Becket and Other Plays — Alfred Tennyson
Becket and Other Plays, by Alfred Lord Tennyson, Poet Laureate You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org . If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook. Title : Becket and other plays Author : Baron Alfred Tennyson Tennyson Release date : October 1, 2005 [eBook #9162] Most recently updated: February 10, 2019 Language : English Other information and formats : www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/9162 Credits : Etext produced by Jonathan Ingram, Tapio Riikonen and Distributed Proofreaders HTML file produced by David Widger *** START OF MY DEAR SELBORNE, To you, the honoured Chancellor of our own day, I dedicate this dramatic memorial of your great predecessor;—which, altho' not intended in its present form to meet the exigencies of our modern theatre, has nevertheless—for so you have assured me—won your approbation. Ever yours, TENNYSON. DRAMATIS PERSONAE . HENRY II. ( son of the Earl of Anjou ). THOMAS BECKET, Chancellor of England, afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury . GILBERT FOLIOT, Bishop of London . ROGER, Archbishop of York . Bishop of Hereford . HILARY, Bishop of Chichester . JOCELYN, Bishop of Salisbury . JOHN OF SALISBURY | HERBERT OF BOSHAM | friends of Becket . WALTER MAP, reputed author of 'Golias,' Latin poems against the priesthood . KING LOUIS OF FRANCE. GEOFFREY, son of Rosamund and Henry . GRIM, a monk of Cambridge . SIR REGINALD FITZURSE | SIR RICHARD DE BRITO | the four knights of the King's SIR WILLIAM DE TRACY | household, enemies of Becket . SIR HUGH DE MORVILLE | DE BROC OF SALTWOOD CASTLE. LORD LEICESTER. PHILIP DE ELEEMOSYNA. TWO KNIGHT TEMPLARS. JOHN OF OXFORD ( called the Swearer ). ELEANOR OF AQUITAINE, Queen of England (divorced from Louis of France) . ROSAMUND DE CLIFFORD. MARGERY. Knights, Monks, Beggars, etc . PROLOGUE. A Castle in Normandy. Interior of the Hall. Roofs of a City seen thro' Windows . HENRY and BECKET at chess . HENRY. So then our good Archbishop Theobald Lies dying. BECKET. I am grieved to know as much. HENRY. But we must have a mightier man than he For his successor. BECKET. Have you thought of one? HENRY. A cleric lately poison'd his own mother, And being brought before the courts of the Church, They but degraded him. I hope they whipt him. I would have hang'd him. BECKET. It is your move. HENRY. Well—there. [ Moves . The Church in the pell-mell of Stephen's time Hath climb'd the throne and almost clutch'd the crown; But by the royal customs of our realm The Church should hold her baronies of me, Like other lords amenable to law. I'll have them written down and made the law. BECKET. My liege, I move my bishop. HENRY. And if I live, No man without my leave shall excommunicate My tenants or my household. BECKET. Look to your king. HENRY. No man without my leave shall cross the seas To set the Pope against me—I pray your pardon. BECKET. Well—will you move? HENRY. There. [ Moves . BECKET. Check—you move so wildly. HENRY. There then! [ Moves . BECKET. Why—there then, for you see my bishop Hath brought your king to a standstill. You are beaten. HENRY ( kicks over the board ). Why, there then—down go bishop and king together. I loathe being beaten; had I fixt my fancy Upon the game I should have beaten thee, But that was vagabond. BECKET. Where, my liege? With Phryne, Or Lais, or thy Rosamund, or another? HENRY. My Rosamund is no Lais, Thomas Becket; And yet she plagues me too—no fault in her— But that I fear the Queen would have her life. BECKET. Put her away, put her away, my liege! Put her away into a nunnery! Safe enough there from her to whom thou art bound By Holy Church. And wherefore should she seek The life of Rosamund de Clifford more Than that of other paramours of thine? HENRY. How dost thou know I am not wedded to her? BECKET. How should I know? HENRY. That is my secret, Thomas. BECKET. State secrets should be patent to the statesman Who serves and loves his king, and whom the king Loves not as statesman, but true lover and friend. HENRY. Come, come, thou art but deacon, not yet bishop, No, nor archbishop, nor my confessor yet. I would to God thou wert, for I should find An easy father confessor in thee. BECKET. St. Denis, that thou shouldst not. I should beat Thy kingship as my bishop hath beaten it. HENRY. Hell take thy bishop then, and my kingship too! Come, come, I love thee and I know thee, I know thee, A doter on white pheasant-flesh at feasts, A sauce-deviser for thy days of fish, A dish-designer, and most amorous Of good old red sound liberal Gascon wine: Will not thy body rebel, man, if thou flatter it? BECKET. That palate is insane which cannot tell A good dish from a bad, new wine from old. HENRY. Well, who loves wine loves woman. BECKET. So I do. Men are God's trees, and women are God's flowers; And when the Gascon wine mounts to my head, The trees are all the statelier, and the flowers Are all the fairer. HENRY. And thy thoughts, thy fancies? BECKET. Good dogs, my liege, well train'd, and easily call'd Off from the game. HENRY. Save for some once or twice, When they ran down the game and worried it. BECKET. No, my liege, no!—not once—in God's name, no! HENRY. Nay, then, I take thee at thy word—believe thee The veriest Galahad of old Arthur's hall. And so this Rosamund, my true heart-wife, Not Eleanor—she whom I love indeed As a woman should be loved—Why dost thou smile So dolorously? BECKET. My good liege, if a man Wastes himself among women, how should he love A woman, as a woman should be loved? HENRY. How shouldst thou know that never hast loved one? Come, I would give her to thy care in England When I am out in Normandy or Anjou. BECKET. My lord, I am your subject, not your— HENRY. Pander. God's eyes! I know all that—not my purveyor Of pleasures, but to save a life—her life; Ay, and the soul of Eleanor from hell-fire. I have built a