Michael Drayton- Collected Poetical Works
Page 189
MAYOR.
Mine host, know you this man?
HOST.
Yes, master Mayor, I’ll give my word for him. Why, neighbor
Club, how comes this gear about?
KATE.
Now, a fowl ont, I can not make this gew-gaw stand on my head: now the lads and the lasses won flout me too too —
CONSTABLE.
How came this man and woman thus attired?
HOST.
Here came a man and woman hither this last night, which I did take for substantial people, and lodged all in one chamber by these folks, me thinks, have been so bold to change apparel, and gone away this morning ere they rose.
MAYOR.
That was that villain traitor, Old-castle, that thus escaped us: make out hue and cry yet after him, keep fast that traitorous rebel, his servant, there: farewell, mine host.
CARRIER.
Come, Kate Owdham, thou and Ise trimly dizard.
[Exeunt.]
ACT V. SCENE VIII. A wood near St. Albans.
[Enter sir John Old-castle, and his Lady disguised.]
COBHAM.
Come, Madam, happily escaped; here let us sit.
This place is far remote from any path,
And here awhile our weary limbs may rest,
To take refreshing, free from the pursuit
Of envious Rochester.
LADY COBHAM.
But where, my Lord,
Shall we find rest for our disquiet minds?
There dwell untamed thoughts that hardly stop,
To such abasement of disdained rags.
We were not wont to travel thus by night,
Especially on foot.
COBHAM.
No matter, love;
Extremities admit no better choice,
And were it not for thee, say froward time
Imposed a greater task, I would esteem it
As lightly as the wind that blows upon us;
But in thy sufference I am doubly tasked.
Thou wast not wont to have the earth thy stool,
Nor the moist dewy grass thy pillow, nor
Thy chamber to be the wide horizon.
LADY COBHAM.
How can it seem a trouble, having you
A partner with me in the worst I feel?
No, gentle Lord, your presence would give ease
To death it self, should he now seize upon me.
Behold what my foresight hath underta’en
[Here’s bread and cheese & a bottle.]
For fear we faint; they are but homely cates,
Yet sauced with hunger, they may seem as sweet
As greater dainties we were wont to taste.
COBHAM.
Praise be to him whose plenty sends both this
And all things else our mortal bodies need;
Nor scorn we this poor feeding, nor the state
We now are in, for what is it on earth,
Nay, under heaven, continues at a stay?
Ebbs not the sea, when it hath overflown?
Follows not darkness when the day is gone?
And see we not sometime the eye of heaven
Dimmed with overflying clouds: there’s not that work
Of careful nature, or of cunning art,
(How strong, how beauteous, or how rich it be)
But falls in time to ruin. Here, gentle Madame,
In this one draught I wash my sorrow down.
[Drinks.]
LADY COBHAM.
And I, encouraged with your cheerful speech,
Will do the like.
COBHAM.
Pray God poor Harpoole come.
If he should fall into the Bishop’s hands,
Or not remember where we bade him meet us,
It were the thing of all things else, that now
Could breed revolt in this new peace of mind.
LADY COBHAM.
Fear not, my Lord, he’s witty to devise,
And strong to execute a present shift.
COBHAM.
That power be still his guide hath guided us!
My drowsy eyes wax heavy: early rising,
Together with the travel we have had,
Make me that I could gladly take a nap,
Were I persuaded we might be secure.
LADY COBHAM.
Let that depend on me: whilst you do sleep,
I’ll watch that no misfortune happen us.
Lay then your head upon my lap, sweet Lord,
And boldly take your rest.
COBHAM.
I shall, dear wife,
Be too much trouble to thee.
LADY COBHAM.
Urge not that;
My duty binds me, and your love commands.
I would I had the skill with tuned voice
To draw on sleep with some sweet melody,
But imperfection, and unaptness too,
Are both repugnant: fear insert the one,
The other nature hath denied me use.
But what talk I of means to purchase that,
Is freely happened? sleep with gentle hand
Hath shut his eye-lids. Oh victorious labour,
How soon thy power can charm the bodies sense?
And now thou likewise climbst unto my brain,
Making my heavy temples stoop to thee.
Great God of heaven from danger keep us free.
[Both sleep.]
[Enter sir Richard Lee, and his men.]
LEE.
A murder closely done, and in my ground?
Search carefully, if any where it were,
This obscure thicket is the likeliest place.
SERVANT.
Sir, I have found the body stiff with cold,
And mangled cruelly with many wounds.
LEE.
Look if thou knowest him, turn his body up. —
Alack, it is my son, my son and heir,
Whom two years since I sent to Ireland,
To practice there the discipline of war,
And coming home (for so he wrote to me)
Some savage heart, some bloody devilish hand,
Either in hate, or thirsting for his coin,
Hath here sluiced out his blood. Unhappy hour,
Accursed place, but most inconstant fate,
That hadst reserved him from the bullet’s fire,
And suffered him to scape the wood-karn’s fury,
Didst here ordain the treasure of his life,
(Even here within the arms of tender peace,
And where security gave greatest hope)
To be consumed by treason’s wasteful hand!
And what is most afflicting to my soul,
That this his death and murther should be wrought
Without the knowledge by whose means twas done.
SECOND SERVANT.
Not so, sir; I have found the authors of it.
See where they sit, and in their bloody fists,
The fatal instruments of death and sin.
LEE.
Just judgement of that power, whose gracious eye,
Loathing the sight of such a heinous fact,
Dazzled their senses with benumbing sleep,
Till their unhallowed treachery were known!
Awake, ye monsters; murderers, awake;
Tremble for horror; blush, you cannot choose,
Beholding this inhumane deed of yours.
COBHAM.
What mean you, sir, to trouble weary souls,
And interrupt us of our quiet sleep?
LEE.
Oh devilish! can you boast unto your selves
Of quiet sleep, having within your hearts
The guilt of murder waking, that with cries
Deafs the loud thunder, and solicits heaven
With more than Mandrake’s shrieks for your offence?
LADY COBHAM.
What murder? you upbraid us wrongfully.
LEE.
Can you deny the fact? see you not here
The body of my son by you mis-done?
Look on his wounds, look on his purple hue:
Do we not find you where the deed was done?
Were not your knives fast closed in your hands?
Is not this cloth an argument beside,
Thus stained and spotted with his innocent blood?
These speaking characters, were nothing else
To plead against ye, would convict you both.
Bring them away, bereavers of my joy.
At Hartford, where the Sizes now are kept,
Their lives shall answer for my son’s lost life.
COBHAM.
As we are innocent, so may we speed.
LEE.
As I am wronged, so may the law proceed.
[Exeunt.]
ACT V. SCENE IX. St. Albans.
[Enter bishop of Rochester, constable of St. Albans, with sir John of Wrotham, Doll his wench, and the Irishman in Harpoole’s apparel.]
BISHOP.
What intricate confusion have we here?
Not two hours since we apprehended one,
In habit Irish, but in speech not so:
And now you bring another, that in speech
Is altogether Irish, but in habit
Seems to be English: yea and more than so,
The servant of that heretic Lord Cobham.
IRISHMAN.
Fait, me be no servant of the lord Cobham,
Me be Mack Chane of Vister.
BISHOP.
Otherwise called Harpoole of Kent; go to, sir,
You cannot blind us with your broken Irish.
SIR JOHN.
Trust me, my Lord Bishop, whether Irish,
Or English, Harpoole or not Harpoole, that
I leave to be decided by the trial:
But sure I am this man by face and speech
Is he that murdered young sir Richard Lee —
I met him presently upon the fact —
And that he slew his master for that gold;
Those jewels, and that chain I took from him.
BISHOP.
Well, our affairs do call us back to London,
So that we cannot prosecute the cause,
As we desire to do; therefore we leave
The charge with you, to see they be conveyed
To Hartford Sise: both this counterfeit
And you, sir John of Wrotham, and your wench,
For you are culpable as well as they,
Though not for murder, yet for felony.
But since you are the means to bring to light
This graceless murder, you shall bear with you
Our letters to the Judges of the bench,
To be your friends in what they lawful may.
BISHOP.
So, away with them.
[Exeunt.]
ACT V. SCENE X. Hertford. A Hall of Justice.
[Enter Gaoler and his man, bringing forth Old-castle.]
GAOLER.
Bring forth the prisoners, see the court prepared;
The Justices are coming to the bench.
So, let him stand; away, and fetch the rest.
[Exeunt.]
COBHAM.
Oh, give me patience to endure this scourge,
Thou that art fountain of that virtuous stream,
And though contempt, false witness, and reproach
Hang on these iron gyves, to press my life
As low as earth, yet strengthen me with faith,
That I may mount in spirit above the clouds.
[Enter Gaoler, bringing in Lady Old-castle and
Harpoole.]
Here comes my lady: sorrow, tis for her
Thy wound is grievous; else I scoff at thee.
What, and poor Harpoole! art thou ith bryars too?
HARPOOLE.
Ifaith, my Lord, I am in, get out how I can.
LADY COBHAM.
Say, gentle Lord, for now we are alone,
And may confer, shall we confess in brief,
Of whence, and what we are, and so prevent
The accusation is commenced against us?
COBHAM.
What will that help us? being known, sweet love,
We shall for heresy be put to death,
For so they term the religion we profess.
No, if it be ordained we must die,
And at this instant, this our comfort be,
That of the guilt imposed, our souls are free.
HARPOOLE.
Yea, yea, my lord, Harpoole is so resolved.
I wreak of death the less, in that I die
Not by the sentence of that envious priest
The Bishop of Rochester: oh, were it he,
Or by his means that I should suffer here,
It would be double torment to my soul.
LADY COBHAM.
Well, be it then according as heaven please.
[Enter lord Judge, two Justices, Mayor of Saint
Albans, lord Powesse and his lady, and old sir
Richard Lee: the Judge and Justices take their
places.]
JUDGE.
Now, Master Mayor, what gentleman is that,
You bring with you before us and the bench?
MAYOR.
The Lord Powis, if it like your honor,
And this his Lady, travelling toward Wales,
Who, for they lodged last night within my house,
And my Lord Bishop did lay search for such,
Were very willing to come on with me,
Lest for their sakes suspicion me might wrong.
JUDGE.
We cry your honor mercy, good my Lord,
Wilt please ye take your place. Madame, your ladyship
May here or where you will repose your self,
Until this business now in hand be past.
LADY POWIS.
I will withdraw into some other room,
So that your Lordship and the rest be pleased.
JUDGE.
With all our hearts: attend the Lady there.
LORD POWIS.
Wife, I have eyed yond prisoners all this while,
And my conceit doth tell me, tis our friend,
The noble Cobham, and his virtuous Lady.
LADY POWIS.
I think no less: are they suspected, trow ye,
For doing of this murder?
LORD POWIS.
What is means
I cannot tell, but we shall know anon.
Mean space as you pass by them, ask the question,
But do it secretly, you be not seen,
And make some sign that I may know your mind.
LADY POWIS.
My Lord Cobham? madam?
[As she passeth over the stage by them.]
COBHAM.
No Cobham now, nor madam, as you love us,
But John of Lancashire, and Ione his wife.
LADY POWIS.
Oh tell, what is it that our love can do,
To pleasure you? for we are bound to you.
COBHAM.
Nothing but this, that you conceal our names;
So, gentle lady, pass for being spied.
LADY POWIS.
My heart I leave, to bear part of your grief.
[Exit.]
JUDGE.
Call the prisoners to the bar. Sir Richard Lee,
What evidence can you bring against these people,
To prove them guilty of the murder done?
LEE.
This bloody towel and these naked knives,
Beside we found them sitting by the place,
Where the dead body lay, within a bush.
JUDGE.
What answer you why law should not proceed,
According to the evidence given in,
To tax ye with the penalty of death?
COBHAM.
That we are free from murder’s very thoug
hts,
And know not how the gentleman was slain.
FIRST JUSTICE.
How came this linen cloth so bloody then?
LADY COBHAM.
My husband hot with travelling, my lord,
His nose gushed out a bleeding, that was it.
SECOND JUSTICE.
But wherefore were your sharp edged knives unsheathed?
LADY COBHAM.
To cut such simple victual as we had.
JUDGE.
Say we admit this answer to those articles,
What made ye in so private a dark nook,
So far remote from any common path,
As was the thick where the dead corpse was thrown?
COBHAM.
Journeying, my lord, from London from the term,
Down into Lancashire where we do dwell,
And what with age and travel being faint,
We gladly sought a place where we might rest,
Free from resort of other passengers,
And so we strayed into that secret corner.
JUDGE.
These are but ambages to drive of time,
And linger Justice from her purposed end.
But who are these?
[Enter the Constable, bringing in the Irishman, sir
John of Wrotham, and Doll.]
CONSTABLE.
Stay Judgement, and release those innocents,
For here is he, whose hand hath done the deed,
For which they stand indicted at the bar, —
This savage villain, this rude Irish slave.
His tongue already hath confessed the fact,
And here is witness to confirm as much.
SIR JOHN.
Yes, my good Lords, no sooner had he slain
His loving master for the wealth he had,
But I upon the instant met with him,
And what he purchased with the loss of blood:
With strokes I presently bereaved him of;
Some of the which is spent, the rest remaining
I willingly surrender to the hands
Of old sir Richard Lee, as being his.
Beside, my Lord Judge, I greet your honor
With letters from my Lord of Rochester.
[Delivers a letter.]
LEE.
Is this the wolf whose thirsty throat did drink
My dear son’s blood? art thou the snake
He cherished, yet with envious piercing sting
Assailed him mortally? foul stigmatic,
Thou venom of the country where thou livedst,
And pestilence of this: were it not that law
Stands ready to revenge thy cruelty,
Traitor to God, thy master, and to me,
These hands should be thy executioner.
JUDGE.
Patience, sir Richard Lee, you shall have justice,
And he the guerdon of his base desert.
The fact is odious; therefore, take him hence,