Robert Browning - Delphi Poets Series
Page 281
They wince and fret enough, but pay they must
— We manage that, — so, pay with a good grace
They might as well, it costs so little more.
But when we’ve done with taxes, meet folk next
Outside the toll-booth and the rating-place,
In public — there they have us if they will,
We ‘re at their mercy after that, you see!
For one tax not ten devils could extort —
Over and above necessity, a grace;
This prompt disbosoming of love, to wit —
Their vine-leaf wrappage of our tribute penny,
And crowding attestation, all works well.
Yet this precisely do they thrust on us!
These cappings quick, these crook-and-cringings low,
Hand to the heart, and forehead to the knee,
With grin that shuts the eyes and opes the mouth —
So tender they their love; and, tender made,
Go home to curse us, the first doit we ask.
As if their souls were any longer theirs!
As if they had not given ample warrant
To who should clap a collar on their neck,
Rings in their nose, a goad to either flank,
And take them for the brute they boast themselves!
Stay — there’s a bustle at the outer door —
And somebody entreating . . . that’s my name!
Adolf, — I heard my name!
ADOLF.
’T was probably
The suitor.
GUIBERT.
Oh, there is one?
ADOLF.
With a suit
He’d fain enforce in person.
GUIBERT.
The good heart
— And the great fool! Just ope the mid-door’s fold!
Is that a lappet of his cloak, I see?
ADOLF.
If it bear plenteous sign of travel . . . ay,
The very cloak my comrades tore!
GUIBERT.
Why tore?
ADOLF.
He seeks the Duchess’ presence in that trim:
Since daybreak, was he posted hereabouts
Lest he should miss the moment.
GUIBERT.
Where’s he now?
ADOLF.
Gone for a minute possibly, not more:
They have ado enough to thrust him back.
GUIBERT.
Ay — but my name, I caught?
ADOLF.
Oh, sir — he said
— What was it? — You had known him formerly,
And, he believed, would help him did you guess
He waited now; you promised him as much:
The old plea! ‘Faith, he’s back, — renews the charge!
[Speaking at the door.] So long as the man parleys, peace outside —
Nor be too ready with your halberts, there!
GAUCELME.
My horse bespattered, as he blocked the path
A thin sour man, not unlike somebody.
ADOLF.
He holds a paper in his breast, whereon
He glances when his cheeks flush and his brow
At each repulse
GAUCELME.
I noticed he’d a brow.
ADOLF.
So glancing, he grows calmer, leans awhile
Over the balustrade, adjusts his dress,
And presently turns round, quiet again,
With some new pretext for admittance. — Back!
[To GUIBERT.] — Sir, he has seen you! Now cross halberts! Ha —
Pascal is prostrate — there lies Fabian too!
No passage! Whither would the madman press?
Close the doors quick on me!
GUIBERT.
Too late! He’s here.
Enter, hastily and with discomposed dress, VALENCE.
VALENCE.
Sir Guibert, will you help me? — me, that come
Charged by your townsmen, all who starve at Cleves,
To represent their heights and depths of woe
Before our Duchess and obtain relief!
Such errands barricade such doors, it seems:
But not a common hindrance drives me back
On all the sad yet hopeful faces, lit
With hope for the first time, which sent me forth.
Cleves, speak for me! Cleves’ men and women, speak!
Who followed me — your strongest — many a mile
That I might go the fresher from their ranks,
— Who sit — your weakest — by the city gates,
To take me fuller of what news I bring
As I return for I must needs return!
— Can I? ‘T were hard, no listener for their wrongs,
To turn them back upon the old despair —
Harder, Sir Guibert, than imploring thus —
So, I do any way you please implore!
If you . . . but how should you remember Cleves?
Yet they of Cleves remember you so well!
Ay, comment on each trait of you they keep,
Your words and deeds caught up at second hand, —
Proud, I believe, at bottom of their hearts,
O’ the very levity and recklessness
Which only prove that you forget their wrongs.
Cleves, the grand town, whose men and women starve,
Is Cleves forgotten? Then, remember me!
You promised me that you would help me once,
For other purpose: will you keep your word?
GUIBERT.
And who may you be, friend?
VALENCE.
Valence of Cleves.
GUIBERT.
Valence of . . . not the advocate of Cleves,
I owed my whole estate to, three years back?
Ay, well may you keep silence! Why, my lords,
You’ve heard, I’m sure, how, Pentecost three years,
I was so nearly ousted of my land
By some knave’s — pretext (eh? when you refused me
Your ugly daughter, Clugnet!) — and you’ve heard
How I recovered it by miracle
— (When I refused her!) Here’s the very friend,
— Valence of Cleves, all parties have to thank!
Nay, Valence, this procedure’s vile in you!
I’m no more grateful than a courtier should,
But politic am I — I bear a brain,
Can cast about a little, might require
Your services a second time. I tried
To tempt you with advancement here to court
— ”No!” — well, for curiosity at least
To view our life here — ”No!” — our Duchess, then, —
A pretty woman’s worth some pains to see,
Nor is she spoiled, I take it, if a crown
Complete the forehead pale and tresses pure . . .
VALENCE.
Our city trusted me its miseries,
And I am come.
GUIBERT.
So much for taste! But “come,” —
So may you be, for anything I know,
To beg the Pope’s cross, or Sir Clugnet’ s daughter,
And with an equal chance you get all three.
If it was ever worth your while to come,
Was not the proper way worth finding too?
VALENCE.
Straight to the palace-portal, sir, I came —
GUIBERT.
— And said? —
VALENCE.
— That I had brought the miseries
Of a whole city to relieve.
GUIBERT.
— Which saying
Won your admittance? You saw me, indeed,
And here, no doubt, you stand: as certainly,
My intervention, I shall not dispute,
Procures you audience; which, if I procure, —
That paper ‘s closely written — by Saint Paul,
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Here flock the Wrongs, follow the Remedies,
Chapter and verse, One, Two, A, B and C!
Perhaps you’d enter, make a reverence,
And launch these “miseries” from first to last?
VALENCE.
How should they let me pause or turn aside?
GAUCELME [to VALENCE] .
My worthy sir, one question! You’ve come straight
From Cleves, you tell us: heard you any talk
At Cleves about our lady?
VALENCE.
Much.
GAUCELME.
And what?
VALENCE.
Her wish was to redress all wrongs she knew.
GAUCELME.
That, you believed?
VALENCE.
You see me, sir!
GAUCELME.
— Nor stopped
Upon the road from Cleves to Juliers here,
For any — rumors you might find afloat?
VALENCE.
I had my townsmen’s wrongs to busy me.
GAUCELME.
This is the lady’s birthday, do you know?
— Her day of pleasure?
VALENCE.
— That the great, I know,
For pleasure born, should still be on the watch
To exclude pleasure when a duty offers:
Even as, for duty born, the lowly too
May ever snatch a pleasure if in reach:
Both will have plenty of their birthright, sir!
GAUCELME [aside to GUIBERT].
Sir Guibert, here’s your man! No scruples now —
You’ll never find his like! Time presses hard.
I’ve seen your drift and Adolf’s too, this while,
But you can’t keep the hour of audience back
Much longer, and at noon the Prince arrives.
[Pointing to VALENCE.]
Entrust him with it — fool no chance away!
GUIBERT.
Him?
GAUCELME.
— With the missive! What’s the man to her?
GUIBERT.
No bad thought! Yet, ‘t is yours, who ever played
The tempting serpent: else ‘t were no bad thought!
I should — and do — mistrust it for your sake,
Or else . . .
Enter an OFFICIAL who communicates with ADOLF.
ADOLF.
The Duchess will receive the court.
GUIBERT.
Give us a moment, Adolf! Valence, friend,
I’ll help you. We of the service, you ‘re to mark,
Have special entry, while the herd . . . the folk
Outside, get access through our help alone;
— Well, it is so, was so, and I suppose
So ever will be: your natural lot is, therefore,
To wait your turn and opportunity,
And probably miss both. Now, I engage
To set you, here and in a minute’s space,
Before the lady, with full leave to plead
Chapter and verse, and A, and B, and C,
To heart’s content.
VALENCE.
I grieve that I must ask, —
This being, yourself admit, the custom here, —
To what the price of such a favor mounts?
GUIBERT.
Just so! You ‘re not without a courtier’s tact.
Little at court, as your quick instinct prompts,
Do such as we without a recompense.
VALENCE.
Yours is? —
GUIBERT.
A trifle: here’s a document
‘Tis some one’s duty to present her Grace
I say, not mine — these say, not theirs — such points
Have weight at court. Will you relieve us all
And take it? Just say, “I am bidden lay
This paper at the Duchess’ feet!”
VALENCE.
No more?
I thank you, sir!
ADOLF.
Her Grace receives the court.
GUIBERT [aside.]
Now, sursum corda, quoth the mass-priest! Do —
Whoever’ s my kind saint, do let alone
These pushings to and fro, and pullings back;
Peaceably let me hang o’ the devil’s arm
The downward path, if you can’t pluck me off
Completely! Let me live quite his, or yours!
[The Courtiers begin to range themselves, and move toward the door.
After me, Valence! So, our famous Cleves
Lacks bread? Yet don’ t we gallants buy their lace?
And dear enough — it beggars me, I know,
To keep my very gloves fringed properly.
This, Valence, is our Great State Hall you cross;
Yon gray urn ‘s veritable marcasite,
The Pope’s gift: and those salvers testify
The Emperor. Presently you’ll set your foot
. . . But you don’t speak, friend Valence!
VALENCE.
I shall speak.
GAUCELME [aside to GUIBERT].
Guibert — it were no such ungraceful thing
If you and I, at first, seemed horror-struck
With the bad news. Look here, what you shall do.
Suppose you, first, clap hand to sword and cry
“Yield strangers our allegiance? First I’ll perish
Beside your Grace!” — and so give me the cue
To . . .
GUIBERT.
— Clap your hand to note-book and jot down
That to regale the Prince with? I conceive.
[To VALENCE.] Do, Valence, speak, or I shall half suspect
You ‘re plotting to supplant us, me the first,
I’ the lady’s favor! Is ‘t the grand harangue
You mean to make, that thus engrosses you?
— Which of her virtues you’ll apostrophize?
Or is ‘t the fashion you aspire to start,
Of that close-curled, not unbecoming hair?
Or what else ponder you?
VALENCE.
My townsmen’s wrongs.
Act II
Noon.
SCENE. The Presence-chamber.
The DUCHESS and SABYNE.
THE DUCHESS.
Announce that I am ready for the court!
SABYNE.
‘T is scarcely audience-hour, I think; your Grace
May best consult your own relief, no doubt,
And shun the crowd: but few can have arrived.
THE DUCHESS.
Let those not yet arrived, then, keep away!
‘Twas me, this day last year at Ravestein,
You hurried. It has been full time, beside,
This half-hour. Do you hesitate?
SABYNE.
Forgive me!
THE DUCHESS.
Stay, Sabyne; let me hasten to make sure
Of one true thanker: here with you begins
My audience, claim you first its privilege!
It is my birth’s event they celebrate:
You need not wish me more such happy days,
But — ask some favor! Have you none to ask?
Has Adolf none, then? this was far from least
Of much I waited for impatiently,
Assure yourself! It seemed so natural
Your gift, beside this bunch of river-bells,
Should be the power and leave of doing good
To you, and greater pleasure to myself.
You ask my leave to-day to marry Adolf?
The rest is my concern.
SABYNE.
Your Grace is ever
Our lady of dear Ravestein, — but, for Adolf . . .
THE DUCHESS.
“But”? You have not, sure, changed in your regard
And purpose towards him?
SABYNE.
We change?
THE DUCHESS.
Well
then? Well?
SABYNE.
How could we two be happy, and, most like,
Leave Juliers, when — when . . . but ‘t is audience-time!
THE DUCHESS.
“When, if you left me, I were left indeed!”
Would you subjoin that? — Bid the court approach!
— Why should we play thus with each other, Sabyne?
Do I not know, if courtiers prove remiss,
If friends detain me, and get blame for it,
There is a cause? Of last year’s fervid throng
Scarce one half comes now.
SABYNE [aside].
One half? No, alas!
THE DUCHESS.
So can the mere suspicion of a cloud
Over my fortunes, strike each loyal heart.
They’ve heard of this Prince Berthold; and, forsooth,
Some foolish arrogant pretence he makes,
May grow more foolish and more arrogant,
They please to apprehend! I thank their love.
Admit them!
SABYNE [aside].
How much has she really learned?
THE DUCHESS.
Surely, whoever’s absent, Tristan waits?
— Or at least Romuald, whom my father raised
From nothing — come, he’s faithful to me, come!
(Sabyne, I should but be the prouder yes,
The fitter to comport myself aright)
Not Romuald? Xavier — what said he to that?
For Xavier hates a parasite, I know!
[Sabyne goes out.
THE DUCHESS.
Well, sunshine’s everywhere, and summer too.
Next year ‘tis the old place again, perhaps —
The water-breeze again, the birds again.
— It cannot be! It is too late to be!
What part had I, or choice in all of it?
Hither they brought me; I had not to think
Nor care, concern myself with doing good
Or ill, my task was just — to live, — to live,
And, answering ends there was no need explain,
To render Juliers happy — so they said.
All could not have been falsehood: some was love,
And wonder and obedience. I did all
They looked for: why then cease to do it now?
Yet this is to be calmly set aside,
And — ere next birthday’s dawn, for aught I know,
Things change, a claimant may arrive, and I . . .
It cannot nor it shall not be! His right?
Well then, he has the right, and I have not,
— But who bade all of you surround my life
And close its growth up with your ducal crown
Which, plucked off rudely, leaves me perishing?
I could have been like one of you, — loved, hoped,
Feared, lived and died like one of you — but you
Would take that life away and give me this,
And I will keep this! I will face you! Come!
Enter the COURTIERS and VALENCE.
THE COURTIERS.
Many such happy mornings to your Grace!