Act 5 — SCENE II.

Before a Castle in Wales.

Enter Aurelius and Uther, and Lords, with Soldiers.

Uth. My lord, the castle is so fortified—

Aur. Let wild-fire ruin it,

That his destruction may appear to him

In the figure of heaven’s wrath at the last day,

That murderer of our brother. Hence, away!

I’ll send my heart no peace till’t^[541] be consum’d.

[Enter above Vortiger and Horsus.

Uth. There he appears again—behold, my lord!

Aur. O that the zealous fire on my soul’s altar,

To the high birth of virtue consecrated,

Would fit me with a lightning now to blast him,

Even as I look upon him!

215Uth. Good my lord,

Your anger is too noble and too precious

To waste itself on guilt so foul as his:

Let ruin work her will.

Vort. Begirt all round?

Hor. All, all, my lord; ’tis folly to make doubt of’t:^[542]

You question things, that horror long ago

Resolv’d^[543] us on.

Vort. Give me leave, Horsus, though——

Hor. Do what you will, sir; question them again;

I’ll tell them to you.

Vort. Not so, sir;

I will not have them told again.

Hor. It rests then—

Vort. That’s an ill word put in, when thy heart knows

There is no rest at all, but torment waking.^[544]

Hor. True; my heart finds it, that sits weeping blood now

For poor Roxena’s safety.—[Aside.] You’ll confess, my lord,

My love to you has brought me to this danger?

I could have liv’d, like Hengist king of Kent,

London, York, Lincoln, and Winchester,

Under the power of my command, the portion

Of my most just desert, enjoyèd now

By pettier deservers.

Vort. Say you so, sir?

And you’ll confess, since you began confession,

(A thing I should have died ere I had thought on),

You’ve marr’d the fashion of your affection utterly,

In your own wicked counsel, there you paid me:

216You were bound in conscience to love me after;

You were bound to’t, as men in honesty,

That vitiate virgins, to give dowries to them:

My faith was pure before to a faithful woman.

Hor. My lord, my counsel—

Vort. Why, I’ll be judg’d by these

That knit death in their brows, and hold me now

Not worth the acception of a flattery;

Most of whose faces smil’d when I smil’d once.—

My lords!

Uth. Reply not, brother.

Vort. Seeds of scorn,

I mind you not; I speak to them alone

Whose force makes yours a power, which else were none.

Shew me the main food of your hate,

Which cannot be the murder of Constantius,

That crawls in your revenges, for your loves

Were violent long since that.

First Lord. And had been still,

If from that pagan wound thou’dst kept thee free;

But when thou fled’st from heaven, we fled from thee.

Vort. This was your counsel now.

Hor. Mine? ’twas the counsel

Of your own lust and blood; your appetite knows it.

Vort. May thunder strike me from these walls, my lords,

And leave me many leagues off from your eyes,

If this be not the man whose Stygian soul

Breath’d forth that counsel to me, and sole plotter

Of all those false injurious disgraces,

That have abus’d the virtuous patience

Of our religious queen.

Hor. A devil in madness!

Vort. Upon whose life I swear there sticks no stain

217But what’s most wrongful: and where^[545] now she thinks

A rape dwells on her honour, only I

Her ravisher was, and his the policy.

Aur. Inhuman practice!^[546]

Vort. Now you know the truth,

Will his death serve your fury?

Hor. My death?

Vort. Say, will it do it?

Hor. Say they should say ’twould do’t?

Vort. Why, then it must.

Hor. It must?

Vort. It shall.—

Speak but the word, it shall be yielded up.

Hor. Believe him not; he cannot do it.

Vort. Cannot?

Hor. ’Tis but a false and base insinuation

For his own life, and like his late submission.

Vort. O sting to honour! Alive or dead, thou goest

For that word’s rudeness only. [Stabs him.

First Lord. See, sin needs

No other destruction than [what] it breeds

In its own bosom.

Vort. Such another brings him.

Hor. What! has thy vile rage stampt a wound upon me?

I’ll send one to thy soul shall never heal for’t.

Vort. How, to my soul?

Hor. It shall be thy master torment,

Both for the pain and th’ everlastingness.

Vort. Ha, ha, ha!

Hor. Dost laugh? take leave of’t:^[547] all eternity

Shall never see thee do so much again.

Know, thou’rt a cuckold.

218Vort. What!

Hor. You change too soon, sir.

Roxena, whom thou’st rais’d to thy own ruin,

She was my whore in Germany.

Vort. Burst me open,

The violence of whirlwinds!

Hor. Hear me out first.

For her embrace, which my flesh yet sits warm in,

I was thy friend and follower.

Vort. Deafen me,

Thou most imperious noise that starts the world!

Hor. And to serve both our lusts, I practis’d with thee

Against thy virtuous queen.

Vort. Bane to all comforts!

Hor. Whose faithful sweetness, too precious for thy blood,

I made thee change for love’s hypocrisy.

Vort. Insufferable!

Hor. Only to make

My way to pleasure fearless, free, and fluent.

Vort. Hell’s trump is in that throat!

Hor. It shall sound shriller.

Vort. I’ll dam it up with death first.

[They stab each other. Enter Roxena above.

Rox. O for succour!

Who’s near me? Help me, save me! the flame follows me;

’Tis in the figure of young Vortimer, the prince,^[548]

Whose life I took by poison.

Hor. Hold out, breath,

And I shall find thee quickly.

Vort. I will^[549] tug

Thy soul out here.

219Hor. Do, monster!

Rox. Vortiger!

Vort. Monster!

Rox. My lord!

Vort. Toad! Pagan!

Hor. Viper! Christian!

Rox. O hear me, O help me, my love, my lord! ’tis here!

Horsus, look up, if not to succour me,

To see me yet consum’d. O what is love,

When life is not regarded!

Vort. What strength’s left

I’ll fix upon thy throat.

Hor. I have some force yet.

[They stab each other, Horsus falls.

Rox. No way to ’scape? is this the end of glory?

Doubly beset with enemies’ wrath, and fire?

It comes nearer—rivers and fountains, fall!—

It sucks away my breath; I cannot give

A curse to sin, and hear’t out while I live.

Help, help! [Falls.

Vort. Burn, burn! Now I can tend thee.

Take time with her in torment, call her life

Afar off to thee, dry up her strumpet-blood,

And hardly parch the skin; let one heat strangle her,

Another fetch her to her sense again,

And the worst pain be only her reviving;

Follow her eternally! O mystical harlot,

Thou hast thy full due! Whom lust crown’d queen before,

Flames crown her now a most triumphant whore;

And that end crowns them all! [Falls.

Aur. Our peace is full

In yon usurper’s fall; nor have I known

A judgment meet [the bad] more fearfully.

220Here, take this ring; deliver the good queen,

And those grave pledges of her murder’d honour,

Her worthy father and her noble uncle.

[Exit Second Lord with ring. Trumpets sound.

How now! the meaning of these sounds?

Enter Devonshire, Stafford, and Soldiers, with Hengist prisoner.

Hen. The consumer has been here; she’s gone, she’s lost;

In glowing cinders now lie all my joys:

The headlong fortune of my rash captivity

Strikes not so deep a wound into my hopes

As thy dear loss.

Aur. Her father and her uncle!

First Lord. They are indeed, my lord.

Aur. Part of my wishes.

What fortunate power has prevented^[550] me,

And ere my love came, brought them victory?

First Lord. My wonder sticks in Hengist, king of Kent.

Devonshire. My lord, to make that plain which now I see

Fix’d in astonishment; the only name

Of your return and being, brought such gladness

To this distracted kingdom, that, to express

A thankfulness to heaven, it grew great

In charitable actions; from which goodness

We taste our liberty, who liv’d engag’d

Upon the innocence of woman’s honour,

(A kindness that even threaten’d to undo us):

And having newly but enjoy’d the benefit

And fruits of our enlargement, ’twas our happiness

221To intercept this monster of ambition,

Bred in these times of usurpation,

The rankness of whose insolence and treason

Grew to such height, ’twas arm’d to bid you battle;

Whom, as our fame’s redemption, on our knees

We present captive.

Aur. Had it needed reason,

You richly came provided. I understood

Not your deserts till now.—My honour’d lords,

Is this that German Saxon, whose least thirst

Could not be satisfied under a province?

Heng. Had but my fate directed this bold arm

To thy life, the whole kingdom had been mine;

That was my hope’s great aim: I have a thirst

Could never have been full quench’d under all;

The whole must do’t, or nothing.

Aur. A strange drought!

And what a little ground shall death now teach you

To be content withal!

Heng. Why let it then,

For none else can; you’ve nam’d the only way

To limit my ambition; a full cure

For all my fading hopes and sickly fears;

Nor shall it be less welcome to me now,

Than a fresh acquisition would have been

Unto my new-built kingdoms. Life to me,

’Less it be glorious, is a misery.

Aur. That pleasure we will do you.—Lead him out:

And when we have inflicted our just doom

On his usurping head, it will become

Our pious care to see this realm secur’d

From the convulsions it hath long endur’d.

[Exeunt omnes.

223