No More Learning

COURTENAY. You are wild; what headache?
Heartache, perchance; not headache.

ELIZABETH (_aside to_ COURTENAY). Are you blind?

[COURTENAY _sees the_ QUEEN _and exit. Exit_ MARY.


_Enter_ LORD WILLIAM HOWARD.

HOWARD. Was that my Lord of Devon? do not you
Be seen in corners with my Lord of Devon.
He hath fallen out of favour with the Queen.
She fears the Lords may side with you and him
Against her marriage; therefore is he dangerous.
And if this Prince of fluff and feather come
To woo you, niece, he is dangerous everyway.

ELIZABETH.
Not very dangerous that way, my good uncle.

HOWARD. But your own state is full of danger here.
The disaffected, heretics, reformers,
Look to you as the one to crown their ends.
Mix not yourself with any plot I pray you;
Nay, if by chance you hear of any such,
Speak not thereof--no, not to your best friend,
Lest you should be confounded with it. Still--
Perinde ac cadaver--as the priest says,
You know your Latin--quiet as a dead body.
What was my Lord of Devon telling you?

ELIZABETH. Whether he told me anything or not,
I follow your good counsel, gracious uncle.
Quiet as a dead body.

HOWARD. You do right well.
I do not care to know; but this I charge you,
Tell Courtenay nothing. The Lord Chancellor
(I count it as a kind of virtue in him,
He hath not many), as a mastiff dog
May love a puppy cur for no more reason
Than that the twain have been tied up together,
Thus Gardiner--for the two were fellow-prisoners
So many years in yon accursed Tower--
Hath taken to this Courtenay. Look to it, niece,
He hath no fence when Gardiner questions him;
All oozes out; yet him--because they know him
The last White Rose, the last Plantagenet
(Nay, there is Cardinal Pole, too), the people
Claim as their natural leader--ay, some say,
That you shall marry him, make him King belike.

ELIZABETH.