Becket and other playsTennyson, Alfred Tennyson, Baron
General
Becket and other plays
Tennyson, Alfred Tennyson, Baron
Drama; Thomas, à Becket, Saint, 1118?-1170 -- Drama
SYNORIX.
I send it to the wife of Sinnatus,
One half besotted in religious rites.
You come here with your soldiers to enforce
The long-withholden tribute: you suspect
This Sinnatus of playing patriotism,
Which in your sense is treason. You have yet
No proof against him: now this pious cup
Is passport to their house, and open arms
To him who gave it; and once there I warrant
I worm thro' all their windings.
ANTONIUS.
If you prosper,
Our Senate, wearied of their tetrarchies,
Their quarrels with themselves, their spites at Rome,
Is like enough to cancel them, and throne
One king above them all, who shall be true
To the Roman: and from what I heard in Rome,
This tributary crown may fall to you.
SYNORIX.
The king, the crown! their talk in Rome? is it so?
[ANTONIUS _nods_.
Well--I shall serve Galatia taking it,
And save her from herself, and be to Rome
More faithful than a Roman.
[_Turns and sees_ CAMMA _coming_.
Stand aside,
Stand aside; here she comes!
[_Watching_ CAMMA _as she enters with her Maid_.
GAMMA (_to Maid_).
Where is he, girl?
MAID.
You know the waterfall
That in the summer keeps the mountain side,
But after rain o'erleaps a jutting rock
And shoots three hundred feet.
CAMMA.
The stag is there?
MAID.
Seen in the thicket at the bottom there
But yester-even.
GAMMA.
Good then, we will climb
The mountain opposite and watch the chase.
[_They descend the rocks and exeunt_.
SYNORIX (_watching her_).
(_Aside_.) The bust of Juno and the brows and eyes
Of Venus; face and form unmatchable!
ANTONIUS.
Why do you look at her so lingeringly?
SYNORIX.
To see if years have changed her.
ANTONIUS (_sarcastically_).
Love her, do you?
SYNORIX.
I envied Sinnatus when he married her.
ANTONIUS.
She knows it? Ha!
SYNORIX.
She--no, nor ev'n my face.
ANTONIUS.
Nor Sinnatus either?
SYNORIX.
No, nor Sinnatus.
ANTONIUS.
Hot-blooded! I have heard them say in Rome.
That your own people cast you from their bounds,
For some unprincely violence to a woman,
As Rome did Tarquin.
SYNORIX.
Well, if this were so,
I here return like Tarquin--for a crown.
ANTONIUS.
And may be foil'd like Tarquin, if you follow
Not the dry light of Rome's straight-going policy,
But the fool-fire of love or lust, which well
May make you lose yourself, may even drown you
In the good regard of Rome.
SYNORIX.
Tut--fear me not;
I ever had my victories among women.
I am most true to Rome.
ANTONIUS (_aside_).
I hate the man!
What filthy tools our Senate works with! Still
I must obey them. (_Aloud_.) Fare you well. [_Going_.
SYNORIX.
Farewell!
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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