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Why that was false: there is the right, I'll fight it on the threshold of the

hand still

Beckons me hence.

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grave.

Lady Clarence. Madam, your royal sister comes to see you. Mary. I will not see her.

Who knows if Boleyn's daughter be my sister?

arm.

I will see none except the priest. Your O Saint of Aragon, with that sweet worn [To LADY CLARENCE. smile Among thy patient wrinkleshence.

And Pole; we are three to one you found mercy there,

Have

Grant it me here and see he

smiles

and goes,

Gentle as in life.

Alice. Madam, who goes? Philip?

King

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Mary. No, Philip comes and

but never goes.

Women, when I am dead,

Open my heart, and there you will find

written

Two names, Philip and Calais; open his,

So that he have one,

You will find Philip only, policy, policy,

Ay, worse than that

true to me!

not one hour

Foul maggots crawling in a fester'd vice! Adulterous to the very heart of Hell. Hast thou a knife?

Alice. Ay, Madam, but o' God's mercy

Mary. Fool, think'st thou I would peril mine own soul

By slaughter of the body? I could not, girl,

Not this way- callous with a constant

stripe, Unwoundable.

Thy knife! Take heed, take heed! The blade is keen as death.

Alice.

Mary. This Philip shall not Stare in upon me in my haggardness; Old, miserable, diseased, Incapable of children. Come thou down, [Cuts out the picture and throws it down.

Lie there. (Wails.) O God, I have killed my Philip.

Alice. No, Madam, you have but cut the canvas out, We can replace it. Mary. All is well then; rest I will to rest; he said, I must have rest. [Cries of" ELIZABETH " in the street. A cry! What's that? Elizabeth? revolt?

A new Northumberland, another Wyatt?

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and SIR WILLIAM CECIL.

Elizabeth. Good counsel yours

No one in waiting? still,

As if the chamberlain were Death him

self! The room she sleeps in

way?

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is not this the

No, that way there are voices. too late?

way.

Am I

Cecil... God guide me lest I lose the [Exit ELIZABETH. Cecil. Many points weather'd, many perilous ones,

At last a harbor opens; but therein Sunk rocks - they need find steering

much it is

To be nor mad, nor bigot - have a mind

Not let Priests' talk, or dream of worlds to be,

Miscolor things about her - sudden touches For him, or him - sunk rocks; no passionate faith if let be- - balance and compromise; Brave, wary, sane to the heart of hera Tudor

But

School'd by the shadow of death- -a Boleyn, too,

Glancing across the Tudor- not so well.
Enter ALICE.

How is the good Queen now?
Alice.
Back in her childhood
her mother

Away from Philip. - prattling to

Of her betrothal to the Emperor Charles, And childlike-jealous of him again

and once

She thank'd her father sweetly for his book

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Poor sister? Sir, I swear I have no heart To be your Queen. To reign is restless fence,

Tierce, quart, and trickery. Peace is with the dead.

Her life was winter, for her spring was nipt:

And she loved much: pray God she be forgiven.

Cecil. Peace with the dead, who never were at peace!

Yet she loved one so much-1 needs must say

That never English monarch dying left
England so little.
Elizabeth.

But with Cecil's aid And others, if our person be secured From traitor stabs- we will make England great.

Enter PAGET, and other LORDS OF THE COUNCIL, SIR RALPH BAGENHALL, etc. Lords. God save Elizabeth, the Queen of England!

Bagenhall. God save the Crown: the Papacy is no more.

Paget (aside). Are we so sure of that? Acclamation. God save the Queen!

HAROLD.

TO HIS EXCELLENCY

THE RIGHT HON. LORD LYTTON,

VICEROY AND GOVERNOR-GENERAL OF INDIA.

MY DEAR LORD LYTTON, -After old-world records, such as the Bayeux tapestry and the Roman de Rou, Edward Freeman's History of the Norman Conquest, and your father's Historical Romance treating of the same times, have been mainly helpful to me in writing this Drama. Your father dedicated his "Harold " to my father's brother; allow me to dedicate my "Harold " to yourself.

SHOW-DAY AT BATTLE ABBEY, 1876.

A garden here May breath and bloom of spring -
The cuckoo yonder from an English elm
Crying" with my false egg I overwhelm
The native nest": and fancy hears the ring
Of harness, and that deathful arrow sing,
And Saxon battle axe clang on Norman helm.
Here rose the dragon-banner of our realm:
Here fought, here fell, our Norman-slander'd king.
O Garden blossoming out of English blood!
O strange hate-healer Time! We stroll and stare
Where might made right eight hundred years ago;
Might, right? ay good, so all things make for good-
But he and he, if soul be soul, are where
Each stands full face with all he did below.

A. TENNYSON.

DRAMATIS PERSONE.

KING EDWARD THE CONFESSOR.

STIGAND (created Archbishop of Canterbury by the Antipope Benedict).

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OSGOD and ATHELRIC ( Canons from Waltham).

THE QUEEN (Edward the Confessor's Wife, Daughter of Godwin).

ALDWYTH (Daughter of Alfgar and Widow of Griffyth, King of Wales).
EDITH (Ward of King Edward).

Courtiers, Earls and Thanes, Men-at-Arms, Canons of Waltham, Fishermen, etc.

Compater Heraldi, quidam partim Normannus et Anglus. Guy of Amiens.

ACT I.

Three rods of blood-red fire up yonder

mean

SCENE I. LONDON. THE KING'S The doom of England and the wrath of

PALACE.

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Abysm.

from the undescendible

upward

Heaven?

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Ask our Archbishop.

First Courtier. Or floated downward Stigand should know the purposes of

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Heaven.

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Ask our broad Earl.

[Pointing to HAROLD, who enters. Harold (seeing GAMEL). Hail, Gamei, son of Orr !

Morcar. Lord Leofwin, dost thou be-] Albeit no rolling stone, my good friend

of this!

lieve, that these

Gamei,

Thou hast rounded since we met. Thy | life at home

Is easier than mine here. Look! am I

not

Work-wan, flesh-fallen?

Gamel. Art thou sick, good Earl? Harold. Sick as an autumn swallow

for a voyage,

Sick for an idle week of hawk and hound Beyond the seas a change! When camest thou hither?

Gamel. To-day, good Earl. Harold. Is the North quiet, Gamel? Gamel. Nay, there be murmurs, for thy brother breaks us With over-taxing-quiet, ay, as yet Nothing as yet.

Harold. Stand by him, mine old friend,

Thou art a great voice in Northumberland!

Advise him speak him sweetly, he will hear thee.

He is passionate but honest. Stand thou by him!

More talk of this to-morrow, if yon weird sign

Not blast us in our dreams. Well, father Stigand

[To STIGAND, who advances to him. Stigand (pointing to the comet). War there, my son? is that the doom of England?

Harold. Why not the doom of all the world as well?

For all the world sees it as well as England.

Gurth. I trust the kingly touch that cures the evil

May serve to charm the tiger out of him. Leofwin. He hath as much of cat as tiger in him.

Our Tostig loves the hand and not the

man.

Harold. Nay! Better die than lie!

Enter KING, QUEEN and TOSTIG. Edward. In heaven signs! Signs upon earth! signs everywhere! your Priests

Gross, worldly, simoniacal, unlearn'd! They scarce can read their Psalter; and your churches

Uncouth, unhandsome, while in Nor

manland

God speaks thro' abler voices, as He dwells

In statelier shrines. I say not this, as being

Half Norman-blooded, nor as some have held,

Because I love the Norman better-no, But dreading God's revenge upon this realm

For narrowness and coldness: and I say it
For the last time perchance, before I go
To find the sweet refreshment of the
Saints.

I have lived a life of utter purity:
I have builded the great church of Holy
Peter:

I have wrought miracles- to God the glory

And miracles will in my name be wrought These meteors came and went before our Hereafter. - I have fought the fight and

day,

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go

I see the flashing of the gates of pearl And it is well with me, tho' some of you Have scorn'd me- - ay- but after I am

gone Woe, woe to England! I have had a vision;

The seven sleepers in the cave at Ephesus
Have turn'd from right to left.
Harold.
My most dear Master,
What matters? let them turn from left
to right
And sleep again.

Tostig. Too hardy with thy king! A life of prayer and fasting well may

see

Deeper into the mysteries of heaven
Than thou, good brother.

Aldwyth (aside). Sees he into thine,

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