As through an arch the violent roaring tide
Out-runs the eye that doth behold his haste,
Yet in the eddy boundeth in his pride.
Back to the strait that forc'd him on so fast,
In rage sent out, recall'd in rage, being past;
Even so his sighs, his sorrows, make a saw,
To push grief on, and back the same grief draw.
Which speechless woe of his poor she attendeth,
And his untimely frenzy thus awaketh :-
Dear lord, thy sorrow to my sorrow lendeth
Another power; no flood by raining slaketh.
My woe, too sensible, thy passion maketh
More feeling painful : let it, then, suffice
To drown one woe one pair of weeping eyes.
And for my sake, when I might charm thee so,
For she that was thy Lucrece, now attend me :
Be suddenly revenged on my foe,
Thine, mine, his own: suppose thou dost defend me
From what is past, the help that thou shalt lend me
Comes all too late, yet let the traitor die;
For sparing justice feeds iniquity.
But ere I name him, you fair lords, quoth she,
(Speaking to those that came with Collatine)
Shall plight your honourable faiths to me,
With swift pursuit to venge this wrong of mine;
For 'tis a meritorious fair design,
To chase injustice with revengeful arms:
Knights, by their oaths, should right poor ladies' harms.
At this request, with noble disposition
Each present lord began to promise aid,
As bound in knighthood to her imposition,
Longing to hear the hateful foe bewray'd;
But she, that yet her sad task hath not said,
The protestation stops.-O! speak, quoth she,
How may this forced stain be wip'd from me?
What is the quality of mine offence,
Being constrain'd with dreadful circumstance?
May my pure mind with the foul act dispense,
My low-declined honour to advance ?
May any terms acquit me from this chance?
The poison'd fountain clears itself again,
And why not I from this compelled stain?
With this, they all at once began to say,
Her body's stain her mind untainted clears;
While with a joyless smile she turns away
The face, that map which deep impression bears
Of hard misfortune, carv'd in it with tears.
No, no, quoth she; no dame, hereafter living,
By my excuse shall claim excuse's giving.
Here, with a sigh, as if her heart would break,
She throws forth Tarquin's name: he, he, she says,
But more than he her poor tongue could not speak;
Till after many accents and delays,
Untimely breathings, sick and short assays,
She utters this: he, he, fair lords, 'tis he,
That guides this hand to give this wound to me.
Even here she sheathed in her harmless breast
A harmful knife, that thence her soul unsheath'd:
That blow did bail it from the deep unrest
Of that polluted prison where it breath'd:
Her contrite sighs unto the clouds bequeath'd
Her winged sprite, and through her wounds doth fly
Life's lasting date from cancell'd destiny.
Stone-still, astonish'd with this deadly deed,
Stood Collatine and all his lordly crew;
Till Lucrece' father, that beholds her bleed,
Himself on her self-slaughter'd body threw :
And from the purple fountain Brutus drew
The murderous knife, and, as it left the place,
Her blood, in poor revenge, held it in chase;
And bubbling from her breast, it doth divide
In two slow rivers, that the crimson blood
Circles her body in on every side,
Who, like a late-sack'd island, vastly stood
Bare and unpeopled, in this fearful flood.
Some of her blood still pure and red remain'd,
And some look'd black, and that false Tarquin stain’d.
About the mourning and congealed face
Of that black blood a watery rigol goes,1
Which seems to weep upon the tainted place:
And ever since, as pitying Lucrece' woes,
Corrupted blood some watery token shows;
1 —a watery RIGOL goes,] A "rigol" is a circle, properly spelt ringol.
See also Henry IV, Pt. II, act iv, sc. 4, p. 94.
And blood untainted still doth red abide,
Blushing at that which is so putrified.
Daughter, dear daughter! old Lucretius cries,
That life was mine, which thou hast here depriv'd.
If in the child the father's image lies,
Where shall I live, now Lucrece is unliv'd?
Thou wast not to this end from me deriv'd.
If children pre-decease progenitors,
We are their offspring, and they none of ours.
Poor broken glass! I often did behold
In thy sweet semblance my old age new-born ;
But now that fair fresh mirror, dim and old,
Shows me a bare-bon'd death by time out-worn.
O! from thy cheeks my image thou hast torn,
And shiver'd all the beauty of my glass,
That I no more can see what once I was.
O time! cease thou thy course, and last no longer,
If they surcease to be that should survive.
Shall rotten death make conquest of the stronger,
And leave the faltering feeble souls alive?
The old bees die, the young possess their hive:
Then live, sweet Lucrece; live again, and see
Thy father die, and not thy father thee!
By this starts Collatine as from a dream,
And bids Lucretius give his sorrow place;
And then in key-cold Lucrece' bleeding stream.
He falls, and bathes the pale fear in his face,
And counterfeits to die with her a space;
Till manly shame bids him possess his breath,
And live to be revenged on her death.
The deep vexation of his inward soul
Hath serv'd a dumb arrest upon his tongue;
Who, mad that sorrow should his use control,
Or keep him from heart-easing words so long,
Begins to talk; but through his lips do throng
Weak words, so thick come in his poor heart's aid,2
That no man could distinguish what he said.
Yet sometime Tarquin was pronounced plain,
But through his teeth, as if the name he tore.
This windy tempest, till it blow up rain,
Held back his sorrow's tide to make it more;
At last it rains, and busy winds give o'er :
Then, son and father weep with equal strife,
Who should weep most, for daughter or for wife.
The one doth call her his, the other his,
Yet neither may possess the claim they lay.
The father says, She's mine.-O! mine she is,
Replies her husband: Do not take away
My sorrow's interest; let no mourner say
He weeps for her, for she was only mine,
And only must be wail'd by Collatine.
-SO THICK come in his poor heart's aid,] "So thick" is with such rapidity. See Macbeth, act i, sc. 3, p. 11, etc.
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