute! — and, on her prodigal flesh,

  She has lavished all the diamonds of the Guise,

  To set her off, and sell her to the king.

  Mar. O heavens! did ever virgin yet attempt

  An enterprise like mine? I, that resolved

  Never to leave those dear delightful shades,

  But act the little part that nature gave me,

  On the green carpets of some guiltless grove,

  And having finished it, forsake the world;

  Unless sometimes my heart might entertain

  Some small remembrance of the taking Guise:

  But that far, far from any darkening thought,

  To cloud my honour, or eclipse my virtue.

  Gril. Thou liest! and if thou hadst not glanced aside,

  And spied me coming, I had had it all.

  Mar. By heaven! by all that’s good —

  Gril. Thou hast lost thy honour.

  Give me this hand, this hand by which I caught thee

  From the bold ruffian in the massacre,

  That would have stained thy almost infant honour,

  With lust, and blood; — dost thou remember it?

  Mar. I do, and bless the godlike arm, that saved me.

  Gril. ’Tis false! thou hast forgot my generous action;

  And now thou laugh’st, to think how thou hast cheated,

  For all his kindness, this old grisled fool.

  Mar. Forbid it heaven!

  Gril. But oh, that thou hadst died

  Ten thousand deaths, ere blasted Grillon’s glory;

  Grillon, that saved thee from a barbarous world.

  Where thou hadst starved, or sold thyself for bread;

  Took thee into his bosom, fostered thee

  As his own soul, and laid thee in his heart-strings;

  And now, for all my cares, to serve me thus!

  O ’tis too much, ye powers! double confusion

  On all my wars; and oh, — out, shame upon thee!

  It wrings the tears from Grillon’s iron heart,

  And melts me to a babe.

  Mar. Sir! father! hear me!

  I come to court, to save the life of Guise.

  Gril. And prostitute thy honour to the king.

  Mar. I have looked, perhaps, too nicely for my sex,

  Into the dark affairs of fatal state;

  And, to advance this dangerous inquisition,

  I listened to the love of daring Guise.

  Gril. By arms, by honesty, I swear thou lovest him!

  Mar. By heaven, that gave those arms success, I swear

  I do not, as you think! but take it all.

  I have heard the Guise, not with an angel’s temper,

  Something beyond the tenderness of pity,

  And yet, not love.

  Now, by the powers that framed me, this is all!

  Nor should the world have wrought this close confession,

  But to rebate your jealousy of honour.

  Gril. I know not what to say, nor what to think;

  There’s heaven still in thy voice, but that’s a sign

  Virtue’s departing; for thy better angel

  Still makes the woman’s tongue his rising ground,

  Wags there a while, and takes his flight for ever.

  Mar. You must not go.

  Gril. Though I have reason, plain

  As day, to judge thee false, I think thee true:

  By heaven, methinks I see a glory round thee!

  There’s something says, thou wilt not
lose thy honour: —

  Death and the devil! that’s my own honesty;

  My foolish open nature, that would have

  All like myself; — but off; I’ll hence and curse thee!

  Mar. O, stay!

  Gril. I will not.

  Mar. Hark! the king’s coming.

  Let me conjure you, for your own soul’s quiet,

  And for the everlasting rest of mine,

  Stir not, till you have heard my heart’s design.

  Gril. Angel, or devil, I will. — Nay, at this rate,

  She’ll make me shortly bring him to her bed. —

  Bawd for him? no, he shall make me run my head

  Into a cannon, when ’tis firing, first;

  That’s honourable sport. But I’ll retire,

  And if she plays me false, here’s that shall mend her.

  [Touching his Dagger, exit. Marmoutiere sits. Song and Dance.

  Enter the King.

  King. After the breathing of a love-sick heart

  Upon your hand, once more, — nay twice, — forgive me.

  Mar. I discompose you, sir.

  King. Thou dost, by heaven;

  But with such charming pleasure,

  I love, and tremble, as at angels’ view.

  Mar. Love me, my lord?

  King. Who should be loved, but you?

  So loved, that even my crown, and self are vile,

  While you are by. Try me upon despair;

  My kingdom at the stake, ambition starved,

  Revenge forgot, and all great appetites

  That whet uncommon spirits to aspire,

  So once a day I may have leave —

  Nay, madam, then you fear me.

  Mar. Fear you, sir! what is there dreadful in you?

  You’ve all the graces that can crown mankind;

  Yet wear them so, as if you did not know them;

  So stainless, fearless, free in all your actions,

  As if heaven lent you to the world to pattern.

  King. Madam, I find you are no petitioner;

  My people would not treat me in this sort,

  Though ‘twere to gain a part of their design;

  But to the Guise they deal their faithless praise

  As fast, as you your flattery to me;

  Though for what end I cannot guess, except

  You come, like them, to mock at my misfortunes.

  Mar. Forgive you, heaven, that thought! No, mighty monarch,

  The love of all the good, and wonder of the great;

  I swear, by heaven, my heart adores, and loves you.

  King. O madam, rise.

  Mar. Nay, were you, sir, unthroned

  By this seditious rout that dare despise you,

  Blast all my days, ye powers! torment my nights;

  Nay, let the misery invade my sex,

  That could not for the royal cause, like me,

  Throw all their luxury before your feet,