Part 1

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KING LEAR'S WIFE

THE CRIER BY NIGHT

THE RIDING TO LITHEND

MIDSUMMER-EVE

LAODICE AND DANAË

PLAYS BY GORDON BOTTOMLEY

BOSTON SMALL, MAYNARD & COMPANY PUBLISHERS

MADE AND PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY CHARLES WHITTINGHAM AND GRIGGS (PRINTERS), LTD. AT THE CHISWICK PRESS, TOOKS COURT, CHANCERY LANE.

CONTENTS

PAGE KING LEAR'S WIFE 1

THE CRIER BY NIGHT 49

THE RIDING TO LITHEND 81

MIDSUMMER EVE 131

LAODICE AND DANAË 169

APPENDIX A (KING LEAR'S WIFE) 207

APPENDIX B (THE CRIER BY NIGHT) 211

NOTE.--_Throughout the stage-directions in the following pages the words "right" and "left" are used with reference to the actor's right and left, not the spectator's._

"REMEMBER THE LIFE OF THESE THINGS CONSISTS IN ACTION."

JOHN MARSTON: 1606.

BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE

THE plays here collected were originally published separately at various dates during the past eighteen years, and are now brought together for the first time. The details of the previous issues, now for the most part out of print, are appended.

I. THE CRIER BY NIGHT. (1900.) Published by the Unicorn Press, London, 1902. 32 pp. Quarto, boards. 500 copies.

II. MIDSUMMER EVE. (1901-2.) Printed and published at the Pear Tree Press, South Harting, near Petersfield, 1905, with decorations by James Guthrie. iv+ 36 pp. Large post 8vo, boards. 120 copies.

III. LAODICE AND DANAË. (1906.) Printed for private circulation, 1909. iv + 26 pp. Royal 8vo, wrappers. 150 copies.

IV. THE RIDING TO LITHEND. (1907.) Printed and published at the Pear Tree Press, Flansham near Bognor, 1909, with decorations by James Guthrie. vi + 40pp. Foolscap 4to, boards. 120 copies (20 of which had an extra plate and were hand-coloured.)

V. KING LEAR'S WIFE. (1911-13.) Published in "Georgian Poetry, 1913-1915," pp. 1 to 47. The Poetry Bookshop, London, 1915.

THE CRIER BY NIGHT, THE RIDING TO LITHEND, and LAODICE AND DANAË have been reprinted in the United States of America, the first in 1909, the second in two separate forms in 1910, the third in 1916.

NOTE

APPLICATIONS for permission to perform these plays in Great Britain and the Colonies should be addressed to the author, care of Messrs. Constable and Co. Ltd., 10-12 Orange Street, Leicester Square, London, W.C.2; and in the United States of America to Mr. Paul R. Reynolds, 70 Fifth Avenue, New York.

KING LEAR'S WIFE _is copyright by Gordon Bottomley in the United States of America_, 1915.

KING LEAR'S WIFE

_TO T. STURGE MOORE_

_THE years come on, the years go by, And in my Northern valley I, Withdrawn from life, watch life go by. But I have formed within my heart A state that does not thus depart, Richer than life, greater than being, Truer in feeling and in seeing Than outward turbulence can know; Where time is still, like a large, slow And lofty bird that moves her wings In far, invisible flutterings To gaze on every part of space Yet poise for ever in one place; Where line and sound, colour and phrase Rebuild in clear, essential ways The powers behind the veil of sense; While tragic things are made intense By passion brooding on old dread, Till a faint light of beauty shed From night-enfolded agony Shews in the ways men fail and die The deeps whose knowledge never cloys But, striking inward without voice, Stirs me to tremble and rejoice._

_For twenty years and more than twenty I have found my riches and my plenty In poets dead and poets living, Painters and music-men, all giving, By life shut in creative deeds, Live force and insight to my needs; And long before I came to stand And hear your voice and touch your hand In that great treasure-house new-known, Where in their tower above the Town The masters of _The Dial_ sit, I loved in every word of it Your finely tempered verse that told me Of patient power, and still can hold me By its authentic divination Of the right knowledge of creation, Its grave, still beauty brought to day Tissue by tissue in nature's way, Petal by petal sure to shew Imagination's quiet glow That burns intenseliest at the core. And through that twenty years and more I have been envious of your reach In speaking form and plastic speech, Your double energy of hand That puts two arts at your command While I must be content with one And feel true life but half begun; So that by graver as by pen You can create earth, stars, and men, And prove yourself by more than rime A prince of poets in our time._

_For these delights, and the delight Of converse in a Surrey night After the deep sound had lapsed by Of ocean-haunted poetry, For counsel and another zest Added to beauty's life-long quest I, in acknowledgment, would bring The homage of an offering; And, being too poor to reach the height Of my conception or requite Your greater giving equally, I search in my capacity And, by my self-appointed trade, Find something I myself have made, That here I offer. Let it be A token betwixt you and me Of admiration and loyalty._

February 29th, 1916.

PERSONS:

LEAR, King of Britain. HYGD, his Queen. GONERIL, daughter to Lear and Hygd. CORDEIL, daughter to Lear and Hygd. GORMFLAITH, waiting-woman to Hygd. MERRYN, waiting-woman to Hygd. A PHYSICIAN. TWO ELDERLY WOMEN.

KING LEAR'S WIFE

_The scene is a bedchamber in a one-storied house. The walls consist of a few courses of huge irregular boulders roughly squared and fitted together; a thatched roof rises steeply from the back wall. In the centre of the back wall is a doorway opening on a garden and covered by two leather curtains; the chamber is partially hung with similar hangings stitched with bright wools. There is a small window on each side of this door._

_Toward the front a bed stands with its head against the right wall; it has thin leather curtains hung by thongs and drawn back. Farther forward a rich robe and a crown hang on a peg in the same wall. There is a second door beyond the bed, and between this and the bed's head stands a small table with a bronze lamp and a bronze cup on it. Queen HYGD, an emaciated woman, is asleep in the bed; her plenteous black hair, veined with silver, spreads over the pillow. Her waiting-woman, MERRYN, middle-aged and hard-featured, sits watching her in a chair on the farther side of the bed. The light of early morning fills the room._

MERRYN. MANY, many must die who long to live, Yet this one cannot die who longs to die: Even her sleep, come now at last, thwarts death, Although sleep lures us all half way to death.... I could not sit beside her every night If I believed that I might suffer so: I am sure I am not made to be diseased, I feel there is no malady can touch me-- Save the red cancer, growing where it will.

_Taking her beads from her girdle, she kneels at the foot of the bed._

O sweet Saint Cleer, and sweet Saint Elid too, Shield me from rooting cancers and from madness: Shield me from sudden death, worse than two death-beds; Let me not lie like this unwanted queen, Yet let my time come not ere I am ready-- Grant space enow to relish the watchers' tears And give my clothes away and calm my features And streek my limbs according to my will, Not the hard will of fumbling corpse-washers.

_She prays silently._

_KING LEAR, a great, golden-bearded man in the full maturity of life, enters abruptly by the door beyond the bed, followed by the PHYSICIAN._

LEAR. Why are you here? Are you here for ever? Where is the young Scotswoman? Where is she?

MERRYN. O, Sire, move softly; the Queen sleeps at last.

LEAR, _continuing in an undertone._ Where is the young Scotswoman? Where is Gormflaith? It is her watch.... I know; I have marked your hours. Did the Queen send her away? Did the Queen Bid you stay near her in her hate of Gormflaith? You work upon her yeasting brain to think That she's not safe except when you crouch near her To spy with your dropt eyes and soundless presence.

MERRYN. Sire, midnight should have ended Gormflaith's watch, But Gormflaith had another kind of will And ended at a godlier hour by slumber, A letter in her hand, the night-lamp out. She loitered in the hall when she should sleep. My duty has two hours ere she returns.

LEAR. The Queen should have young women about her bed, Fresh cool-breathed women to lie down at her side And plenish her with vigour; for sick or wasted women Can draw a virtue from such abounding presence, When night makes life unwary and looses the strings of being, Even by the breath, and most of all by sleep. Her slumber was then no fault: go you and find her.

PHYSICIAN. It is not strange that a bought watcher drowses; What is most strange is that the Queen sleeps Who would not sleep for all my draughts of sleep In the last days. When did this change appear?

MERRYN. We shall not know--it came while Gormflaith nodded. When I awoke her and she saw the Queen She could not speak for fear: When the rekindling lamp showed certainly The bed-clothes stirring about our lady's neck, She knew there was no death, she breathed, she said She had not slept until her mistress slept And lulled her; but I asked her how her mistress Slept, and her utterance faded. She should be blamed with rods, as I was blamed For slumber, after a day and a night of watching, By the Queen's child-bed, twenty years ago.

LEAR. She does what she must do: let her alone. I know her watch is now: get gone and send her.

_MERRYN goes out by the door beyond the bed._

Is it a portent now to sleep at night? What change is here? What see you in the Queen? Can you discern how this disease will end?

PHYSICIAN. Surmise might spring and healing follow yet, If I could find a trouble that could heal; But these strong inward pains that keep her ebbing Have not their source in perishing flesh. I have seen women creep into their beds And sink with this blind pain because they nursed Some bitterness or burden in the mind That drew the life, sucklings too long at breast. Do you know such a cause in this poor lady?

LEAR. There is no cause. How should there be a cause?

PHYSICIAN. We cannot die wholly against our wills; And in the texture of women I have found Harder determination than in men: The body grows impatient of enduring, The harried mind is from the body estranged, And we consent to go: by the Queen's touch, The way she moves--or does not move--in bed, The eyes so cold and keen in her white mask, I know she has consented. The snarling look of a mute wounded hawk, That would be let alone, is always hers-- Yet she was sorely tender: it may be Some wound in her affection will not heal. We should be careful--the mind can so be hurt That nought can make it be unhurt again. Where, then, did her affection most persist?

LEAR. Old bone-patcher, old digger in men's flesh, Doctors are ever itching to be priests, Meddling in conduct, natures, life's privacies. We have been coupled now for twenty years, And she has never turned from me an hour-- She knows a woman's duty and a queen's: Whose, then, can her affection be but mine? How can I hurt her--she is still my queen? If her strong inward pain is a real pain Find me some certain drug to medicine it: When common beings have decayed past help, There must be still some drug for a king to use; For nothing ought to be denied to kings.

PHYSICIAN. For the mere anguish there is such a potion. The gum of warpy juniper shoots is seethed With the torn marrow of an adder's spine; An unflawed emerald is pashed to dust And mingled there; that broth must cool in moonlight. I have indeed attempted this already, But the poor emeralds I could extort From wry-mouthed earls' women had no force. In two more dawns it will be late for potions.... There are not many emeralds in Britain, And there is none for vividness and strength Like the great stone that hangs upon your breast: If you will waste it for her she shall be holpen.

LEAR, _with rising voice._ Shatter my emerald? My emerald? My emerald? A High King of Eire gave it to his daughter Who mothered generations of us, the kings of Britain; It has a spiritual influence; its heart Burns when it sees the sun.... Shatter my emerald! Only the fungused brain and carious mouth Of senile things could shape such thought.... My emerald!

_HYGD stirs uneasily in her sleep._

PHYSICIAN. Speak lower, low; for your good fame, speak low-- If she should waken thus....

LEAR. There is no wise man Believes that medicine is in a jewel. It is enough that you have failed with one. Seek you a common stone. I'll not do it. Let her eat heartily: she is spent with fasting. Let her stand up and walk: she is so still Her blood can never nourish her. Come away.

PHYSICIAN. I must not leave her ere the woman comes-- Or will some other woman....

LEAR. No, no, no, no; The Queen is not herself; she speaks without sense; Only Merryn and Gormflaith understand. She is better quiet. Come....

_He urges the PHYSICIAN roughly away by the shoulder._

My emerald!

_He follows the PHYSICIAN out by the door at the back._

_Queen HYGD awakes at his last noisy words as he disappears._

HYGD. I have not slept; I did but close mine eyes A little while--a little while forgetting.... Where are you, Merryn?... Ah, it is not Merryn.... Bring me the cup of whey, woman; I thirst.... Will you speak to me if I say your name? Will you not listen, Gormflaith? ... Can you hear? I am very thirsty--let me drink.... Ah, wicked woman, why did I speak to you? I will not be your suppliant again.... Where are you? O, where are you?... Where are you?

_She tries to raise herself to look about the room, but sinks back helplessly._

_The curtains of the door at the back are parted, and GONERIL appears in hunting dress,--her kirtle caught up in her girdle, a light spear over her shoulder--stands there a moment, then enters noiselessly and approaches the bed. She is a girl just turning to womanhood, proud in her poise, swift and cold, an almost gleaming presence, a virgin huntress._

GONERIL. Mother, were you calling? Have I awakened you? They said that you were sleeping. Why are you left alone, mother, my dear one?

HYGD. Who are you? No, no, no! Stand farther off! You pulse and glow; you are too vital; your presence hurts.... Freshness of hill-swards, wind and trodden ling, I should have known that Goneril stands here. It is yet dawn, but you have been afoot Afar and long: where could you climb so soon?

GONERIL. Dearest, I am an evil daughter to you: I never thought of you--O, never once-- Until I heard a moor-bird cry like you. I am wicked, rapt in joys of breath and life, And I must force myself to think of you. I leave you to caretakers' cold gentleness; But O, I did not think that they dare leave you. What woman should be here?

HYGD. I have forgot.... I know not.... She will be about some duty. I do not matter: my time is done ... nigh done ... Bought hands can well prepare me for a grave, And all the generations must serve youth. My girls shall live untroubled while they may, And learn happiness once while yet blind men Have injured not their freedom; For women are not meant for happiness. Where have you been, my falcon?

GONERIL. I dreamt that I was swimming, shoulder up, And drave the bed-clothes spreading to the floor: Coldness awoke me; through the waning darkness I heard far hounds give shivering aëry tongue, Remote, withdrawing, suddenly faint and near; I leapt and saw a pack of stretching weasels Hunt a pale coney in a soundless rush, Their elfin and thin yelping pierced my heart As with an unseen beauty long awaited; Wolf-skin and cloak I buckled over this night-gear, And took my honoured spear from my bed-side Where none but I may touch its purity, And sped as lightly down the dewy bank As any mothy owl that hunts quick mice. They went crying, crying, but I lost them Before I stept, with the first tips of light, On Raven Crag near by the Druid Stones; So I paused there and, stooping, pressed my hand Against the stony bed of the clear stream; Then entered I the circle and raised up My shining hand in cold stern adoration Even as the first great gleam went up the sky.

HYGD. Ay, you do well to worship on that height: Life is free to the quick up in the wind, And the wind bares you for a god's descent-- For wind is a spirit immediate and aged. And you do well to worship harsh men-gods, God Wind and Those who built his Stones with him: All gods are cruel, bitter, and to be bribed, But women-gods are mean and cunning as well. That fierce old virgin, Cornish Merryn, prays To a young woman, yes and even a virgin-- The poorest kind of woman--and she says That is to be a Christian: avoid then Her worship most, for men hate such denials, And any woman scorns her unwed daughter. Where sped you from that height? Did Regan join you there?

GONERIL. Does Regan worship anywhere at dawn? The sweaty half-clad cook-maids render lard Out in the scullery, after pig-killing, And Regan sidles among their greasy skirts, Smeary and hot as they, for craps to suck. I lost my thoughts before the giant Stones... And when anew the earth assembled round me I swung out on the heath and woke a hare And speared it at a cast and shouldered it, Startled another drinking at a tarn And speared it ere it leapt; so steady and clear Had the god in his fastness made my mind. Then, as I took those dead things in my hands, I felt shame light my face from deep within, And loathing and contempt shake in my bowels, That such unclean coarse blows from me had issued To crush delicate things to bloody mash And blemish their fur when I would only kill. My gladness left me; I careered no more Upon the morning; I went down from there With empty hands: But under the first trees and without thought I stole on conies at play and stooped at one; I hunted it, I caught it up to me As I outsprang it, and with this thin knife Pierced it from eye to eye; and it was dead, Untorn, unsullied, and with flawless fur. Then my untroubled mind came back to me.

HYGD. Leap down the glades with a fawn's ignorance; Live you your fill of a harsh purity; Be wild and calm and lonely while you may. These are your nature's joys, and it is human Only to recognize our natures' joys When we are losing them for ever.

GONERIL. But why Do you say this to me with a sore heart? You are a queen, and speak from the top of life, And when you choose to wish for others' joys Those others must have woe.

HYGD. The hour comes for you to turn to a man And give yourself with the high heart of youth More lavishly than a queen gives anything. But when a woman gives herself She must give herself for ever and have faith; For woman is a thing of a season of years, She is an early fruit that will not keep, She can be drained and as a husk survive To hope for reverence for what has been; While man renews himself into old age, And gives himself according to his need, And women more unborn than his next child May take him yet with youth And lose him with their potence.

GONERIL. But women need not wed these men.

HYGD. We are good human currency, like gold, For men to pass among them when they choose.

_A child's hands beat on the outside of the door beyond the bed._

CORDEIL'S VOICE, _a child's voice, outside._ Father.... Father.... Father.... Are you here? Merryn, ugly Merryn, let me in.... I know my father is here.... I want him.... Now.... Mother, chide Merryn, she is old and slow....

HYGD, _softly._ My little curse. Send her away--away....

CORDEIL'S VOICE. Father.... O, father, father.... I want my father.

GONERIL, _opening the door a little way._ Hush; hush--you hurt your mother with your voice. You cannot come in, Cordeil; you must go away: Your father is not here....

CORDEIL'S VOICE. He must be here: He is not in his chamber or the hall, He is not in the stable or with Gormflaith: He promised I should ride with him at dawn And sit before his saddle and hold his hawk, And ride with him and ride to the heron-marsh; He said that he would give me the first heron, And hang the longest feathers in my hair.

GONERIL. Then you must haste to find him; He may be riding now....

CORDEIL'S VOICE. But Gerda said she saw him enter here.

GONERIL. Indeed, he is not here....

CORDEIL'S VOICE. Let me look....

GONERIL. You are too noisy. Must I make you go?

CORDEIL'S VOICE. Mother, Goneril is unkind to me.

HYGD, _raising herself in bed excitedly, and speaking so vehemently that her utterance strangles itself._ Go, go, thou evil child, thou ill-comer.

_GONERIL, with a sudden strong movement, shuts the resisting door and holds it rigidly. The little hands beat on it madly for a moment, then the child's voice is heard in a retreating wail._

GONERIL. Though she is wilful, obeying only the King, She is a very little child, mother, To be so bitterly thought of.

HYGD. Because a woman gives herself for ever Cordeil the useless had to be conceived (Like an after-thought that deceives nobody) To keep her father from another woman. And I lie here.

GONERIL, _after a silence._ Hard and unjust my father has been to me; Yet that has knitted up within my mind A love of coldness and a love of him Who makes me firm, wary, swift and secret, Until I feel if I become a mother I shall at need be cruel to my children, And ever cold, to string their natures harder And make them able to endure men's deeds; But now I wonder if injustice Keeps house with baseness, taught by kinship-- I never thought a king could be untrue, I never thought my father was unclean.... O mother, mother, what is it? Is this dying?

HYGD. I think I am only faint.... Give me the cup of whey....

_GONERIL takes the cup and, supporting HYGD, lets her drink._

GONERIL. There is too little here. When was it made?

HYGD. Yester-eve.... Yester-morn....