An easy father confessor in thee.
Irving, transposing, takes us at once into the plotting of the Queen against Becket because of her hatred for Rosamund and Becket’s supposed protection of the King’s mistress. A secondary interest in Tennyson’s presentation becomes by this shifting first interest with Irving.
PROLOGUE
SCENE 1. A Castle in Normandy. Eleanor. Fitz Urse
Eleanor. Dost thou love this Becket, this son of a London merchant, that thou hast sworn a voluntary allegiance to him?
Fitz Urse. Not for my love toward him, but because he hath the love of the King. How should a baron love a beggar on horseback, with the retinue of three kings behind him, outroyaltying royalty?
Eleanor. Pride of the plebeian!
Fitz Urse. And this plebeian like to be Archbishop!
Eleanor. True, and I have an inherited loathing of these black sheep of the Papacy. Archbishop? I can see farther into man than our hot-headed Henry, and if there ever come feud between Church and Crown, and I do not charm this secret out of our loyal Thomas, I am not Eleanor.