Refectory of the Monastery at Northampton.
A Banquet on the Tables.
Enter BECKET. BECKET’S RETAINERS.
1ST RETAINER.
Do thou speak first.
2ND RETAINER.
Nay, thou! Nay, thou! Hast not thou drawn the short straw?
1ST RETAINER.
My lord Archbishop, wilt thou permit us—
BECKET.
To speak without stammering and like a free man?
Ay.
1ST RETAINER.
My lord, permit us then to leave thy service.
BECKET.
When?
1ST RETAINER.
Now.
BECKET.
To-night?
1ST RETAINER.
To-night, my lord.
BECKET.
And why?
1ST RETAINER.
My lord, we leave thee not without tears.
BECKET.
Tears? Why not stay with me then?
1ST RETAINER.
My lord, we cannot yield thee an answer altogether to thy satisfaction.
BECKET.
I warrant you, or your own either. Shall I find you one? The King hath frowned upon me.
1ST RETAINER.
That is not altogether our answer, my lord.
BECKET.
No; yet all but all. Go, go! Ye have eaten of my dish and drunken of my cup for a dozen years.
1ST RETAINER.
And so we have. We mean thee no wrong. Wilt thou not say, ‘God bless you,’ ere we go?
BECKET.
God bless you all! God redden your pale blood! But mine is human-red; and when ye shall hear it is poured out upon earth, and see it mounting to Heaven, my God bless you, that seems sweet to you now, will blast and blind you like a curse.
1ST RETAINER.
We hope not, my lord. Our humblest thanks for your blessing. Farewell!
[Exeunt Retainers.
BECKET.
Farewell, friends! farewell, swallows! I wrong the bird; she leaves only the nest she built, they leave the builder. Why? Am I to be murdered to-night?
[Knocking at the door.
ATTENDANT.
Here is a missive left at the gate by one from the castle.
BECKET.
Cornwall’s hand or Leicester’s: they write marvellously alike.
[Reading.
‘Fly at once to France, to King Louis of France: there be those about our King who would have thy blood.’
Was not my lord of Leicester bidden to our supper?
ATTENDANT.
Ay, my lord, and divers other earls and barons. But the hour is past, and our brother, Master Cook, he makes moan that all be a-getting cold.
BECKET.
And I make my moan along with him. Cold after warm, winter after summer, and the golden leaves, these earls and barons, that clung to me, frosted off me by the first cold frown of the King. Cold, but look how the table steams, like a heathen altar; nay, like the altar at Jerusalem. Shall God’s good gifts be wasted? None of them here! Call in the poor from the streets, and let them feast.
HERBERT.
That is the parable of our blessed Lord.
BECKET.
And why should not the parable of our blessed Lord be acted again? Call in the poor! The Church is ever at variance with the kings, and ever at one with the poor. I marked a group of lazars in the marketplace—half-rag, half-sore—beggars, poor rogues (Heaven bless ’em) who never saw nor dreamed of such a banquet. I will amaze them. Call them in, I say. They shall henceforward be my earls and barons— our lords and masters in Christ Jesus.
[Exit Herbert.
If the King hold his purpose, I am myself a beggar. Forty thousand marks! forty thousand devils—and these craven bishops!
A POOR MAN (entering) with his dog.
My lord Archbishop, may I come in with my poor friend, my dog? The King’s verdurer caught him a-hunting in the forest, and cut off his paws. The dog followed his calling, my lord. I ha’ carried him ever so many miles in my arms, and he licks my face and moans and cries out against the King.
BECKET.
Better thy dog than thee. The King’s courts would use thee worse than thy dog—they are too bloody. Were the Church king, it would be otherwise. Poor beast! poor beast! set him down. I will bind up his wounds with my napkin. Give him a bone, give him a bone! Who misuses a dog would misuse a child—they cannot speak for themselves. Past help! his paws are past help. God help him!
Enter the BEGGARS (and seat themselves at the Tables).
BECKET and HERBERT wait upon them.
1ST BEGGAR.
Swine, sheep, ox—here’s a French supper. When thieves fall out, honest men——
2ND BEGGAR.
Is the Archbishop a thief who gives thee thy supper?
1ST BEGGAR.
Well, then, how does it go? When honest men fall out, thieves—no, it can’t be that.
2ND BEGGAR.
Who stole the widow’s one sitting hen o’ Sunday, when she was at mass?
1ST BEGGAR.
Come, come! thou hadst thy share on her. Sitting hen! Our Lord Becket’s our great sitting-hen cock, and we shouldn’t ha’ been sitting here if the barons and bishops hadn’t been a-sitting on the Archbishop.
BECKET.
Ay, the princes sat in judgment against me, and the Lord hath prepared your table—Sederunt principes, ederunt pauperes.
A VOICE.
Becket, beware of the knife!
BECKET.
Who spoke?
3RD BEGGAR.
Nobody, my lord. What’s that, my lord?
BECKET.
Venison.
3RD BEGGAR.
Venison?
BECKET.
Buck; deer, as you call it.
3RD BEGGAR.
King’s meat! By the Lord, won’t we pray for your lordship!
BECKET.
And, my children, your prayers will do more for me in the day of peril that dawns darkly and drearily over the house of God—yea, and in the day of judgment also, than the swords of the craven sycophants would have done had they remained true to me whose bread they have partaken. I must leave you to your banquet. Feed, feast, and be merry. Herbert, for the sake of the Church itself, if not for my own, I must fly to France to-night. Come with me.
[Exit with Herbert.
3RD BEGGAR.
Here—all of you—my lord’s health (they drink). Well—if that isn’t goodly wine—
1ST BEGGAR.
Then there isn’t a goodly wench to serve him with it: they were fighting for her to-day in the street.
3RD BEGGAR.
Peace!
1ST BEGGAR.
The black sheep baaed to the miller’s ewe-lamb,
The miller’s away for to-night.
Black sheep, quoth she, too black a sin for me.
And what said the black sheep, my masters?
We can make a black sin white.
3RD BEGGAR.
Peace!
1ST BEGGAR.
‘Ewe lamb, ewe lamb, I am here by the dam.’
But the miller came home that night,
And so dusted his back with the meal in his sack,
That he made the black sheep white.
3RD BEGGAR.
Be we not of the family? be we not a-supping with the head of the family? be we not in my lord’s own refractory? Out from among us; thou art our black sheep.
Enter the four KNIGHTS.
FITZURSE.
Sheep, said he? And sheep without the shepherd, too. Where is my lord Archbishop? Thou the lustiest and lousiest of this Cain’s brotherhood, answer.
3RD BEGGAR.
With Cain’s answer, my lord. Am I his keeper? Thou shouldst call him Cain, not me.
FITZURSE.
So I do, for he would murder his brother the State.
3RD BEGGAR (rising and advancing).
No my lord; but because the Lord hath set his mark upon him that no man should murder him.
FITZURSE.
Where is he? where is he?
3RD BEGGAR.
With Cain belike, in the land of Nod, or in the land of France for aught I know.
FITZURSE.
France! Ha! De Morville, Tracy, Brito—fled is he? Cross swords all of you! swear to follow him! Remember the Queen!
[The four KNIGHTS cross their swords.
DE BRITO.
They mock us; he is here.
[All the BEGGARS rise and advance upon them.
FITZURSE.
Come, you filthy knaves, let us pass.
3RD BEGGAR.
Nay, my lord, let us pass. We be a-going home after our supper in all humbleness, my lord; for the Archbishop loves humbleness, my lord; and though we be fifty to four, we daren’t fight you with our crutches, my lord. There now, if thou hast not laid hands upon me! and my fellows know that I am all one scale like a fish. I pray God I haven’t given thee my leprosy, my lord.
[FITZURSE shrinks from him and another presses upon DE BRITO.
DE BRITO.
Away, dog!
4TH BEGGAR.
And I was bit by a mad dog o’ Friday, an’ I be half dog already by this token, that tho’ I can drink wine I cannot bide water, my lord; and I want to bite, I want to bite, and they do say the very breath catches.
DE BRITO.
Insolent clown. Shall I smite him with the edge of the sword?
DE MORVILLE.
No, nor with the flat of it either. Smite the shepherd and the sheep are scattered. Smite the sheep and the shepherd will excommunicate thee.
DE BRITO.
Yet my fingers itch to beat him into nothing.
5TH BEGGAR.
So do mine, my lord. I was born with it, and sulphur won’t bring it out o’ me. But for all that the Archbishop washed my feet o’ Tuesday. He likes it, my lord.
6TH BEGGAR.
And see here, my lord, this rag fro’ the gangrene i’ my leg. It’s humbling—it smells o’ human natur’. Wilt thou smell it, my lord? for the Archbishop likes the smell on it, my lord; for I be his lord and master i’ Christ, my lord.
DE MORVILLE.
Faugh! we shall all be poisoned. Let us go.
[They draw back, BEGGARS following.
7TH BEGGAR.
My lord, I ha’ three sisters a-dying at home o’ the sweating sickness. They be dead while I be a-supping.
8TH BEGGAR.
And I ha’ nine darters i’ the spital that be dead ten times o’er i’ one day wi’ the putrid fever; and I bring the taint on it along wi’ me, for the Archbishop likes it, my lord.
[Pressing upon the KNIGHTS till they disappear thro’ the door.
3RD BEGGAR.
Crutches, and itches, and leprosies, and ulcers, and gangrenes, and running sores, praise ye the Lord, for to-night ye have saved our Archbishop!
1ST BEGGAR.
I’ll go back again. I hain’t half done yet.
HERBERT OF BOSHAM (entering).
My friends, the Archbishop bids you good-night. He hath retired to rest, and being in great jeopardy of his life, he hath made his bed between the altars, from whence he sends me to bid you this night pray for him who hath fed you in the wilderness.
3RD BEGGAR.
So we will—so we will, I warrant thee. Becket shall be king, and the Holy Father shall be king, and the world shall live by the King’s venison and the bread o’ the Lord, and there shall be no more poor for ever. Hurrah! Vive le Roy! That’s the English of it.
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