No More Learning

O noble Harold,
I would thou couldst have sworn.

HAROLD. For thine own pleasure?

ALDWYTH. No, but to please our dying king, and those
Who make thy good their own--all England, Earl.

ALDRED. _I_ would thou couldst have sworn. Our holy king
Hath given his virgin lamb to Holy Church
To save thee from the curse.

HAROLD. Alas! poor man,
_His_ promise brought it on me.

ALDRED. O good son!
That knowledge made him all the carefuller
To find a means whereby the curse might glance
From thee and England.

HAROLD. Father, we so loved--

ALDRED. The more the love, the mightier is the prayer;
The more the love, the more acceptable
The sacrifice of both your loves to heaven.
No sacrifice to heaven, no help from heaven;
That runs thro' all the faiths of all the world.
And sacrifice there must be, for the king
Is holy, and hath talk'd with God, and seen
A shadowing horror; there are signs in heaven--

HAROLD. Your comet came and went.

ALDRED. And signs on earth!
Knowest thou Senlac hill?

HAROLD. I know all Sussex;
A good entrenchment for a perilous hour!

ALDRED. Pray God that come not suddenly! There is one
Who passing by that hill three nights ago--
He shook so that he scarce could out with it--
Heard, heard--

HAROLD. The wind in his hair?

ALDRED. A ghostly horn
Blowing continually, and faint battle-hymns,
And cries, and clashes, and the groans of men;
And dreadful shadows strove upon the hill,
And dreadful lights crept up from out the marsh--
Corpse-candles gliding over nameless graves--

HAROLD. At Senlac?

ALDRED. Senlac.

EDWARD (_waking_).
Senlac! Sanguelac,
The Lake of Blood!

STIGAND. This lightning before death
Plays on the word,--and Normanizes too!

HAROLD. Hush, father, hush!

EDWARD. Thou uncanonical fool,
Wilt _thou_ play with the thunder? North and South
Thunder together, showers of blood are blown
Before a never-ending blast, and hiss
Against the blaze they cannot quench--a lake,
A sea of blood--we are drown'd in blood--for God
Has fill'd the quiver, and Death has drawn the bow--
Sanguelac! Sanguelac! the arrow! the arrow! [_Dies_.

STIGAND. It is the arrow of death in his own heart--
And our great Council wait to crown thee King.



SCENE II. --IN THE GARDEN. THE KING'S HOUSE NEAR LONDON.


EDITH. Crown'd, crown'd and lost, crown'd King--and lost to me!

(_Singing_. )

Two young lovers in winter weather,
None to guide them,
Walk'd at night on the misty heather;
Night, as black as a raven's feather;
Both were lost and found together,
None beside them.

That is the burthen of it--lost and found
Together in the cruel river Swale
A hundred years ago; and there's another,

Lost, lost, the light of day,

To which the lover answers lovingly

'I am beside thee. '
Lost, lost, we have lost the way.
'Love, I will guide thee. '
Whither, O whither? into the river,
Where we two may be lost together,
And lost for ever? 'Oh! never, oh! never,
Tho' we be lost and be found together. '

Some think they loved within the pale forbidden
By Holy Church: but who shall say? the truth
Was lost in that fierce North, where _they_ were lost,
Where all good things are lost, where Tostig lost
The good hearts of his people. It is Harold!

_Enter_ HAROLD.

Harold the King!

HAROLD. Call me not King, but Harold.

EDITH. Nay, thou art King!

HAROLD. Thine, thine, or King or churl!
My girl, thou hast been weeping: turn not thou
Thy face away, but rather let me be
King of the moment to thee, and command
That kiss my due when subject, which will make
My kingship kinglier to me than to reign
King of the world without it.

EDITH. Ask me not,
Lest I should yield it, and the second curse
Descend upon thine head, and thou be only
King of the moment over England.

HAROLD. Edith,
Tho' somewhat less a king to my true self
Than ere they crown'd me one, for I have lost
Somewhat of upright stature thro' mine oath,
Yet thee I would not lose, and sell not thou
Our living passion for a dead man's dream;
Stigand believed he knew not what he spake.
Oh God! I cannot help it, but at times
They seem to me too narrow, all the faiths
Of this grown world of ours, whose baby eye
Saw them sufficient. Fool and wise, I fear
This curse, and scorn it. But a little light! --
And on it falls the shadow of the priest;
Heaven yield us more! for better, Woden, all
Our cancell'd warrior-gods, our grim Walhalla,
Eternal war, than that the Saints at peace
The Holiest of our Holiest one should be
This William's fellow-tricksters;--better die
Than credit this, for death is death, or else
Lifts us beyond the lie. Kiss me--thou art not
A holy sister yet, my girl, to fear
There might be more than brother in my kiss,
And more than sister in thine own.

EDITH. I dare not.

HAROLD. Scared by the church--'Love for a whole life long'
When was that sung?

EDITH. Here to the nightingales.

HAROLD. Their anthems of no church, how sweet they are!
Nor kingly priest, nor priestly king to cross
Their billings ere they nest.

EDITH. They are but of spring,
They fly the winter change--not so with us--
No wings to come and go.

HAROLD. But wing'd souls flying
Beyond all change and in the eternal distance
To settle on the Truth.

EDITH. They are not so true,
They change their mates.

HAROLD. Do they? I did not know it.

EDITH. They say thou art to wed the Lady Aldwyth.

HAROLD. They say, they say.

EDITH. If this be politic,
And well for thee and England--and for her--
Care not for me who love thee.

GURTH (_calling_). Harold, Harold!

HAROLD. The voice of Gurth! (_Enter_ GURTH. )
Good even, my good brother!

GURTH. Good even, gentle Edith.

EDITH. Good even, Gurth.

GURTH. Ill news hath come! Our hapless brother, Tostig--
He, and the giant King of Norway, Harold
Hardrada--Scotland, Ireland, Iceland, Orkney,
Are landed North of Humber, and in a field
So packt with carnage that the dykes and brooks
Were bridged and damm'd with dead, have overthrown
Morcar and Edwin.

HAROLD. Well then, we must fight.
How blows the wind?

GURTH. Against St. Valery
And William.

HAROLD. Well then, we will to the North.

GURTH. Ay, but worse news: this William sent to Rome,
Swearing thou swarest falsely by his Saints:
The Pope and that Archdeacon Hildebrand
His master, heard him, and have sent him back
A holy gonfanon, and a blessed hair
Of Peter, and all France, all Burgundy,
Poitou, all Christendom is raised against thee;
He hath cursed thee, and all those who fight for thee,
And given thy realm of England to the bastard.

HAROLD. Ha! ha!

EDITH. Oh! laugh not! . . . Strange and ghastly in the gloom
And shadowing of this double thunder-cloud
That lours on England--laughter!

HAROLD. No, not strange!
This was old human laughter in old Rome
Before a Pope was born, when that which reign'd
Call'd itself God. --A kindly rendering
Of 'Render unto Caesar. ' . . . The Good Shepherd!
Take this, and render that.

GURTH. They have taken York.

HAROLD. The Lord was God and came as man--the Pope
Is man and comes as God. --York taken?

GURTH. Yea,
Tostig hath taken York!

HAROLD. To York then. Edith,
Hadst thou been braver, I had better braved
All--but I love thee and thou me--and that
Remains beyond all chances and all churches,
And that thou knowest.

EDITH. Ay, but take back thy ring.
It burns my hand--a curse to thee and me.
I dare not wear it.
[_Proffers_ HAROLD _the ring, which he takes_.

HAROLD. But I dare. God with thee!

[_Exeunt_ HAROLD _and_ GURTH.

EDITH. The King hath cursed him, if he marry me;
The Pope hath cursed him, marry me or no!
God help me! I know nothing--can but pray
For Harold--pray, pray, pray--no help but prayer,
A breath that fleets beyond this iron world,
And touches Him that made it.




ACT IV.


SCENE I. --IN NORTHUMBRIA.

ARCHBISHOP ALDRED, MORCAR, EDWIN, _and_ FORCES. _Enter_ HAROLD.
_The standard of the golden Dragon of Wessex preceding him_.


HAROLD. What! are thy people sullen from defeat?
Our Wessex dragon flies beyond the Humber,
No voice to greet it.

EDWIN. Let not our great king
Believe us sullen--only shamed to the quick
Before the king--as having been so bruised
By Harold, king of Norway; but our help
Is Harold, king of England. Pardon us, thou!
Our silence is our reverence for the king!

HAROLD. Earl of the Mercians! if the truth be gall,
Cram me not thou with honey, when our good hive
Needs every sting to save it.

VOICES. Aldwyth! Aldwyth!

HAROLD. Why cry thy people on thy sister's name?

MORCAR.
She hath won upon our people thro' her beauty,
And pleasantness among them.

VOICES. Aldwyth, Aldwyth!

HAROLD. They shout as they would have her for a queen.

MORCAR. She hath followed with our host, and suffer'd all.

HAROLD. What would ye, men?

VOICE. Our old Northumbrian crown,
And kings of our own choosing.

HAROLD. Your old crown
Were little help without our Saxon carles
Against Hardrada.

VOICE. Little! we are Danes,
Who conquer'd what we walk on, our own field.

HAROLD. They have been plotting here! [_Aside_.

VOICE. He calls us little!

HAROLD. The kingdoms of this world began with little,
A hill, a fort, a city--that reach'd a hand
Down to the field beneath it, 'Be thou mine,
Then to the next, 'Thou also! ' If the field
Cried out 'I am mine own;' another hill
Or fort, or city, took it, and the first
Fell, and the next became an Empire.

VOICE. Yet
Thou art but a West Saxon: _we_ are Danes!

HAROLD. My mother is a Dane, and I am English;
There is a pleasant fable in old books,
Ye take a stick, and break it; bind a score
All in one faggot, snap it over knee,
Ye cannot.

VOICE. Hear King Harold! he says true!

HAROLD. Would ye be Norsemen?

VOICES. No!

HAROLD. Or Norman?

VOICES. No!

HAROLD. Snap not the faggot-band then.

VOICE. That is true!

VOICE. Ay, but thou art not kingly, only grandson
To Wulfnoth, a poor cow-herd.

HAROLD. This old Wulfnoth
Would take me on his knees and tell me tales
Of Alfred and of Athelstan the Great
Who drove you Danes; and yet he held that Dane,
Jute, Angle, Saxon, were or should be all
One England, for this cow-herd, like my father,
Who shook the Norman scoundrels off the throne,
Had in him kingly thoughts--a king of men,
Not made but born, like the great king of all,
A light among the oxen.

VOICE. That is true!

VOICE. Ay, and I love him now, for mine own father
Was great, and cobbled.

VOICE. Thou art Tostig's brother,
Who wastes the land.

HAROLD. This brother comes to save
Your land from waste; I saved it once before,
For when your people banish'd Tostig hence,
And Edward would have sent a host against you,
Then I, who loved my brother, bad the king
Who doted on him, sanction your decree
Of Tostig's banishment, and choice of Morcar,
To help the realm from scattering.

VOICE. King! thy brother,
If one may dare to speak the truth, was wrong'd.
Wild was he, born so: but the plots against him
Had madden'd tamer men.

MORCAR. Thou art one of those
Who brake into Lord Tostig's treasure-house
And slew two hundred of his following,
And now, when Tostig hath come back with power,
Are frighted back to Tostig.

OLD THANE. Ugh! Plots and feuds!
This is my ninetieth birthday. Can ye not
Be brethren? Godwin still at feud with Alfgar,
And Alfgar hates King Harold. Plots and feuds!
This is my ninetieth birthday!

HAROLD. Old man, Harold
Hates nothing; not _his_ fault, if our two houses
Be less than brothers.

VOICES. Aldwyth, Harold, Aldwyth!

HAROLD. Again! Morcar! Edwin! What do they mean?

EDWIN. So the good king would deign to lend an ear
Not overscornful, we might chance--perchance--
To guess their meaning.

MORCAR. Thine own meaning, Harold,
To make all England one, to close all feuds,
Mixing our bloods, that thence a king may rise
Half-Godwin and half-Alfgar, one to rule
All England beyond question, beyond quarrel.

HAROLD. Who sow'd this fancy here among the people?

MORCAR. Who knows what sows itself among the people?
A goodly flower at times.

HAROLD. The Queen of Wales?
Why, Morcar, it is all but duty in her
To hate me; I have heard she hates me.

MORCAR. No!
For I can swear to that, but cannot swear
That these will follow thee against the Norsemen,
If thou deny them this.

HAROLD. Morcar and Edwin,
When will you cease to plot against my house?

EDWIN. The king can scarcely dream that we, who know
His prowess in the mountains of the West,
Should care to plot against him in the North.

MORCAR. Who dares arraign us, king, of such a plot?

HAROLD. Ye heard one witness even now.

MORCAR. The craven!
There is a faction risen again for Tostig,
Since Tostig came with Norway--fright not love.

HAROLD. Morcar and Edwin, will ye, if I yield,
Follow against the Norseman?

MORCAR. Surely, surely!

HAROLD. Morcar and Edwin, will ye upon oath,
Help us against the Norman?

MORCAR. With good will;
Yea, take the Sacrament upon it, king.

HAROLD. Where is thy sister?

MORCAR. Somewhere hard at hand.
Call and she comes.

[_One goes out, then enter_ ALDWYTH.

HAROLD. I doubt not but thou knowest
Why thou art summon'd.

ALDWYTH. Why? --I stay with these,
Lest thy fierce Tostig spy me out alone,
And flay me all alive.

HAROLD. Canst thou love one
Who did discrown thine husband, unqueen thee?
Didst thou not love thine husband?

ALDWYTH. Oh! my lord,
The nimble, wild, red, wiry, savage king--
That was, my lord, a match of policy.

HAROLD. Was it?
I knew him brave: he loved his land: he fain
Had made her great: his finger on her harp
(I heard him more than once) had in it Wales,
Her floods, her woods, her hills: had I been his,
I had been all Welsh.

ALDWYTH. Oh, ay--all Welsh--and yet
I saw thee drive him up his hills--and women
Cling to the conquer'd, if they love, the more;
If not, they cannot hate the conqueror.
We never--oh! good Morcar, speak for us,
His conqueror conquer'd Aldwyth.

HAROLD. Goodly news!

MORCAR. Doubt it not thou! Since Griffith's
head was sent
To Edward, she hath said it.

HAROLD. I had rather
She would have loved her husband. Aldwyth, Aldwyth,
Canst thou love me, thou knowing where I love?

ALDWYTH. I can, my lord, for mine own sake, for thine,
For England, for thy poor white dove, who flutters
Between thee and the porch, but then would find
Her nest within the cloister, and be still.

HAROLD. Canst thou love one, who cannot love again?

ALDWYTH. Full hope have I that love will answer love.

HAROLD. Then in the name of the great God, so be it!
Come, Aldred, join our hands before the hosts,
That all may see.

[ALDRED _joins the hands of_ HAROLD _and_ ALDWYTH
_and blesses them_.

VOICES. Harold, Harold and Aldwyth!

HAROLD. Set forth our golden Dragon, let him flap
The wings that beat down Wales!
Advance our Standard of the Warrior,
Dark among gems and gold; and thou, brave banner,
Blaze like a night of fatal stars on those
Who read their doom and die.
Where lie the Norsemen? on the Derwent? ay
At Stamford-bridge.
Morcar, collect thy men; Edwin, my friend--
Thou lingerest. --Gurth,--
Last night King Edward came to me in dreams--
The rosy face and long down-silvering beard--
He told me I should conquer:--
I am no woman to put faith in dreams.
(To his army. )
Last night King Edward came to me in dreams,
And told me we should conquer.

VOICES. Forward! Forward!
Harold and Holy Cross!

ALDWYTH. The day is won!



SCENE II. --A PLAIN. BEFORE THE BATTLE OF STAMFORD-BRIDGE.

HAROLD _and his_ GUARD.


HAROLD. Who is it comes this way? Tostig?
(_Enter_ TOSTIG _with a small force_. ) O brother,
What art thou doing here?

TOSTIG. I am foraging
For Norway's army.

HAROLD. I could take and slay thee.
Thou art in arms against us.

TOSTIG. Take and slay me,
For Edward loved me.

HAROLD. Edward bad me spare thee.

TOSTIG. I hate King Edward, for he join'd with thee
To drive me outlaw'd. Take and slay me, I say,
Or I shall count thee fool.

HAROLD. Take thee, or free thee,
Free thee or slay thee, Norway will have war;
No man would strike with Tostig, save for Norway.
Thou art nothing in thine England, save for Norway,
Who loves not thee but war. What dost thou here,
Trampling thy mother's bosom into blood?

TOSTIG. She hath wean'd me from it with such bitterness.
I come for mine own Earldom, my Northumbria;
Thou hast given it to the enemy of our house.

HAROLD.