Five Revenge Tragedies: The Spanish Tragedy, Hamlet, Antonio's Revenge, The Tragedy of Hoffman, The Revenger's Tragedy (Penguin Classics)
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This bush shroud you, this you.
60 Stand close, true soldiers, for revenge.
Lucibella. Ay: do, do, do, I pray you heartily do; stand close.
Enter Hoffman and [Martha].
Hoffman. I wonder much why you ask me for Lorrique.
What is Lorrique to you, or what to me?
I tell you he is damned: inquire no more,
His name’s hatefuller than death.
Martha. Heaven! what alterations these.
Can I believe you love me as you swore,
When you are so inconstant to your friend?
Hoffman. He is no friend of mine whom you affect.
70 Pardon me, madam: such a fury reigns
Over my boiling blood, that I envy
Anyone on whom you cast an amorous eye.
Martha. What, grown so loving? marry, heaven defend,
We shall deceive you if you dote on us,
For I have sworn to live a widow’s life,
And never more to be termed married wife.
Hoffman. Ay, but you must.
Martha. Must? use not force, I pray.
Hoffman. Yield to my love, and then with meekest words
80 And the most humble actions, I’ll entreat
Your sacred beauty. Deny me? I’ll turn fire,
More wild than wrath. Come then agree
If not to marry, yet in unseen sports
To quench these lawless heats that burn in me.
Martha. What, my adopted son become my lover?
And make a wanton minion of his mother?
Now fie upon you, fie, you are too obscene,
If, like your words, your thoughts appear unclean.
Hoffman. By heaven, I do not jest: go to, believe me.
90 ’Tis well you laugh. Smile on, I like this;
Say, will you yield?
Martha. At the first? Fie, no!
That were an abject course. But let us walk
Into some covert; there are pretty caves
Lucky to lovers’ suits: for Virgil sings
That Dido being driven by a sharp storm
Into a Lybian cave, was there enticed
By silver-tongued Aeneas to affect.
And should you serve me so, I were undone,
100 Disgraced in Germany by every boor,
Who in their rhymes would jest at Martha’s name,
Calling her minion to her cousin-son.
Hoffman. Fairer than Dido, or love’s amorous queen:
I know a cave, wherein the bright day’s eyes
Looked never but askance through a small crack
Or little cranny of the fretted scar;
There I have sometimes lived, there are fit seats
To sit and chat, and coll and kiss, and steal
Love’s hidden pleasures. Come, are you disposed
110 To venture entrance? If you be, assay:
’Tis death to quick desire; use no delay.
Martha. Virtue and modesty bids me say no.
Yet trust me, Hoffman, th’art so sweet a man,
And so beloved of me, that I must go.
Hoffman. I am crowned the king of pleasure.
Martha. [Aside] Slave, thou goest to meet destruction in thy cave.
Hoffman. ’Sdeath, who stands here?
[Discovers Lorrique’s body.]
What’s that? Lorrique’s pale ghost?
I am amazed. Nay, slave, stand off:
120 Martha. [Armed with Hoffman’s sword.] Thy weapon’s sure, the prize is ours.
Come forth dear friends, murder is in our powers.
Saxony. Yield thee, base son of shame!
Hoffman. How now: what’s here? am I betrayed?
By dotage, by the falsehood of a face?
Oh wretched fool, fallen by a woman’s hand
From high revenge’s sphere, the bliss of souls!
Saxony. Cut out the murderer’s tongue.
Hoffman. What do you mean?
Whom have I murdered; wherefore bind ye me?
130 Martha. They are justices to punish thy bare bones.
[Reveals skeletons.]
Look with thy bloodshed eyes on these bare bones,
And tell me that which dead Lorrique confessed
Who is’t thou villained? That least – who was’t?
Hoffman. Why Otho thy son’s, and that’s my father’s by him.
Martha. O merciless and cruel murderer
To leave me childless!
Lucibella. And me husbandless.
Mathias. Me brotherless. Oh smooth-tongued hypocrite
How thou didst draw me to my brother’s death?
140 Saxony. Talk no more to him, he seeks dignity;
Reason he should receive his desperate hire,
And wear his crown made flaming hot with fire:
Bring forth the burning crown there –
Enter a lord with the crown [and places it on Hoffman’s head].
Hoffman. Do, old dog, thou help’st to worry my dead father
And must thou kill me too? ’tis well, ’tis fit,
I that had sworn unto my father’s soul
To be revenged on Austria, Saxony,
Prussia, Luningberg, and all their heirs:
Had prospered in the downfall of some five;
150 Had only three to offer to the fiends,
And then must fall in love – oh, wretched eyes
That have betrayed my heart: be you accursed,
And as the melting drops run from my brows,
So fall they on the strings that guide your heart,
Whereby their oily heat may crack them first.
Ay, so, boil on, thou foolish idle brain,
For giving entertainment to love’s thoughts.
A man resolved in blood, bound by a vow
For no less vengeance than his father’s death,
160 Yet become amorous of his foe’s wife!
Oh sin against all conceit! worthy this shame
And all the tortures that the world can name.
Martha. Call upon heaven, base wretch, think on thy soul.
Hoffman. In charity and prayer:
To no purpose without charity.
Saxony. We pardon thee, and pray for thy soul’s health.
Hoffman. So do I not yours, nor pardon you.
You killed my father, my most warlike father;
Thus as you deal by me, you did by him.
170 But I deserve it that have slacked revenge
Through fickle beauty and a woman’s fraud.
But hell, the hope of all despairing men,
That wring the poor, and eat the people up
As greedy beasts the harvest of their spring;
That hell, where cowards have their seats prepared,
And barbarous asses, such as have robbed soldiers of
Reward, and punish true desert with scorned death –
[Dies.]
FINIS
THOMAS MIDDLETON
The Revenger’s Tragedy
List of Characters
VINDICE
HIPPOLITO his brother
CASTIZA his sister
MOTHER Graziana
DONDOLO servant to Graziana
DUKE
DUCHESS
LUSSURIOSO eldest son of the duke
SPURIO duke’s illegitimate son
ANTONIO
PIERO
2 JUDGES
Spurio’s SERVANTS
NOBLEMEN
OFFICERS
GENTLEMAN
Act 1
Scene 1
Enter Vindice [holding a skull], the Duke, Duchess, lussurioso her son, Spurio the bastard, with a train; pass over the stage with torchlight.
Vindice. Duke: royal lecher; go, grey-haired adultery,
And thou his son, as impious steeped as he:
And thou his bastard true-begot in evil:
And thou his duchess that will do with devil.
Four excellent characters – O that marrowless age
Would stuff the hollow bones with damned desires,
And ’stead of heat kindle infernal fire
Within the spendthrift veins of a dry duke.
A parched and juiceless luxur. O God! one
10 That has scarce blood enough to live upon,
And he to riot it like a son and heir?
O, the thought of that
Turns my abused heart-strings into fret.
Thou sallow picture of my poisoned love,
My study’s ornament, thou shell of death,
Once the bright face of my betrothed lady;
When life and beauty naturally filled out
These ragged imperfections;
When two heaven-pointed diamonds were set
20 In those unsightly rings – then ’twas a face
So far beyond the artificial shine
Of any woman’s bought complexion,
That the uprightest man – if such there be,
That sin but seven times a day – broke custom,
And made up eight with looking after her.
Oh, she was able to ha’ made a usurer’s son
Melt all his patrimony in a kiss;
And what his father fifty years told
To have consumed, and yet his suit been cold.
30 But oh, accursed palace!
Thee when thou wert apparelled in thy flesh,
The old duke poisoned,
Because thy purer part would not consent
Unto his palsy-lust; for old men lustful
Do show like young men angry, eager, violent,
Outbid like their limited performances
O ’ware an old man hot and vicious
‘Age as in gold, in lust is covetous.’
Vengeance, thou murder’s quit-rent, and whereby
40 Thou show’st thyself tenant to tragedy,
Oh keep thy day, hour, minute, I beseech,
For those thou hast determined. Hum: whoe’er knew
Murder unpaid? ’Faith, give revenge her due;
She’s kept touch hitherto. Be merry, merry,
Advance thee, o thou terror to fat folks,
To have their costly three-piled flesh worn off
As bare as this. For banquets, ease, and laughter
Can make great men, as greatness goes by clay.
But wise men little are more great than they.
Enter [his] brother Hippolito.
50 Hippolito. Still sighing o’er death’s vizard?
Vindice. Brother, welcome,
What comfort bring’st thou? how go things at court?
Hippolito. In silk and silver, brother: never braver.
Vindice. Puh,
Thou play’st upon my meaning, prithee say
Has that bald madam Opportunity
Yet thought upon’s? speak, are we happy yet?
Thy wrongs and mine are for one scabbard fit.
Hippolito. It may prove happiness?
60 Vindice. What is’t may prove?
Give me to taste.
Hippolito. Give me your hearing then.
You know my place at Court.
Vindice. Ay, the duke’s chamber
But ’tis a marvel thou’rt not turned out yet!
Hippolito. ’Faith I have been shoved at, but ’twas still my hap
To hold by th’ duchess’ skirt, you guess at that.
Whom such a coat keeps up can ne’er fall flat.
But to the purpose.
70 Last evening predecessor unto this,
The duke’s son warily inquired for me,
Whose pleasure I attended: he began
By policy to open and unhusk me
About the time and common rumour.
But I had so much wit to keep my thoughts
Up in their built houses, yet afforded him
An idle satisfaction without danger.
But in the whole aim, and scope of his intent
Ended in this: conjuring me in private
80 To seek some strange-digested fellow forth,
Of ill-contented nature; either disgraced
In former times, or by new grooms displaced,
Since his step-mother’s nuptials; such a blood
A man that were for evil only good:
To give you the true word, some base-coined pander.
Vindice. I reach you, for I know his heat is such.
Were there as many concubines as ladies
He would not be contained, he must fly out.
I wonder how ill-featured, vile-proportioned
90 That one should be – if she were made for woman –
Whom, at the insurrection of his lust,
He would refuse for once. Heart, I think none
Next to a skull, no more unsound than one,
Each face he meets he strongly dotes upon.
Hippolito. Brother, y’have truly spoke him!
He knows not you, but I’ll swear you know him.
Vindice. And therefore I’ll put on that knave for once,
And be a right man then, a man a’th time;
For to be honest is not to be i’the world.
100 Brother, I’ll be that strange-composed fellow.
Hippolito. And I’ll prefer you, brother.
Vindice. Go to then:
The smallest advantage fattens wronged men.
It may point out Occasion, if I meet her,
I’ll hold her by the fore-top fast enough;
Or like the French mole heave up hair and all.
I have a habit that will fit it quaintly –
Here comes our mother.
Hippolito. And sister.
110 Vindice. We must coin.
Women are apt, you know, to take false money,
But I dare stake my soul for these two creatures.
Only excuse excepted that they’ll swallow,
Because their sex is easy in belief. [Enter Mother and Castiza.]
Mother. What news from court, son Carlo?
Hippolito. Faith, mother,
’Tis whispered there the duchess’ youngest son
Has played a rape on lord Antonio’s wife.
Mother. On that religious lady?
120 Castiza. Royal blood! monster, he deserves to die,
If Italy had no more hopes but he.
Vindice. Sister, y’have sentenced most direct, and true;
The law’s a woman, and would she were you.
Mother, I must take leave of you.
Mother. leave for what?
Vindice. I intend speedy travel.
Hippolito. That he does, Madam.
Mother. Speedy indeed!
Vindice. For, since my worthy father’s funeral,
130 My life’s unnaturally to me, e’en compelled,
As if I lived now when I should be dead.
Mother. Indeed, he was a worthy gentleman
Had his state been fellow to his mind.
Vindice. The duke did much deject him.
Mother. Much!
Vindice. Too much.
And through disgrace oft smothered in his spirit
When it would mount; surely I think he died
Of discontent, the nobleman’s consumption.
140 Mother. Most sure he did!
Vindice. Did he? ’lack – you know all
You were his midnight secretary.
Mother. No:
He was too wise to trust me with his thoughts.
Vindice. I’faith then father, thou wast wise indeed,
‘Wives are but made to go to bed and feed.’
Come mother, sister: you’ll bring me onward, brother?
Hippolito. I will.
Vindice. I’ll quickly turn into another. Exeunt.
[Act 1
Scene 2]
Enter the old Duke, lussurioso, his son, the Duchess, the Bastard, the Duchess’ two sons Ambitioso and Supervacuo; the third her youngest b
rought out with Officers for the rape; two judges.
Duke. Duchess, it is your youngest son: we’re sorry,
His violent act has e’en drawn blood of honour
And stained our honours,
Thrown ink upon the forehead of our state
Which envious spirits will dip their pens into
After our death, and blot us in our tombs.
For that which would seem treason in our lives
Is laughter when we’re dead; who dares now whisper
That dares not then speak out, and e’en proclaim
10 With loud words and broad pens our closest shame.
1 Judge. Your grace hath spoke like to your silver years,
Full of confirmed gravity. For what is it to have
A flattering false insculption on a tomb,
And in men’s hearts reproach? The ’bowelled corpse
May be cered in, but with free tongue I speak:
‘The faults of great men through their cerecloths break.’
Duke. They do: we’re sorry for’t. It is our fate,
To live in fear and die to live in hate.
I leave him to your sentence. Doom him, lords –
20 The fact is great – whilst I sit by and sigh.
Duchess. [Kneeling.] My gracious lord, I pray: be merciful.
Although his trespass far exceed his years,
Think him to be your own as I am yours.
Call him not son-in-law; the law, I fear,
Will fall too soon upon his name and him.
Temper his fault with pity?
Lussurioso. Good my lord:
Then ’twill not taste so bitter and unpleasant
Upon the judges’ palate; for offences
30 Gilt o’er with mercy, show like fairest women
Good only for their beauties; which, washed off, no sin is uglier.
Ambitioso. I beseech your grace,
Be soft and mild: let not relentless law,
Look with an iron forehead on our brother.
Spurio. [Aside] He yields small comfort yet – hope he shall die –
And if a bastard’s wish might stand in force,
Would all the court were turned into a corse.
Duchess. No pity yet? must I rise fruitless then,
A wonder in a woman? Are my knees
40 Of such low mettle that without respect –
1 Judge. let the offender stand forth.
’Tis the duke’s pleasure that impartial doom
Shall take first hold of his unclean attempt.
A rape! Why, ’tis the very core of lust,
Double adultery.
Junior. So, sir.
2 Judge. And which was worse,
Committed on the lord Antonio’s wife,
That general honest lady. Confess, my lord!