Five Revenge Tragedies: The Spanish Tragedy, Hamlet, Antonio's Revenge, The Tragedy of Hoffman, The Revenger's Tragedy (Penguin Classics)

by William Shakespeare

  Act 4

  Scene 4

  Enter Vindice and Hippolito, bringing out their mother one by one shoulder, and the other by the other, with daggers in their hands.

  Vindice. O, thou for whom no name is bad enough.

  Mother. What means my sons? What, will you murder me?

  Vindice. Wicked, unnatural parents.

  Hippolito. Fiend of women.

  Mother. Oh! are sons turned monsters? Help!

  Vindice. In vain.

  Mother. Are you so barbarous to set iron nipples

  Upon the breast that gave you suck?

  Vindice. That breast

  10 Is turned to quarled poison.

  Mother. Cut not your days for’t. Am not I your mother?

  Vindice. Thou dost usurp that title now by fraud,

  For in that shell of mother breeds a bawd.

  Mother. A bawd? O name far loathsomer than hell!

  Hippolito. It should be so, knew’st thou thy office well.

  Mother. I hate it.

  Vindice. Ah is’t possible? Thou only? You powers on high,

  That women should dissemble when they die.

  Mother. Dissemble?

  20 Vindice. Did not the duke’s son direct

  A fellow of the world’s condition hither,

  That did corrupt all that was good in thee,

  Made thee uncivilly to forget thyself,

  And work our sister to his lust?

  Mother. Who, I?

  That had been monstrous: I defy that man

  For any such intent. None lives so pure

  But shall be soiled with slander: good son, believe it not.

  Vindice. Oh I’m in doubt

  30 Whether I’m myself, or no:

  Stay, let me look again upon this face.

  Who shall be saved when mothers have no grace?

  Hippolito. ’Twould make one half despair.

  Vindice. I was the man.

  Defy me now? let’s see, do’t modestly.

  Mother. O hell unto my soul!

  Vindice. In that disguise, I sent from the duke’s son,

  Tried you, and found you base metal

  As any villain might have done.

  40 Mother. O no, no tongue but yours could have bewitched me so!

  Vindice. O nimble in damnation, quick in tune,

  There is no devil could strike fire so soon:

  I am confuted in a word.

  Mother. O son, forgive me: to myself I’ll prove more true.

  You that should honour me, I kneel to you.

  Vindice. A mother to give aim to her own daughter.

  Hippolito. True brother, how far beyond nature ’tis,

  Though many mothers do it.

  Vindice. Nay and you draw tears once: go you to bed.

  50 Wet will make iron blush and change to red.

  Brother, it rains; ’twill spoil your dagger, house it.

  Hippolito. ’Tis done.

  Vindice. I’faith ’tis a sweet shower, it does much good.

  The fruitful grounds and meadows of her soul

  Has been long dry: pour down, thou blessed dew.

  Rise, mother; troth, this shower has made you higher.

  Mother. O you heavens. Take this infectious spot out of my soul,

  I’ll rinse it in seven waters of mine eyes;

  Make my tears salt enough to taste of grace.

  60 To weep is to our sex naturally given:

  But to weep truly, that’s a gift from heaven.

  Vindice. Nay I’ll kiss thee now: kiss her brother.

  Let’s marry her to our souls wherein’s no lust,

  And honourably love her.

  Hippolito. let it be.

  Vindice. For honest women are so seld and rare,

  ’Tis good to cherish those poor few that are.

  Oh you of easy wax, do but imagine,

  Now the disease has left you, how leprously

  70 That office would have clinged to your forehead.

  All mothers that had any graceful hue

  Would have worn masks to hide their face at you.

  It would have grown to this: at your foul name,

  Green-coloured maids would have turned red with shame.

  Hippolito. And then our sister full of hire and baseness.

  Vindice. There had been boiling lead again:

  The duke’s son’s great concubine,

  A drab of state, a cloth-o’-silver slut,

  To have her train born up, and her soul trail i’th’dirt: great!

  80 Hippolito. To be miserably great; rich, to be eternally wretched.

  Vindice. O common madness.

  Ask but the thriving’st harlot in cold blood,

  She’d give the world to make her honour good.

  Perhaps you’ll say, but only to the duke’s son

  In private; why, she first begins with one,

  Who afterward to thousand proves a whore.

  Break ice in one place, it will crack in more.

  Mother. Most certainly applied.

  Hippolito. Oh brother, you forget our business.

  90 Vindice. And well remembered: joy’s a subtle elf.

  I think man’s happiest when he forgets himself.

  Farewell, once dried, now holy-watered mead;

  Our hearts wear feathers, that before wore lead.

  Mother. I’ll give you this, that one I never knew

  Plead better, for, and ’gainst the devil, than you.

  Vindice. You make me proud on’t.

  Hippolito. Commend us in all virtue to our sister.

  Vindice. Ay, for the love of heaven, to that true maid.

  Mother. With my best words.

  100 Vindice. Why that was motherly said. Exeunt.

  Mother. I wonder now what fury did transport me?

  I feel good thoughts begin to settle in me.

  Oh, with what forehead can I look on her?

  Whose honour I’ve so impiously beset. [Enter Castiza.]

  And here she comes.

  Castiza. Now mother, you have wrought with me so strongly,

  That what for my advancement, as to calm

  The trouble of your tongue – I am content.

  Mother. Content to what?

  110 Castiza. To do as you have wished me.

  To prostitute my breast to the duke’s son:

  And put myself to common usury.

  Mother. I hope you will not so.

  Castiza. Hope you I will not?

  That’s not the hope you look to be saved in.

  Mother. Truth, but it is.

  Castiza. Do not deceive yourself.

  I am as you e’en out of marble wrought,

  What would you now? Are ye not pleased with me?

  120 You shall not wish me to be more lascivious

  Than I intend to be.

  Mother. Strike me not cold!

  Castiza. How often have you charged me on your blessing

  To be a cursed woman? When you knew

  Your blessing had no force to make me lewd,

  You laid your curse upon me: that did more.

  The mother’s curse is heavy, where that fights,

  Sons set in storm, and daughters lose their lights.

  Mother. Good child, dear maid: if there be any spark

  130 Of heavenly intellectual fire within thee, oh let my breath

  Revive it to a flame.

  Put not all out, with woman’s wilful follies.

  I am recovered of that foul disease

  That haunts too many mothers: kind, forgive me;

  Make me not sick in health? If then

  My words prevailed when they were wickedness,

  How much more now when they are just and good?

  Castiza. I wonder what you mean: are not you she

  For whose infect persuasions I could scarce

  140 Kneel out my prayers, and had much ado

  In three hours’ reading, to untwist so much />
  Of the black serpent as you wound about me?

  Mother. ’Tis unfruitful, held tedious to repeat what’s past.

  I’m now your present mother.

  Castiza. Push, now ’tis too late.

  Mother. Bethink again: thou knowst not what thou sayst.

  Castiza. No: deny advancement, treasure, the duke’s son?

  Mother. O see, I spoke those words, and now they poison me!

  What will the deed do then?

  150 Advancement? True, as high as shame can pitch

  For treasure: who e’er knew a harlot rich?

  Or could build by the purchase of her sin,

  An hospital to keep their bastards in? The duke’s son:

  Oh, when women are young courtiers, they are sure to be old beggars to know the miseries most harlots taste.

  Thou’dst wish thyself unborn, when thou art unchaste.

  Castiza. O mother, let me twine about your neck,

  And kiss you till my soul melt on your lips.

  I did but this to try you!

  Mother. O, speak truth.

  160 Castiza. Indeed I did not, for no tongue has force to alter me from honest.

  If maidens would, men’s words could have no power:

  A virgin honour is a crystal tower

  Which, being weak, is guarded with good spirits,

  Until she basely yields, no ill inherits.

  Mother. O happy child! Faith and thy birth hath saved me,

  ’Mongst thousand daughters happiest of all others,

  Be thou a glass for maids, and I for mothers. Exeunt.

  Act 5

  Scene 1

  Enter Vindice and Hippolito[, arranging the corpse of the Duke dressed as Piato].

  Vindice. So, so, he leans well; take heed you wake him not, brother.

  Hippolito. I warrant you, my life for yours.

  Vindice. That’s a good lay, for I must kill myself!

  Brother, that’s I: that fits for me, do you mark it,

  And I must stand ready here to make away myself yonder. I must be fit to be killed, and stand to kill myself. I could vary if not so little as thrice over again: ’t’as some eight returns like Michaelmas term.

  10 Hippolito. That’s enow, o’conscience.

  Vindice. But sirrah, does the duke’s son come single?

  Hippolito. No, there’s the hell on’t: his faith’s too feeble to go alone. He brings flesh-flies after him, that will buzz against suppertime, and hum for his coming out.

  Vindice. Ah, the fly-flop of vengeance beat ’em to pieces! Here was the sweetest occasion, the fittest hour, to have made my revenge familiar with him; show him the body of the duke his father, and how quaintly he died, like a politician in hugger-mugger; made no man acquainted with it, and in

  20 catastrophe, slain him over his father’s breast, and oh, I’m mad to lose such a sweet opportunity.

  Hippolito. Nay pish, prithee be content! There’s no remedy present: may not hereafter times open in as fair faces as this?

  Vindice. They may if they can paint so well.

  Hippolito. Come, now to avoid all suspicion, let’s forsake this room, and be going to meet the duke’s son.

  Vindice. Content: I’m for any weather. Heart, step close; here he comes. Enter lussurioso.

  Hippolito. My honoured lord?

  30 Lussurioso. Oh me, you both present?

  Vindice. E’en newly my lord, just as your lordship entered now. About this place we had notice given he should be, but in some –

  Hippolito. Came your honour private?

  Lussurioso. Private enough for this: only a few

  Attend my coming out.

  Hippolito. [Aside] Death rot those few.

  Lussurioso. Stay, yonder’s the slave.

  Vindice. Mass, there’s the slave indeed, my lord.

  40 [Aside] ’Tis a good child: he calls his father slave.

  Lussurioso. Ay, that’s the villain, the damned villain: softly,

  Tread easy.

  Vindice. Puh, I warrant you my lord; we’ll stifle in our breaths.

  Lussurioso. That will do well.

  Base rogue, thou sleepest thy last. [Aside] ’Tis policy

  To have him killed in’s sleep, for if he waked

  He would betray all to them.

  Vindice. But my lord.

  Lussurioso. Ha, what sayst?

  50 Vindice. Shall we kill him now he’s drunk?

  Lussurioso. Ay, best of all.

  Vindice. Why then he will ne’er live to be sober?

  Lussurioso. No matter, let him reel to hell.

  Vindice. But being so full of liquor, I fear he will put out all the fire.

  Lussurioso. Thou art a mad breast!

  Vindice. [Aside] And leave none to warm your lordship’s golls withal;

  for he that dies drunk falls into hell-fire like a bucket o’water, qush, qush.

  60 Lussurioso. Come be ready: nake your swords; think of your wrongs.

  This slave has injured you.

  Vindice. Troth, so he has [Aside] and he has paid well for’t.

  Lussurioso. Meet with him now.

  Vindice. You’ll bear us out, my lord?

  Lussurioso. Puh, am I a lord for nothing, think you? Quickly now.

  Vindice. Sa, sa, sa: [Stabs the corpse.] thump, there he lies.

  Lussurioso. Nimbly done, ha? Oh villains, murderers!

  70 ’Tis the old duke my father.

  Vindice. [Aside] That’s a jest.

  Lussurioso. What, stiff and cold already?

  O pardon me to call you from your names,

  ’Tis none of your deed. That villain Piato,

  Whom you thought now to kill, has murdered him

  And left him thus disguised.

  Hippolito. And not unlikely.

  Vindice. O rascal, was he not ashamed

  To put the duke into a greasy doublet?

  80 Lussurioso. He has been cold and stiff – who knows how long?

  Vindice. [Aside] Marry, that do I.

  Lussurioso. No words, I pray, of anything intended.

  Hippolito. I would fain have your lordship think that we have small reason to prate.

  Lussurioso. ’Faith, thou sayest true. I’ll forthwith send to court,

  For all the nobles, bastard, duchess all,

  How here by miracle we found him dead,

  And in his raiment that foul villain fled.

  90 Vindice. That will be the best way my lord, to clear us all: let’s cast about to be clear.

  Lussurioso. Ho, Nencio, Sordido, and the rest.

  Enter [Nencio, Sordido and servants].

  Sordido. My lord.

  Nencio. My lord.

  Lussurioso. Be witnesses of a strange spectacle:

  Choosing for private conference that sad room

  We found the duke my father geal’d in blood.

  Sordido. My lord the duke! Run, hie thee, Nencio.

  Startle the court by signifying so much. [Exit Nencio.]

  Vindice. [Aside] Thus much by wit a deep revenger can,

  100 When murders known, to be the clearest man;

  We’re furthest off, and with as bold an eye,

  Survey his body as the standers by.

  Lussurioso. My royal father, too basely let blood,

  By a malevolent slave.

  Hippolito. [Aside] Hark? he calls thee slave again.

  Vindice. [Aside] H’as lost, he may.

  Lussurioso. Oh sight, look hither! See, his lips are gnawn with poison.

  Vindice. How – his lips? By th’mass, they be.

  110 Lussurioso. O villain – O rogue – O slave – O rascal!

  Hippolito. O good deceit, he quits him with like terms.

  [Enter Nobles, Gentleman, Ambitioso and Supervacuo.]

  1 Noble. Where?

  2 Noble. Which way?

  Ambitioso. Over what roof hangs this prodigious comet

  In deadly fire?

  Lussurios
o. Behold, behold my lords: the duke my father’s murdered by a vassal, that owes this habit, and here left disguised.

  [Enter Duchess and Spurio.]

  Duchess. My lord and husband!

  2 Noble. Reverent majesty.

  120 1 Noble. I have seen these clothes often attending on him.

  Vindice. [Aside] That nobleman hath been i’th’ country, for he does not lie.

  Supervacuo. [Aside] learn of our mother let’s dissemble too.

  I’m glad he’s vanished; so I hope are you?

  Ambitioso. [Aside] Ay, you may take my word for’t.

  Spurio. [Aside] Old dad, dead?

  Ay, one of his cast sins will send the fates

  Most hearty commendations by his own son.

  I’ll tug in the new stream, till strength be done.

  Lussurioso. Where be those two, that did affirm to us

  130 My lord the duke was privately rid forth?

  Gentleman. O pardon us, my lords: he gave that charge

  Upon our lives, if he were missed at Court

  To answer so; he rode not anywhere,

  We left him private with that fellow here?

  Vindice. [Aside] Confirmed.

  Lussurioso. O heavens, that false charge was his death.

  Impudent beggars, durst you to our face

  Maintain such a false answer? Bear him straight to execution.

  Gentleman. My lord?

  140 Lussurioso. Urge me no more.

  In this the excuse may be called half the murder.

  Vindice. You’ve sentenced well.

  Lussurioso. Away, see it be done.

  [Exit Gentleman under guard.]

  Vindice. [Aside] Could you not stick; see what confession doth?

  Who would not lie when men are hanged for truth?

  Hippolito. [Aside] Brother, how happy is our vengeance.

  Vindice. [Aside] Why it hits past the apprehension of indifferent wits.

  Lussurioso. My lord, let post-horse be sent

  Into all places to entrap the villain.

  150 Vindice. [Aside] Post-horse, ha ha.

  Nobles. My lord, we’re something bold to know our duty.

  Your father’s accidentally departed:

  The titles that were due to him meet you.

  Lussurioso. Meet me? I’m not at leisure, my good lord,

  I’ve many griefs to dispatch out o’th’way.

  [Aside] Welcome, sweet titles: talk to me, my lords,

  Of sepulchres and mighty emperors’ bones;

  That’s thought for me.

  Vindice. [Aside] So, one may see by this,

  160 How foreign markets go:

  Courtiers have feet o’th’ nines, and tongues o’th’ twelves;

  They flatter dukes, and dukes flatter themselves.