Part 375 (1/2)

[Exit.

SCENE IX.

ELIZABETH, LEICESTER.

ELIZABETH.

Say, who was here? I heard the sound of voices.

LEICESTER (turning quickly and perplexed round on hearing the QUEEN).

It was young Mortimer----

ELIZABETH.

How now, my lord: Why so confused?

LEICESTER (collecting himself).

Your presence is the cause.

Ne'er did I see thy beauty so resplendent, My sight is dazzled by thy heavenly charms.

Oh!

ELIZABETH.

Whence this sigh?

LEICESTER.

Have I no reason, then, To sigh? When I behold you in your glory, I feel anew, with pain unspeakable, The loss which threatens me.

ELIZABETH.

What loss, my lord?

LEICESTER.

Your heart; your own inestimable self Soon will you feel yourself within the arms Of your young ardent husband, highly blessed; He will possess your heart without a rival.

He is of royal blood, that am not I.

Yet, spite of all the world can say, there lives not One on this globe who with such fervent zeal Adores you as the man who loses you.

Anjou hath never seen you, can but love Your glory and the splendor of your reign; But I love you, and were you born of all The peasant maids the poorest, I the first Of kings, I would descend to your condition, And lay my crown and sceptre at your feet!

ELIZABETH.

Oh, pity me, my Dudley; do not blame me; I cannot ask my heart. Oh, that had chosen Far otherwise! Ah, how I envy others Who can exalt the object of their love!

But I am not so blest: 'tis not my fortune To place upon the brows of him, the dearest Of men to me, the royal crown of England.

The Queen of Scotland was allowed to make Her hand the token of her inclination; She hath had every freedom, and hath drunk, Even to the very dregs, the cup of joy.

LEICESTER.

And now she drinks the bitter cup of sorrow.

ELIZABETH.

She never did respect the world's opinion; Life was to her a sport; she never courted The yoke to which I bowed my willing neck.

And yet, methinks, I had as just a claim As she to please myself and taste the joys Of life: but I preferred the rigid duties Which royalty imposed on me; yet she, She was the favorite of all the men Because she only strove to be a woman; And youth and age became alike her suitors.

Thus are the men voluptuaries all!

The willing slaves of levity and pleasure; Value that least which claims their reverence.

And did not even Talbot, though gray-headed, Grow young again when speaking of her charms?

LEICESTER.