The Project Gutenberg eBook of Bussy D'Ambois and The Revenge of Bussy D'Ambois by George Chapman.

In this volume an attempt is made for the first time to edit Bussy D'Ambois and The Revenge of Bussy D'Ambois in a manner suitable to the requirements of modern scholarship. Of the relations of this edition to its predecessors some details are given in the Notes on the Text of the two plays. But in these few prefatory words I should like to call attention to one or two points, and make some acknowledgments.

The immediate source of Bussy D'Ambois still remains undiscovered. But the episodes in the career of Chapman's hero, vouched for by contemporaries like Brantôme and Marguerite of Valois, and related in some detail in my Introduction, are typical of the material which the dramatist worked upon. And an important clue to the spirit in which he handled it is the identification, here first made, of part of Bussy's dying speech with lines put by Seneca into the mouth of Hercules in his last agony on Mount Œta. The exploits of D'Ambois were in Chapman's imaginative vision those of a semi-mythical hero rather than of a Frenchman whose life overlapped with his own.

On the provenance of The Revenge of Bussy D'Ambois I have been fortunately able, with valuable assistance from others, to cast much new light. In an article in The Athenæum, Jan. 10, 1903, I showed that the [Pg iv]immediate source of many of the episodes in the play was Edward Grimeston's translation (1607) of Jean de Serres's Inventaire Général de l'Histoire de France. Since that date I owe to Mr. H. Richards, Fellow of Wadham College, Oxford, the important discovery that a number of speeches in the play are borrowed from the Discourses of Epictetus, from whom Chapman drew his conception of the character of Clermont D'Ambois. My brother-in-law, Mr. S. G. Owen, Student of Christ Church, has given me valuable help in explaining some obscure classical allusions. Dr. J. A. H. Murray, the editor of the New English Dictionary, has kindly furnished me with the interpretation of a difficult passage in Bussy D'Ambois; and Mr. W. J. Craig, editor of the Arden Shakespeare, and Mr. Le Gay Brereton, of the University of Sidney, have been good enough to proffer helpful suggestions. Finally I am indebted to Professor George P. Baker, the General Editor of this Series, for valuable advice and help on a large number of points, while the proofs of this volume were passing through the press.

Biography

George Chapman was probably born in the year after Elizabeth's accession. Anthony Wood gives 1557 as the date, but the inscription on his portrait, prefixed to the edition of The Whole Works of Homer in 1616, points to 1559. He was a native of Hitchin in Hertfordshire, as we learn from an allusion in his poem Euthymiæ Raptus or The Teares of Peace, and from W. Browne's reference to him in Britannia's Pastorals as "the learned shepheard of faire Hitching Hill." According to Wood "in 1574 or thereabouts, he being well grounded in school learning was sent to the University." Wood is uncertain whether he went first to Oxford or to Cambridge, but he is sure, though he gives no authority for the statement, that Chapman spent some time at the former "where he was observed to be most excellent in the Latin & Greek tongues, but not in logic or philosophy, and therefore I presume that that was the reason why he took no degree there."

His life for almost a couple of decades afterwards is a blank, though it has been conjectured on evidences drawn from The Shadow of Night and Alphonsus Emperor of Germany, respectively, that he served in one of Sir F. Vere's campaigns in the Netherlands, and that he travelled in Germany. The Shadow of Night, consisting of two "poeticall hymnes" appeared in 1594, and is his first extant work. It was followed in 1595 by Ovid's Banquet of Sence, The Amorous Zodiac, and other poems. These early compositions, while containing fine passages, are obscure and crabbed in style.[v:1] In 1598 appeared Marlowe's fragmentary Hero and Leander with Chapman's continuation. By this year he had established his [Pg vi]position as a playwright, for Meres in his Palladis Tamia praises him both as a writer of tragedy and of comedy. We know from Henslowe's Diary that his earliest extant comedy The Blinde Begger of Alexandria was produced on February 12, 1596, and that for the next two or three years he was working busily for this enterprising manager. An Humerous dayes Myrth (pr. 1599), and All Fooles (pr. 1605) under the earlier title of The World Runs on Wheels,[vi:1] were composed during this period.

Meanwhile he had begun the work with which his name is most closely linked, his translation of Homer. The first instalment, entitled Seaven Bookes of the Iliades of Homere, Prince of Poets, was published in 1598, and was dedicated to the Earl of Essex. After the Earl's execution Chapman found a yet more powerful patron, for, as we learn from the letters printed recently in The Athenæum (cf. Bibliography, sec. iii), he was appointed about 1604 "sewer (i. e. cupbearer) in ordinary," to Prince Henry, eldest son of James I. The Prince encouraged him to proceed with his translation, and about 1609 appeared the first twelve books of the Iliad (including the seven formerly published) with a fine "Epistle Dedicatory," to "the high-born Prince of men, Henry." In 1611 the version of the Iliad was completed, and that of the Odyssey was, at Prince Henry's desire, now taken in hand. But the untimely death of the Prince, on November 6th, 1612, dashed all Chapman's hopes of receiving the anticipated reward of his labours. According to a petition which he addressed to the Privy Council, the Prince had promised him on the conclusion of his translation £300, and "uppon his deathbed a good pension during my life." Not only were both of these withheld, but he was deprived of his post of "sewer" by Prince Charles. Nevertheless he completed the version of the Odyssey in 1614, and in 1616 he published a folio volume entitled The Whole Works of Homer. The translation, in spite of its inaccuracies and its "conceits," is, by virtue of its sustained dignity and vigour, one of the noblest monuments of Elizabethan genius.

[Pg vii] By 1605, if not earlier, Chapman had resumed his work for the stage. In that year he wrote conjointly with Marston and Jonson the comedy of Eastward Hoe. On account of some passages reflecting on the Scotch, the authors were imprisoned. The details of the affair are obscure. According to Jonson, in his conversation later with Drummond, Chapman and Marston were responsible for the obnoxious passages, and he voluntarily imprisoned himself with them. But in one of the recently printed letters, which apparently refers to this episode, Chapman declares that he and Jonson lie under the Kings displeasure for "two clawses and both of them not our owne," i. e., apparently, written by Marston.[vii:1] However this may be, the offenders were soon released, and Chapman continued energetically his dramatic work. In 1606 appeared two of his most elaborate comedies, The Gentleman Usher and Monsieur D'Olive, and in the next year was published his first and most successful tragedy, Bussy D'Ambois. In 1608 were produced two connected plays, The Conspiracie and Tragedie of Charles, Duke of Byron, dealing with recent events in France, and based upon materials in E. Grimeston's translation (1607) of Jean de Serres' History. Again Chapman found himself in trouble with the authorities, for the French ambassador, offended by a scene in which Henry IV's Queen was introduced in unseemly fashion, had the performance of the plays stopped for a time. Chapman had to go into hiding to avoid arrest, and when he came out, he had great difficulty in getting the plays licensed for publication, even with the omission of the offending episodes. His fourth tragedy based on French history, The Revenge of Bussy D'Ambois, appeared in 1613. It had been preceded by two comedies, May-Day (1611), and The Widdowes' Teares (1612). Possibly, as Mr Dobell suggests (Athenæum, 23 March, 1901), the coarse satire of the latter play may have been due to its author's annoyance at the apparent refusal of his suit by a widow to whom some of the recently printed letters are addressed. In 1613 he produced his Maske of the Middle Temple and Lyncolns Inne, which was one of the series performed in honour of the marriage of the Princess Elizabeth and the Elector Palatine. Another hymeneal work, produced on a much less auspicious occasion, was an [Pg viii]allegorical poem, Andromeda Liberata, celebrating the marriage of the Earl of Somerset with the divorced Lady Essex in December, 1613.

The year 1614, when the Odyssey was completed, marks the culminating point of Chapman's literary activity. Henceforward, partly perhaps owing to the disappointment of his hopes through Prince Henry's death, his production was more intermittent. Translations of the Homeric Hymns, of the Georgicks of Hesiod, and other classical writings, mainly occupy the period till 1631. In that year he printed another tragedy, Cæsar and Pompey, which, however, as we learn from the dedication, had been written "long since." The remaining plays with which his name has been connected did not appear during his lifetime. A comedy, The Ball, licensed in 1632, but not published till 1639, has the names of Chapman and Shirley on the title-page, but the latter was certainly its main author. Another play, however, issued in the same year, and ascribed to the same hands, The Tragedie of Chabot, Admiral of France makes the impression, from its subject-matter and its style, of being chiefly due to Chapman. In 1654 two tragedies, Alphonsus Emperour of Germany and The Revenge for Honour, were separately published under Chapman's name. Their authorship, however, is doubtful. There is nothing in the style or diction of Alphonsus which resembles Chapman's undisputed work, and it is hard to believe that he had a hand in it. The Revenge for Honour is on an Oriental theme, entirely different from those handled by Chapman in his other tragedies, and the versification is marked by a greater frequency of feminine endings than is usual with him; but phrases and thoughts occur which may be paralleled from his plays, and the work may be from his hand.

On May 12, 1634, he died, and was buried in the churchyard of St. Giles's in the Field, where his friend Inigo Jones erected a monument to his memory. According to Wood, he was a person of "most reverend aspect, religious and temperate, qualities rarely meeting in a poet." Though his material success seems to have been small, he gained the friendship of many of the most illustrious spirits of his time—Essex, Prince Henry, Bacon, Jonson, Webster, among the number—and it has been his good fortune to draw in after years splendid tributes from such successors in the poetic art as Keats and A. C. Swinburne.

FOOTNOTES:

Introduction

The group of Chapman's plays based upon recent French history, to which Bussy D'Ambois and its sequel belong, forms one of the most unique memorials of the Elizabethan drama. The playwrights of the period were profoundly interested in the annals of their own country, and exploited them for the stage with a magnificent indifference to historical accuracy. Gorboduc and Locrine were as real to them as any Lancastrian or Tudor prince, and their reigns were made to furnish salutary lessons to sixteenth century "magistrates." Scarcely less interesting were the heroes of republican Greece and Rome: Cæsar, Pompey, and Antony, decked out in Elizabethan garb, were as familiar to the playgoers of the time as their own national heroes, real or legendary. But the contemporary history of continental states had comparatively little attraction for the dramatists of the period, and when they handled it, they usually had some political or religious end in view. Under a thin veil of allegory, Lyly in Midas gratified his audience with a scathing denunciation of the ambition and gold-hunger of Philip II of Spain; and half a century later Middleton in a still bolder and more transparent allegory, The Game of Chess, dared to ridicule on the stage Philip's successor, and his envoy, Gondomar. But both plays were suggested by the elements of friction in the relations of England and Spain.

[Pg x]French history also supplied material to some of the London playwrights, but almost exclusively as it bore upon the great conflict between the forces of Roman Catholicism and Protestantism. The Masaker of France, which Henslowe mentions as having been played on January 3, 1592-3, may or may not be identical with Marlowe's The Massacre at Paris, printed towards the close of the sixteenth century, but in all probability it expressed similarly the burning indignation of Protestant England at the appalling events of the Eve of St. Bartholomew. Whatever Marlowe's religious or irreligious views may have been, he acted on this occasion as the mouthpiece of the vast majority of his countrymen, and he founded on recent French history a play which, with all its defects, is of special interest to our present inquiry. For Chapman, who finished Marlowe's incompleted poem, Hero and Leander, must have been familiar with this drama, which introduced personages and events that were partly to reappear in the two Bussy plays. A brief examination of The Massacre at Paris will, therefore, help to throw into relief the special characteristics of Chapman's dramas.

It opens with the marriage, in 1572, of Henry of Navarre and Margaret, sister of King Charles IX, which was intended to assuage the religious strife. But the Duke of Guise, the protagonist of the play, is determined to counterwork this policy, and with the aid of Catherine de Medicis, the Queen-Mother, and the Duke of Anjou (afterwards Henry III), he arranges the massacre of the Huguenots. Of the events of the fatal night we get a number of glimpses, including the [Pg xi]murder of a Protestant, Scroune, by Mountsorrell (Chapman's Montsurry), who is represented as one of the Guise's most fanatical adherents. Charles soon afterwards dies, and is succeeded by his brother Henry, but "his mind runs on his minions," and Catherine and the Guise wield all real power. But there is one sphere which Guise cannot control—his wife's heart, which is given to Mugeroun, one of the "minions" of the King. Another of the minions, Joyeux, is sent against Henry of Navarre, and is defeated and slain; but Henry, learning that Guise has raised an army against his sovereign "to plant the Pope and Popelings in the realm," joins forces with the King against the rebel, who is treacherously murdered and dies crying, "Vive la messe! perish Huguenots!" His brother, the Cardinal, meets a similar fate, but the house of Lorraine is speedily revenged by a friar, who stabs King Henry. He dies, vowing vengeance upon Rome, and sending messages to Queen Elizabeth, "whom God hath bless'd for hating papistry."

It is easy to see how a play on these lines would have appealed to an Elizabethan audience, while Marlowe, whether his religious sympathies were engaged or not, realized the dramatic possibilities of the figure of the Guise, one of the lawlessly aspiring brotherhood that had so irresistible a fascination for his genius. But it is much more difficult to understand why, soon after the accession of James I, Chapman should have gone back to the same period of French history, and reintroduced a number of the same prominent figures, Henry III, Guise, his Duchess, and Mountsorrell, not [Pg xii]in their relation to great political and religious outbreaks, but grouped round a figure who can scarcely have been very familiar to the English theatre-going public—Louis de Clermont, Bussy d'Amboise.[xii:1]

This personage was born in 1549, and was the eldest son of Jacques de Clermont d'Amboise, seigneur de Bussy et de Saxe-Fontaine, by his first wife, Catherine de Beauvais. He followed the career of arms, and in 1568 we hear of him as a commandant of a company. He was in Paris during the massacre of St. Bartholomew, [Pg xiii]and took advantage of it to settle a private feud. He had had a prolonged lawsuit with his cousin Antoine de Clermont, a prominent Huguenot, and follower of the King of Navarre. While his rival was fleeing for safety he had the misfortune to fall into the hands of Bussy, who dispatched him then and there. He afterwards distinguished himself in various operations against the Huguenots, and by his bravery and accomplishments won the favour of the Duke of Anjou, who, after the accession of Henry III in 1575, was heir to the throne. The Duke in this year appointed him his couronell, and henceforward he passed into his service. In 1576, as a reward for negotiating "la paix de Monsieur" with the Huguenots, the Duke received the territories of Anjou, Touraine, and Berry, and at once appointed Bussy governor of Anjou. In November the new governor arrived at Angers, the capital of the Duchy, and was welcomed by the citizens; but the disorders and exactions of his troops soon aroused the anger of the populace, and the King had to interfere in their behalf, though for a time Bussy set his injunctions at defiance. At last he retired from the city, and rejoined the Duke, in close intercourse with whom he remained during the following years, accompanying him finally on his unsuccessful expedition to the Low Countries in the summer of 1578. On Anjou's return to court in January, 1579, Bussy, who seems to have alienated his patron by his presumptuous behaviour, did not go with him, but took up his residence again in the territory of Anjou. He was less occupied, however, with his official duties than with his criminal passion [Pg xiv]for Françoise de Maridort, wife of the Comte de Monsoreau, who had been appointed grand-veneur to the Duke. The favorite mansion of the Comte was at La Coutancière, and it was here that Bussy ardently pursued his intrigue with the Countess. But a jocular letter on the subject, which he sent to the Duke of Anjou, was shown, according to the historian, De Thou, by the Duke to the King, who, in his turn, passed it on to Montsoreau. The latter thereupon forced his wife to make a treacherous assignation with Bussy at the château on the night of the 18th of August, and on his appearance, with his companion in pleasure, Claude Colasseau, they were both assassinated by the retainers of the infuriated husband.

The tragic close of Bussy's life has given his career an interest disproportionate to his historical importance. But the drama of La Coutancière was only the final episode in a career crowded with romantic incidents. The annalists and memoir-writers of the period prove that Bussy's exploits as a duellist and a gallant had impressed vividly the imagination of his contemporaries. Margaret of Valois, the wife of Henry IV, Brantôme, who was a relative and friend of D'Ambois, and L'Estoile, the chronicler and journalist, are amongst those who have left us their impressions of this beau sabreur. Chapman must have had access to memorials akin to theirs as a foundation for his drama, and though, for chronological reasons, they cannot have been utilized by him, they illustrate the materials which he employed.

The first two Acts of the play are chiefly occupied [Pg xv]with Bussy's arrival at court, his entry into the service of Monsieur, his quarrel with Guise, and the duel between himself and Barrisor, with two supporters on either side. Brantôme, in his Discours sur les Duels, relates from personal knowledge an incident between Guise and Bussy, which took place shortly after the accession of Henry III. The Duke took occasion of a royal hunting party to draw Bussy alone into the forest, and to demand certain explanations of him. D'Ambois gave these in a satisfactory manner; but had he not done so, the Duke declared, in spite of their difference of rank, he would have engaged in single combat with him. The explanations demanded may well have concerned the honour of the Duchess, and we get at any rate a hint for the episode in Chapman's play (i, ii, 57-185).

For the duelling narrative (ii, i, 35-137) we get considerably more than a hint. Our chief authority is again Brantôme, in another work, the Discours sur les Couronnels de l'infanterie de France. He tells us that he was with Bussy at a play, when a dispute arose between him and the Marquis of Saint-Phal as to whether the jet embroidery on a certain muff represented xx or yy. The quarrel was appeased for the time being, but on the following day Bussy, meeting Saint-Phal at the house of a lady with whom he had had relations, and who was now the mistress of the Marquis, renewed the dispute. An encounter took place between Bussy, supported by five or six gentlemen, and Saint-Phal, assisted by an equal number of Scotchmen of the Royal Guard, one of whom wounded Bussy's hand. [Pg xvi]Thereupon Saint-Phal withdrew, but his fire-eating rival was anxious at all hazards for another encounter. It was only with the greatest difficulty, as Brantôme relates in entertaining fashion, that the King was able to bring about a reconciliation between them. Such an episode, reported with exaggeration of details, might well have suggested the narrative in Act ii of the triple encounter.

Brantôme further relates a midnight attack upon Bussy, about a month later, by a number of his jealous rivals, when he had a narrow escape from death. Of this incident another account has been given by Margaret of Valois in her Mémoires. Margaret and her brother, the Duke of Anjou, were devoted to one another, and Bussy was for a time a paramour of the Queen of Navarre. Though she denies the liaison, she says of him that there was not "en ce siècle-là de son sexe et de sa qualité rien de semblable en valeur, reputation, grace, et esprit." Margaret, L'Estoile, and Brantôme all relate similar incidents during Bussy's sojourn at court in the year 1578, and the last-named adds:

It is plain, therefore, that Chapman in his picture of Bussy's quarrels and encounters-at-arms was deviating little, except in details of names and dates, from [Pg xvii]the actual facts of history. Bussy's career was so romantic that it was impossible for even the most inventive dramatist to embellish it. This was especially true of its closing episode, which occupies the later acts of Chapman's drama—the intrigue with the Countess of Montsoreau and the tragic fate which it involved. It is somewhat singular that the earliest narratives of the event which have come down to us were published subsequently to the play. The statement, accepted for a long time, that De Thou's Historiæ sui Temporis was the basis of Chapman's tragedy, has been completely disproved. The passage in which he narrates the story of Bussy's death does not occur in the earlier editions of his work, and first found its way into the issue published at Geneva in 1620. A similar narrative appeared in the following year in L'Estoile's Journal, which first saw the light in 1621, ten years after its author's death. But under a thin disguise there had already appeared a detailed history of Bussy's last amour and his fall, though this, too, was later than Chapman's drama. A novelist, François de Rosset, had published a volume of tales entitled Les Histoires Tragiques de Nostre Temps. The earliest known edition is one of 1615, though it was preceded, probably not long, by an earlier edition full of "fautes insupportables," for which Rosset apologizes. He is careful to state in his preface that he is relating "des histoires autant veritables que tristes et funestes. Les noms de la pluspart des personnages sont seulement desguisez en ce Theatre, à fin de n'affliger pas tant les familles de ceux qui en ont donné le sujet." The fate of Bussy [Pg xviii]forms the subject of the seventeenth history, entitled "De la mort pitoyable du valeureux Lysis." Lysis was the name under which Margaret of Valois celebrated the memory of her former lover in a poem entitled "L'esprit de Lysis disant adieu à sa Flore." But apart from this proof of identification, the details given by Rosset are so full that there can be no uncertainty in the matter. Indeed, in some of his statements, as in his account of the first meeting between the lovers, Rosset probably supplies facts unrecorded by the historians of the period.

From a comparison of these more or less contemporary records it is evident that, whatever actual source Chapman may have used, he has given in many respects a faithful portrait of the historical Bussy D'Ambois. It happened that at the time of Bussy's death the Duke of Anjou, his patron, was in London, laying ineffective siege to the hand of Elizabeth. This coincidence may have given wider currency in England to Bussy's tragic story than would otherwise have been the case. But a quarter of a century later this adventitious interest would have evaporated, and the success of Chapman's play would be due less to its theme than to its qualities of style and construction. To these we must therefore now turn.

With Chapman's enthusiasm for classical literature, it was natural that he should be influenced by classical models, even when handling a thoroughly modern subject. His Bussy is, in certain aspects, the miles gloriosus of Latin drama, while in the tragic crisis of his fate he demonstrably borrows, as is shown in this edition [Pg xix]for the first time, the accents of the Senecan Hercules on Mount Œta (cf. notes on v, iv, 100 and 109). Hence the technique of the work is largely of the semi-Senecan type with which Kyd and his school had familiarized the English stage. Thus Bussy's opening monologue serves in some sort as a Prologue; the narrative by the Nuntius in Act ii, i, 35-137, is in the most approved classical manner; an Umbra or Ghost makes its regulation entrance in the last Act, and though the accumulated horrors of the closing scenes violate every canon of classical art, they had become traditional in the semi-Senecan type of play, and were doubtless highly acceptable to the audiences of the period. But while the Senecan and semi-Senecan methods had their dangers, their effect on English dramatists was in so far salutary that they necessitated care in plot-construction. And it is doubtful whether Chapman has hitherto received due credit for the ingenuity and skill with which he has woven into the texture of his drama a number of varied threads. Bussy's life was, as has been shown, crowded with incidents, and the final catastrophe at La Coutancière had no direct relation with the duels and intrigues of his younger days at Court. Chapman, however, has connected the earlier and the later episodes with much ingenuity. Departing from historical truth, he represents Bussy as a poor adventurer at Court, whose fortunes are entirely made by the patronage of Monsieur. His sudden elevation turns his head, and he insults the Duke of Guise by courting his wife before his face, thus earning his enmity, and exciting at the same time [Pg xx]the ridicule of the other courtiers. Hence springs the encounter with Barrisor and his companions, and this is made to serve as an introduction to the amour between Bussy and Tamyra, as Chapman chooses to call the Countess of Montsurry. For Barrisor, we are told (ii, ii, 202 ff.), had long wooed the Countess, and the report was spread that the "main quarrel" between him and Bussy "grew about her love," Barrisor thinking that D'Ambois's courtship of the Duchess of Guise was really directed towards "his elected mistress." On the advice of a Friar named Comolet, to whom Chapman strangely enough assigns the repulsive rôle of go-between, Bussy wins his way at night into Tamyra's chamber on the plea that he has come to reassure her that she is in no way guilty of Barrisor's blood. Thus the main theme of the play is linked with the opening incidents, and the action from first to last is laid in Paris, whither the closing scenes of Bussy's career are shifted. By another ingenious departure from historical truth the Duke of Anjou, to whom Bussy owes his rise, is represented as the main agent in his fall. He is angered at the favour shown by the King to the follower whom he had raised to serve his own ends, and he conspires with Guise for his overthrow. He is the more eagerly bent upon this when he discovers through Tamyra's waiting-woman that the Countess, whose favours he has vainly sought to win, has granted them to Bussy. It is he who, by means of a paper, convinces Montsurry of his wife's guilt, and it is he, together with Guise, who suggests to the Count the stratagem by which Tamyra is forced to decoy her [Pg xxi]paramour to his doom. All this is deftly contrived and does credit to Chapman's dramatic craftsmanship. It is true that the last two Acts are spun out with supernatural episodes of a singularly unconvincing type. The Friar's invocation of Behemoth, who proves a most unserviceable spirit, and the vain attempts of this scoundrelly ecclesiastic's ghost to shield D'Ambois from his fate, strike us as wofully crude and mechanical excursions into the occult. But they doubtless served their turn with audiences who had an insatiable craving for such manifestations, and were not particular as to the precise form they took.

In point of character-drawing the play presents a more complex problem. Bussy is a typically Renaissance hero and appealed to the sympathies of an age which set store above all things on exuberant vitality and prowess, and was readier than our own to allow them full rein. The King seems to be giving voice to Chapman's conception of Bussy's character, when he describes him in iii, ii, 90 ff. as

"A man so good that only would uphold
Man in his native noblesse, from whose fall
All our dissentions arise," &c.

And in certain aspects Bussy does not come far short of the ideal thus pictured. His bravery, versatility, frankness, and readiness of speech are all vividly portrayed, while his mettlesome temper and his arrogance are alike essential to his rôle, and are true to the record of the historical D'Ambois. But there is a coarseness of fibre in Chapman's creation, an occasional [Pg xxii]foul-mouthed ribaldry of utterance which robs him of sympathetic charm. He has in him more of the swashbuckler and the bully than of the courtier and the cavalier. Beaumont and Fletcher, one cannot help feeling, would have invested him with more refinement and grace, and would have given a tenderer note to the love-scenes between him and Tamyra. Bussy takes the Countess's affections so completely by storm, and he ignores so entirely the rights of her husband, that it is difficult to accord him the measure of sympathy in his fall, which the fate of a tragic hero should evoke.

Tamyra appeals more to us, because we see in her more of the conflict between passion and moral obligation, which is the essence of drama. Her scornful rejection of the advances of Monsieur (ii, ii), though her husband palliates his conduct as that of "a bachelor and a courtier, I, and a prince," proves that she is no light o' love, and that her surrender to Bussy is the result of a sudden and overmastering passion. Even in the moment of keenest expectation she is torn between conflicting emotions (ii, ii, 169-182), and after their first interview, Bussy takes her to task because her

"Conscience is too nice,
And bites too hotly of the Puritane spice."

But she masters her scruples sufficiently to play the thorough-going dissembler when she meets her husband, and she keeps up the pretence when she declares to Bussy before the Court (iii, ii, 138), "Y'are one I know not," and speaks of him vaguely in a later scene as "the man." So, too, when [Pg xxiii]Montsurry first tells her of the suspicions which Monsieur has excited in him, she protests with artfully calculated indignation against the charge of wrong-doing with this "serpent." But the brutal and deliberate violence of her husband when he knows the truth, and the perfidious meanness with which he makes her the reluctant instrument of her lover's ruin, win back for her much of our alienated sympathy. Yet at the close her position is curiously equivocal. It is at her prayer that Bussy has spared Montsurry when "he hath him down" in the final struggle; but when her lover is mortally wounded by a pistol shot, she implores his pardon for her share in bringing him to his doom. And when the Friar's ghost seeks to reconcile husband and wife, the former is justified in crying ironically (v, iv, 163-64):

"See how she merits this, still kneeling by,
And mourning his fall, more than her own fault!"

Montsurry's portraiture, indeed, suffers from the same lack of consistency as his wife's. In his earlier relations with her he strikes a tenderer note than is heard elsewhere in the play, and his first outburst of fury, when his suspicions are aroused, springs, like Othello's, from the depth of his love and trust (iv, i, 169-70):

"My whole heart is wounded,
When any least thought in you is but touch'd."

But there is nothing of Othello's noble agony of soul, nor of his sense that he is carrying out a solemn judicial act on the woman he still loves, in Montsurry's long-drawn torture of his wife. Indeed a comparison [Pg xxiv]of the episodes brings into relief the restraint and purity of Shakespeare's art when handling the most terrible of tragic themes. Yet the Moor himself might have uttered Montsurry's cry (v, i, 183-85),

"Here, here was she
That was a whole world without spot to me,
Though now a world of spot."

And there is something of pathetic dignity in his final forgiveness of his wife, coupled with the declaration that his honour demands that she must fly his house for ever.

Monsieur and the Guise are simpler types. The former is the ambitious villain of quality, chafing at the thought that there is but a thread betwixt him and a crown, and prepared to compass his ends by any means that fall short of the actual killing of the King. It is as a useful adherent of his faction that he elevates Bussy, and when he finds him favoured by Henry he ruthlessly strikes him down, all the more readily that he is his successful rival for Tamyra's love. He is the typical Renaissance politician, whose characteristics are expounded with characteristically vituperative energy by Bussy in iii, ii, 439-94.

Beside this arch-villain, the Guise, aspiring and factious though he be, falls into a secondary place. Probably Chapman did not care to elaborate a figure of whom Marlowe had given so powerful a sketch in the Massacre at Paris. The influence of the early play may also be seen in the handling of the King, who is portrayed with an indulgent pen, and who reappears [Pg xxv]in the rôle of an enthusiastic admirer of the English Queen and Court. The other personages in the drama are colourless, though Chapman succeeds in creating the general atmosphere of a frivolous and dissolute society.

But the plot and portraiture in Bussy D'Ambois are both less distinctive than the "full and heightened" style, to which was largely due its popularity with readers and theatre-goers of its period, but which was afterwards to bring upon it such severe censure, when taste had changed. Dryden's onslaught in his Dedication to the Spanish Friar (1681) marks the full turn of the tide. The passage is familiar, but it must be reproduced here:

Dryden's critical verdicts are never lightly to be set aside. He is singularly shrewd and unprejudiced in his judgements, and has a remarkable faculty of hitting the right nail on the head. But Chapman, in whom the barbarian and the pedant were so strongly commingled, [Pg xxvi]was a type that fell outside the wide range of Dryden's appreciation. The Restoration writer fails, in the first place, to recognize that Bussy D'Ambois is pitched advisedly from first to last in a high key. Throughout the drama men and women are playing for great stakes. No one is ever at rest. Action and passion are both at fever heat. We move in an atmosphere of duels and state intrigues by day, of assignations and murders by night. Even the subordinate personages in the drama, the stewards and waiting-women, partake of the restless spirit of their superiors. They are constantly arguing, quarrelling, gossiping—their tongues and wits are always on the move. Thus Chapman aimed throughout at energy of expression at all costs. To this he sacrificed beauty of phrase and rhythm, even lucidity. He pushed it often to exaggerated extremes of coarseness and riotous fancy. He laid on "glaring colours" till eye and brain are fatigued. To this opening phrase of Dryden no exception can be taken. But can his further charges stand? Is it true to say of Bussy D'Ambois that it is characterised by "dwarfish thought dressed up in gigantic words," that it is "a hideous mingle of false poetry and true nonsense"? The accusation of "nonsense" recoils upon its maker. Involved, obscure, inflated as Chapman's phrasing not infrequently is, it is not mere rhodomontade, sound, and fury, signifying nothing. There are some passages (as the Notes testify) where the thread of his meaning seems to disappear amidst his fertile imagery, but even here one feels not that sense is lacking, but that one has failed to find the clue to the zigzag movements of Chapman's brain. Nor is it fair [Pg xxvii]to speak of Chapman as dressing up dwarfish thoughts in stilted phrases. There is not the slightest tendency in the play to spin out words to hide a poverty of ideas; in fact many of the difficulties spring from excessive condensation. Where Chapman is really assailable is in a singular incontinence of imagery. Every idea that occurs to him brings with it a plethora of illustrations, in the way of simile, metaphor, or other figure of speech; he seems impotent to check the exuberant riot of his fancy till it has exhausted its whole store. The underlying thought in many passages, though not deserving Dryden's contemptuous epithet, is sufficiently obvious. Chapman was not dowered with the penetrating imagination that reveals as by a lightning flash unsuspected depths of human character or of moral law. But he has the gnomic faculty that can convey truths of general experience in aphoristic form, and he can wind into a debatable moral issue with adroit casuistry. Take for instance the discussion (ii, i, 149-79) on the legitimacy of private vengeance, or (iii, i, 10-30) on the nature and effect of sin, or (v, ii) on Nature's "blindness" in her workings. In lighter vein, but winged with the shafts of a caustic humour are Bussy's invectives against courtly practices (i, i, 84-104) and hypocrisy in high places (iii, ii, 25-59), while the "flyting" between him and Monsieur is perhaps the choicest specimen of Elizabethan "Billingsgate" that has come down to us. It was a versatile pen that could turn from passages like these to the epic narrative of the duel, or Tamyra's lyric invocation of the "peaceful regents of the night" (ii, ii, 158), or Bussy's stately elegy upon [Pg xxviii]himself, as he dies standing, propped on his true sword.

It can only have been the ingrained prejudice of the Restoration period against "metaphysical" verse that deadened Dryden's ear to the charm of such passages as these. Another less notable poet and playwright of the time showed more discrimination. This was Thomas D'Urfey, who in 1691 brought out a revised version of the play at the Theatre Royal. In a dedication to Lord Carlisle which he prefixed to this version, on its publication in the same year, he testifies to the great popularity of the play after the reopening of the theatres.

Charles Hart, who was thus one of the long succession of actors to make a striking reputation in the title part, died in 1683, and, according to D'Urfey, "for a long time after" the play "lay buried in [his] grave." But "not willing to have it quite lost, I presumed to revise it and write the plot new." D'Urfey's main alteration was to represent Bussy and Tamyra as having been betrothed before the play opens, and the latter [Pg xxix]forced against her will into a marriage with the wealthy Count Montsurry. This, he maintained, palliated the heroine's surrender to passion and made her "distress in the last Act . . . much more liable to pity." Whether morality is really a gainer by this well-meant variation from the more primitive code of the original play is open to question, but we welcome the substitution of Teresia the "governess" and confidante of Tamyra for Friar Comolet as the envoy between the lovers. Another notable change is the omission of the narrative of the Nuntius, which is replaced by a short duelling scene upon the stage. D'Urfey rejects, too, the supernatural machinery in Act iv, and the details of the torture of the erring Countess, whom, at the close of the play, he represents not as wandering from her husband's home, but as stabbing herself in despair.

If Chapman's plot needed to be "writ new" at all, D'Urfey deserves credit for having done his work with considerable skill and taste, though he hints in his dedication that there were detractors who did not view his version as favourably as Lord Carlisle. He had some difficulty, he tells us, in finding an actor to undertake the part, but at last prevailed upon Mountfort to do so, though he was diffident of appearing in a rôle in which Hart had made so great a reputation. Mrs. Bracegirdle, as we learn from the list of Dramatis Personæ prefixed to the published edition, played Tamyra, and the revival seems to have been a success. But Mountfort was assassinated in the Strand towards the close of the following year, and apparently the career of Bussy upon the boards ended with his life.

[Pg xxx]In the same year as D'Urfey revised the play, Langbaine published his Account of the English Dramatick Poets, wherein (p. 59) he mentions that Bussy "has the preference" among all Chapman's writings and vindicates it against Dryden's attack:

But neither D'Urfey nor Langbaine could secure for Bussy D'Ambois a renewal of its earlier popularity. During the eighteenth century it fell into complete oblivion, and though (as the Bibliography testifies) nineteenth-century critics and commentators have sought to atone for the neglect of their predecessors, the faults of the play, obvious at a glance, have hitherto impaired the full recognition of its distinctive merits of design and thought. To bring these into clearer relief, and trace the relation of its plot to the recorded episodes of Bussy's career, has been the aim of the preceding pages. It must always count to Chapman's credit that he, an Englishman, realized to the full the fascination of the brilliant Renaissance figure, who had to wait till the nineteenth century to be rediscovered for literary purposes by the greatest romance-writer among his own countrymen. In Bussy, the man of action, there was a Titanic strain that appealed to Chapman's intractable and rough-hewn genius. To the dramatist he was the classical Hercules born anew, accomplishing [Pg xxxi]similar feats, and lured to a similar treacherous doom. Thus the cardinal virtue of the play is a Herculean energy of movement and of speech which borrows something of epic quality from the Homeric translations on which Chapman was simultaneously engaged, and thereby links Bussy D'Ambois to his most triumphant literary achievement.

Six years after the publication of the first Quarto of Bussy D'Ambois Chapman issued a sequel, The Revenge of Bussy D'Ambois, which, as we learn from the title-page, had been "often presented at the private Playhouse in the White-Fryers." But in the interval he had written two other plays based on recent French history, Byrons Conspiracie and The Tragedie of Charles Duke of Byron, and in certain aspects The Revenge is more closely related to these immediate forerunners than to the piece of which it is the titular successor. The discovery which I recently was fortunate enough to make of a common immediate source of the two Byron plays and of The Revenge accentuates the connection between them, and at the same time throws fresh light on the problem of the provenance of the second D'Ambois drama.

In his scholarly monograph Quellen Studien zu den Dramen George Chapmans, Massingers, und Fords (1897), E. Koeppel showed that the three connected plays were based upon materials taken from Jean de Serres's Inventaire Général de l'Histoire de France (1603), Pierre Matthieu's Histoire de France durant Sept Années de Paix du Regne de Henri IV (1605), and P. V. Cayet's Chronologie Septénaire de [Pg xxxii]l'Histoire de la Paix entre les Roys de France et d'Espagne (1605). The picture suggested by Koeppel's treatise was of Chapman collating a number of contemporary French historical works, and choosing from each of them such portions as suited his dramatic purposes. But this conception, as I have shown in the Athenæum for Jan. 10, 1903, p. 51, must now be abandoned. Chapman did not go to the French originals at all, but to a more easily accessible source, wherein the task of selection and rearrangement had already been in large measure performed. In 1607 the printer, George Eld, published a handsome folio, of which the British Museum possesses a fine copy (c. 66, b. 14), originally the property of Prince Henry, eldest son of James I. Its title is: "A General Inventorie of the Historie of France, from the beginning of that Monarchie, unto the Treatie of Vervins, in the Yeare 1598. Written by Jhon de Serres. And continued unto these Times, out of the best Authors which have written of that Subiect. Translated out of French into English by Edward Grimeston, Gentleman." This work, the popularity of which is attested by the publication of a second, enlarged, edition in 1611, was the direct source of the "Byron" plays, and of The Revenge.

In a dedication addressed to the Earls of Suffolk and Salisbury, Grimeston states that having retired to "private and domesticke cares" after "some years expence in France, for the publike service of the State," he has translated "this generall Historie of France written by John de Serres." In a preface "to the Reader" he makes the further important statement:

From this we learn that Grimeston followed Jean de Serres till 1598, and that from then till 1604 (his time-limit in his first edition) his principal source was P. Matthieu's Histoire de France, rigorously condensed, and, at the same time, supplemented from other authorities. A collation of Grimeston's text with that of the "Byron" plays and The Revenge proves that every passage in which the dramatist draws upon historical materials is to be found within the four corners of the folio of 1607. The most striking illustrations of this are to be found in the "Byron" plays, and I have shown elsewhere (Athenæum, loc. cit.) that though Chapman in handling the career of the ill-fated Marshal of France is apparently exploiting Pierre Matthieu, Jean de Serres, and Cayet in turn, he is really taking advantage of the labours of Grimeston, who had rifled their stores for his skilful historical mosaic. Grimeston must thus henceforward be recognized as [Pg xxxiv]holding something of the same relation to Chapman as Sir T. North does to Shakespeare, with the distinction that he not only provides the raw material of historical tragedy, but goes some way in the refining process.

The Revenge of Bussy D'Ambois follows historical lines less closely than the "Byron" plays, but here, too, Grimeston's volume was Chapman's inspiring source, and the perusal of its closing pages gives a clue to the origin of this most singular of the dramatist's serious plays. The final episode included in the folio of 1607 was the plot by which the Count d'Auvergne, who had been one of Byron's fellow conspirators, and who had fallen under suspicion for a second time in 1604, was treacherously arrested by agents of the King while attending a review of troops. The position of this narrative (translated from P. Matthieu) at the close of the folio must have helped to draw Chapman's special attention to it, and having expended his genius so liberally on the career of the arch-conspirator of the period, he was apparently moved to handle also that of his interesting confederate. But D'Auvergne's fortunes scarcely furnished the stuff for a complete drama, on Chapman's customary broad scale, and he seems therefore to have conceived the ingenious idea of utilising them as the groundwork of a sequel to his most popular play, Bussy D'Ambois.

He transformed the Count into an imaginary brother of his former hero. For though D'Ambois had two younger brothers, Hubert, seigneur de Moigneville, and Georges, baron de Bussy, it is highly improbable that Chapman had ever heard of them, and there was [Pg xxxv]nothing in the career of either to suggest the figure of Clermont D'Ambois. The name given by Chapman to this unhistorical addition to the family was, I believe, due to a mere chance, if not a misunderstanding. In Grimeston's narrative of the plot against D'Auvergne he mentions that one of the King's agents, D'Eurre, "came to Clermont on Monday at night, and goes unto him [D'Auvergne] where he supped." Here the name Clermont denotes, of course, a place. But Chapman may have possibly misconceived it to refer to the Count, and, in any case, its occurrence in this context probably suggested its bestowal upon the hero of the second D'Ambois play.

A later passage in Grimeston's history gives an interesting glimpse of D'Auvergne's character. We are told that after he had been arrested, and was being conducted to Paris, "all the way he seemed no more afflicted, then when he was at libertie. He tould youthfull and idle tales of his love, and the deceiving of ladies. Hee shott in a harquebuse at birds, wherein hee was so perfect and excellent, as hee did kill larkes as they were flying."

From this hint of a personality serenely proof against the shocks of adversity Chapman elaborated the figure of the "Senecall man," Clermont D'Ambois. In developing his conception he drew, however, not primarily, as this phrase suggests, from the writings of the Roman senator and sage, but from those of the lowlier, though not less authoritative exponent of Stoic doctrine, the enfranchised slave, Epictetus. As is shown, for the first time, in the Notes to this edition, the Discourses of [Pg xxxvi]"the grave Greek moralist," known probably through a Latin version (cf. ii, i, 157), must have been almost as close to Chapman's hand while he was writing The Revenge as Grimeston's compilation. Five long passages in the play (i, i, 336-42, ii, i, 157-60, ii, i, 211-32, iii, iv, 58-75, and iii, iv, 127-41) are translated or adapted from specific dicta in the Discourses, while Epictetus's work in its whole ethical teaching furnished material for the delineation of the ideal Stoic (iv, iv, 14-46) who

"May with heavens immortall powers compare,
To whom the day and fortune equall are;
Come faire or foule, what ever chance can fall,
Fixt in himselfe, hee still is one to all."

But in the character of Clermont there mingle other elements than those derived from either the historical figure of D'Auvergne, or the ideal man of Stoic speculation. Had Hamlet never faltered in the task of executing justice upon the murderer of his father, it is doubtful if a brother of Bussy would ever have trod the Jacobean stage. Not indeed that the idea of vengeance being sought for D'Ambois's fate by one of his nearest kith and kin was without basis in fact. But it was a sister, not a brother, who had devoted her own and her husband's energies to the task, though finally the matter had been compromised. De Thou, at the close of his account of Bussy's murder, relates (vol. iii, lib. lxvii, p. 330):

In a later passage (vol. v, lib. cxviii, p. 558) he is even more explicit. After referring to Bussy's treacherous assassination, he continues:

As these passages first appeared in De Thou's History in the edition of 1620, they cannot have been known to Chapman, when he was writing The Revenge. But the circumstances must have been familiar to him from some other source, probably that which supplied the material for the earlier play. He accordingly introduces Renée D'Ambois (whom he rechristens Charlotte) with her husband into his drama, but with great skill he makes her fiery passion for revenge at all costs a foil to the scrupulous and deliberate procedure of the high-souled Clermont. Like Hamlet, the latter has been commissioned by the ghost of his murdered kinsman to the execution of a task alien to his nature.

Though he sends a challenge to Montsurry, and is not lacking in "the D'Ambois spirit," the atmosphere in which he lingers with whole-hearted zest is that of the philosophical schools. He is eager to draw every chance comer into debate on the first principles of action. Absorbed in speculation, he is indifferent to external circumstances. As Hamlet at the crisis of his fate lets himself be shipped off to England, so Clermont makes no demur when the King, who suspects him of complicity with Guise's traitorous designs, sends him to Cambray, of which his brother-in-law, Baligny, has been appointed Lieutenant. When on his arrival, his sister, the Lieutenant's wife, upbraids him with "lingering" their "dear brother's wreak," he makes the confession (iii, ii, 112-15):

"I repent that ever
(By any instigation in th'appearance
My brothers spirit made, as I imagin'd)
That e'er I yeelded to revenge his murther."

Like Hamlet, too, Clermont, "generous and free from all contriving," is slow to suspect evil in others, and though warned by an anonymous letter—here Chapman draws the incidents from the story of Count D'Auvergne—he lets himself be entrapped at a "muster" or review of troops by the King's emissaries. But the intervention of Guise soon procures his release. In the dialogue that follows between him and his patron the influence of Shakespeare's tragedy is unmistakably patent. The latter is confiding to Clermont his apprehensions for the future, when the ghost of Bussy appears, and chides his brother for his delay in righting [Pg xxxix]his wrongs. That the Umbra of the elder D'Ambois is here merely emulating the attitude of the elder Hamlet's spirit would be sufficiently obvious, even if it were not put beyond doubt by the excited dialogue between Guise, to whom the Ghost is invisible, and Clermont, which is almost a verbal echo of the parallel dialogue between the Danish Prince and the Queen. This second visitation from the unseen world at last stirs up Clermont to execute the long-delayed vengeance upon Montsurry, though he is all but forestalled by Charlotte, who has donned masculine disguise for the purpose. But hard upon the deed comes the news of Guise's assassination, and impatient of the earthly barriers that now sever him from his "lord," Clermont takes his own life in the approved Stoic fashion. So passes from the scene one of the most original and engaging figures in our dramatic literature, and the more thorough our analysis of the curiously diverse elements out of which he has been fashioned, the higher will be our estimate of Chapman's creative power.

Was it primarily with the motive of providing Clermont with a plausible excuse for suicide that Chapman so startlingly transformed the personality of Henry of Guise? The Duke as he appears in The Revenge has scarcely a feature in common either with the Guise of history or of the earlier play. Instead of the turbulent and intriguing noble we see a "true tenth worthy," who realizes that without accompanying virtues "greatness is a shade, a bubble," and who drinks in from the lips of Clermont doctrines "of stability and freedom." To such an extent does Chapman turn apologist for [Pg xl]Guise that in a well-known passage (ii, i, 205 ff.) he goes out of his way to declare that the Massacre of St. Bartholomew was "hainous" only "to a brutish sense, But not a manly reason," and to argue that the blame lay not with "religious Guise," but with those who had played false to "faith and true religion." So astonishing is the dramatist's change of front that, but for the complete lack of substantiating evidence, one would infer that, like Dryden in the interval between Religio Laici and The Hind and Panther, he had joined the Church of Rome. In any case the change is not due to the influence of Grimeston's volume, whence Chapman draws his material for the account of Guise's last days. For Jean de Serres (whom the Englishman is here translating) sums up the Duke's character in an "appreciation," where virtues and faults are impartially balanced and the latter are in no wise extenuated. It is another tribute to Chapman's skill, which only close study of the play in relation to its source brings out, that while he borrows, even to the most minute particulars, from the annalist, he throws round the closing episodes of Guise's career a halo of political martyrdom which there is nothing in the original to suggest. This metamorphosis of Guise is all the more remarkable, because Monsieur, his former co-partner in villany, reappears, in the one scene where he figures, in the same ribald, blustering vein as before, and his death is reported, at the close of Act iv, as a fulfilment of Bussy's dying curse.

While Guise is transfigured, and Monsieur remains his truculent, vainglorious self, Montsurry has suffered a strange degeneration. It is sufficiently remarkable, to [Pg xli]begin with, after his declaration at the end of Bussy D'Ambois,

"May both points of heavens strait axeltree
Conjoyne in one, before thy selfe and me!"

to find him ready to receive back Tamyra as his wife, though her sole motive in rejoining him is to precipitate vengeance on his head. Nor had anything in the earlier play prepared us for the spectacle of him as a poltroon, who has "barricado'd" himself in his house to avoid a challenge, and who shrieks "murther!" at the entrance of an unexpected visitor. In the light of such conduct it is difficult to regard as merely assumed his pusillanimity in the final scene, where he at first grovels before Clermont on the plea that by his baseness he will "shame" the avenger's victory. And when he does finally nerve himself to the encounter, and dies with words of forgiveness for Clermont and Tamyra on his lips, the episode of reconciliation, though evidently intended to be edifying, is so huddled and inconsecutive as to be well-nigh ridiculous.

Equally ineffective and incongruous are the moralising discourses of which Bussy's ghost is made the spokesman. It does not seem to have occurred to Chapman that vindications of divine justice, suitable on the lips of the elder Hamlet, fell with singular infelicity from one who had met his doom in the course of a midnight intrigue. In fact, wherever the dramatist reintroduces the main figures of the earlier play, he falls to an inferior level. He seems unable to revivify its nobler elements, and merely repeats the more [Pg xlii]melodramatic and garish effects which refuse to blend with the classic grace and pathos of Clermont's story. The audiences before whom The Revenge was produced evidently showed themselves ill-affected towards such a medley of purely fictitious creations, and of historical personages and incidents, treated in the most arbitrary fashion. For Chapman in his dedicatory letter to Sir Thomas Howard refers bitterly to the "maligners" with whom the play met "in the scenicall presentation," and asks who will expect "the autenticall truth of eyther person or action . . . in a poeme, whose subject is not truth, but things like truth?" He forgets that "things like truth" are not attained, when alien elements are forced into mechanical union, or when well-known historical characters and events are presented under radically false colours. But we who read the drama after an interval of three centuries can afford to be less perturbed than Jacobean playgoers at its audacious juggling with facts, provided that it appeals to us in other ways. We are not likely indeed to adopt Chapman's view that the elements that give it enduring value are "materiall instruction, elegant and sententious excitation to vertue, and deflection from her contrary." For these we shall assuredly look elsewhere; it is not to them that The Revenge of Bussy D'Ambois owes its distinctive charm. The secret of that charm lies outside the spheres of "autenticall truth," moral as well as historical. It consists, as it seems to me, essentially in this—that the play is one of the most truly spontaneous products of English "humanism" in its later phase. The same passionate impulse—in [Pg xliii]itself so curiously "romantic"—to revitalise classical life and ideals, which prompted Chapman's translation of "Homer, Prince of Poets," is the shaping spirit of this singular tragedy. Its hero, as we have seen, has strayed into the France of the Catholic Reaction from some academe in Athens or in imperial Rome. He is, in truth, far more really a spirit risen from the dead than the materialised Umbra of his brother. His pervasive influence works in all around him, so that nobles and courtiers forget for a time the strife of faction while they linger over some fragrant memory of the older world. Epictetus with his doctrines of how to live and how to die; the "grave Greeke tragedian" who drew "the princesse, sweet Antigone"; Homer with his "unmatched poem"; the orators Demetrius Phalerius and Demades—these and their like cast a spell over the scene, and transport us out of the troubled atmosphere of sixteenth-century vendetta into the "ampler æther," the "diviner air," of "the glory that was Greece, the grandeur that was Rome."

Thus the two Bussy plays, when critically examined, are seen to be essentially unlike in spite of their external similarity. The plot of the one springs from that of the other; both are laid in the same period and milieu; in technique they are closely akin. The diction and imagery are, indeed, simpler, and the verse is of more liquid cadence in The Revenge than in Bussy D'Ambois. But the true difference lies deeper,—in the innermost spirit of the two dramas. Bussy D'Ambois is begotten of "the very torrent, tempest, and whirlwind" of passion; it throbs with the stress of an over-tumultuous life. [Pg xliv]The Revenge is the offspring of the meditative impulse, that averts its gaze from the outward pageant of existence, to peer into the secrets of Man's ultimate destiny, and his relation to the "Universal," of which he involuntarily finds himself a part.

FOOTNOTES:

THE TEXT

Bussy D'Ambois was first printed in quarto in 1607 by W. Aspley, and was reissued in 1608. In 1641, seven years after Chapman's death, Robert Lunne published another edition in quarto of the play, which, according to the title-page, was "much corrected and amended by the Author before his death." This quarto differs essentially from its predecessors. It omits and adds numerous passages, and makes constant minor changes in the text. The revised version is not appreciably superior to the original draft, but, on the evidence of the title-page, it must be accepted as authoritative. It was reissued by Lunne, with a different imprint, in 1646, and by J. Kirton, with a new title-page, in 1657. Copies of the 1641 quarto differ in unimportant details such as articular, articulat, for evidently some errors were corrected as the edition passed through the press. Some copies of the 1646 quarto duplicate the uncorrected copies of the 1641 quarto.

In a reprint of Chapman's Tragedies and Comedies, published by J. Pearson in 1873, the anonymous editor purported to "follow mainly" the text of 1641, but collation with the originals shows that he transcribed that of 1607, substituting the later version where the two quartos differed, but retaining elsewhere the spelling of the earlier one. Nor is his list of variants complete. There have been also three editions of the play in modernized spelling by C. W. Dilke in 1814, R. H. Shepherd in 1874, and W. L. Phelps in 1895, particulars of which are given in the Bibliography. The present edition is therefore the first to reproduce the authoritative text unimpaired. The original spelling has been retained, though capitalization has been modernized, and the use of italics for personal names has not been preserved. But the chaotic punctuation has been throughout revised, though, except to remove ambiguity, I have not interfered with one distinctive feature, an exceptionally frequent use of brackets. In a few cases of doubtful interpretation, the old punctuation has been given in the footnotes.

Dilke, though the earliest of the annotators, contributed most to [Pg xlvi]the elucidation of allusions and obsolete phrases. While seeking to supplement his and his successors' labours in this direction, I have also attempted a more perilous task—the interpretation of passages where the difficulty arises from the peculiar texture of Chapman's thought and style. Such a critical venture seems a necessary preliminary if we are ever to sift truth from falsehood in Dryden's indictment—indolently accepted by many critics as conclusive—of Bussy D'Ambois.

The group of quartos of 1641, 1646, and 1657, containing Chapman's revised text, is denoted by the symbol "B"; those of 1607 and 1608 by "A." In the footnotes all the variants contained in A are given except in a few cases where the reading of A has been adopted in the text and that of B recorded as a variant. I have preferred the reading of A to B, when it gives an obviously better sense, or is metrically superior. I have also included in the Text fifty lines at the beginning of Act ii, Scene 2, which are found only in A. Some slight conjectural emendations have been attempted which are distinguished by "emend. ed." in the footnotes. In these cases the reading of the quartos, if unanimous, is denoted by "Qq."

In the quartos the play is simply divided into five Acts. These I have subdivided into Scenes, within which the lines have been numbered to facilitate reference. The stage directions in B are numerous and precise, and I have made only a few additions, which are enclosed in brackets. The quartos vary between Bussy and D'Ambois, and between Behemoth and Spiritus, as a prefix to speeches. I have kept to the former throughout in either case.

Bussy D'Ambois:

A
TRAGEDIE:

SOURCES

The immediate source of the play has not been identified, but in the Introduction attention has been drawn to passages in the writings of Bussy's contemporaries, especially Brantôme and Marguerite de Valois, which narrate episodes similar to those in the earlier Acts. Extracts from De Thou's Historiae sui temporis and Rosset's Histoires Tragiques, which tell the tale of Bussy's amorous intrigue and his assassination, have also been reprinted as an Appendix. But both these narratives are later than the play. Seneca's representation in the Hercules Œtaeus of the Greek hero's destruction by treachery gave Chapman suggestions for his treatment of the final episode in Bussy's career (cf. v, 4, 100-108, and note).

PROLOGUE

Not out of confidence that none but wee

Are able to present this tragedie,

Nor out of envie at the grace of late

It did receive, nor yet to derogate

From their deserts, who give out boldly that5

They move with equall feet on the same flat;

Neither for all, nor any of such ends,

We offer it, gracious and noble friends,

To your review; wee, farre from emulation,

And (charitably judge) from imitation,10

With this work entertaine you, a peece knowne,

And still beleev'd, in Court to be our owne.

To quit our claime, doubting our right or merit,

Would argue in us poverty of spirit

Which we must not subscribe to: Field is gone,15

Whose action first did give it name, and one

Who came the neerest to him, is denide

[Pg 3]

By his gray beard to shew the height and pride

Of D'Ambois youth and braverie; yet to hold

Our title still a foot, and not grow cold20

By giving it o're, a third man with his best

Of care and paines defends our interest;

As Richard he was lik'd, nor doe wee feare,

In personating D'Ambois, hee'le appeare

To faint, or goe lesse, so your free consent,25

As heretofore, give him encouragement.

LINENOTES:

[DRAMATIS PERSONÆ.[4:1]

FOOTNOTES:

Bussy D'Ambois

A
Tragedie

Actus primi Scena prima.

[Bussy.] Fortune, not Reason, rules the state of things,

Reward goes backwards, Honor on his head,

Who is not poore is monstrous; only Need

Gives forme and worth to every humane seed.

As cedars beaten with continuall stormes,5

So great men flourish; and doe imitate

Unskilfull statuaries, who suppose

(In forming a Colossus) if they make him

Stroddle enough, stroot, and look bigg, and gape,

Their work is goodly: so men meerely great 10

In their affected gravity of voice,

[Pg 6]

Sowrnesse of countenance, manners cruelty,

Authority, wealth, and all the spawne of Fortune,

Think they beare all the Kingdomes worth before them;

Yet differ not from those colossick statues,15

Which, with heroique formes without o're-spread,

Within are nought but morter, flint and lead.

Man is a torch borne in the winde; a dreame

But of a shadow, summ'd with all his substance;

And as great seamen using all their wealth 20

And skills in Neptunes deepe invisible pathes,

In tall ships richly built and ribd with brasse,

To put a girdle round about the world,

When they have done it (comming neere their haven)

Are faine to give a warning peece, and call 25

A poore staid fisher-man, that never past

His countries sight, to waft and guide them in:

So when we wander furthest through the waves

Of glassie Glory, and the gulfes of State,

Topt with all titles, spreading all our reaches,30

As if each private arme would sphere the earth,

Wee must to vertue for her guide resort,

Or wee shall shipwrack in our safest port. Procumbit.

[Monsieur.] There is no second place in numerous state

That holds more than a cypher: in a King35

All places are contain'd. His words and looks

Are like the flashes and the bolts of Jove;

His deeds inimitable, like the sea

That shuts still as it opes, and leaves no tracts,

Nor prints of president for meane mens facts:40

There's but a thred betwixt me and a crowne;

I would not wish it cut, unlesse by nature;

Yet to prepare me for that possible fortune,

'Tis good to get resolved spirits about mee.

I follow'd D'Ambois to this greene retreat;45

A man of spirit beyond the reach of feare,

Who (discontent with his neglected worth)

Neglects the light, and loves obscure abodes;

But hee is young and haughty, apt to take

Fire at advancement, to beare state, and flourish;50

In his rise therefore shall my bounties shine:

None lothes the world so much, nor loves to scoffe it,

But gold and grace will make him surfet of it.

What, D'Ambois!—

Buss.He, sir.

Mons.Turn'd to earth, alive!

Up man, the sunne shines on thee.

[Pg 8]

Buss.Let it shine:55

I am no mote to play in't, as great men are.

Mons. Callest thou men great in state, motes in the sunne?

They say so that would have thee freeze in shades,

That (like the grosse Sicilian gurmundist)

Empty their noses in the cates they love,60

That none may eat but they. Do thou but bring

Light to the banquet Fortune sets before thee

And thou wilt loath leane darknesse like thy death.

Who would beleeve thy mettall could let sloth

Rust and consume it? If Themistocles65

Had liv'd obscur'd thus in th'Athenian State,

Xerxes had made both him and it his slaves.

If brave Camillus had lurckt so in Rome,

He had not five times beene Dictator there,

Nor foure times triumpht. If Epaminondas70

(Who liv'd twice twenty yeeres obscur'd in Thebs)

Had liv'd so still, he had beene still unnam'd,

And paid his country nor himselfe their right:

But putting forth his strength he rescu'd both

From imminent ruine; and, like burnisht steele,75

After long use he shin'd; for as the light

Not only serves to shew, but render us

[Pg 9]

Mutually profitable, so our lives

In acts exemplarie not only winne

Our selves good names, but doe to others give 80

Matter for vertuous deeds, by which wee live.

Buss. What would you wish me?

Mons.Leave the troubled streames,

And live where thrivers doe, at the well head.

Buss. At the well head? Alas! what should I doe

With that enchanted glasse? See devils there?85

Or (like a strumpet) learne to set my looks

In an eternall brake, or practise jugling,

To keep my face still fast, my heart still loose;

Or beare (like dames schoolmistresses their riddles)

Two tongues, and be good only for a shift;90

Flatter great lords, to put them still in minde

Why they were made lords; or please humorous ladies

With a good carriage, tell them idle tales,

To make their physick work; spend a man's life

In sights and visitations, that will make95

His eyes as hollow as his mistresse heart:

To doe none good, but those that have no need;

To gaine being forward, though you break for haste

[Pg 10]

All the commandements ere you break your fast;

But beleeve backwards, make your period 100

And creeds last article, "I beleeve in God":

And (hearing villanies preacht) t'unfold their art,

Learne to commit them? Tis a great mans part.

Shall I learne this there?

Mons.No, thou needst not learne;

Thou hast the theorie; now goe there and practise.105

Buss. I, in a thrid-bare suit; when men come there,

They must have high naps, and goe from thence bare:

A man may drowne the parts of ten rich men

In one poore suit; brave barks, and outward glosse

Attract Court loves, be in parts ne're so grosse.110

Mons. Thou shalt have glosse enough, and all things fit

T'enchase in all shew thy long smothered spirit:

Be rul'd by me then. The old Scythians

Painted blinde Fortunes powerfull hands with wings,

[Pg 11]

To shew her gifts come swift and suddenly,115

Which if her favorite be not swift to take,

He loses them for ever. Then be wise;

Stay but a while here, and I'le send to thee.

Buss. What will he send? some crowns? It is to sow them

Upon my spirit, and make them spring a crowne 120

Worth millions of the seed crownes he will send.

Like to disparking noble husbandmen,

Hee'll put his plow into me, plow me up;

But his unsweating thrift is policie,

And learning-hating policie is ignorant 125

To fit his seed-land soyl; a smooth plain ground

Will never nourish any politick seed.

I am for honest actions, not for great:

If I may bring up a new fashion,

And rise in Court for vertue, speed his plow!130

The King hath knowne me long as well as hee,

Yet could my fortune never fit the length

Of both their understandings till this houre.

There is a deepe nicke in Times restlesse wheele

[Pg 12]

For each mans good, when which nicke comes, it strikes;135

As rhetorick yet workes not perswasion,

But only is a meane to make it worke:

So no man riseth by his reall merit,

But when it cries "clincke" in his raisers spirit.

Many will say, that cannot rise at all,140

Mans first houres rise is first step to his fall.

I'le venture that; men that fall low must die,

As well as men cast headlong from the skie.

[Maffe.] Humor of Princes! Is this wretch indu'd

With any merit worth a thousand crownes?145

Will my lord have me be so ill a steward

Of his revenue, to dispose a summe

So great, with so small cause as shewes in him?

I must examine this. Is your name D'Ambois?

Buss. Sir?

Maff. Is your name D'Ambois?

Buss. Who have we here?150

Serve you the Monsieur?

Maff. How?

Buss. Serve you the Monsieur?

Maff. Sir, y'are very hot. I doe serve the Monsieur;

[Pg 13]

But in such place as gives me the command

Of all his other servants: and because

His Graces pleasure is to give your good 155

His passe through my command, me thinks you might

Use me with more respect.

Buss. Crie you mercy!

Now you have opened my dull eies, I see you,

And would be glad to see the good you speake of:

What might I call your name?

Maff. Monsieur Maffe.160

Buss. Monsieur Maffe? Then, good Monsieur Maffe,

Pray let me know you better.

Maff. Pray doe so,

That you may use me better. For your selfe,

By your no better outside, I would judge you

To be some poet. Have you given my lord 165

Some pamphlet?

Buss. Pamphlet!

Maff. Pamphlet, sir, I say.

[Pg 14]

Buss. Did your great masters goodnesse leave the good,

That is to passe your charge to my poore use,

To your discretion?

Maff. Though he did not, sir,

I hope 'tis no rude office to aske reason 170

How that his Grace gives me in charge, goes from me?

Buss. That's very perfect, sir.

Maff. Why, very good, sir;

I pray, then, give me leave. If for no pamphlet,

May I not know what other merit in you

Makes his compunction willing to relieve you?175

Buss. No merit in the world, sir.

Maff. That is strange.

Y'are a poore souldier, are you?

Buss. That I am, sir.

Maff. And have commanded?

Buss. I, and gone without, sir.

Maff. I see the man: a hundred crownes will make him

Swagger, and drinke healths to his Graces bountie,180

And sweare he could not be more bountifull;

So there's nine hundred crounes sav'd. Here, tall souldier,

[Pg 15]

His Grace hath sent you a whole hundred crownes.

Buss. A hundred, sir! Nay, doe his Highnesse right;

I know his hand is larger, and perhaps185

I may deserve more than my outside shewes.

I am a poet as I am a souldier,

And I can poetise; and (being well encourag'd)

May sing his fame for giving; yours for delivering

(Like a most faithfull steward) what he gives.190

Maff. What shall your subject be?

Buss. I care not much

If to his bounteous Grace I sing the praise

Of faire great noses, and to you of long ones.

What qualities have you, sir, (beside your chaine

And velvet jacket)? Can your Worship dance?195

Maff. A pleasant fellow, faith; it seemes my lord

Will have him for his jester; and, berlady,

Such men are now no fooles; 'tis a knights place.

If I (to save his Grace some crounes) should urge him

[Pg 16]

T'abate his bountie, I should not be heard;200

I would to heaven I were an errant asse,

For then I should be sure to have the eares

Of these great men, where now their jesters have them.

Tis good to please him, yet Ile take no notice

Of his preferment, but in policie 205

Will still be grave and serious, lest he thinke

I feare his woodden dagger. Here, Sir Ambo!

Buss. How, Ambo, Sir?

Maff. I, is not your name Ambo?

Buss. You call'd me lately D'Amboys; has your Worship

So short a head?

Maff. I cry thee mercy, D'Amboys.210

A thousand crownes I bring you from my lord;

If you be thriftie, and play the good husband, you may make

This a good standing living; 'tis a bountie,

His Highnesse might perhaps have bestow'd better.

Buss. Goe, y'are a rascall; hence, away, you rogue! [Strikes him.]215

Maff. What meane you, sir?

Buss. Hence! prate no more!

Or, by thy villans bloud, thou prat'st thy last!

[Pg 17]

A barbarous groome grudge at his masters bountie!

But since I know he would as much abhorre

His hinde should argue what he gives his friend,220

Take that, Sir, for your aptnesse to dispute. Exit.

Maff. These crownes are set in bloud; bloud be their fruit! Exit.

LINENOTES:

[Scena Secunda.

Henry, Guise, Montsurry, Elenor, Tamyra, Beaupre, Pero, Charlotte, Pyra, Annable.

Henry. Duchesse of Guise, your Grace is much enricht

In the attendance of that English virgin,

That will initiate her prime of youth,

(Dispos'd to Court conditions) under the hand

Of your prefer'd instructions and command,5

Rather than any in the English Court,

Whose ladies are not matcht in Christendome

For gracefull and confirm'd behaviours,

More than the Court, where they are bred, is equall'd.

Guise. I like not their Court-fashion; it is too crestfalne 10

[Pg 18]

In all observance, making demi-gods

Of their great nobles; and of their old Queene

An ever-yong and most immortall goddesse.

Montsurry. No question shee's the rarest Queene in Europe.

Guis. But what's that to her immortality?15

Henr. Assure you, cosen Guise, so great a courtier,

So full of majestic and roiall parts,

No Queene in Christendome may vaunt her selfe.

Her Court approves it: that's a Court indeed,

Not mixt with clowneries us'd in common houses;20

But, as Courts should be th'abstracts of their Kingdomes,

In all the beautie, state, and worth they hold,

So is hers, amplie, and by her inform'd.

The world is not contracted in a man,

With more proportion and expression,25

Than in her Court, her kingdome. Our French Court

Is a meere mirror of confusion to it:

The king and subject, lord and every slave,

Dance a continuall haie; our roomes of state

Kept like our stables; no place more observ'd 30

[Pg 19]

Than a rude market-place: and though our custome

Keepe this assur'd confusion from our eyes,

'Tis nere the lesse essentially unsightly,

Which they would soone see, would they change their forme

To this of ours, and then compare them both;35

Which we must not affect, because in kingdomes,

Where the Kings change doth breed the subjects terror,

Pure innovation is more grosse than error.

Mont. No question we shall see them imitate

(Though a farre off) the fashions of our Courts,40

As they have ever ap't us in attire;

Never were men so weary of their skins,

And apt to leape out of themselves as they;

Who, when they travell to bring forth rare men,

Come home delivered of a fine French suit:45

Their braines lie with their tailors, and get babies

For their most compleat issue; hee's sole heire

To all the morall vertues that first greetes

The light with a new fashion, which becomes them

Like apes, disfigur'd with the attires of men.50

Henr. No question they much wrong their reall worth

[Pg 20]

In affectation of outlandish scumme;

But they have faults, and we more: they foolish-proud

To jet in others plumes so haughtely;

We proud that they are proud of foolerie,55

Holding our worthes more compleat for their vaunts.

Monsieur. Come, mine owne sweet heart, I will enter thee.

Sir, I have brought a gentleman to court;

And pray, you would vouchsafe to doe him grace.

Henr. D'Ambois, I thinke.

Bussy. That's still my name, my lord,60

Though I be something altered in attire.

Henr. We like your alteration, and must tell you,

We have expected th'offer of your service;

For we (in feare to make mild vertue proud)

Use not to seeke her out in any man.65

Buss. Nor doth she use to seeke out any man:

He that will winne, must wooe her: she's not shameless.

[Pg 21]

Mons. I urg'd her modestie in him, my lord,

And gave her those rites that he sayes shee merits.

Henr. If you have woo'd and won, then, brother, weare him.70

Mons. Th'art mine, sweet heart! See, here's the Guises Duches;

The Countesse of Mountsurreaue, Beaupre.

Come, I'le enseame thee. Ladies, y'are too many

To be in counsell: I have here a friend

That I would gladly enter in your graces.75

Buss. 'Save you, ladyes!

Duchess. If you enter him in our graces, my

lord, me thinkes, by his blunt behaviour he should

come out of himselfe.

Tamyra. Has he never beene courtier, my80

lord?

Mons. Never, my lady.

Beaupre. And why did the toy take him inth'

head now?

Buss. Tis leape yeare, lady, and therefore very 85

good to enter a courtier.

Henr. Marke, Duchesse of Guise, there is

one is not bashfull.

Duch. No my lord, he is much guilty of the

bold extremity.90

[Pg 22]

Tam. The man's a courtier at first sight.

Buss. I can sing pricksong, lady, at first

sight; and why not be a courtier as suddenly?

Beaup. Here's a courtier rotten before he be

ripe.95

Buss. Thinke me not impudent, lady; I am

yet no courtier; I desire to be one and would

gladly take entrance, madam, under your

princely colours.

Duch. Soft sir, you must rise by degrees, first 100

being the servant of some common Lady or

Knights wife, then a little higher to a Lords

wife; next a little higher to a Countesse; yet a

little higher to a Duchesse, and then turne the

ladder.105

Buss. Doe you alow a man then foure mistresses,

when the greatest mistresse is alowed

but three servants?

Duch. Where find you that statute sir.

Buss. Why be judged by the groome-porters.110

Duch. The groome-porters!

Buss. I, madam, must not they judge of all

gamings i'th' Court?

Duch. You talke like a gamester.

Gui. Sir, know you me?115

[Pg 23]

Buss. My lord!

Gui. I know not you; whom doe you serve?

Buss. Serve, my lord!

Gui. Go to companion; your courtship's too

saucie.120

Buss. Saucie! Companion! tis the Guise,

but yet those termes might have beene spar'd of

the guiserd. Companion! He's jealous, by this

light. Are you blind of that side, Duke? Ile

to her againe for that. Forth, princely mistresse,125

for the honour of courtship. Another riddle.

Gui. Cease your courtshippe, or, by heaven,

Ile cut your throat.

Buss. Cut my throat? cut a whetstone, young

Accius Nœvius! Doe as much with your 130

tongue as he did with a rasor. Cut my throat!

Barrisor. What new-come gallant have wee

heere, that dares mate the Guise thus?

L'Anou. Sfoot, tis D'Ambois! the Duke mistakes

him (on my life) for some Knight of the135

new edition.

Buss. Cut my throat! I would the King

fear'd thy cutting of his throat no more than I

feare thy cutting of mine.

Gui. Ile doe't, by this hand.140

[Pg 24]

Buss. That hand dares not doe't; y'ave cut

too many throats already, Guise, and robb'd the

realme of many thousand soules, more precious

than thine owne. Come, madam, talk on. Sfoot,

can you not talk? Talk on, I say. Another 145

riddle.

Pyrhot. Here's some strange distemper.

Bar. Here's a sudden transmigration with

D'Ambois, out of the Knights ward into the

Duches bed.150

L'An. See what a metamorphosis a brave

suit can work.

Pyr. Slight! step to the Guise, and discover

him.

Bar. By no meanes; let the new suit work;155

wee'll see the issue.

Gui. Leave your courting.

Buss. I will not. I say, mistresse, and I will

stand unto it, that if a woman may have three

servants, a man may have threescore mistresses.160

Gui. Sirrha, Ile have you whipt out of the

Court for this insolence.

Buss. Whipt! Such another syllable out a

th'presence, if thou dar'st, for thy Dukedome.

Gui. Remember, poultron!165

Mons. Pray thee forbeare!

[Pg 25]

Buss. Passion of death! Were not the King

here, he should strow the chamber like a rush.

Mons. But leave courting his wife then.

Buss. I wil not: Ile court her in despight of170

him. Not court her! Come madam, talk on;

feare me nothing. [To Guise.] Well mai'st

thou drive thy master from the Court, but never

D'Ambois.

Mons. His great heart will not down, tis like the sea,175

That partly by his owne internall heat,

Partly the starrs daily and nightly motion,

Their heat and light, and partly of the place

The divers frames, but chiefly by the moone,

Bristled with surges, never will be wonne,180

(No, not when th'hearts of all those powers are burst)

To make retreat into his setled home,

Till he be crown'd with his owne quiet fome.

Henr. You have the mate. Another?

Gui. No more. Flourish short.

Bar. Why here's the lion skar'd with the185

throat of a dunghill cock, a fellow that has

newly shak'd off his shackles; now does he

crow for that victory.

[Pg 26]

L'An. Tis one of the best jiggs that ever

was acted.190

Pyr. Whom does the Guise suppose him to

be, troe?

L'An. Out of doubt, some new denizond

Lord, and thinks that suit newly drawne out a

th' mercers books.195

Bar. I have heard of a fellow, that by a fixt

imagination looking upon a bulbaiting, had a

visible paire of hornes grew out of his forhead:

and I beleeve this gallant overjoyed with the

conceit of Monsieurs cast suit, imagines himselfe 200

to be the Monsieur.

L'An. And why not? as well as the asse

stalking in the lions case, bare himselfe like a

lion, braying all the huger beasts out of the

forrest?205

Pyr. Peace! he looks this way.

Bar. Marrie, let him look, sir; what will you

say now if the Guise be gone to fetch a blanquet

for him?

L'An. Faith, I beleeve it, for his honour sake.210

Pyr. But, if D'Ambois carrie it cleane? Exeunt Ladies.

Bar. True, when he curvets in the blanquet.

Pyr. I, marrie, sir.

L'An. Sfoot, see how he stares on's.

Bar. Lord blesse us, let's away.215

[Pg 27]

Buss. Now, sir, take your full view: who

does the object please ye?

Bar. If you aske my opinion, sir, I think

your suit sits as well as if't had beene made for

you.220

Buss. So, sir, and was that the subject of your

ridiculous joylity?

L'An. What's that to you, sir?

Buss. Sir, I have observ'd all your fleerings;

and resolve your selves yee shall give a strickt 225

account for't.

Bar. O miraculous jealousie! Doe you think

your selfe such a singular subject for laughter

that none can fall into the matter of our merriment

but you?230

L'An. This jealousie of yours, sir, confesses

some close defect in your selfe that wee never

dream'd of.

Pyr. Wee held discourse of a perfum'd asse,

that being disguis'd in a lions case imagin'd 235

himself a lion: I hope that toucht not you.

Buss. So, sir? Your descants doe marvellous

well fit this ground; we shall meet where your

buffonly laughters will cost ye the best blood in

your bodies.240

[Pg 28]

Bar. For lifes sake, let's be gone; hee'll kill's

outright else.

Buss. Goe, at your pleasures; Ile be your

ghost to haunt you; and yee sleepe an't, hang

me.245

L'An. Goe, goe, sir; court your mistresse.

Pyr. And be advis'd; we shall have odds

against you.

Buss. Tush, valour stands not in number: Ile

maintaine it that one man may beat three boyes.250

Brisac. Nay, you shall have no ods of him in

number, sir; hee's a gentleman as good as the

proudest of you, and yee shall not wrong him.

Bar. Not, sir?

Melynell. Not, sir; though he be not so rich,255

hee's a better man than the best of you; and I

will not endure it.

L'An. Not you, sir?

Bris. No, sir, nor I.

Buss. I should thank you for this kindnesse,260

if I thought these perfum'd musk-cats (being

out of this priviledge) durst but once mew at us.

Bar. Does your confident spirit doubt that,

sir? Follow us and try.

L'An. Come, sir, wee'll lead you a dance. 265

LINENOTES:

Actus Secund[i.] Scena Prima.

Henry. This desperate quarrell sprung out of their envies

To D'Ambois sudden bravery, and great spirit.

Guise. Neither is worth their envie.

Henr. Lesse than either

Will make the gall of envie overflow;

She feeds on outcast entrailes like a kite:5

In which foule heape, if any ill lies hid,

She sticks her beak into it, shakes it up,

And hurl's it all abroad, that all may view it.

Corruption is her nutriment; but touch her

With any precious oyntment, and you kill her.10

Where she finds any filth in men, she feasts,

And with her black throat bruits it through the world

Being sound and healthfull; but if she but taste

The slenderest pittance of commended vertue,

She surfets of it, and is like a flie15

That passes all the bodies soundest parts,

And dwels upon the sores; or if her squint eie

[Pg 30]

Have power to find none there, she forges some:

She makes that crooked ever which is strait;

Calls valour giddinesse, justice tyrannie:20

A wise man may shun her, she not her selfe;

Whither soever she flies from her harmes,

She beares her foe still claspt in her own armes:

And therefore, cousen Guise, let us avoid her.

Nuncius. What Atlas or Olympus lifts his head 25

So farre past covert, that with aire enough

My words may be inform'd, and from their height

I may be seene and heard through all the world?

A tale so worthy, and so fraught with wonder,

Sticks in my jawes, and labours with event.30

Henr. Com'st thou from D'Ambois?

Nun. From him, and the rest,

His friends and enemies; whose sterne fight I saw,

And heard their words before, and in the fray.

Henr. Relate at large what thou hast seene and heard.

Nun. I saw fierce D'Ambois and his two brave friends35

Enter the field, and at their heeles their foes;

Which were the famous souldiers, Barrisor,

[Pg 31]

L'Anou, and Pyrrhot, great in deeds of armes.

All which arriv'd at the evenest peece of earth

The field afforded, the three challengers40

Turn'd head, drew all their rapiers, and stood ranck't;

When face to face the three defendants met them,

Alike prepar'd, and resolute alike.

Like bonfires of contributorie wood

Every mans look shew'd, fed with eithers spirit;45

As one had beene a mirror to another,

Like formes of life and death each took from other;

And so were life and death mixt at their heights,

That you could see no feare of death, for life,

Nor love of life, for death: but in their browes50

Pyrrho's opinion in great letters shone:

That life and death in all respects are one.

Henr. Past there no sort of words at their encounter?

Nun. As Hector, twixt the hosts of Greece and Troy,

(When Paris and the Spartane King should end55

The nine yeares warre) held up his brasen launce

For signall that both hosts should cease from armes,

And heare him speak; so Barrisor (advis'd)

[Pg 32]

Advanc'd his naked rapier twixt both sides,

Ript up the quarrell, and compar'd six lives60

Then laid in ballance with six idle words;

Offer'd remission and contrition too,

Or else that he and D'Ambois might conclude

The others dangers. D'Ambois lik'd the last;

But Barrisors friends (being equally engag'd65

In the maine quarrell) never would expose

His life alone to that they all deserv'd.

And for the other offer of remission

D'Ambois (that like a lawrell put in fire

Sparkl'd and spit) did much much more than scorne 70

That his wrong should incense him so like chaffe,

To goe so soone out, and like lighted paper

Approve his spirit at once both fire and ashes.

So drew they lots, and in them Fates appointed,

That Barrisor should fight with firie D'Ambois;75

Pyrhot with Melynell, with Brisac L'Anou;

And then, like flame and powder, they commixt

So spritely, that I wisht they had beene spirits,

That the ne're shutting wounds they needs must open

Might, as they open'd, shut, and never kill.80

But D'Ambois sword (that lightned as it flew)

Shot like a pointed comet at the face

[Pg 33]

Of manly Barrisor, and there it stucke:

Thrice pluckt he at it, and thrice drew on thrusts

From him that of himselfe was free as fire,85

Who thrust still as he pluckt; yet (past beliefe!)

He with his subtile eye, hand, body, scap't.

At last, the deadly bitten point tugg'd off,

On fell his yet undaunted foe so fiercely,

That (only made more horrid with his wound)90

Great D'Ambois shrunke, and gave a little ground;

But soone return'd, redoubled in his danger,

And at the heart of Barrisor seal'd his anger.

Then, as in Arden I have seene an oke

Long shooke with tempests, and his loftie toppe95

Bent to his root, which being at length made loose

(Even groaning with his weight), he gan to nodde

This way and that, as loth his curled browes

(Which he had oft wrapt in the skie with stormes)

Should stoope: and yet, his radicall fivers burst,100

Storme-like he fell, and hid the feare-cold earth—

So fell stout Barrisor, that had stood the shocks

Of ten set battels in your Highnesse warre,

'Gainst the sole souldier of the world, Navarre.

[Pg 34]

Gui. O pitious and horrid murther!

[Montsurry.] Such a life 105

Me thinks had mettall in it to survive

An age of men.

Henr. Such often soonest end.—

Thy felt report cals on; we long to know

On what events the other have arriv'd.

Nun. Sorrow and fury, like two opposite fumes110

Met in the upper region of a cloud,

At the report made by this worthies fall,

Brake from the earth, and with them rose Revenge,

Entring with fresh powers his two noble friends;

And under that ods fell surcharg'd Brisac,115

The friend of D'Ambois, before fierce L'Anou;

Which D'Ambois seeing, as I once did see,

In my young travels through Armenia,

An angrie unicorne in his full cariere

Charge with too swift a foot a jeweller,120

That watcht him for the treasure of his brow,

And, ere he could get shelter of a tree,

Naile him with his rich antler to the earth:

So D'Ambois ranne upon reveng'd L'Anou,

Who eying th'eager point borne in his face,125

And giving backe, fell back; and, in his fall,

His foes uncurbed sword stopt in his heart:

By which time all the life strings of th'tw'other

[Pg 35]

Were cut, and both fell, as their spirit flew,

Upwards, and still hunt Honour at the view.130

And now (of all the six) sole D'Ambois stood

Untoucht, save only with the others bloud.

Henr. All slaine outright?

Nun. All slaine outright but he,

Who kneeling in the warme life of his friends,

(All freckled with the bloud his rapier raind)135

He kist their pale lips, and bade both farewell:

And see the bravest man the French earth beares! [Exit Nuntius.]

Bussy. Now is the time; y'are princely vow'd my friend;

Perform it princely, and obtaine my pardon.

Monsieur. Else Heaven forgive not me! Come on, brave friend!140

If ever Nature held her selfe her owne,

When the great triall of a King and subject

Met in one bloud, both from one belly springing,

Now prove her vertue and her greatnesse one,

Or make the t'one the greater with the t'other,145

(As true Kings should) and for your brothers love

(Which is a speciall species of true vertue)

Doe that you could not doe, not being a King.

[Pg 36]

Henr. Brother, I know your suit; these wilfull murthers

Are ever past our pardon.

Mons. Manly slaughter150

Should never beare th'account of wilfull murther,

It being a spice of justice, where with life

Offending past law equall life is laid

In equall ballance, to scourge that offence

By law of reputation, which to men155

Exceeds all positive law; and what that leaves

To true mens valours (not prefixing rights

Of satisfaction suited to their wrongs)

A free mans eminence may supply and take.

Henr. This would make every man that thinks him wrong'd,160

Or is offended, or in wrong or right,

Lay on this violence; and all vaunt themselves

Law-menders and supplyers, though meere butchers,

Should this fact, though of justice, be forgiven.

Mons. O no, my Lord! it would make cowards feare 165

To touch the reputations of true men.

When only they are left to impe the law,

Justice will soone distinguish murtherous minds

From just revengers. Had my friend beene slaine,

[Pg 37]

His enemy surviving, he should die,170

Since he had added to a murther'd fame

(Which was in his intent) a murthered man;

And this had worthily beene wilfull murther;

But my friend only sav'd his fames deare life,

Which is above life, taking th'under value175

Which in the wrong it did was forfeit to him;

And in this fact only preserves a man

In his uprightnesse, worthy to survive

Millions of such as murther men alive.

Henr. Well, brother, rise, and raise your friend withall180

From death to life: and, D'Ambois, let your life

(Refin'd by passing through this merited death)

Be purg'd from more such foule pollution;

Nor on your scape, nor valour, more presuming

To be again so violent.

Buss. My Lord,185

I lothe as much a deed of unjust death,

As law it selfe doth; and to tyrannise,

Because I have a little spirit to dare,

And power to doe, as to be tyranniz'd.

This is a grace that (on my knees redoubled)190

I crave, to double this my short lifes gift,

And shall your royal bountie centuple,

That I may so make good what Law and Nature

Have given me for my good: since I am free,

[Pg 38]

(Offending no just law) let no law make,195

By any wrong it does, my life her slave:

When I am wrong'd, and that Law failes to right me,

Let me be King my selfe (as man was made)

And doe a justice that exceeds the Law:

If my wrong passe the power of single valour 200

To right and expiate, then be you my King,

And doe a right, exceeding Law and Nature.

Who to himselfe is law, no law doth need,

Offends no law, and is a King indeed.

Henr. Enjoy what thou intreat'st, we give but ours.205

Buss. What you have given, my lord, is ever yours. Exit Rex cum [Montsurry.]

Gui. Mort dieu, who would have pardon'd such a murther? Exit.

Mons. Now vanish horrors into Court attractions

For which let this balme make thee fresh and faire!

And now forth with thy service to the Duchesse,210

As my long love will to Monsurries Countesse. Exit.

[Pg 39]

Buss. To whom my love hath long been vow'd in heart,

Although in hand, for shew, I held the Duchesse.

And now through bloud and vengeance, deeds of height,

And hard to be atchiev'd, tis fit I make215

Attempt of her perfection. I need feare

No check in his rivality, since her vertues

Are so renown'd, and hee of all dames hated. Exit.

LINENOTES:

[Actus Secundi Scena Secunda.

Montsurry. He will have pardon, sure.

Tamyra. Twere pittie else:

For though his great spirit something overflow,

All faults are still borne, that from greatnesse grow:

But such a sudden courtier saw I never.

Beaupre. He was too sudden, which indeed was rudenesse.5

Tam. True, for it argued his no due conceit

Both of the place, and greatnesse of the persons,

Nor of our sex: all which (we all being strangers

[Pg 40]

To his encounter) should have made more maners

Deserve more welcome.

Mont. All this fault is found10

Because he lov'd the Duchesse and left you.

Tam. Ahlas, love give her joy! I am so farre

From envie of her honour, that I sweare,

Had he encounterd me with such proud sleight,

I would have put that project face of his15

To a more test than did her Dutchesship.

Beau. Why (by your leave, my lord) Ile speake it heere,

(Although she be my ante) she scarce was modest,

When she perceived the Duke, her husband, take

Those late exceptions to her servants courtship,20

To entertaine him.

Tam. I, and stand him still,

Letting her husband give her servant place:

Though he did manly, she should be a woman.

[Guise.] D'Ambois is pardond! wher's a King? where law?

See how it runnes, much like a turbulent sea;25

Heere high and glorious, as it did contend

To wash the heavens, and make the stars more pure;

And heere so low, it leaves the mud of hell

[Pg 41]

To every common view. Come, Count Montsurry,

We must consult of this.

Tam. Stay not, sweet lord.30

Mont. Be pleased; Ile strait returne. Exit cum Guise.

Tam. Would that would please me!

Beau. Ile leave you, madam, to your passions;

I see ther's change of weather in your lookes. Exit cum suis.

Tam. I cannot cloake it; but, as when a fume,

Hot, drie, and grosse, within the wombe of earth35

Or in her superficies begot,

When extreame cold hath stroke it to her heart,

The more it is comprest, the more it rageth,

Exceeds his prisons strength that should containe it,

And then it tosseth temples in the aire,40

All barres made engines to his insolent fury:

So, of a sudden, my licentious fancy

Riots within me: not my name and house,

Nor my religion to this houre observ'd,

Can stand above it; I must utter that45

That will in parting breake more strings in me,

Than death when life parts; and that holy man

[Pg 42]

That, from my cradle, counseld for my soule,

I now must make an agent for my bloud.

Monsieur. Yet is my mistresse gratious?

Tam. Yet unanswered?50

Mons. Pray thee regard thine owne good, if not mine,

And cheere my love for that: you doe not know

What you may be by me, nor what without me;

I may have power t'advance and pull downe any.

Tam. That's not my study. One way I am sure55

You shall not pull downe me; my husbands height

Is crowne to all my hopes, and his retiring

To any meane state, shall be my aspiring.

Mine honour's in mine owne hands, spite of kings.

Mons. Honour, what's that? your second maydenhead:60

And what is that? a word: the word is gone,

The thing remaines; the rose is pluckt, the stalk

Abides: an easie losse where no lack's found.

Beleeve it, there's as small lack in the losse

As there is paine ith' losing. Archers ever65

[Pg 43]

Have two strings to a bow, and shall great Cupid

(Archer of archers both in men and women)

Be worse provided than a common archer?

A husband and a friend all wise wives have.

Tam. Wise wives they are that on such strings depend,70

With a firme husband joyning a lose friend.

Mons. Still you stand on your husband; so doe all

The common sex of you, when y'are encounter'd

With one ye cannot fancie: all men know

You live in Court here by your owne election,75

Frequenting all our common sports and triumphs,

All the most youthfull company of men.

And wherefore doe you this? To please your husband?

Tis grosse and fulsome: if your husbands pleasure

Be all your object, and you ayme at honour80

In living close to him, get you from Court,

You may have him at home; these common put-ofs

For common women serve: "my honour! husband!"

[Pg 44]

Dames maritorious ne're were meritorious:

Speak plaine, and say "I doe not like you, sir,85

Y'are an ill-favour'd fellow in my eye,"

And I am answer'd.

Tam. Then I pray be answer'd:

For in good faith, my lord, I doe not like you

In that sort you like.

Mons. Then have at you here!

Take (with a politique hand) this rope of pearle;90

And though you be not amorous, yet be wise:

Take me for wisedom; he that you can love

Is nere the further from you.

Tam. Now it comes

So ill prepar'd, that I may take a poyson

Under a medicine as good cheap as it:95

I will not have it were it worth the world.

Mons. Horror of death! could I but please your eye,

You would give me the like, ere you would loose me.

"Honour and husband!"

Tam. By this light, my lord,

Y'are a vile fellow; and Ile tell the King100

Your occupation of dishonouring ladies,

And of his Court. A lady cannot live

As she was borne, and with that sort of pleasure

That fits her state, but she must be defam'd

[Pg 45]

With an infamous lords detraction:105

Who would endure the Court if these attempts,

Of open and profest lust must be borne?—

Whose there? come on, dame, you are at your book

When men are at your mistresse; have I taught you

Any such waiting womans quality?110

Mons. Farewell, good "husband"! Exit Mons[ieur].

Tam. Farewell, wicked lord!

Mont. Was not the Monsieur here?

Tam. Yes, to good purpose;

And your cause is as good to seek him too,

And haunt his company.

Mont. Why, what's the matter?

Tam. Matter of death, were I some husbands wife:115

I cannot live at quiet in my chamber

For oportunities almost to rapes

Offerd me by him.

Mont. Pray thee beare with him:

Thou know'st he is a bachelor, and a courtier,

I, and a Prince: and their prerogatives120

Are to their lawes, as to their pardons are

Their reservations, after Parliaments—

[Pg 46]

One quits another; forme gives all their essence.

That Prince doth high in vertues reckoning stand

That will entreat a vice, and not command:125

So farre beare with him; should another man

Trust to his priviledge, he should trust to death:

Take comfort then (my comfort), nay, triumph,

And crown thy selfe; thou part'st with victory:

My presence is so onely deare to thee130

That other mens appeare worse than they be:

For this night yet, beare with my forced absence:

Thou know'st my businesse; and with how much weight

My vow hath charged it.

Tam. True, my lord, and never

My fruitlesse love shall let your serious honour;135

Yet, sweet lord, do no stay; you know my soule

Is so long time with out me, and I dead,

As you are absent.

Mont. By this kisse, receive

My soule for hostage, till I see my love.

Tam. The morne shall let me see you?

Mont. With the sunne140

Ile visit thy more comfortable beauties.

Tam. This is my comfort, that the sunne hath left

[Pg 47]

The whole worlds beauty ere my sunne leaves me.

Mont. Tis late night now, indeed: farewell, my light! Exit.

Tam. Farewell, my light and life! but not in him,145

In mine owne dark love and light bent to another.

Alas! that in the wane of our affections

We should supply it with a full dissembling,

In which each youngest maid is grown a mother.

Frailty is fruitfull, one sinne gets another:150

Our loves like sparkles are that brightest shine

When they goe out; most vice shewes most divine.

Goe, maid, to bed; lend me your book, I pray,

Not, like your selfe, for forme. Ile this night trouble

None of your services: make sure the dores,155

And call your other fellowes to their rest.

Per. I will—yet I will watch to know why you watch. Exit.

Tam. Now all yee peacefull regents of the night,

Silently-gliding exhalations,

Languishing windes, and murmuring falls of waters,160

[Pg 48]

Sadnesse of heart, and ominous securenesse,

Enchantments, dead sleepes, all the friends of rest,

That ever wrought upon the life of man,

Extend your utmost strengths, and this charm'd houre

Fix like the Center! make the violent wheeles165

Of Time and Fortune stand, and great Existens,

(The Makers treasurie) now not seeme to be

To all but my approaching friends and me!

They come, alas, they come! Feare, feare and hope

Of one thing, at one instant, fight in me:170

I love what most I loath, and cannot live,

Unlesse I compasse that which holds my death;

For life's meere death, loving one that loathes me,

And he I love will loath me, when he sees

I flie my sex, my vertue, my renowne,175

To runne so madly on a man unknowne. The Vault opens.

See, see, a vault is opening that was never

Knowne to my lord and husband, nor to any

[Pg 49]

But him that brings the man I love, and me.

How shall I looke on him? how shall I live,180

And not consume in blushes? I will in;

And cast my selfe off, as I ne're had beene. Exit.

Friar. Come, worthiest sonne, I am past measure glad

That you (whose worth I have approv'd so long)

Should be the object of her fearefull love;185

Since both your wit and spirit can adapt

Their full force to supply her utmost weaknesse.

You know her worths and vertues, for report

Of all that know is to a man a knowledge:

You know besides that our affections storme,190

Rais'd in our blood, no reason can reforme.

Though she seeke then their satisfaction

(Which she must needs, or rest unsatisfied)

Your judgement will esteeme her peace thus wrought

Nothing lesse deare than if your selfe had sought:195

And (with another colour, which my art

Shall teach you to lay on) your selfe must seeme

The only agent, and the first orbe move

In this our set and cunning world of love.

[Pg 50]

Bussy. Give me the colour (my most honour'd father)200

And trust my cunning then to lay it on.

Fri. Tis this, good sonne:—Lord Barrisor (whom you slew)

Did love her dearely, and with all fit meanes

Hath urg'd his acceptation, of all which

Shee keepes one letter written in his blood:205

You must say thus, then: that you heard from mee

How much her selfe was toucht in conscience

With a report (which is in truth disperst)

That your maine quarrell grew about her love,

Lord Barrisor imagining your courtship210

Of the great Guises Duchesse in the Presence

Was by you made to his elected mistresse:

And so made me your meane now to resolve her,

Chosing by my direction this nights depth,

For the more cleare avoiding of all note215

Of your presumed presence. And with this

(To cleare her hands of such a lovers blood)

She will so kindly thank and entertaine you

(Me thinks I see how), I, and ten to one,

Shew you the confirmation in his blood,220

Lest you should think report and she did faine,

That you shall so have circumstantiall meanes

To come to the direct, which must be used:

For the direct is crooked; love comes flying;

The height of love is still wonne with denying.225

[Pg 51]

Buss. Thanks, honoured father.

Fri. Shee must never know

That you know any thing of any love

Sustain'd on her part: for, learne this of me,

In any thing a woman does alone,

If she dissemble, she thinks tis not done;230

If not dissemble, nor a little chide,

Give her her wish, she is not satisfi'd;

To have a man think that she never seekes

Does her more good than to have all she likes:

This frailty sticks in them beyond their sex,235

Which to reforme, reason is too perplex:

Urge reason to them, it will doe no good;

Humour (that is the charriot of our food

In every body) must in them be fed,

To carrie their affections by it bred.240

Stand close!

Tam. Alas, I fear my strangenesse will retire him.

If he goe back, I die; I must prevent it,

And cheare his onset with my sight at least,

And that's the most; though every step he takes245

Goes to my heart. Ile rather die than seeme

Not to be strange to that I most esteeme.

Fri. Madam!

[Pg 52]

Tam. Ah!

Fri. You will pardon me, I hope,

That so beyond your expectation,

(And at a time for visitants so unfit)250

I (with my noble friend here) visit you:

You know that my accesse at any time

Hath ever beene admitted; and that friend,

That my care will presume to bring with me,

Shall have all circumstance of worth in him255

To merit as free welcome as myselfe.

Tam. O father, but at this suspicious houre

You know how apt best men are to suspect us

In any cause that makes suspicious shadow

No greater than the shadow of a haire;260

And y'are to blame. What though my lord and husband

Lie forth to night, and since I cannot sleepe

When he is absent I sit up to night;

Though all the dores are sure, and all our servants

As sure bound with their sleepes; yet there is One 265

That wakes above, whose eye no sleepe can binde:

He sees through dores, and darknesse, and our thoughts;

And therefore as we should avoid with feare

[Pg 53]

To think amisse our selves before his search,

So should we be as curious to shunne 270

All cause that other think not ill of us.

Buss. Madam, 'tis farre from that: I only heard

By this my honour'd father that your conscience

Made some deepe scruple with a false report

That Barrisors blood should something touch your honour,275

Since he imagin'd I was courting you

When I was bold to change words with the Duchesse,

And therefore made his quarrell, his long love

And service, as I heare, beeing deepely vowed

To your perfections; which my ready presence,280

Presum'd on with my father at this season

For the more care of your so curious honour,

Can well resolve your conscience is most false.

Tam. And is it therefore that you come, good sir?

Then crave I now your pardon and my fathers,285

And sweare your presence does me so much good

That all I have it bindes to your requitall.

Indeed sir, 'tis most true that a report

[Pg 54]

Is spread, alleadging that his love to me

Was reason of your quarrell; and because290

You shall not think I faine it for my glory

That he importun'd me for his Court service,

I'le shew you his own hand, set down in blood,

To that vaine purpose: good sir, then come in.

Father, I thank you now a thousand fold.295

Fri. May it be worth it to you, honour'd daughter! Descendit Fryar.

LINENOTES:

Actus Tertii Scena Prima.

Bussy. Sweet mistresse, cease! your conscience is too nice,

And bites too hotly of the Puritane spice.

Tamyra. O, my deare servant, in thy close embraces

I have set open all the dores of danger

To my encompast honour, and my life:5

Before I was secure against death and hell;

But now am subject to the heartlesse feare

Of every shadow, and of every breath,

And would change firmnesse with an aspen leafe:

So confident a spotlesse conscience is,10

So weake a guilty. O, the dangerous siege

Sinne layes about us, and the tyrannie

He exercises when he hath expugn'd!

Like to the horror of a winter's thunder,

Mixt with a gushing storme, that suffer nothing15

To stirre abroad on earth but their own rages,

Is sinne, when it hath gathered head above us;

[Pg 56]

No roofe, no shelter can secure us so,

But he will drowne our cheeks in feare or woe.

Buss. Sin is a coward, madam, and insults20

But on our weaknesse, in his truest valour:

And so our ignorance tames us, that we let

His shadowes fright us: and like empty clouds

In which our faulty apprehensions forge

The formes of dragons, lions, elephants,25

When they hold no proportion, the slie charmes

Of the witch policy makes him like a monster

Kept onely to shew men for servile money:

That false hagge often paints him in her cloth

Ten times more monstrous than he is in troth.30

In three of us the secret of our meeting

Is onely guarded, and three friends as one

Have ever beene esteem'd, as our three powers

That in our one soule are as one united:

Why should we feare then? for my selfe, I sweare,35

Sooner shall torture be the sire to pleasure,

And health be grievous to one long time sick,

Than the deare jewell of your fame in me

Be made an out-cast to your infamy;

Nor shall my value (sacred to your vertues)40

Onely give free course to it from my selfe,

[Pg 57]

But make it flie out of the mouths of Kings

In golden vapours, and with awfull wings.

Tam. It rests as all Kings seales were set in thee.

Now let us call my father, whom I sweare 45

I could extreamly chide, but that I feare

To make him so suspicious of my love,

Of which (sweet servant) doe not let him know

For all the world.

Buss. Alas! he will not think it.

Tam. Come then—ho! Father, ope and take your friend.50

Fri. Now, honour'd daughter, is your doubt resolv'd?

Tam. I, father, but you went away too soone.

Fri. Too soone!

Tam. Indeed you did; you should have stayed;

Had not your worthy friend beene of your bringing,

And that containes all lawes to temper me,55

Not all the fearefull danger that besieged us

Had aw'd my throat from exclamation.

Fri. I know your serious disposition well.

Come, sonne, the morne comes on.

[Pg 58]

Buss. Now, honour'd mistresse,

Till farther service call, all blisse supply you!60

Tam. And you this chaine of pearle, and my love onely! Descendit Frier and D'Amb[ois].

It is not I, but urgent destiny

That (as great states-men for their generall end

In politique justice make poore men offend)

Enforceth my offence to make it just.65

What shall weak dames doe, when th' whole work of Nature

Hath a strong finger in each one of us?

Needs must that sweep away the silly cobweb

Of our still-undone labours, that layes still

Our powers to it, as to the line, the stone,70

Not to the stone, the line should be oppos'd.

We cannot keepe our constant course in vertue:

What is alike at all parts? every day

Differs from other, every houre and minute;

I, every thought in our false clock of life75

Oft times inverts the whole circumference:

We must be sometimes one, sometimes another.

Our bodies are but thick clouds to our soules,

Through which they cannot shine when they desire.

When all the starres, and even the sunne himselfe,80

Must stay the vapours times that he exhales

[Pg 59]

Before he can make good his beames to us,

O how can we, that are but motes to him,

Wandring at random in his ordered rayes,

Disperse our passions fumes, with our weak labours,85

That are more thick and black than all earths vapours?

Mont. Good day, my love! what, up and ready too!

Tam. Both (my deare lord): not all this night made I

My selfe unready, or could sleep a wink.

Mont. Alas, what troubled my true love, my peace,90

From being at peace within her better selfe?

Or how could sleepe forbeare to seize thine eyes,

When he might challenge them as his just prise?

Tam. I am in no powre earthly, but in yours.

To what end should I goe to bed, my lord,95

That wholly mist the comfort of my bed?

Or how should sleepe possesse my faculties,

Wanting the proper closer of mine eyes?

Mont. Then will I never more sleepe night from thee:

[Pg 60]

All mine owne businesse, all the Kings affaires,100

Shall take the day to serve them; every night

Ile ever dedicate to thy delight.

Tam. Nay, good my lord, esteeme not my desires

Such doters on their humours that my judgement

Cannot subdue them to your worthier pleasure:105

A wives pleas'd husband must her object be

In all her acts, not her sooth'd fantasie.

Mont. Then come, my love, now pay those rites to sleepe

Thy faire eyes owe him: shall we now to bed?

Tam. O no, my lord! your holy frier sayes110

All couplings in the day that touch the bed

Adulterous are, even in the married;

Whose grave and worthy doctrine, well I know,

Your faith in him will liberally allow.

Mont. Hee's a most learned and religious man.115

Come to the Presence then, and see great D'Ambois

(Fortunes proud mushrome shot up in a night)

Stand like an Atlas under our Kings arme;

Which greatnesse with him Monsieur now envies

As bitterly and deadly as the Guise.120

[Pg 61]

Tam. What! he that was but yesterday his maker,

His raiser, and preserver?

Mont. Even the same.

Each naturall agent works but to this end,

To render that it works on like it selfe;

Which since the Monsieur in his act on D'Ambois125

Cannot to his ambitious end effect,

But that (quite opposite) the King hath power

(In his love borne to D'Ambois) to convert

The point of Monsieurs aime on his owne breast,

He turnes his outward love to inward hate:130

A princes love is like the lightnings fume,

Which no man can embrace, but must consume. Exeunt.

LINENOTES:

[Actus Tertii Scena Secunda.

Henry. Speak home, my Bussy! thy impartiall words

Are like brave faulcons that dare trusse a fowle

[Pg 62]

Much greater than themselves; flatterers are kites

That check at sparrowes; thou shalt be my eagle,

And beare my thunder underneath thy wings:5

Truths words like jewels hang in th'eares of kings.

Bussy. Would I might live to see no Jewes hang there

In steed of jewels—sycophants, I meane,

Who use Truth like the Devill, his true foe,

Cast by the angell to the pit of feares,10

And bound in chaines; Truth seldome decks kings eares.

Slave flattery (like a rippiers legs rowl'd up

In boots of hay-ropes) with kings soothed guts

Swadled and strappl'd, now lives onely free.

O, tis a subtle knave; how like the plague 15

Unfelt he strikes into the braine of man,

And rageth in his entrailes when he can,

Worse than the poison of a red hair'd man.

Henr. Fly at him and his brood! I cast thee off,

And once more give thee surname of mine eagle.20

Buss. Ile make you sport enough, then. Let me have

My lucerns too, or dogs inur'd to hunt

[Pg 63]

Beasts of most rapine, but to put them up,

And if I trusse not, let me not be trusted.

Shew me a great man (by the peoples voice,25

Which is the voice of God) that by his greatnesse

Bumbasts his private roofes with publique riches;

That affects royaltie, rising from a clapdish;

That rules so much more than his suffering King,

That he makes kings of his subordinate slaves:30

Himselfe and them graduate like woodmongers

Piling a stack of billets from the earth,

Raising each other into steeples heights;

Let him convey this on the turning props

Of Protean law, and (his owne counsell keeping)35

Keepe all upright—let me but hawlk at him,

Ile play the vulture, and so thump his liver

That (like a huge unlading Argosea)

He shall confesse all, and you then may hang him.

Shew me a clergie man that is in voice40

A lark of heaven, in heart a mowle of earth;

That hath good living, and a wicked life;

A temperate look, and a luxurious gut;

Turning the rents of his superfluous cures

Into your phesants and your partriches;45

Venting their quintessence as men read Hebrew—

[Pg 64]

Let me but hawlk at him, and like the other,

He shall confesse all, and you then may hang him.

Shew me a lawyer that turnes sacred law

(The equall rendrer of each man his owne,50

The scourge of rapine and extortion,

The sanctuary and impregnable defence

Of retir'd learning and besieged vertue)

Into a Harpy, that eates all but's owne,

Into the damned sinnes it punisheth,55

Into the synagogue of theeves and atheists;

Blood into gold, and justice into lust:—

Let me but hawlk at him, as at the rest,

He shall confesse all, and you then may hang him.

Gui. Where will you find such game as you would hawlk at?60

Buss. Ile hawlk about your house for one of them.

Gui. Come, y'are a glorious ruffin and runne proud

Of the Kings headlong graces; hold your breath,

Or, by that poyson'd vapour, not the King

Shall back your murtherous valour against me.65

Buss. I would the King would make his presence free

[Pg 65]

But for one bout betwixt us: by the reverence

Due to the sacred space twixt kings and subjects,

Here would I make thee cast that popular purple

In which thy proud soule sits and braves thy soveraigne.70

Mons. Peace, peace, I pray thee, peace!

Buss. Let him peace first

That made the first warre.

Mons. He's the better man.

Buss. And, therefore, may doe worst?

Mons. He has more titles.

Buss. So Hydra had more heads.

Mons. He's greater knowne.

Buss. His greatnesse is the peoples, mine's mine owne.75

Mons. He's noblier borne.

Buss. He is not; I am noble,

And noblesse in his blood hath no gradation,

But in his merit.

Gui. Th'art not nobly borne,

But bastard to the Cardinall of Ambois.

Buss. Thou liest, proud Guiserd; let me flie, my Lord!80

[Pg 66]

Henr. Not in my face, my eagle! violence flies

The sanctuaries of a princes eyes.

Buss. Still shall we chide, and fome upon this bit?

Is the Guise onely great in faction?

Stands he not by himselfe? Proves he th'opinion 85

That mens soules are without them? Be a duke,

And lead me to the field.

Guis. Come, follow me.

Henr. Stay them! stay, D'Ambois! Cosen Guise, I wonder

Your honour'd disposition brooks so ill

A man so good that only would uphold90

Man in his native noblesse, from whose fall

All our dissentions rise; that in himselfe

(Without the outward patches of our frailty,

Riches and honour) knowes he comprehends

Worth with the greatest. Kings had never borne 95

Such boundlesse empire over other men,

Had all maintain'd the spirit and state of D'Ambois;

Nor had the full impartiall hand of Nature,

That all things gave in her originall

[Pg 67]

Without these definite terms of Mine and Thine,100

Beene turn'd unjustly to the hand of Fortune,

Had all preserv'd her in her prime like D'Ambois;

No envie, no disjunction had dissolv'd,

Or pluck'd one stick out of the golden faggot

In which the world of Saturne bound our lifes,105

Had all beene held together with the nerves,

The genius, and th'ingenious soule of D'Ambois.

Let my hand therefore be the Hermean rod

To part and reconcile, and so conserve you,

As my combin'd embracers and supporters.110

Buss. Tis our Kings motion, and we shall not seeme

To worst eies womanish, though we change thus soone

Never so great grudge for his greater pleasure.

Gui. I seale to that, and so the manly freedome,

That you so much professe, hereafter prove not 115

A bold and glorious licence to deprave,

To me his hand shall hold the Hermean vertue

His grace affects, in which submissive signe

On this his sacred right hand I lay mine.

[Pg 68]

Buss. Tis well, my lord, and so your worthy greatnesse 120

Decline not to the greater insolence,

Nor make you think it a prerogative

To rack mens freedomes with the ruder wrongs,

My hand (stuck full of lawrell, in true signe

Tis wholly dedicate to righteous peace)125

In all submission kisseth th'other side.

Henr. Thanks to ye both: and kindly I invite ye

Both to a banquet where weele sacrifice

Full cups to confirmation of your loves;

At which (faire ladies) I entreat your presence;130

And hope you, madam, will take one carowse

For reconcilement of your lord and servant.

Duchess. If I should faile, my lord, some other lady

Would be found there to doe that for my servant.

Mons. Any of these here?

Duch. Nay, I know not that.135

Buss. Think your thoughts like my mistresse, honour'd lady?

Tamyra. I think not on you, sir; y'are one I know not.

[Pg 69]

Buss. Cry you mercy, madam!

Montsurry. Oh sir, has she met you? Exeunt Henry, D'Amb[ois], Ladies.

Mons. What had my bounty drunk when it rais'd him?

Gui. Y'ave stuck us up a very worthy flag,140

That takes more winde than we with all our sailes.

Mons. O, so he spreds and flourishes.

Gui. He must downe;

Upstarts should never perch too neere a crowne.

Mons. Tis true, my lord; and as this doting hand

Even out of earth (like Juno) struck this giant,145

So Joves great ordinance shall be here implide

To strike him under th'Ætna of his pride.

To which work lend your hands, and let us cast

Where we may set snares for his ranging greatnes.

I think it best, amongst our greatest women:150

For there is no such trap to catch an upstart

As a loose downfall; for, you know, their falls

Are th'ends of all mens rising. If great men

And wise make scapes to please advantage,

Tis with a woman—women that woorst may155

Still hold mens candels: they direct and know

[Pg 70]

All things amisse in all men, and their women

All things amisse in them; through whose charm'd mouthes

We may see all the close scapes of the Court.

When the most royall beast of chase, the hart,160

Being old, and cunning in his layres and haunts,

Can never be discovered to the bow,

The peece, or hound—yet where, behind some queich,

He breaks his gall, and rutteth with his hinde,

The place is markt, and by his venery 165

He still is taken. Shall we then attempt

The chiefest meane to that discovery here,

And court our greatest ladies chiefest women

With shewes of love, and liberall promises?

Tis but our breath. If something given in hand 170

Sharpen their hopes of more, 'twill be well ventur'd.

Gui. No doubt of that: and 'tis the cunningst point

Of our devis'd investigation.

[Pg 71]

Mons. I have broken

The yce to it already with the woman

Of your chast lady, and conceive good hope 175

I shall wade thorow to some wished shore

At our next meeting.

Mont. Nay, there's small hope there.

Gui. Take say of her, my lord, she comes most fitly.

Mons. Starting back?

Gui. Y'are ingag'd indeed.180

Annable. Nay pray, my lord, forbeare.

Mont. What, skittish, servant?

An. No, my lord, I am not so fit for your service.

Charlotte. Nay, pardon me now, my lord; my lady expects me.185

Gui. Ile satisfie her expectation, as far as an unkle may.

Mons. Well said! a spirit of courtship of all

[Pg 72]

hands. Now, mine owne Pero, hast thou remembred 190

me for the discovery I entreated thee

to make of thy mistresse? Speak boldly, and be

sure of all things I have sworne to thee.

Pero. Building on that assurance (my lord) I

may speak; and much the rather because my 195

lady hath not trusted me with that I can tell

you; for now I cannot be said to betray her.

Mons. That's all one, so wee reach our

objects: forth, I beseech thee.

Per. To tell you truth, my lord, I have made 200

a strange discovery.

Mons. Excellent Pero, thou reviv'st me; may I

sink quick to perdition if my tongue discover it!

Per. Tis thus, then: this last night my lord

lay forth, and I, watching my ladies sitting up,205

stole up at midnight from my pallat, and (having

before made a hole both through the wall and

arras to her inmost chamber) I saw D'Ambois

and her selfe reading a letter!

[Pg 73]

Mons. D'Ambois!210

Per. Even he, my lord.

Mons. Do'st thou not dreame, wench?

Per. I sweare he is the man.

Mons. The devill he is, and thy lady his dam!

Why this was the happiest shot that ever flewe;215

the just plague of hypocrisie level'd it. Oh, the

infinite regions betwixt a womans tongue and

her heart! is this our Goddesse of chastity? I

thought I could not be so sleighted, if she had

not her fraught besides, and therefore plotted this 220

with her woman, never dreaming of D'Amboys.

Deare Pero, I will advance thee for ever: but

tell me now—Gods pretious, it transformes mee

with admiration—sweet Pero, whom should she

trust with this conveyance? Or, all the dores 225

being made sure, how should his conveyance be

made?

Per. Nay, my lord, that amazes me: I cannot

by any study so much as guesse at it.

Mons. Well, let's favour our apprehensions 230

with forbearing that a little; for, if my heart

[Pg 74]

were not hoopt with adamant, the conceipt of

this would have burst it: but heark thee. Whispers.

Mont. I pray thee, resolve mee: the Duke

will never imagine that I am busie about's wife:235

hath D'Ambois any privy accesse to her?

An. No, my lord, D'Ambois neglects her (as

shee takes it) and is therefore suspicious that

either your lady, or the lady Beaupre, hath

closely entertain'd him.240

Mont. Ber lady, a likely suspition, and very

neere the life—especially of my wife.

Mons. Come, we'l disguise all with seeming

onely to have courted.—Away, dry palm! sh'as

a livor as dry as a bisket; a man may goe a 245

whole voyage with her, and get nothing but

tempests from her windpipe.

Gui. Here's one (I think) has swallowed a

porcupine, shee casts pricks from her tongue so.

Mont. And here's a peacock seemes to have 250

devour'd one of the Alpes, she has so swelling

a spirit, & is so cold of her kindnes.

[Pg 75]

Char. We are no windfalls, my lord; ye must

gather us with the ladder of matrimony, or we'l

hang till we be rotten.255

Mons. Indeed, that's the way to make ye right

openarses. But, alas, ye have no portions fit for

such husbands as we wish you.

Per. Portions, my lord! yes, and such portions

as your principality cannot purchase.260

Mons. What, woman, what are those portions?

Per. Riddle my riddle, my lord.

Mons. I, marry, wench, I think thy portion

is a right riddle; a man shall never finde it out:

but let's heare it.265

Per. You shall, my lord.

What's that, that being most rar's most cheap?

That when you sow, you never reap?

That when it growes most, most you [th]in it,

And still you lose it, when you win it?270

That when tis commonest, tis dearest,

And when tis farthest off, 'tis neerest?

Mons. Is this your great portion?

Per. Even this, my lord.

Mons. Beleeve me, I cannot riddle it.275

Per. No, my lord; tis my chastity, which you

shall neither riddle nor fiddle.

Mons. Your chastity! Let me begin with the

[Pg 76]

end of it; how is a womans chastity neerest

man, when tis furthest off?280

Per. Why, my lord, when you cannot get it,

it goes to th'heart on you; and that I think comes

most neere you: and I am sure it shall be farre

enough off. And so wee leave you to our mercies. Exeunt Women.

Mons. Farewell, riddle.285

Gui. Farewell, medlar.

Mont. Farewell, winter plum.

Mons. Now, my lords, what fruit of our inquisition?

feele you nothing budding yet? Speak,

good my lord Montsurry.290

Mont. Nothing but this: D'Ambois is thought

negligent in observing the Duchesse, and therefore

she is suspicious that your neece or my wife

closely entertaines him.

Mons. Your wife, my lord! Think you that295

possible?

Mont. Alas, I know she flies him like her

last houre.

Mons. Her last houre? Why that comes upon

her the more she flies it. Does D'Ambois so,300

think you?

Mont. That's not worth the answering. Tis

miraculous to think with what monsters womens

[Pg 77]

imaginations engrosse them when they are once

enamour'd, and what wonders they will work 305

for their satisfaction. They will make a sheepe

valiant, a lion fearefull.

Mons. And an asse confident. Well, my lord,

more will come forth shortly; get you to the

banquet.310

Gui. Come, my lord, I have the blind side of

one of them. Exit Guise cum Mont[surry].

Mons. O the unsounded sea of womens bloods,

That when tis calmest, is most dangerous!

Not any wrinkle creaming in their faces,315

When in their hearts are Scylla and Caribdis,

Which still are hid in dark and standing foggs,

Where never day shines, nothing ever growes

But weeds and poysons that no states-man knowes;

Nor Cerberus ever saw the damned nookes 320

Hid with the veiles of womens vertuous lookes.

But what a cloud of sulphur have I drawne

[Pg 78]

Up to my bosome in this dangerous secret!

Which if my hast with any spark should light

Ere D'Ambois were engag'd in some sure plot,325

I were blowne up; he would be, sure, my death.

Would I had never knowne it, for before

I shall perswade th'importance to Montsurry,

And make him with some studied stratagem

Train D'Ambois to his wreak, his maid may tell it;330

Or I (out of my fiery thirst to play

With the fell tyger up in darknesse tyed,

And give it some light) make it quite break loose.

I feare it, afore heaven, and will not see

D'Ambois againe, till I have told Montsurry,335

And set a snare with him to free my feares.

Whose there?

Maffe. My lord?

Mons. Goe, call the Count Montsurry,

And make the dores fast; I will speak with none

Till he come to me.

Maf. Well, my lord. Exiturus.

Mons. Or else

[Pg 79]

Send you some other, and see all the dores340

Made safe your selfe, I pray; hast, flie about it.

Maf. You'l speak with none but with the Count Montsurry?

Mons. With none but hee, except it be the Guise.

Maf. See, even by this there's one exception more;

Your Grace must be more firme in the command,345

Or else shall I as weakly execute.

The Guise shall speak with you?

Mons. He shall, I say.

Maf. And Count Montsurry?

Mons. I, and Count Montsurry.

Maf. Your Grace must pardon me, that I am bold

To urge the cleare and full sence of your pleasure;350

Which when so ever I have knowne, I hope

Your Grace will say I hit it to a haire.

Mons. You have.

Maf. I hope so, or I would be glad—

Mons. I pray thee, get thee gone; thou art so tedious

In the strick't forme of all thy services 355

That I had better have one negligent.

You hit my pleasure well, when D'Ambois hit you;

Did you not, think you?

[Pg 80]

Maf. D'Ambois! why, my lord—

Mons. I pray thee, talk no more, but shut the dores:

Doe what I charge thee.

Maf. I will my lord, and yet 360

I would be glad the wrong I had of D'Ambois—

Mons. Precious! then it is a fate that plagues me

In this mans foolery; I may be murthered,

While he stands on protection of his folly.

Avant, about thy charge!

Maf. I goe, my lord.—365

I had my head broke in his faithfull service;

I had no suit the more, nor any thanks,

And yet my teeth must still be hit with D'Ambois.

D'Ambois, my lord, shall know—

Mons. The devill and D'Ambois! Exit Maffe.

How am I tortur'd with this trusty foole!370

Never was any curious in his place

To doe things justly, but he was an asse:

We cannot finde one trusty that is witty,

And therefore beare their disproportion.

Grant, thou great starre, and angell of my life,375

A sure lease of it but for some few dayes,

[Pg 81]

That I may cleare my bosome of the snake

I cherisht there, and I will then defie

All check to it but Natures; and her altars

Shall crack with vessels crown'd with ev'ry liquor380

Drawn from her highest and most bloudy humors.

I feare him strangely; his advanced valour

Is like a spirit rais'd without a circle,

Endangering him that ignorantly rais'd him,

And for whose fury he hath learnt no limit.385

Maf. I cannot help it; what should I do more?

As I was gathering a fit guard to make

My passage to the dores, and the dores sure,

The man of bloud is enter'd.

Mons. Rage of death!

If I had told the secret, and he knew it,390

Thus had I bin endanger'd.

My sweet heart!

How now? what leap'st thou at?

Bussy. O royall object!

Mons. Thou dream'st awake: object in th'empty aire!

Buss. Worthy the browes of Titan, worth his chaire.

[Pg 82]

Mons. Pray thee, what mean'st thou?

Buss. See you not a crowne 395

Empalethe forehead of the great King Monsieur?

Mons. O, fie upon thee!

Buss. Prince, that is the subject

Of all these your retir'd and sole discourses.

Mons. Wilt thou not leave that wrongfull supposition?

Buss. Why wrongfull to suppose the doubtlesse right 400

To the succession worth the thinking on?

Mons. Well, leave these jests! how I am over-joyed

With thy wish'd presence, and how fit thou com'st,

For, of mine honour, I was sending for thee.

Buss. To what end?

Mons. Onely for thy company, 405

Which I have still in thought; but that's no payment

On thy part made with personall appearance.

Thy absence so long suffered oftentimes

Put me in some little doubt thou do'st not love me.

Wilt thou doe one thing therefore now sincerely?410

[Pg 83]

Buss. I, any thing—but killing of the King.

Mons. Still in that discord, and ill taken note?

How most unseasonable thou playest the cucko,

In this thy fall of friendship!

Buss. Then doe not doubt

That there is any act within my nerves,415

But killing of the King, that is not yours.

Mons. I will not then; to prove which, by my love

Shewne to thy vertues, and by all fruits else

Already sprung from that still flourishing tree,

With whatsoever may hereafter spring,420

I charge thee utter (even with all the freedome

Both of thy noble nature and thy friendship)

The full and plaine state of me in thy thoughts.

Buss. What, utter plainly what I think of you?

Mons. Plaine as truth.425

Buss. Why this swims quite against the stream of greatnes:

Great men would rather heare their flatteries,

And if they be not made fooles, are not wise.

[Pg 84]

Mons. I am no such great foole, and therefore charge thee

Even from the root of thy free heart display mee.430

Buss. Since you affect it in such serious termes,

If your selfe first will tell me what you think

As freely and as heartily of me,

I'le be as open in my thoughts of you.

Mons. A bargain, of mine honour! and make this,435

That prove we in our full dissection

Never so foule, live still the sounder friends.

Buss. What else, sir? come, pay me home, ile bide it bravely.

Mons. I will, I sweare. I think thee, then, a man

That dares as much as a wilde horse or tyger,440

As headstrong and as bloody; and to feed

The ravenous wolfe of thy most caniball valour

(Rather than not employ it) thou would'st turne

Hackster to any whore, slave to a Jew,

Or English usurer, to force possessions 445

(And cut mens throats) of morgaged estates;

Or thou would'st tire thee like a tinkers strumpet,

And murther market folks; quarrell with sheepe,

[Pg 85]

And runne as mad as Ajax; serve a butcher;

Doe any thing but killing of the King.450

That in thy valour th'art like other naturalls

That have strange gifts in nature, but no soule

Diffus'd quite through, to make them of a peece,

But stop at humours, that are more absurd,

Childish and villanous than that hackster, whore,455

Slave, cut-throat, tinkers bitch, compar'd before;

And in those humours would'st envie, betray,

Slander, blaspheme, change each houre a religion,

Doe any thing, but killing of the King:

That in thy valour (which is still the dunghill,460

To which hath reference all filth in thy house)

Th'art more ridiculous and vaine-glorious

Than any mountibank, and impudent

Than any painted bawd; which not to sooth,

And glorifie thee like a Jupiter Hammon,465

Thou eat'st thy heart in vinegar, and thy gall

Turns all thy blood to poyson, which is cause

Of that toad-poole that stands in thy complexion,

And makes thee with a cold and earthy moisture,

(Which is the damme of putrifaction)470

As plague to thy damn'd pride, rot as thou liv'st:

[Pg 86]

To study calumnies and treacheries;

To thy friends slaughters like a scrich-owle sing,

And to all mischiefes—but to kill the King.

Buss. So! have you said?

Mons. How thinkest thou? Doe I flatter? 475

Speak I not like a trusty friend to thee?

Buss. That ever any man was blest withall.

So here's for me! I think you are (at worst)

No devill, since y'are like to be no King;

Of which with any friend of yours Ile lay480

This poore stillado here gainst all the starres,

I, and 'gainst all your treacheries, which are more:

That you did never good, but to doe ill,

But ill of all sorts, free and for it selfe:

That (like a murthering peece making lanes in armies,485

The first man of a rank, the whole rank falling)

If you have wrong'd one man, you are so farre

From making him amends that all his race,

Friends, and associates fall into your chace:

That y'are for perjuries the very prince490

Of all intelligencers; and your voice

Is like an easterne winde, that, where it flies,

Knits nets of catterpillars, with which you catch

The prime of all the fruits the kingdome yeelds:

That your politicall head is the curst fount 495

Of all the violence, rapine, cruelty,

[Pg 87]

Tyrannie, & atheisme flowing through the realme:

That y'ave a tongue so scandalous, 'twill cut

The purest christall, and a breath that will

Kill to that wall a spider; you will jest500

With God, and your soule to the Devill tender

For lust; kisse horror, and with death engender:

That your foule body is a Lernean fenne

Of all the maladies breeding in all men:

That you are utterly without a soule;505

And for your life, the thred of that was spunne

When Clotho slept, and let her breathing rock

Fall in the durt; and Lachesis still drawes it,

Dipping her twisting fingers in a boule

Defil'd, and crown'd with vertues forced soule:510

And lastly (which I must for gratitude

Ever remember) that of all my height

And dearest life you are the onely spring,

Onely in royall hope to kill the King.

Mons. Why, now I see thou lov'st me! come to the banquet! Exeunt. 515

LINENOTES:

Actus Quarti Scena Prima.

Henry, Monsieur with a letter, Guise, Montsurry, Bussy, Elynor, Tamyra, Beaupre, Pero, Charlotte, Anable, Pyrha, with foure Pages.

Henry. Ladies, ye have not done our banquet right,

Nor lookt upon it with those cheereful rayes

That lately turn'd your breaths to flouds of gold;

Your looks, me thinks, are not drawne out with thoughts

So cleare and free as heretofore, but foule 5

As if the thick complexions of men

Govern'd within them.

Bussy. 'Tis not like, my lord,

That men in women rule, but contrary;

For as the moone, of all things God created

Not only is the most appropriate image10

Or glasse to shew them how they wax and wane,

But in her height and motion likewise beares

Imperiall influences that command

In all their powers, and make them wax and wane:

[Pg 89]

So women, that, of all things made of nothing,15

Are the most perfect idols of the moone,

Or still-unwean'd sweet moon-calves with white faces,

Not only are paterns of change to men,

But as the tender moon-shine of their beauties

Cleares or is cloudy, make men glad or sad.20

So then they rule in men, not men in them.

Monsieur. But here the moons are chang'd (as the King notes)

And either men rule in them, or some power

Beyond their voluntary faculty,

For nothing can recover their lost faces.25

Montsurry. None can be alwayes one: our griefes and joyes

Hold severall scepters in us, and have times

For their divided empires: which griefe now in them

Doth prove as proper to his diadem.

Buss. And griefe's a naturall sicknesse of the bloud,30

That time to part asks, as his comming had;

Onely sleight fooles griev'd suddenly are glad.

A man may say t'a dead man, "be reviv'd,"

As well as to one sorrowfull, "be not griev'd."

[Pg 90]

And therefore (princely mistresse) in all warres 35

Against these base foes that insult on weaknesse,

And still fight hous'd behind the shield of Nature,

Of priviledge law, treachery, or beastly need,

Your servant cannot help; authority here

Goes with corruption, something like some states40

That back woorst men; valour to them must creepe

That to themselves left would feare him asleepe.

Duchess. Ye all take that for granted that doth rest

Yet to be prov'd; we all are as we were,

As merry and as free in thought as ever.45

Guise. And why then can ye not disclose your thoughts?

Tamyra. Me thinks the man hath answer'd for us well.

Mons. The man! why, madam, d'ee not know his name?

Tam. Man is a name of honour for a King:

Additions take away from each chiefe thing.50

The schoole of modesty not to learne learnes dames:

They sit in high formes there that know mens names.

[Pg 91]

Mons. [to Bussy.] Heark, sweet heart, here's a bar set to your valour!

It cannot enter here, no, not to notice

Of what your name is; your great eagles beak55

(Should you flie at her) had as good encounter

An Albion cliffe as her more craggy liver.

Buss. Ile not attempt her, sir; her sight and name

(By which I onely know her) doth deter me.

Henr. So doe they all men else.

Mons. You would say so, 60

If you knew all.

Tam. Knew all, my lord? what meane you?

Mons. All that I know, madam.

Tam. That you know! Speak it.

Mons. No, tis enough I feele it.

Henr. But me thinks

Her courtship is more pure then heretofore.

True courtiers should be modest, and not nice;65

Bold, but not impudent; pleasure love, not vice.

Mons. Sweet heart, come hither! what if one should make

Horns at Mountsurry, would it not strike him jealous

Through all the proofes of his chaste ladies vertues?

[Pg 92]

Buss. If he be wise, not.70

Mons. What, not if I should name the gardener

That I would have him think hath grafted him?

Buss. So the large licence that your greatnesse uses

To jest at all men may be taught indeed

To make a difference of the grounds you play on,75

Both in the men you scandall and the matter.

Mons. As how, as how?

Buss. Perhaps led with a traine

Where you may have your nose made lesse and slit,

Your eyes thrust out.

Mons. Peace, peace, I pray thee, peace!

Who dares doe that? the brother of his King!80

Buss. Were your King brother in you; all your powers

(Stretcht in the armes of great men and their bawds)

Set close downe by you; all your stormy lawes

[Pg 93]

Spouted with lawyers mouthes, and gushing bloud,

Like to so many torrents; all your glories85

Making you terrible, like enchanted flames,

Fed with bare cockscombs and with crooked hammes,

All your prerogatives, your shames, and tortures,

All daring heaven and opening hell about you—

Were I the man ye wrong'd so and provok'd,90

(Though ne're so much beneath you) like a box tree

I would out of the roughnesse of my root

Ramme hardnesse in my lownesse, and, like death

Mounted on earthquakes, I would trot through all

Honors and horrors, thorow foule and faire,95

And from your whole strength tosse you into the aire.

Mons. Goe, th'art a devill! such another spirit

Could not be still'd from all th'Armenian dragons.

O, my loves glory! heire to all I have

(That's all I can say, and that all I sweare)100

If thou out-live me, as I know thou must,

[Pg 94]

Or else hath Nature no proportion'd end

To her great labours; she hath breath'd a minde

Into thy entrails, of desert to swell

Into another great Augustus Cæsar;105

Organs and faculties fitted to her greatnesse;

And should that perish like a common spirit,

Nature's a courtier and regards no merit.

Henr. Here's nought but whispering with us; like a calme

Before a tempest, when the silent ayre 110

Layes her soft eare close to the earth to hearken

For that she feares steales on to ravish her;

Some fate doth joyne our eares to heare it comming.

Come, my brave eagle, let's to covert flie!

I see almighty Æther in the smoak115

Of all his clowds descending, and the skie

Hid in the dim ostents of tragedy. Exit Henr[y] with D'Amb[ois] & Ladies.

Guis. Now stirre the humour, and begin the brawle.

Mont. The King and D'Ambois now are growne all one.

Mons. Nay, they are two, my lord.

Mont. How's that?

Mons. No more. 120

Mont. I must have more, my lord.

[Pg 95]

Mons. What, more than two?

Mont. How monstrous is this!

Mons. Why?

Mont. You make me horns.

Mons. Not I, it is a work without my power,

Married mens ensignes are not made with fingers;

Of divine fabrique they are, not mens hands:125

Your wife, you know, is a meere Cynthia,

And she must fashion hornes out of her nature.

Mont. But doth she? dare you charge her? speak, false prince.

Mons. I must not speak, my lord; but if you'l use

The learning of a noble man, and read,130

Here's something to those points. Soft, you must pawne

Your honour, having read it, to return it.

Mont. Not I:—I pawne mine honour for a paper!

Mons. You must not buy it under. Exeunt Guise and Monsieur.

Mont. Keepe it then,

And keepe fire in your bosome!

Tam. What sayes he? 135

Mont. You must make good the rest.

[Pg 96]

Tam. How fares my lord?

Takes my love any thing to heart he sayes?

Mont. Come, y'are a—

Tam. What, my lord?

Mont. The plague of Herod

Feast in his rotten entrailes!

Tam. Will you wreak

Your angers just cause given by him on me?140

Mont. By him?

Tam. By him, my lord. I have admir'd

You could all this time be at concord with him,

That still hath plaid such discords on your honour.

Mont. Perhaps tis with some proud string of my wives.

Tam. How's that, my lord?

Mont. Your tongue will still admire, 145

Till my head be the miracle of the world.

Tam. O woe is me! She seemes to sound.

Pero. What does your lordship meane?

Madam, be comforted; my lord but tries you.

Madam! Help, good my lord, are you not mov'd?

Doe your set looks print in your words your thoughts?150

Sweet lord, cleare up those eyes,

[Pg 97]

Unbend that masking forehead. Whence is it

You rush upon her with these Irish warres,

More full of sound then hurt? But it is enough;

You have shot home, your words are in her heart;155

She has not liv'd to beare a triall now.

Mont. Look up, my love, and by this kisse receive

My soule amongst thy spirits, for supply

To thine chac'd with my fury.

Tam. O, my lord,

I have too long liv'd to heare this from you.160

Mont. 'Twas from my troubled bloud, and not from me.

I know not how I fare; a sudden night

Flowes through my entrailes, and a headlong chaos

Murmurs within me, which I must digest,

And not drowne her in my confusions,165

That was my lives joy, being best inform'd.

Sweet, you must needs forgive me, that my love

(Like to a fire disdaining his suppression)

Rag'd being discouraged; my whole heart is wounded

When any least thought in you is but touch't,170

And shall be till I know your former merits,

Your name and memory, altogether crave

In just oblivion their eternall grave;

[Pg 98]

And then, you must heare from me, there's no meane

In any passion I shall feele for you.175

Love is a rasor, cleansing, being well us'd,

But fetcheth blood still, being the least abus'd.

To tell you briefly all—the man that left me

When you appear'd, did turne me worse than woman,

And stab'd me to the heart, thus, with his fingers.180

Tam. O happy woman! comes my stain from him,

It is my beauty, and that innocence proves

That slew Chymæra, rescued Peleus

From all the savage beasts in Peleon,

And rais'd the chaste Athenian prince from hell:185

All suffering with me, they for womens lusts,

I for a mans, that the Egean stable

Of his foule sinne would empty in my lap.

How his guilt shunn'd me! Sacred innocence

That, where thou fear'st, are dreadfull, and his face 190

Turn'd in flight from thee that had thee in chace!

Come, bring me to him. I will tell the serpent

[Pg 99]

Even to his venom'd teeth (from whose curst seed

A pitcht field starts up 'twixt my lord and me)

That his throat lies, and he shall curse his fingers195

For being so govern'd by his filthy soule.

Mont. I know not if himselfe will vaunt t'have beene

The princely author of the slavish sinne,

Or any other; he would have resolv'd me,

Had you not come, not by his word, but writing,200

Would I have sworne to give it him againe,

And pawn'd mine honour to him for a paper.

Tam. See, how he flies me still! tis a foule heart

That feares his owne hand. Good my lord, make haste

To see the dangerous paper: papers hold 205

Oft-times the formes and copies of our soules,

And (though the world despise them) are the prizes

Of all our honors; make your honour then

A hostage for it, and with it conferre

[Pg 100]

My neerest woman here in all she knowes;210

Who (if the sunne or Cerberus could have seene

Any staine in me) might as well as they.

And, Pero, here I charge thee, by my love,

And all proofes of it (which I might call bounties);

By all that thou hast seene seeme good in mee,215

And all the ill which thou shouldst spit from thee;

By pity of the wound this touch hath given me,

Not as thy mistresse now, but a poore woman

To death given over, rid me of my paines;

Powre on thy powder; cleare thy breast of me.220

My lord is only here: here speak thy worst;

Thy best will doe me mischiefe; if thou spar'st me,

Never shine good thought on thy memory!

Resolve my lord, and leave me desperate.

Per. My lord!—my lord hath plaid a prodigals part,225

To break his stock for nothing, and an insolent,

To cut a Gordian when he could not loose it.

What violence is this, to put true fire

To a false train; to blow up long crown'd peace

[Pg 101]

With sudden outrage; and beleeve a man,230

Sworne to the shame of women, 'gainst a woman

Borne to their honours? But I will to him.

Tam. No, I will write (for I shall never more

Meet with the fugitive) where I will defie him,

Were he ten times the brother of my King.235

To him, my lord,—and ile to cursing him. Exeunt.

LINENOTES:

[Actus Quarti Scena Secunda.

Bussy. I am suspitious, my most honour'd father,

By some of Monsieurs cunning passages,

That his still ranging and contentious nose-thrils

To scent the haunts of mischiefe have so us'd

The vicious vertue of his busie sence5

That he trails hotly of him, and will rowze him,

Driving him all enrag'd and foming on us;

And therefore have entreated your deepe skill

In the command of good aeriall spirits,

[Pg 102]

To assume these magick rites, and call up one,10

To know if any have reveal'd unto him

Any thing touching my deare love and me.

Friar. Good sonne, you have amaz'd me but to make

The least doubt of it, it concernes so neerely

The faith and reverence of my name and order.15

Yet will I justifie upon my soule

All I have done;

If any spirit i'th[e] earth or aire

Can give you the resolve, doe not despaire.

Tamyra. Away, deliver it. Exit Pero.

O may my lines, 20

Fill'd with the poyson of a womans hate,

When he shall open them, shrink up his curst eyes

With torturous darknesse, such as stands in hell,

Stuck full of inward horrors, never lighted;

With which are all things to be fear'd, affrighted.25

Buss. How is it with my honour'd mistresse?

Tam. O, servant, help, and save me from the gripes

[Pg 103]

Of shame and infamy. Our love is knowne;

Your Monsieur hath a paper where is writ

Some secret tokens that decipher it.30

Buss. What cold dull Northern brain, what foole but he,

Durst take into his Epimethean breast

A box of such plagues as the danger yeelds

Incur'd in this discovery? He had better

Ventur'd his breast in the consuming reach35

Of the hot surfets cast out of the clouds,

Or stood the bullets that (to wreak the skie)

The Cyclops ramme in Joves artillerie.

Fri. We soone will take the darknesse from his face

That did that deed of darknesse; we will know40

What now the Monsieur and your husband doe;

What is contain'd within the secret paper

Offer'd by Monsieur, and your loves events.

To which ends (honour'd daughter) at your motion

I have put on these exorcising rites,45

And, by my power of learned holinesse

Vouchsaft me from above, I will command

Our resolution of a raised spirit.

[Pg 104]

Tam. Good father, raise him in some beauteous forme,

That with least terror I may brook his sight.50

Fri. Stand sure together, then, what ere you see,

And stir not, as ye tender all our lives. He puts on his robes.

Behemoth. What would the holy frier?

Fri. I would see

What now the Monsieur and Mountsurrie doe,

And see the secret paper that the Monsieur65

Offer'd to Count Montsurry; longing much

To know on what events the secret loves

Of these two honour'd persons shall arrive.

[Pg 105]

Beh. Why calledst thou me to this accursed light,

To these light purposes? I am Emperor70

Of that inscrutable darknesse, where are hid

All deepest truths, and secrets never seene,

All which I know; and command legions

Of knowing spirits that can doe more then these.

Any of this my guard that circle me 75

In these blew fires, and out of whose dim fumes

Vast murmurs use to break, and from their sounds

Articulat voyces, can doe ten parts more

Than open such sleight truths as you require.

Fri. From the last nights black depth I call'd up one 80

Of the inferiour ablest ministers,

And he could not resolve mee. Send one, then,

Out of thine owne command to fetch the paper

That Monsieur hath to shew to Count Montsurry.

Beh. I will. Cartophylax! thou that properly85

Hast in thy power all papers so inscrib'd,

Glide through all barres to it, and fetch that paper.

Cartophylax. I will. A torch removes.

[Pg 106]

Fri. Till he returnes (great prince of darknesse)

Tell me if Monsieur and the Count Montsurry90

Are yet encounter'd.

Beh. Both them and the Guise

Are now together.

Fri. Show us all their persons,

And represent the place, with all their actions.

Beh. The spirit will strait return, and then Ile shew thee.

See, he is come. Why brought'st thou not the paper?95

Car. He hath prevented me, and got a spirit

Rais'd by another, great in our command,

To take the guard of it before I came.

Beh. This is your slacknesse, not t'invoke our powers

When first your acts set forth to their effects.100

Yet shall you see it and themselves. Behold

They come here, & the Earle now holds the paper.

Buss. May we not heare them?

[Fri.] No, be still and see.

Buss. I will goe fetch the paper.

Fri. Doe not stirre.

There's too much distance, and too many locks105

[Pg 107]

Twixt you and them (how neere so e're they seeme)

For any man to interrupt their secrets.

Tam. O honour'd spirit, flie into the fancie

Of my offended lord; and doe not let him

Beleeve what there the wicked man hath written.110

Beh. Perswasion hath already enter'd him

Beyond reflection; peace, till their departure!

Monsieur. There is a glasse of ink where you may see

How to make ready black fac'd tragedy:

You now discerne, I hope, through all her paintings,115

Her gasping wrinkles and fames sepulchres.

Guise. Think you he faines, my lord? what hold you now?

Doe we maligne your wife, or honour you?

Mons. What, stricken dumb! Nay fie, lord, be not danted:

Your case is common; were it ne're so rare,120

Beare it as rarely! Now to laugh were manly.

A worthy man should imitate the weather,

That sings in tempests, and being cleare, is silent.

[Pg 108]

Gui. Goe home, my lord, and force your wife to write

Such loving lines to D'Ambois as she us'd125

When she desir'd his presence.

Mons. Doe, my lord,

And make her name her conceal'd messenger,

That close and most inennerable pander,

That passeth all our studies to exquire:

By whom convay the letter to her love;130

And so you shall be sure to have him come

Within the thirsty reach of your revenge.

Before which, lodge an ambush in her chamber,

Behind the arras, of your stoutest men

All close and soundly arm'd; and let them share 135

A spirit amongst them that would serve a thousand.

Gui. Yet, stay a little: see, she sends for you.

Mons. Poore, loving lady, she'le make all good yet;

Think you not so, my lord? Mont[surry] stabs Pero, and exit.

Gui. Alas, poore soule!

Mons. This was cruelly done, y'faith.

Pero. T'was nobly done; 140

And I forgive his lordship from my soule.

[Pg 109]

Mons. Then much good doo't thee, Pero! hast a letter?

Per. I hope it rather be a bitter volume

Of worthy curses for your perjury.

Gui. To you, my lord.

Mons. To me? Now out upon her! 145

Gui. Let me see, my lord.

Mons. You shall presently: how fares my Pero? Enter Servant.

Who's there? Take in this maid, sh'as caught a clap,

And fetch my surgeon to her. Come, my lord,

We'l now peruse our letter. Exeunt Mons[ieur], Guise. Lead her out.

Per. Furies rise 150

Out of the black lines, and torment his soule!

Tam. Hath my lord slaine my woman?

Beh. No, she lives.

Fri. What shall become of us?

Beh. All I can say,

Being call'd thus late, is briefe, and darkly this:—

If D'Ambois mistresse die not her white hand 155

In her forc'd bloud, he shall remaine untoucht:

[Pg 110]

So, father, shall your selfe, but by your selfe.

To make this augurie plainer, when the voyce

Of D'Amboys shall invoke me, I will rise

Shining in greater light, and shew him all 160

That will betide ye all. Meane time be wise,

And curb his valour with your policies. Descendit cum suis.

Buss. Will he appeare to me when I invoke him?

Fri. He will, be sure.

Buss. It must be shortly, then,

For his dark words have tyed my thoughts on knots165

Till he dissolve and free them.

Tam. In meane time,

Deare servant, till your powerfull voice revoke him,

Be sure to use the policy he advis'd;

Lest fury in your too quick knowledge taken

Of our abuse, and your defence of me,170

Accuse me more than any enemy.

And, father, you must on my lord impose

Your holiest charges, and the Churches power,

To temper his hot spirit, and disperse

The cruelty and the bloud I know his hand175

Will showre upon our heads, if you put not

[Pg 111]

Your finger to the storme, and hold it up,

As my deare servant here must doe with Monsieur.

Buss. Ile sooth his plots, and strow my hate with smiles,

Till all at once the close mines of my heart180

Rise at full date, and rush into his bloud:

Ile bind his arme in silk, and rub his flesh

To make the veine swell, that his soule may gush

Into some kennell where it longs to lie;

And policy shall be flanckt with policy.185

Yet shall the feeling Center where we meet

Groane with the wait of my approaching feet:

Ile make th'inspired threshals of his Court

Sweat with the weather of my horrid steps,

Before I enter: yet will I appeare 190

Like calme security before a ruine.

A politician must, like lightning, melt

The very marrow, and not taint the skin:

His wayes must not be seene; the superficies

Of the greene Center must not taste his feet,195

When hell is plow'd up with his wounding tracts,

And all his harvest reap't by hellish facts. Exeunt.

LINENOTES:

Actus Quinti Scena Prima.

Montsurry bare, unbrac't, pulling Tamyra in by the haire; Frier; One bearing light, a standish, and paper, which sets a table.

Tamyra. O, help me, father!

Friar. Impious earle, forbeare;

Take violent hand from her, or, by mine order,

The King shall force thee.

Montsurry. Tis not violent;

Come you not willingly?

Tam. Yes, good my lord.

Fri. My lord, remember that your soule must seek5

Her peace as well as your revengefull bloud.

You ever to this houre have prov'd your selfe

A noble, zealous, and obedient sonne

T'our holy mother: be not an apostate.

Your wives offence serves not (were it the worst10

You can imagine) without greater proofes

To sever your eternall bonds and hearts;

Much lesse to touch her with a bloudy hand.

Nor is it manly (much lesse husbandly)

To expiate any frailty in your wife15

[Pg 113]

With churlish strokes, or beastly ods of strength.

The stony birth of clowds will touch no lawrell,

Nor any sleeper: your wife is your lawrell,

And sweetest sleeper; doe not touch her, then;

Be not more rude than the wild seed of vapour 20

To her that is more gentle than that rude;

In whom kind nature suffer'd one offence

But to set off her other excellence.

Mont. Good father, leave us: interrupt no more

The course I must runne for mine honour sake.25

Rely on my love to her, which her fault

Cannot extinguish. Will she but disclose

Who was the secret minister of her love,

And through what maze he serv'd it, we are friends.

Fri. It is a damn'd work to pursue those secrets 30

That would ope more sinne, and prove springs of slaughter;

Nor is't a path for Christian feet to tread,

But out of all way to the health of soules;

A sinne impossible to be forgiven,

Which he that dares commit—

Mont. Good father, cease your terrors. 35

[Pg 114]

Tempt not a man distracted; I am apt

To outrages that I shall ever rue:

I will not passe the verge that bounds a Christian,

Nor break the limits of a man nor husband.

Fri. Then Heaven inspire you both with thoughts and deeds 40

Worthy his high respect, and your owne soules!

Tam. Father!

Fri. I warrant thee, my dearest daughter,

He will not touch thee; think'st thou him a pagan?

His honor and his soule lies for thy safety. Exit.

Mont. Who shall remove the mountaine from my brest,45

Stand [in] the opening furnace of my thoughts,

And set fit out-cries for a soule in hell? Mont[surry] turnes a key.

For now it nothing fits my woes to speak,

But thunder, or to take into my throat

The trump of Heaven, with whose determinate blasts 50

The windes shall burst and the devouring seas

Be drunk up in his sounds, that my hot woes

[Pg 115]

(Vented enough) I might convert to vapour

Ascending from my infamie unseene;

Shorten the world, preventing the last breath55

That kils the living, and regenerates death.

Tam. My lord, my fault (as you may censure it

With too strong arguments) is past your pardon.

But how the circumstances may excuse mee,

Heaven knowes, and your more temperate minde hereafter 60

May let my penitent miseries make you know.

Mont. Hereafter! tis a suppos'd infinite

That from this point will rise eternally.

Fame growes in going; in the scapes of vertue

Excuses damne her: they be fires in cities 65

Enrag'd with those winds that lesse lights extinguish.

Come syren, sing, and dash against my rocks

Thy ruffin gally rig'd with quench for lust:

Sing, and put all the nets into thy voice

With which thou drew'st into thy strumpets lap70

The spawne of Venus, and in which ye danc'd;

That, in thy laps steed, I may digge his tombe,

And quit his manhood with a womans sleight,

Who never is deceiv'd in her deceit.

Sing (that is, write); and then take from mine eyes75

The mists that hide the most inscrutable pander

[Pg 116]

That ever lapt up an adulterous vomit,

That I may see the devill, and survive

To be a devill, and then learne to wive!

That I may hang him, and then cut him downe,80

Then cut him up, and with my soules beams search

The cranks and cavernes of his braine, and study

The errant wildernesse of a womans face,

Where men cannot get out, for all the comets

That have beene lighted at it. Though they know85

That adders lie a sunning in their smiles,

That basilisks drink their poyson from their eyes,

And no way there to coast out to their hearts,

Yet still they wander there, and are not stay'd

Till they be fetter'd, nor secure before 90

All cares devoure them, nor in humane consort

Till they embrace within their wives two breasts

All Pelion and Cythæron with their beasts.—

Why write you not?

Tam. O, good my lord, forbeare

In wreak of great faults to engender greater,95

And make my loves corruption generate murther.

Mont. It followes needfully as childe and parent;

The chaine-shot of thy lust is yet aloft,

And it must murther; tis thine owne deare twinne.

No man can adde height to a womans sinne.100

Vice never doth her just hate so provoke,

[Pg 117]

As when she rageth under vertues cloake.

Write! for it must be—by this ruthlesse steele,

By this impartiall torture, and the death

Thy tyrannies have invented in my entrails,105

To quicken life in dying, and hold up

The spirits in fainting, teaching to preserve

Torments in ashes that will ever last.

Speak: will you write?

Tam. Sweet lord, enjoyne my sinne

Some other penance than what makes it worse:110

Hide in some gloomie dungeon my loth'd face,

And let condemned murtherers let me downe

(Stopping their noses) my abhorred food:

Hang me in chaines, and let me eat these armes

That have offended: binde me face to face115

To some dead woman, taken from the cart

Of execution?—till death and time

In graines of dust dissolve me, Ile endure;

Or any torture that your wraths invention

Can fright all pitie from the world withall.120

But to betray a friend with shew of friendship,

That is too common for the rare revenge

Your rage affecteth; here then are my breasts,

Last night your pillowes; here my wretched armes,

As late the wished confines of your life:125

Now break them, as you please, and all the bounds

Of manhood, noblesse, and religion.

[Pg 118]

Mont. Where all these have bin broken, they are kept

In doing their justice there with any shew

Of the like cruell cruelty: thine armes have lost130

Their priviledge in lust, and in their torture

Thus they must pay it. Stabs her.

Tam. O lord—

Mont. Till thou writ'st,

Ile write in wounds (my wrongs fit characters)

Thy right of sufferance. Write!

Tam. O kill me, kill me!

Deare husband, be not crueller than death!135

You have beheld some Gorgon: feele, O feele

How you are turn'd to stone. With my heart blood

Dissolve your selfe againe, or you will grow

Into the image of all tyrannie.

Mont. As thou art of adultry; I will ever 140

Prove thee my parallel, being most a monster.

Thus I expresse thee yet. Stabs her againe.

Tam. And yet I live.

Mont. I, for thy monstrous idoll is not done yet.

This toole hath wrought enough. Now, Torture, use Ent[er] Servants.

This other engine on th'habituate powers145

[Pg 119]

Of her thrice damn'd and whorish fortitude:

Use the most madding paines in her that ever

Thy venoms sok'd through, making most of death,

That she may weigh her wrongs with them—and then

Stand, vengeance, on thy steepest rock, a victor!150

Tam. O who is turn'd into my lord and husband?

Husband! my lord! None but my lord and husband!

Heaven, I ask thee remission of my sinnes,

Not of my paines: husband, O help me, husband!

Fri. What rape of honour and religion!155

O wrack of nature! Falls and dies.

Tam. Poore man! O, my father!

Father, look up! O, let me downe, my lord,

And I will write.

Mont. Author of prodigies!

What new flame breakes out of the firmament

That turnes up counsels never knowne before?160

Now is it true, earth moves, and heaven stands still;

Even heaven it selfe must see and suffer ill.

The too huge bias of the world hath sway'd

[Pg 120]

Her back-part upwards, and with that she braves

This hemisphere that long her mouth hath mockt:165

The gravity of her religious face

(Now growne too waighty with her sacriledge,

And here discern'd sophisticate enough)

Turnes to th'Antipodes; and all the formes

That her illusions have imprest in her 170

Have eaten through her back; and now all see

How she is riveted with hypocrisie.

Was this the way? was he the mean betwixt you?

Tam. He was, he was, kind worthy man, he was.

Mont. Write, write a word or two.

Tam. I will, I will. 175

Ile write, but with my bloud, that he may see

These lines come from my wounds & not from me. Writes.

Mont. Well might he die for thought: methinks the frame

And shaken joynts of the whole world should crack

To see her parts so disproportionate;180

And that his generall beauty cannot stand

Without these staines in the particular man.

Why wander I so farre? here, here was she

[Pg 121]

That was a whole world without spot to me,

Though now a world of spots. Oh what a lightning185

Is mans delight in women! What a bubble

He builds his state, fame, life on, when he marries!

Since all earths pleasures are so short and small,

The way t'enjoy it is t'abjure it all.

Enough! I must be messenger my selfe,190

Disguis'd like this strange creature. In, Ile after,

To see what guilty light gives this cave eyes,

And to the world sing new impieties.

LINENOTES:

[Scena Secunda.

Monsieur. Now shall we see that Nature hath no end

In her great works responsive to their worths;

That she, that makes so many eyes and soules

[Pg 122]

To see and fore-see, is stark blind her selfe;

And as illiterate men say Latine prayers 5

By rote of heart and dayly iteration,

Not knowing what they say, so Nature layes

A deale of stuffe together, and by use,

Or by the meere necessity of matter,

Ends such a work, fills it, or leaves it empty 10

Of strength, or vertue, error, or cleare truth,

Not knowing what she does; but usually

Gives that which we call merit to a man,

And beliefe must arrive him on huge riches,

Honour and happinesse, that effects his ruine.15

Even as in ships of warre whole lasts of powder

Are laid, me thinks, to make them last, and gard them,

When a disorder'd spark, that powder taking,

Blowes up, with sodaine violence and horror,

Ships that (kept empty) had sayl'd long, with terror.20

Guise. He that observes but like a worldly man

[Pg 123]

That which doth oft succeed and by th'events

Values the worth of things, will think it true

That Nature works at random, just with you:

But with as much proportion she may make 25

A thing that from the feet up to the throat

Hath all the wondrous fabrique man should have,

And leave it headlesse, for a perfect man,

As give a full man valour, vertue, learning,

Without an end more excellent then those 30

On whom she no such worthy part bestowes.

Mons. Yet shall you see it here; here will be one

Young, learned, valiant, vertuous, and full mann'd;

One on whom Nature spent so rich a hand

That with an ominous eye she wept to see 35

So much consum'd her vertuous treasurie.

Yet as the winds sing through a hollow tree,

And (since it lets them passe through) let's it stand;

But a tree solid (since it gives no way

To their wild rage) they rend up by the root:40

So this whole man

(That will not wind with every crooked way

Trod by the servile world) shall reele and fall

[Pg 124]

Before the frantick puffes of blind borne chance,

That pipes through empty men and makes them dance.45

Not so the sea raves on the Libian sands,

Tumbling her billowes in each others neck:

Not so the surges of the Euxian Sea

(Neere to the frosty pole, where free Bootes

From those dark deep waves turnes his radiant teame)50

Swell, being enrag'd even from their inmost drop,

As fortune swings about the restlesse state

Of vertue now throwne into all mens hate.

Away, my lord; you are perfectly disguis'd;

Leave us to lodge your ambush.

Montsurry. Speed me, vengeance! 55

Mons. Resolve, my masters, you shall meet with one

Will try what proofes your privy coats are made on:

When he is entred, and you heare us stamp,

Approach, and make all sure.

Murderers. We will, my lord. Exeunt.

LINENOTES:

[Scena Tertia.

Bussy. Sit up to night, and watch: Ile speak with none

But the old Frier, who bring to me.

Pages. We will, sir. Exeunt.

Buss. What violent heat is this? me thinks the fire

Of twenty lives doth on a suddaine flash

Through all my faculties: the ayre goes high 5

In this close chamber and the frighted earth Thunder.

Trembles and shrinks beneath me; the whole house

Nods with his shaken burthen.

Blesse me, heaven!

Umb[ra Friar]. Note what I want, deare sonne, and be fore-warn'd.

O there are bloudy deeds past and to come.10

I cannot stay; a fate doth ravish me;

Ile meet thee in the chamber of thy love. Exit.

[Pg 126]

Buss. What dismall change is here! the good old Frier

Is murther'd, being made knowne to serve my love;

And now his restlesse spirit would fore-warne me 15

Of some plot dangerous, and imminent.

Note what he wants! He wants his upper weed,

He wants his life, and body: which of these

Should be the want he meanes, and may supply me

With any fit fore-warning? This strange vision,20

(Together with the dark prediction

Us'd by the Prince of Darknesse that was rais'd

By this embodied shadow) stirre my thoughts

With reminiscion of the Spirits promise,

Who told me that by any invocation25

I should have power to raise him, though it wanted

The powerfull words and decent rites of art.

Never had my set braine such need of spirit

T'instruct and cheere it; now then I will claime

Performance of his free and gentle vow30

T'appeare in greater light, and make more plain

His rugged oracle. I long to know

How my deare mistresse fares, and be inform'd

[Pg 127]

What hand she now holds on the troubled bloud

Of her incensed lord: me thought the Spirit35

(When he had utter'd his perplext presage)

Threw his chang'd countenance headlong into clouds;

His forehead bent, as it would hide his face,

He knockt his chin against his darkned breast,

And struck a churlish silence through his pow'rs.40

Terror of darknesse! O, thou King of flames!

That with thy musique-footed horse dost strike

The cleare light out of chrystall on dark earth,

And hurlst instructive fire about the world,

Wake, wake, the drowsie and enchanted night 45

That sleepes with dead eyes in this heavy riddle!

Or thou great Prince of Shades, where never sunne

Stickes his far-darted beames, whose eyes are made

To shine in darknesse, and see ever best

Where men are blindest, open now the heart 50

Of thy abashed oracle, that, for feare

Of some ill it includes, would faine lie hid,

And rise thou with it in thy greater light!

Behemoth. Thus, to observe my vow of apparition

[Pg 128]

In greater light, and explicate thy fate,55

I come; and tell thee that, if thou obey

The summons that thy mistresse next will send thee,

Her hand shall be thy death.

Buss. When will she send?

Beh. Soone as I set againe, where late I rose.

Buss. Is the old Frier slaine?

Beh. No, and yet lives not. 60

Buss. Died he a naturall death?

Beh. He did.

Buss. Who then

Will my deare mistresse send?

Beh. I must not tell thee.

Buss. Who lets thee?

Beh. Fate.

Buss. Who are Fates ministers?

Beh. The Guise and Monsieur.

Buss. A fit paire of sheeres

To cut the threds of kings and kingly spirits,65

And consorts fit to sound forth harmony

Set to the fals of kingdomes. Shall the hand

Of my kind mistresse kill me?

Beh. If thou yeeld

To her next summons. Y'are faire warn'd; farewell! Thunders. Exit.

Buss. I must fare well, how ever, though I die,70

[Pg 129]

My death consenting with his augurie.

Should not my powers obay when she commands,

My motion must be rebell to my will,

My will to life; if, when I have obay'd,

Her hand should so reward me, they must arme it,75

Binde me, or force it; or, I lay my life,

She rather would convert it many times

On her owne bosome, even to many deaths.

But were there danger of such violence,

I know 'tis farre from her intent to send:80

And who she should send is as farre from thought,

Since he is dead whose only mean she us'd. Knocks.

Whose there? Look to the dore, and let him in,

Though politick Monsieur, or the violent Guise.

Mont. Haile to my worthy sonne!

Buss. O lying Spirit, 85

To say the Frier was dead! Ile now beleeve

[Pg 130]

Nothing of all his forg'd predictions.

My kinde and honour'd father, well reviv'd!

I have beene frighted with your death and mine,

And told my mistresse hand should be my death,90

If I obeyed this summons.

Mont. I beleev'd

Your love had bin much clearer then to give

Any such doubt a thought, for she is cleare,

And having freed her husbands jealousie

(Of which her much abus'd hand here is witnesse)95

She prayes, for urgent cause, your instant presence.

Buss. Why, then, your Prince of Spirits may be call'd

The Prince of lyers.

Mont. Holy Writ so calls him.

Buss. What! writ in bloud!

Mont. I, 'tis the ink of lovers.

Buss. O, 'tis a sacred witnesse of her love.100

So much elixer of her bloud as this,

Dropt in the lightest dame, would make her firme

As heat to fire; and, like to all the signes,

Commands the life confinde in all my veines.

O, how it multiplies my bloud with spirit,105

And makes me apt t'encounter death and hell.

[Pg 131]

But come, kinde father; you fetch me to heaven,

And to that end your holy weed was given. Exeunt.

LINENOTES:

[Scena Quarta.

[Umbra] Friar. Up with these stupid thoughts, still loved daughter,

And strike away this heartlesse trance of anguish:

Be like the sunne, and labour in eclipses.

Look to the end of woes: oh, can you sit

Mustering the horrors of your servants slaughter 5

Before your contemplation, and not study

How to prevent it? Watch when he shall rise,

And, with a suddaine out-crie of his murther,

Blow his retreat before he be revenged.

Tamyra. O father, have my dumb woes wak'd your death?10

When will our humane griefes be at their height?

Man is a tree that hath no top in cares,

[Pg 132]

No root in comforts; all his power to live

Is given to no end but t'have power to grieve.

Umb. Fri. It is the misery of our creation.15

Your true friend,

Led by your husband, shadowed in my weed,

Now enters the dark vault.

Tam. But, my dearest father,

Why will not you appeare to him your selfe,

And see that none of these deceits annoy him?20

Umb. Fri. My power is limited; alas! I cannot;

All that I can doe—See! the cave opens. Exit.

Tam. Away (my love) away! thou wilt be murther'd.

Bussy. Murther'd! I know not what that Hebrew means:

That word had ne're bin nam'd had all bin D'Ambois.25

[Pg 133]

Murther'd! By heaven, he is my murtherer

That shewes me not a murtherer: what such bugge

Abhorreth not the very sleepe of D'Amboys?

Murther'd! Who dares give all the room I see

To D'Ambois reach? or look with any odds 30

His fight i'th' face, upon whose hand sits death,

Whose sword hath wings, and every feather pierceth?

If I scape Monsieurs pothecarie shops,

Foutir for Guises shambles! 'Twas ill plotted;

They should have mall'd me here35

When I was rising. I am up and ready.

Let in my politique visitants, let them in,

Though entring like so many moving armours.

Fate is more strong than arms and slie than treason,

And I at all parts buckl'd in my fate.40

Mons. }

Guise. } Why enter not the coward villains?

Buss. Dare they not come?

Tam. They come.

First Murderer. Come, all at once!

[Pg 134]

[Umbra] Friar. Back, coward murtherers, back!

Omnes. Defend us heaven! Exeunt all but the first.

First Murd. Come ye not on?

Buss. No, slave! nor goest thou off.

Stand you so firme?

Will it not enter here? 45

You have a face yet. So! in thy lifes flame

I burne the first rites to my mistresse fame.

Umb. Fri. Breath thee, brave sonne, against the other charge.

Buss. O is it true, then, that my sense first told me?

Is my kind father dead?

Tam. He is, my love; 50

'Twas the Earle, my husband, in his weed that brought thee.

Buss. That was a speeding sleight, and well resembled.

Where is that angry Earle? My lord! come forth,

And shew your owne face in your owne affaire;

Take not into your noble veines the blood55

Of these base villaines, nor the light reports

[Pg 135]

Of blister'd tongues for cleare and weighty truth:

But me against the world, in pure defence

Of your rare lady, to whose spotlesse name

I stand here as a bulwark, and project60

A life to her renowne that ever yet

Hath been untainted, even in envies eye,

And, where it would protect, a sanctuarie.

Brave Earle, come forth, and keep your scandall in!

'Tis not our fault, if you enforce the spot;65

Nor the wreak yours, if you performe it not.

Montsurry. Cowards! a fiend or spirit beat ye off!

They are your owne faint spirits that have forg'd

The fearefull shadowes that your eyes deluded:

The fiend was in you; cast him out, then, thus!70

Tam. Favour my lord, my love, O, favour him!

Buss. I will not touch him. Take your life, my lord,

And be appeas'd. Pistolls shot within.

O then the coward Fates

Have maim'd themselves, and ever lost their honour!

[Pg 136]

Umb. Fri. What have ye done, slaves! irreligious lord!75

Buss. Forbeare them, father; 'tis enough for me

That Guise and Monsieur, death and destinie,

Come behind D'Ambois. Is my body, then,

But penetrable flesh, and must my mind

Follow my blood? Can my divine part adde80

No ayd to th'earthly in extremity?

Then these divines are but for forme, not fact;

Man is of two sweet courtly friends compact,

A mistresse and a servant. Let my death

Define life nothing but a courtiers breath.85

Nothing is made of nought, of all things made

Their abstract being a dreame but of a shade.

Ile not complaine to earth yet, but to heaven,

And (like a man) look upwards even in death.

And if Vespasian thought in majestie 90

An Emperour might die standing, why not I? She offers to help him.

Nay, without help, in which I will exceed him;

For he died splinted with his chamber groomes.

Prop me, true sword, as thou hast ever done!

The equall thought I beare of life and death95

Shall make me faint on no side; I am up.

Here, like a Roman statue, I will stand

[Pg 137]

Till death hath made me marble. O my fame

Live in despight of murther! take thy wings

And haste thee where the gray-ey'd morn perfumes100

Her rosie chariot with Sabæan spices!

Fly where the evening from th'Iberean vales

Takes on her swarthy shoulders Heccate

Crown'd with a grove of oakes! flie where men feele

The burning axeltree; and those that suffer105

Beneath the chariot of the snowy Beare:

And tell them all that D'Ambois now is hasting

To the eternall dwellers; that a thunder

Of all their sighes together (for their frailties

Beheld in me) may quit my worthlesse fall110

With a fit volley for my funerall.

Umb. Fri. Forgive thy murtherers.

Buss. I forgive them all;

And you, my lord, their fautor; for true signe

Of which unfain'd remission, take my sword;

Take it, and onely give it motion,115

And it shall finde the way to victory

By his owne brightnesse, and th'inherent valour

My fight hath still'd into't with charmes of spirit.

Now let me pray you that my weighty bloud,

[Pg 138]

Laid in one scale of your impertiall spleene,120

May sway the forfeit of my worthy love

Waid in the other: and be reconcil'd

With all forgivenesse to your matchlesse wife.

Tam. Forgive thou me, deare servant, and this hand

That lead thy life to this unworthy end;125

Forgive it for the bloud with which 'tis stain'd,

In which I writ the summons of thy death—

The forced summons—by this bleeding wound,

By this here in my bosome, and by this

That makes me hold up both my hands embrew'd130

For thy deare pardon.

Buss. O, my heart is broken.

Fate nor these murtherers, Monsieur nor the Guise,

Have any glory in my death, but this,

This killing spectacle, this prodigie.

My sunne is turn'd to blood, in whose red beams 135

Pindus and Ossa (hid in drifts of snow

Laid on my heart and liver), from their veines

Melt, like two hungry torrents eating rocks,

Into the ocean of all humane life,

And make it bitter, only with my bloud.140

O fraile condition of strength, valour, vertue

[Pg 139]

In me (like warning fire upon the top

Of some steepe beacon, on a steeper hill)

Made to expresse it: like a falling starre

Silently glanc't, that like a thunderbolt 145

Look't to have struck, and shook the firmament! Moritur.

Umb. Fri. Farewell! brave reliques of a compleat man,

Look up, and see thy spirit made a starre.

Joine flames with Hercules, and when thou set'st

Thy radiant forehead in the firmament,150

Make the vast chrystall crack with thy receipt;

Spread to a world of fire, and the aged skie

Cheere with new sparks of old humanity.

[To Montsurry.] Son of the earth, whom my unrested soule

[Pg 140]

Rues t'have begotten in the faith of heaven,155

Assay to gratulate and pacifie

The soule fled from this worthy by performing

The Christian reconcilement he besought

Betwixt thee and thy lady; let her wounds,

Manlessly digg'd in her, be eas'd and cur'd 160

With balme of thine owne teares; or be assur'd

Never to rest free from my haunt and horror.

Mont. See how she merits this, still kneeling by,

And mourning his fall, more than her own fault!

Umb. Fri. Remove, deare daughter, and content thy husband:165

So piety wills thee, and thy servants peace.

Tam. O wretched piety, that art so distract

In thine owne constancie, and in thy right

Must be unrighteous. If I right my friend,

I wrong my husband; if his wrong I shunne,170

The duty of my friend I leave undone.

Ill playes on both sides; here and there it riseth;

No place, no good, so good, but ill compriseth.

O had I never married but for forme;

Never vow'd faith but purpos'd to deceive;175

[Pg 141]

Never made conscience of any sinne,

But clok't it privately and made it common;

Nor never honour'd beene in bloud or mind;

Happy had I beene then, as others are

Of the like licence; I had then beene honour'd,180

Liv'd without envie; custome had benumb'd

All sense of scruple and all note of frailty;

My fame had beene untouch'd, my heart unbroken:

But (shunning all) I strike on all offence.

O husband! deare friend! O my conscience!185

Mons. Come, let's away; my sences are not proofe

Against those plaints.

Mont. I must not yeeld to pity, nor to love

So servile and so trayterous: cease, my bloud,

To wrastle with my honour, fame, and judgement.190

Away! forsake my house; forbeare complaints

Where thou hast bred them: here all things [are] full

Of their owne shame and sorrow—leave my house.

Tam. Sweet lord, forgive me, and I will be gone;

And till these wounds (that never balme shall close 195

[Pg 142]

Till death hath enterd at them, so I love them,

Being opened by your hands) by death be cur'd,

I never more will grieve you with my sight;

Never endure that any roofe shall part

Mine eyes and heaven; but to the open deserts 200

(Like to a hunted tygres) I will flie,

Eating my heart, shunning the steps of men,

And look on no side till I be arriv'd.

Mont. I doe forgive thee, and upon my knees

(With hands held up to heaven) wish that mine honour205

Would suffer reconcilement to my love:

But, since it will not, honour never serve

My love with flourishing object, till it sterve!

And as this taper, though it upwards look,

Downwards must needs consume, so let our love!210

As, having lost his hony, the sweet taste

Runnes into savour, and will needs retaine

A spice of his first parents, till (like life)

It sees and dies, so let our love! and, lastly,

As when the flame is suffer'd to look up215

It keepes his luster, but being thus turn'd downe

(His naturall course of usefull light inverted)

His owne stuffe puts it out, so let our love!

[Pg 143]

Now turne from me, as here I turne from thee;

And may both points of heavens strait axeltree220

Conjoyne in one, before thy selfe and me! Exeunt severally.

LINENOTES:

EPILOGUE

With many hands you have seene D'Ambois slaine;

Yet by your grace he may revive againe,

And every day grow stronger in his skill

To please, as we presume he is in will.

The best deserving actors of the time5

Had their ascents, and by degrees did clime

To their full height, a place to studie due.

To make him tread in their path lies in you;

Hee'le not forget his makers, but still prove

His thankfulnesse, as you encrease your love.10

LINENOTES:

Notes To Bussy D'Ambois

Prologue. The allusions in these lines can be only partially explained. The play had evidently been performed, not long before 1641, by a company which had not possessed original acting rights in it. The performance had been successful (cf. ll. 3-4 "the grace of late It did receive"), and the "King's men," while not claiming a monopoly in it, nor seeking to detract from their rivals' merits, felt bound to revive the play on their own account, lest they should seem to be letting their claim go by default. It is possible that in ll. 11-12, they refer to a performance that in vindication of this claim they had given at Court, while, as further evidence of their priority of interest, they remind the audience of the actors belonging to the company who had appeared in the title-rôle. Nathaniel Field (l. 15), born in 1587, had as a boy been one of the "Children of the Queen's Revels," and had performed in Jonson's Cynthia's Revels, 1600, and Poetaster, 1601. He seems to have joined the King's players soon after 1614, and his name appears in the list of "the principall actors in all these playes" prefixed to the first Shakespearean Folio of 1623. Not long after this period, Field, who by his Woman is a Weathercock (1612) and his Amends for Ladies (1618) had made a reputation as a dramatist as well as an actor, is believed to have retired from the stage, though he lived till 1633. If, however, he did not appear as Bussy till after 1614, when the play had already been at least seven years, perhaps considerably longer, on the boards, it can scarcely be said with truth that his "action first did give it name" (l. 16). His successor in the part, whom the "gray beard" (l. 18) of advancing years had now disqualified, cannot be identified; but the "third man" (l. 21) is probably Ilyard Swanston, who, according to Fleay (Biog. Chron. of Drama, vol. i, p. 60), was one of the "King's men" from 1625 to 1642. His [Pg 146]impersonation of Bussy is favourably referred to by Edmund Gayton in his Festivous Notes upon Don Quixote (1654), p. 25 and his previous rôle of "Richard" (l. 23) may have been that of Ricardo in Massinger's Picture, which he had played in 1629 (cf. Phelps, Geo. Chap. p. 125). The earlier editors thought that Charles Hart was here alluded to, but Wright in his Historia Histrionica states it was the part of the Duchess in Shirley's Cardinal, licensed 1641, that first gave him any reputation. Hence he cannot at this date have performed Bussy; his fame in the part was made after the Restoration (cf. Introduction, p. xxv).

5-6, 1-33. Fortune . . . port. This opening speech of Bussy illustrates the difficult compression of Chapman's style and the diversion of his thought from strictly logical sequence by his excessive use of simile. He begins (ll. 1-4) by emphasising the paradoxical character of human affairs, in which only those escape poverty who are abnormal, while it is among the necessitous that worthily typical representatives of the race must be sought. The former class, under the designation of "great men," are then (after a parenthetical comparison with cedars waxing amidst tempests) likened to statuaries who are satisfied if the exterior of the Colossus they are creating is sufficiently imposing; they are then (by an awkward transition of the imagery) likened to the statues themselves (l. 15) "heroique" in form but "morter, flint, and lead" within. Chapman's meaning is here obvious enough, but it is a singular canon of æsthetics that estimates the worth of a statue by the materials out of which it is made. In l. 18 a new thought is started, that of the transitoriness of life, and the perishable nature of its gifts, and as the ocean-voyager needs a stay-at-home pilot to steer him safely into port, so the adventurer in "the waves of glassie glory" (ll. 29-30) is bidden look to "vertue" for guidance to his desired haven—not exactly the conclusion to be expected from the opening lines of the speech.

6, 23. To put a girdle . . . world. The editors all compare Mid. Night's Dream, i, 1, 175, which Chapman probably had in mind.

7, 34. in numerous state. A play of words, apparently, on two senses of the phrase: (1) the series of numbers, (2) a populous kingdom.

[Pg 147]8, 59. gurmundist. The N. E. D. quotes no other example of the form "gurmundist" for "gurmond" = "gourmand."

9, 86-87. set my looks In an eternall brake: keep my countenance perpetually immoveable. A "brake" is a piece of framework for holding something steady.

15, 187. I am a poet. This is historically true. A poem of some length, Stances faictes par M. de Bussy, is quoted by Joubert in his Bussy D'Amboise, pp. 205-09.

16, 207. his woodden dagger. The Elizabethan jester carried the wooden dagger or sword, which was often one of the properties of the "Vice" in the later Moralities and the Interludes.

17, Pyra. Though this character is mentioned here and elsewhere among the Dramatis Personæ, she takes no part in the dialogue.

17, 2. that English virgin: apparently Annable, who is the Duchess of Guise's lady-in-waiting (cf. iii, 2, 234-40).

18, 16-27. Assure you . . . confusion to it. With this encomium on Elizabeth and her Court compare Crequi's account of Byron's compliments to the Queen (Byron's Conspiracie, iv, 1).

19, 36. Which we must not affect: which change, however, we must not desire to take place.

19, 39-43. No question . . . as they. The travelled Englishman's affectation of foreign attire is a stock theme of Elizabethan satire. Cf. (e. g.) Merch. of Ven. i, 2, 78-81.

19, 44. travell. A pun on the two senses, (1) journey, (2) labour, the latter of which is now distinguished by the spelling "travail."

21, 85. Tis leape yeare. F. G. Fleay (Biog. Chron. i, 59) considers that this refers "to the date of production, as Bussy's introduction at Court was in 1569, not a Leap Year," and that it "fixes the time of representation to 1604." See Introduction.

22, 110. the groome-porters. Chapman here transfers to the French Court an official peculiar to the English Royal [Pg 148]Household till his abolition under George III. The function of the groom-porter was to furnish cards and dice for all gaming at Court, and to decide disputes arising at play.

23, 123. the guiserd. The play on words here is not clear; "guiserd" may be a variant of "gizzard," in which case it would mean the Duke's throat. This is more probable than a "jingling allusion . . . to goose-herd or gozzard," which Dilke suggests.

23, 124. are you blind of that side: unguarded and assailable in that direction.

23, 130. Accius Nævius: the augur who cut a whetstone in pieces in presence of Tarquinius Priscus.

23, 133. mate: either match or put down, overcome. The latter sense is more probable, with a punning allusion to the use of the word in chess, at which Guise seems to be engaged with the King. Cf. l. 184.

23, 135-36. of the new edition: of the recent creation. An allusion to the lavish creation of knights by James, shortly after his accession.

24, 141-42. y'ave cut too many throats. An allusion to Guise's share in the Massacre of St. Bartholomew. Contrast the references to the episode in The Revenge, ii, 1, 198-234.

24, 149. the Knights ward. Dilke thought that the allusion here was to the "poor knights of Windsor," but it really refers to a part of the "Counter" prison in London. Cf. Eastward Hoe, v, 2, 54, where Wolf says of Sir Petronel Flash, "The knight will i' the Knights-Ward, doe what we can, sir." (See Schelling's note.)

25, 168. like a rush. An allusion to the custom, still prevalent in Chapman's time, of strewing floors with rushes.

25, 178-79. of the place The divers frames. An obscure expression, which may mean: the varied character in different places of the bed of the sea.

25, 180-83. Bristled . . . fome. The imagery in these lines also presents difficulty. D'Ambois's heart is likened to the sea, [Pg 149]which, once swollen into billows, will not sink into its original calm till it is overspread by the crown or sheet of foam which the waves, after their subsidence, leave behind.

27, 237-38. Your descants . . . this ground. There is a complicated play on words here. Descant in music is the melodious accompaniment to a simple theme, the plainsong or ground. Hence arises the derived meaning, a variation on any theme, a comment, often of a censorious kind. This, as well as the original meaning, is implied here, while ground has, of course, its usual as well as its technical sense.

28, 243-44. Ile be your ghost to haunt you. May this be an early reference to Banquo's ghost? Macbeth was probably produced in 1606, the year before Bussy D'Ambois was printed.

28, 262. this priviledge. The royal presence-chamber, though the King has left it, is still regarded as inviolable.

29. Henry, Guise, Montsurry and Attendants. The Qq of 1607 and 1608, instead of Montsurry and Attendants, read Beaumond, Nuncius. Nuncius is a mistake, as he does not enter till after l. 24. Beaumond is evidently a courtier, who speaks ll. 105-107 (Such a life . . . of men), and who goes out with the King after l. 206. In 1641 and later Qq it was apparently thought desirable to leave out this "single-speech" character and transfer his words to Montsurry; but by an oversight Beau. was left prefixed to the second half of l. 105, and the S. D., Exit Rex cum Beau., was retained after l. 206. The editor has therefore substituted Mont. for Beau. in either case. Montsurry being thus present at the pardon of Bussy, the 1641 and later Qq leave out ll. 1-50 of the next Scene wherein inter alia Montsurry speaks of the pardon as yet undecided, and Guise enters to announce it to him.

Dilke in his edition in 1814 thought Beaumond a misprint for [Pg 150]Beaupre, who appears in other scenes, and whom he took to be a man, instead of a woman. Hence he reads Montsurry, Beaupre and Attendants both here and after l. 206. The other editors have not realized that there is any discrepancy to be explained.

29, 12-13. bruits it . . . healthfull: proclaims it through the world to be sound and wholesome.

31, 51-52. Pyrrho's opinion . . . are one. A sweeping generalisation, which cannot be accepted as an interpretation of the doctrines of the sceptical philosopher of Elis.

31, 54-58. As Hector . . . speak. The reference is to Iliad, vii, 54 ff., though Hector is there described as keeping back the Trojans with his spear.

32, 60. Ript up the quarrell: explained the cause and origin of the quarrel (Dilke).

32, 63-64. conclude The others dangers: might put an end to the risks of their companions by making their single combat cover the whole quarrel. Conclude here unites the Elizabethan sense include with the ordinary meaning finish.

32, 77-80. And then . . . never kill. An anticipation, as Lamb and others have pointed out, of Milton's description of angelic wounds, Par. Lost, vi, 344-49.

33, 84-87. Thrice pluckt . . . scap't. The accumulation of personal pronouns makes the interpretation somewhat difficult: thrice D'Ambois plucked at it, and thrice drew on thrusts from Barrisor who darted hither and thither like flame, and continued thrusting as D'Ambois plucked; yet, incredible to relate, the latter escaped injury.

33, 90. only made more horrid with his wound: Barrisor being only rendered fiercer by his wound. The construction is loose, as grammatically the words should qualify D'Ambois.

33, 92. redoubled in his danger: thrusting himself into danger for the second time. For this peculiar use of redoubled cf. l. 190, "on my knees redoubled," and note.

33, 94. Arden. Probably to be no more identified here with the Warwickshire district of this name than in As You Like It. Ardennes would be more appropriate on a Frenchman's lips, but the district belongs to the realm of fancy as much as Armenia in l. 117.

33, 97. he gan to nodde. An anacoluthon. The [Pg 151]construction should be "begin to nodde" after "I have seene an oke" in l. 94, but the intervening participial clauses produce irregularity. Similarily in l. 101 "he fell" should be "fall" and "hid" should be "hide."

33, 103-104. Of ten set. . . Navarre. The war between Henry III and Henry of Navarre continued from 1587 to 1589, but the "ten set battles" are without historical foundation.

34, 105. [Montsurry.] See note on stage direction at beginning of the scene.

34, 122. shelter of a tree. Unicorns were supposed to be worsted in encounters by their adversaries sheltering behind trees, in which they impaled themselves. Spenser, F. Q. ii, 5, 10, describes how a lion defeats a unicorn by this stratagem. Cf. Jul. Cæs. ii, 1, 303-04.

"He loves to hear
That unicorns may be betray'd with trees."

35, 130. hunt Honour at the view. A rare metaphorical application of the technical phrase, "hunt at the view."

35. [Exit Nuntius.] The editor has inserted this, as the Qq do not indicate when the Nuncius departs, and, with the entrance of Bussy, there is no further need of him. bare: bareheaded.

35, 141-44. If ever Nature . . . one. Difficult lines, which may be paraphrased: if ever Nature's bond maintained its strength, when subjected to the severe test of bridging the distance between sovereign and subject, both sprung from the same seed, now prove that in elevated stations she can show her nobility.

36, 164. this fact, though of justice: this action, though done in the name of justice.

37, 175-76. which . . . him: which is more precious [Pg 152]than a human life, which is inferior in value to it, and which was rightly forfeited to him through ill-doing.

37, 190. This is a grace. The grace or boon for which Bussy asks is explained by him in ll. 193-203. "This" usually refers to something that has gone before, on my knees redoubled: going down for the second time on my knees—from which he had risen after l. 179.

38, 198-204. Let me . . . King indeed. With this assertion of man's original "Kingship" cf. The Gentleman Usher, v, 1.

And what's a prince? Had all been virtuous men,
There never had been prince upon the earth,
And so no subject: all men had been princes.
A virtuous man is subject to no prince,
But to his soul and honour.

40, 18. Although she be my ante. From these words we learn that Beaupre is niece to the Duke and Duchess of Guise. Compare iii, ii, 188, and the reference to "my lady, your niece" in the passage in Qq 1607 and 1608 quoted in the textual note on iii, ii, 233.

42, 49. an agent for my bloud: an instrument in the satisfaction of my passions.

42, 57-58. his retiring . . . aspiring: his retirement to a position of inferiority will satisfy my aspirations.

43, 70-71. Wise wives . . . friend. Tamyra ironically keeps up the metaphor of the "two strings" in l. 66, and plays upon the double senses of "firm" and "loose" in archery and morals.

44, 95. as good cheap as it: literally, on as advantageous terms as; hence, with as little effort as, as readily as.

45, 108-10. Whose there . . . quality. Cf. All Fools, ii, 1, p. 67 (Phelps).

While I sit like a well-taught writing-woman
Turning her eyes upon some work or picture,
Read in a book, or take a feigned nap,
While her kind lady takes one to her lap.

45, 117. oportunities: importunities, which Dilke wished to substitute. But "opportunity" was used in this sense. Cf. Mer. Wiv. Wind. iii, 4, 20-2.

"Yet seeke my Fathers love, still seeke it, sir;
If opportunity and humblest suite
Cannot attain it, why then harke you hither."

45, 121-122. as to their pardons . . . Parliaments. The meaning appears to be: as the exceptions they make, after Parliaments have ceased to sit, are to the pardons they have granted.

48, 165. the Center: the unmoved central point of the earth, according to the Ptolemaic system.

49, 182. cast . . . beene: undress, as if I had never been watching here. Tamyra here determines to go to bed, but afterwards (l. 242) she returns.

49, 198. the first orbe move. An allusion to the Primum Mobile, which, in the Ptolemaic system, was the tenth sphere "of a most pure and cleare substance and without starres," which revolved in twenty-four hours, and carried round in its course all the inner spheres.

51, 231-32. If not . . . satisfi'd: if she is not given opportunity to dissemble or show petulance, she is not satisfied even if she gains what she desires.

56, 20-30. Sin . . . troth. A characteristic illustration of how one simile in Chapman's verse begets another, with little regard for logical sequence. The "shadowes" with which sin frightens us are first compared to the imaginary creatures into which fancy shapes the clouds; then sin itself (relegated from an active to a passive part) is likened not to a pure creation of the fancy, but to an exaggerated picture of a real monster displayed by "policy," i. e. the craft which seeks to debar men from their desires.

For the custom of exhibiting a rude painting of a curiosity, as a decoy to sightseers, cf. The Tempest, ii, 2, 29-31, "Were I in England now . . . and had but this fish painted, not a holiday fool there but would give a piece of silver."

[Pg 154]56, 33. our three powers. The vegetative, sensitive and reasoning faculties.

56-57, 40-43. Nor shall . . . wings. Tamyra's "fame," which in l. 38 has been spoken of as a "jewell," is now likened to a fabulous winged creature which is accorded free flight.

58, 69-71. layes . . . oppos'd. I am indebted to Dr. J. A. H. Murray for the following interpretation of this passage: [Nature] brings our powers into accordance with its own will or working, just as the stone (laid by the builder) should be apposed or brought into accord with the line, not the line (which is straight and not to be shifted) made to lie along the stone.

62, 13. Boots of hay-ropes. Bands of hay were sometimes wrapped round the legs, to serve instead of boots. Cf. Ben Jonson's Every Man in his Humour, i, 2. Step. But I have no boots . . . Brainworm. Why a fine wisp of hay roll'd hard, Master Stephen.

62, 18. a redhair'd man: a deceiver, traitor; so called from the representation of Judas in tapestries, and probably on the stage of the Miracle plays, with red hair.

63, 28. That . . . clapdish: That keeps regal state, though sprung from beggary. A clapdish was a wooden dish with a lid, carried by beggars and lepers, which they clapped to announce their approach.

63, 46. Venting . . . Hebrew: putting the best product of his livings to the reverse of its intended use. Hebrew is read backwards.

65, 69. that popular purple. An allusion to the Duke's robe, which was of royal purple, to impress the populace.

65, 76. He's noblier borne. "Noblier" has been here substituted for "nobly." The parallel phrases in the preceding lines are all comparatives, "better," "more," "greater," and Bussy, in the second half of this line, cannot mean to deny that Guise is of noble birth.

65, 79. Cardinall of Ambois. The Cardinal Georges d'Amboise was in reality Bussy's great-uncle.

66, 86-87. Be a duke . . . field. A play, of course, on the original meaning of Duke, as Dux or leader.

67, 108. the Hermean rod: the caduceus or rod of Hermes, with which he parted two fighting serpents, whereupon they embraced and stuck to the rod.

69, 144-47. and as this . . . pride. An allusion to the myth of the giant Typhoeus who, according to one version, was created by Hera alone, in anger at the birth of Pallas from the head of Zeus. He was killed by Zeus with a flash of lighting, and was buried in Tartarus under Mt. Etna.

69, 154. make scapes to please advantage: commit escapades, and thereby give points against themselves.

69, 155-56. women . . . candels: women who make the worst accomplices to men.

71, 187-88. as far as an unkle may. Guise is uncle to the lady Beaupre. Cf. note on ii, 2, 18.

74, 243-44. Come . . . courted. These words are whispered by Monsieur to Pero. The rest of his speech is spoken aloud as if in disgust at the rejection of advances made by him to Pero.

78, 325. engag'd in some sure plot: involved in the toils of some plot securely laid against him.

80, 375. angell of my life: an allusion to the tutelary genius. For a similar use of angel cf. Ant. and Cleop. ii, 3, 21.

81, 383. rais'd without a circle. If a necromancer, before raising a spirit, drew a circle within which he stood, he was secure against its power.

82, 406. which I have still in thought: which is always with me, as far as my thoughts are concerned.

84, 445-46. to force . . . estates. With the punctuation adopted And . . .bsp;. . throats is a clause parenthetically inserted [Pg 156]in the main statement, and the meaning is: to get possession of estates by foreclosing mortgages, and thus destroying their owners. The Qq have a comma after possessions, and no brackets in the following line.

84-85, 448-49. quarrell . . . Ajax. A reference to the well-known episode in Sophocles' Ajax.

85, 465. And glorifie . . . Hammon. Probably an allusion to the adoration of Alexander the Great as the son of Jupiter Ammon by the priests of this originally Æthiopian deity, at Thebes in Upper Egypt, in B. C. 331.

86, 473. like a scrich-owle sing. The screech of the owl was supposed to be an omen of death to the hearer. Cf. Macbeth, ii, 2, 3-4.

87, 507. her breathing rock. Dilke explains this as "the distaff from whence she draws the thread of life," but though this is evidently the meaning required, it is difficult to extract it from this obscure phrase.

87, 510. Defil'd . . . soule. Another instance of confused imagery, which yields no satisfactory meaning.

91, 57. her . . . liver. A double allusion, as Dilke has pointed out, to the story of Prometheus, and to the conception of the liver as the seat of the emotions.

93, 84. gushing. Used here transitively, qualifying laws, and governing blood.

93, 87. bare . . . hammes: the uncovered heads and cringing postures of sycophants.

93, 98. Armenian dragons. Chapman is fond of locating fabulous monsters in Armenia. Cf. ii, 1, 118-19.

[Pg 157]94, 115. almighty Æther. Probably a reminiscence of Virgil, Georg. 2, 325, pater omnipotens Æther.

94, 120. Nay, they are two. Monsieur, while saying this, makes two horns with his fingers.

96, 138. The plague of Herod. Cf. Acts xii, 23, "And he was eaten of worms, and gave up the ghost."

98, 181-83. comes . . . slew: if he is the source of the blot on my honour, it becomes a beauty, not a blemish, and proves that I posses the same innocence that caused the death of.

98, 183. Chymæra. A fire-breathing monster, brought up by Amisodarus, King of Caria. She was slain by Bellerophon. This Corinthian prince, to purify himself from a murder he had committed, had fled to the court of Proetus of Argos, whose wife, Anteia, fell in love with him. On his rejection of her advances, she made false accusations against him, whereupon Proetus sent him to his father-in-law, Iobates, King of Lycia, with a sealed letter, requesting him to put him to death. Iobates sent him to kill Chimæra, thinking he would be certain to perish in the attempt. But mounted on the winged horse Pegasus, he killed her from on high with his arrows.

98, 183-84. rescued . . . Peleon. Peleus, King of the Myrmidons, during a visit to Iolcus, attracted the love of Astydameia, the wife of Acastus. On his rejection of her proposals, she denounced him falsely to her husband, who took him to hunt wild beasts on Mount Peleon, and when he fell asleep through fatigue, concealed his sword, and left him alone to be devoured. But he was saved by Cheiron, who restored him his sword.

98, 185. the chaste Athenian prince: Hippolytus, son of Theseus and Hippolyta, with whom his step-mother Phædra fell in love. On his rejection of her advances, she accused him to Theseus, at whose prayer Poseidon caused his destruction, by frightening his horses, when he was driving along the seacoast, and overturning his chariot. Afterwards, on the discovery of his innocence, Asclepius restored him to the upper world.

98, 190. where thou fear'st, are dreadfull: inspirest terror even in those of whom thou art afraid.

[Pg 158]98-99, 192-94. the serpent . . . and me. A curious application of the legend of armed men springing from the dragon's teeth sown by Jason.

99, 204. feares his owne hand: is afraid of the consequences of his own handwriting.

99, 205-208. papers hold . . . honors: written documents often contain the revelation of our true selves, and, though of no material value, put the crown to our reputations.

99-100, 209-210. and with . . . knowes: and compare with its contents the evidence of this my most intimate attendant.

101, 6. trails hotly of him: is hot upon his scent. Him apparently refers to mischiefe in l. 4.

102, 25. With . . . affrighted: by which all things capable of terror are frightened.

103, 32. Epimethean. Epimetheus, the brother of Prometheus, opened Pandora's box, and let its evils loose among mankind.

103, 37-38. Or stood . . . artillerie. In the war of Zeus against Cronos, the Cyclopes aided the former, who had released them from Tartarus, by furnishing him with thunderbolts.

103, 47-48. I will . . . spirit: I will command a spirit, raised by my art, to enlighten us.

104, 54. Behemoth. The editor has been unable to find any precedent for Chapman's application of this name—which in the Book of Job denotes the whale or hippopotamus—to the chief of the powers of darkness.

104, 55. Asaroth. Apparently a variant of Ashtaroth, the plural of Ashtoreth, the Phœnician moon-goddess; here mistakenly used for the name of a male spirit.

107-109, 113-51. There is . . . his soule. The dialogue and action here take place probably at the back of the stage, perhaps on the upper stage, of which use is made in The Tempest, the Spanish Tragedie, and other plays. The characters (as is evident [Pg 159]from ll. 102-104) are supposed to be far off, but rendered visible and audible to Tamyra and D'Ambois by Behemoth's power.

107, 113. a glasse of ink: a mirror made of ink, i. e. the paper with the proofs of Tamyra's unfaithfulness.

107, 116. fames sepulchres: the foulness beneath which her good name is buried.

107, 120-21. were . . . rarely: were it never so uncommon, bear it with as unexampled courage.

109, 156. In her forc'd bloud. Dilke is followed in the substitution of her for his. The allusion is evidently to the letter that Tamyra afterwards writes to D'Ambois in her own blood. Cf. v, 1, 176-77.

110, 169-70. Lest . . . abuse: lest a furious outburst due to your foreknowledge of the plot against us.

111, 185. And . . . policy: and the Monsieur's stratagems shall be taken in the flank by my own.

111, 186. Center. Here and in l. 192 this word, though strictly meaning the central point of the earth, seems used for the earth itself, as the centre of the universe. For this use cf. Shaks. Tro. and Cress. i, 3, 85-86.

"The heavens themselves, the planets, and this center
Observe degree, priority, and place."

111, 191. calme . . . ruine: unsuspecting tranquillity previous to a convulsion of the elements.

113, 17-18. The stony . . . sleeper. The thunderstone, or thunderbolt, was supposed to have no power of harming any one who was asleep, or who wore laurel leaves. Leigh, in his Observations on the First Twelve Cæsars (1647), p. 43, says of Tiberius that "he feared thunder exceedingly, and when the aire or weather was any thing troubled, he even carried a chaplet or wreath of laurell about his neck, because that as (Pliny reporteth) is never blasted with lightning."

114, 50. determinate: apparently used in the sense of final, though the sense is rare, except as qualifying a word which implies previous deliberation.

115, 55-56. preventing . . . death: anticipating the last blast that is to kill those who live, and to give life anew to the dead.

115, 64. Fame growes in going. Borrowed from the Æneid, iv, 173-75, Fama . . . viresque acquirit eundo.

115, 67-68. come . . . lust. The syren is Tamyra; her song the letter she is to write to her lover (cf. l. 75); Montsurry; band of murderers the fatal rocks; and the ruffin gally, D'Ambois.

115, 69-71. the nets . . . danc'd. There is a play here upon nets in the sense of wiles, and in its usual signification. To "dance," or "march," or "hide" in a net was to delude oneself that one was acting secretly (cf. Henry V, i, 4, 173, and Span. Trag. iv, 4, 118).

116, 86. their should be, in grammatical sequence, "her," referring to "a womans" in 83.

116, 91. nor in humane consort: nor do they find human fellowship. The metaphor of the wildernesse is still being carried on.

118, 128-30. Where . . . cruelty: in the same quarter [i. e. your person] where all these bonds have been violated, they are preserved by the infliction of just punishment, with some exhibition of the same quintessence of cruelty that you have shown me.

118, 142. Thus I expresse thee yet: thus I give a further stroke to my delineation of thee.

118, 143. thy . . . yet: the image of thy unnatural depravity is not yet fully completed.

118, 145. This other engine: the rack, on which Montsurry's servants place Tamyra. Cf. l. 157, "O let me downe, my lord."

119, 151-52. O who . . . None but my lord and husband. Tamyra thinks that some evil spirit has taken her husband's shape, and cries to Montsurry to appear and deliver her.

119, 161. Now . . . stands still. This statement of the leading principle of the Copernican system, as a mere rhetorical paradox, is remarkable.

119-120, 163-72. The too huge . . . with hypocrisie. In this curious passage the earth is conceived of as a recumbent figure, which usually lies face upwards to the sky. But the weight of her sins has caused her to roll over, so that her back [Pg 161]part now braves heaven, while her face is turned to the Antipodes; and all the deceitful appearances which she has adopted through her cheating arts have come out in their true nature on her back, so that her hypocrisy stands revealed.

120, 181. his. We should expect a repetition of her in l. 180. His, however seems to be equivalent to man's, anticipating man in l. 182. Possibly we should read this.

121, 191. In, Ile after. These words are addressed to the body of the Friar.

123, 28. And . . . man: And consider it, though left headless, as a completely formed man.

124, 46-53. Not so . . . mens hate. An adaptation of Seneca's Agamemnon, 64-72:

Non sic Libycis Syrtibus æquor
Furit alternos volvere fluctus,
Non Euxini turget ab imis
Commota vadis unda, nivali
Vicina polo;
Ubi, cæruleis immunis aquis,
Lucida versat plaustra Bootes,
Ut praecipites regum casus
Fortuna rotat.

These lines, with those immediately before and after, are more loosely adapted in Kyd's Spanish Tragedie, iii, 1, 1-11.

127, 41-53. Terror of darknesse . . . greater light. After Bussy's statement in ll. 29-32 we should expect him to immediately summon the Prince of darknesse, Behemoth. But ll. 41-46 are apparently addressed to the sun-god, who is invoked to put to flight night and mystery. Then as an alternative, in ll. 47-53, Behemoth, to whom darkness is as light, is bidden appear. Dilke substitutes oh for or (the reading of all Qq) at the beginning of l. 47. If this change be right, the invocation commences [Pg 162]at this line, and ll. 41-46 are merely a preliminary rhetorical appeal for more illumination. But in this case there is an incongruity between such an appeal and the summoning of the Prince of shades, who sees best where darkness is thickest. Lamb in his Specimens retains the reading of the Qq, and says of the passage: "This calling upon Light and Darkness for information, but, above all, the description of the spirit—'threw his changed countenance headlong into clouds'—is tremendous, to the curdling of the blood. I know nothing in poetry like it."

131. Intrat Umbra Frier . . . Tamyra. The Ghost of the Friar enters and discovers, i. e. reveals to view, Tamyra, who since the close of v, 1, has remained wrapped in the arras, or, as the variant stage direction in A here puts it, wrapt in a canapie.

131, 9. before he be revenged: before vengeance is taken on him. The reading of A, engaged, is perhaps (as Dilke suggests) preferable.

133, 27-28. what . . . D'Amboys: what bugbear, such as this, is not afraid to visit D'Amboys, even in his sleep?

134, 45. Will . . . here? D'Ambois's sword fails to pierce the privy coat worn by the murderer. Cf. v, 2, 57.

134, 52. That . . . resembled: That was a successful artifice, and a skilful impersonation.

136, 82. Then . . . fact: then these teachers of divinity deal with figments, not with realities.

136, 83-84. Man . . . servant: Man consists of two attached friends, the body and the mind, of which the latter is swayed by the former, as a lover by his mistress.

136, 90-93. And if Vespasian . . . groomes. Cf. Suetonius, Life of Vespasian, Ch. 24. Hic, quum super urgentem valetudinem creberrimo frigidæ aquæ usu etiam intestina vitiasset, nec eo minus muneribus imperatoriis ex consuetudine fungeretur, ut etiam legationes audiret cubans, alvo repente usque ad defectionem soluta, Imperatorem, ait, stantem mori oportere. Dumque consurgit, ac nititur, inter manus sublevantium exstinctus est.

137, 100-108. And haste . . . dwellers. An adaptation of Seneca, Her. Oet. 1518-1526:

O decus mundi, radiate Titan,
Cujus ad primos Hecate vapores
Lassa nocturnæ levat ora bigæ,
Dic sub Aurora positis Sabæis,
Dic sub Occasu positis Iberis,
Quique ferventi quatiuntur axe,
Quique sub plaustro patiuntur Ursæ;
Dic ad æternos, properare Manes
Herculem.

137, 110-111. may . . . funerall: may celebrate fittingly my unworthy end with such a funeral volley as it deserves.

138, 135-40. My sunne . . . bloud. In these lines the killing spectacle, the prodigie, of l. 134, and its effect are described. Tamyra, the light of D'Ambois's life, with her reddened bosom and hands, is likened to a sun whose beams have turned to blood. So far the imagery is clear, but it is difficult to extract a satisfactory sense from what follows. What do Pindus and Ossa symbolize, and what exactly does their melting mean? This seems one of the few passages in the play which really deserve Dryden's stricture for "looseness of expression and gross hyperboles."

139, 146. struck. The Qq, and all editors, read stuck, but the word seems inapplicable to a thunderbolt. The editor has conjectured struck, which, with a minimum of change, gives the sense required.

139, 149 Joine flames with Hercules. Here the quartos of 1607 and 1608 contain the right reading. D'Ambois, who has met death in the spirit of Hercules (cf. ll. 100-108), is now to share his translation to the skies. For the description of Hercules as a star see Seneca, Her. Oet. 1564-1581.

142, 211-14 as . . . dies. The reference is to the wax in the taper, which retains in its savour the mark of its origin in the hive, till transient as life, it glances with the eye of a flame, and, so doing, expires.

THE TEXT

The Revenge of Bussy D'Ambois was printed in quarto in 1613 by T. S. for John Helme. No reprint appeared till 1873, when it was included in the edition of Chapman's Tragedies and Comedies published by J. Pearson. The text of the quarto was reproduced, with the original spelling and punctuation, but with a few errors. There have been two later editions in modernized spelling, and with slight emendations, by R. H. Shepherd in 1874, and W. L. Phelps in 1895.

In the present edition the text of the quarto has been reproduced, with some additional emendations, and the original spelling has been retained. As regards punctuation, the use of capital letters and italics, and the division of the Acts into Scenes, the same methods have been followed as in the case of Bussy D'Ambois.

THE
REVENGE

Bussy D'Ambois.

A
Tragedie

As it hath beene often presented at the
priuate Play-house in the White Fryers.

Written

By George Chapman, Gentleman.

LONDON:
Printed by T. S. and are to be solde by Iohn Helme,
at his Shop in S. Dunstones Church-Yard,
in Fleetstreet. 1613.

SOURCES

The story of a plot by Bussy D'Ambois's kinsfolk to avenge his murder is, in the main, of Chapman's own invention. But he had evidently read an account similar to that given later by De Thou of the design entertained for a time by Bussy's sister Renée (whom Chapman calls Charlotte) and her husband, Baligny, to take vengeance on Montsurry. Clermont D'Ambois is himself a fictitious character, but the episodes in which he appears in Acts II-IV are drawn from the account of the treacherous proceedings against the Count d'Auvergne in Edward Grimeston's translation of Jean de Serres's Inventaire Général de l'Histoire de France. This narrative, however, is not by De Serres, but by Pierre Matthieu, whose Histoire de France was one of the sources used by Grimeston for events later than 1598.

The portraiture of Clermont throughout the play as the high-souled philosopher is inspired by Epictetus's delineation in his Discourses of the ideal Stoic. But in his reluctance to carry out his duty of revenge he is evidently modelled upon Hamlet. In Act v, Scene i, the influence of Shakespeare's tragedy is specially manifest.

The Scenes in Act v relating to the assassination of Guise are based upon Grimeston's translation of De Serres's Inventaire Général.

The passages in Grimeston's volume which recount the Duke's murder, and those which tell the story of the Count d'Auvergne, are reprinted as an Appendix.

The frontispiece to this volume, the Château of La Coutancière, at which Bussy D'Ambois was killed, is reproduced from an illustration in A. Joubert's Louis de Clermont.

[Pg 168]TO THE RIGHT

VERTUOUS, AND

truely Noble Knight, S^r.

Thomas Howard, &c.

Since workes of this kinde have beene lately esteemed
worthy the patronage of some of our worthiest
Nobles, I have made no doubt to preferre this of mine
to your undoubted vertue and exceeding true noblesse,
as contayning matter no lesse deserving your reading, 5
and excitation to heroycall life, then any such late dedication.
Nor have the greatest Princes of Italie and other
countries conceived it any least diminution to their greatnesse
to have their names wing'd with these tragicke
plumes, and disperst by way of patronage through the 10
most noble notices of Europe.

Howsoever, therefore, in the scænicall presentation it
might meete with some maligners, yet, considering even
therein it past with approbation of more worthy judgements,
the ballance of their side (especially being held 15
by your impartiall hand) I hope will to no graine abide
the out-weighing. And for the autenticall truth of eyther
person or action, who (worth the respecting) will expect
it in a poeme, whose subject is not truth, but things like
truth? Poore envious soules they are that cavill at truths 20
want in these naturall fictions: materiall instruction, elegant
and sententious excitation to vertue, and deflection
[Pg 169]from her contrary, being the soule, lims, and limits of an
autenticall tragedie. But whatsoever merit of your full
countenance and favour suffers defect in this, I shall soone 25
supply with some other of more generall account; wherein
your right vertuous name made famous and preserved to
posteritie, your future comfort and honour in your present
acceptation and love of all vertuous and divine expression
may be so much past others of your rancke encreast, as 30
they are short of your judiciall ingenuitie, in their due
estimation.

For howsoever those ignoble and sowre-brow'd
worldlings are carelesse of whatsoever future or present
opinion spreads of them; yet (with the most divine 35
philosopher, if Scripture did not confirme it) I make it
matter of my faith, that we truely retaine an intellectuall
feeling of good or bad after this life, proportionably
answerable to the love or neglect we beare here to all
vertue and truely-humane instruction: in whose favour 40
and honour I wish you most eminent, and rest ever,

THE ACTORS NAMES

The Revenge
of
Bussy D'Ambois

A
Tragedie

Actus primi Scæna prima.

Baligny. To what will this declining kingdome turne,

Swindging in every license, as in this

Stupide permission of brave D'Ambois Murther?

Murther made paralell with Law! Murther us'd

To serve the kingdome, given by sute to men5

For their advancement! suffered scarcrow-like

To fright adulterie! what will policie

At length bring under his capacitie?

[Pg 172]

Renel. All things; for as, when the high births of Kings,

Deliverances, and coronations,10

We celebrate with all the cities bels

Jangling together in untun'd confusion,

All order'd clockes are tyed up; so, when glory,

Flatterie, and smooth applauses of things ill,

Uphold th'inordinate swindge of downe-right power,15

Justice, and truth that tell the bounded use,

Vertuous and well distinguisht formes of time,

Are gag'd and tongue-tide. But wee have observ'd

Rule in more regular motion: things most lawfull

Were once most royall; Kings sought common good,20

Mens manly liberties, though ne'er so meane,

And had their owne swindge so more free, and more.

But when pride enter'd them, and rule by power,

All browes that smil'd beneath them, frown'd; hearts griev'd

By imitation; vertue quite was vanisht,25

And all men studi'd selfe-love, fraud, and vice.

Then no man could be good but he was punisht.

Tyrants, being still more fearefull of the good

[Pg 173]

Then of the bad, their subjects vertues ever

Manag'd with curbs and dangers, and esteem'd30

As shadowes and detractions to their owne.

Bal. Now all is peace, no danger, now what followes?

Idlenesse rusts us, since no vertuous labour

Ends ought rewarded; ease, securitie,

Now all the palme weares. Wee made warre before35

So to prevent warre; men with giving gifts,

More then receiving, made our countrey strong;

Our matchlesse race of souldiers then would spend

In publike warres, not private brawles, their spirits;

In daring enemies, arm'd with meanest armes,40

Not courting strumpets, and consuming birth-rights

In apishnesse and envy of attire.

No labour then was harsh, no way so deepe,

No rocke so steepe, but if a bird could scale it,

Up would our youth flie to. A foe in armes45

Stirr'd up a much more lust of his encounter

Then of a mistresse never so be-painted.

Ambition then was onely scaling walles,

And over-topping turrets; fame was wealth;

Best parts, best deedes, were best nobilitie;50

Honour with worth, and wealth well got or none.

[Pg 174]

Countries we wonne with as few men as countries:

Vertue subdu'd all.

Ren. Just: and then our nobles

Lov'd vertue so, they prais'd and us'd it to;

Had rather doe then say; their owne deedes hearing55

By others glorified, then be so barraine

That their parts onely stood in praising others.

Bal. Who could not doe, yet prais'd, and envi'd not;

Civile behaviour flourisht; bountie flow'd;

Avarice to upland boores, slaves, hang-men banisht.60

Ren. Tis now quite otherwise. But to note the cause

Of all these foule digressions and revolts

From our first natures, this tis in a word:

Since good arts faile, crafts and deceits are us'd:

Men ignorant are idle; idle men65

Most practise what they most may doe with ease,

Fashion and favour; all their studies ayming

At getting money, which no wise man ever

Fed his desires with.

Bal. Yet now none are wise

That thinke not heavens true foolish, weigh'd with that.70

[Pg 175]

Well, thou most worthy to be greatest Guise,

Make with thy greatnesse a new world arise.

Such deprest nobles (followers of his)

As you, my selfe, my lord, will finde a time

When to revenge your wrongs.

Ren. I make no doubt: 75

In meane time, I could wish the wrong were righted

Of your slaine brother in law, brave Bussy D'Ambois.

Bal. That one accident was made my charge.

My brother Bussy's sister (now my wife)

By no suite would consent to satisfie80

My love of her with marriage, till I vow'd

To use my utmost to revenge my brother:

But Clermont D'Ambois (Bussy's second brother)

Had, since, his apparition, and excitement

To suffer none but his hand in his wreake;85

Which hee hath vow'd, and so will needes acquite

Me of my vow made to my wife, his sister,

And undertake himselfe Bussy's revenge.

Yet loathing any way to give it act,

But in the noblest and most manly course,90

If th'Earle dares take it, he resolves to send

A challenge to him, and my selfe must beare it;

To which deliverie I can use no meanes,

[Pg 176]

He is so barricado'd in his house,

And arm'd with guard still.

Ren. That meanes lay on mee, 95

Which I can strangely make. My last lands sale,

By his great suite, stands now on price with him,

And hee (as you know) passing covetous,

With that blinde greedinesse that followes gaine,

Will cast no danger where her sweete feete tread.100

Besides, you know, his lady, by his suite

(Wooing as freshly as when first love shot

His faultlesse arrowes from her rosie eyes)

Now lives with him againe, and shee, I know,

Will joyne with all helps in her friends revenge.105

Bal. No doubt, my lord, and therefore let me pray you

To use all speede; for so on needels points

My wifes heart stands with haste of the revenge,

Being (as you know) full of her brothers fire,

That shee imagines I neglect my vow;110

Keepes off her kinde embraces, and still askes,

"When, when, will this revenge come? when perform'd

Will this dull vow be?" And, I vow to heaven,

So sternely, and so past her sexe she urges

[Pg 177]

My vowes performance, that I almost feare115

To see her, when I have a while beene absent,

Not showing her, before I speake, the bloud

She so much thirsts for, freckling hands and face.

Ren. Get you the challenge writ, and looke from me

To heare your passage clear'd no long time after. Exit Ren[el]. 120

Bal. All restitution to your worthiest lordship!

Whose errand I must carrie to the King,

As having sworne my service in the search

Of all such malecontents and their designes,

By seeming one affected with their faction125

And discontented humours gainst the state:

Nor doth my brother Clermont scape my counsaile

Given to the King about his Guisean greatnesse,

Which (as I spice it) hath possest the King,

Knowing his daring spirit, of much danger130

Charg'd in it to his person; though my conscience

Dare sweare him cleare of any power to be

Infected with the least dishonestie:

Yet that sinceritie, wee politicians

Must say, growes out of envie since it cannot135

Aspire to policies greatnesse; and the more

We worke on all respects of kinde and vertue,

[Pg 178]

The more our service to the King seemes great,

In sparing no good that seemes bad to him:

And the more bad we make the most of good,140

The more our policie searcheth, and our service

Is wonder'd at for wisedome and sincerenesse.

Tis easie to make good suspected still,

Where good, and God, are made but cloakes for ill.

See Monsieur taking now his leave for Brabant;145

The Guise & his deare minion, Clermont D'Ambois,

Whispering together, not of state affaires,

I durst lay wagers, (though the Guise be now

In chiefe heate of his faction) but of some thing

Savouring of that which all men else despise,150

How to be truely noble, truely wise.

Monsieur. See how hee hangs upon the eare of Guise,

Like to his jewell!

Epernon. Hee's now whisp'ring in

Some doctrine of stabilitie and freedome,

Contempt of outward greatnesse, and the guises155

That vulgar great ones make their pride and zeale,

[Pg 179]

Being onely servile traines, and sumptuous houses,

High places, offices.

Mons. Contempt of these

Does he read to the Guise? Tis passing needfull,

And hee, I thinke, makes show t'affect his doctrine.160

Ep. Commends, admires it—

Mons. And pursues another.

Tis fine hypocrisie, and cheape, and vulgar,

Knowne for a covert practise, yet beleev'd

By those abus'd soules that they teach and governe

No more then wives adulteries by their husbands,165

They bearing it with so unmov'd aspects,

Hot comming from it, as twere not [at] all,

Or made by custome nothing. This same D'Ambois

Hath gotten such opinion of his vertues,

Holding all learning but an art to live well,170

And showing hee hath learn'd it in his life,

Being thereby strong in his perswading others,

That this ambitious Guise, embracing him,

Is thought t'embrace his vertues.

[Pg 180]

Ep. Yet in some

His vertues are held false for th'others vices:175

For tis more cunning held, and much more common,

To suspect truth then falshood: and of both

Truth still fares worse, as hardly being beleev'd,

As tis unusuall and rarely knowne.

Mons. Ile part engendring vertue. Men affirme,180

Though this same Clermont hath a D'Ambois spirit,

And breathes his brothers valour, yet his temper

Is so much past his that you cannot move him:

Ile try that temper in him.—Come, you two

Devoure each other with your vertues zeale,185

And leave for other friends no fragment of yee:

I wonder, Guise, you will thus ravish him

Out of my bosome, that first gave the life

His manhood breathes spirit, and meanes, and luster.

What doe men thinke of me, I pray thee, Clermont?190

Once give me leave (for tryall of that love

That from thy brother Bussy thou inherit'st)

T'unclaspe thy bosome.

Clermont. As how, sir?

Mons. Be a true glasse to mee, in which I may

[Pg 181]

Behold what thoughts the many-headed beast195

And thou thy selfe breathes out concerning me,

My ends and new upstarted state in Brabant,

For which I now am bound, my higher aymes

Imagin'd here in France: speake, man, and let

Thy words be borne as naked as thy thoughts.200

O were brave Bussy living!

Cler. Living, my lord!

Mons. Tis true thou art his brother, but durst thou

Have brav'd the Guise; mauger his presence, courted

His wedded lady; emptied even the dregs

Of his worst thoughts of mee even to my teeth;205

Discern'd not me, his rising soveraigne,

From any common groome, but let me heare

My grossest faults, as grosse-full as they were?

Durst thou doe this?

Cler. I cannot tell. A man

Does never know the goodnesse of his stomacke210

Till hee sees meate before him. Were I dar'd,

Perhaps, as he was, I durst doe like him.

Mons. Dare then to poure out here thy freest soule

Of what I am.

Cler. Tis stale, he tolde you it.

Mons. He onely jested, spake of splene and envie;215

[Pg 182]

Thy soule, more learn'd, is more ingenuous,

Searching, judiciall; let me then from thee

Heare what I am.

Cler. What but the sole support,

And most expectant hope of all our France,

The toward victor of the whole Low Countryes?220

Mons. Tush, thou wilt sing encomions of my praise!

Is this like D'Ambois? I must vexe the Guise,

Or never looke to heare free truth. Tell me,

For Bussy lives not; hee durst anger mee,

Yet, for my love, would not have fear'd to anger225

The King himselfe. Thou understand'st me, dost not?

Cler. I shall my lord, with studie.

Mons. Dost understand thy selfe? I pray thee tell me,

Dost never search thy thoughts, what my designe

Might be to entertaine thee and thy brother?230

What turne I meant to serve with you?

Cler. Even what you please to thinke.

Mons. But what thinkst thou?

Had I no end in't, think'st?

Cler. I thinke you had.

Mons. When I tooke in such two as you two were,

A ragged couple of decaid commanders,235

[Pg 183]

When a French-crowne would plentifully serve

To buy you both to any thing i'th'earth—

Cler. So it would you.

Mons. Nay bought you both out-right,

You and your trunkes—I feare me, I offend thee.

Cler. No, not a jot.

Mons. The most renowmed souldier, 240

Epaminondas (as good authors say)

Had no more suites then backes, but you two shar'd

But one suite twixt you both, when both your studies

Were not what meate to dine with, if your partridge,

Your snipe, your wood-cocke, larke, or your red hering,245

But where to begge it; whether at my house,

Or at the Guises (for you know you were

Ambitious beggars) or at some cookes-shop,

T'eternize the cookes trust, and score it up.

Dost not offend thee?

Cler. No, sir. Pray proceede. 250

Mons. As for thy gentry, I dare boldly take

Thy honourable othe: and yet some say

Thou and thy most renowmed noble brother

Came to the Court first in a keele of sea-coale.

Dost not offend thee?

[Pg 184]

Cler. Never doubt it, sir. 255

Mons. Why doe I love thee, then? Why have I rak'd thee

Out of the dung-hill? cast my cast ward-robe on thee?

Brought thee to Court to, as I did thy brother?

Made yee my sawcy bon companions?

Taught yee to call our greatest Noblemen 260

By the corruption of their names—Jack, Tom?

Have I blowne both for nothing to this bubble?

Though thou art learn'd, thast no enchanting wit;

Or, were thy wit good, am I therefore bound

To keepe thee for my table?

Cler. Well, sir, 'twere 265

A good knights place. Many a proud dubb'd gallant

Seekes out a poore knights living from such emrods.

[Mons.] Or what use else should I designe thee to?

Perhaps you'll answere me—to be my pander.

Cler. Perhaps I shall.

Mons. Or did the slie Guise put thee 270

Into my bosome t'undermine my projects?

[Pg 185]

I feare thee not; for, though I be not sure

I have thy heart, I know thy braine-pan yet

To be as emptie a dull piece of wainscot

As ever arm'd the scalpe of any courtier;275

A fellow onely that consists of sinewes;

Meere Swisser, apt for any execution.

Cler. But killing of the King!

Mons. Right: now I see

Thou understand'st thy selfe.

Cler. I, and you better.

You are a Kings sonne borne.

Mons. Right.

Cler. And a Kings brother. 280

Mons. True.

Cler. And might not any foole have beene so too,

As well as you?

Mons. A poxe upon you!

Cler. You did no princely deedes

Ere you were borne (I take it) to deserve it;285

Nor did you any since that I have heard;

Nor will doe ever any, as all thinke.

Mons. The Divell take him! Ile no more of him.

Guise. Nay: stay, my lord, and heare him answere you.

[Pg 186]

Mons. No more, I sweare. Farewell. Ex[eunt] Mons[ieur], Esper[none], Soiss[on].

Gui. No more! Ill fortune! 290

I would have given a million to have heard

His scoffes retorted, and the insolence

Of his high birth and greatnesse (which were never

Effects of his deserts, but of his fortune)

Made show to his dull eyes beneath the worth295

That men aspire to by their knowing vertues,

Without which greatnesse is a shade, a bubble.

Cler. But what one great man dreames of that but you?

All take their births and birth-rights left to them

(Acquir'd by others) for their owne worths purchase,300

When many a foole in both is great as they:

And who would thinke they could winne with their worths

Wealthy possessions, when, wonne to their hands,

They neyther can judge justly of their value,

Nor know their use? and therefore they are puft305

With such proud tumours as this Monsieur is,

Enabled onely by the goods they have

To scorne all goodnesse: none great fill their fortunes;

But as those men that make their houses greater,

[Pg 187]

Their housholds being lesse, so Fortune raises310

Huge heapes of out-side in these mightie men,

And gives them nothing in them.

Gui. True as truth:

And therefore they had rather drowne their substance

In superfluities of brickes and stones

(Like Sysiphus, advancing of them ever,315

And ever pulling downe) then lay the cost

Of any sluttish corner on a man,

Built with Gods finger, and enstil'd his temple.

Bal. Tis nobly said, my lord.

Gui. I would have these things

Brought upon stages, to let mightie misers320

See all their grave and serious miseries plaid,

As once they were in Athens and olde Rome.

Cler. Nay, we must now have nothing brought on stages,

But puppetry, and pide ridiculous antickes:

Men thither come to laugh, and feede fool-fat,325

Checke at all goodnesse there, as being prophan'd:

When, wheresoever goodnesse comes, shee makes

The place still sacred, though with other feete

Never so much tis scandal'd and polluted.

Let me learne anything that fits a man,330

In any stables showne, as well as stages.

[Pg 188]

Bal. Why, is not all the world esteem'd a stage?

Cler. Yes, and right worthily; and stages too

Have a respect due to them, if but onely

For what the good Greeke moralist sayes of them:335

"Is a man proud of greatnesse, or of riches?

Give me an expert actor, Ile shew all,

That can within his greatest glory fall.

Is a man fraid with povertie and lownesse?

Give me an actor, Ile shew every eye340

What hee laments so, and so much doth flye,

The best and worst of both." If but for this then,

To make the proudest out-side that most swels

With things without him, and above his worth,

See how small cause hee has to be so blowne up;345

And the most poore man, to be griev'd with poorenesse,

Both being so easily borne by expert actors,

The stage and actors are not so contemptfull

As every innovating Puritane,

And ignorant sweater out of zealous envie350

Would have the world imagine. And besides

That all things have been likened to the mirth

Us'd upon stages, and for stages fitted,

The splenative philosopher, that ever

[Pg 189]

Laught at them all, were worthy the enstaging.355

All objects, were they ne'er so full of teares,

He so conceited that he could distill thence

Matter that still fed his ridiculous humour.

Heard he a lawyer, never so vehement pleading,

Hee stood and laught. Heard hee a trades-man swearing,360

Never so thriftily selling of his wares,

He stood and laught. Heard hee an holy brother,

For hollow ostentation, at his prayers

Ne'er so impetuously, hee stood and laught.

Saw hee a great man never so insulting,365

Severely inflicting, gravely giving lawes,

Not for their good, but his, hee stood and laught.

Saw hee a youthfull widow

Never so weeping, wringing of her hands

For her lost lord, still the philosopher laught.370

Now whether hee suppos'd all these presentments

Were onely maskeries, and wore false faces,

Or else were simply vaine, I take no care;

But still hee laught, how grave soere they were.

Gui. And might right well, my Clermont; and for this375

[Pg 190]

Vertuous digression we will thanke the scoffes

Of vicious Monsieur. But now for the maine point

Of your late resolution for revenge

Of your slaine friend.

Cler. I have here my challenge,

Which I will pray my brother Baligny380

To beare the murtherous Earle.

Bal. I have prepar'd

Meanes for accesse to him, through all his guard.

Gui. About it then, my worthy Baligny,

And bring us the successe.

Bal. I will, my lord. Exeunt.

LINENOTES:

[Scæna Secunda.

Tamyra. Revenge, that ever red sitt'st in the eyes

Of injur'd ladies, till we crowne thy browes

With bloudy lawrell, and receive from thee

Justice for all our honours injurie;

Whose wings none flye that wrath or tyrannie5

Have ruthlesse made and bloudy, enter here,

[Pg 191]

Enter, O enter! and, though length of time

Never lets any scape thy constant justice,

Yet now prevent that length. Flye, flye, and here

Fixe thy steele foot-steps; here, O here, where still10

Earth (mov'd with pittie) yeelded and embrac'd

My loves faire figure, drawne in his deare bloud,

And mark'd the place, to show thee where was done

The cruell'st murther that ere fled the sunne.

O Earth! why keep'st thou not as well his spirit,15

To give his forme life? No, that was not earthly;

That (rarefying the thinne and yeelding ayre)

Flew sparkling up into the sphære of fire

Whence endlesse flames it sheds in my desire.

Here be my daily pallet; here all nights 20

That can be wrested from thy rivals armes,

O my deare Bussy, I will lye, and kisse

Spirit into thy bloud, or breathe out mine

In sighes, and kisses, and sad tunes to thine. She sings.

Montsurry. Still on this hant? Still shall adulterous bloud 25

Affect thy spirits? Thinke, for shame, but this,

This bloud, that cockatrice-like thus thou brood'st,

[Pg 192]

To dry is to breede any quench to thine.

And therefore now (if onely for thy lust

A little cover'd with a vaile of shame)30

Looke out for fresh life, rather then witch-like

Learne to kisse horror, and with death engender.

Strange crosse in nature, purest virgine shame

Lies in the bloud as lust lyes; and together

Many times mixe too; and in none more shamefull35

Then in the shamefac't. Who can then distinguish

Twixt their affections; or tell when hee meetes

With one not common? Yet, as worthiest poets

Shunne common and plebeian formes of speech,

Every illiberall and affected phrase,40

To clothe their matter, and together tye

Matter and forme with art and decencie;

So worthiest women should shunne vulgar guises,

And though they cannot but flye out for change,

Yet modestie, the matter of their lives,45

Be it adulterate, should be painted true

With modest out-parts; what they should doe still

Grac'd with good show, though deedes be ne'er so ill.

Tamy. That is so farre from all yee seeke of us

[Pg 193]

That (though your selves be common as the ayre)50

We must not take the ayre, wee must not fit

Our actions to our owne affections:

But as geometricians (you still say)

Teach that no lines, nor superficies,

Doe move themselves, but still accompanie55

The motions of their bodies; so poore wives

Must not pursue, nor have their owne affections,

But to their husbands earnests, and their jests,

To their austerities of lookes, and laughters,

(Though ne'er so foolish and injurious)60

Like parasites and slaves, fit their disposures.

Mont. I usde thee as my soule, to move and rule me.

Tamy. So said you, when you woo'd. So souldiers tortur'd

With tedious sieges of some wel-wall'd towne,

Propound conditions of most large contents,65

Freedome of lawes, all former government;

But having once set foote within the wals,

And got the reynes of power into their hands,

Then doe they tyrannize at their owne rude swindges,

[Pg 194]

Seaze all their goods, their liberties, and lives,70

And make advantage, and their lusts, their lawes.

Mont. But love me, and performe a wifes part yet,

With all my love before, I sweare forgivenesse.

Tamy. Forgivenesse! that grace you should seeke of mee:

These tortur'd fingers and these stab'd-through armes75

Keepe that law in their wounds yet unobserv'd,

And ever shall.

Mont. Remember their deserts.

Tam. Those with faire warnings might have beene reform'd,

Not these unmanly rages. You have heard

The fiction of the north winde and the sunne,80

Both working on a traveller, and contending

Which had most power to take his cloake from him:

Which when the winde attempted, hee roar'd out

Outragious blasts at him to force it off,

That wrapt it closer on: when the calme sunne85

(The winde once leaving) charg'd him with still beames,

Quiet and fervent, and therein was constant,

Which made him cast off both his cloake and coate;

[Pg 195]

Like whom should men doe. If yee wish your wives

Should leave dislik'd things, seeke it not with rage,90

For that enrages; what yee give, yee have:

But use calme warnings, and kinde manly meanes,

And that in wives most prostitute will winne

Not onely sure amends, but make us wives

Better then those that ne'er led faultie lives.95

Soldier. My lord.

Mont. How now; would any speake with me?

Sold. I, sir.

Mont. Perverse, and traiterous miscreant!

Where are your other fellowes of my guard?

Have I not told you I will speake with none

But Lord Renel?

Sold. And it is hee that stayes you. 100

Mont. O, is it he? Tis well: attend him in. [Exit Soldier.]

I must be vigilant; the Furies haunt mee.

Doe you heare, dame?

Renel [aside, to the Soldier]. Be true now, for your ladies injur'd sake,

[Pg 196]

Whose bountie you have so much cause to honour:105

For her respect is chiefe in this designe,

And therefore serve it; call out of the way

All your confederate fellowes of his guard,

Till Monsieur Baligny be enter'd here.

Sold. Upon your honour, my lord shall be free110

From any hurt, you say?

Ren. Free as my selfe. Watch then, and cleare his entrie.

Sold. I will not faile, my lord. Exit Souldier.

Ren. God save your lordship!

Mont. My noblest Lord Renel! past all men welcome!

Wife, welcome his lordship. Osculatur.

Ren. [to Tam.] I much joy 115

In your returne here.

Tamy. You doe more then I.

Mont. Shee's passionate still, to thinke we ever parted

By my too sterne injurious jelousie.

Ren. Tis well your lordship will confesse your errour

In so good time yet.

Mont. Death! who have wee here? 120

Ho! Guard! Villaines!

[Pg 197]

Baligny. Why exclaime you so?

Mont. Negligent trayters! Murther, murther, murther!

Bal. Y'are mad. Had mine entent beene so, like yours,

It had beene done ere this.

Ren. Sir, your intent,

And action too, was rude to enter thus.125

Bal. Y'are a decaid lord to tell me of rudenesse,

As much decaid in manners as in meanes.

Ren. You talke of manners, that thus rudely thrust

Upon a man that's busie with his wife!

Bal. And kept your lordship then the dore?

Ren. The dore! 130

Mont. Sweet lord, forbeare. Show, show your purpose, sir,

To move such bold feete into others roofes.

Bal. This is my purpose, sir; from Clermont D'Ambois

I bring this challenge.

Mont. Challenge! Ile touch none.

Bal. Ile leave it here then.

Ren. Thou shall leave thy life first. 135

Mont. Murther, murther!

[Pg 198]

Ren. Retire, my lord; get off.

They all fight and Bal[igny] drives in Mont[surry].

Hold, or thy death shall hold thee. Hence, my lord!

Bal. There lye the chalenge. Exit Mon[tsurry].

Ren. Was not this well handled?

Bal. Nobly, my lord. All thankes. Exit Bal[igny].

Tamy. Ile make him reade it. Exit Tamy[ra].

Ren. This was a sleight well maskt. O what is man,140

Unlesse he be a politician! Exit.

LINENOTES:

Actus secundi Scæna prima.

Henry. Come, Baligny, we now are private; say,

What service bring'st thou? make it short; the Guise

(Whose friend thou seem'st) is now in Court, and neare,

And may observe us.

Baligny. This, sir, then, in short.

The faction of the Guise (with which my policie,5

For service to your Highnesse, seemes to joyne)

Growes ripe, and must be gather'd into hold;

Of which my brother Clermont being a part

Exceeding capitall, deserves to have

A capitall eye on him. And (as you may10

With best advantage, and your speediest charge)

Command his apprehension: which (because

The Court, you know, is strong in his defence)

Wee must aske country swindge and open fields.

And therefore I have wrought him to goe downe15

To Cambray with me (of which government

[Pg 200]

Your Highnesse bountie made mee your lieutenant),

Where when I have him, I will leave my house,

And faine some service out about the confines;

When, in the meane time, if you please to give20

Command to my lieutenant, by your letters,

To traine him to some muster, where he may

(Much to his honour) see for him your forces

Put into battaile, when hee comes, hee may

With some close stratageme be apprehended:25

For otherwise your whole powers there will faile

To worke his apprehension: and with that

My hand needes never be discern'd therein.

Hen. Thankes, honest Baligny.

Bal. Your Highnesse knowes

I will be honest, and betray for you30

Brother and father; for I know (my lord)

Treacherie for Kings is truest loyaltie,

Nor is to beare the name of treacherie,

But grave, deepe policie. All acts that seeme

Ill in particular respects are good35

As they respect your universal rule:

As in the maine sway of the Universe

The supreame Rectors generall decrees,

To guard the mightie globes of earth and heaven,

Since they make good that guard to preservation40

Of both those in their order and first end,

[Pg 201]

No mans particular (as hee thinkes) wrong

Must hold him wrong'd; no, not though all mens reasons,

All law, all conscience, concludes it wrong.

Nor is comparison a flatterer45

To liken you here to the King of Kings;

Nor any mans particular offence

Against the worlds sway, to offence at yours

In any subject; who as little may

Grudge at their particular wrong, if so it seeme50

For th'universall right of your estate,

As, being a subject of the worlds whole sway

As well as yours, and being a righteous man

To whom heaven promises defence, and blessing,

Brought to decay, disgrace, and quite defencelesse,55

Hee may complaine of heaven for wrong to him.

Hen. Tis true: the simile at all parts holds,

As all good subjects hold, that love our favour.

Bal. Which is our heaven here; and a miserie

Incomparable, and most truely hellish,60

To live depriv'd of our Kings grace and countenance,

Without which best conditions are most cursed:

Life of that nature, howsoever short,

Is a most lingering and tedious life;

[Pg 202]

Or rather no life, but a languishing,65

And an abuse of life.

Hen. Tis well conceited.

Bal. I thought it not amisse to yeeld your Highness

A reason of my speeches; lest perhaps

You might conceive I flatter'd: which (I know)

Of all ils under heaven you most abhorre.70

Hen. Still thou art right, my vertuous Baligny,

For which I thanke and love thee. Thy advise

Ile not forget. Haste to thy government,

And carry D'Ambois with thee. So farewell. Exit.

Bal. Your Majestie fare ever like it selfe.75

Guise. My sure friend Baligny!

Bal. Noblest of princes!

Gui. How stands the state of Cambray?

Bal. Strong, my lord,

And fit for service: for whose readinesse

Your creature, Clermont D'Ambois, and my selfe

Ride shortly downe.

Gui. That Clermont is my love; 80

France never bred a nobler gentleman

For all parts; he exceeds his brother Bussy.

Bal. I, my lord?

[Pg 203]

Gui. Farre: because (besides his valour)

Hee hath the crowne of man and all his parts,

Which Learning is; and that so true and vertuous85

That it gives power to doe as well as say

What ever fits a most accomplisht man;

Which Bussy, for his valours season, lackt;

And so was rapt with outrage oftentimes

Beyond decorum; where this absolute Clermont,90

Though (onely for his naturall zeale to right)

Hee will be fiery, when hee sees it crost,

And in defence of it, yet when he lists

Hee can containe that fire, as hid in embers.

Bal. No question, hee's a true, learn'd gentleman.95

Gui. He is as true as tides, or any starre

Is in his motion; and for his rare learning,

Hee is not (as all else are that seeke knowledge)

Of taste so much deprav'd that they had rather

Delight and satisfie themselves to drinke100

Of the streame troubled, wandring ne'er so farre

From the cleare fount, then of the fount it selfe.

In all, Romes Brutus is reviv'd in him,

Whom hee of industry doth imitate;

Or rather, as great Troys Euphorbus was105

After Pithagoras, so is Brutus, Clermont.

And, were not Brutus a conspirator—

[Pg 204]

Bal. Conspirator, my lord! Doth that empaire him?

Cæsar beganne to tyrannize; and when vertue,

Nor the religion of the Gods, could serve110

To curbe the insolence of his proud lawes,

Brutus would be the Gods just instrument.

What said the Princesse, sweet Antigone,

In the grave Greeke tragedian, when the question

Twixt her and Creon is for lawes of Kings?115

Which when he urges, shee replies on him

Though his lawes were a Kings, they were not Gods;

Nor would shee value Creons written lawes

With Gods unwrit edicts, since they last not

This day and the next, but every day and ever,120

Where Kings lawes alter every day and houre,

And in that change imply a bounded power.

Gui. Well, let us leave these vaine disputings what

Is to be done, and fall to doing something.

When are you for your government in Cambray?125

Bal. When you command, my lord.

Gui. Nay, that's not fit.

Continue your designements with the King,

With all your service; onely, if I send,

Respect me as your friend, and love my Clermont.

[Pg 205]

Bal. Your Highnesse knowes my vowes.

Gui. I, tis enough. 130

Bal. Thus must wee play on both sides, and thus harten

In any ill those men whose good wee hate.

Kings may doe what they list, and for Kings, subjects,

Eyther exempt from censure or exception;

For, as no mans worth can be justly judg'd 135

But when he shines in some authoritie,

So no authoritie should suffer censure

But by a man of more authoritie.

Great vessels into lesse are emptied never,

There's a redoundance past their continent ever.140

These virtuosi are the poorest creatures;

For looke how spinners weave out of themselves

Webs, whose strange matter none before can see;

So these, out of an unseene good in vertue,

Make arguments of right and comfort in her,145

That clothe them like the poore web of a spinner.

Clermont. Now, to my challenge. What's the place, the weapon?

Bal. Soft, sir! let first your challenge be received.

Hee would not touch, nor see it.

Cler. Possible!

How did you then?

Bal. Left it, in his despight. 150

But when hee saw mee enter so expectlesse,

To heare his base exclaimes of "murther, murther,"

Made mee thinke noblesse lost, in him quicke buried.

Cler. They are the breathing sepulchres of noblesse:

No trulier noble men then lions pictures,155

Hung up for signes, are lions. Who knowes not

That lyons the more soft kept, are more servile?

And looke how lyons close kept, fed by hand,

Lose quite th'innative fire of spirit and greatnesse

That lyons free breathe, forraging for prey,160

And grow so grosse that mastifes, curs, and mungrils

[Pg 207]

Have spirit to cow them: so our soft French Nobles

Chain'd up in ease and numbd securitie

(Their spirits shrunke up like their covetous fists,

And never opened but Domitian-like,165

And all his base, obsequious minions

When they were catching though it were but flyes),

Besotted with their pezzants love of gaine,

Rusting at home, and on each other preying,

Are for their greatnesse but the greater slaves,170

And none is noble but who scrapes and saves.

Bal. Tis base, tis base; and yet they thinke them high.

Cler. So children mounted on their hobby-horse

Thinke they are riding, when with wanton toile

They beare what should beare them. A man may well175

Compare them to those foolish great-spleen'd cammels,

That to their high heads beg'd of Jove hornes higher;

Whose most uncomely and ridiculous pride

When hee had satisfied, they could not use,

But where they went upright before, they stoopt,180

And bore their heads much lower for their hornes: Simil[iter.]

[Pg 208]

As these high men doe, low in all true grace,

Their height being priviledge to all things base.

And as the foolish poet that still writ

All his most selfe-lov'd verse in paper royall,185

Or partchment rul'd with lead, smooth'd with the pumice,

Bound richly up, and strung with crimson strings;

Never so blest as when hee writ and read

The ape-lov'd issue of his braine; and never

But joying in himselfe, admiring ever:190

Yet in his workes behold him, and hee show'd

Like to a ditcher. So these painted men,

All set on out-side, looke upon within,

And not a pezzants entrailes you shall finde

More foule and mezel'd, nor more sterv'd of minde.195

Bal. That makes their bodies fat. I faine would know

How many millions of our other Nobles

Would make one Guise. There is a true tenth Worthy,

Who, did not one act onely blemish him—

Cler. One act! what one?

Bal. One that (though yeeres past done) 200

Stickes by him still, and will distaine him ever.

Cler. Good heaven! wherein? what one act can you name

[Pg 209]

Suppos'd his staine that Ile not prove his luster?

Bal. To satisfie you, twas the Massacre.

Cler. The Massacre! I thought twas some such blemish.205

Bal. O, it was hainous!

Cler. To a brutish sense,

But not a manly reason. Wee so tender

The vile part in us that the part divine

We see in hell, and shrinke not. Who was first

Head of that Massacre?

Bal. The Guise.

Cler. Tis nothing so. 210

Who was in fault for all the slaughters made

In Ilion, and about it? Were the Greekes?

Was it not Paris ravishing the Queene

Of Lacædemon; breach of shame and faith,

And all the lawes of hospitalitie?215

This is the beastly slaughter made of men,

When truth is over-throwne, his lawes corrupted;

When soules are smother'd in the flatter'd flesh,

Slaine bodies are no more then oxen slaine.

Bal. Differ not men from oxen?

Cler. Who sayes so? 220

But see wherein; in the understanding rules

Of their opinions, lives, and actions;

In their communities of faith and reason.

Was not the wolfe that nourisht Romulus

[Pg 210]

More humane then the men that did expose him?225

Bal. That makes against you.

Cler. Not, sir, if you note

That by that deede, the actions difference make

Twixt men and beasts, and not their names nor formes.

Had faith, nor shame, all hospitable rights

Beene broke by Troy, Greece had not made that slaughter.230

Had that beene sav'd (sayes a philosopher)

The Iliads and Odysses had beene lost.

Had Faith and true Religion beene prefer'd

Religious Guise had never massacerd.

Bal. Well, sir, I cannot, when I meete with you,235

But thus digresse a little, for my learning,

From any other businesse I entend.

But now the voyage we resolv'd for Cambray,

I told the Guise, beginnes; and wee must haste.

And till the Lord Renel hath found some meane240

(Conspiring with the Countesse) to make sure

Your sworne wreake on her husband, though this fail'd,

In my so brave command wee'll spend the time,

Sometimes in training out in skirmishes

And battailes all our troopes and companies;245

And sometimes breathe your brave Scotch running horse,

[Pg 211]

That great Guise gave you, that all th'horse in France

Farre over-runnes at every race and hunting

Both of the hare and deere. You shall be honor'd

Like the great Guise himselfe, above the King.250

And (can you but appease your great-spleen'd sister

For our delaid wreake of your brothers slaughter)

At all parts you'll be welcom'd to your wonder.

Cler. Ile see my lord the Guise againe before

Wee take our journey?

Bal. O, sir, by all meanes; 255

You cannot be too carefull of his love,

That ever takes occasion to be raising

Your virtues past the reaches of this age,

And rankes you with the best of th'ancient Romanes.

Cler. That praise at no part moves mee, but the worth260

Of all hee can give others spher'd in him.

Bal. Hee yet is thought to entertaine strange aymes.

Cler. He may be well; yet not, as you thinke, strange.

His strange aymes are to crosse the common custome

Of servile Nobles; in which hee's so ravisht,265

[Pg 212]

That quite the earth he leaves, and up hee leapes

On Atlas shoulders, and from thence lookes downe,

Viewing how farre off other high ones creepe;

Rich, poore of reason, wander; all pale looking,

And trembling but to thinke of their sure deaths,270

Their lives so base are, and so rancke their breaths.

Which I teach Guise to heighten, and make sweet

With lifes deare odors, a good minde and name;

For which hee onely loves me, and deserves

My love and life, which through all deaths I vow:275

Resolving this (what ever change can be)

Thou hast created, thou hast ruinde mee. Exit.

LINENOTES:

Actus tertii Scæna prima.

Maillard. These troopes and companies come in with wings:

So many men, so arm'd, so gallant horse,

I thinke no other government in France

So soone could bring together. With such men

Me thinkes a man might passe th'insulting Pillars5

Of Bacchus and Alcides.

Chalon. I much wonder

Our Lord Lieutenant brought his brother downe

To feast and honour him, and yet now leaves him

At such an instance.

Mail. Twas the Kings command;

For whom he must leave brother, wife, friend, all things.10

Aumale. The confines of his government, whose view

Is the pretext of his command, hath neede

Of no such sodaine expedition.

[Pg 214]

Mail. Wee must not argue that. The Kings command

Is neede and right enough: and that he serves,15

(As all true subjects should) without disputing.

Chal. But knowes not hee of your command to take

His brother Clermont?

Mail. No: the Kings will is

Expressely to conceale his apprehension

From my Lord Governour. Observ'd yee not?20

Againe peruse the letters. Both you are

Made my assistants, and have right and trust

In all the waightie secrets like my selfe.

Aum. Tis strange a man that had, through his life past,

So sure a foote in vertue and true knowledge25

As Clermont D'Ambois, should be now found tripping,

And taken up thus, so to make his fall

More steepe and head-long.

Mail. It is Vertues fortune,

To keepe her low, and in her proper place;

Height hath no roome for her. But as a man30

That hath a fruitfull wife, and every yeere

A childe by her, hath every yeere a month

To breathe himselfe, where hee that gets no childe

Hath not a nights rest (if he will doe well);

[Pg 215]

So, let one marry this same barraine Vertue,35

She never lets him rest, where fruitfull Vice

Spares her rich drudge, gives him in labour breath,

Feedes him with bane, and makes him fat with death.

Chal. I see that good lives never can secure

Men from bad livers. Worst men will have best40

As ill as they, or heaven to hell they'll wrest.

Aum. There was a merit for this, in the fault

That Bussy made, for which he (doing pennance)

Proves that these foule adulterous guilts will runne

Through the whole bloud, which not the cleare can shunne.45

Mail. Ile therefore take heede of the bastarding

Whole innocent races; tis a fearefull thing.

And as I am true batcheler, I sweare,

To touch no woman (to the coupling ends)

Unlesse it be mine owne wife or my friends;50

I may make bold with him.

Aum. Tis safe and common.

The more your friend dares trust, the more deceive him.

And as through dewie vapors the sunnes forme

Makes the gay rainebow girdle to a storme,

So in hearts hollow, friendship (even the sunne 55

[Pg 216]

To all good growing in societie)

Makes his so glorious and divine name hold

Collours for all the ill that can be told. Trumpets within.

Mail. Harke! our last troopes are come.

Chal. (Drums beate.) Harke! our last foote.

Mail. Come, let us put all quickly into battaile,60

And send for Clermont, in whose honour all

This martiall preparation wee pretend.

Chal. Wee must bethinke us, ere wee apprehend him,

(Besides our maine strength) of some stratageme

To make good our severe command on him,65

As well to save blood as to make him sure:

For if hee come on his Scotch horse, all France

Put at the heeles of him will faile to take him.

Mail. What thinke you if wee should disguise a brace

Of our best souldiers in faire lackies coates,70

And send them for him, running by his side,

Till they have brought him in some ambuscado

We close may lodge for him, and sodainely

Lay sure hand on him, plucking him from horse?

Aum. It must be sure and strong hand; for if once75

[Pg 217]

Hee feeles the touch of such a stratageme,

Tis not choicest brace of all our bands

Can manacle or quench his fiery hands.

Mail. When they have seaz'd him, the ambush shal make in.

Aum. Doe as you please; his blamelesse spirit deserves80

(I dare engage my life) of all this, nothing.

Chal. Why should all this stirre be, then?

Aum. Who knowes not

The bumbast politie thrusts into his gyant,

To make his wisedome seeme of size as huge,

And all for sleight encounter of a shade,85

So hee be toucht, hee would have hainous made?

Mail. It may be once so; but so ever, never.

Ambition is abroad, on foote, on horse;

Faction chokes every corner, streete, the Court;

Whose faction tis you know, and who is held90

The fautors right hand: how high his aymes reach

Nought but a crowne can measure. This must fall

Past shadowes waights, and is most capitall.

Chal. No question; for since hee is come to Cambray,

The malecontent, decaid Marquesse Renel,95

Is come, and new arriv'd; and made partaker

[Pg 218]

Of all the entertaining showes and feasts

That welcom'd Clermont to the brave virago,

His manly sister. Such wee are esteem'd

As are our consorts. Marquesse malecontent 100

Comes where hee knowes his vaine hath safest vent.

Mail. Let him come at his will, and goe as free;

Let us ply Clermont, our whole charge is hee. Exeunt.

LINENOTES:

[Scæna Secunda.

Enter a Gentleman Usher before Clermont: Renel, Charlotte, with two women attendants, with others: showes having past within.

Charlotte. This for your lordships welcome into Cambray.

Renel. Noblest of ladies, tis beyond all power

(Were my estate at first full) in my meanes

To quit or merit.

Clermont. You come something latter

From Court, my lord, then I: and since newes there5

Is every day encreasing with th'affaires,

Must I not aske now, what the newes is there?

[Pg 219]

Where the Court lyes? what stirre? change? what avise

From England, Italie?

Ren. You must doe so,

If you'll be cald a gentleman well quallified,10

And weare your time and wits in those discourses.

Cler. The Locrian princes therefore were brave rulers;

For whosoever there came new from countrie,

And in the citie askt, "What newes?" was punisht:

Since commonly such braines are most delighted15

With innovations, gossips tales, and mischiefes.

But as of lyons it is said and eagles,

That, when they goe, they draw their seeres and tallons

Close up, to shunne rebating of their sharpnesse:

So our wits sharpnesse, which wee should employ20

In noblest knowledge, wee should never waste

In vile and vulgar admirations.

Ren. Tis right; but who, save onely you, performes it,

And your great brother? Madame, where is he?

Char. Gone, a day since, into the countries confines,25

To see their strength, and readinesse for service.

[Pg 220]

Ren. Tis well; his favour with the King hath made him

Most worthily great, and live right royally.

Cler. I: would hee would not doe so! Honour never

Should be esteem'd with wise men as the price30

And value of their virtuous services,

But as their signe or badge; for that bewrayes

More glory in the outward grace of goodnesse

Then in the good it selfe; and then tis said,

Who more joy takes that men his good advance35

Then in the good it selfe, does it by chance.

Char. My brother speakes all principle. What man

Is mov'd with your soule? or hath such a thought

In any rate of goodnesse?

Cler. Tis their fault.

We have examples of it, cleare and many.40

Demetrius Phalerius, an orator,

And (which not oft meete) a philosopher,

So great in Athens grew that he erected

Three hundred statues of him; of all which,

No rust nor length of time corrupted one;45

But in his life time all were overthrowne.

And Demades (that past Demosthenes

For all extemporall orations)

Erected many statues, which (he living)

[Pg 221]

Were broke, and melted into chamber-pots.50

Many such ends have fallen on such proud honours,

No more because the men on whom they fell

Grew insolent and left their vertues state,

Then for their hugenesse, that procur'd their hate:

And therefore little pompe in men most great55

Makes mightily and strongly to the guard

Of what they winne by chance or just reward.

Great and immodest braveries againe,

Like statues much too high made for their bases,

Are overturn'd as soone as given their places.60

Messenger. Here is a letter, sir, deliver'd mee

Now at the fore-gate by a gentleman.

Cler. What gentleman?

Mess. Hee would not tell his name;

Hee said, hee had not time enough to tell it,

And say the little rest hee had to say.65

Cler. That was a merry saying; he tooke measure

Of his deare time like a most thriftie husband.

Char. What newes?

Cler. Strange ones, and fit for a novation;

Waightie, unheard of, mischievous enough.

Ren. Heaven shield! what are they?

[Pg 222]

Cler. Read them, good my lord. 70

Ren. "You are betraid into this countrie." Monstrous!

Char. How's that?

Cler. Read on.

Ren. "Maillard, your brothers Lieutenant,

that yesterday invited you to see his musters,75

hath letters and strickt charge from the King to

apprehend you."

Char. To apprehend him!

Ren. "Your brother absents himselfe of

purpose."80

Cler. That's a sound one.

Char. That's a lye.

Ren. "Get on your Scotch horse, and retire

to your strength; you know where it is, and

there it expects you. Beleeve this as your best85

friend had sworne it. Fare-well if you will.

Anonymos." What's that?

Cler. Without a name.

Char. And all his notice, too, without all truth.

Cler. So I conceive it, sister: ile not wrong90

My well knowne brother for Anonymos.

Char. Some foole hath put this tricke on you, yet more

T'uncover your defect of spirit and valour,

[Pg 223]

First showne in lingring my deare brothers wreake.

See what it is to give the envious world95

Advantage to diminish eminent virtue.

Send him a challenge. Take a noble course

To wreake a murther, done so like a villaine.

Cler. Shall we revenge a villanie with villanie.

Char. Is it not equall?

Cler. Shall wee equall be with villaines? 100

Is that your reason?

Char. Cowardise evermore

Flyes to the shield of reason.

Cler. Nought that is

Approv'd by reason can be cowardise.

Char. Dispute, when you should fight! Wrong, wreaklesse sleeping,

Makes men dye honorlesse; one borne, another105

Leapes on our shoulders.

Cler. Wee must wreake our wrongs

So as wee take not more.

Char. One wreakt in time

Prevents all other. Then shines vertue most

When time is found for facts; and found, not lost.

Cler. No time occurres to Kings, much lesse to vertue;110

Nor can we call it vertue that proceedes

[Pg 224]

From vicious fury. I repent that ever

(By any instigation in th'appearance

My brothers spirit made, as I imagin'd)

That e'er I yeelded to revenge his murther.115

All worthy men should ever bring their bloud

To beare all ill, not to be wreakt with good.

Doe ill for no ill; never private cause

Should take on it the part of publike lawes.

Char. A D'Ambois beare in wrong so tame a spirit!120

Ren. Madame, be sure there will be time enough

For all the vengeance your great spirit can wish.

The course yet taken is allow'd by all,

Which being noble, and refus'd by th'Earle,

Now makes him worthy of your worst advantage:125

And I have cast a project with the Countesse

To watch a time when all his wariest guards

Shall not exempt him. Therefore give him breath;

Sure death delaid is a redoubled death.

Cler. Good sister, trouble not your selfe with this:130

Take other ladyes care; practise your face.

There's the chaste matron, Madame Perigot,

Dwels not farre hence; Ile ride and send her to you.

[Pg 225]

Shee did live by retailing mayden-heads

In her minoritie; but now shee deales135

In whole-sale altogether for the Court.

I tell you, shee's the onely fashion-monger,

For your complexion, poudring of your haire,

Shadowes, rebatoes, wires, tyres, and such trickes,

That Cambray or, I thinke, the Court affords.140

She shall attend you, sister, and with these

Womanly practises emply your spirit;

This other suites you not, nor fits the fashion.

Though shee be deare, lay't on, spare for no cost;

Ladies in these have all their bounties lost.145

Ren. Madame, you see, his spirit will not checke

At any single danger, when it stands

Thus merrily firme against an host of men,

Threaten'd to be [in] armes for his surprise.

Char. That's a meere bugge-beare, an impossible mocke.150

If hee, and him I bound by nuptiall faith,

Had not beene dull and drossie in performing

Wreake of the deare bloud of my matchlesse brother,

What Prince, what King, which of the desperat'st ruffings,

Outlawes in Arden, durst have tempted thus 155

One of our bloud and name, be't true or false?

[Pg 226]

Cler. This is not caus'd by that; twill be as sure

As yet it is not, though this should be true.

Char. True, tis past thought false.

Cler. I suppose the worst,

Which farre I am from thinking; and despise 160

The armie now in battaile that should act it.

[Char.] I would not let my bloud up to that thought,

But it should cost the dearest bloud in France.

Cler. Sweet sister, (osculatur) farre be both off as the fact

Of my fain'd apprehension.

Char. I would once 165

Strip off my shame with my attire, and trie

If a poore woman, votist of revenge,

Would not performe it with a president

To all you bungling, foggy-spirited men.

But for our birth-rights honour, doe not mention170

One syllable of any word may goe

To the begetting of an act so tender

And full of sulphure as this letters truth:

It comprehends so blacke a circumstance

Not to be nam'd, that but to forme one thought,175

It is or can be so, would make me mad.

Come, my lord, you and I will fight this dreame

Out at the chesse.

[Pg 227]

Ren. Most gladly, worthiest ladie. Exeunt Char[lotte] and Ren[el].

Messenger. Sir, my Lord Governours Lieutenant prayes

Accesse to you.

Cler. Himselfe alone?

Mess. Alone, sir. 180

Cler. Attend him in. (Exit Messenger.) Now comes this plot to tryall;

I shall descerne (if it be true as rare)

Some sparkes will flye from his dissembling eyes.

Ile sound his depth.

Maillard. Honour, and all things noble!

Cler. As much to you, good Captaine. What's th'affaire?185

Mail. Sir, the poore honour we can adde to all

Your studyed welcome to this martiall place,

In presentation of what strength consists

My lord your brothers government, is readie.

I have made all his troopes and companies190

Advance and put themselves in battailia,

That you may see both how well arm'd they are

How strong is every troope and companie,

How ready, and how well prepar'd for service.

[Pg 228]

Cler. And must they take mee?

Mail. Take you, sir! O heaven! 195

Mess. [aside, to Clermont]. Beleeve it, sir, his count'nance chang'd in turning.

Mail. What doe you meane, sir?

Cler. If you have charg'd them,

You being charg'd your selfe, to apprehend mee,

Turne not your face; throw not your lookes about so.

Mail. Pardon me, sir. You amaze me to conceive200

From whence our wils to honour you should turne

To such dishonour of my lord, your brother.

Dare I, without him, undertake your taking?

Cler. Why not? by your direct charge from the King.

Mail. By my charge from the King! would he so much205

Disgrace my lord, his owne Lieutenant here,

To give me his command without his forfaite?

Cler. Acts that are done by Kings, are not askt why.

Ile not dispute the case, but I will search you.

Mail. Search mee! for what?

Cler. For letters.

Mail. I beseech you, 210

[Pg 229]

Doe not admit one thought of such a shame

To a commander.

Cler. Goe to! I must doo't.

Stand and be searcht; you know mee.

Mail. You forget

What tis to be a captaine, and your selfe.

Cler. Stand, or I vow to heaven, Ile make you lie,215

Never to rise more.

Mail. If a man be mad,

Reason must beare him.

Cler. So coy to be searcht?

Mail. Sdeath, sir, use a captaine like a carrier!

Cler. Come, be not furious; when I have done,

You shall make such a carrier of me,220

If't be your pleasure: you're my friend, I know,

And so am bold with you.

Mail. You'll nothing finde

Where nothing is.

Cler. Sweare you have nothing.

Mail. Nothing you seeke, I sweare. I beseech you,

Know I desir'd this out of great affection,225

To th'end my lord may know out of your witnesse

His forces are not in so bad estate

[Pg 230]

As hee esteem'd them lately in your hearing;

For which he would not trust me with the confines,

But went himselfe to witnesse their estate.230

Cler. I heard him make that reason, and am sorie

I had no thought of it before I made

Thus bold with you, since tis such ruberb to you.

Ile therefore search no more. If you are charg'd

(By letters from the King, or otherwise)235

To apprehend me, never spice it more

With forc'd tearmes of your love, but say: I yeeld;

Holde, take my sword, here; I forgive thee freely;

Take; doe thine office.

Mail. Sfoote! you make m'a hang-man;

By all my faith to you, there's no such thing.240

Cler. Your faith to mee!

Mail. My faith to God; all's one:

Who hath no faith to men, to God hath none.

Cler. In that sense I accept your othe, and thanke you.

I gave my word to goe, and I will goe. Exit Cler[mont].

Mail. Ile watch you whither. Exit Mail[lard].

Mess. If hee goes, hee proves 245

[Pg 231]

How vaine are mens fore knowledges of things,

When heaven strikes blinde their powers of note and use,

And makes their way to ruine seeme more right

Then that which safetie opens to their sight.

Cassandra's prophecie had no more profit250

With Troyes blinde citizens, when shee foretolde

Troyes ruine; which, succeeding, made her use

This sacred inclamation: "God" (said shee)

"Would have me utter things uncredited;

For which now they approve what I presag'd;255

They count me wise, that said before, I rag'd." [Exit.]

LINENOTES:

[Scæna Tertia.

Chalon. Come, souldiers: you are downewards fit for lackies;

Give me your pieces, and take you these coates,

To make you compleate foot men, in whose formes

You must be compleate souldiers: you two onely

Stand for our armie.

1[st Soldier.] That were much.

[Pg 232]

Chal. Tis true; 5

You two must doe, or enter, what our armie

Is now in field for.

2[d Sol.] I see then our guerdon

Must be the deede it selfe, twill be such honour.

Chal. What fight souldiers most for?

1[st Sol.] Honour onely.

Chal. Yet here are crownes beside.

Ambo. We thanke you, Captaine. 10

2[d Sol.] Now, sir, how show wee?

Chal. As you should at all parts.

Goe now to Clermont D'Ambois, and informe him,

Two battailes are set ready in his honour,

And stay his presence onely for their signall,

When they shall joyne; and that, t'attend him hither15

Like one wee so much honour, wee have sent him—

1[st Sol.] Us two in person.

Chal. Well, sir, say it so;

And having brought him to the field, when I

Fall in with him, saluting, get you both

Of one side of his horse, and plucke him downe,20

And I with th'ambush laid will second you.

1[st Sol.] Nay, we shall lay on hands of too much strength

To neede your secondings.

[Pg 233]

2[d Sol.] I hope we shall.

Two are enough to encounter Hercules.

Chal. Tis well said, worthy souldiers; hast, and hast him. [Exeunt.] 25

LINENOTES:

[Scæna Quarta.

Clermont. My Scotch horse to their armie—

Maillard. Please you, sir?

Cler. Sdeath! you're passing diligent.

Mail. Of my soule,

Tis onely in my love to honour you

With what would grace the King: but since I see

You still sustaine a jealous eye on mee,5

Ile goe before.

Cler. Tis well; Ile come; my hand.

Mail. Your hand, sir! Come, your word; your choise be us'd. Exit.

Cler. I had an aversation to this voyage,

When first my brother mov'd it, and have found

That native power in me was never vaine;10

Yet now neglected it. I wonder much

At my inconstancie in these decrees

[Pg 234]

I every houre set downe to guide my life.

When Homer made Achilles passionate,

Wrathfull, revengefull, and insatiate15

In his affections, what man will denie

He did compose it all of industrie

To let men see that men of most renowne,

Strong'st, noblest, fairest, if they set not downe

Decrees within them, for disposing these,20

Of judgement, resolution, uprightnesse,

And certaine knowledge of their use and ends,

Mishap and miserie no lesse extends

To their destruction, with all that they pris'd,

Then to the poorest and the most despis'd?25

Renel. Why, how now, friend, retir'd! take heede you prove not

Dismaid with this strange fortune. All observe you:

Your government's as much markt as the Kings.

What said a friend to Pompey?

Cler. What?

Ren. The people

Will never know, unlesse in death thou trie,30

That thou know'st how to beare adversitie.

Cler. I shall approve how vile I value feare

Of death at all times; but to be too rash,

Without both will and care to shunne the worst,

[Pg 235]

(It being in power to doe well and with cheere)35

Is stupid negligence and worse then feare.

Ren. Suppose this true now.

Cler. No, I cannot doo't.

My sister truely said, there hung a taile

Of circumstance so blacke on that supposure,

That to sustaine it thus abhorr'd our mettall.40

And I can shunne it too, in spight of all,

Not going to field; and there to, being so mounted

As I will, since I goe.

Ren. You will then goe?

Cler. I am engag'd both in my word and hand.

But this is it that makes me thus retir'd,45

To call my selfe t'account, how this affaire

Is to be manag'd, if the worst should chance:

With which I note, how dangerous it is

For any man to prease beyond the place

To which his birth, or meanes, or knowledge ties him.50

For my part, though of noble birth, my birthright

Had little left it, and I know tis better

To live with little, and to keepe within

A mans owne strength still, and in mans true end,

Then runne a mixt course. Good and bad hold never55

[Pg 236]

Any thing common; you can never finde

Things outward care, but you neglect your minde.

God hath the whole world perfect made and free;

His parts to th'use of th'All. Men, then, that are

Parts of that All, must, as the generall sway60

Of that importeth, willingly obay

In every thing without their power to change.

Hee that, unpleas'd to hold his place, will range,

Can in no other be contain'd that's fit,

And so resisting th'All is crusht with it:65

But he that knowing how divine a frame

The whole world is, and of it all can name

(Without selfe-flatterie) no part so divine

As hee himselfe; and therefore will confine

Freely his whole powers in his proper part,70

Goes on most God-like. Hee that strives t'invert

The Universals course with his poore way,

Not onely dust-like shivers with the sway,

But crossing God in his great worke, all earth

Beares not so cursed and so damn'd a birth.75

Ren. Goe on; Ile take no care what comes of you;

Heaven will not see it ill, how ere it show.

But the pretext to see these battailes rang'd

Is much your honour.

Cler. As the world esteemes it.

[Pg 237]

But to decide that, you make me remember80

An accident of high and noble note,

And fits the subject of my late discourse

Of holding on our free and proper way.

I over-tooke, comming from Italie,

In Germanie a great and famous Earle85

Of England, the most goodly fashion'd man

I ever saw; from head to foote in forme

Rare and most absolute; hee had a face

Like one of the most ancient honour'd Romanes

From whence his noblest familie was deriv'd;90

He was beside of spirit passing great,

Valiant, and learn'd, and liberall as the sunne,

Spoke and writ sweetly, or of learned subjects,

Or of the discipline of publike weales;

And t'was the Earle of Oxford: and being offer'd95

At that time, by Duke Cassimere, the view

Of his right royall armie then in field,

Refus'd it, and no foote was mov'd to stirre

Out of his owne free fore-determin'd course.

I, wondring at it, askt for it his reason,100

It being an offer so much for his honour.

Hee, all acknowledging, said t'was not fit

To take those honours that one cannot quit.

Ren. Twas answer'd like the man you have describ'd.

Cler. And yet he cast it onely in the way,105

To stay and serve the world. Nor did it fit

[Pg 238]

His owne true estimate how much it waigh'd;

For hee despis'd it, and esteem'd it freer

To keepe his owne way straight, and swore that hee

Had rather make away his whole estate 110

In things that crost the vulgar then he would

Be frozen up stiffe (like a Sir John Smith,

His countrey-man) in common Nobles fashions;

Affecting, as't the end of noblesse were,

Those servile observations.

Ren. It was strange. 115

Cler. O tis a vexing sight to see a man,

Out of his way, stalke proud as hee were in;

Out of his way, to be officious,

Observant, wary, serious, and grave,

Fearefull, and passionate, insulting, raging,120

Labour with iron flailes to thresh downe feathers

Flitting in ayre.

Ren. What one considers this,

Of all that are thus out? or once endevours,

Erring, to enter on mans right-hand path?

Cler. These are too grave for brave wits; give them toyes;125

Labour bestow'd on these is harsh and thriftlesse.

If you would Consull be (sayes one) of Rome,

You must be watching, starting out of sleepes;

Every way whisking; gloryfying Plebeians;

[Pg 239]

Kissing Patricians hands, rot at their dores;130

Speake and doe basely; every day bestow

Gifts and observance upon one or other:

And what's th'event of all? Twelve rods before thee;

Three or foure times sit for the whole tribunall;

Exhibite Circean games; make publike feasts;135

And for these idle outward things (sayes he)

Would'st thou lay on such cost, toile, spend thy spirits?

And to be voide of perturbation,

For constancie, sleepe when thou would'st have sleepe,

Wake when thou would'st wake, feare nought, vexe for nought,140

No paines wilt thou bestow? no cost? no thought?

Ren. What should I say? As good consort with you

As with an angell; I could heare you ever.

Cler. Well, in, my lord, and spend time with my sister,

And keepe her from the field with all endeavour.145

The souldiers love her so, and shee so madly

Would take my apprehension, if it chance,

That bloud would flow in rivers.

Ren. Heaven forbid!

And all with honour your arrivall speede! Exit.

Messenger. Here are two lackies, sir, have message to you.150

Cler. What is your message? and from whom, my friends?

1[st Soldier.] From the Lieutenant, Colonell, and the Captaines,

Who sent us to informe you that the battailes

Stand ready rang'd, expecting but your presence

To be their honor'd signall when to joyne,155

And we are charg'd to runne by, and attend you.

Cler. I come. I pray you see my running horse

Brought to the backe-gate to mee.

Mess. Instantly. Exit Mess[enger].

Cler. Chance what can chance mee, well or ill is equall

In my acceptance, since I joy in neyther,160

But goe with sway of all the world together.

In all successes Fortune and the day

To mee alike are; I am fixt, be shee

Never so fickle; and will there repose,

Farre past the reach of any dye she throwes. Ex[it] cum Pediss[equis]. 165

LINENOTES:

Actus quarti Scæna prima.

Maillard. Villaines, not hold him when ye had him downe!

1[st Soldier.] Who can hold lightning? Sdeath a man as well

Might catch a canon bullet in his mouth,

And spit it in your hands, as take and hold him.

Mail. Pursue, enclose him! stand or fall on him,5

And yee may take him. Sdeath! they make him guards. Exit.

Challon. Stand, cowards, stand; strike, send your bullets at him.

1[st Soldier.] Wee came to entertaine him, sir, for honour.

2[d Soldier.] Did ye not say so?

Chal. Slaves, hee is a traitor;

Command the horse troopes to over-runne the traitor. Exeunt. 10

[Pg 242]Shouts within. Alarum still, and Chambers shot off. Then enter Aumall.

Aumale. What spirit breathes thus in this more then man,

Turnes flesh to ayre possest, and in a storme

Teares men about the field like autumne leaves?

He turnd wilde lightning in the lackies hands,

Who, though their sodaine violent twitch unhorst him,15

Yet when he bore himselfe, their saucie fingers

Flew as too hot off, as hee had beene fire.

The ambush then made in, through all whose force

Hee drave as if a fierce and fire-given canon

Had spit his iron vomit out amongst them.20

The battailes then in two halfe-moones enclos'd him,

In which he shew'd as if he were the light,

And they but earth, who, wondring what hee was,

Shruncke their steele hornes and gave him glorious passe.

And as a great shot from a towne besieg'd25

At foes before it flyes forth blacke and roring,

But they too farre, and that with waight opprest

(As if disdaining earth) doth onely grasse,

Strike earth, and up againe into the ayre,

Againe sinkes to it, and againe doth rise,30

[Pg 243]

And keepes such strength that when it softliest moves

It piece-meale shivers any let it proves—

So flew brave Clermont forth, till breath forsooke him,

Then fell to earth; and yet (sweet man) even then

His spirits convulsions made him bound againe35

Past all their reaches; till, all motion spent,

His fixt eyes cast a blaze of such disdaine,

All stood and star'd, and untouch'd let him lie,

As something sacred fallen out of the skie. A cry within.

O now some rude hand hath laid hold on him!40

See, prisoner led, with his bands honour'd more

Then all the freedome he enjoy'd before.

Mail. At length wee have you, sir.

Clermont. You have much joy too;

I made you sport. Yet, but I pray you tell mee,

Are not you perjur'd?

Mail. No: I swore for the King. 45

Cler. Yet perjurie, I hope, is perjurie.

Mail. But thus forswearing is not perjurie.

You are no politician: not a fault,

How foule soever, done for private ends,

Is fault in us sworne to the publike good:50

[Pg 244]

Wee never can be of the damned crew;

Wee may impolitique our selves (as 'twere)

Into the kingdomes body politique,

Whereof indeede we're members; you misse termes.

Cler. The things are yet the same.55

Mail. Tis nothing so; the propertie is alter'd:

Y'are no lawyer. Or say that othe and othe

Are still the same in number, yet their species

Differ extreamely, as, for flat example,

When politique widowes trye men for their turne,60

Before they wed them, they are harlots then,

But when they wed them, they are honest women:

So private men, when they forsweare, betray,

Are perjur'd treachers, but being publique once,

That is, sworne-married to the publique good—65

Cler. Are married women publique?

Mail. Publique good;

For marriage makes them, being the publique good,

And could not be without them: so I say

Men publique, that is, being sworne-married

To the good publique, being one body made70

With the realmes body politique, are no more

[Pg 245]

Private, nor can be perjur'd, though forsworne,

More then a widow married, for the act

Of generation is for that an harlot,

Because for that shee was so, being unmarried:75

An argument a paribus.

Chal. Tis a shrow'd one.

Cler. "Who hath no faith to men, to God hath none:"

Retaine you that, sir? who said so?

Mail. Twas I.

Cler. Thy owne tongue damne thy infidelitie!

But, Captaines all, you know me nobly borne;80

Use yee t'assault such men as I with lackyes?

Chal. They are no lackyes, sir, but souldiers

Disguis'd in lackyes coates.

1 Sold. Sir, wee have seene the enemie.

Cler. Avant! yee rascols, hence!

Mail. Now leave your coates.

Cler. Let me not see them more. 85

Aum. I grieve that vertue lives so undistinguisht

From vice in any ill, and though the crowne

Of soveraigne law, shee should be yet her footstoole,

Subject to censure, all the shame and paine

Of all her rigor.

[Pg 246]

Cler. Yet false policie 90

Would cover all, being like offenders hid,

That (after notice taken where they hide)

The more they crouch and stirre, the more are spide.

Aum. I wonder how this chanc'd you.

Cler. Some informer,

Bloud-hound to mischiefe, usher to the hang-man,95

Thirstie of honour for some huge state act,

Perceiving me great with the worthy Guise,

And he (I know not why) held dangerous,

Made me the desperate organe of his danger,

Onely with that poore colour: tis the common100

And more then whore-like tricke of treacherie

And vermine bred to rapine and to ruine,

For which this fault is still to be accus'd;

Since good acts faile, crafts and deceits are us'd.

If it be other, never pittie mee.105

Aum. Sir, we are glad, beleeve it, and have hope

The King will so conceit it.

Cler. At his pleasure.

In meane time, what's your will, Lord Lieutenant?

Mail. To leave your owne horse, and to mount the trumpets.

Cler. It shall be done. This heavily prevents110

[Pg 247]

My purpos'd recreation in these parts;

Which now I thinke on, let mee begge you, sir,

To lend me some one captaine of your troopes,

To beare the message of my haplesse service

And miserie to my most noble mistresse,115

Countesse of Cambray; to whose house this night

I promist my repaire, and know most truely,

With all the ceremonies of her favour,

She sure expects mee.

Mail. Thinke you now on that?

Cler. On that, sir? I, and that so worthily,120

That if the King, in spight of your great service,

Would send me instant promise of enlargement,

Condition I would set this message by,

I would not take it, but had rather die.

Aum. Your message shall be done, sir: I, my selfe,125

Will be for you a messenger of ill.

Cler. I thanke you, sir, and doubt not yet to live

To quite your kindnesse.

Aum. Meane space use your spirit

And knowledge for the chearfull patience

Of this so strange and sodaine consequence.130

Cler. Good sir, beleeve that no particular torture

Can force me from my glad obedience

[Pg 248]

To any thing the high and generall Cause,

To match with his whole fabricke, hath ordainde;

And know yee all (though farre from all your aymes,135

Yet worth them all, and all mens endlesse studies)

That in this one thing, all the discipline

Of manners and of manhood is contain'd:—

A man to joyne himselfe with th'Universe

In his maine sway, and make (in all things fit)140

One with that all, and goe on round as it;

Not plucking from the whole his wretched part,

And into straites, or into nought revert,

Wishing the compleate Universe might be

Subject to such a ragge of it as hee;145

But to consider great Necessitie

All things, as well refract as voluntarie,

Reduceth to the prime celestiall cause;

Which he that yeelds to with a mans applause,

And cheeke by cheeke goes, crossing it no breath,150

But like Gods image followes to the death,

That man is truely wise, and every thing

(Each cause and every part distinguishing)

In nature with enough art understands,

And that full glory merits at all hands155

That doth the whole world at all parts adorne,

And appertaines to one celestiall borne. Exeunt omnes.

LINENOTES:

[Scæna secunda.

Baligny. So foule a scandall never man sustain'd,

Which caus'd by th'King is rude and tyrannous:

Give me a place, and my Lieutenant make

The filler of it!

Renel. I should never looke

For better of him; never trust a man5

For any justice, that is rapt with pleasure;

To order armes well, that makes smockes his ensignes,

And his whole governments sayles: you heard of late

Hee had the foure and twenty wayes of venerie

Done all before him.

Bal. Twas abhorr'd and beastly.10

Ren. Tis more then natures mightie hand can doe

To make one humane and a letcher too.

Looke how a wolfe doth like a dogge appeare,

So like a friend is an adulterer;

Voluptuaries, and these belly-gods,15

No more true men are then so many toads.

[Pg 250]

A good man happy is a common good;

Vile men advanc'd live of the common bloud.

Bal. Give, and then take, like children!

Ren. Bounties are

As soone repented as they happen rare.20

Bal. What should Kings doe, and men of eminent places,

But, as they gather, sow gifts to the graces?

And where they have given, rather give againe

(Being given for vertue) then, like babes and fooles,

Take and repent gifts? why are wealth and power?25

Ren. Power and wealth move to tyranny, not bountie;

The merchant for his wealth is swolne in minde,

When yet the chiefe lord of it is the winde.

Bal. That may so chance to our state-merchants too;

Something performed, that hath not farre to goe.30

Ren. That's the maine point, my lord; insist on that.

Bal. But doth this fire rage further? hath it taken

The tender tynder of my wifes sere bloud?

Is shee so passionate?

Ren. So wilde, so mad,

[Pg 251]

Shee cannot live and this unwreakt sustaine.35

The woes are bloudy that in women raigne.

The Sicile gulfe keepes feare in lesse degree;

There is no tyger not more tame then shee.

Bal. There is no looking home, then?

Ren. Home! Medea

With all her hearbs, charmes, thunders, lightning,40

Made not her presence and blacke hants more dreadfull.

Bal. Come, to the King; if he reforme not all,

Marke the event, none stand where that must fall. Exeunt.

[Scæna tertia.

Usher. Madame, a captaine come from Clermont D'Ambois

Desires accesse to you.

Countess. And not himselfe?

Ush. No, madame.

Count. That's not well. Attend him in. Exit Ush[er].

The last houre of his promise now runne out!

[Pg 252]

And hee breake, some brack's in the frame of nature 5

That forceth his breach.

Aumale. Save your ladiship!

Coun. All welcome! Come you from my worthy servant?

Aum. I, madame, and conferre such newes from him—

Coun. Such newes! what newes?

Aum. Newes that I wish some other had the charge of.10

Coun. O, what charge? what newes?

Aum. Your ladiship must use some patience,

Or else I cannot doe him that desire

He urg'd with such affection to your graces.

Coun. Doe it, for heavens love, doe it! if you serve15

His kinde desires, I will have patience.

Is hee in health?

Aum. He is.

Count. Why, that's the ground

Of all the good estate wee hold in earth;

All our ill built upon that is no more

Then wee may beare, and should; expresse it all.20

[Pg 253]

Aum. Madame, tis onely this; his libertie—

Coun. His libertie! Without that health is nothing.

Why live I, but to aske in doubt of that?

Is that bereft him?

Aum. You'll againe prevent me.

Coun. No more, I sweare; I must heare, and together25

Come all my miserie! Ile hold, though I burst.

Aum. Then, madame, thus it fares; he was envited,

By way of honour to him, to take view

Of all the powers his brother Baligny

Hath in his government; which rang'd in battailes,30

Maillard, Lieutenant to the Governour,

Having receiv'd strickt letters from the King,

To traine him to the musters and betray him

To their supprise; which, with Chalon in chiefe,

And other captaines (all the field put hard35

By his incredible valour for his scape)

They haplesly and guiltlesly perform'd;

And to Bastile hee's now led prisoner.

Count. What change is here! how are my hopes prevented!

O my most faithfull servant, thou betraid!40

[Pg 254]

Will Kings make treason lawfull? Is societie

(To keepe which onely Kings were first ordain'd)

Lesse broke in breaking faith twixt friend and friend

Then twixt the King and subject? let them feare

Kings presidents in licence lacke no danger.45

Kings are compar'd to Gods, and should be like them,

Full in all right, in nought superfluous,

Nor nothing straining past right for their right.

Raigne justly, and raigne safely. Policie

Is but a guard corrupted, and a way50

Venter'd in desarts, without guide or path.

Kings punish subjects errors with their owne.

Kings are like archers, and their subjects, shafts:

For as when archers let their arrowes flye,

They call to them, and bid them flye or fall,55

As if twere in the free power of the shaft

To flye or fall, when onely tis the strength,

Straight shooting, compasse given it by the archer,

That makes it hit or misse; and doing eyther,

Hee's to be prais'd or blam'd, and not the shaft:60

So Kings to subjects crying, "Doe, doe not this,"

[Pg 255]

Must to them by their owne examples strength,

The straightnesse of their acts, and equall compasse,

Give subjects power t'obey them in the like;

Not shoote them forth with faultie ayme and strength,65

And lay the fault in them for flying amisse.

Aum. But for your servant, I dare sweare him guiltlesse.

Count. Hee would not for his kingdome traitor be;

His lawes are not so true to him, as he.

O knew I how to free him, by way forc'd70

Through all their armie, I would flye, and doe it:

And had I of my courage and resolve

But tenne such more, they should not all retaine him.

But I will never die, before I give

Maillard an hundred slashes with a sword,75

Chalon an hundred breaches with a pistoll.

They could not all have taken Clermont D'Ambois

Without their treacherie; he had bought his bands out

With their slave blouds: but he was credulous;

Hee would beleeve, since he would be beleev'd;80

Your noblest natures are most credulous.

[Pg 256]

Who gives no trust, all trust is apt to breake;

Hate like hell mouth who thinke not what they speake.

Aum. Well, madame, I must tender my attendance

On him againe. Will't please you to returne85

No service to him by me?

Count. Fetch me straight

My little cabinet. Exit Ancil[la].

Tis little, tell him,

And much too little for his matchlesse love:

But as in him the worths of many men

Are close contracted, (Intr[at] Ancil[la.]) so in this are jewels90

Worth many cabinets. Here, with this (good sir)

Commend my kindest service to my servant,

Thanke him, with all my comforts, and, in them,

With all my life for them; all sent from him

In his remembrance of mee and true love.95

And looke you tell him, tell him how I lye She kneeles downe at his feete.

Prostrate at feet of his accurst misfortune,

Pouring my teares out, which shall ever fall,

Till I have pour'd for him out eyes and all.

Aum. O madame, this will kill him; comfort you100

With full assurance of his quicke acquitall;

Be not so passionate; rise, cease your teares.

[Pg 257]

Coun. Then must my life cease. Teares are all the vent

My life hath to scape death. Teares please me better

Then all lifes comforts, being the naturall seede105

Of heartie sorrow. As a tree fruit beares,

So doth an undissembled sorrow, teares. Hee raises her, and leades her out. Exe[unt].

Usher. This might have beene before, and sav'd much charge. Exit.

LINENOTES:

[Scæna quarta.

Enter Henry, Guise, Baligny, Esp[ernone], Soisson. Pericot with pen, incke, and paper.

Guise. Now, sir, I hope you're much abus'd eyes see

In my word for my Clermont, what a villaine

Hee was that whisper'd in your jealous eare

His owne blacke treason in suggesting Clermonts,

Colour'd with nothing but being great with mee.5

Signe then this writ for his deliverie;

Your hand was never urg'd with worthier boldnesse:

Come, pray, sir, signe it. Why should Kings be praid

[Pg 258]

To acts of justice? tis a reverence

Makes them despis'd, and showes they sticke and tyre 10

In what their free powers should be hot as fire.

Henry. Well, take your will, sir;—Ile have mine ere long.— Aversus.

But wherein is this Clermont such a rare one?

Gui. In his most gentle and unwearied minde,

Rightly to vertue fram'd in very nature;15

In his most firme inexorable spirit

To be remov'd from any thing hee chuseth

For worthinesse; or beare the lest perswasion

To what is base, or fitteth not his object;

In his contempt of riches, and of greatnesse20

In estimation of th'idolatrous vulgar;

His scorne of all things servile and ignoble,

Though they could gaine him never such advancement;

His liberall kinde of speaking what is truth,

In spight of temporising; the great rising25

And learning of his soule so much the more

Against ill fortune, as shee set her selfe

Sharpe against him or would present most hard,

To shunne the malice of her deadliest charge;

His detestation of his speciall friends,30

When he perceiv'd their tyrannous will to doe,

[Pg 259]

Or their abjection basely to sustaine

Any injustice that they could revenge;

The flexibilitie of his most anger,

Even in the maine careere and fury of it,35

When any object of desertfull pittie

Offers it selfe to him; his sweet disposure,

As much abhorring to behold as doe

Any unnaturall and bloudy action;

His just contempt of jesters, parasites,40

Servile observers, and polluted tongues—

In short, this Senecall man is found in him,

Hee may with heavens immortall powers compare,

To whom the day and fortune equall are;

Come faire or foule, whatever chance can fall,45

Fixt in himselfe, hee still is one to all.

Hen. Showes he to others thus?

Omnes. To all that know him.

Hen. And apprehend I this man for a traitor?

Gui. These are your Machevilian villaines,

Your bastard Teucers, that, their mischiefes done,50

Runne to your shield for shelter; Cacusses

That cut their too large murtherous theveries

To their dens length still. Woe be to that state

Where treacherie guards, and ruine makes men great!

[Pg 260]

Hen. Goe, take my letters for him, and release him.55

Om. Thankes to your Highnesse; ever live your Highnesse! Exeunt.

Baligny. Better a man were buried quicke then live

A propertie for state and spoile to thrive. Exit.

LINENOTES:

[Scæna quinta.

Maillard. Wee joy you take a chance so ill, so well.

Clermont. Who ever saw me differ in acceptance

Of eyther fortune?

Chalon. What, love bad like good!

How should one learne that?

Cler. To love nothing outward,

Or not within our owne powers to command;5

And so being sure of every thing we love,

Who cares to lose the rest? if any man

Would neyther live nor dye in his free choise,

But as hee sees necessitie will have it

(Which if hee would resist, he strives in vaine)10

What can come neere him that hee doth not well?

[Pg 261]

And if in worst events his will be done,

How can the best be better? all is one.

Mail. Me thinkes tis prettie.

Cler. Put no difference

If you have this, or not this; but as children15

Playing at coites ever regard their game,

And care not for their coites, so let a man

The things themselves that touch him not esteeme,

But his free power in well disposing them.

Chal. Prettie, from toyes!

Cler. Me thinkes this double disticke 20

Seemes prettily too to stay superfluous longings:

"Not to have want, what riches doth exceede?

Not to be subject, what superiour thing?

He that to nought aspires, doth nothing neede;

Who breakes no law is subject to no King."25

Mail. This goes to mine eare well, I promise you.

Chal. O, but tis passing hard to stay one thus.

Cler. Tis so; rancke custome raps men so beyond it.

And as tis hard so well mens dores to barre

To keepe the cat out and th'adulterer:30

So tis as hard to curbe affections so

Wee let in nought to make them over-flow.

And as of Homers verses, many critickes

[Pg 262]

On those stand of which times old moth hath eaten

The first or last feete, and the perfect parts35

Of his unmatched poeme sinke beneath,

With upright gasping and sloath dull as death:

So the unprofitable things of life,

And those we cannot compasse, we affect;

All that doth profit and wee have, neglect,40

Like covetous and basely getting men

That, gathering much, use never what they keepe;

But for the least they loose, extreamely weepe.

Mail. This prettie talking, and our horses walking

Downe this steepe hill, spends time with equall profit.45

Cler. Tis well bestow'd on ye; meate and men sicke

Agree like this and you: and yet even this

Is th'end of all skill, power, wealth, all that is.

Chal. I long to heare, sir, how your mistresse takes this.

Mail. Wee soone shall know it; see Aumall return'd.50

Aumale. Ease to your bands, sir!

Cler. Welcome, worthy friend!

[Pg 263]

Chal. How tooke his noblest mistresse your sad message?

Aum. As great rich men take sodaine povertie.

I never witness'd a more noble love,

Nor a more ruthfull sorrow: I well wisht55

Some other had beene master of my message.

Mail. Y'are happy, sir, in all things, but this one

Of your unhappy apprehension.

Cler. This is to mee, compar'd with her much mone,

As one teare is to her whole passion.60

Aum. Sir, shee commends her kindest service to you,

And this rich cabinet.

Chal. O happy man!

This may enough hold to redeeme your bands.

Cler. These clouds, I doubt not, will be soone blowne over.

Aum. Your hope is just and happy; see, sir, both65

In both the looks of these.

Baligny. Here's a discharge

For this your prisoner, my good Lord Lieutenant.

Mail. Alas, sir, I usurpe that stile, enforc't,

And hope you know it was not my aspiring.

[Pg 264]

Bal. Well, sir, my wrong aspir'd past all mens hopes.70

Mail. I sorrow for it, sir.

Renel. You see, sir, there

Your prisoners discharge autenticall.

Mail. It is, sir, and I yeeld it him with gladnesse.

Bal. Brother, I brought you downe to much good purpose.

Cler. Repeate not that, sir; the amends makes all.75

Ren. I joy in it, my best and worthiest friend;

O, y'have a princely fautor of the Guise.

Bal. I thinke I did my part to.

Ren. Well, sir, all

Is in the issue well: and (worthiest friend)

Here's from your friend, the Guise; here from the Countesse,80

Your brothers mistresse, the contents whereof

I know, and must prepare you now to please

Th'unrested spirit of your slaughtered brother,

If it be true, as you imagin'd once,

His apparition show'd it. The complot85

Is now laid sure betwixt us; therefore haste

Both to your great friend (who hath some use waightie

For your repaire to him) and to the Countesse,

Whose satisfaction is no lesse important.

[Pg 265]

Cler. I see all, and will haste as it importeth.90

And good friend, since I must delay a little

My wisht attendance on my noblest mistresse,

Excuse me to her, with returne of this,

And endlesse protestation of my service;

And now become as glad a messenger,95

As you were late a wofull.

Aum. Happy change!

I ever will salute thee with my service. Exit.

Bal. Yet more newes, brother; the late jesting Monsieur

Makes now your brothers dying prophesie equall

At all parts, being dead as he presag'd.100

Ren. Heaven shield the Guise from seconding that truth

With what he likewise prophesied on him!

Cler. It hath enough, twas grac'd with truth in one;

To'th other falshood and confusion!

Leade to the Court, sir.

Bal. You Ile leade no more; 105

It was to ominous and foule before. Exeunt.

LINENOTES:

Actus quinti Scæna prima.

Umbra Bussi. Up from the chaos of eternall night

(To which the whole digestion of the world

Is now returning) once more I ascend,

And bide the cold dampe of this piercing ayre,

To urge the justice whose almightie word5

Measures the bloudy acts of impious men

With equall pennance, who in th'act it selfe

Includes th'infliction, which like chained shot

Batter together still; though (as the thunder

Seemes, by mens duller hearing then their sight,10

To breake a great time after lightning forth,

Yet both at one time teare the labouring cloud)

So men thinke pennance of their ils is slow,

Though th'ill and pennance still together goe.

Reforme, yee ignorant men, your manlesse lives15

Whose lawes yee thinke are nothing but your lusts;

When leaving (but for supposition sake)

The body of felicitie, religion,

Set in the midst of Christendome, and her head

Cleft to her bosome, one halfe one way swaying,20

[Pg 267]

Another th'other, all the Christian world

And all her lawes whose observation

Stands upon faith, above the power of reason—

Leaving (I say) all these, this might suffice

To fray yee from your vicious swindge in ill25

And set you more on fire to doe more good;

That since the world (as which of you denies?)

Stands by proportion, all may thence conclude

That all the joynts and nerves sustaining nature

As well may breake, and yet the world abide,30

As any one good unrewarded die,

Or any one ill scape his penaltie. The Ghost stands close.

Guise. Thus (friend) thou seest how all good men would thrive,

Did not the good thou prompt'st me with prevent

The jealous ill pursuing them in others.35

But now thy dangers are dispatcht, note mine.

Hast thou not heard of that admired voyce

That at the barricadoes spake to mee,

(No person seene) "Let's leade my lord to Reimes"?

Clermont. Nor could you learne the person?

Gui. By no meanes. 40

Cler. Twas but your fancie, then, a waking dreame:

[Pg 268]

For as in sleepe, which bindes both th'outward senses

And the sense common to, th'imagining power

(Stird up by formes hid in the memories store,

Or by the vapours of o'er-flowing humours45

In bodies full and foule, and mixt with spirits)

Faines many strange, miraculous images,

In which act it so painfully applyes

It selfe to those formes that the common sense

It actuates with his motion, and thereby 50

Those fictions true seeme and have reall act:

So, in the strength of our conceits awake,

The cause alike doth [oft] like fictions make.

Gui. Be what it will, twas a presage of something

Waightie and secret, which th'advertisements 55

I have receiv'd from all parts, both without

And in this kingdome, as from Rome and Spaine,

Lorraine and Savoye, gives me cause to thinke,

All writing that our plots catastrophe,

For propagation of the Catholique cause,60

Will bloudy prove, dissolving all our counsailes.

Cler. Retyre, then, from them all.

Gui. I must not doe so.

The Arch-Bishop of Lyons tels me plaine

[Pg 269]

I shall be said then to abandon France

In so important an occasion;65

And that mine enemies (their profit making

Of my faint absence) soone would let that fall,

That all my paines did to this height exhale.

Cler. Let all fall that would rise unlawfully!

Make not your forward spirit in vertues right70

A property for vice, by thrusting on

Further then all your powers can fetch you off.

It is enough, your will is infinite

To all things vertuous and religious,

Which, within limits kept, may without danger75

Let vertue some good from your graces gather.

Avarice of all is ever nothings father.

Umb. Danger (the spurre of all great mindes) is ever

The curbe to your tame spirits; you respect not

(With all your holinesse of life and learning)80

More then the present, like illiterate vulgars;

Your minde (you say) kept in your fleshes bounds

Showes that mans will must rul'd be by his power:

When by true doctrine you are taught to live

Rather without the body then within,85

And rather to your God still then your selfe.

To live to Him is to doe all things fitting

His image in which like Himselfe we live;

[Pg 270]

To be His image is to doe those things

That make us deathlesse, which by death is onely 90

Doing those deedes that fit eternitie;

And those deedes are the perfecting that justice

That makes the world last, which proportion is

Of punishment and wreake for every wrong,

As well as for right a reward as strong:95

Away, then! use the meanes thou hast to right

The wrong I suffer'd. What corrupted law

Leaves unperform'd in Kings, doe thou supply,

And be above them all in dignitie. Exit.

Gui. Why stand'st thou still thus, and applyest thine eares100

And eyes to nothing?

Cler. Saw you nothing here?

Gui. Thou dream'st awake now; what was here to see?

Cler. My brothers spirit, urging his revenge.

Gui. Thy brothers spirit! pray thee mocke me not.

Cler. No, by my love and service.

Gui. Would he rise, 105

And not be thundring threates against the Guise?

Cler. You make amends for enmitie to him,

With tenne parts more love and desert of mee;

And as you make your hate to him no let

[Pg 271]

Of any love to mee, no more beares hee110

(Since you to me supply it) hate to you.

Which reason and which justice is perform'd

In spirits tenne parts more then fleshy men;

To whose fore-sights our acts and thoughts lie open:

And therefore, since hee saw the treacherie115

Late practis'd by my brother Baligny,

Hee would not honor his hand with the justice

(As hee esteemes it) of his blouds revenge,

To which my sister needes would have him sworne,

Before she would consent to marry him.120

Gui. O Baligny!—who would beleeve there were

A man that (onely since his lookes are rais'd

Upwards, and have but sacred heaven in sight)

Could beare a minde so more then divellish?

As for the painted glory of the countenance,125

Flitting in Kings, doth good for nought esteeme,

And the more ill hee does, the better seeme.

Cler. Wee easily may beleeve it, since we see

In this worlds practise few men better be.

Justice to live doth nought but justice neede,130

But policie must still on mischiefe feede.

Untruth, for all his ends, truths name doth sue in;

None safely live but those that study ruine.

[Pg 272]

A good man happy is a common good;

Ill men advanc'd live of the common bloud.135

Gui. But this thy brothers spirit startles mee,

These spirits seld or never hanting men

But some mishap ensues.

Cler. Ensue what can;

Tyrants may kill but never hurt a man;

All to his good makes, spight of death and hell.140

Aumale. All the desert of good renowne your Highnesse!

Gui. Welcome, Aumall!

Cler. My good friend, friendly welcome!

How tooke my noblest mistresse the chang'd newes?

Aum. It came too late sir, for those loveliest eyes

(Through which a soule look't so divinely loving,145

Teares nothing uttering her distresse enough)

She wept quite out, and, like two falling starres,

Their dearest sights quite vanisht with her teares.

Cler. All good forbid it!

Gui. What events are these!

[Pg 273]

Cler. All must be borne, my lord; and yet this chance150

Would willingly enforce a man to cast off

All power to beare with comfort, since hee sees

In this our comforts made our miseries.

Gui. How strangely thou art lov'd of both the sexes;

Yet thou lov'st neyther, but the good of both.155

Cler. In love of women my affection first

Takes fire out of the fraile parts of my bloud;

Which, till I have enjoy'd, is passionate

Like other lovers; but, fruition past,

I then love out of judgement, the desert160

Of her I love still sticking in my heart,

Though the desire and the delight be gone,

Which must chance still, since the comparison

Made upon tryall twixt what reason loves,

And what affection, makes in mee the best165

Ever preferd, what most love, valuing lest.

Gui. Thy love being judgement then, and of the minde,

Marry thy worthiest mistresse now being blinde.

Cler. If there were love in mariage, so I would;

But I denie that any man doth love,170

Affecting wives, maides, widowes, any women:

For neither flyes love milke, although they drowne

[Pg 274]

In greedy search thereof; nor doth the bee

Love honey, though the labour of her life

Is spent in gathering it; nor those that fat 175

On beasts, or fowles, doe any thing therein

For any love: for as when onely nature

Moves men to meate, as farre as her power rules,

Shee doth it with a temperate appetite,

The too much men devoure abhorring nature,180

And in our most health is our most disease:

So, when humanitie rules men and women,

Tis for societie confinde in reason.

But what excites the beds desire in bloud,

By no meanes justly can be construed love;185

For when love kindles any knowing spirit,

It ends in vertue and effects divine,

And is in friendship chaste and masculine.

Gui. Thou shalt my mistresse be; me thinkes my bloud

Is taken up to all love with thy vertues.190

And howsoever other men despise

These paradoxes strange and too precise,

Since they hold on the right way of our reason,

I could attend them ever. Come, away;

Performe thy brothers thus importun'd wreake;195

And I will see what great affaires the King

Hath to employ my counsell which he seemes

Much to desire, and more and more esteemes. Exeunt.

LINENOTES:

[Scæna secunda.

Henry. Saw you his sawcie forcing of my hand

To D'Ambois freedome?

Baligny. Saw, and through mine eyes

Let fire into my heart, that burn'd to beare

An insolence so giantly austere.

Hen. The more Kings beare at subjects hands, the more5

Their lingring justice gathers; that resembles

The waightie and the goodly-bodied eagle,

Who (being on earth) before her shady wings

Can raise her into ayre, a mightie way

Close by the ground she runnes; but being aloft,10

All shee commands, she flyes at; and the more

Death in her seres beares, the more time shee stayes

Her thundry stoope from that on which shee preyes.

Bal. You must be then more secret in the waight

Of these your shadie counsels, who will else15

Beare (where such sparkes flye as the Guise and D'Ambois)

[Pg 276]

Pouder about them. Counsels (as your entrailes)

Should be unpierst and sound kept; for not those

Whom you discover you neglect; but ope

A ruinous passage to your owne best hope.20

Hen. Wee have spies set on us, as we on others;

And therefore they that serve us must excuse us,

If what wee most hold in our hearts take winde;

Deceit hath eyes that see into the minde.

But this plot shall be quicker then their twinckling,25

On whose lids Fate with her dead waight shall lie,

And confidence that lightens ere she die.

Friends of my Guard, as yee gave othe to be

True to your Soveraigne, keepe it manfully.

Your eyes have witnest oft th'ambition30

That never made accesse to me in Guise

But treason ever sparkled in his eyes;

Which if you free us of, our safetie shall

You not our subjects but our patrons call.

Omnes. Our duties binde us; hee is now but dead.35

Hen. Wee trust in it, and thanke ye. Baligny,

Goe lodge their ambush, and thou God, that art

Fautor of princes, thunder from the skies

Beneath his hill of pride this gyant Guise. Exeunt.

[Scæna tertia.

Tamyra. I see y'are servant, sir, to my deare sister,

The lady of her loved Baligny.

Charlotte. Madame, I am bound to her vertuous bounties

For that life which I offer, in her service,

To the revenge of her renowned brother.5

Tam. She writes to mee as much, and much desires

That you may be the man, whose spirit shee knowes

Will cut short off these long and dull delayes

Hitherto bribing the eternall Justice:

Which I beleeve, since her unmatched spirit10

Can judge of spirits that have her sulphure in them.

But I must tell you that I make no doubt

Her living brother will revenge her dead,

On whom the dead impos'd the taske, and hee,

I know, will come t'effect it instantly.15

[Pg 278]

Char. They are but words in him; beleeve them not.

Tam. See; this is the vault where he must enter;

Where now I thinke hee is.

Renel. God save you, lady!

What gentleman is this, with whom you trust

The deadly waightie secret of this houre?20

Tam. One that your selfe will say I well may trust.

Ren. Then come up, madame. He helps the Countesse up.

See here, honour'd lady,

A Countesse that in loves mishap doth equall

At all parts your wrong'd selfe, and is the mistresse

Of your slaine servants brother; in whose love,25

For his late treachrous apprehension,

She wept her faire eyes from her ivory browes,

And would have wept her soule out, had not I

Promist to bring her to this mortall quarrie,

That by her lost eyes for her servants love30

She might conjure him from this sterne attempt,

In which (by a most ominous dreame shee had)

Shee knowes his death fixt, and that never more

Out of this place the sunne shall see him live.

[Pg 279]

Char. I am provided, then, to take his place 35

And undertaking on me.

Ren. You sir, why?

Char. Since I am charg'd so by my mistresse,

His mournfull sister.

Tam. See her letter, sir. Hee reades.

Good madame, I rue your fate more then mine,

And know not how to order these affaires,40

They stand on such occurrents.

Ren. This, indeede,

I know to be your lady mistresse hand;

And know besides, his brother will and must

Indure no hand in this revenge but his.

Umbra. Away, dispute no more; get up, and see!45

Clermont must auchthor this just tragedie.

Coun. Who's that?

Ren. The spirit of Bussy.

Tam. O my servant!

Let us embrace.

Umb. Forbeare! The ayre, in which

My figures liknesse is imprest, will blast.

Let my revenge for all loves satisfie,50

In which, dame, feare not, Clermont shall not dye.

No word dispute more; up, and see th'event. Exeunt Ladyes.

[Pg 280]

Make the guard sure, Renel; and then the doores

Command to make fast, when the Earle is in. Exit Ren[el].

The blacke soft-footed houre is now on wing,55

Which, for my just wreake, ghosts shall celebrate

With dances dire and of infernall state. Exit.

LINENOTES:

[Scæna quarta.

Guise. Who sayes that death is naturall, when nature

Is with the onely thought of it dismaid?

I have had lotteries set up for my death,

And I have drawne beneath my trencher one,

Knit in my hand-kerchiefe another lot,5

The word being, "Y'are a dead man if you enter";

And these words this imperfect bloud and flesh

Shrincke at in spight of me, their solidst part

Melting like snow within mee with colde fire.

I hate my selfe, that, seeking to rule Kings,10

I cannot curbe my slave. Would any spirit

Free, manly, princely, wish to live to be

Commanded by this masse of slaverie,

Since reason, judgement, resolution,

[Pg 281]

And scorne of what we feare, will yeeld to feare?15

While this same sincke of sensualitie swels,

Who would live sinking in it? and not spring

Up to the starres, and leave this carrion here,

For wolfes, and vultures, and for dogges to teare?

O Clermont D'Ambois, wert thou here to chide20

This softnesse from my flesh, farre as my reason,

Farre as my resolution not to stirre

One foote out of the way for death and hell!

Let my false man by falshood perish here;

There's no way else to set my true man cleere.25

Messenger. The King desires your Grace to come to Councill.

Gui. I come. It cannot be; hee will not dare

To touch me with a treacherie so prophane.

Would Clermont now were here, to try how hee

Would lay about him, if this plot should be:30

Here would be tossing soules into the skie.

Who ever knew bloud sav'd by treacherie?

Well, I must on, and will; what should I feare?

Not against two, Alcides; against two,

And Hercules to friend, the Guise will goe.35

Gui. Holde, murtherers! They strike him downe.

So then, this is confidence

[Pg 282]

In greatnes, not in goodnes. Wher is the King?

Let him appeare to justifie his deede,

In spight of my betrai'd wounds; ere my soule

Take her flight through them, and my tongue hath strength40

To urge his tyrannie.

Henry. See, sir, I am come

To justifie it before men and God,

Who knowes with what wounds in my heart for woe

Of your so wounded faith I made these wounds,

Forc't to it by an insolence of force45

To stirre a stone; nor is a rocke, oppos'd

To all the billowes of the churlish sea,

More beate and eaten with them then was I

With your ambitious, mad idolatrie;

And this bloud I shed is to save the bloud50

Of many thousands.

Gui. That's your white pretext;

But you will finde one drop of bloud shed lawlesse

Will be the fountaine to a purple sea.

The present lust and shift made for Kings lives,

Against the pure forme and just power of law,55

Will thrive like shifters purchases; there hangs

A blacke starre in the skies, to which the sunne

[Pg 283]

Gives yet no light, will raine a poyson'd shower

Into your entrailes, that will make you feele

How little safetie lies in treacherous steele.60

Hen. Well, sir, Ile beare it; y'have a brother to

Bursts with like threates, the skarlet Cardinall—

Seeke, and lay hands on him; and take this hence,

Their blouds, for all you, on my conscience! Exit.

Gui. So, sir, your full swindge take; mine death hath curb'd.65

Clermont, farewell! O didst thou see but this!

But it is better; see by this the ice

Broke to thine owne bloud, which thou wilt despise

When thou hear'st mine shed. Is there no friend here

Will beare my love to him?

Aumale. I will, my lord. 70

Gui. Thankes with my last breath: recommend me, then,

To the most worthy of the race of men. Dyes. Exeunt.

[Scæna quinta.

Montsurry. Who have you let into my house?

Tamyra. I? none.

Mont. Tis false; I savour the rancke bloud of foes

In every corner.

Tam. That you may doe well;

It is the bloud you lately shed you smell.

Mont. Sdeath! the vault opens. The gulfe opens.

Tam. What vault? hold your sword. 5

Clermont. No, let him use it.

Mont. Treason! murther! murther!

Cler. Exclaime not; tis in vaine, and base in you,

Being one to onely one.

Mont. O bloudy strumpet!

Cler. With what bloud charge you her? it may be mine

As well as yours; there shall not any else10

Enter or touch you: I conferre no guards,

Nor imitate the murtherous course you tooke,

[Pg 285]

But single here will have my former challenge

Now answer'd single; not a minute more

My brothers bloud shall stay for his revenge,15

If I can act it; if not, mine shall adde

A double conquest to you, that alone

Put it to fortune now, and use no ods.

Storme not, nor beate your selfe thus gainst the dores,

Like to a savage vermine in a trap:20

All dores are sure made, and you cannot scape

But by your valour.

Mont. No, no, come and kill mee.

Cler. If you will die so like a beast, you shall;

But when the spirit of a man may save you,

Doe not so shame man, and a Nobleman.25

Mont. I doe not show this basenesse that I feare thee,

But to prevent and shame thy victory,

Which of one base is base, and so Ile die.

Cler. Here, then.

Mont. Stay, hold! One thought hath harden'd me, He starts up.

And since I must afford thee victorie,30

It shall be great and brave, if one request

Thou wilt admit mee.

[Pg 286]

Cler. What's that?

Mont. Give me leave

To fetch and use the sword thy brother gave mee,

When he was bravely giving up his life.

Cler. No; Ile not fight against my brothers sword;35

Not that I feare it, but since tis a tricke

For you to show your backe.

Mont. By all truth, no:

Take but my honourable othe, I will not.

Cler. Your honourable othe! Plaine truth no place has

Where othes are honourable.

Tam. Trust not his othe. 40

Hee will lie like a lapwing; when shee flyes

Farre from her sought nest, still "Here tis" shee cryes.

Mont. Out on thee, damme of divels! I will quite

Disgrace thy bravos conquest, die, not fight. Lyes downe.

Tam. Out on my fortune, to wed such an abject!45

Now is the peoples voyce the voyce of God;

Hee that to wound a woman vants so much,

As hee did mee, a man dares never touch.

[Pg 287]

Cler. Revenge your wounds now, madame; I resigne him

Up to your full will, since hee will not fight.50

First you shall torture him (as hee did you,

And justice wils) and then pay I my vow.

Here, take this ponyard.

Mont. Sinke earth, open heaven,

And let fall vengeance!

Tam. Come sir, good sir, hold him.

Mont. O shame of women, whither art thou fled!55

Cler. Why (good my lord) is it a greater shame

For her then you? come, I will be the bands

You us'd to her, prophaning her faire hands.

Mont. No, sir, Ile fight now, and the terror be

Of all you champions to such as shee.60

I did but thus farre dally; now observe.

O all you aking fore-heads that have rob'd

Your hands of weapons and your hearts of valour,

Joyne in mee all your rages and rebutters,

And into dust ram this same race of Furies;65

In this one relicke of the Ambois gall,

In his one purple soule shed, drowne it all. Fight.

Mont. Now give me breath a while.

[Pg 288]

Cler. Receive it freely.

Mont. What thinke y'a this now?

Cler. It is very noble,

Had it beene free, at least, and of your selfe;70

And thus wee see (where valour most doth vant)

What tis to make a coward valiant.

Mont. Now I shall grace your conquest.

Cler. That you shall.

Mont. If you obtaine it.

Cler. True, sir, tis in fortune.

Mont. If you were not a D'Ambois, I would scarce75

Change lives with you, I feele so great a change

In my tall spirits breath'd, I thinke, with the breath

A D'Ambois breathes here; and necessitie

(With whose point now prickt on, and so whose helpe

My hands may challenge) that doth all men conquer,80

If shee except not you of all men onely,

May change the case here.

Cler. True, as you are chang'd;

Her power, in me urg'd, makes y'another man

Then yet you ever were.

Mont. Well, I must on.

Cler. Your lordship must by all meanes.

[Pg 289]

Mont. Then at all. 85

Charlotte. Death of my father, what a shame is this!

Sticke in his hands thus! She gets downe.

Renel [trying to stop her]. Gentle sir, forbeare!

Countess. Is he not slaine yet?

Ren. No, madame, but hurt

In divers parts of him.

Mont. Y'have given it me,

And yet I feele life for another vennie.90

Cler. What would you, sir?

Char. I would performe this combat.

Cler. Against which of us?

Char. I care not much if twere

Against thy selfe; thy sister would have sham'd

To have thy brothers wreake with any man

In single combat sticke so in her fingers.95

Cler. My sister! know you her?

Tam. I, sir, shee sent him

With this kinde letter, to performe the wreake

Of my deare servant.

Cler. Now, alas! good sir,

Thinke you you could doe more?

[Pg 290]

Char. Alas! I doe;

And wer't not I, fresh, sound, should charge a man100

Weary and wounded, I would long ere this

Have prov'd what I presume on.

Cler. Y'have a minde

Like to my sister, but have patience now;

If next charge speede not, Ile resigne to you.

Mont. Pray thee, let him decide it.

Cler. No, my lord, 105

I am the man in fate; and since so bravely

Your lordship stands mee, scape but one more charge,

And, on my life, Ile set your life at large.

Mont. Said like a D'Ambois, and if now I die,

Sit joy and all good on thy victorie!110

Mont. Farewell! I hartily forgive thee; wife,

And thee; let penitence spend thy rest of life. Hee gives his hand to Cler[mont] and his wife.

Cler. Noble and Christian!

Tam. O, it breakes my heart.

Cler. And should; for all faults found in him before

These words, this end, makes full amends and more.115

Rest, worthy soule; and with it the deare spirit

Of my lov'd brother rest in endlesse peace!

[Pg 291]

Soft lie thy bones; Heaven be your soules abode;

And to your ashes be the earth no lode!

Musicke, and the Ghost of Bussy enters, leading the Ghost[s] of the Guise, Monsieur, Cardinall Guise, and Shattilion; they dance about the dead body, and exeunt.

Cler. How strange is this! The Guise amongst these spirits,120

And his great brother Cardinall, both yet living!

And that the rest with them with joy thus celebrate

This our revenge! This certainely presages

Some instant death both to the Guise and Cardinall.

That the Shattilions ghost to should thus joyne 125

In celebration of this just revenge

With Guise that bore a chiefe stroke in his death,

It seemes that now he doth approve the act;

And these true shadowes of the Guise and Cardinall,

Fore-running thus their bodies, may approve130

That all things to be done, as here wee live,

Are done before all times in th'other life.

That spirits should rise in these times yet are fables;

[Pg 292]

Though learnedst men hold that our sensive spirits

A little time abide about the graves135

Of their deceased bodies, and can take,

In colde condenc't ayre, the same formes they had

When they were shut up in this bodies shade.

Aumale. O sir, the Guise is slaine!

Cler. Avert it heaven!

Aum. Sent for to Councill by the King, an ambush 140

(Lodg'd for the purpose) rusht on him, and tooke

His princely life; who sent (in dying then)

His love to you, as to the best of men.

Cler. The worst and most accursed of things creeping

On earths sad bosome. Let me pray yee all145

A little to forbeare, and let me use

Freely mine owne minde in lamenting him.

Ile call yee straight againe.

Aum. We will forbeare,

And leave you free, sir. Exeunt.

Cler. Shall I live, and hee

Dead, that alone gave meanes of life to me?150

[Pg 293]

Theres no disputing with the acts of Kings;

Revenge is impious on their sacred persons.

And could I play the worldling (no man loving

Longer then gaine is reapt or grace from him)

I should survive; and shall be wondred at155

Though (in mine owne hands being) I end with him:

But friendship is the sement of two mindes,

As of one man the soule and body is,

Of which one cannot sever but the other

Suffers a needfull separation.160

Ren. I feare your servant, madame: let's descend. Descend Ren[el] & Coun[tess].

Cler. Since I could skill of man, I never liv'd

To please men worldly, and shall I in death

Respect their pleasures, making such a jarre

Betwixt my death and life, when death should make165

The consort sweetest, th'end being proofe and crowne

To all the skill and worth wee truely owne?

Guise, O my lord, how shall I cast from me

The bands and coverts hindring me from thee?

The garment or the cover of the minde170

The humane soule is; of the soule, the spirit

The proper robe is; of the spirit, the bloud;

And of the bloud, the body is the shrowd.

With that must I beginne then to unclothe,

[Pg 294]

And come at th'other. Now, then, as a ship175

Touching at strange and farre removed shores,

Her men a shore goe, for their severall ends,

Fresh water, victuals, precious stones, and pearle,

All yet intentive, when the master cals,

The ship to put off ready, to leave all180

Their greediest labours, lest they there be left

To theeves or beasts, or be the countries slaves:

So, now my master cals, my ship, my venture

All in one bottome put, all quite put off,

Gone under saile, and I left negligent185

To all the horrors of the vicious time,

The farre remov'd shores to all vertuous aimes,

None favouring goodnesse, none but he respecting

Pietie or man-hood—shall I here survive,

Not cast me after him into the sea,190

Rather then here live, readie every houre

To feede theeves, beasts, and be the slave of power?

I come, my lord! Clermont, thy creature, comes. Hee kils himselfe.

Aum. What! lye and languish, Clermont! Cursed man,

To leave him here thus! hee hath slaine himselfe.195

[Pg 295]

Tam. Misery on misery! O me wretched dame,

Of all that breath! all heaven turne all his eyes

In harty envie thus on one poore dame.

Char. Well done, my brother! I did love thee ever,

But now adore thee: losse of such a friend 200

None should survive, of such a brother [none.]

With my false husband live, and both these slaine!

Ere I returne to him, Ile turne to earth.

Ren. Horror of humane eyes! O Clermont D'Ambois!

Madame, wee staid too long, your servant's slaine.205

Coun. It must be so; he liv'd but in the Guise,

As I in him. O follow life mine eyes!

Tam. Hide, hide thy snakie head; to cloisters flie;

In pennance pine; too easie tis to die.

Char. It is. In cloisters then let's all survive.210

Madame, since wrath nor griefe can helpe these fortunes,

[Pg 296]

Let us forsake the world in which they raigne,

And for their wisht amends to God complaine.

Count. Tis fit and onely needfull: leade me on;

In heavens course comfort seeke, in earth is none. Exeunt. 215

Henry. Wee came indeede too late, which much I rue,

And would have kept this Clermont as my crowne.

Take in the dead, and make this fatall roome

(The house shut up) the famous D'Ambois tombe. Exeunt.

LINENOTES:

Notes to The Revenge of Bussy D'Ambois

168. To the right vertuous . . . Sr. Thomas Howard, &c. Thomas Howard, born before 1594, was the second son of the first Earl of Suffolk. He was created a Knight of the Bath in January, 1605, and in May, 1614, was appointed Master of the Horse to Charles, Prince of Wales. In 1622 he became Viscount Andover, and in 1626 Earl of Berkshire. He held a number of posts till the outbreak of the Civil War, and after the Restoration was appointed Gentleman of the Bedchamber to Charles II, and Privy Councillor. He died on July 16, 1669. His daughter Elizabeth married Dryden, and his sixth son, Sir Robert Howard, became distinguished as a dramatic writer and critic. Chapman addresses to this patron one of the Sonnets appended to his translation of the Iliad, in which he compares him to Antilochus, and calls him "valiant, and mild, and most ingenious."

169, 35-36. the most divine philosopher. The reference is doubtless to Epictetus, the influence of whose Discourses appears throughout The Revenge of Bussy D'Ambois.

174, 70. That thinke . . . that, that do not consider heavenly bliss complete folly, when compared with money.

175, 71-2. Well . . . arise. A hypocritical appeal by Baligny to the absent Duke of Guise, of whose ambitious schemes he suspects Renel to be a supporter.

176, 97. stands now on price with him: is now the subject of bargaining between him and me.

178. Monsieur taking leave of the King. Henry apparently leaves the stage, after this formal ceremony of farewell, without speaking, for he takes no part in the dialogue, and he is not mentioned among those who exeunt at l. 290.

[Pg 298]178, 145. See . . . Brabant. The expedition of the Duke of Anjou here alluded to is that of 1582, when he was crowned Duke of Brabant at Antwerp.

182, 234-5. When . . . commanders. Monsieur's description in these and the following lines of Clermont's and Bussy's first appearance at Court is purely fictitious.

183, 254. a keele of sea-coale. A keel was a flat-bottomed boat, used in the northeast of England, for loading and carrying coal. Afterwards the word was also used of the amount of coal a keel would carry, i. e. 8 chaldrons, or 21 tons 4 cwt. Sea-coal was the original term for the fossil coal borne from Newcastle to London by sea, to distinguish it from char-coal. Cf. Shakespeare, Merry Wives of Windsor, i, iv, 9, "at the latter end of a sea-coal fire."

184, 267. a poore knights living. The knights of Windsor, a small body who had apartments in the Castle, and pensions, were often known as "poor knights."

188, 332-3. Why, is not . . . worthily. If this is a complimentary allusion to Jaques' speech in As You Like It, ii, vii, 140-166, it is remarkable as coming from the writer whom Shakespeare at an earlier date had probably attacked in his Sonnets.

188, 335-42. what the good Greeke moralist sayes . . . of both. This passage is based upon the Discourses of Epictetus, bk. iv, vii, 13, which, however, Chapman completely misinterprets. Epictetus is demonstrating that a reasonable being should be able to bear any lot contentedly. "θέλεις πενίαν? φέρε καὶ γνώσῃ τί ἐστιν πενία τυχοῦσα καλοῦ ὑποκριτοῦ. θέλεις ἀρχὰς? φέρε, καὶ πόνους."

ὑποκρίτης is used here metaphorically, of one who acts a part in life, not, as Chapman takes it, of an actor in the professional sense.

[Pg 299]188-189, 354-5. The splenative philosopher . . . all. Democritus.

189, 356-74. All objects . . . they were. These lines are suggested by Juvenal's Satire, x, ll. 33-55, but they diverge too far from the original to be merely a paraphrase, as they are termed by the editor of the 1873 reprint.

200-201, 40-3. Since they . . . wrong'd: since these decrees ensure the performance of that guardianship, so that earth and heaven are kept true to their original order and purpose, in no case must the wrong suffered by an individual man, as he thinks, be considered really a wrong done to him.

203, 105. Euphorbus, son of Panthous, a Trojan hero, who first wounded Patroclus, but was afterwards slain by Menelaus. Pythagoras, as part of his doctrine of the transmigration of souls, is said to have claimed to have been formerly Euphorbus.

204, 113-22. What said . . . power. The reference is to Sophocles' Antigone, 446-457, where the Princess justifies herself for burying her brother's body in defiance of Creon's edict.

205, 135-6. For . . . authoritie. The lines here paraphrased, to which Chapman gives a marginal reference, are from the Antigone, 175-7.

Ἀμήχανον δὲ παντὸς ἀνδρὸς ἐκμαθεῖν
ψυχήν τε καὶ φρόνημα καὶ γνώμην, πρὶν ᾄν
ἀρχαῖς τε καὶ νόμοισιν ἐντριβὴς φᾳνῇ.

205, 141. virtuosi. The word is here used not in the sense of connoisseurs, but of devotees of virtue. The editor has not been able to trace any other instance of this.

206, 157-60. that lyons . . . prey. Adapted and expanded from the Discourses of Epictetus, bk. iv, i, 25. The original of the words quoted marginally by Chapman in a Latin version is, οὐχὶ δ' ὅσῳ μαλακώτερον διεξάγει, τοσούτῳ δουλικώτερον?

207, 181. Simil[iter]. By this marginal reference Chapman seems to indicate that ll. 176-181 are drawn from the same source—the [Pg 300]Discourses of Epictetus—as ll. 157-160, to which the previous marginal note refers. But no such passage occurs in the Discourses.

209-210, 205-34 The Massacre . . . never massacerd. On this strange apologia for the Guise's share in the Massacre of St. Bartholomew, see Introduction, pp. xxxix-xl.

209-210, 211-32. Who was in fault . . . lost. Freely adapted and transposed from the Discourses of Epictetus, i, xxviii, 11-20.

210-211, 246-9. your brave . . . deere. Cf. Appendix B, where De Serres mentions the Count of Auvergne's "Scottish horse (which Vitry had given him) the which would have outrunne all the horses of France."

213, 5-6. th'insulting Pillars Of Bacchus and Alcides. These "Pillars" are mentioned together by Strabo (bk. iii, vi), who relates that during Alexander's expedition to India the Macedonians did not see them, but identified those places with them, where they found records of the god or the hero.

216, 69-70. What thinke . . . lackies coates. Cf. Appendix B, where Nerestan has three "lackquaies," who are in reality "soldiars so attyred" for the purpose of arresting the Count of Auvergne.

217, 82-6. Who knowes . . . made: who is unaware that crafty policy pads out the giant that does his will, so that his wisdom may seem commensurate with his bulk, though it is merely for a trifling encounter with what, when touched, proves a shadow, though policy makes it out to be a monster.

219, 12. The Locrian princes. The inhabitants of Locri, a settlement near the promontory of Zephyrium, were celebrated for the excellence of their code of laws, drawn up by Zaleucus.

220, 41-46. Demetrius Phalerius, born about b. c. 345, was a follower of Phocion, and on the death of the latter in b. c. 317, became head of the Athenian administration. The citizens, in gratitude for his services, erected 360 statues to him, but afterwards turned against him. In b. c. 307 he was driven from Athens, sentence of death was passed on him, and the statues were demolished.

[Pg 301]220, 47. Demades, a contemporary of Demosthenes, who, by his genius for extempore oratory, raised himself to a predominant position in Athens as a champion of the Macedonian influence, but afterwards incurred the penalty of ἀτιμία.

228-230, 209-34. I will search you . . . search no more. This episode is suggested by the following passage concerning the Count of Auvergne in Appendix B. "Hee was ready to call the two brothers of Murat into his cabinet, and to cause them to be searcht, for that he was well advertised that they alwayes carryed the Kings letters and his commandments. But a great resolution, thinking that there is no more harme in fearing, then in the thing that causeth feare, feares extremely to make shewe that hee hath any feare."

234, 14-25. When Homer . . . despis'd. The editor of the 1873 edition of Chapman's Plays points out that "these twelve lines headed Of great men appear, with a few unimportant verbal differences, among the Epigrams printed at the end of Chapman's Petrarch in 1612."

234, 20. for disposing these: for regulating these gifts of fame, strength, noble birth, and beauty. These is used loosely to qualify the nouns implied by the adjectives, Strong'st, noblest, fairest, in l. 19.

236, 56-7. You can . . . minde. If the text is correct, the lines mean: you can never find means to give attention to externals without neglecting the improvement of your mind. Mr. Brereton has suggested to the editor that the true reading may be, Things out worth care, in which case "out" = "outward."

236, 58-75. God . . . birth. A free paraphrase of the Discourses of Epictetus, bk. iv, vii, 6-11.

236, 78-9. But . . . honour, but the reason alleged, to see these battalions in review order, is a great compliment to you.

237, 84-95. I over-tooke . . . the Earle of Oxford. The subject of this remarkable encomium was Edward de Vere (1550-1604), seventeenth Earl of Oxford. He was educated at Cambridge, and from an early age became a prominent figure at the Court of Elizabeth, who, it was said in 1573, "delighteth [Pg 302]more in his personage, and his dancing and valiantness, than any other." In 1575 he paid a visit to Italy, and it is apparently to an episode on his return journey in the spring of 1576 that reference is made here, and in the following lines. The portrait here drawn of him is too flattering, as he was violent in temper and extravagant, but the Earl's literary gifts merited the praise of Chapman. Puttenham and Meres speak highly of him as a writer of comedy, and Webbe pays a tribute to his excellence in "the rare devises of poetry." Over twenty of his lyrics survive, chiefly in anthologies.

237, 95-103. being offer'd . . . quit. The Duke Cassimere here spoken of was John Casimir, Count Palatine, who in the autumn of 1575 entered into alliance with the Huguenots and invaded France, but, after suffering a check at the hands of the Duke of Guise, made a truce and retired. The incident here spoken of apparently took place in the spring of the next year (cf. the previous note). Why, however, does Chapman introduce it here, and how did he know of it? Can he, immediately after leaving Oxford, which he entered, according to Wood, "in 1574 or thereabouts," have gone in Oxford's train to the Continent?

238, 112. a Sir John Smith. Though alluded to in so contemptuous a way, this Sir John Smith appears to be the noted soldier of fortune, diplomatist, and military writer, who lived from about 1534 to 1607. After serving for many years in continental armies, in 1574 he became an agent of the English government, and took part in various diplomatic missions. In 1590 he published "Certain Discourses concerning the formes and effects of divers sorts of Weapons" and dedicated the work to the English nobility, whom he calls in one part of his "proeme" the "verie eyes, eares and language of the king, and the bodie of the watch, and redresse of the Commonwealth." Hence perhaps the allusion in l. 113 to "common Nobles fashions."

238-9, 127-41. If you would Consull be . . . no thought? A translation of the Discourses of Epictetus, bk. iv, x, 20-22.

238-9, 129-30. gloryfying Plebeians, Kissing Patricians hands. Epictetus has simply, τὰς χεῖρας καταφιλῆσαι.

239, 134. sit for the whole tribunall. A mistranslation of ἐρὶ βῆμα καθίσαι, i. e. "sit on the tribunal."

239, 138-9. And to be voide . . . constancie. An [Pg 303]obscure rendering of ὑπὲρ ἀπαθείας οὖν, ὑπὲρ ἀταραξίας. For constancie = for the sake of tranquillity of mind.

240, 152. Colonell. Clermont seems to be addressed by this title because of the statement in Appendix B that "D'Eurre intreated the count of Auvergne to see [the muster] to the ende . . . that all his companions should be wonderfully honored with the presence of their coronell."

242-3, 11-39. What spirit . . . of the skie. This account of Clermont's desperate struggle to avoid capture is an invention of Chapman. P. Matthieu says of the Count of Auvergne: "It was feared that he would not have suffered himselfe to bee taken so easily nor so quietly." Cf. Appendix B.

245, 80-5. But . . . more. Cf. Appendix B. "Hee was mooved to see himselfe so intreated by laquais, intreating D'Eurre . . . that hee might not see those rascals any more."

246, 109. To leave . . . trumpets. Cf. Appendix B. "'Well,' said hee, 'I yeeld, what will you have mee to doe?' 'That you mount upon the trompets horse,' sayd D'Eurre."

247, 112-24. let mee begge . . . rather die. Cf. Appendix B. "He intreated D'Eurre to lend him one of his troupe to carry some message of his remembrance, and of his miserie, to a ladie that attended him. . . . Shee loved him well, and was well beloved: for the Count of Auvergne hath been heard say, that if the King did set him at libertie and send him back to his house, uppon condition that he should not see this ladie, hee would rather desire to die."

250, 30. Something . . . goe. An obscure line. It seems to mean that, as the wealth of merchants may be scattered by storms, so the performances of "state-merchants" or rulers may be cut short before obtaining their end.

254, 44-5. let . . . danger: let them be afraid that the precedents set by Kings in violating obligations may prove a dangerous example.

255, 70-76. O knew I . . . a pistoll. Cf. Appendix B. "If I knew . . . that I might save him, in forcing through your [Pg 304]troupe, I would willingly doe it, and if I had but tenne men of my courage and resolution, you should not carrie him where you thinke. But I will never die till I have given D'Eurre a hundred shott with a pistoll, and to Murat a hundred blowes with a sword."

257, 108. This . . . charge. The thrifty Usher is apparently deploring that the Countess, before retiring, had sent so rich a gift of jewels to Clermont.

259, 42-3. this Senecall man . . . compare. He is so completely a Senecall man that he may be compared with, etc.

259, 51-3. Cacusses . . . still. The legend of the Italian shepherd and robber Cacus, who carried his plunder to his cave or "den," is told by Ovid (Fasti, i, 544 ff.), Virgil (Æneid, viii, 190 ff.), and other writers.

260, 57-8. Better . . . thrive: it were better for a man to be buried alive than exist as a mere property for a despoliating government to grow rich upon.

265, 98-102. the late . . . on him. It is singular that Bussy D'Ambois contains no such "dying prophesie" as is here alluded to, unless the reference is to v, iv, 76-78. Bussy, as he dies, forgives his murderers (v, iv, 112).

267, 37-9. Hast thou . . . Reimes. Cf. Appendix B. "At the Barricades this voice was heard: 'It is no longer time to dally, let us lead my lord to Reimes.'"

268, 55-61. which . . . counsailes. Cf. Appendix B. "Advertisements were come to him from all parts, both within and without the realme, from Rome, Spaine, Lorraine, and Savoye, that a bloodie catastrophe would dissolve the assemblie."

268-69, 62-8. Retyre . . . exhale. Cf. Appendix B. "The Archbishop of Lion . . . 'Retyring yourselfe from the Estates' (said he unto him) 'you shall beare the blame to have abandoned France in so important an occasion, and your enemies, making their profit of your absence, wil sone overthrowe al that which you have with so much paine effected for the assurance of religion.'"

270, 89-91. To be . . . eternitie: to be His image is to [Pg 305]do the deeds that confer immortality, which, owing to the existence of death, consists only in doing the deeds that befit eternal life.

270, 102. Thou dream'st awake now. Guise here turns Clermont's own words in l. 41 against him.

272, 144-8. those loveliest eyes . . . teares. A much more overwhelming calamity than that which befell the lady in the original narrative, where it is stated that owing to her "passion . . . she lost the sight of one eye for a tyme."

276, 18-19. for not . . . neglect: for the counsels that you disclose you do not render of no account.

278, 29. this mortal quarrie: this deadly attack. Quarry is generally used of slaughtered game, but it also signifies the attack or swoop of the bird or beast of prey on its victim, and here we have an extension of this sense.

280, 3-6. I . . . enter. Chapman here combines two episodes assigned by De Serres to different days. Cf. Appendix B. "The eve before his death, the Duke himselfe sitting down to dinner, found a scroule under his napkin, advertising him of this secret ambush." On the following morning "the Duke of Guise comes, and attending the beginning of the councell sends for a handkercher. . . . Pericart, his secretarie . . . ties a note to one of the corners thereof, saying, 'Come forth and save your selfe, else you are but a dead man.'"

281, 34-5. Not . . . goe. Taken in conjunction with iii, iii, 24, this means: Hercules is no match for two foes, but Guise will encounter two, though with Hercules as their ally.

283, 61-3. y'have a brother to . . . on him. Louis de Lorraine, youngest brother of the Duke of Guise, became Archbishop of Rheims in 1574, and Cardinal in 1578.

286, 41-2. Hee will lie . . . shee cryes. This habit of the lapwing gave the bird an evil reputation as a symbol of deceitfulness. Cf. Measure for Measure, i, iv, 32.

Though 'tis my familiar sin
With maids to seem the lapwing and to jest,
Tongue far from heart.

For a sarcastic hit at a different trick of the lapwing, cf. Hamlet, v, ii, 174.

[Pg 306]289, 85. [Enter Renel, the Countess, and] Charlotte above. The addition of the bracketed words is necessary, as the Q gives no indication of the entrance of these two characters. They appear with Charlotte "above," i. e. in a gallery at the back of the stage. When Charlotte, enraged at Clermont's slowness in dispatching Montsurry, "gets downe" (l. 87), they remain in the gallery unobserved.

291, 125-7. That the Shatillions ghost . . . death. Gaspar de Chatillon, better known as Admiral de Coligny, the champion of the Huguenot party, was murdered during "the Massacre of St. Bartholomew," on Aug. 24, 1572, at the instigation of the Duke of Guise.

293, 161. I . . . descend. Renel and the Countess have overheard from the gallery (cf. note on l. 85) Clermont's speech, and Renel, realising that it foreshadows suicide, descends in the hope of preventing this. But, as he has to lead his blind companion, his progress is slow, and when they "enter" the main stage (l. 203), it is too late.

APPENDIX A

DE LA MORT PITOYABLE DU VALEUREUX LYSIS

Under this title, in the 17th of the series of tales founded on fact which he calls Les Histoires Tragiques de Nostre Temps, François de Rosset relates in 1615 the story of Bussy's death. In the Preface to the volume he declares: "Ce ne sont pas des contes de l'Antiquité fabuleuse . . . Ce sont des histoires autant veritables que tristes et funestes. Les noms de la pluspart des personnages sont seulement desguisez en ce Théatre, à fin de [Pg 307]n'affliger pas tant les familles de ceux qui en ont donné le suject, puis qu'elles en sont assez affligées." We thus find that the outlines of the story of "Lysis" tally with what we know about Bussy from other sources, and Rosset not improbably preserves details omitted by the historians of the period.

Lysis, Rosset tells us, was sprung from one of the most noble and renowned Houses of France. At seventeen he had acquired an extraordinary reputation for bravery, which increased till "jamais la France depuis le valeureux Roland, ne porta un tel Palladin." Afterwards "il vint à la cour du Prince qui venoit de quiter une Couronne estrangere, pour recevoir celle qui luy appartenoit par les droits de la loy Salique, [i. e. Henry III, who gave up the throne of Poland on succeeding to that of France.] . . . Les rares dons dont il estoit accomply luy acquirent tant de part aux bonnes graces du premier Prince du sang Royal, qu'il estoit tousiours aupres de luy. . . . Mais l'envie . . . tous les jours . . . faisait de mauvais rapports a sa Maiesté de Lysis, de sorte qu'elle le voyoit d'aussi mauvais œil, que l'autre Prince, son proche parent, faisoit conte de sa prouësse."

He had never been the victim of love, but he was instantly captivated by the beautiful eyes of a lady whom he met at an assembly at the house of a Judge in one of the towns of which he was Governor.

"Ceste beauté, pour le respect que je dois à ceux a qui elle appartenoit, sera nommée Sylvie. . . . Cette dame . . . estoit mariée avec un grand Seigneur, jeune, vaillan, sage, [Pg 308]discret et courtois." She would not at first gratify her lover's passion, though she granted him "de petites privautez," which only fanned the flame. He wrote her a letter in which he declared that if she refused him her favour, it meant his sentence of death. She replied in a temporising manner that when he had given proofs of his fidelity, she would decide as to what she ought to do. Rosset asserts that these two letters are not invented, but that he obtained them from a friend who had made a collection of such epistles, and who "a esté curieux de sçavoir le nom des personnes qui les ont escrites."

Meanwhile, he continues, "elle donne le vray moyen à Lysis de la voir, sans le souciet qu'on en parle, pourveu que sa conscience la deffende. Et particulierement ce fut en un jardin qui est à l'un des fauxbourgs de la ville." Some tale-bearers, putting the worst construction on their behaviour, gave information to Lisandre, the husband of Sylvie, but he refused to credit anything to the dishonour of his wife. To stop gossip, however, he took her with him to a house he had not far from the town. But the lovers communicated with one another by messengers, till Lisandre's departure on a journey removed all obstacle to their intercourse. "Ce Seigneur avait des affaires hors de la province où il faisoit pour lors sa demeure. Pour les terminer, il s'y achemine au grand contentement de Sylvie, qui neantmoins contrefaisoit la dolente à son depart & le sommoit de revenir le plustot qu'il luy seroit possible, tandis que dans son ame elle prioit à Dieu que son voyage fust aussi long que celuy d'Ulysse." When he was gone, [Pg 309]she immediately sent for Lysis, and they spent two or three days in transports of delight, though she continued to safeguard her honour.

On Lisandre's return the King, instigated by the enemies of Lysis, reproached the former for tamely enduring dishonour, and bade him never reappear in the royal presence till he had wiped out the stain. Lisandre therefore offered his wife the choice of three courses. She was to swallow poison, or die beneath his dagger, or write to Lysis, telling him that Lisandre was still absent, and begging him to come to her. After a struggle Sylvie wrote the fatal missive, and Lysis, though at the castle gate he was overcome by a premonition of evil and almost turned back, was obedient to her summons, and entered her chamber unarmed. The final scene is thus described.

"A l'instant il se void environné d'une douzaine d'hommes armez, qui de pistolets, qui d'espees nues, et qui de hallebardes. Lisandre est parmy eux, qui luy crie: 'C'est maintenant que tu recevras le salaire de la honte que tu as faicte à ma maison. Ce disant, il lasche un pistolet, et luy perce un bras. Les autres le chargent avec leurs halebardes, et avec leurs espees. . . . Le valeureux Lysis . . . avec un escabeau qu'il tient en main donne si rudement sur la teste de l'un de ses adversaires, qu'il en fait sortir la cervelle. Il en assomme encores deux autres: mais que peut-il faire contre tant de gens, & ainsi desarmé qu'il est? Son corps percé comme un crible, verse un grand ruisseau de sang. En fin il se jette sur Lisandre, et bien [Pg 310]que par derriere on luy baille cent coups de poignards, il le prend, et le souleve, prest à le jetter du haut en bas d'une fenestre, si tous les autres ensemble, en se jettant sur luy, ne l'en eussent empesché. Il les escarte encores à coups de poings & neantmoins il sesent tousiours percer de part en part. Voyant qu'il ne pouvoit eschapper la mort, il s'approche de la fenestre & puis, tout sanglant qu'il est, il saute legerement en bas. Mais, ô malheur, il portoit un accoustrement decouppé, qui est arresté par le fer d'un treillis. Ses adversaires le voyant ainsi empestré comme un autre Absalon, luy donnent tant de coups de halebardes, qu'à la fin, ils privent le monde du plus grand courage, et de la plus grande valeur du siecle. O valeureux Lysis! que je plains l'injustice de ton sort!"

It will be seen that Rosset's account of the final episodes, beginning with the intervention of the King, agrees, in the main details, with the following description by De Thou, which appeared in 1620, in the Genevan edition of the Historiae Sui Temporis, lib. lxviii, p. 330 (vol. iii, p. 675, of Buckley's edition, 1733).

"Dum [310:1] adhuc Andinus in aula esset, literas per jocum regi ostenderat a Ludovico Claramontio Ambosiano Bussio ad se scriptas; quibus, pro summa quae ei cum hero suo juvene erat familiaritate, significabat se feram magni venatoris (ita uxorem vocabat Caroli Cambii Monsorelli [Pg 311]comitis, quem ea dignitate Andinus paulo ante Bussii commendatione ornaverat) indagine cinxisse, et in plagas conjecisse. Quas literas rex retinuerat, et Bussii jam a longo tempore insolenti arrogantia et petulantia irritatus, occasionem inde sumpsit veteres ab eo acceptas injurias ulciscendi. Is siquidem, et dum in aula esset, nullo non contumeliae genere in proceres et gynaeceum etiam aulicum usus fuerat, fiducia pugnacitatis qua se terribilem cunctis reddiderat; sed etiam postquam se ad comitatum Andini receperat, dum Andegavi arcem toto illo tractu munitissimam et urbi populosae impositam teneret, oppidanis et toti provinciae gravis ob crebras exactiones, quas privata auctoritate, non consulto plerumque Andino ipso, faciebat, summum omnium odium in se concitaverat. Igitur rex Monsorellum, qui tunc forte in aula erat, clam revocat, et literas Bussii ei ostendit; additque se decoris familiae et ejus dignitatis perquam studiosum, noluisse rem adeo injuriosam eum celare; ceterum scire ipsum debere, quid consilii in tali occasione se capere deceat et oporteat. [Pg 312]Nec plura elocutus hominem dimittit, qui, non solum injuriae tantae morsu perculsus, sed monitis regis incitatus, quae ille tanquam ignaviae exprobationem si injuriam ferret accipiebat, protinus domum revolat, summo silentio, ut Bussium lateret: astuque per uxorem ad Bussium literas dari curat, quibus ei horam ad secretum Coustanteriae condicebat; ea erat arx voluptuaria et venationibus opportuna; ad quam cum Bussius cum Colladone conscio sub vesperam XIV Kal. Sept. venisset, ab ipso Monsorello et aliis loricatis oppressus: tamen, qua erat animi praesentia, quamvis unus contra plures, summa vi percussores initio disjecit; tandemque numero victus, spiritu inter certandum deficiente, cum se in fossam per fenestram praecipitare vellet, a tergo interfectus est."

FOOTNOTES:

APPENDIX B

HISTORICAL SOURCES OF THE REVENGE OF BUSSY D'AMBOIS

Pierre Matthieu's Narrative of the Arrest of the Count d'Auvergne, Incorporated by Edward Grimeston in his Translation of Jean de Serres's Inventaire Général de l'Histoire de France

(1046.)[313:1] "The King offended with the practises of the Count of Auvergne, commanded him to come unto him, and to trust unto his clemency, the which was not unknowne unto him. Descures made some jorneys unto him, from whome he brought nothing but delaies and excuses. . . .

(1047.) "The King, therefore, seeing that he would not come but with conditions that did not agree with a perfect obedience, resolved to have him by one means or other. . . . The King's intention was imparted to the Vicont of Pont du Chasteau, to D'Eurre, Lieutenant of the Duke of Vandosmes company, to the Baron of Camilac, to La Boulaye, Lieutenant to the company of the Marquis of Verneuil, to Nerestan, Colonell of a Regiment of foote, and to so many others as it is a wonder it [Pg 314]was not divulged being in so many heads. In this action all shewed the duties and affections of good men which respected their honours. Many means were attempted but they were incountred with great difficulties and crosses. . . . The surest meanes (& that wherein there was least trouble and scandall) was the mustring of the Duke of Vandosmes company. . . . D'Eurre who prest Murat (Treasorer extraordinary of the warres) to paie his company a muster, intreated the count of Auvergne to see it, to the ende hee might assure the King that hee had gallant men and good horses, and that all his companions should be wonderfully honored with the presence of their coronell. 'I will part to morrowe' sayd the Count of Auvergne 'to hunt at Alezou, and will returne againe on Monday at night; I pray you bee heere at super, and lodge your company at Normain, to the ende that the next day, after that wee have dronke, runne at the ring, and dined, we may see it.'

(1048.) "This was done as he had appointed. . . . D'Eurre came to Clermont on Monday at night, and goes unto him where he supped in one of their houses that managed this businesse. . . . The next day, the ninth of November, the morning was spent in running at the ring. . . . They went to dinner, and it was well observed that the Count of Auvergne had some distrust. He hath since confest that hee was ready to call the two brothers of Murat into his cabinet, and to cause them to be searcht, for that he was well advertised that they alwayes carryed the Kings letters and his commandments. [Pg 315]But a great resolution, thinking that there is no more harme in fearing then in the thing that causeth feare, feares extremely to make shewe that hee hath any feare. After dinner D'Eurre asked, 'If it pleased him to go to horse to see the musters.' He answered him; 'That it should be presently, and that he should use speed.' He retyred himselfe soone after into his cabinet and went downe . . . mounted upon a Scottish horse (which Vitry had given him) the which would have outrunne all the horses of France. He would not attend the other noblemen for that he distrusted them, having an intent to passe on, if he found them not ready. But beeing come to the place, he found the company in battell. This great diligence made him somewhat jealous, and they might perceive him, that, pulling up his cloake, he drewe his sword foure fingers out, yet without any amazement. D'Eurre, seeing him make even the reynes of his horse, came to him trotting, with his hat in his hand, and hearing him sweare with a great oath that he had been very dilligent, 'You may see, my lord' (answered he) 'I have caused my companions to advance, for that I would not trouble you with attendance.' 'Monsieur D'Eurre' (replyed the Earle) 'you are one of my friends, I cannot make any long stay here.' To whome D'Eurre said: 'All my companions are not yet here, but, if it please you, you shall see this troupe, and judge of the whole by a part.' Hereupon he sees some horsemen come and demands what they were. D'Eurre told him: 'That it was Nerestan, who had beene at Rion [Pg 316]about a sute of his daughters.' He beleeved it, for he knewe that Nerestan had stayd some dayes at Rion and yet his heart began to suspect more. But it was too late, hee was environed on every side, and hardly can one resist many. Nerestan lighted to salute him, and having entertayned him with some discourse uppon the occasion of his staye at Rion, or of his returne to Court, he went presently to horse-back, and thrust on one of the lackquaies with his foote, for a signe and token of the beginning of the execution.

"One of Nerestans three lackquaies takes holde of his horse by the bridle. D'Eurre, seeing that Nerestan had taken the right side to salute the Count of Auvergne, went unto the left, and laying hold with his hand uppon the hilt of his sword, he sayd unto him that hee had commandement from the King to take him. The other two laquais pulled him so roughly from his horse, as he had like to have fallen to the ground; hee was mooved to see himselfe so intreated by laquais, intreating D'Eurre to cause two of his companions to light, and that hee might not see those rascalls any more. Nerestan sayd unto him that they were soldiars so attyred to serve the King in this action. A peece shott into the ayre by chance made him to doubt worse measure, so as hee intreated D'Eurre that he would not use his pistolet. D'Eurre freed him from these apprehensions, intreating him to resolve upon the Kings will, and not to force them to intreat him otherwise than they desired. 'Well,' said hee, 'I yeeld, what will you have mee to doe?' 'That you mount [Pg 317]upon the trompets horse,' sayd D'Eurre. It was feared that he would not have suffered himselfe to bee taken so easily nor so quietly, as wee have seene many great courages choose rather to be cut in peeces then to see themselves reserved for some shamefull end, and others that have willingly dyed, for that they would not die by force. When as he sees himselfe in the toyles invironed on al sides . . . hee sayd, 'Ah! in the Divels name, I doubted all this.' Being mounted upon the trompets nagg, they conduct him presently to Aigueperse. Before hee had gone a hundred paces, he intreated D'Eurre to lend him one of his troupe, to carry some message of his remembrance, and of his miserie, to a ladie that attended him. De Pleche had the charge. Shee who had not prepared her heart to withstand the assaults of a most extreame and sensible griefe, tooke D'Eurre for the object, against whome shee poured forth the furie of her passions. 'If I knew' (sayd shee unto this gentleman) 'that I might save him in forcing through your troupe, I would willingly doe it, and if I had but tenne men of my courage and resolution, you should not carrie him where you thinke. But I will never die till I have given D'Eurre a hundred shott with a pistoll, and to Murat a hundred blowes with a sword.' These were the passions of her love, transported with a resolution beyond her sexe, and which did participate of a man, of a troubled mind, and of love. This last makes miracles of marvells and marvells of miracles, in wills that are equally toucht with his inspirations. . . . Shee loved him well, and was well [Pg 318]beloved: for the Count of Auvergne hath been heard say, that if the King did set him at libertie, and send him back to his house, uppon condition that hee should not see this ladie, hee would rather desire to die. Shee presently ordered the affaires of her house, the disposition of her furniture, and the retreat of her servants. This passion going from the memorie to the thought, from the thought to the heart, from the heart to the eyes, made her to powre forth so many teares, as shee lost the sight of one eye for a tyme. . . .

"All the way hee seemed no more afflicted, then when hee was at libertie. He tould youthfull and idle tales of his love, and the deceiving of ladies. Hee shott in a harquebuse at birds, wherein hee was so perfect and excellent, as hee did kill larkes as they were flying. . . .

(1050.) "We may observe in this apprehension many things that may breed admiration and amazement, and which shewe that men do in vaine furnish themselves with wisedome against Heaven and with intelligences against the King. The Count of Auvergne had advertisements from all places that they should take him, and that the Kings pensioners were in the field to that effect. His most inward and neerest friends and, among others Florac, knewe it, and said nothing unto him, preferring his duty to his Prince before all affection. The Constable was also as well informed thereof as any other and yet he made no shewe thereof. . . . His duty prescribed him a law to all the bounds of nature; so there is not any one but is more bound to the service of the King and his [Pg 319]country then to his owne health, or to that of his children. A gentleman, being at his table, speaking of this taking, said, 'Sir, if the King should command mee to take you, I would doe it, although I bee your most humble servant, that you march in the first rankes of greatnesse in the realm, and that all things touching armes, depend upon your commandments.' 'I beleeve it' (answered the Constable) 'else you should do ill, for the King is both your King and mine. I am your friend.' There is no love nor affection to dispence any one from the Kings commandments."

Grimeston's Translation of J. de Serres's Narrative of the Murder of the Duke of Guise in his Inventaire General

The King determines to get rid of Guise, "this newe starre in the East whom the people worshipped already." (722.) "Hee hath caused bookes to bee printed in favour of the lawfull succession of the House of Lorraine to the Crowne. At the Barricades this voice was heard: 'It is no longer time to dally, let us lead my lord to Reimes.' He hath suffered himselfe to be saluted by the people, with cries and acclamations which belong only to the Soveraigne Prince."

The Duke, scenting danger, thinks of absenting himself from the meetings of the Estates, but is dissuaded.

(723.) "The Archbishop of Lion, attending a Cardinals [Pg 320]hatt within a few dayes from Rome, 'Retyring your selfe from the Estates' (said he unto him) 'you shall beare the blame to have abandoned France in so important an occasion, and your enemies, making their profit of your absence, wil sone overthrowe al that which you have with so much paine effected for the assurance of religion.'

"Man doth often loose his judgement upon the point of his fal. Advertisements were come to him from all parts, both within and without the realme, from Rome, Spaine, Lorraine and Savoye, that a bloodie catastrophe would dissolve the assemblie. The almanakes had well observed it: it was generally bruted in the Estates, that the execution should be on Saint Thomas day. The eve before his death, the Duke himselfe sitting downe to dinner, found a scroule under his napkin, advertising him of this secret ambush. But (as ambition blinds those whome shee hath raised up to the pies nest, and the furie of Gods judgements confounds such as trust in their authoritie) he writ underneath, with his owne hand 'They dare not'; and threw it under the table.

"The Duke of Guise, following the councell of the Cardinall Morosin, had the one and twentith of December incensed the King a new by some bold and presumptous speeches. . . . The King had the two and twentith day following prepared seven of his five and fortie (they were gentlemen whome hee had appointed to be neere his person, besides the ordinarie archers of his gard) to execute his will, and by many dispatches had assured [Pg 321]those townes which hee held to bee most mutinous. The three and twentith he assembles his Councell somewhat more early in the morning then was usuall, having a devotion to go after dinner, and to spend the holidayes at our Ladie of Clery. . . . The Duke of Guise comes, and attending the beginning of the councell sends for a handkercher: (the groome of [724] his chamber had forgotten to put one into his hose.) Pericart, his secretarie, not daring to commit this new advertisement to any mans report, ties a note to one of the corners thereof, saying, 'Come forth and save your selfe, else you are but a dead man.' But they stay the page that carried it. Larchant, captaine of the Kings gard, causeth an other to be given unto him with all speed by Saint Prix, the chiefe grome of the Kings chamber. The Castle gates are shutt, and the Councell sits about eight of the clocke.

"The spirit of man doth often prophecie of the mischeefe that doth pursue him. So whilest they dispute of a matter propounded by Petremolle, the Duke feeles strange alterations, and extraordinary distemperatures, and, amidest his distrust, a great fainting of his heart. Saint Prix presents unto him some prunes of Brignolles and raisins of the sunne. Hee eats, and thereupon the King calls him into his Cabinet by Revoll, one of the secretaries of his Estate, as it were to confer with him about some secret of importance. The Duke leaves the Councell to passe unto the Cabinet: and as he did lift up the tapistrie with one hand to enter, they charge him [Pg 322]with their swords, daggers, and pertuisans: yet not with so great violence, but he shewed the murtherers the last endeavours of an invincible valour and courage.

"Thus lived and thus died Henry of Lorraine, Duke of Guise: a Prince worthie to be in the first rankes of Princes, goodly, great, tall of proportion, amiable of countenance, great of courage, readie in the execution of his enterprises, popular, dissembling, but covering the secrets of his minde with his outward behaviour, imbracing all times and occasions, politike in stratagems, making much of his souldiars, and honouring his captaines. But a Prince who hath blemished the greatest beautie of his practises by extreame ambition; factious, a great bragger, vaine in beleeving of soothsayers who assured him of his greatnes, and of the change of his familie into a royaltie, proud, not able to submit his hopes, even to those from whome hee should hope for his advancement, giving men to understand by his inclination, that he was not borne to obey, but to commaund, and with this dessein, he framed the minds of the French, by his first actions, to beleeve that he had partes fit to make a strange alteration in a realme."

FOOTNOTES:

Bibliography

1607, 4^o. Bussy D'Ambois: A Tragedie: As it hath been often presented at Paules. London, Printed for William Aspley, [B. M. C. 34. c. 12.]

1608, 4^o. Bussy D'Ambois: [&c. A reissue of the 1607 edition, with the date altered. B. M. 644. d. 41.]

1613, 4^o. The Revenge of Bussy D'Ambois. A Tragedie. As it hath beene often presented at the private Play-house in the White-Fryers. Written by George Chapman, Gentleman. London. Printed by T. S. and are to be solde by Iohn Helme, at his Shop in S. Dunstones Church-yard, in Fleetstreet. [B. M. C. 34. c. 16.]

1641, 4^o. Bussy D'Ambois: A Tragedie: As it hath been often Acted with great Applause. Being much corrected and amended by the Author before his death. London. Printed by A. N. for Robert Lunne. [B. M. 644. d. 42.]

1646, 4^o. Bussy D'Ambois: [A . . . London, as in 1641 edition.] Printed by T. W. for Robert Lunne and are to be sold at his house next doore to the signe of the Crane on Lambeth Hill at the end of old Fishstreet. [B. M. 644. d. 43. A reissue of the 1641 edition with the imprint altered.]

1657, 4^o. Bussy D'Ambois: A Tragedie: As it hath been often Acted with great applause. Being much corrected and amended by the Author, George Chapman, Gent. Before his death. London, Printed, for Joshua Kirton, at his Shop in St. Pauls Church-yard, at the sign of the Kings-Arms. [B. M. 644. d. 44. Another reissue of the 1641 edition, with a new title-page.]

[Baker in his Biographia Dramatica (1812) ii, 73, mentions an edition of Bussy D'Ambois in 1616, but no copy of such an [Pg 324]edition has been traced, and Dilke, Old English Plays (1814) vol. iii, p. 228, is probably right in considering that the entry is an error for that of 1646, which Baker does not mention.]

1691, 4^o. Bussy D'Ambois or the Husbands Revenge. A Tragedy. As it is Acted at the Theatre Royal. Newly Revised by Mr. D'Urfey [quotation from the Satires of Horace]. London. Printed for R. Bently in Covent Garden, Jo. Hindmarsh over against the Royal Exchange, and Abel Roper at the Mitre near Temple Bar.

1814, 8^o. Old English Plays; being a selection from the early dramatic writers. [Volume iii contains Bussy D'Ambois, together with Monsieur D'Olive, and Dekker's The Wonder of a Kingdom and Old Fortunatus. A short life of Chapman is prefixed to Bussy D'Ambois. The text is that of the edition of 1641, in modernised spelling. The notes contain some of the variants in the Q of 1607, and explanations of many difficult phrases. The editor, though his name does not appear, was C. W. Dilke, afterwards editor of the Athenæum, and grandfather of the present Sir C. W. Dilke.]

1873, 8^o. The Comedies and Tragedies of George Chapman. Now first collected, with illustrative notes and a memoir of the author. In three volumes. London. John Pearson York Street Covent Garden. [Vol. ii contains Bussy D'Ambois and The Revenge of Bussy D'Ambois, together with Byron's Conspiracie and Tragedie and May-Day. The text of Bussy D'Ambois is, where differences of reading occur, that of the edition of 1641, the variants of 1607 being given (with some inaccuracies) at the foot of the page. Otherwise the spelling of 1607 is followed, and the title-page of the 1607 Quarto is faultily reproduced. The Revenge of Bussy D'Ambois is reprinted from the 1613 Quarto, in the original spelling, and with a faulty reproduction of the title-page. The explanatory notes to both plays are very slight, but there is a valuable introductory memoir to vol. i, giving extracts from previous criticisms of Chapman.]

1874-5, 8^o. The Works of George Chapman: edited with notes, by Richard Herne Shepherd. [Vol. i, Plays, vol. ii, Homer's Iliad and Odyssey, vol. iii, Poems and Minor Translations, Chatto and Windus. An edition in modernised spelling, and with merely [Pg 325]a sprinkling of notes. To vol. iii is prefixed Mr. A. C. Swinburne's Essay on the Poetical and Dramatic Works of George Chapman, the finest and most comprehensive study of Chapman's writings.]

1895, 8^o. George Chapman edited, with an Introduction and Notes, by William Lyon Phelps, M.A. Ph.D. London: T. Fisher Unwin. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons. [This volume of the Mermaid Series contains Bussy D'Ambois and The Revenge, together with Byron's Conspiracie and Tragedie and All Fools. The text is reprinted from the edition of 1873, but with the spelling modernised. There is an introductory memoir containing an "appreciation" of Chapman as a dramatist, and brief explanatory notes are added at the foot of the text.]

1681. Dedication of the Spanish Friar, J. Dryden. Reprinted in W. P. Ker's Essays of John Dryden, vol. i, pp. 244-50, Oxford, 1900.

1691. The Lives and Characters of the English Dramatick Poets, G. Langbaine. Oxford.

1691. Athenæ Oxonienses, Anthony à Wood: vol. ii, pp. 575-81 (edition continued by Ph. Bliss, 1815). Short life of Chapman.

1808. Specimens of English Dramatic Poets, Charles Lamb. Lamb quotes the following passages from Bussy D'Ambois: ii, 1, 33-135; i, 1, 5-17; i, 1, 20-23; i, 1, 134-9; i, 2, 10-33. Further extracts, together with several from The Revenge of Bussy D'Ambois, were added in 1827.

1818. Lectures on the Dramatic Literature of the Age of Elizabeth. W. Hazlitt. Lecture iii, On Marston, Chapman, Decker, and Webster.

1821. The Retrospective Review, vol. iv: Article on Chapman's Plays. This Article deals with the Tragedies and gives long extracts from Bussy D'Ambois and the two "Byron" plays. It concludes: "The Revenge of Bussy D'Ambois we regret to say [Pg 326]we have never seen. The rarity of the old plays is such, that they are only to be found in some public libraries, and in the extensive hoards of private collectors; and in such applications as we have reluctantly caused to be made, we confess, we have rather found the exclusive spirit of the monopolist, than the liberality of the enlightened lover of literature." A second Article, on the Comedies, is contained in vol. v.

1841. The Edinburgh Review, April: Article on Beaumont and Fletcher and their Contemporaries.

1865. Chapman in seinem Verhältniss zu Shakespeare, F. Bodenstedt. Shakspere Jahrbuch, i, Berlin.

1875. George Chapman: A critical essay, A. C. Swinburne. A reprint of the Introductory Essay to vol. ii of the Edition of Chapman's works edited by R. H. Shepherd. Chatto & Windus.

1887. The Dictionary of National Biography, vol. x, Article on George Chapman by A. H. Bullen.

1891. A Biographical Chronicle of the English Drama, F. G. Fleay, vol. i, pp. 50-66. Reeves and Turner.

1899. A History of English Dramatic Literature to the death of Queen Anne, A. W. Ward. New and Revised Edition, vol. ii, chap. vi, 408-450. Macmillan.

1897. Quellen-studien zu den Dramen George Chapman's, Philip Massinger's und John Ford's, Emil Koeppel. An account of this important monograph, which is the 82d volume of the Strassburg Quellen und Forschungen is given in the Introduction, p. xxxi.

1900. George Chapman und das Italienische Drama, A. L. Stiefel. Shakspere Jahrbuch, xxxv. Deals chiefly with the relation between Chapman's May-Day and A. Piccolomini's Alessandro.

1901. Letters and Documents by George Chapman, Ben Jonson, etc., Bertram Dobell, printed in The Athenæum, Nos. 3830-3833. These "letters and documents" form part of a [Pg 327]small quarto MS. volume of about 90 leaves, containing "copies of letters, petitions, or other documents dating from about 1580 to 1613." Mr. Dobell, to whom their publication is due, considers "that the writer or collector of the documents can have been no other than George Chapman." Six of these letters are reprinted in Prof. Schelling's edition of Eastward Hoe and The Alchemist, 1903.

1903. The Source of Chapman's "The Conspiracie and Tragedie of Charles, Duke of Byron" and "The Revenge of Bussy D'Ambois," F. S. Boas, in The Athenæum, No. 3924, Jan. 10th.

1903. Shakespeare and the Rival Poet, Arthur Acheson. John Lane. An attempt to identify Chapman with "the rival poet" alluded to in Shakespeare's Sonnets.

MS. Chorus Vatum, Joseph Hunter, British Museum Addit. MSS. 24488, vol. v, pp. 61-66. Article on George Chapman.

1604-20. Historiæ sui temporis, J. A. De Thou. The earliest editions, published in 1604, do not mention Bussy. That of 1609, which carries on the narrative to the year 1584, only mentions (lib. lii, p. 132) his proceedings during the Massacre of St. Bartholomew. It is the edition of 1620, published at Geneva, and embracing events till 1607 that includes (lib. lxviii, p. 330 ff.) the narrative of Bussy's murder, in printed Appendix A, and (lib. cxiii, p. 558) of Renée D'Ambois's meditated revenge (cf. Introduction, p. xxxvi). The most convenient edition of De Thou's History is that published by S. Buckley in 1733.

1615. Les Histoires Tragiques de Nostre Temps, François de Rosset. The story of Bussy's love for the Countess of Montsoreau, and his murder forms the subject of the 17th Histoire, De la mort pitoyable du valeureux Lysis, the most important parts of which are printed in Appendix A.

1628. Memoires et lettres, Marguerite de Valois. Paris. The edition published by F. Guessard for La Societe de l'Histoire de France (1842) is the most convenient.

1666. Discours sur les couronnels de l'infanterie de France, Pierre de Bourdeille, Seigneur de Brantôme. Leyden.

1885. Louis de Clermont, Sieur de Bussy D'Amboise, Gouverneur D'Anjou, André Joubert. Angers and Paris. A full and interesting study of Bussy's career based upon first-hand materials.

1597. Inventaire Général de l'Histoire de France, Jean de Serres. A later edition in 1603 continues the narrative to the peace of Vervins in 1598. Paris.

1605. Histoire de France durant sept années de paix du regne de Henry IV, Pierre Matthieu. Paris.

1605. Chronologie Septenaire de l'Histoire de la Paix entre les Roys de France et d'Espagne, P. V. Cayet. Paris.

1607. A General Inventorie of the History of France, Edward Grimeston. From the beginning of that monarchie unto the treatie of Vervins, in the yeare 1598. Written by Jhon de Serres, And continued unto these times, out of the best Authors which have written of that subject. Translated out of French into English. [A second edition, in 1611, continues the narrative till 1610.] Upon this volume see Introduction, pp. xxxii-xxxv.

Glossary

check(e) at, (1) take offence at; (2) go in pursuit of. Used technically of a hawk which turns aside from its proper quarry to follow inferior game.

enseame, bring together, introduce. Cf. Spens. F. Q. iv, ii, 35-6, where the word = "includes," "contains together."

impe, piece out. Used, originally, in hawking, of the process of grafting new feathers on a maimed wing.

last, a certain weight or quantity of goods. In the case of powder, it represented twenty-four barrels.

lucerns, hunting dogs. Used in the same sense by Chapman in trans. of Iliad, xi, 417. The usual meaning of the word is lynx.

mezel'd, leprous, fr. M. E. mesel, < O. F. mesel, mezel, leper, < M. L. misellus, a wretched person.

randon, earlier and more correct form of random, O. F. randon f. randir, to run fast.

BUSSY D'AMBOIS

AND

THE REVENGE OF BUSSY D'AMBOIS

By GEORGE CHAPMAN

EDITED BY

FREDERICK S. BOAS, M.A.

PROFESSOR OF ENGLISH LITERATURE IN QUEEN'S COLLEGE, BELFAST

BOSTON, U.S.A., AND LONDON D. C. HEATH & CO., PUBLISHERS 1905

COPYRIGHT, 1905, BY D. C. HEATH & CO.

Table of Contents

Prefatory Note

Biography

FOOTNOTES:

Introduction

FOOTNOTES:

THE TEXT

Bussy D'Ambois: A TRAGEDIE:

SOURCES

PROLOGUE

LINENOTES:

[DRAMATIS PERSONÆ.[4:1]

FOOTNOTES:

Bussy D'Ambois A Tragedie

Actus primi Scena prima.

LINENOTES:

[Scena Secunda.

LINENOTES:

Actus Secund[i.] Scena Prima.

LINENOTES:

[Actus Secundi Scena Secunda.

LINENOTES:

Actus Tertii Scena Prima.

LINENOTES:

[Actus Tertii Scena Secunda.

LINENOTES:

Actus Quarti Scena Prima.

LINENOTES:

[Actus Quarti Scena Secunda.

LINENOTES:

Actus Quinti Scena Prima.

LINENOTES:

[Scena Secunda.

LINENOTES:

[Scena Tertia.

LINENOTES:

[Scena Quarta.

LINENOTES:

EPILOGUE

LINENOTES:

Notes To Bussy D'Ambois

THE TEXT

THE REVENGE

OF

Bussy D'Ambois. A Tragedie

As it hath beene often presented at the priuate Play-house in the White Fryers.

Written

By George Chapman, Gentleman.

LONDON: Printed by T. S. and are to be solde by Iohn Helme, at his Shop in S. Dunstones Church-Yard, in Fleetstreet. 1613.

SOURCES

THE ACTORS NAMES

The Revenge of Bussy D'Ambois A Tragedie

Actus primi Scæna prima.

LINENOTES:

[Scæna Secunda.

LINENOTES:

Actus secundi Scæna prima.

LINENOTES:

Actus tertii Scæna prima.

LINENOTES:

[Scæna Secunda.

LINENOTES:

[Scæna Tertia.

LINENOTES:

[Scæna Quarta.

LINENOTES:

Actus quarti Scæna prima.

LINENOTES:

[Scæna secunda.

[Scæna tertia.

LINENOTES:

THE REVENGE OF
BUSSY D'AMBOIS

PROFESSOR OF ENGLISH LITERATURE IN
QUEEN'S COLLEGE, BELFAST

BOSTON, U.S.A., AND LONDON
D. C. HEATH & CO., PUBLISHERS
1905

COPYRIGHT, 1905, BY
D. C. HEATH & CO.

Bussy D'Ambois:

A
TRAGEDIE:

Bussy D'Ambois

A
Tragedie

THE
REVENGE

Bussy D'Ambois.

A
Tragedie

As it hath beene often presented at the
priuate Play-house in the White Fryers.

LONDON:
Printed by T. S. and are to be solde by Iohn Helme,
at his Shop in S. Dunstones Church-Yard,
in Fleetstreet. 1613.

The Revenge
of
Bussy D'Ambois

A
Tragedie