Enter a Servant.
Ser. My lord, here's one, i' the habit of a soldier, says he is newly returned from Ostend, and has some business of import to speak.
D'Am. Ostend! let him come in. My soul foretells
He brings the news will make our music full.
My brother's joy would do't, and here comes he
Will raise it.
Enter Borachio disguised.
Mont. O my spirit, it does dissuade
My tongue to question him, as if it knew
His answer would displease.
D'Am. Soldier, what news?
We heard a rumour of a blow you gave
The enemy.[145]
Bor. 'Tis very true, my lord.
Bel. Canst thou relate it?
Bor. Yes.
D'Am. I prithee do.
Bor. The enemy, defeated of a fair
Advantage by a flatt'ring stratagem,
Plants all the artillery against the town;
Whose thunder and lightning made our bulwarks shake,
And threatened in that terrible report
The storm wherewith they meant to second it.
The assault was general. But, for the place
That promised most advantage to be forced,
The pride of all their army was drawn forth
And equally divided into front
And rear. They marched, and coming to a stand,
Ready to pass our channel at an ebb,
We advised it for our safest course, to draw
Our sluices up and mak't impassable.
Our governor opposed and suffered them
To charge us home e'en to the rampier's foot.
But when their front was forcing up our breach
At push o' pike, then did his policy
Let go the sluices, and tripped up the heels
Of the whole body of their troop that stood
Within the violent current of the stream.
Their front, beleaguered 'twixt the water and
The town, seeing the flood was grown too deep
To promise them a safe retreat, exposed
The force of all their spirits (like the last
Expiring gasp of a strong-hearted man)
Upon the hazard of one charge, but were
Oppressed, and fell. The rest that could not swim
Were only drowned; but those that thought to 'scape
By swimming, were by murderers that flanked
The level of the flood, both drowned and slain.
D'Am. Now, by my soul, soldier, a brave service.
Mont. O what became of my dear Charlemont?
Bor. Walking next day upon the fatal shore,
Among the slaughtered bodies of their men
Which the full-stomached sea had cast upon
The sands, it was my unhappy chance to light
Upon a face, whose favour[146] when it lived,
My astonished mind informed me I had seen.
He lay in's armour, as if that had been
His coffin; and the weeping sea, like one
Whose milder temper doth lament the death
Of him whom in his rage he slew, runs up
The shore, embraces him, kisses his cheek,
Goes back again, and forces up the sands
To bury him, and every time it parts
Sheds tears upon him, till at last (as if
It could no longer endure to see the man
Whom it had slain, yet loth to leave him) with
A kind of unresolved unwilling pace,
Winding her waves one in another, like
A man that folds his arms or wrings his hands
For grief, ebbed from the body, and descends
As if it would sink down into the earth,
And hide itself for shame of such a deed.[147]
D'Am. And, soldier, who was this?
Mont. O Charlemont!
Bor. Your fear hath told you that, whereof my grief
Was loth to be the messenger.
Cast. O God! [Exit.
D'Am. Charlemont drowned! Why how could that be, since
It was the adverse party that received
The overthrow?
Bor. His forward spirit pressed into the front,
And being engaged within the enemy
When they retreated through the rising stream,
I' the violent confusion of the throng
Was overborne, and perished in the flood.
And here's the sad remembrance of his life—the scarf,
Which, for his sake, I will for ever wear.
Mont. Torment me not with witnesses of that
Which I desire not to believe, yet must.
D'Am. Thou art a screech-owl and dost come i' the night
To be the cursèd messenger of death.
Away! depart my house, or, by my soul,
You'll find me a more fatal enemy
Than ever was Ostend. Begone; dispatch!
Bor. Sir, 'twas my love.
D'Am. Your love to vex my heart
With that I hate?
Hark, do you hear, you knave?
O thou'rt a most delicate, sweet, eloquent villain!
[Aside.
Bor. Was't not well counterfeited? [Aside.
D'Am. Rarely.—[Aside.] Begone. I will not here reply.
Bor. Why then, farewell. I will not trouble you.
[Exit.
D'Am. So. The foundation's laid. Now by degrees
[Aside.
The work will rise and soon be perfected.
O this uncertain state of mortal man!
Bel. What then? It is the inevitable fate
Of all things underneath the moon.
D'Am. 'Tis true.
Brother, for health's sake overcome your grief.
Mont. I cannot, sir. I am incapable
Of comfort. My turn will be next. I feel
Myself not well.
D'Am. You yield too much to grief.
Lang. All men are mortal. The hour of death is uncertain. Age makes sickness the more dangerous, and grief is subject to distraction. You know not how soon you may be deprived of the benefit of sense. In my understanding, therefore,
You shall do well if you be sick to set
Your state in present order. Make your will.
D'Am. I have my wish. Lights for my brother.
Mont. I'll withdraw a while,
And crave the honest counsel of this man.
Bel. With all my heart. I pray attend him, sir.
[Exeunt Montferrers and Snuffe.
This next room, please your lordship.
D'Am. Where you will.
[Exeunt Belforest and D'Amville.