Mary Tudor

Front matter

MARY TUDOR.

Preface

PREFACE.

There are two ways of arousing the enthusiasm of the public at the theatre: by the great and by the true. The great captivates the masses, the true impresses the individual spectator.

The aim of the dramatic poet, whatever his general ideas concerning art, should be therefore, first of all, to seek the great, like Corneille, or the true, like Molière; or, better still,—and this is the highest elevation that genius can attain,—to aspire to both the great and the true, the great in the true, the true in the great, like Shakespeare.

For, let us observe in passing, it was given to Shakespeare—and therein consists the sovereignty of his genius—to reconcile, to unite, to amalgamate constantly in his work these two qualities, truth and greatness,—qualities almost the opposite of each other, or, at all events, so distinct that the defect of either of them constitutes the opposite of the other. The stumbling-block of the true is the petty; the stumbling-block of the great is the false. In all of Shakespeare's works there is greatness which is true, and there is truth which is great. At the centre of all his creations, we find the point of intersection of greatness and truth; and where these great things and these true things meet, art is complete. Shakespeare, like Michelangelo, seems to have been created to solve that strange problem of which the mere enunciation seems absurd: to remain always within the limits of nature, while going outside of them now and again.—Shakespeare exaggerates proportions, but he maintains the relations of things. Marvellous omnipotence of the poet! he makes things higher than ourselves, which live as we do. Hamlet, for example, is as true as any one of us, and greater. Hamlet is colossal, yet real. It is because Hamlet is not you, or I, but all of us. Hamlet is not a man, he is man.

Constantly to distinguish the great through the true, and the true through the great—such, is, therefore, according to the author of this drama, the proper end of the poet on the stage,—always, be it said, upholding such other ideas as he may have developed elsewhere touching these matters. And those two words, great and true, contain everything. Truth contains morality, the great contains the beautiful.

This end it will not be supposed that he has the presumption to believe that he has ever attained; but he may be permitted to do himself the justice to say thus publicly that he has never sought any other end on the stage down to this day. The new drama that has recently been performed is a further effort toward that radiant goal. What is, in truth, the thought that he has tried to represent in "Mary Tudor?" It is this: a queen who is a woman. Great as queen; true as woman.

As he has already said elsewhere, the drama as he conceives it, the drama as he would like to see it created by a man of genius, the drama according to the nineteenth century, is not the lofty, impossible, sublime, Spanish tragi-comedy of Corneille; it is not the abstract, amorous, imaginative, and discreetly elegiac tragedy of Racine; it is not the profound, sagacious, keen-sighted, too pitilessly satirical comedy of Molière; it is not the philosophically inclined tragedy of Voltaire; it is not the revolutionary comedy of Beaumarchais; it is no more than all these, but it is all these at the same time; or, to speak more truly, it is none of them. It is not, as in the works of these great men, a single aspect of things constantly and persistently placed before the eyes, but it is everything considered at once in all its aspects. If there were a man living to-day who could reconstruct the drama as we understand it, that drama would be the human heart, the human brain, human passion, the human will; it would be the past revived for the behoof of the present; it would be the history that our fathers made placed side by side with the history that we are making; it would be a commingling on the stage of all things that are commingled in life; it would be an émeute here, and a love-talk there, and in the latter a lesson for the people, and in the former a cry for the heart; it would be laughter and tears; it would be good, evil, the high, the low, fatality, provi , genius, chance, society, the world, nature, life; and above all these one would be conscious that something great was soaring!

To this drama, which would be a never-failing source of instruction for the multitude, everything would be allowable, because it would be of its essence to abuse nothing. It would have on its side such a reputation for loyalty, elevation of mind, usefulness, and conscientiousness, that no one would ever accuse it of seeking effect and sensations where it had sought only a moral lesson. It could take François I to Maguelonne's hovel without arousing suspicion; it could, without alarming the sternest moralists, cause pity for Marion to gush from Didier's breast; it could, without being accused of over-emphasis and exaggeration like the author of "Mary Tudor," display freely on the stage, in all its awe-inspiring reality, that dread triangle that appears so often in history: a queen, a favourite, a headsman.

The man who shall create this drama will require two qualities—conscientiousness and genius. The author who is now speaking has only the first, as he well knows. He will nevertheless continue what he has begun, hoping that others will do better than he. To-day an enormous public, constantly increasing in intelligence, sympathizes with all the serious efforts of art. To-day every high-minded critic assists and encourages the poet. The other judges matter little. So let the poet come forth! As for the author of this drama, sure of the future that is in store for progress, certain that, in default of talent, his perseverance will some day be counted in his favour, he gazes with serene and tranquil confidence upon the multitude which every evening encompasses this incomplete work with so much curiosity, anxiety and attention. In presence of that multitude, he realizes the responsibility that rests upon him, and he accepts it calmly. Never in his works does he lose sight for an instant of the people whom the stage civilizes; of history, which the stage explains; of the human heart, to which the stage gives counsel. To-morrow he will lay aside the work that is done for the work that is to do; he will turn his back upon that multitude, to return to his solitude—a profound solitude sheltered from every evil influence of the outside world, where youth, his friend, comes now and then to grasp his hand, where he is alone with his thoughts, his will, and his independence. His solitude will be more than ever dear to him, for only in solitude can one work for the multitude. More than ever he will keep his spirit, his thought, and his work aloof from all coteries, for he knows something greater than coteries—parties; something greater than parties—the people; something greater than the people—mankind.

November 17, 1833.

Dramatis Personæ

DRAMATIS PERSONÆ.

Queen Mary. Jane. Gilbert. Fabiano Fabiani. Simon Renard. Joshua Farnaby. A Jew. Lord Clinton. Lord Chandos. Lord Montagu. Master Æneas Dulverton. Lord Gardiner. A Gaoler.

Lords, Pages, Guards, The Headsman.

Scene.—London, 1553.

First Day. The Man of the People

FIRST DAY. THE MAN OF THE PEOPLE.

The Shore of the Thames.—A deserted strand. An ancient parapet all in ruins conceals the margin of the stream. At the right a house of mean aspect. At the corner of the house a statuette of the Virgin, at whose foot a bit of tow is burning in an iron cage. In the background, across the Thames, London. Two lofty buildings, the Tower and Westminster, can be distinguished. Night is beginning to fall.

Scene 1.—Several men standing in groups on the strand, among them Simon Renard; John Bridges, Baron Chandos; Robert Clinton, Baron Clinton; Anthony Browne, Viscount Montagu.

Chandos. You are right, my lord. It must be that the accurst Italian has bewitched the Queen. She can not do without him; she lives but through him, she has no joy save in him, she listens to none but him. If she but pass a day without seeing him, her eyes take on a languishing look, as in the days when she loved Cardinal Pole, as you recall.

Renard. Most amorous, in truth, and therewithal most jealous.

Chandos. The Italian has bewitched her!

Montagu. Faith, 'tis said that those of his nation have philters for that purpose.

Clinton. The Spaniards are skilful in the poisons that cause death, the Italians in the poisons that cause love.

Chandos. The Fabiani then is Spaniard and Italian at once. The Queen 's in love and sick. He gives her both poisons to drink.

Montagu. But tell me, is he a Spaniard or Italian, in truth?

Chandos. It seems certain that he was born in Italy, and that he was reared in Spain. He pretends that he is akin to a great Spanish family. Lord Clinton knows all that 's to be known thereon.

Clinton. An adventurer. Neither Spanish nor Italian, and English even less, God be praised! These men who are of no country are without pity for any country when they are powerful.

Montagu. Said you not, Chandos, that the Queen is ill? That does not prevent her leading a merry life with her favourite.

Clinton. A merry life! a merry life! While the Queen laughs, the people weep and the favourite is gorged. He eats silver and drinks gold, does that man! The Queen hath given him Lord Talbot's estates, the great Lord Talbot! The Queen hath made him Earl of Clanbrassil and Baron Dinasmonddy,—this Fabiano Fabiani, who says that he is of the Spanish family of Peñalver, and who lies! He is a peer of England, like you, Montagu, like you, Chandos, like Stanley, like Norfolk, like myself, like the King! He has the Garter, like the Infant of Portugal, like the King of Denmark, like Thomas Percy, seventh Earl of Northumberland! And what a tyrant is this tyrant who governs us from his bed! Never has England been so grievously oppressed. And I have seen some evil times, for I am an old man! There are seventy new gibbets on Tyburn Hill; the pyres are always red-hot embers, never ashes; the headsman's axe is sharpened every morning and notched every night. Every day some great nobleman is struck down. Day before yesterday 'twas Blantyre, yesterday Northcurry, to-day South-Reppo, to-morrow Tyrconnel. Next week 'twill be you, Chandos, and next month 'twill be I. My lords, my lords, 'tis a crying, impious shame, that all these honourable English heads should fall thus for the pleasure of a wretched nameless adventurer, who is not even of this country! 'Tis a shocking and intolerable thought that a Neapolitan favourite can draw as many blocks as he will from beneath the bed of this Queen! They lead a merry life together, say you? By Heaven! 'tis infamous! Ah! they lead a merry life, these lovers, while the head-cutter at their door makes widows and orphans! Too often is their Italian guitar accompanied by the clank of fetters! My lady Queen! you import singers from the chapel of Avignon, you have every day, in your palace, theatres and galleries full of musicians. By God! my lady, less merry-making in your abode, may it please you, and less mourning in ours; fewer merry-andrews here and fewer headsmen yonder; fewer showmen's booths at Westminster, and fewer scaffolds at Tyburn!

Montagu. Beware. We are loyal subjects, my Lord Clinton. Put nought upon the Queen, all upon Fabiani.

Renard [laying his hand on Clinton's shoulder.] Patience.

Clinton. Patience! 'Tis easy for you to say, Master Simon Renard. You are bailli of Amont in Franche-Comté, a subject of the Emperor, and his legate in London. You represent here the Prince of Spain, the Queen's future consort. Your person is sacred to the favourite. But with us, 'tis another matter.—D'ye see: for you Fabiani is the shepherd, for us he's the butcher.

[It has become quite dark.

Renard. That fellow is in my way no less than in yours. You fear only for your life. I fear for my credit, which is of far greater importance. I do not talk, I act. I have less wrath than you, my lord, but more hate. I will annihilate the favourite.

Montagu. Oh! how may it be done? I think thereon the whole day long.

Renard. Not by day are queens' favourites made and unmade, but by night.

Chandos. This is a very dark and awesome night.

Renard. I find it fair for what I purpose to do.

Chandos. What do you purpose to do?

Renard. You will see.—My Lord Chandos, when a woman reigns, 'tis the reign of caprice. Then, politics is not a matter of deliberation, but of chance. One can depend upon nothing. To-day does not lead logically to to-morrow. Public affairs no longer play at chess but at cards.

Clinton. That is all very well, but let us come to the fact. When will you have delivered us from the favourite, my friend? Time presses. Tyrconnel 's to be beheaded to-morrow.

Renard. If to-night I fall in with the sort of man I seek, Tyrconnel will sup with you to-morrow night.

Clinton. What mean you? What will have become of Fabiani?

Renard. Have you good eyes, my lord?

Clinton. Yes, although I'm old and the night is dark.

Renard. Do you see London across the river?

Clinton. Yes. Why?

Renard. Look closely. From here you see the zenith and the nadir of every favourite's fortunes—Westminster and the Tower of London.

Clinton. Well?

Renard. If God is on my side, there is a man who at this moment is still there,

[He points to Westminster.

and who at this hour to-morrow will be here.

[He points to the Tower.

Clinton. May God be on your side!

Montagu. The people detest him no less than we do. What rejoicing there will be in London on the day of his fall!

Chandos. We have put ourselves in your hands, my good sir. Command us. What must we do?

Renard [pointing to the house near the water.] You all see yonder house. 'Tis Gilbert's the journeyman carver. Do not lose sight of it. Disperse, with your people, but go not too far away. Above all, do nothing without me.

Chandos. Agreed.

[Exeunt in various directions.

Renard [alone.] Such a man as I need is not easily found.

[Exit.—Enter Jane and Gilbert, arm-in-arm; they walk toward the house. Joshua Farnaby, wrapped in a cloak, accompanies them.

Scene 2.—Jane, Gilbert, Joshua Farnaby.

Joshua. I leave you here, my dear friends. It is late, and I must resume my services as warden in the Tower. Ah! I am not free like you! A turnkey, you see, is only a sort of prisoner. Fare you well, Jane. Fare you well, Gilbert. Good lack! my friends, how happy I am to see you happy! By the way, Gilbert, when is the wedding to be?

Gilbert. A week hence; eh, Jane?

Joshua. By my faith! the day after to-morrow will be Christmas. This is the season of gifts and good wishes. But I have nothing to wish for you. It is impossible to imagine more love in a lover or more beauty in a sweetheart. You are happy!

Gilbert. Dear Joshua! And you—are you not happy?

Joshua. Neither happy nor unhappy. I have renounced everything. Look, Gilbert [opening his cloak and disclosing a bunch of keys hanging at his belt], these prison-keys, jingling always at your belt, they talk, they inspire all sorts of philosophic thoughts. When I was young, I was like other men, in love a whole day, ambitious a whole month, mad a whole year. It was under King Henry the Eighth that I was young. A strange man was that same Henry the Eighth! a man who changed wives as a woman changes dresses. He cast off the first, he had the second's head cut off, he had the third disembowelled; as for the fourth, he pardoned her and simply turned her out-of-doors, but, in revenge, the fifth lost her head. This is not the tale of Blue Beard that I am telling you, lovely Jane, but the history of Henry the Eighth. In those days, I was busied with the religious wars: I fought on both sides. That was the best course then. In any case the question was a very knotty one. It was a matter of being for or against the Pope. The King's men hung those who were for the Pope, but they burned those who were against him. The indifferent—those who were neither for nor against—they burned or hung, indifferently. Let him save himself who could. Yes, the rope. No, the stake. Neither yes nor no, the rope or the stake. I who speak to you have smelt the smoke more than once, and I am not sure that I was not strung up two or three times. Those were fine times, almost like these. Yes, I fought for it all. Deuce take me if I know now for whom or for what I fought. If anyone mentions Master Luther or Pope Paul the Third to me, I shrug my shoulders. You see, Gilbert, when your hair is grey, you mustn't go back to the ideas you fought for and the women you made love to when you were twenty. Women and ideas alike appear very ugly and old and toothless and wrinkled and paltry and foolish. That is my story. Now I have retired from public affairs. I am neither King's soldier nor Pope's soldier; I am a gaoler in the Tower. I fight for nobody, and I put everybody behind the bars. I am a gaoler and I am an old man. I have one foot in the prison and the other in the grave. It is I who pick up the pieces of all the ministers and favourites who get broken in the Queen's palace. It is most diverting. And then I have a little child whom I love, and you two whom I love also, and if you are happy I am happy!

Gilbert. In that case, be happy, Joshua; eh, Jane?

Joshua. I can do nothing for your happiness, but Jane can do everything. You love her! I shall never do you any service while I live. Luckily you are not high enough in rank ever to need the turnkey of the Tower of London. Jane will pay my debt at the same time with her own. For she and I owe everything to you. Jane was only a poor abandoned orphan; you took her in and reared her. I was drowning in the Thames one fine day; you took me out of the water.

Gilbert. Why need you be always talking of that, Joshua?

Joshua. To tell you that 'tis our duty, Jane's and mine, to love you, I, as a brother, she—not as a sister.

Jane. No, as a wife. I understand you, Joshua.

[She falls a-musing again.

Gilbert [to Joshua, in an undertone.] Look at her, Joshua! Isn't she beautiful and charming and worthy of a king? If you but knew! You cannot conceive how dearly I love her!

Joshua. Beware. 'Tis imprudent. A woman isn't to be loved like that. As for a child—well enough!

Gilbert. What do you mean?

Joshua. Nothing.—I will be at your wedding a week hence. I trust that affairs of state will allow me a little liberty then, and that 'twill all be over.

Gilbert. That what will be over?

Joshua. Oh! you don't concern yourself with such matters, Gilbert. You are in love. You are of the people. And what have you to do with intrigues in high life, you who are happy in a humble station? But since you ask the question, I will tell you that it is hoped that within a week, within twenty-four hours, it may be, Fabiano Fabiani will be replaced in the Queen's service by another.

Gilbert. Who is Fabiano Fabiani?

Joshua. He is the Queen's lover; he is a very famous and very seductive favourite; a favourite who gets you a man's head cut off more quickly than a procuress says Ave,—the best favourite the headsman of the Tower has had for ten years. For, you know, the headsman receives for every great noble's head ten silver crowns, and sometimes twice that, when the head is unusually eminent.—The downfall of this Fabiani is fervently desired.—To be sure, in my service at the Tower, I hear nobody talk about him except those who are in a decidedly evil mood—men whose heads are to be cut off within the month—malcontents.

Gilbert. Let the wolves devour one another! What do we care for the Queen and the Queen's favourite—eh, Jane?

Joshua. Oh! there 's a fine plot on foot against Fabiani. If he escapes it, he 'll be fortunate, indeed. I should not be surprised if something were done to-night. I saw Master Simon Renard prowling about here just now, in deep thought.

Gilbert. Who is Master Simon Renard?

Joshua. How does it happen that you do not know him? He's the Emperor's right arm in London. The Queen is to marry the Prince of Spain, whose ambassador to her this Simon Renard is. The Queen hates him, but she fears him, and can do nothing against him. He has already crushed two or three favourites. He sweeps the palace clean from time to time. A subtle and most malignant man, who knows all that is going forward, and who is forever digging two or three floors of subterranean intrigues under every occurrence. As for Lord Paget,—did you not ask also who Lord Paget is?—he is a crafty gentleman who was prominent in affairs under Henry the Eighth. He is a member of the select council. His influence is so predominant that the other ministers dare not breathe in his presence, save the Chancellor, Lord Gardiner, who detests him. A man of violent temper, this Gardiner, and very well-born. As for Paget, he 's a mere nobody—a cobbler's son. He 's to be created Baron Paget of Beaudesert in Staffordshire.

Gilbert. How trippingly he doth tell all these things, doth this Joshua!

Joshua. Good lack! by dint of hearing the prisoners of state converse.

[Renard appears at the back of the stage.

Look you, Gilbert, the man who best knows the history of these days is the gaoler of the Tower of London.

Renard [who has overheard the last words.] You are wrong, my good man, 'tis the headsman.

Joshua [to Jane and Gilbert, in an undertone.] Let us stand apart.

[Renard walks slowly across the stage and exit.

'Tis Master Simon Renard himself.

Gilbert. All these people prowling about my house anger me.

Joshua. What the deuce is he doing here? I must return at once. I think that he 's preparing work for me. Fare you well, Gilbert. Fare you well, Jane.—I saw you both when you were no taller than that.

Gilbert. Fare you well, Joshua.—But, tell me, what is that you are hiding under your cloak?

Joshua. Oh! I have my own little plot.

Gilbert. What is it?

Joshua. Oh! you lovers who forget everything! I have just told you that day after to-morrow is the day of gifts. The nobles are plotting a surprise for Fabiani; and I am plotting in my turn. The Queen, perchance, is going to give herself a new favourite. I am going to give my child a doll.

[He takes a doll from under his cloak.

'Tis all new, also.—We shall see which of the two will break her doll first. God keep you, my friends!

Gilbert. Good-night, Joshua.

[Joshua walks away. Gilbert seizes Jane's hand and kisses it passionately.

Joshua [at the back of the stage.] Ah! how great is Providence! It gives to each his plaything: the doll to the child, the child to the man, the man to the woman, the woman to the devil!

Scene 3.—Gilbert, Jane.

Gilbert. I, too, must leave you. Good-night, my Jane. Sleep well.

Jane. You will not come in with me to-night, Gilbert?

Gilbert. I cannot. As I told you, Jane, I have some work to finish in my shop to-night. A dagger-hilt to carve for one Lord Clanbrassil, whom I have never seen, and who ordered it for to-morrow morning.

Jane. Good-night, then, Gilbert. Until to-morrow.

Gilbert. No, Jane—stay a moment. Great God! how hard it is for me to part from you, even for a few hours! How truly you are my joy and my life! But I must go and work; We are so poor! I must not go in with you, for I should stay; and yet I cannot leave you, weak creature that I am! Let us sit a few moments at the door, on this bench. It seems to me that it will not be so hard to go away as if I went into the house and, above all, to your room. Give me your hand.

[He sits down and takes both her hands in his, while she stands beside him.

Dost love me, Jane?

Jane. Oh! I owe everything to you, Gilbert. I know it, although you concealed it from me a long time. When I was a little child, almost in the cradle, I was abandoned by my parents, and you took me. For sixteen years your arm has worked for me like a father's, your eyes have watched over me like a mother's. What should I be but for you? All that I have, you have given me; all that I am, you have made me.

Gilbert. Jane, dost love me?

Jane. Such devotion as yours, Gilbert! You work for me night and day. You wear out your eyes, you are killing yourself. And now again you are going to work all night. And never a reproach, never a harsh word, never a sign of anger. Poor as you are, you have pity even on my petty woman's whims, and gratify them. Gilbert, I never think of you without tears in my eyes. You have sometimes lacked bread, but I have never lacked ribbons.

Gilbert. Jane, dost love me?

Jane. Gilbert, I would like to kiss your feet.

Gilbert. Dost love me? dost love me? Oh! all this does not tell me that you love me. That is the word I crave, Jane! Gratitude, always gratitude! Oh! I trample your gratitude under my feet! I will have love or nothing!—To die!—Jane, for sixteen years you have been my daughter, now you will be my wife. I adopted you, now I would marry you! A week hence, you know you promised me. You consented. You are my betrothed. Oh! you loved me when you gave me that promise. O Jane! there was a time—do you remember?—when you said, "I love thee!" raising your lovely eyes to Heaven. I would have you like that still. For several months past it has seemed to me that there has been some change in you—especially during these last three weeks when my work has compelled me to be absent sometimes at night. O Jane! I want you to love me. I am used to it. You, who were always so joyous, seem sad and preoccupied now—not cold, poor child; you do your utmost not to be that; but I feel that words of love do not come naturally to your lips as they used. What is it? Is it that you no longer love me? No doubt I am an honest man, no doubt I am a good workman—no doubt, no doubt! But I would rather be a thief and a murderer, and be loved by you!—Jane! if you knew how I love you!

Jane. I do know, Gilbert, and I weep because of it.

Gilbert. For joy, is it not? Tell me that 'tis for joy. Oh! I must believe it. There is nothing else in the world but that—to be loved. I am only a poor artisan, but my Jane must love me. Why do you talk to me forever of what I have done for you? A single word of love, from you, Jane, puts all the gratitude on my side. I will damn myself, I will commit a crime, when you choose. You will be my wife, won't you, and you do love me? Why, Jane, for a glance from you I would give all my toil, for a smile my life, for a kiss my very soul!

Jane. What a noble heart you have, Gilbert!

Gilbert. Listen, Jane! laugh at me if you am mad, I am jealous! That 's the truth. Don't be offended. For some time past it has seemed to me that I have seen young gentlemen prowling about here. Do you know, Jane, that I am thirty-four years old? What a misfortune for a wretched, awkward, ill-clad workingman like myself, who is no longer young, who is not comely, to love a beautiful, fascinating child of seventeen, who attracts fine young noblemen, begilt and bedizened, as a light attracts moths! Oh! I am suffering sorely! I never insult you in my thoughts, you so sincere, so pure, whose brow no lips save mine have ever touched! It simply seems to me that sometimes you take too much pleasure in watching the Queen's retinue and riding parties pass, and in seeing all those fine coats of satin and velvet beneath which there are so few hearts and so few souls! Forgive me!—Great Heaven! why is it that so many young gentlemen come to this place? Why am I not young, handsome, nobly born and rich? Gilbert the carver—that is all. And they are Lord Chandos, and Lord Gerard Fitz-Gerard, and the Earl of Arundel, and the Duke of Norfolk! Oh! how I hate them! I pass my life carving for them hilts for swords whose blades I would like to run through their bodies.