ANTONIO’S REVENGE.
ACT I.
SCENE I.
A corridor in the palace of Piero.
Enter Piero, unbraced, his arms bare, smeared in blood, a poniard in one hand bloody, and a torch in the other; Strotzo following him with a cord.
Pier. Ho, Gasper Strotzo, bind Feliche’s trunk
Unto the panting side of Mellida!
[Exit Strotzo.
’Tis yet dead night, yet all the earth is clutch’d[198]
In the dull leaden hand of snoring sleep;
No breath disturbs the quiet of the air,
No spirit moves upon the breast of earth,
Save howling dogs, night-crows, and screeching owls,
Save meagre ghosts, Piero, and black thoughts.
One, two!
[Clock strikes.
Lord, in two hours what a topless mount 10
Of unpeer’d mischief have these hands cast up!
Re-enter Strotzo.
I can scarce coop triumphing vengeance up
From bursting forth in braggart passion.
Str. My lord, ’tis firmly said that——
Pier. Andrugio sleeps in peace: this brain hath choked
The organ of his breast. Feliche hangs
But as a bait upon the line of death,
To tice on mischief. I am great in blood,
Unequall’d in revenge. You horrid scouts
That sentinel swart night, give loud applause 20
From your large palms. First, know, my heart was rais’d
Unto Andrugio’s life upon this ground—
Str. Duke, ’tis reported——
Pier. We both were rivals in our may of blood,
Unto Maria, fair Ferrara’s heir.
He won the lady, to my honour’s death,
And from her sweets cropp’d this Antonio;
For which I burnt in inward swelt’ring hate,
And fester’d rankling malice in my breast,
Till I might belk revenge upon his eyes: 30
And now (O blessèd now!) ’tis done. Hell, night,
Give loud applause to my hypocrisy.
When his bright valour even dazzled sense,
In off’ring his own head, public reproach
Had blurr’d my name. Speak, Strotzo, had it not?
If then I had——
Str. It had, so please——
Pier. What had, so please? Unseasoned sycophant,
Piero Sforza is no numbèd lord,
Senseless of all true touch;[199] stroke not the head 40
Of infant speech, till it be fully born;
Go to!
Str. How now! Fut, I’ll not smother your speech.
Pier. Nay, right thine eyes: ’twas but a little spleen,—
(Huge plunge![200]
Sin’s grown a slave, and must observe slight evils;
Huge villains are enforced to claw[201] all devils.)—
Pish, sweet, thy thoughts, and give me——.
Str. Stroke not the head of infant speech! go to!
Pier. Nay, calm this storm. I ever held thy breast
More secret, and more firm in league of blood, 50
Than to be struck in heat with each slight puff.
Give me thy ears; huge infamy [had] press[’d] down
My honour, if even then, when his fresh act
Of prowess bloom’d out full,
I had ta’en vengeance on his hated head——.
Str. Why it had——.
Pier. Could I avoid to give a seeming grant
Unto fruition of Antonio’s love?
Str. No.
Pier. And didst thou ever see a Judas kiss 60
With a more covert touch of fleering hate?
Str. No.
Pier. And having clipt them with pretence of love,
Have I not crush’d them with a cruel wring?
Str. Yes.
Pier. Say, faith, didst thou e’er hear, or read, or see
Such happy vengeance, unsuspected death?
That I should drop strong poison in the bowl,
Which I myself caroused unto his health
And future fortune of our unity! 70
That it should work even in the hush[202] of night,
And strangle him on sudden, that fair show
Of death, for the excessive joy of his fate,
Might choke the murder! Ha, Strotzo, is’t not rare?
Nay, but weigh it. Then Feliche stabb’d
(Whose sinking thought[203] frighted my conscious heart),
And laid by Mellida, to stop the match,
And hale on mischief. This all in one night!
Is’t to be equall’d, think’st thou? O, I could eat
Thy fumbling throat, for thy lagg’d censure. Fut, 80
Is’t not rare?
Str. Yes.
Pier. No? yes? nothing but no and yes, dull lump?
Canst thou not honey me with fluent speech,
And even adore my topless villainy?
Will I not blast my own blood for revenge,
Must not thou straight be perjur’d for revenge,
And yet no creature dream ’tis my revenge?
Will I not turn a glorious bridal morn
Unto a Stygian night? Yet naught but no and yes! 90
Str. I would have told you, if the incubus[204]
That rides your bosom would have patience,
It is reported that in private state
Maria, Genoa’s duchess, makes to court,
Longing to see him, whom she ne’er shall see,
Her lord Andrugio. Belike she hath receiv’d
The news of reconciliation.
A[205] reconciliation with death!
Poor lady! shall but find poor comfort in’t.
Pier. O, let me swoon for joy. By heaven, I think 100
I ha’ said my prayers, within this month at least;
I am so boundless happy. Doth she come?
By this warm reeking gore, I’ll marry her.
Look I not now like an inamorate?[206]
Poison the father, butcher the son, and marry the mother, ha!
Strotzo, to bed: snort in securest sleep;
For see, the dapple grey coursers of the morn
Beat up the light with their bright silver hooves,
And chase it through the sky.—To bed, to bed!
This morn my vengeance shall be amply fed. 110
[Exeunt.
[198] Old eds. “cloucht,” which we might regard as a misprint for “coucht” if Marston had not shown an excessive fondness (ridiculed in The Poetaster) for the word “clutch.”
[199] Feeling, perception.—See Dyce’s Shakesp. Glossary.
[200] Plunge often has the meaning of—difficulty, embarrassment. I suppose it has that meaning here. Piero is annoyed at having to speak fair words to so paltry a rascal as Strotzo.
[201] Stroke gently, flatter.—A common name for a flatterer was clawback.—“Flatant.—Flattering, fawning, colloguing with, clawing, smoothing, stroaking.”—Cotgrave.
[202] Old eds. “husht.”
[203] “Sinking thought” is a curious expression. It means, I suppose—deep discernment, penetrative shrewdness. Piero dreaded that his villainies would be detected by Feliche.
[204] Marston’s use of this word is ridiculed in The Poetaster (v. 1).
[205] Old eds. “Reconciliation with a death?” Metre and sense show that the article “a” has been misplaced by the printer.
[206] So old eds.
SCENE II.
Precincts of the palace of Piero.
Enter Lucio, Maria, and Nutriche.
Mar. Stay, gentle Lucio, and vouchsafe thy hand.
Lu. O, Madam——.
Mar. Nay, prithee give me leave to say, vouchsafe;
Submiss entreats beseem my humble fate.
Here let us sit. O Lucio, fortune’s gilt
Is rubb’d quite off from my slight tin-foil’d state,
And poor Maria must appear ungraced
Of the bright fulgor of gloss’d majesty.
Lu. Cheer up your spirits, Madam; fairer chance,
Than that which courts your presence instantly, 10
Can not be formed by the quick mould of thought.
Mar. Art thou assured the dukes are reconciled?
Shall my womb’s honour wed fair Mellida?
Will heaven at length grant harbour to my head?
Shall I once more clip my Andrugio,
And wreath my arms about Antonio’s neck?
Or is glib rumour grown a parasite,
Holding a false glass to my sorrow’s eyes,
Making the wrinkled front of grief seem fair,
Though ’tis much rivell’d[207] with abortive care? 20
Lu. Most virtuous princess, banish straggling fear,
Keep league with comfort. For these eyes beheld
The dukes united; yon faint glimmering light
Ne’er peepèd through the crannies of the east,
Since I beheld them drink a sound carouse,
In sparkling Bacchus, unto each other’s health;
Your son assur’d[208] to beauteous Mellida,
And all clouds clear’d of threat’ning discontent.
Mar. What age is morning of?
Lu. I think ’bout five.
Mar. Nutriche, Nutriche! 30
Nut. Beshrow your fingers! marry, you have disturb’d the pleasure of the finest dream. O God! I was even coming to it, law. O Jesu! ’twas coming of the sweetest. I’ll tell you now, methought I was married, and methought I spent (O Lord, why did you wake me?), and methought I spent three spur-royals[209] on the fiddlers for striking up a fresh hornpipe. Saint Ursula! I was even going to bed, and you, methought, my husband, was even putting out the tapers, when you—Lord I shall never have such a dream come upon me, as long as——. 40
Mar. Peace, idle creature, peace!—When will the court rise?
Lu. Madam, ’twere best you took some lodging up,
And lay in private till the soil of grief
Were clear’d your cheek, and new burnish’d lustre
Clothèd your presence, ’fore you saw the dukes,
And enter’d ’mong the proud Venetian states.[210]
Mar. No, Lucio, my dear lord is wise, and knows
That tinsel glitter, or rich purfled[211] robes,
Curl’d hairs, hung full of sparkling carcanets,
Are not the true adornments of a wife. 50
So long as wives are faithful, modest, chaste,
Wise lords affect them. Virtue doth not waste
With each slight flame of crackling vanity.
A modest eye forceth affection,
Whilst outward gayness’ light looks but entice:
Fairer than nature’s fair is foulest vice.
She that loves art to get her cheek more lovers,
Much outward gauds, slight inward grace discovers.
I care not to seem fair but to my lord:
Those that strive most to please most strangers’ sight,
Folly may judge most fair, wisdom most light. 61
[Music sounds a short strain.
But hark, soft music gently moves the air!
I think the bridegroom’s up. Lucio, stand close.
O now, Maria, challenge grief to stay
Thy joy’s encounter. Look, Lucio, ’tis clear day.
[They retire to the back of the stage.
Enter Antonio, Galeatzo, Matzagente, Balurdo, Pandulpho, Feliche, Alberto, Forobosco, Castilio, and a Page.
Ant. Darkness is fled: look, infant morn hath drawn
Bright silver curtains ’bout the couch of night;
And now Aurora’s horse trots azure rings,[212]
Breathing fair light about the firmament.—
Stand, what’s that? 70
Mat. And if a hornèd devil should burst forth,
I would pass on him with a mortal stock.[213]
Alb. Oh, a horned devil would prove ominous
Unto a bridegroom’s eyes.
Mat. A horned devil? Good: ha, ha, ha!—very good!
Alb. Good tann’d prince, laugh not. By the joys of love,
When thou dost girn,[214] thy rusty face doth look
Like the head of a roasted rabbit: fie upon’t!
Bal. By my troth, methinks his nose is just colour de roy.[215]
Mat. I tell thee, fool, my nose will abide no jest. 80
Bal. No, in truth, I do not jest; I speak truth. Truth is the touchstone of all things; and, if your nose will not abide the truth, your nose will not abide the touch; and, if your nose will not abide the touch, your nose is a copper nose, and must be nail’d up for a slip.[216]
Mat. I scorn to retort the obtuse jest of a fool.
[Balurdo draws out his writing tables, and writes.
Bal. Retort and obtuse, good words, very good words.
Gal. Young prince, look sprightly; fie, a bridegroom sad!
Bal. In truth, if he were retort and obtuse, no question he would be merry; but, and please my genius, I will be most retort and obtuse ere night. I’ll tell you what I’ll bear soon at night in my shield, for my device. 92
Gal. What, good Balurdo?
Bal. O, do me right:—Sir Jeffrey Balurdo; sir, sir, as long as ye live, sir.
Gal. What, good Sir Jeffrey Balurdo?
Bal. Marry forsooth, I’ll carry for my device my grandfather’s great stone horse, flinging up his head, and jerking out his left leg: the word, “Wighy Purt.” As I am a true knight, will’t not be most retort and obtuse, ha? 101
Ant. Blow hence these sapless jests. I tell you, bloods,
My spirit’s heavy, and the juice of life
Creeps slowly through my stiffen’d arteries.
Last sleep, my sense was steep’d in horrid dreams:
Three parts of night were swallow’d in the gulf
Of ravenous time, when to my slumb’ring powers,
Two meagre ghosts made apparition.
The one’s breast seem’d fresh paunch’d with bleeding wounds,
Whose bubbling gore sprang in [my] frighted eyes; 110
The other ghost assum’d my father’s shape:
Both cried, “Revenge!” At which my trembling joints,
Icèd quite over with a frozed cold sweat,[217]
Leap’d forth the sheets. Three[218] times I g[r]asp’d at shades,
And thrice, deluded by erroneous sense,
I forc’d my thoughts make stand; when lo, I oped[219]
A large bay window, th[o]rough which the night
Struck terror to my soul. The verge of heaven
Was ring’d with flames, and all the upper vault
Thick-lac’d with flakes of fire; in midst whereof 120
A blazing comet shot his threat’ning train
Just on my face. Viewing these prodigies,
I bow’d my naked knee and pierc’d the star
With an outfacing eye, pronouncing thus:
Deus imperat astris. At which, my nose straight bled;
Then doubted I my word, so slunk to bed. 126
Bal. Verily, Sir Jeffrey had a monstrous strange dream the last night. For methought I dreamt I was asleep, and methought the ground yawn’d and belkt up the abhominable ghost of a misshapen simile, with two ugly pages; the one called master, even as going before; and the other mounser,[220] even so following after; whilst
Signior Simile stalk’d most prodigiously in the midst. At which I bewray’d[221] the fearfulness of my nature, and being ready to forsake the fortress of my wit, start up, called for a clean shirt, ate a mess of broth, and with that I awaked.
Ant. I prithee, peace. I tell you, gentlemen,
The frightful shades of night yet shake my brain:
My jellied[222] blood’s not thaw’d: the sulphur damps, 140
That flew[223] in wingèd lightning ’bout my couch,
Yet stick within my sense, my soul is great
In expectation of dire prodigies.
Pan. Tut, my young prince, let not thy fortunes see
Their lord a coward. He that’s nobly born
Abhors to fear: base fear’s the brand of slaves.
He that observes, pursues, slinks back for fright,
Was never cast in mould of noble sprite.
Gal. Tush, there’s a sun will straight exhale these damps
Of chilling fear. Come, shall’s salute the bride? 150
Ant. Castilio, I prithee mix thy breath with his:
Sing one of Signior Renaldo’s airs,
To rouse the slumb’ring bride from gluttoning
In surfeit of superfluous sleep. Good signior, sing.
[A Song.
What means this silence and unmovèd calm?
Boy, wind thy cornet: force the leaden gates
Of lazy sleep fly open with thy breath.
My Mellida not up? not stirring yet? umh!
Mar. That voice should be my son’s, Antonio’s. Antonio! 160
Ant. Here: who calls? here stands Antonio.
Mar. Sweet son!
Ant. Dear mother!
Mar. Fair honour of a chaste and loyal bed,
Thy father’s beauty, thy sad mother’s love,
Were I as powerful as the voice of fate,
Felicity complete should sweet thy state;
But all the blessings that a poor banish’d wretch
Can pour upon thy head, take, gentle son:
Live, gracious youth, to close thy mother’s eyes, 170
Loved of thy parents, till their latest hour.
How cheers my lord, thy father? O sweet boy,
Part of him thus I clip, my dear, dear joy.
[Embraces Antonio.
Ant. Madam, last night I kissed his princely hand,
And took a treasured blessing from his lips.
O mother, you arrive in jubilee,
And firm atonement of all boist’rous rage;
Pleasure, united love, protested faith,
Guard my loved father, as sworn pensioners:
The dukes are leagued in firmest bond of love, 180
And you arrive even in the solsticy
And highest point of sunshine happiness.
[One winds a cornet within.
Hark, madam, how yon cornet jerketh up
His strain’d shrill accents in the capering air,
As proud to summon up my bright-cheek’d love!
Now, mother, ope wide expectation;
Let loose your amplest sense, to entertain
Th’ impression of an object of such worth
That life’s too poor to——
Gal. Nay, leave hyperboles.
Ant. I tell thee, prince, that presence straight appears
Of which thou canst not form hyperboles; 191
The trophy of triumphing excellence,
The heart of beauty, Mellida appears.
See, look, the curtain stirs; shine nature’s pride,
Love’s vital spirit, dear Antonio’s bride.
[The curtain’s drawn, and the body of Feliche, stabb’d thick with wounds, appears hung up.
What villain bloods the window of my love?
What slave hath hung yon gory ensign up
In flat defiance of humanity?
Awake, thou fair unspotted purity!
Death’s at thy window, awake, bright Mellida! 200
Antonio calls!
Enter Piero, unbraced, with Forobosco.
Pier. Who gives these ill-befitting attributes
Of chaste, unspotted, bright, to Mellida?
He lies as loud as thunder: she’s unchaste,
Tainted, impure, black as the soul of hell.
[Antonio draws his rapier, offers to run at Piero, but Maria holds his arm and stays him.
Ant. Dog! I will make thee eat thy vomit up,
Which thou hast belkt ’gainst taintless Mellida.
Pier.[224] Ram’t quickly down, that it may not rise up
To imbraid[225] my thoughts. Behold my stomach;
Strike me quite through with the relentless edge 210
Of raging fury. Boy, I’ll kill thy love.
Pandulf Feliche, I have stabb’d thy son:
Look, yet his lifeblood reeks upon this steel.
Albert, yon hangs thy friend. Have none of you
Courage of vengeance? Forget I am your duke;
Think Mellida is not Piero’s blood;
Imagine on slight ground I’ll blast his honour;
Suppose I saw not that incestuous slave,
Clipping the strumpet with luxurious twines![226]
O, numb my sense of anguish, cast my life 220
In a dead sleep, whilst law cuts off yon maim,[227]
Yon putrid ulcer of my royal blood!
For. Keep league with reason, gracious sovereign.
Pier. There glow no sparks of reason in the world;
All are raked up in ashy beastliness.
The bulk of man’s as dark as Erebus,
No branch of reason’s light hangs in his trunk:
There lives no reason to keep league withal.
I ha’ no reason to be reasonable.
Her wedding eve, link’d to the noble blood 230
Of my most firmly-reconcilèd friend,
And found even cling’d in sensuality!
O heaven! O heaven! Were she as near my heart
As is my liver, I would rend her off.
Enter Strotzo.
Str. Whither, O whither shall I hurl vast grief!
Pier. Here, into my breast: ’tis a place built wide
By fate, to give receipt to boundless woes.
Str. O no; here throb those hearts, which I must cleave
With my keen-piercing news. Andrugio’s dead.
Pier. Dead! 240
Mar. O me, most miserable!
Pier. Dead! alas, how dead?
[Gives seeming passion.
[Aside.] Fut, weep, act, feign—Dead! alas, how dead?
Str. The vast delights of his large sudden joys
Open’d his powers so wide, that ’s native heat
So prodigally flow’d t’ exterior parts,
That th’inner citadel was left unmann’d,
And so surpris’d on sudden by cold death.
Mar. O fatal, disastrous, cursèd, dismal!
Choke breath and life! I breathe, I live too long. 250
Andrugio, my lord, I come, I come!
[Swoons.
Pier. Be cheerful, princess; help, Castilio,
The lady’s swounèd;[228] help to bear her in:
Slow comfort to huge cares is swiftest sin.
Bal. Courage, courage, sweet lady, ’tis Sir Jeffrey Balurdo bids you courage. Truly I am as nimble as an elephant about a lady.
[Exeunt Piero, Castilio, Forobosco and Balurdo, bearing out Maria.
Pan. Dead!
Ant. Dead!
Alb. Dead! 260
Ant. Why, now the womb of mischief is deliver’d,
Of the prodigious issue of the night.
Pan. Ha, ha, ha!
Ant. My father dead: my love attaint of lust,—
That’s a large lie, as vast as spacious hell!
Poor guiltless lady! O, accursèd lie!
What, whom, whither, which shall I first lament?
A[229] dead father, a dishonour’d wife? Stand.
Methinks I feel the frame of nature shake.
Cracks not the joints of earth to bear my woes? 270
Alb. Sweet prince, be patient.
Ant. ’Slid, sir, I will not in despite of thee.
Patience is slave to fools: a chain that’s fixt
Only to posts, and senseless log-like dolts.
Alb. ’Tis reason’s glory to command affects.[230]
Ant. Lies thy cold father dead, his glossèd eyes
New closèd up by thy sad mother’s hands?
Hast thou a love, as spotless as the brow
Of clearest heaven, blurr’d with false defames?
Are thy moist entrails crumpled up with grief 280
Of parching mischiefs? Tell me, does thy heart
With punching anguish spur thy gallèd ribs?
Then come, let’s sit[231] and weep and wreathe our arms:
I’ll hear thy counsel.
Alb. Take comfort.
Ant. Confusion to all comfort! I defy it.
Comfort’s a parasite, a flattering jack,[232]
And melts resolv’d despair. O boundless woe,
If there be any black yet unknown grief,
If there be any horror yet unfelt, 290
Unthought of mischief in thy fiend-like power,
Dash it upon my miserable head;
Make me more wretch, more cursèd if thou canst!
O, now my fate is more than I could fear:
My woes more weighty than my soul can bear.
[Exit.
Pan. Ha, ha, ha!
Alb. Why laugh you, uncle? That’s my coz, your son,
Whose breast hangs casèd in his cluttered[233] gore.
Pan. True, man, true: why, wherefore should I weep?
Come, sit, kind nephew: come on; thou and I 300
Will talk as chorus to this tragedy.
Entreat the music strain their instruments
With a slight touch, whilst we—Say on, fair coz.
Alb. He was the very hope of Italy,
[Music sounds softly.
The blooming honour of your drooping age.
Pan. True, coz, true. They say that men of hope are crush’d;
Good are supprest by base desertless clods,
That stifle gasping virtue. Look, sweet youth,
How provident our quick Venetians are,
Lest hooves of jades should trample on my boy: 310
Look how they lift him up to eminence,
Heave him ’bove reach of flesh. Ha, ha, ha!
Alb. Uncle, this laughter ill becomes your grief.
Pan. Would’st have me cry, run raving up and down,
For my son’s loss? Would’st have me turn rank mad,
Or wring my face with mimic action;
Stamp, curse, weep, rage, and then my bosom strike?
Away, ’tis aspish action, player-like.[234]
If he is guiltless, why should tears be spent?
Thrice blessèd soul that dieth innocent. 320
If he is leper’d with so foul a guilt,
Why should a sigh be lent, a tear be spilt?
The gripe of chance is weak to wring a tear
From him that knows what fortitude should bear.
Listen, young blood. ’Tis not true valour’s pride
To swagger, quarrel, swear, stamp, rave, and chide,
To stab in fume of blood, to keep loud coil
To bandy factions in domestic broils,
To dare the act of sins, whose filth excels
The blackest customs of blind infidels. 330
No, my lov’d youth: he may of valour vaunt
Whom fortune’s loudest thunder cannot daunt;
Whom fretful gales of chance, stern fortune’s siege,
Makes not his reason slink, the soul’s fair liege;
Whose well-pais’d[235] action ever rests upon
Not giddy humours but discretion.
This heart in valour even Jove out-goes:
Jove is without, but this ’bove sense of woes:[236]
And such a one, eternity. Behold—
Good morrow, son; thou bid’st a fig for cold. 340
Sound louder music: let my breath exact
[Loud music.
You strike sad tones unto this dismal act.
[Exeunt.
[207] Wrinkled.
[208] Affianced.
[209] Spur-royal was a gold coin worth fifteen shillings.
[210] Nobles.
[211] Embroidered (Fr. pourfiler).
[212] To make a horse tread the ring was an equestrian feat. The ring was the circular piece of ground on which the horse displayed his agility. See note on Middleton, vol. i. p. 190.
[213] Stockado, stoccata,—a thrust in fencing.
[214] Grin or snarl.
[215] “Couleur de Roy was in the old time Purple; but now is the bright Tawnie which wee also tearme Coulour de Roy.”—Cotgrave.
[216] A counterfeit coin.
[217] A reminiscence of Virgil:—
“Tum gelidus toto manabat corpore sudor:
Corripio e stratis corpus.”—Æn. iii. 174-5.
[218] Again we are reminded of Virgil:—
“Ter conatus ibi collo dare brachia circum,
Ter frustra comprensa manus effugit imago.”—Æn. vi, 699-700.
[219] For “I oped” old eds. give “top’t.”
[220] Old form of “monsieur.”—Balurdo is talking arrant nonsense.
[221] The dramatists are fond of punning on the words, (1) bewray (betray), (2) beray (befoul). Cf. Middleton, i. 82, &c.
[222] Old eds. “gellied,” which I take to be jellied—not gelid. In the first edition of Shelley’s Cenci (iv. 3) we have:—“The gellyed blood runs freely through my veins:” later editions read jellied.
[223] Old eds. “flow.”
[224] Not marked in ed. 1602.
[225] Reproach, upbraid.
[226] “Luxurious twines”—lustful embraces.
[227] Old eds. “maine.”
[228] So ed. 1602.—Ed. 1633, “swounded.”
[229] The metrical harshness might be removed by reading “A father dead, a wife dishonour’d.”
[230] Affections, feelings.
[231] Old eds. “and let’s sit.”
[232] Saucy fellow.
[233] “‘Grumean de sang, a clot or clutter of congealed blood,’ Cotgrave. Cluttered blood, ‘Holinshed, Hist. Engl. p. 74.’”—Halliwell.
[234] There seems to be an allusion to old Hieronymo’s frantic behaviour in The Spanish Tragedy.
[235] Well-balanced.
[236] A Stoic sentiment. Seneca writes:—“Est aliquid quo sapiens antecedat deum: ille beneficio naturæ non timet, suo sapiens.” (Ep. Mor., Lib. vi, Ep. 1.) But see particularly the quotation from Seneca on [p. 133].
ACT II.
SCENE I.
A dumb show.
The cornets sound a senet.
Enter two mourners with torches, two with streamers; Castilio and Forobosco, with torches; a Herald bearing Andrugio’s helm and sword; the coffin; Maria supported by Lucio and Alberto; Antonio, by himself; Piero and Strotzo, talking; Galeatzo and Matzagente, Balurdo and Pandulfo: the coffin set down; helm, sword, and streamers hung up, placed by the Herald, whilst Antonio and Maria wet their handkerchers with their tears, kiss them, and lay them on the hearse, kneeling: all go out but Piero. Cornets cease, and he speaks.
Pier. Rot there, thou cerecloth that enfolds the flesh
Of my loath’d foe; moulder to crumbling dust;
Oblivion choke the passage of thy fame!
Trophies of honour’d birth drop quickly down:
Let nought of him, but what was vicious, live.
Though thou art dead, think not my hate is dead:
I have but newly twone my arm in the curl’d locks
Of snaky vengeance. Pale, beetle-brow’d hate
But newly bustles up. Sweet wrong, I clap thy thoughts!
O let me hug thy[237] bosom, rub thy[237] breast, 10
In hope of what may hap. Andrugio rots,
Antonio lives: umh: how long? ha, ha! how long?
Antonio pack’d hence, I’ll his mother wed,
Then clear my daughter of supposèd lust,
Wed her to Florence heir. O excellent!
Venice, Genoa, Florence at my beck,
At Piero’s nod.—Balurdo, O ho![238]—
O ’twill be rare, all unsuspected done.
I have been nursed in blood, and still have suck’d
The steam of reeking gore.—Balurdo, ho! 20
Enter Balurdo with a beard, half off, half on.
Bal. When my beard is on, most noble prince, when my beard is on.
Pier. Why, what dost thou with a beard?
Bal. In truth, one told me that my wit was bald, and that a mermaid was half fish and half fish [sic]; and therefore to speak wisely, like one of your counsel, as indeed it hath pleased you to make me, not only being a fool of your counsel, but also to make me of your counsel being a fool: if my wit be bald, and a mermaid be half fish and half conger, then I must be forced to conclude—The
tiring man hath not glued on my beard half fast enough. God’s bores, it will not stick to fall off. 32
Pier. Dost thou know what thou hast spoken all this while?
Bal. O lord, duke, I would be sorry of that. Many men can utter that which no man but themselves can conceive: but I thank a good wit, I have the gift to speak that which neither any man else nor myself understands.
Pier. Thou art wise. He that speaks he knows not what, shall never sin against his own conscience: go to, thou art wise. 40
Bal. Wise? O no, I have a little natural discretion, or so; but for wise, I am somewhat prudent; but for wise, O lord!
Pier. Hold, take those keys, open the castle vault, And put in Mellida.
Bal. And put in Mellida? Well, let me alone.
Pier. Bid Forobosco and Castilio guard;
Endear thyself Piero’s intimate.
Bal. Endear, and intimate; good, I assure you. I will endear and intimate Mellida into the dungeon presently. 51
Pier. Will[239] Pandulfo Feliche wait on me.
Bal. I will make him come, most retort and obtuse, to you presently. I think Sir Jeffrey talks like a counsellor. Go to, god’s neaks, I think I tickle it.
Pier. I’ll seem to wind yon fool with kindest arm.
He that’s ambitious-minded, and but man,
Must have his followers beasts, damn’d[240] slavish sots,
Whose service is obedience, and whose wit
Reacheth no further than to admire their lord, 60
And stare in adoration of his worth.
I loathe a slave, raked out of common mud,
Should seem to sit in counsel with my heart.
High-honour’d blood’s too squeamish to assent
And lend a hand to an ignoble act:
Poison from roses who could e’er abstract?—
Enter Pandulfo.
How now, Pandulfo? weeping for thy son?
Pan. No, no, Piero, weeping for my sins:
Had I been a good father, he had been
A gracious son.
Pier. Pollution must be purged. 70
Pan. Why taint’st thou then the air with stench of flesh,
And human putrefaction’s noisome scent?
I pray his body. Who less boon can crave
Than to bestow upon the dead his grave?
Pier. Grave! Why, think’st thou he deserves a grave,
That hath defil’d the temple of——
Pan. Peace, peace!
Methinks I hear a humming murmur creep
From out his jellied[241] wounds. Look on those lips,
Those now lawn pillows, on whose tender softness
Chaste modest speech, stealing from out his breast, 80
Had wont to rest itself, as loath to post
From out so fair an inn! look, look, they seem to stir
And breathe defiance to black obloquy!
Pier. Think’st thou thy son could suffer wrongfully?
Pan. A wise man wrongfully, but never wrong
Can take;[242] his breast’s of such well-tempered proof
It may be razed, not pierced by savage tooth
Of foaming malice: showers of darts may dark
Heaven’s ample brow, but not strike out a spark,
Much less pierce the sun’s cheek. Such songs as these
I often dittied till my boy did sleep; 91
But now I turn plain fool, alas, I weep.
Pier. [Aside.] ’Fore heaven he makes me shrug; would ’a were dead.
He is a virtuous man: what has our court to do
With virtue, in the devil’s name!—Pandulpho, hark:
My lustful daughter dies; start not, she dies.
I pursue justice; I love sanctity,
And an undefiled temple of pure thoughts.
Shall I speak freely? Good Andrugio’s dead:
And I do fear a fetch;[243] but (umh) would I durst speak—
I do mistrust but (umh)—[Aside.] Death is he all, all man,
Hath he no part of mother in him, ha? 102
No licorish womanish inquisitiveness?
Pan. Andrugio’s dead!
Pier. Ay; and I fear his own unnatural blood,
To whom he gave life, hath given death for life.
[Aside.] How could he come on? I see false suspect
Is viced; wrung hardly in a virtuous heart.—
Well, I could give you reason for my doubts:
You are of honour’d birth, my very friend: 110
You know how god-like ’tis to root out sin.
Antonio is a villain: will you join
In oath with me against the traitor’s life,
And swear you knew he sought his father’s death?
I loved him well, yet I love justice more:
Our friends we should affect, justice adore.
Pan. My lord, the clapper of my mouth’s not glibb’d
With court-oil, ’twill not strike on both sides yet.
Pier. ’Tis[244] just that subjects act commands of kings.
Pan. Command then just and honourable things. 120
Pier. Even so, myself then will traduce his guilt.
Pan. Beware, take heed, lest guiltless blood be spilt.
Pier. Where only honest deeds to kings are free,
It is no empire, but a beggary.
Pan. Where more than noble deeds to kings are free,
It is no empire, but a tyranny.
Pier. Tush, juiceless graybeard, ’tis immunity,
Proper to princes, that our state exacts;
Our subjects not alone to bear, but praise our acts. 129
Pan. O, but that prince, that worthful praise aspires,
From hearts, and not from lips, applause desires.
Pier. Pish!
True praise the brow of common men doth ring,
False only girts the temple of a king.
He that hath strength and ’s ignorant of power,
He was not made to rule, but to be rul’d.
Pan. ’Tis praise to do, not what we can, but should.
Pier. Hence, doting stoic! by my hope of bliss,
I’ll make thee wretched.
Pan. Defiance to thy power, thou rifted jawn![245] 140
Now, by the lovèd heaven, sooner thou shalt
Rinse thy foul ribs from the black filth of sin
That soots thy heart than make me wretched. Pish!
Thou canst not coop me up. Hadst thou a jail
With treble walls, like antique Babylon,
Pandulpho can get out. I tell thee, duke,
I have old Fortunatus’ wishing-cap,
And can be where I list even in a trice.
I’ll skip from earth into the arms of heaven:
And from triumphal arch of blessedness, 150
Spit on thy frothy breast. Thou canst not slave
Or banish me; I will be free at home,
Maugre the beard of greatness. The port-holes
Of sheathèd spirit are ne’er corbèd[246] up,
But still stand open ready to discharge
Their precious shot into the shrouds of heaven.
Pier. O torture! slave, I banish thee the town,
Thy native seat of birth.
Pan. How proud thou speak’st! I tell thee, duke, the blasts 159
Of the swoll’n-cheek’d winds, nor all the breath of kings
Can puff me out my native seat of birth.
The earth’s my body’s, and the heaven’s my soul’s
Most native place of birth, which they will keep
Despite the menace of mortality.
Why, duke,
That’s not my native place,[247] where I was rock’d.
A wise man’s home is wheresoe’er he is wise;
Now that, from man, not from the place, doth rise.
Pier. Would I were deaf! O plague! Hence, dotard wretch!
Tread not in court: all that thou hast, I seize. 170
[Aside.] His quiet’s firmer than I can disease.
Pan. Go, boast unto thy flatt’ring sycophants
Pandulpho’s slave Piero hath o’erthrown:
Loose fortune’s rags are lost, my own’s my own.
[Piero going out, looks back.
’Tis true, Piero, thy vex’d heart shall see,
Thou hast but tripp’d my slave, not conquered me.
[Exeunt at several doors.
[237] So ed. 1633.—Ed. 1602 “my.”
[238] We are to suppose that Piero has left the church and is in the courtyard of the palace.
[239] i.e., desire, order.
[240] Old eds. “dub’d.”
[242] Pandulpho is again ready with his Stoic maxims. Seneca wrote a dissertation to show “Nec injuriam nec contumeliam accipere sapientem.”
[243] “I do fear a fetch,” i.e., I suspect that Andrugio has perished by treachery. Fetch = plot, device.
[244] There is an Attic flavour in this passage of stichomythia. For a passing moment one is reminded of Creon’s altercation with his son (in the Antigone):—
Κρ. ὦ παγκάκιστε, διὰ δίκης ἰὼν πατρί.
Αι. οὐ γὰρ δίκαιά σ’ ἐξαμαρτάνονθ’ ὁρῶ.
Κρ. ἁμαρτάνω γὰρ τὰς ἐμὰς ἀρχὰς σέβων;
Αι. οὐ γὰρ σέβεις, τιμάς γε τὰς θεῶν πατῶν.
[245] Marston uses indifferently the forms chawn and jawn for a rift or chasm.
[246] “Corbèd” (old eds. “corb’d”) is “good,” as Polonius would say; but I have no suspicion as to its meaning. It would be a pity to suggest an emendation.
[247] Seneca is fond of harping on this theme. “In ultimas expellaris terras licebit,” he writes in one of his epistles, “in quolibet barbariæ angulo colloceris, hospitalis tibi illa qualiscumque sedes erit; magis quis veneris quam quo, interest, et ideo nulli loco addicere debemus arbitrium. Cum hac persuasione vivendum est: ‘Non sum uni angulo natus, patria mea totus hic mundus est.’”
SCENE II.
Before the palace of Piero.
Enter Antonio, in black, with a book; Lucio and Alberto.
Alb. Nay, sweet, be comforted, take counsel and——.
Ant. Alberto, peace: that grief is wanton-sick,
Whose stomach can digest and brook the diet
Of stale ill-relish’d counsel. Pigmy cares
Can shelter under patience’ shield; but giant griefs
Will burst all covert.
Lu. My lord, ’tis supper time.
Ant. Drink deep, Alberto; eat, good Lucio;
But my pined heart shall eat on nought but woe.
Alb. My lord, we dare not leave you thus alone.
Ant. You cannot leave Antonio alone. 10
The chamber of my breast is even throng’d
With firm attendance that forswears to flinch.
I have a thing sits here; it is not grief,
’Tis not despair, nor the [ut]most plague
That the most wretched are infected with;
But the most griefful,[248] [most] despairing, wretched,
Accursèd, miserable—O, for heaven’s sake
Forsake me now; you see how light I am,
And yet you force me to defame my patience.
Lu. Fair gentle prince——. 20
Ant. Away, thy voice is hateful: thou dost buzz,
And beat my ears with intimations
That Mellida, that Mellida is light,
And stainèd with adulterous luxury!
I cannot brook’t. I tell thee, Lucio,
Sooner will I give faith that Virtue’s cant[249]
In princes’ courts will be adorn’d with wreath
Of choice respect, and endear’d intimate;
Sooner will I believe that friendship’s rein
Will curb ambition from utility, 30
Than Mellida is light. Alas, poor soul,
Didst e’er see her?—good heart!—hast heard her speak?
Kind, kind soul! Incredulity itself
Would not be so brass-hearted, as suspect
So modest cheeks.
Lu. My lord——.
Ant. Away!
A self-sown[250] guilt doth only hatch distrust;
But a chaste thought’s as far from doubt as lust.
I entreat you, leave me.
Alb. Will you endeavour to forget your grief?
Ant. I’faith I will, good friend, i’faith I will. 40
I’ll come and eat with you. Alberto, see,
I am taking physic, here’s philosophy.
Good honest, leave me, I’ll drink wine anon.
Alb. Since you enforce us, fair prince, we are gone.
[Exeunt Alberto and Lucio.
Antonio reads.
A. Ferte[251] fortiter: hoc est quo deum antecedatis. Ille enim extra patientiam malorum, vos supra. Contemnite dolorem: aut solvetur, aut solvet. Contemnite fortunam: nullum telum, quo feriret animum habet.[252]
Pish, thy mother was not lately widowèd,
Thy dear affièd love lately defam’d 50
With blemish of foul lust, when thou wrotest thus;
Thou wrapt in furs, beaking[253] thy limbs ’fore fires;
Forbid’st the frozen zone to shudder. Ha, ha! ’tis nought
But foamy bubbling of a fleamy[254] brain,
Nought else but smoke. O what dank marish spirit,
But would be fired with impatience
At my——
No more, no more; he that was never blest
With height of birth, fair expectation
Of mounted fortunes, knows not what it is 60
To be the pitied object of the world.
O, poor Antonio, thou may’st sigh!
Mel. [from beneath.] Ay me!
Ant. And curse.
Pan. [from within.] Black powers!
Ant. And cry.
Mar. [from within.] O Heaven!
Ant. And close laments with——.
Mel.[255] [from beneath.] O me, most miserable!
Pan. Woe for my dear, dear son! 70
Mar. Woe for my dear, dear husband!
Mel. Woe for my dear, dear love!
Ant. Woe for me all, close all your woes in me!
In me, Antonio!—ha! where live these sounds?
I can see nothing; grief’s invisible,
And lurks in secret angles of the heart.
Come, sigh again, Antonio bears his part.
Mel. O here, here is a vent to pass my sighs.
I have surcharged the dungeon with my plaints.
Prison and heart will burst, if void of vent. 80
Ay, that is Phœbe, empress of the night,
That ’gins to mount; O chastest deity,
If I be false to my Antonio,
If the least soil of lust smears my pure love,
Make me more wretched, make me more accurs’d
Than infamy, torture, death, hell, and heaven,
Can bound with amplest power of thought: if not,
Purge my poor heart from[256] defamation’s blot.
Ant. Purge my poor heart from defamation’s blot!
Poor heart, how like her virtuous self she speaks.— 90
Mellida, dear Mellida! it is Antonio:
Slink not away, ’tis thy Antonio.
Mel. How found you out, my lord? Alas! I know
’Tis easy in this age to find out woe.
I have a suit to you.
Ant. What is’t, dear soul?
Mel. Kill me; i’faith I’ll wink, not stir a jot.
For God sake kill me; in sooth, lovèd youth,
I am much injur’d; look, see how I creep.
I cannot wreak my wrong, but sigh and weep.
Ant. May I be cursèd, but I credit thee. 100
Mel. To-morrow I must die.
Ant. Alas, for what?
Mel. For loving thee. ’Tis true, my sweetest breast,
I must die falsely: so must thou, dear heart.
Nets are a-knitting to entrap thy life.
Thy father’s death must make a paradise
To my (I shame to call him) father. Tell me, sweet,
Shall I die thine? dost love me still, and still?
Ant. I do.
Mal. Then welcome heaven’s will.
Ant. Madam, I will not swell, like a tragedian,
In forcèd passion of affected strains. 110
If I had present power of ought but pitying you,
I would be as ready to redress your wrongs
As to pursue your love. Throngs of thoughts
Crowd for their passage; somewhat I will do.
Reach me thy hand; think this is honour’s bent,
To live unslavèd, to die innocent.
Mel. Let me entreat a favour, gracious love.
Be patient, see me die; good, do not weep:
Go sup, sweet chuck, drink, and securely sleep.
Ant. I’faith I cannot; but I’ll force my face 120
To palliate my sickness.
Mel. Give me thy hand. Peace on thy bosom dwell:
That’s all my woe can breathe. Kiss: thus, farewell.
Ant. Farewell: my heart is great of thoughts; stay, dove:
And therefore I must speak: but what? O love!
By this white hand: no more: read in these tears,
What crushing anguish thy Antonio bears.
[Antonio kisseth Mellida’s hand: then Mellida goes from the grate.
Mel. Good night, good heart.
Ant. Thus heat from blood, thus souls from bodies part. 129
Enter Piero and Strotzo.
Pier. He grieves; laugh, Strotzo, laugh. He weeps.
Hath he tears? O pleasure! hath he tears?
Now do I scourge Andrugio with steel whips
Of knotty vengeance. Strotzo, cause me straight
Some plaining ditty to augment despair.
[Exit Strotzo.
Triumph, Piero: hark, he groans. O rare!
Ant. Behold a prostrate wretch laid on his tomb.
His epitaph, thus: Ne plus ultra. Ho!
Let none out-woe me: mine’s Herculean woe.
[A song within.—Exit Piero at the end of the song.
Enter Maria.
Ant. May I be more cursed than Heaven can make me, if
I’m not more wretched than man can conceive me. 140
Sore forlorn orphant, what omnipotence
Can make thee happy?
Mar. How now, sweet son? Good youth,
What dost thou?
Ant. Weep, weep.
Mar. Dost nought but weep, weep?
Ant. Yes, mother, I do sigh, and wring my hands,
Beat my poor breast, and wreathe my tender arms.
Hark ye; I’ll tell you wondrous strange, strange news.
Mar. What, my good boy, stark mad?
Ant. I am not.
Mar. Alas!
Is that strange news? 150
Ant. Strange news? why, mother, is’t not wondrous strange
I am not mad—I run not frantic, ha?
Knowing, my father’s trunk scarce cold, your love
Is sought by him that doth pursue my life!
Seeing the beauty of creation,
Antonio’s bride, pure heart, defamed, and stowed
Under the hatches of obscuring earth!
Heu, quo labor, quo vota ceciderunt mea!
Enter Piero.
Pier. Good evening to the fair Antonio;
Most happy fortune, sweet succeeding time, 160
Rich hope: think not thy fate a bankrout,[257] though——
Ant. [Aside.] Umh! the devil in his good time and tide forsake thee.
Pier. How now? hark ye, prince.
Ant. God be with you.
Pier. Nay, noble blood, I hope ye not suspect——
Ant. Suspect! I scorn’t. Here’s cap and leg, good night.
[Aside.] Thou that wants power, with dissemblance fight.
[Exit Antonio.
Pier. Madam, O that you could remember to forget——
Mar. I had a husband and a happy son.
Pier. Most powerful beauty, that enchanting grace——
Mar. Talk not of beauty, nor enchanting grace,—— 170
My husband’s dead, my son’s distraught, accurs’d!
Come, I must vent my griefs, or heart will burst.
[Exit Maria.
Pier. She’s gone, and yet she’s here: she hath left a print
Of her sweet graces fix’d within my heart,
As fresh as is her face. I’ll marry her.
She’s most fair,—true; most chaste,—false;[258] because
Most fair, ’tis firm I’ll marry her.
Enter Strotzo.
Str. My lord.
Pier. Ha, Strotzo, my other soul, my life!
Dear, hast thou steel’d the point of thy resolve?
Will’t not turn edge in execution?
Str. No. 180
Pier. Do it with rare passion, and present thy guilt
As if ’twere wrung out with thy conscience’ gripe.
Swear that my daughter’s innocent of lust,
And that Antonio bribed thee to defame
Her maiden honour, on inveterate hate
Unto my blood; and that thy hand was feed
By his large bounty for his father’s death.
Swear plainly that thou choked’st Andrugio,
By his son’s only egging. Rush me in
Whilst Mellida prepares herself to die, 190
Halter about thy neck, and with such sighs,
Laments, and applications lifen it,
As if impulsive power of remorse——
Str. I’ll weep.
Pier. Ay, ay, fall on thy face and cry “why suffer you
So lewd a slave as Strotzo is to breathe?”
Str. I’ll beg a strangling, grow importunate——
Pier. As if thy life were loathsome to thee: then I
Catch straight the cord’s end; and, as much incens’d
With thy damn’d mischiefs, offer a rude hand 200
As ready to gird in thy pipe of breath;
But on the sudden straight I’ll stand amaz’d,
And fall in exclamations of thy virtues.
Str. Applaud my agonies and penitence.
Pier. Thy honest stomach, that could not disgest[259]
The crudities of murder, but surcharged,
Vomited’st them up in Christian piety.
Str. Then clip me in your arms.
Pier. And call thee brother, mount thee straight to state,
Make thee of council: tut, tut, what not? what not? 210
Think on’t, be confident, pursue the plot.
Str. Look, here’s a trope: a true rogue’s lips are mute,
I do not use to speak, but execute.
[He lays finger on his mouth, and draws his dagger.—Exit.
Pier. So, so; run headlong to confusion:
Thou slight-brain’d mischief, thou art made as dirt,
To plaster up the bracks[260] of my defects.
I’ll wring what may be squeezed from out his use,
And good night, Strotzo. Swell plump, bold heart;
For now thy tide of vengeance rolleth in:
O now Tragœdia Cothurnata[261] mounts, 220
Piero’s thoughts are fix’d on dire exploits.
Pell mell—confusion and black murder guides
The organs of my spirit: shrink not, heart!
Capienda[262] rebus in malis præceps via est.
[Exit.
[248] Old eds. “greeful.”
[249] Old eds. “scant.”—Cant = the corner or niche in which the statue of Virtue was placed. Cf. Middleton, vii. 222:—“Directly under her, in a cant by herself, was Arete (Virtue) enthroned.”
[250] Old eds. “self-one.”
[251] The quotation is from Seneca’s De Providentia, cap. vi.
[252] The true reading is dedi.
[253] “‘Beak’—bask in the heat. North.”—Halliwell.
[254] Fleam = phlegm.
[255] Old eds. “Alb.”
[256] Ed. 1602 “with.”
[257] Old form of “bankrupt.”
[258] Ed. 1602 “most false.”
[259] Old form of digest.
[260] Flaws, cracks.
[261] Cf. Spanish Tragedy, v. 1:—
“Give me a stately-written tragedy,
Tragœdia Cothurnata, fitting kings.”
[262] “Rapienda rebus,” &c., is the true reading. The quotation is from Seneca’s Agamemnon, l. 154.
ACT III.
SCENE I.
A dumb show. The cornets sounding for the Act.
Enter Castilio and Forobosco, Alberto and Balurdo, with poleaxes; Piero, talking with Strotzo, seemeth to send him out: exit Strotzo. Re-enter Strotzo with Maria, Nutriche, and Lucio. Piero passeth through his guard, and talks with Maria with seeming amorousness; she seemeth to reject his suit, flies to the tomb, kneels, and kisseth it. Piero bribes Nutriche and Lucio; they go to her, seeming to solicit his suit. She riseth, offers to go out; Piero stayeth her, tears open his breast, embraceth and kisseth her; and so they go all out in state.
After the dumb show enter two Pages, the one with tapers, the other holding a chafing-dish with a perfume in it; Antonio, in his night-gown and a night-cap, unbraced, following after.
Ant. The black jades of swart night trot foggy rings[263]
’Bout heaven’s brow: [clock strikes twelve] ’tis now stark dead night.
Is this Saint Mark’s Church?
1st Pa. It is, my lord.
Ant. Where stands my father’s hearse?
2d Pa. Those streamers bear his arms. Ay, that is it.
Ant. Set tapers to the tomb, and lamp the church:
Give me the fire.—Now depart and sleep.
[Exeunt Pages.
I purify the air with odorous fume.
Graves, vaults, and tombs, groan not to bear my weight;
Cold flesh, bleak trunks, wrapt in your half-rot shrouds,
I press you softly with a tender foot. 11
Most honour’d sepulchre, vouchsafe a wretch
Leave to weep o’er thee. Tomb, I’ll not be long
Ere I creep in thee, and with bloodless lips
Kiss my cold father’s cheek. I prithee, grave,
Provide soft mold to wrap my carcass in.
Thou royal spirit of Andrugio,
Where’er thou hover’st, airy intellect,
I heave up tapers to thee (view thy son)
In celebration of due obsequies; 20
Once every night I’ll dew thy funeral hearse
With my religious tears.
O, blessèd father of a cursèd son,
Thou died’st most happy, since thou lived’st not
To see thy son most wretched, and thy wife
Pursued by him that seeks my guiltless blood!
O, in what orb thy mighty spirit soars,
Stoop and beat down this rising fog of shame,
That strives to blur thy blood, and girt defame
About my innocent and spotless brows. 30
Non est mori miserum, sed misere mori.
[Ghost of Andrugio rises.
Ghost of And. Thy pangs of anguish rip my cerecloth up,
And, lo, the ghost of old Andrugio
Forsakes his coffin. Antonio, revenge!
I was empoison’d by Piero’s hand.
Revenge my blood! take spirit, gentle boy;
Revenge my blood! Thy Mellida is chaste:
Only to frustrate thy pursuit in love,
Is blazed unchaste. Thy mother yields consent
To be his wife, and give his blood a son, 40
That made her husbandless, and doth complot
To make her sonless; but before I touch
The banks of rest, my ghost shall visit her.
Thou vigour of my youth, juice of my love,
Seize on revenge, grasp the stern-bended front
Of frowning vengeance with unpaiz’d[264] clutch.[265]
Alarum Nemesis, rouse up thy blood!
Invent some stratagem of vengeance,
Which, but to think on, may like lightning glide
With horror through thy breast! Remember this: 50
Scelera[266] non ulcisceris, nisi vincis.
[Exit Andrugio’s ghost.
Enter Maria, her hair about her ears; Nutriche and Lucio, with Pages, and torches.
Mar. Where left you him? show me, good boys, away!
Nut. God’s me, your hair!
Mar. Nurse, ’tis not yet proud day:
The neat gay mists of the light’s not up,
Her cheek’s not yet slur’d over with the paint
Of borrow’d crimson; the unprankèd world
Wears yet the night-clothes. Let flare my loosèd hair!
I scorn the presence of the night.—
Where’s my boy?—Run: I’ll range about the church,
Like frantic Bacchanal or Jason’s wife, 60
To tell me where.—Ha? O my poor wretched blood!
What dost thou up at midnight, my kind boy?
Dear soul, to bed! O thou hast struck a fright
Unto thy mother’s panting——
Ant.[267] O quisquis nova
Supplicia functis dirus umbrarum arbiter
Disponis, quisquis exeso jaces
Pavidus sub antro,[268] quisquis venturi times
Montis ruinam, quisquis avidorum feros[269]
Rictus leonum, et dira furiarum agmina 70
Implicitus horres, Antonii vocem excipe
Properantis ad vos—Ulciscar!
Mar. Alas! my son’s distraught. Sweet boy, appease
Thy mutining affections.
Ant. By the astonning terror of swart night,
By the infectious damps of clammy graves,
And[270] by the mould that presseth down
My dead father’s skull, I’ll be revenged!
Mar. Wherefore? on whom? for what? Go, go to bed,
Good, duteous son. Ho, but thy idle—— 80
Ant. So I may sleep tomb’d in an honour’d hearse,
So may my bones rest in that sepulchre,——
Mar. Forget not duty, son: to bed, to bed.
Ant. May I be cursèd by my father’s ghost,
And blasted with incensèd breath of Heaven,
If my heart beat[271] on ought but vengeance!
May I be numb’d with horror, and my veins
Pucker with singeing torture, if my brain
Disgest[272] a thought but of dire vengeance;
May I be fetter’d slave to coward Chance, 90
If blood, heart, brain, plot ought save vengeance.
Mar. Wilt thou to bed? I wonder when thou sleep’st!
I’faith thou look’st sunk-ey’d; go couch thy head:
Now, faith, ’tis idle: sweet, sweet son, to bed.
Ant. I have a prayer or two to offer up
For the good, good prince, my most dear, dear lord,
The duke Piero, and your virtuous self;
And then, when those prayers have obtain’d success,
In sooth I’ll come (believe it now) and couch
My head in downy mould. But first I’ll see 100
You safely laid: I’ll bring ye all to bed.
Piero, Maria, Strotzo, Lucio,
I’ll see you all laid: I’ll bring you all to bed,
And then, i’faith, I’ll come and couch my head,
And sleep in peace.
Mar. Look then, we go before.
[Exeunt all but Antonio.
Ant. Ay, so you must, before we touch the shore
Of wish’d revenge. O, you departed souls,
That lodge in coffin’d trunks, which my feet press,
(If Pythagorean Axioms be true,
Of spirits’ transmigration) fleet no more 110
To human bodies, rather live in swine,
Inhabit wolves’ flesh, scorpions, dogs, and toads,
Rather than man. The curse of Heaven rains
In plagues unlimited through all his days:
His mature age grows only mature vice,
And ripens only to corrupt and rot
The budding hopes of infant modesty.
Still striving to be more than man, he proves
More than a devil. Devilish suspect,
Devilish cruelty, 120
All hell-strai[n’]d juice is pourèd to his veins,
Making him drunk with fuming surquedries;[273]
Contempt of Heaven, untam’d arrogance,
Lust, state, pride, murder.
Ghost of And. Murder!
}
}
Ghost of Feli. Murder!
} From above and beneath.
}
Pan.[274] Murder!
}
Ant. Ay, I will murder: graves and ghosts
Fright me no more, I’ll suck red vengeance
Out of Piero’s wounds, Piero’s wounds!
[Retires to the back of the stage.
Enter two boys, with Piero in his night-gown and night-cap.
Pier. Maria, love, Maria! she took this aisle.
Left you her here? On, lights, away!
I think we shall not warm our beds to-day. 130
Enter Julio, Forobosco, and Castilio.
Jul. Ho, father! father!
Pier. How now, Julio, my little pretty son?
Why suffer you the child to walk so late?
For. He will not sleep, but calls to follow you,
Crying that bug-bears and spirits haunted him.
[Antonio offers to come near and stab; Piero presently withdraws.
Ant. [Aside.] No, not so.
This shall be sought for; I’ll force him feed on life
Till he shall loath it. This shall be the close
Of vengeance’ strain.
Pier. Away there, pages, lead on fast with light; 140
The church is full of damps; ’tis yet dead night.
[Exeunt all, saving Julio and Antonio.
Jul. Brother Antonio, are you here, i’faith?
Why do you frown? Indeed my sister said
That I should call you brother, that she did,
When you were married to her. Buss me: good truth,
I love you better than my father, ’deed.
Ant. Thy father? Gracious, O bounteous Heaven!
I do adore thy justice: venit in nostras manus
Tandem vindicta, venit et tota quidem.[275]
Jul. Truth, since my mother died, I loved you best. 150
Something hath anger’d you; pray you, look merrily.
Ant. I will laugh, and dimple my thin cheek
With cap’ring joy; chuck, my heart doth leap
To grasp thy bosom.—[Aside.] Time, place, and blood,
How fit you close together! Heaven’s tones
Strike not such music to immortal souls
As your accordance sweets my breast withal.
Methinks I pace upon the front of Jove,
And kick corruption with a scornful heel!
Griping this flesh, disdain mortality! 160
O that I knew which joint, which side, which limb,
Were father all, and had no mother in’t,
That I might rip it vein by vein, and carve revenge
In bleeding races! but since ’tis mix’d together,
Have at adventure, pell mell, no reverse.—
Come hither, boy. This is Andrugio’s hearse.
Jul. O God, you’ll hurt me. For my sister’s sake,
Pray you do not hurt me. And you kill me, ’deed,
I’ll tell my father.
Ant. O, for thy sister’s sake, I flag revenge. 170
Ghost of And. Revenge!
Ant. Stay, stay, dear father, fright mine eyes no more.
And cleaves[276] his heart.—Come, pretty tender child,
It is not thee I hate, not thee I kill.
Thy father’s blood that flows within thy veins,
Is it I loathe; is that revenge must suck.
I love thy soul: and were thy heart lapp’d up
In any flesh but in Piero’s blood,
I would thus kiss it; but being his, thus, thus, 180
And thus I’ll punch it. Abandon fears:
Whilst thy wounds bleed, my brows shall gush out tears.
Jul. So you will love me, do even what you will.
Ant. Now barks the wolf against the full-cheek’d moon;
Now lions half-clam’d[277] entrails roar for food;
Now croaks the toad, and night-crows screech aloud,
Fluttering ’bout casements of departed souls;
Now gapes the graves, and through their yawns let loose
Imprison’d spirits to revisit earth;
And now, swart night, to swell thy hour out, 190
Behold I spurt warm blood in thy black eyes.
[He stabs Julio.—From under the stage a groan.
Howl not, thou putry[278] mould; groan not, ye graves;
Be dumb, all breath. Here stands Andrugio’s son,
Worthy his father. So: I feel no breath.
His jaws are fall’n, his dislodg’d soul is fled:
And now there’s nothing but Piero left:
He is all Piero, father all. This blood,
This breast, this heart, Piero all:
Whom thus I mangle. Sprite of Julio,
Forget this was thy trunk. I live thy friend: 200
May’st thou be twinèd with the soft’st embrace
Of clear eternity: but thy father’s blood
I thus make incense of to vengeance.
Ghost of my poison’d sire, suck this fume:
To sweet revenge perfume thy circling air
With smoke of blood. I sprinkle round his gore,
And dew thy hearse with these fresh-reeking drops.
Lo thus I heave my blood-dyed hands to heaven,
Even like insatiate hell still crying, More!
My heart hath thirsting dropsies after gore. 210
Sound peace and rest to church, night-ghosts, and graves:
Blood cries for blood, and murder murder craves.
[Exit.
[264] We should have expected “paizèd,” i.e., steady, unfaltering. (The reader will note that Marston constantly uses “vengeance” as a trisyllable.)
[265] Cf. p. 178. “The fist of strenuous vengeance is clutch’d”—a line which Ben Jonson ridicules in The Poetaster (v. i.)
[266] A quotation from Seneca’s Thyestes, 194-5.
[267] Not marked in old eds.—The Latin lines are from Seneca’s Thyestes. ll. 13-14, 75-80.
[268] Ed. 1602 “antri.”
[269] Old eds. “feres.”
[270] The metre might be restored by reading—
“And by the mould that presseth down the skull
Of my dead father, I will be revenged.”
[271] Is busy with.—So in The Tempest:—
“Do not infest your mind with beating on
The strangeness of this business.”
[272] Old form of digest.
[273] Wanton excesses.
[274] It is hard to see why Pandulfo should be shouting with the ghosts.
[275] Senec., Thyestes, 494-5:—
“Venit in nostras manus
Tandem Thyestes; venit et totus quidem.”
[276] Old eds. “cleares.”
[277] Half-starved.
[278] So ed. 1633.—Ed. 1602 “pury.”
SCENE II.
Chamber of Maria.
Enter two Pages with torches; Maria, her hair loose, and Nutriche.
Nut. Fie, fie; to-morrow your wedding day, and weep! God’s my comfort! Andrugio could do well: Piero may do better. I have had four husbands myself.
The first I called, sweet duck; the second, dear heart; the third, pretty pug;[279] but the fourth, most sweet, dear, pretty, all in all; he was the very cockall of a husband. What, lady? your skin is smooth, your blood warm, your cheek fresh, your eye quick: change of pasture makes fat calves; choice of linen clean bodies, and (no question) variety of husbands perfect wives. I would you should know it: as few teeth as I have in my head, I have read Aristotle’s Problems,[280] which saith that woman receiveth perfection by the man. What then be the men? Go to, to bed, lie on your back, dream not on Piero; I say no more. To-morrow is your wedding: go,[281] dream not of Piero. 16
Enter Balurdo with a base viol.
Mar. What an idle prate thou keep’st, good nurse; go sleep.
I have a mighty task of tears to weep.
Bal. Lady, with a most retort and obtuse leg,
I kiss the curlèd locks of your loose hair. 20
The Duke hath sent you the most musical Sir Jeffrey, with his not base, but most ennobled viol, to rock your baby thoughts in the cradle of sleep.
Mar. I give the noble Duke respective[282] thanks.
Bal. Respective; truly a very pretty word. Indeed, madam, I have the most respective fiddle; did you ever smell a more sweet sound? My ditty must go thus; very witty, I assure you: I myself in an humorous passion made it, to the tune of my mistress Nutriche’s beauty. Indeed, very pretty, very retort, and obtuse, I’ll assure you; ’tis thus:— 31
My mistress’ eye doth oil my joints,
And makes my fingers nimble:
O love, come on, untruss your points,
My fiddlestick wants rozen.
My lady’s duggs are all so smooth,
That no flesh must them handle:
Her eyes do shine, for to say sooth,
Like a new-snuffèd candle.
Mar. Truly, very pathetical and unvulgar. 40
Bal. Pathetical and unvulgar; words of worth, excellent words. In sooth, madam, I have taken a murr,[283] which makes my nose run most pathetically, and unvulgarly. Have you any tobacco?
Mar. Good Signior, your song.
Bal. Instantly, most unvulgarly, at your service. Truly, here’s the most pathetical rozen. Umh.
[A Song.
Mar. In sooth, most knightly sung, and like Sir Jeffrey.
Bal. Why, look you, lady, I was made a knight only for my voice; and a councillor only for my wit. 51
Mar. I believe it. Good night, gentle sir, good night.
Bal. You will give me leave to take my leave of my mistress, and I will do it most famously in rhyme.
Farewell, adieu! saith thy love true,
As to part loath.
Time bids us part, mine own sweet heart,
God bless us both.
[Exit Balurdo.
Mar. Good night, Nutriche. Pages, leave the room.
The life of night grows short, ’tis almost dead. 60
[Exeunt Pages and Nutriche.
O thou cold widow-bed, sometime thrice blest
By the warm pressure of my sleeping lord,
Open thy leaves, and whilst on thee I tread,
Groan out,—Alas, my dear Andrugio’s dead!
[Maria draweth the curtain: and the ghost of Andrugio is displayed, sitting on the bed.
Amazing terror, what portent is this!
Ghost of And. Disloyal to our hymeneal[284] rites,
What raging heat reigns in thy strumpet blood?
Hast thou so soon forgot Andrugio?
Are our love-bands so quickly cancellèd?
Where lives thy plighted faith unto this breast? 70
O weak Maria! Go to, calm thy fears.
I pardon thee, poor soul! O shed no tears;
Thy sex is weak. That black incarnate fiend
May trip thy faith that hath o’erthrown my life:
I was impoison’d by Piero’s hand.
Join with my son to bend up strain’d revenge,
Maintain a seeming favour to his suit,
Till time may form our vengeance absolute.
Enter Antonio, his arms bloody, bearing a torch, and a poniard.
Ant. See, unamazed I will behold thy face;
Outstare the terror of thy grim aspect, 80
Daring the horrid’st object of the night.
Look how I smoke in blood, reeking the steam
Of foaming vengeance. O my soul’s enthroned
In the triumphant chariot of revenge!
Methinks I am all air, and feel no weight
Of human dirt clog. This is Julio’s blood!
Rich music, father: this is Julio’s blood!
Why lives that mother?
Ghost of And. Pardon ignorance.
Fly, dear Antonio:
Once more assume disguise, and dog the court 90
In feignèd habit, till Piero’s blood
May even o’erflow the brim of full revenge.
Peace and all blessèd fortunes to you both!
Fly thou from court, be peerless in revenge:
[Exit Antonio.
Sleep thou in rest, lo, here I close thy couch.
[Exit Maria to her bed, Andrugio drawing the curtains.
And now ye sooty coursers of the night,
Hurry your chariot into hell’s black womb.
Darkness, make flight; graves, eat your dead again:
Let’s repossess our shrouds. Why lags delay?
Mount sparkling brightness, give the world his day! 100
[Exit Andrugio.
[279] A common term for endearment.
[280] The Problemes of Aristotle, with other Philosophers and Phisitions, wherein are contayned diuers questions, with their answers, touching the estate of man’s bodie, 1595, 1597, &c.—an old chap-book.
[281] Old eds. “do.”
[282] Respectful.
[283] Violent cold.
[284] Ed. 1602 “Hymniall.”
ACT IV.
SCENE I.
Enter Antonio in a fool’s habit, with a little toy of a walnut shell, and soap to make bubbles: Maria and Alberto.
Mar. Away with this disguise in any hand!
Alb. Fie, ’tis unsuiting to your elate spirit:
Rather put on some transhaped cavalier,
Some habit of a spitting critic, whose mouth
Voids nothing but gentile and unvulgar
Rheum of censure: rather assume——
Ant. Why, then should I put on the very flesh
Of solid folly. No, this cock’s comb is a crown
Which I affect even with unbounded zeal.
Alb. ’Twill thwart your plot, disgrace your high resolve. 10
Ant. By wisdom’s heart, there is no essence mortal
That I can envy, but a plump-cheek’d fool:
O, he hath a patent of immunities
Confirm’d by custom, seal’d by policy,
As large as spacious thought.
Alb. You cannot press among the courtiers,
And have access to——
Ant. What? not a fool? Why, friend, a golden ass,
A babled[285] fool, are sole canonical,
Whilst pale-cheek’d wisdom, and lean-ribbèd art 20
Are kept in distance at the halbert’s point;
All held Apocrypha, not worth survey.
Why, by the genius of that Florentine,
Deep, deep observing, sound-brain’d Machiavel,
He is not wise that strives not to seem fool.
When will the Duke hold fee’d intelligence,
Keep wary observation in large pay,
To dog a fool’s act?
Mar. Ay, but feigning known disgraceth much.
Ant. Pish! Most things that morally adhere to souls, 30
Wholly exist in drunk opinion:
Whose reeling censure, if I value not,
It values nought.
Mar. You are transported with too slight a thought,
If you but meditate of what is past,
And what you plot to pass.
Ant. Even in that note a fool’s beatitude:
He is not capable of passion;
Wanting the power of distinction,
He bears an unturned sail with every wind: 40
Blow east, blow west, he stirs his course alike.
I never saw a fool lean: the chub-faced fop
Shines sleek with full-cramm’d fat of happiness,
Whilst studious contemplation sucks the juice
From wisards’[286] cheeks: who making curious search
For nature’s secrets, the first innating cause
Laughs them to scorn, as man doth busy apes
When they will zany men. Had Heaven been kind,
Creating me an honest senseless dolt,
A good poor fool, I should want sense to feel 50
The stings of anguish shoot through every vein;
I should not know what ’twere to lose a father;
I should be dead of sense to view defame
Blur my bright love; I could not thus run mad,
As one confounded in a maze of mischief,
Stagger’d, stark, fell’d with bruising stroke of chance;
I should not shoot mine eyes into the earth,
Poring for mischief that might counterpoise
Mischief, murder and——
Enter Lucio.
How now, Lucio?
Lu. My lord, the Duke, with the Venetian states,[287] 60
Approach the great hall to judge Mellida.
Ant. Ask’d he for Julio yet?
Lu. No motion[288] of him: dare you trust this habit?
Ant. Alberto, see you straight rumour me dead.
Leave me, good mother; leave me, Lucio;
Forsake me, all.
[Exeunt omnes, saving Antonio.
Now patience hoop my sides
With steelèd ribs, lest I do burst my breast
With struggling passions. Now disguise, stand bold:
Poor scornèd habits oft choice souls enfold.
[The cornets sound a senet.
Enter Castilio, Forobosco, Balurdo, and Alberto, with pole-axes, Lucio bare; followed by Piero and Maria talking together; two Senators, Galeatzo, Matzagente, and Nutriche.
Pier. Entreat me not: there’s not a beauty lives 70
Hath that imperial predominance
O’er my affects[289] as your enchanting graces:
Yet give me leave to be myself—
Ant. [Aside.] A villain.
Pier. Just—
Ant. [Aside.] Most just.
Pier. Most just and upright in our judgment seat.
Were Mellida mine eye, with such a blemish
Of most loath’d looseness, I would scratch it out.
Produce the strumpet in her bridal robes,
That she may blush t’appear so white in show, 80
And black in inward substance. Bring her in.
[Exeunt Forobosco and Castilio.
I hold Antonio, for his father’s sake,
So very dearly, so entirely choice,
That knew I but a thought of prejudice
Imagined ’gainst his high ennobled blood,
I would maintain a mortal feud, undying hate,
’Gainst the conceiver’s life. And shall justice sleep
In fleshly lethargy, for mine own blood’s favour,
When the sweet prince hath so apparent scorn
By my—I will not call her daughter? Go, 90
Conduct in the loved youth Antonio:
[Exit Alberto to fetch Antonio.
He shall behold me spurn my private good;
Piero loves his honour more than ’s blood.
Ant. [Aside.] The devil he does more than both.
Bal. Stand back there, fool; I do hate a fool most, most pathetically. O, these that have no sap of retort and obtuse wit in them: faugh!
Ant. Puff, hold, world; puff, hold, bubble; puff, hold, world; puff, break not behind; puff, thou art full of wind; puff, keep up thy[290] wind; puff, ’tis broke! and now I laugh like a good fool at the breath of mine own lips, he, he, he, he, he! 102
Bal. You fool!
Ant. You fool, puff!
Bal. I cannot disgest[291] thee, the unvulgar fool. Go, fool.
Pier. Forbear, Balurdo; let the fool alone.
Come hither.[292] Is he your fool?
Mar. Yes, my loved lord.
Pier. [Aside.] Would all the states[293] in Venice were like thee!
O then I were secur’d. 110
He that’s a villain, or but meanly soul’d,
Must still converse and cling to routs of fools,
That can not search the leaks of his defects.
O, your unsalted fresh fool is your only man:
These vinegar tart spirits are too piercing,
Too searching in the unglued joints of shaken wits.
Find they a chink, they’ll wriggle in and in,
And eat like salt sea in his siddow[294] ribs,
Till they have opened all his rotten parts
Unto the vaunting surge of base contempt, 120
And sunk the tossèd galleasse[295] in depth
Of whirlpool scorn. Give me an honest fop.—
Dud a dud a! Why lo, sir, this takes he
As grateful now as a monopoly.
[The still flutes sound softly.
Enter Forobosco and Castilio: Mellida supported by two waiting-women.
Mel. All honour to this royal confluence.
Pier. Forbear, impure, to blot bright honour’s name
With thy defilèd lips. The flux of sin
Flows from thy tainted body: thou so foul,
So all dishonour’d, canst no honour give,
No wish of good, that can have good effect 130
To this grave senate, and illustrate bloods.
Why stays the doom of death?
1st. Sen. Who riseth up to manifest her guilt?
2d Sen. You must produce apparent proof, my lord.
Pier. Why, where is Strotzo?—he that swore he saw
The very act, and vow’d that Feliche fled
Upon his sight: on which I brake the breast
Of the adulterous lecher with five stabs.
Go, fetch in Strotzo. Now, thou impudent,
If thou hast any drop of modest blood 140
Shrouded within thy cheeks, blush, blush for shame,
That rumour yet may say thou felt’st defame.
Mel. Produce the devil; let your Strotzo come:
I can defeat his strongest argument,
With——
Pier. With what?
Mel. With tears, with blushes, sighs, and claspèd hands;
With innocent uprearèd arms to Heaven;
With my unnookt[296] simplicity. These, these
Must, will, can only quit my heart of guilt: 150
Heaven permits not taintless blood be spilt.
If no remorse live in your savage breast——
Pier. Then thou must die.
Mel. Yet dying, I’ll be blest.
Pier. Accurst by me.
Mel. Yet blest, in that I strove
To live, and die——
Pier. My hate.
Mel. Antonio’s love.
Ant. [Aside.] Antonio’s love!
Enter Strotzo, with a cord about his neck.
Str. O what vast ocean of repentant tears
Can cleanse my breast from the polluting filth
Of ulcerous sin! Supreme Efficient,
Why cleavest thou not my breast with thunderbolts 160
Of wing’d revenge?
Pier. What means this passion?
Ant. [Aside.] What villainy are they decocting now? Umh!
Str. In[297] me convertite ferrum, O proceres.
Nihil iste, nec ista.
Pier. Lay hold on him! What strange portent is this?
Str. I will not flinch. Death, hell more grimly stare
Within my heart than in your threatening brows.
Record, thou threefold guard of dreadest power,[298]
What I here speak is forcèd from my lips
By the [im]pulsive strain of conscience. 170
I have a mount of mischief clogs my soul,
As weighty as the high-noll’d[299] Apennine,
Which I must straight disgorge, or breast will burst.
I have defam’d this lady wrongfully,
By instigation of Antonio,
Whose reeling love, tost on each fancy’s surge,
Began to loath before it fully joyed.
Pier. Go, seize Antonio! guard him strongly in!
[Exit Forobosco.
Str. By his ambition being only bribed,
Fee’d by his impious hand, I poisonèd 180
His agèd father, that his thirsty hope
Might quench their dropsy of aspiring drought
With full unbounded quaff.
Pier. Seize me, Antonio!
Str. O, why permit you now such scum of filth
As Strotzo is to live and taint the air
With his infectious breath!
Pier. Myself will be thy strangler, unmatched slave.
Piero comes from his chair, snatcheth the cord’s end, and Castilio aideth him: both strangle Strotzo.
Str. Now change your——
Pier. I—pluck Castilio!—I change my humour: pluck Castilio!
Die, with thy death’s entreats even in thy jaws.— 190
[Aside.] Now, now, now, now, now, my plot begins to work!
Why, thus should statesmen do,
That cleave through knots of craggy policies,
Use men like wedges, one strike out another,
Till by degrees the tough and knurly[300] trunk
Be riv’d in sunder.—Where’s Antonio?
Enter Alberto, running.
Alb. O, black accursèd fate! Antonio’s drown’d.
Pier. Speak, on thy faith, on thy allegiance, speak.
Alb. As I do love Piero, he is drown’d.
Ant. [Aside.] In an inundation of amazement. 200
Mel. Ay, is this the close of all my strains in love?
O me most wretched maid!
Pier. Antonio drown’d! how? how? Antonio drown’d!
Alb. Distraught and raving, from a turret’s top
He threw his body in the swollen sea,
And as he headlong topsy turvy ding’d[301] down,
He still cried “Mellida!”
Ant. [Aside.] My love’s bright crown!
Mel. He still cried “Mellida"!
Pier. Daughter, methinks your eyes should sparkle joy,
Your bosom rise on tiptoe at this news. 210
Mel. Ay me!
Pier. How now? Ay, me! why, art not great of thanks
To gracious Heaven for the just revenge
Upon the author of thy obloquies!
Mar. Sweet beauty, I could sigh as fast as you,
But that I know that, which I weep to know.
[Aside.] His[302] fortunes should be such he dare not show
His open presence!
Mel. I know he lov’d me dearly, dearly, ay:
And since I cannot live with him, I die. 220
[Swoons.
Pier. ’Fore Heaven, her speech falters; look, she swouns.
Convey her up into her private bed.
[Maria, Nutriche, and the Ladies bear out Mellida, as being swooned.
I hope she’ll live. If not——
Ant. Antonio’s dead! the fool will follow too.
He, he, he!
[Aside.] Now works the scene; quick observation, scud
To cote[303] the plot, or else the path is lost:
My very self am gone, my way is fled:
Ay, all is lost, if Mellida is dead.
[Exit Antonio.
Pier. Alberto, I am kind; Alberto, kind. 230
I am sorry for thy coz, i’faith I am.
Go, take him down, and bear him to his father.
Let him be buried; look ye, I’ll pay the priest.
Alb. Please you to admit his father to the court?
Pier. No.
Alb. Please you to restore his lands and goods again?
Pier. No.
Alb. Please you vouchsafe him lodging in the city?
Pier. God’s fut, no, thou odd uncivil fellow!
I think you do forget, sir, where you are. 240
Alb. I know you do forget, sir, where you must be.
Foro. You are too malapert, i’faith you are.
Your honour might do well to——
Alb. Peace, parasite; thou bur, that only sticks
Unto the nap of greatness.
Pier. Away with that same yelping cur—away!
Alb. I—I am gone; but mark, Piero, this.
There is a thing call’d scourging Nemesis.[304]
[Exit Alberto.
Bal. God’s neaks, he has wrong, that he has: and s’fut, and I were as he, I would bear no coals.[305] Law, I, I begin to swell—puff. 251
Pier. How now, fool, fop, fool!
Bal.[306] Fool, fop, fool! Marry muffe![307] I pray you, how many fools have you seen go in a suit of satin? I hope, yet, I do not look a fool i’faith! a fool! God’s bores, I scorn’t with my heel. ’S neaks, and I were worth but three hundred pound a year more, I could swear richly; nay, but as poor as I am, I will swear the fellow hath wrong.
Pier. Young Galeatzo! Ay, a proper man; 260
Florence, a goodly city: it shall be so,
I’ll marry her to him instantly.
Then Genoa mine, by my Maria’s match,
Which I’ll solemnise ere next setting sun:
Thus Venice, Florence, Genoa, strongly leagued.
Excellent, excellent! I’ll conquer Rome,
Pop out the light of bright religion;
And then, helter skelter, all cock-sure.
Bal. Go to, ’tis just, the man hath wrong: go to.
Pier. Go to, thou shall have right. Go to, Castilio,
Clap him into the palace dungeon; 271
Lap him in rags, and let him feed on slime
That smears the dungeon’ cheek. Away with him.
Bal. In very good truth, now, I’ll ne’er do so more; this one time and——
Pier. Away with him—observe it strictly—go!
Bal. Why then, O wight!
Alas, poor knight!
O, welladay,
Sir Jefferay! 280
Let poets roar,
And all deplore;
For now I bid you good-night.
Exit Balurdo with Castilio.
Re-enter Maria.
Mar. O piteous end of love! O too, too rude hand
Of unrespective death! Alas, sweet maid!
Pier. Forbear me, Heaven. What intend these plaints?
Mar. The beauty of admired creation,
The life of modest unmix’d purity,
Our sex’s glory, Mellida is——
Pier. What, O Heaven, what!
Mar. Dead! 290
Pier. May it not sad your thoughts, how?
Mar. Being laid upon her bed, she grasp’d my hand,
And kissing it, spake thus: “Thou very poor,
Why dost not weep? The jewel of thy brow,
The rich adornment that enchased thy breast,
Is lost: thy son, my love, is lost, is dead.
And do I live to say Antonio’s dead?
And have I lived to see his virtues blurr’d
With guiltless blots? O world, thou art too subtle
For honest natures to converse withal, 300
Therefore I’ll leave thee; farewell, mart of woe,
I fly to clip my love, Antonio!”
With that her head sunk down upon her breast;
Her cheek changed earth, her senses slept in rest,
Until my fool, that press’d unto the bed,
Screech’d out so loud that he brought back her soul,
Call’d her again, that her bright eyes gan ope,
And stared upon him. He, audacious fool,
Dared kiss her hand, wish’d her “soft rest, loved bride;”
She fumbled out, “thanks, good;” and so she died. 310
Pier. And so she died! I do not use to weep;
But by thy love (out of whose fertile sweet
I hope for as fair fruit) I am deep sad.—
I will not stay my marriage for all this.—
Castilio, Forobosco, all,
Strain all your wits, wind up invention
Unto his highest bent, to sweet this night;
Make us drink Lethe by your quaint conceits,
That for two days oblivion smother grief.
But when my daughter’s exequies approach, 320
Let’s all turn sighers. Come, despite of fate,
Sound loudest music, let’s pace out in state!
[The cornets sound.—Exeunt.
[285] “Bable” was the old form of “bauble.”
[286] “Wisards” = wise men. In the Ode on the Nativity Milton styles the wise men from the East wisards:—
“The star-led wisards hasten with odours sweet.”
[287] Nobles.
[288] I.e., there has been no question asked about him.
[289] Affections.
[290] Old eds. “by.”
[291] Old form of digest.
[292] Old eds. “Come hither (ficto).” The bracketed word is, I suppose, a direction to the actor; Piero is to talk in an affected voice to Antonio,—treat him as a simpleton.
[293] Nobles.
[294] “The word siddow is of very unusual occurrence in early English, but it is preserved in the provincial dialect of the West of England. In Gloucestershire peas which become pulpy soft by boiling are then said to be siddow.”—Halliwell.
[295] Large galleon.
[296] “Unnookt simplicity” (if the reading is right) must mean “simplicity in which no guile is hidden.”
[297] A mangled quotation from Æn. ix. 427-8.
[298] The “threefold guard of dreadest power” is, I suppose, “tergemina Hecate.” Cf. [p. 176] “By the d[r]ead brow of triple Hecate.”
[299] High-peaked.—Nol = head, top.
[300] Full of knurs, i.e. knotted, gnarled.
[301] Dashed violently.—We have had the word before (p. 11) used transitively; but it is also used intransitively, as in Drayton’s Ballad of Agincourt:—
“This while our noble king,
His broadsword brandishing.
Down the French host did ding
As to o’erwhelm it.” (Text of ed. 1619.)
[302] I.e. alas, that his fortunes should be, &c.
[303] Cote (another form of quote) = mark, note.
[304] So Hieronymo in The Spanish Tragedy:—
“Well heaven is heaven still!
And there is Nemesis and furies,
And things call’d whips.”
[305] “Bear coals” = put up with injuries.
[306] Not marked in ed. 1602.
[307] “Marry muffe”—a common expression of contempt.—Middleton, i. 42, 71, &c.]
SCENE II.
Enter Antonio solus, in fool’s habit.
Ant. Ay, heaven, thou may’st, thou may’st, omnipotence.
What vermin bred of putrefacted slime
Shall dare to expostulate with thy decrees!
O heaven, thou may’st indeed: she was all thine,
All heavenly: I did but humbly beg
To borrow her of thee a little time.
Thou gavest her me, as some weak-breasted dame
Giveth her infant, puts it out to nurse;
And when it once goes high-lone,[308] takes it back.
She was my vital blood, and yet, and yet, 10
I’ll not blaspheme. Look here! behold!
[Antonio puts off his cap and lieth just upon his back.
I turn my prostrate breast upon thy face,
And vent a heaving sigh. O hear but this!
I am a poor, poor orphant—a weak, weak child,—
The wrack of splitted fortune, the very ooze,
The quicksand that devours all misery.
Behold the valiant’st creature that doth breathe!
For all this I dare live, and I will live,
Only to numb some other’s cursèd blood
With the dead palsy of like misery. 20
Then, death, like to a stifling incubus,[309]
Lie on my bosom. Lo, see,[310] I am sped.
My breast is Golgotha, grave for the dead.
Enter Pandulpho, Alberto, and a Page, carrying Feliche’s trunk in a winding sheet, and lay it thwart Antonio’s breast.
Pan. Antonio, kiss my foot: I honour thee,
In laying thwart my blood upon thy breast.
I tell thee, boy, he was Pandulpho’s son;
And I do grace thee with supporting him.
Young man,
He[311] who hath naught that fortune’s gripe can seize,
The domineering monarch of the earth; 30
He who is all impregnably his own,
He whose great heart heaven cannot force with force,
Vouchsafes his love. Non servio Deo, sed assentio.
Ant. I ha’ lost a good wife.
Pan. Didst find her good, or didst thou make her good?
If found, thou may’st refind, because thou hadst her;
If made, the work is lost, but thou that madest her
Livest yet as cunning. Hast lost a good wife?
Thrice-blessèd man that lost her whilst she was good,
Fair, young, unblemish’d, constant, loving, chaste. 40
I tell thee, youth, age knows, young loves seem graced,
Which with gray cares, rude jars, are oft defaced.
Ant. But she was full of hope.
Pan. May be, may be; but that which may be stood,
Stands now without all may. She dièd good,
And dost thou grieve?
Alb. I ha’ lost a true friend.
Pan. I live encompass’d with two blessèd souls.
Thou lost a good wife, thou lost a true friend, ha!
Two of the rarest lendings of the heavens,—
But lendings which, at the fix’d day of pay 50
Set down by fate, thou must restore again.[312]
O what unconscionable souls are here!
Are you all like the spoke-shaves of the church?
Have you no maw to restitution?
Hast lost a true friend, coz? then thou hadst one.
I tell thee, youth, ’tis all as difficult
To find true friend in this apostate age
(That balks all right affiance ’twixt two hearts)
As ’tis to find a fixèd modest heart
Under a painted breast. Lost a true friend! 60
O happy soul that lost him whilst he was true!
Believe it, coz, I to my tears have found,
Oft dirt’s respect makes firmer friends unsound.
Alb. You have lost a good son.
Pan. Why, there’s the comfort on’t, that he was good.
Alas, poor innocent!
Alb. Why weeps mine uncle?
Pan. Ha, dost ask me why? ha, ha!
Good coz, look here!
[He shows him his son’s breast.
Man will break out, despite philosophy.
Why, all this while I ha’ but played a part, 70
Like to some boy that acts a tragedy,
Speaks burly words, and raves out passion;
But, when he thinks upon his infant weakness,
He droops his eye. I spake more than a god,
Yet am less than a man.
I am the miserablest soul that breathes.
[Antonio starts up.
Ant. ’Slid, sir, ye lie! by the heart of grief, thou liest!
I scorn’d that any wretched should survive,
Outmounting me in that superlative,
Most miserable, most unmatch’d in woe. 80
Who dare assume that but Antonio?
Pan. Wilt still be so, and shall yon blood-hound live?
Ant. Have I an arm, a heart, a sword, a soul?
Alb. Were you but private unto what we know——
Pan. I’ll know it all; first let’s inter the dead.
Let’s dig his grave with that shall dig the heart,
Liver, and entrails of the murderer.
[They strike the stage with their daggers, and the grave openeth.
Ant. Wilt sing a dirge, boy?
Pan. No, no song; ’twill be vile out of tune.
Alb. Indeed, he’s hoarse; the poor boy’s voice is crack’d. 90
Pan. Why, coz! why should it not be hoarse and crack’d,
When all the strings of nature’s symphony
Are crack’d and jar? Why should his voice keep tune,
When there’s no music in the breast of man?
I’ll say an honest antic rhyme I have:
Help me, good sorrow-mates, to give him grave.
[They all help to carry Feliche to his grave.
Death, exile, plaints, and woe,
Are but man’s lackeys, not his foe.
No mortal ’scapes from fortune’s war
Without a wound, at least a scar. 100
Many have led thee[313] to the grave;
But all shall follow, none shall save.
Blood of my youth, rot and consume;
Virtue in dirt doth life assume.
With this old saw close up this dust:—
Thrice blessèd man that dieth just.
Ant. The gloomy wing of night begins to stretch
His lazy pinion o’er the air.
We must be stiff and steady in resolve;
Let’s thus our hands, our hearts, our arms involve. 110
[They wreath their arms.
Pan. Now swear we by this Gordian knot of love,
By the fresh-turned up mould that wraps my son,
By the d[r]ead brow of triple Hecate,
Ere night shall close the lids of yon bright stars,
We’ll sit as heavy on Piero’s heart,
As Ætna doth on groaning Pelorus.
Ant. Thanks, good old man; we’ll cast at royal chance.
Let’s think a plot—then pell-mell, vengeance!
[Exeunt, their arms wreathed.
[308] Quite alone.—See note on Middleton, i. 46.
[310] Old eds. “sir.”
[311] In old eds. ll. 29-30 are transposed, and the passage is rendered unintelligible. “The domineering monarch” is of course fortune.
[312] Seneca moralises in the same strain:—“Rerum natura illum tibi non mancipio dedit sed commodavit: cum visum est deinde, repetiit nec tuam in eo satietatem secuta est, sed suam legem. Si quis pecuniam creditam solvisse se moleste ferat, eam præsertim cujus usum gratuitum acceperit, nonne injustus vir habeatur?” (Ad Polybium de Consolatione.)
[313] Old ed. “these.”
ACT V.
SCENE I.
The cornets sound for the Act.
The dumb show.
Enter at one door Castilio and Forobosco, with halberts; four Pages with torches; Lucio, bare; Piero, Maria, and Alberto, talking; Alberto draws out his dagger, Maria her knife, aiming to menace the Duke. Then Galeatzo, betwixt two Senators, reading a paper to them, at which they all make semblance of loathing Piero, and knit their fists at him; two Ladies and Nutriche. All these go softly over the stage, whilst at the other door enters the ghost of Andrugio, who passeth by them, tossing his torch about his head in triumph. All forsake the stage, saving Andrugio, who, speaking, begins the Act.
Ghost of And. Venit dies, tempusque, quo reddat suis
Animam squalentem sceleribus.
The[314] fist of strenuous vengeance is clutch’d,
And stern Vindicta tow’reth up aloft,
That she may fall with a more weighty paise,
And crush life’s sap from out Piero’s veins.
Now ’gins the leprous cores of ulcered sins
Wheel to a head; now is his fate grown mellow,
Instant to fall into the rotten jaws
Of chap-fall’n death. Now down looks Providence, 10
T’attend the last act of my son’s revenge.
Be gracious, observation, to our scene,
For now the plot unites his scatter’d limbs
Close in contracted bands. The Florence Prince
(Drawn by firm notice of the Duke’s black deeds)
Is made a partner in conspiracy.
The states of Venice are so swoll’n in hate
Against the Duke for his accursèd deeds
(Of which they are confirm’d by some odd letters
Found in dead Strotzo’s study, which had past 20
Betwixt Piero and the murd’ring slave)
That they can scarce retain from bursting forth
In plain revolt. O, now triumphs my ghost,
Exclaiming, Heaven’s just, for I shall see
The scourge of murder and impiety!
[Exit.
[314] This line is ridiculed in The Poetaster, v. 1:—
“Break his back,
O poets all and some! for now we list
Of strenuous vengeance to clutch the fist.”
SCENE I.
Balurdo from under the Stage.
Bal. Ho, who’s above there, ho? A murrain on all proverbs. They say hunger breaks through stone walls; but I am as gaunt as lean-ribb’d famine, yet I can burst through no stone walls. O now, Sir Jeffrey, show thy valour, break prison and be hang’d. Nor shall the darkest nook of hell contain the discontented Sir Balurdo’s ghost. Well, I am out well; I have put off the prison to put on the rope. O poor shotten herring, what a pickle art thou in! O hunger, how thou domineer’st in my guts! O for a fat leg of ewe mutton in stewed broth, or drunken song to feed on! I could belch rarely, for I am all wind. O cold, cold, cold, cold, cold! O poor knight! O poor Sir Jeffrey, sing like an unicorn before thou dost dip thy horn in the water of death. O cold, O sing, O cold, O poor Sir Jeffrey, sing, sing! 16
[A song.
Enter Antonio and Alberto at several doors, their rapiers drawn, in their masking attire.
Ant. Vindicta!
Alb. Mellida!
Ant. Alberto!
Alb. Antonio!
Ant. Hath the Duke supp’d?
Alb. Yes, and triumphant revels mount aloft.
The Duke drinks deep to overflow his grief;
The court is rack’d to pleasure; each man strains
To feign a jocund eye. The Florentine——
Ant. Young Galeatzo!
Alb. Even he is mighty on our part. The states of Venice,—
Enter Pandulpho, running, in masking attire.
Pan. Like high-swoll’n floods drive down the muddy dams
Of pent allegiance. O, my lusty bloods,
Heaven sits clapping of our enterprise. 30
I have been labouring general favour firm,
And I do find the citizens grown sick
With swallowing the bloody crudities
Of black Piero’s acts; they fain would cast
And vomit him from off their government.
Now is the plot of mischief ript wide ope;
Letters are found ’twixt Strotzo and the Duke,
So clear apparent, yet more firmly strong
By suiting circumstance, that, as I walk’d,
Muffled, to eavesdrop speech, I might observe 40
The graver statesmen whispering fearfully.
Here one gives nods and hums what he would speak;
The rumour’s got ’mong troop of citizens,
Making loud murmur, with confusèd din;
One shakes his head and sighs, “O ill-used power!”
Another frets, and sets his grinding teeth,
Foaming with rage, and swears this must not be;
Here one complots, and on a sudden starts,
And cries, O monstrous, O deep villainy!
All knit their nerves, and from beneath swoll’n brows 50
Appears a gloating eye of much mislike;
Whilst swart Piero’s lips reak steam of wine,
Swallows lust-thoughts, devours all pleasing hopes,
With strong imagination of—what not?
O now Vindicta! that’s the word we have,
A royal vengeance, or a royal grave!
Ant. Vindicta!
Bal. [From beneath the stage.] I am acold.
Pan. Who’s there? Sir Jeffrey?
Bal. A poor knight, god wot: the nose of thy knighthood is bitten off with cold. O poor Sir Jeffrey, cold, cold! 62
Pan. What chance of fortune hath tripp’d up his heels, And laid him in the kennel, ha?
Alb. I will discourse it all. Poor honest soul,
Hadst thou a beaver to clasp up thy face,
Thou should’st associate us in masquery,
And see revenge.
Bal. Nay, and you talk of revenge, my stomach’s up, for I am most tyrannically hungry. A beaver! I have a headpiece, a skull, a brain of proof, I warrant ye. 71
Alb. Slink to my chamber then, and tire thee.
Bal. Is there a fire?
Alb. Yes.
Bal. Is there a fat leg of ewe mutton?
Alb. Yes.
Bal. And a clean shirt?
Alb. Yes.
Bal. Then am I for you, most pathetically, and unvulgarly, law! 80
[Exit.
Ant. Resolved hearts, time curtails night, opportunity shakes us his foretop. Steel your thoughts, sharp your resolve, embolden your spirit, grasp your swords; alarum mischief, and with an undaunted brow, out scout the grim opposition of most menacing peril.
Hark! here proud pomp shoots mounting triumph up,
Borne in loud accents to the front of Jove.
Pan. O now, he that wants soul to kill a slave,
Let him die slave, and rot in peasant’s grave.
Ant. Give me thy hand, and thine, most noble heart;
Thus will we live, and, but thus, never part. 91
[Exeunt, twined together.
Cornets sound a senet.
SCENE II.
A Banqueting-hall.
Enter Castilio and Forobosco; two Pages, with torches; Lucio, bare; Piero and Maria, Galeatzo, two Senators, and Nutriche.
Pier. Sit close unto my breast, heart of my love;
Advance thy drooping eyes, thy son is drown’d.
Rich happiness that such a son is drown’d!
Thy husband’s dead: life of my joys most bless’d,
In that the sapless log, that press’d thy bed
With an unpleasing weight, being lifted hence,
Even I, Piero, live to warm his place.
I tell you, lady, had you view’d us both
With an unpartial eye, when first we wooed
Your maiden beauties, I had borne the prize. 10
’Tis firm I had; for, fair, I ha’ done that——
Mar. [Aside.] Murder.
Pier. Which he would quake to have adventurèd;
Thou know’st I have——
Mar. [Aside.] Murder’d my husband.
Pier. Borne out the shock of war, and done—what not,
That valour durst? Dost love me, fairest? Say.
Mar. As I do hate my son, I love thy soul.
Pier. Why, then, Io[315] to Hymen, mount a lofty note!
Fill[316] red-cheek’d Bacchus, let Lyæus float 20
In burnish’d goblets! Force the plump-lipp’d god.
Skip light lavoltas[317] in your full-sapp’d veins!
’Tis well, brim full. Even I have glut of blood:
Let quaff carouse. I drink this Burdeaux wine
Unto the health of dead Andrugio,
Feliche, Strotzo, and Antonio’s ghosts.
[Aside.] Would I had some poison to infuse it with;
That having done this honour to the dead,
I might send one to give them notice on’t:
I would endear my favour to the full.— 30
Boy, sing aloud; make heaven’s vault to ring
With thy breath’s strength. I drink. Now loudly sing.
[A song. The song ended the cornets sound a senet.
Enter Antonio, Pandulpho, and Alberto, in maskery; Balurdo, and a Torchbearer.
Pier. Call Julio hither. Where’s the little soul?
I saw him not to-day. Here’s sport alone
For him, i’faith; for babes and fools, I know,
Relish not substance, but applaud the show.
Gal. (To the conspirators as they stand in rank for the measure.[318]) All blessèd fortune crown your brave attempt.
[To Antonio.
I have a troop to second your attempt.
[To Pandulpho.
The Venice states join hearts unto your hands.
[To Alberto.
Pier. By the delights in contemplation 40
Of coming joys, ’tis magnificent.
You grace my marriage eve with sumptuous pomp.
Sound still, loud music! O, your breath gives grace
To curious feet, that in proud measure pace.
Ant. [Aside to Maria.] Mother, is Julio’s body——
Mar. [Aside to Antonio.] Speak not, doubt not; all is above all hope.
Ant. [Aside.] Then will I dance and whirl about the air:
Methinks I am all soul, all heart, all spirit.
Now murder shall receive his ample merit.
The measure.
While the measure is dancing, Andrugio’s ghost is placed betwixt the music-houses.[319]
Pier. Bring hither suckets, candied delicates. 50
We’ll taste some sweetmeats, gallants, ere we sleep.
Ant.—We’ll cook your sweetmeats, gallants, with tart sour sauce.
Ghost of And. Here will I sit, spectator of revenge,
And glad my ghost in anguish of my foe.
[The maskers whisper with Piero.
Pier. Marry and shall; i’faith I were too rude,
If I gainsaid so civil fashion.—
The maskers pray you to forbear the room
Till they have banqueted. Let it be so:
No man presume to visit them, on death.
[The maskers whisper again.
Only my self? O, why, with all my heart; 60
[Exeunt all but Piero and the maskers.
I’ll fill your consort. Here Piero sits;
Come on, unmask, let’s fall to.
[The conspirators bind Piero, pluck out his tongue, and triumph over him.
Ant. Murder and torture! no prayers, no entreats!
Pan. We’ll spoil your oratory. Out with his tongue.
Ant. I have ’t, Pandulpho; the veins panting bleed,
Trickling fresh gore about my fist. Bind fast—so, so!
Ghost of And. Bless’d be thy hand! I taste the joys of heaven,
Viewing my son triumph in his black blood.
Bal. Down to the dungeon with him! I’ll dungeon with him! I’ll fool you; Sir Jeffrey will be Sir Jeffrey; I’ll tickle you. 71
Ant. Behold, black dog!
Pan. Grinn’st thou, thou snurling[320] cur?
Alb. Eat thy black liver.
Ant. To thine anguish see
A fool triumphant in thy misery.
Vex him, Balurdo.
Pan. He weeps; now do I glorify my hands;
I had no vengeance, if I had no tears.
Ant. Fall to, good Duke. O these are worthless cates,
You have no stomach to them; look, look here:
Here lies a dish to feast thy father’s gorge. 80
[Uncovering the dish that contains Lucio’s limbs.
Here’s flesh and blood, which I am sure thou lov’st.
[Piero seems to condole his son.
Pan. Was he thy flesh, thy son, thy dearest son?
Ant. So was Andrugio, my dearest father.
Pan. So was Feliche, my dearest son.
Enter Maria.
Mar. So was Andrugio my dearest husband.
Ant. My father found no pity in thy blood.
Pan. Remorse was banish’d, when thou slew’st my son.
Mar. When thou empoisoned’st my loving lord,
Exiled was piety.
Ant. Now therefore pity, piety, remorse, 90
Be aliens to our thoughts; grim fire-ey’d rage
Possess us wholly.
Pan. Thy son? true; and which is my most joy,
I hope no bastard, but thy very blood,
Thy true-begotten, most legitimate
And lovèd issue—there’s the comfort on’t.
Ant. Scum of the mud of hell!
Alb. Slime of all filth!
Mar. Thou most detested toad!
Bal. Thou most retort and obtuse rascal!
Ant. Thus charge we death at thee; remember hell,
And let the howling murmurs of black spirits, 101
The horrid torments of the damnèd ghosts,
Affright thy soul as it descendeth down
Into the entrails of the ugly deep.
Pan. Sa, sa; no, let him die, and die, and still be dying.
[They offer to run all at Piero, and on a sudden stop.
And yet not die till he hath died and died
Ten thousand deaths in agony of heart.
Ant. Now pellmell: thus the hand of Heaven chokes
The throat of murder. This for my father’s blood!
[He stabs Piero.
Pan. This for my son! 110
Alb. This for them all!
And this, and this, sink to the heart of hell!
[They run all at Piero with their rapiers.
Pan. Murder for murder, blood for blood, doth yell!
And. ’Tis done, and now my soul shall sleep in rest:
Sons that revenge their father’s blood are blest.
[The curtains being drawn, exit Andrugio.
Enter Galeatzo, two Senators, Lucio, Forobosco, Castilio, and Ladies.
1st Sen. Whose hand presents this gory spectacle?
Ant. Mine.
Pan. No, mine.
Alb. No, mine.
Ant. I will not lose the glory of the deed, 120
Were all the tortures of the deepest hell
Fix’d to my limbs. I pierced the monster’s heart
With an undaunted hand.
Pan. By yon bright-spangled front of heaven ’twas I!
’Twas I sluiced[321] out his life-blood.
Alb. Tush, to say truth, ’twas all.
2d Sen. Blest be you all, and may your honours live
Religiously held sacred, even for ever and ever.
Gal. (to Antonio). Thou art another Hercules to us,
In ridding huge pollution from our state. 130
1st Sen. Antonio, belief is fortified
With most invincible approvements[322] of much wrong
By this Piero to thee. We have found
Beadrolls of mischief, plots of villainy,
Laid ’twixt the Duke and Strotzo, which we found
Too firmly acted.
2d Sen. Alas, poor orphant!
Ant. Poor!
Standing triumphant over Belzebub!
Having large interest for blood, and yet deem’d poor?
1st Sen. What satisfaction outward pomp can yield,
Or chiefest fortunes of the Venice state, 140
Claim freely. You are well-season’d props,
And will not warp, or lean to either part;
Calamity gives a man a steady heart.
Ant. We are amaz’d at your benignity;
But other vows constrain another course.
Pan. We know the world, and did we know no more,
We would not live to know; but since constraint
Of holy bands forceth us keep this lodge
Of dirt’s corruption, till dread power calls
Our soul’s appearance, we will live enclosed 150
In holy verge of some religious order,
Most constant votaries.
[The curtains are drawn, Piero departeth.
Ant. First let’s cleanse our hands,
Purge hearts of hatred, and entomb my love,
Over whose hearse I’ll weep away my brain
In true affection’s tears.
For her sake here I vow a virgin bed:
She lives in me, with her my love is dead.
2d Sen. We will attend her mournful exequies;
Conduct you to your calm sequestered life,
And then—— 160
Mar. Leave us to meditate on misery,
To sad our thought with contemplation
Of past calamities. If any ask
Where lives the widow of the poison’d lord?
Where lies the orphant of a murder’d father?
Where lies the father of a butcher’d son?
Where lives all woe?—conduct him to us three,
The down-cast ruins of calamity.
Ant.[323] Sound doleful tunes, a solemn hymn advance,
To close the last act of my vengeance; 170
And when the subject of your passion’s spent,
Sing Mellida is dead; all hearts will relent,
In sad condolement at that heavy sound.
Never more woe in lesser plot was found!
And, O, if ever time create a muse,
That to th’ immortal fame of virgin faith
Dares once engage his pen to write her death,
Presenting it in some black tragedy,
May it prove gracious; may his style be deck’d
With freshest blooms of purest elegance;
May it have gentle presence, and the scenes suck’d up
By calm attention of choice audience; 181
And when the closing Epilogue appears,
Instead of claps, may it obtain but tears.
[A song.—Exeunt omnes.
[315] “Io”—the joyful cry with which Hymen was invoked by the ancients. Cf. Catullus:—
“Ite, concinite in modum:
Io Hymen Hymenæe io,
Io Hymen Hymenæe!”
[316] Old eds. “Ful.”
[317] A sort of waltz, described in Sir John Davies’ Orchestra, st. 70.—Cf. Chapman’s May Day (1611), iv. 1:—
“Fill red-cheek’d Bacchus, let the Burdeux grape
Skip like [sic] lavoltas in their swelling veins”
—lines made up from the present passage.
[318] “Measure”—a grave solemn dance.
[319] See Collier’s Hist. of Engl. Dram. Poetry, iii. 251-2 (ed. 2).
[320] So Marston uses “knurl’d” (p. 166) for “gnarl’d.”
[321] Cf. Richard II., i. 1:—“Sluiced out his innocent soul through streams of blood.”
[322] Proofs.
[323] Old eds. “And.”
THE MALCONTENT.
The Malcontent. By Iohn Marston. 1604. At London printed by V. S. for William Aspley, and are to be solde at his shop in Paules Church-yard. 4to.
The Malcontent. Augmented by Marston. With the Additions played by the Kings Maiesties servants. Written by Ihon Webster. 1604. At London Printed by V. S. for William Aspley, and are to be sold at his shop in Paules Church-yard. 4to.
STORY OF THE PLAY.
Giovanni Altofronto, Duke of Genoa, driven from power by the plots of Pietro Jacomo, disguises himself and lives under the name of Malevole at the usurper’s court, assuming the character of a malcontent. His identity is known only to his faithful friend Celso. A crafty courtier, Mendoza, who had assisted in dethroning Altofronto, has adulterous intercourse with Pietro’s wife, Aurelia. Malevole exposes the intrigue to Pietro; but meanwhile Aurelia, induced by an old procuress, Maquerelle, to believe that her lover is faithless, discards Mendoza and engages in an intrigue with another courtier, Ferneze. Pietro, sword in hand, seeks Mendoza, who makes passionate protestations of his own innocence, and declares that the guilty person is Ferneze. On that very night Ferneze has an appointment with the Duchess; and it is agreed that Pietro with some of the guard shall break into the Duchess’ chamber, while Mendoza waits with his drawn sword at the door. Ferneze is to be allowed to escape from the chamber, only to be received on the sword of Mendoza, who is then to stand over the body and pretend that he is guarding it from assault. Thus Mendoza will not only serve Pietro, but by his seeming generosity towards Ferneze will earn the gratitude of Aurelia, who, should she attempt to take vengeance on her husband, will not fail to make Mendoza acquainted with her plots, which he will incontinently reveal to Pietro. At the hour appointed, Pietro and the guard invade the Duchess’ chamber; the flying gallant is stabbed by Mendoza and left for dead (though he afterwards recovers from the wound); Aurelia receives Mendoza again into favour, and practises with him to murder
Pietro. Mendoza, selecting a time when Pietro had gone a-hunting, bribes Malevole to commit the murder. Malevole undertakes to kill Pietro by stealth in the forest, fling his body into the sea, and then return to announce that Pietro, distracted by grief at the dishonour brought on him by his wife, has made away with himself by leaping into the sea from a high rock. To the forest goes Malevole, finds Pietro, and exposes to him the plot; presently Celso appears bringing a hermit’s weeds, into which Pietro shifts. They return to the court, and the pretended hermit describes with much detail how he saw Pietro perish, the narrative being substantiated by Malevole. Mendoza is proclaimed Duke, and his first act is to pronounce a sentence of perpetual banishment on Aurelia. He then commissions Malevole to bring from the citadel (where she is confined) the wife of the banished Altofronto, the virtuous Maria, whom he intends to make his Duchess. His brain is now exercised to procure the destruction of the supposed murderers. Malevole is instructed to poison the hermit at a supper given in the citadel, and the hermit on the same occasion is to poison Malevole; thus two awkward agents will be removed, and the suspicion will fall on Maria, whose fears will drive her to submit to Mendoza. Pietro informs Malevole of the instructions he had received, and learns that similar instructions have been given to Malevole. Weighed down with sorrow at his own dishonour, and disgusted with Mendoza’s villainy, Pietro declares his determination to dedicate his life to religious solitude, and make it his one care that the banished Altofronto shall be restored to the dukedom. Thereupon Malevole puts off his disguise, and Pietro beholds the banished Duke. Ferneze now approaches with Celso, and receives pardon from Pietro, who had supposed him to be dead. The four then take counsel how they shall depose Mendoza. Malevole goes to the usurper and announces that he has poisoned the hermit; he then produces a box of poison, which, he declares, will cause instant death on being opened and held to the nostrils. Mendoza opens the box and tries its effects on Malevole, who feigns to fall dead. A masque is ordered by Mendoza to be given in honour of Maria, who shows herself indifferent both to the tyrant’s flatteries and threats. At the entertainment Malevole, Pietro, and Ferneze appear masked; Malevole chooses Maria as his partner in the dance, and Pietro is matched with Aurelia, who has deeply repented of her misconduct. At the close of the dance, during which Malevole and Pietro have discovered themselves to their partners, the maskers environ Mendoza, level their pistols at his head, and unmask. Altofronto is received with joyful acclamations by the assembled company, and Mendoza—whose life the restored Duke disdains to take—is banished with shameful ignominy.
BENIAMINO[324] JONSONIO,
POETÆ
ELEGANTISSIMO,
GRAVISSIMO,
AMICO
SVO, CANDIDO ET CORDATO,
IOHANNES MARSTON,
MVSARVM ALVMNVS,
ASPERAM HANC SVAM THALIAM
D. D.
[324] Ed. 2. “Beniamini.”