The Saints Tragedy | Page 8

me!
Isen. They are of this world, thou art not, poor child, Therefore they
hate thee, as they did thy betters.
Eliz. But, Lewis, nurse?
Isen. He, child? he is thy knight; Espoused from childhood: thou hast a
claim upon him. One that thou'lt need, alas!--though, I remember-- 'Tis
fifteen years agone--when in one cradle We laid two fair babes for a
marriage token; And when your lips met, then you smiled, and twined
Your little limbs together.--Pray the Saints That token stand!--He calls
thee love and sister, And brings thee gew-gaws from the wars: that's
much! At least he's thine if thou love him.
Eliz. If I love him? What is this love? Why, is he not my brother And I
his sister? Till these weary wars, The one of us without the other never
Did weep or laugh: what is't should change us now? You shake your
head and smile.

Isen. Go to; the chafe Comes not by wearing chains, but feeling them.
Eliz. Alas! here comes a knight across the court; Oh, hide me, nurse!
What's here? this door is fast.
Isen. Nay, 'tis a friend: he brought my princess hither, Walter of Varila;
I feared him once-- He used to mock our state, and say, good wine
Should want no bush, and that the cage was gay, But that the bird must
sing before he praised it. Yet he's a kind heart, while his bitter tongue
Awes these court popinjays at times to manners. He will smile sadly
too, when he meets my maiden; And once he said, he was your
liegeman sworn, Since my lost mistress, weeping, to his charge Trusted
the babe she saw no more.--God help us!
Eliz. How did my mother die, nurse?
Isen. She died, my child.
Eliz. But how? Why turn away? Too long I've guessed at some dread
mystery I may not hear: and in my restless dreams, Night after night,
sweeps by a frantic rout Of grinning fiends, fierce horses, bodiless
hands, Which clutch at one to whom my spirit yearns As to a mother.
There's some fearful tie Between me and that spirit-world, which God
Brands with his terrors on my troubled mind. Speak! tell me, nurse! is
she in heaven or hell?
Isen. God knows, my child: there are masses for her soul Each day in
every Zingar minster sung.
Eliz. But was she holy?--Died she in the Lord? Isen [weeps]. O God!
my child! And if I told thee all, How couldst thou mend it?
Eliz. Mend it? O my Saviour! I'd die a saint! Win heaven for her by
prayers, and build great minsters, Chantries, and hospitals for her; wipe
out By mighty deeds our race's guilt and shame-- But thus, poor witless
orphan! [Weeps.]
[Count Walter enters.]

Wal. Ah! my princess! accept your liegeman's knee; Down, down,
rheumatic flesh!
Eliz. Ah! Count Walter! you are too tall to kneel to little girls.
Wal. What? shall two hundredweight of hypocrisy bow down to his
four-inch wooden saint, and the same weight of honesty not worship
his four-foot live one? And I have a jest for you, shall make my small
queen merry and wise.
Isen. You shall jest long before she's merry.
Wal. Ah! dowers and dowagers again! The money--root of all evil.
What comes here? [A Page enters.] A long-winged grasshopper, all
gold, green, and gauze? How these young pea-chicks must needs ape
the grown peacock's frippery! Prithee, now, how many such butterflies
as you suck here together on the thistle-head of royalty?
Page. Some twelve gentlemen of us, Sir--apostles of the blind archer,
Love--owning no divinity but almighty beauty--no faith, no hope, no
charity, but those which are kindled at her eyes.
Wal. Saints! what's all this?
Page. Ah, Sir! none but countrymen swear by the saints nowadays: no
oaths but allegorical ones, Sir, at the high table; as thus,--'By the sleeve
of beauty, Madam;' or again, 'By Love his martyrdoms, Sir Count;' or
to a potentate, 'As Jove's imperial mercy shall hear my vows, High
Mightiness.'
Wal. Where did the evil one set you on finding all this heathenry?
Page. Oh, we are all barristers of Love's court, Sir; we have Ovid's gay
science conned, Sir, ad unguentum, as they say, out of the French book.
Wal. So? There are those come from Rome then will whip you and
Ovid out with the same rod which the dandies of Provence felt lately to
their sorrow. Oh, what blinkards are we gentlemen, to train any dumb

beasts more carefully than we do Christians! that a man shall keep his
dog-breakers, and his horse-breakers, and his hawk- breakers, and
never hire him a boy-breaker or two! that we should live without a
qualm at dangling such a flock of mimicking parroquets at our heels a
while,