No More Learning

[Enter MARMADUKE, from behind]


OSWALD (turning to meet him)
But listen, for my peace--


MARMADUKE
Why, I _believe_ you.


OSWALD But hear the proofs--


MARMADUKE Ay, prove that when two peas
Lie snugly in a pod, the pod must then
Be larger than the peas--prove this--'twere matter
Worthy the hearing. Fool was I to dream
It ever could be otherwise!


OSWALD Last night
When I returned with water from the brook,
I overheard the Villains--every word
Like red-hot iron burnt into my heart.
Said one, "It is agreed on. The blind Man
Shall feign a sudden illness, and the Girl,
Who on her journey must proceed alone,
Under pretence of violence, be seized.
She is," continued the detested Slave,
"She is right willing--strange if she were not! --
They say, Lord Clifford is a savage man;
But, faith, to see him in his silken tunic,
Fitting his low voice to the minstrel's harp,
There's witchery in't. I never knew a maid
That could withstand it. True," continued he,
"When we arranged the affair, she wept a little
(Not the less welcome to my Lord for that)
And said, 'My Father he will have it so. '"


MARMADUKE I am your hearer.

OSWALD This I caught, and more
That may not be retold to any ear.
The obstinate bolt of a small iron door
Detained them near the gateway of the Castle.
By a dim lantern's light I saw that wreaths
Of flowers were in their hands, as if designed
For festive decoration; and they said,
With brutal laughter and most foul allusion,
That they should share the banquet with their Lord
And his new Favorite.


MARMADUKE
Misery!
--

OSWALD I knew
How you would be disturbed by this dire news,
And therefore chose this solitary Moor,
Here to impart the tale, of which, last night,
I strove to ease my mind, when our two Comrades,
Commissioned by the Band, burst in upon us.


MARMADUKE Last night, when moved to lift the avenging steel,
I did believe all things were shadows--yea,
Living or dead all things were bodiless,
Or but the mutual mockeries of body,
Till that same star summoned me back again.
Now I could laugh till my ribs ached. Fool!
To let a creed, built in the heart of things,
Dissolve before a twinkling atom! --Oswald,
I could fetch lessons out of wiser schools
Than you have entered, were it worth the pains.
Young as I am, I might go forth a teacher,
And you should see how deeply I could reason
Of love in all its shapes, beginnings, ends;
Of moral qualities in their diverse aspects;
Of actions, and their laws and tendencies.


OSWALD You take it as it merits--


MARMADUKE One a King,
General or Cham, Sultan or Emperor,
Strews twenty acres of good meadow-ground
With carcases, in lineament and shape
And substance, nothing differing from his own,
But that they cannot stand up of themselves;
Another sits i' th' sun, and by the hour
Floats kingcups in the brook--a Hero one
We call, and scorn the other as Time's spendthrift;
But have they not a world of common ground
To occupy--both fools, or wise alike,
Each in his way?


OSWALD Troth, I begin to think so.


MARMADUKE Now for the corner-stone of my philosophy:
I would not give a denier for the man
Who, on such provocation as this earth
Yields, could not chuck his babe beneath the chin,
And send it with a fillip to its grave.


OSWALD Nay, you leave me behind.


MARMADUKE That such a One,
So pious in demeanour! in his look
So saintly and so pure! --Hark'ee, my Friend,
I'll plant myself before Lord Clifford's Castle,
A surly mastiff kennels at the gate,
And he shall howl and I will laugh, a medley
Most tunable.

OSWALD In faith, a pleasant scheme;
But take your sword along with you, for that
Might in such neighbourhood find seemly use. --
But first, how wash our hands of this old Man?