Chapter 8

Enter Cornego and Onaelia.

CORNEGO Here's a parcel of man's flesh has been hanging up and down all this morning to speak with you.

ONAELIA Is't not some executioner?

CORNEGO I see nothing about him to hang in but his garters.

ONAELIA Sent from the King to warn me of my death: I prithee bid him welcome.

CORNEGO He says he is a poet.

ONAELIA Then bid him better welcome. Belike he's come to write my epitaph, Some scurvy thing I'll warrant. Welcome Sir.

Enter Poet.

POET Madam, my love presents this book unto you.

ONAELIA To me? I am not worthy of a line, Unless at that Line hang some hook to choke me:

[Onaelia reads book.]

To the Most Honoured Lady - Onaelia. Fellow thou liest, I'm most dishonoured: Thou should'st have writ to the most wronged Lady. The title of this book is not to me, I tear it therefore as mine honour's torn.

CORNEGO Your verses are lamed in some of their feet, Master poet.

ONAELIA What does it treat of?

POET Of the solemn triumphs Set forth at coronation of the Queen.

ONAELIA Hissing, the poet's whirlwind, blast thy lines! Com'st thou to mock my tortures with her triumphs?

POET 'Las Madam!

ONAELIA When her funerals are past, Crown thou a dedication to my joys, And thou shalt swear each line a golden verse. Cornego, burn this idol.

CORNGO Your book shall come to light, Sir.

Exit Cornego [with book.]

ONAELIA I have read legends of disastrous dames; Will none set pen to paper for poor me? Canst write a bitter satire? Brainless people Do call them libels. Darest thou write a libel?

POET I dare mix gall and poison with my ink.

ONAELIA Do it then for me.

POET And every line must be A whip to draw blood.

ONAELIA Better.

POET And to dare The stab from him it touches. He that writes Such libels, as you call them, must launch wide The sores of men's corruptions, and even search To the quick for dead flesh, or for rotten cores: A poet's ink can better cure some sores Than surgeon's balsam.

ONAELIA Undertake that cure And crown thy verse with bays.

POET Madam, I'll do it, But I must have the party's character.

ONAELIA The King.

POET I do not love to pluck the quills, With which I make pens, out of a lion's claw. The King! Should I be bitter 'gainst the King, I shall have scurvy ballads made of me, Sung to the hanging tune. I dare not, Madam.

ONAELIA This baseness follows your profession. You are like common beadles, apt to lash Almost to death poor wretches not worth striking, But fawn with slavish flattery on damned vices So great men act them. You clap hands at those, Where the true poet indeed doth scorn to guild A gaudy tomb with glory of his verse, Which coffins stinking carrion. No, his lines Are free as his invention. No base fear Can shake his pen to temporise even with kings, The blacker are their crimes, he louder sings. Go, go, thou canst not write: 'tis but my calling The muses help, that I may be inspired. Canst a woman be a poet, Sir?

POET Yes, Madam, best of all. For poesie Is but feigning, feigning is to lie, And women practice lying more than men.

ONAELIA Nay, but if I should write, I would tell truth. How might I reach a lofty strain?

POET Thus Madam: Books, music, wine, brave company and good cheer Make poets to soar high and sing most clear.

ONAELIA Are they born poets?

POET Yes.

ONAELIA Die they?

POET Oh, never die.

ONAELIA My misery is then a poet sure, For time has given it an eternity. What sort of poets are there?

POET Two sorts lady: The great poets and the small poets.

ONAELIA Great and small! Which do you call the great? The fat ones?

POET No: But such as have great heads, which emptied forth, Fill all the world with wonder at their lines; Fellows which swell big with the wind of praise. The small ones are but shrimps of poesie.

ONAELIA Which in the kingdom now is the best poet?

POET Emulation.

ONAELIA Which the next?

POET Necessity.

ONAELIA And which the worst?

POET Self-love.

ONAELIA Say I turn poet, what should I get?

POET Opinion.

ONAELIA Alas, I have got too much of that already, Opinion is my evidence, judge and jury. Mine own guilt and opinion now condemn me. I'll therefore be no poet, no nor make Ten muses of your nine. I'll swear for this; Verses, though freely born, like slaves are sold, I crown thy lines with bays, thy love with gold: So fare thou well.

POET Our pen shall honour thee.

Exit Poet, enter Cornego.

CORNEGO The poet's book Madam, has got the inflammation of the liver, it died of a burning fever.

ONAELIA What shall I do, Cornego? For this poet Has filled me with a fury. I could write Strange satires now against adulterers, And marriage-breakers.

CORNEGO I believe you Madam - but here comes your uncle.

Enter Medina, Alanzo, Carlo, Alba, Sebastian, Daenia.

MEDINA Where's our niece? Turn your brains round, and recollect your spirits, And see your noble friends and kinsmen ready To pay revenge his due.

ONAELIA That word revenge, Startles my sleepy soul, now thoroughly wakened By the fresh object of my hapless child Whose wrongs reach beyond mine.

SEBASTIAN How doth my sweet mother?

ONAELIA How doth my prettiest boy?

ALANZO Wrongs, like great whirlwinds, Shake highest battlements. Few for heaven would care, Should they be ever happy. They are half gods Who both in good days, and good fortune share.

ONAELIA I have no part in either.

CARLO You shall in both, Can swords but cut the way.

ONAELIA I care not much, so you but gently strike him, And that my child escape the lightening.

MEDINA For that our nerves are knit; is there not here A promising face of manly princely virtues, And shall so sweet a plant be rooted out By him that ought to fix it fast in the ground? Sebastian, what will you do to him That hurts your mother?

SEBASTIAN The King my father shall kill him I trow.

DAENIA But sweet cousin, the King loves not your mother.

SEBASTIAN I'll make him love her when I am a King.

MEDINA La you, there's in him a king's heart already. As therefore we before together vowed, Lay all your warlike hands upon my sword, And swear.

SEBASTIAN Will you swear to kill me, Uncle?

MEDINA Oh not for twenty worlds.

SEBASTIAN Nay then draw and spare not, for I love fighting.

MEDINA Stand in the midst, sweet coz, we are your guard. These hammers shall for thee beat out a crown If all hit right. Swear therefore, noble friends, By your high bloods, by true nobility, By what you owe religion, owe to your country, Owe to the raising your posterity, By love you bear to virtue, and to arms, The shield of innocence, swear not to sheath Your swords, when once drawn forth.

ONAELIA Oh not to kill him For twenty thousand worlds.

MEDINA Will you be quiet? Your swords when once drawn forth, till they have forced Yon godless, perjurous, perfidious man...

ONAELIA Pray rail not at him so.

MEDINA Art mad? You're idle Till they have forced him To cancel his late lawless bond he sealed At the high altar to his Florentine strumpet, And in his bed lay this his troth-plight wife.

ONAELIA I, I that's well. Pray swear.

ALL To this we swear.

SEBASTIAN Uncle, I swear too.

MEDINA Our forces let's unite, be bold and secret, And lion-like with open eyes let's sleep, Streams smooth and slowly running are most deep.

Exeunt.