Oliver Cromwell | Page 2

Cromwell: Never mind your manners child. But don't encourage your father. He doesn't need it. This house is all commotion as it is.
Bridget: I can't help it. There's so much going on everywhere. The King doesn't deal fairly by people, I'm sure. Men like father must say it.
Elizabeth: Have you put the lavender in the rooms?
Bridget: No. I'll take it now.
(She takes a tray from the window and goes out.)
Mrs. Cromwell: I don't know what will happen. I sometimes think the world isn't worth quarrelling about at all. And yet I'm a silly old woman to talk like that. But Oliver is a brave fellow--and John, all of them. I want them to be brave in peace--that's the way you think at eighty. (Reading.) This Mr. Donne is a very good poet, but he's rather hard to understand. I suppose that is being eighty, too. Mr. Herrick is very simple. John Hampden sent me some copies from a friend who knows Mr. Herrick. I like them better than John does. (She takes up a manuscript book and reads:)
Lord, Thou hast given me a cell Wherein to dwell; A little house, whose humble roof Is waterproof; Under the spars of which I lie Both soft and dry....
But Mr. Shakespeare was best of all, I do believe. A very civil gentleman, too. I spoke to him once--that was forty years ago, the year Oliver was born, I remember. He didn't hold with all this talk against kings.
Elizabeth: There are kings and kings. Oliver finds no offence in kings--it's in a king.
Mrs. Cromwell: Well, it's all very dangerous, and I'm too old for it. Not but what Oliver's brain is better than mine. But we have to sit still and watch. However-- (reading)
Lord, 'tis thy plenty-dropping hand That sows my land: All this, and better, dost thou send Me for this end: That I should render for my part A thankful heart, Which, fired with incense, I resign As wholly Thine: But the acceptance--that must be, O Lord, by Thee.
Mr. Herrick has chosen a nice name for his book. Hesperides. He has taste as well as understanding.
(The sound of horsemen arriving is heard.)
Elizabeth: That will be John and Mr. Ireton.
(She looks from the window, puts her work into a box, and goes out.)
Mrs. Cromwell (turning her pages):
Ye have been fresh and green, Ye have been filled with flowers, And ye the walks have been Where maids have spent their hours.
Like unthrifts, having spent Your stock, and needy grown, You're left here to lament Your poor estates alone.
(ELIZABETH comes back with JOHN HAMPDEN, aged forty-four, and HENRY IRETON, twenty-eight. They both shake hands with MRS. CROMWELL.)
Hampden: How do you do, ma'am?
Mrs. Cromwell: Well, John.
Ireton: Good-evening, ma'am.
Mrs. Cromwell: You're welcome, Master Ireton, I'm sure. If you behave yourself, young man.
Ireton: How may that be, ma'am?
Mrs. Cromwell: No, don't ask me. Only don't you and John come putting more notions into Oliver's head. I'm sure he's got more than he can rightly manage as it is.
Hampden: We were told down there that it's to-morrow that my Lord of Bedford and his like are to claim the common rights.
Elizabeth: Yes.
Ireton: Mr. Cromwell is to resist, they said.
Mrs. Cromwell: Now, young man, Oliver doesn't need any urging to it. He needs holding back.
Hampden: But that's fine for Oliver. Every man must speak to-day--and do as well, if it comes to it.
Mrs. Cromwell: Yes, but don't be so proud about it, John.
Elizabeth: I think they should be proud.
Mrs. Cromwell: Remember what Mr. Herbert says-- A servant with this clause Makes drudgerie divine. Who sweeps a room, as for thy laws, Makes that and th' action fine. As for thy laws, remember.
Hampden: Surely, we shall remember that always.
(BRIDGET comes in.)
Bridget: Cousin John.
Hampden: Well, Bridget, my girl.
(He kisses her.)
Bridget: How do you do, Mr. Ireton?
Ireton (shaking hands): Well, I thank you, mistress.
Bridget: Does father know, mother?
Elizabeth: I've sent down to the field.
Mrs. Cromwell: He'll be here soon enough. I'm sorry the judges were against you, John. I don't know what else you could expect, though. They are the King's judges, I suppose.
Hampden: That's what we dispute, ma'am. The King says that they should serve him. We say that they should serve the laws.
Ireton: It was just when Mr. Hampden was being heard. The law they said was the King's old and loyal servant: that lex was not rex, but that none could gainsay that rex was lex.
Hampden: That's what we shall have to decide, and before long, I think.
Bridget: Father says that.
Mrs. Cromwell: This house is ready for any kind of revolution, John.
Ireton: But you find it everywhere, ma'am. All along the countryside, in the markets, in the church porches--everywhere.
Elizabeth: Is the vine doing well this year, John?
Hampden: It's the best year I remember.
Elizabeth: Ours, too.
Bridget: Were you there, Mr. Ireton,