Enter LODOVICO, GASPARO and six AMBASSADORS. At another door [FRANCISCO,] the Duke of Florence.
FRANCISCO [To LODOVICO]
So, my lord, I commend your diligence.
Guard well the conclave, and, as the order is,
Let none have conference with the cardinals.
I shall, my lord. Room for the ambassadors!
GASPARO
LODOVICO
Oh, sir, they’re knights
Of several orders.
That lord i’th’ black cloak with the silver cross
Is Knight of Rhodes;3 the next, Knight of St Michael;4
10 That of the Golden Fleece;5 the Frenchman there,
Knight of the Holy Ghost;6 my lord of Savoy,
Knight of th’Annunciation;7 the Englishman
Is Knight of th’honoured Garter,8 dedicated
Unto their saint, St George. I could describe to you
Their several institutions, with the laws
Annexed to their orders, but that time
Permits not such discovery.
FRANCISCO
Where’s Count Lodovic?
LODOVICO
Here, my lord.
FRANCISCO
’Tis o’th’ point of dinner time.
Marshal the cardinals’ service.
LODOVICO
Sir, I shall.
Enter SERVANTS with several dishes covered.
20 Stand, let me search your dish. Who’s this for?
For my Lord Cardinal Monticelso.
LODOVICO
Whose this?
[SECOND] SERVANT
For my Lord Cardinal of Bourbon.
FRENCH AMBASSADOR
Why doth he search the dishes? To observe
What meat is dressed?1
ENGLISH AMBASSADOR
No, sir, but to prevent
Lest any letters should be conveyed in
To bribe or to solicit the advancement
Of any cardinal. When first they enter
’Tis lawful for the ambassadors of princes
30 To enter with them, and to make their suit
For any man their prince affecteth best;
But after, till a general election,
No man may speak with them.
LODOVICO
You that attend on the lord cardinals,
Open the window and receive their viands.
A CARDINAL [At the window]
You must return the service. The lord cardinals
Are busied ’bout electing of the Pope.
They have given o’er scrutiny2 and are fallen
To admiration.3 [Exit.]
LODOVICO
Away, away! [Exeunt SERVANTS with dishes.]
FRANCISCO
40 I’ll lay a thousand ducats you hear news
Of a Pope presently –
[Sound of trumpets.]
Hark! Sure, he’s elected.
[Enter] Cardinal [of ARAGON] on the terrace.
Behold! My lord of Aragon appears
On the church battlements.
ARAGON [Holding up a cross]
De nuntio vobis gaudium magnum. Reverendissimus Cardinalis Lorenzo de Monticelso electus est in sedem apostolicam, et elegit sibi nomen Paulum quartum.1
ALL
Vivat Sanctus Pater Paulus Quartus!2
[Enter SERVANT.]
SERVANT
Vittoria, my lord –
FRANCISCO
Well, what of her?
SERVANT
Is fled the city –
FRANCISCO
Ha?
SERVANT
With Duke Bracciano.
FRANCISCO
Fled? Where’s the Prince Giovanni?
SERVANT
50 Gone with his father.
FRANCISCO
Let the matrona of the convertites
Be apprehended. Fled? Oh, damnable! [Exit SERVANT.]
[Aside] How fortunate are my wishes. Why, ’twas this
I only laboured. I did send the letter
T’instruct him what to do. Thy fame, fond3 Duke,
I first have poisoned; directed thee the way
To marry a whore. What can be worse? This follows:
The hand must act to drown the passionate tongue.
I scorn to wear a sword and prate of wrong.
Enter MONTICELSO in state [as POPE PAUL IV].
MONTICELSO
[FRANCISCO whispers to him.]
My lord reports Vittoria Corombona
Is stol’n from forth the house of convertites
By Bracciano, and they’re fled the city.
Now, though this be the first day of our state,
We cannot better please the divine power,
Than to sequester from the holy church
These cursèd persons. Make it therefore known,
We do denounce excommunication
70 Against them both. All that are theirs in Rome
We likewise banish. Set on.
Exeunt [all except FRANCISCO and LODOVICO].
FRANCISCO
LODOVICO
With all constancy;
But, sir, I wonder you’ll engage yourself
In person, being a great prince.
FRANCISCO
Divert me not.
Most of his court are of my faction,
And some are of my counsel. Noble friend,
Our danger shall be ’like in this design;
Enter MONTICELSO [unseen].
Give leave part of the glory may be mine. [Exit FRANCISCO.]
80 Why did the Duke of Florence with such care
Labour your pardon? Say.
LODOVICO
Italian beggars will resolve you that,
Who, begging of an alms, bid those they beg of
Do good for their own sakes; or’t may be
He spreads his bounty with a sowing1 hand,
Like kings, who many times give out of measure,2
Not for desert so much as for their pleasure.
MONTICELSO
I know you’re cunning. Come, what devil was that
That you were raising?
LODOVICO
Devil, my lord?
I ask you,
90 How doth the Duke employ you, that his bonnet
Fell with such compliment unto his knee
When he departed from you?
LODOVICO
Why, my lord,
He told me of a resty3 Barbary horse
Which he would fain have brought to the career,4
The ’sault5 and the ring-galliard.6 Now, my lord,
I have a rare French rider –
MONTICELSO
Take you heed,
Lest the jade7 break your neck. Do you put me off
With your wild horse-tricks? Sirrah, you do lie.
Oh, thou’rt a foul, black cloud, and thou dost threat
A violent storm.
100 Storms are i’th’ air, my lord.
I am too low to storm.
MONTICELSO
Wretched creature!
I know that thou art fashioned for all ill,
Like dogs, that once get blood, they’ll ever kill.
About some murder, was’t not?
LODOVICO
I’ll not tell you;
And yet I care not greatly if I do.
Marry, with this preparation: holy father,
I come not to you as an intelligencer,1
But as a penitent sinner. What I utter
Is in confession merely, which you know
Must never be revealed.
MONTICELSO
110 You have o’erta’en2 me.
LODOVICO
Sir, I did love Bracciano’s Duchess dearly –
Or rather I pursued her with hot lust,
Though she ne’er knew on’t. She was poisoned,
Upon my soul she was; for which I have sworn
T’avenge her murder.
MONTICELSO
To the Duke of Florence?
LODOVICO
To him I have.
MONTICELSO
Miserable creature!
If thou persist in this, ’tis damnable.
Dost thou imagine thou canst slide on blood
And not be tainted3 with a shameful fall?
120 Or like the black and melancholic yew-tree,
Dost think to root thyself in dead men’s graves,
And yet to prosper? Instruction to thee
Comes like sweet showers to over-hard’ned ground:
They wet, but pierce not deep. And so I leave thee
With all the furies hanging ’bout thy neck,
Till by thy penitence thou remove this evil,
In conjuring from thy breast that cruel devil.
Exit MONTICELSO.
LODOVICO
I’ll give it o’er. He says ’tis damnable.
Besides, I did expect his suffrage1
130 By reason of Camillo’s death.
Enter SERVANT and FRANCISCO [apart].
FRANCISCO
Do you know that count?
SERVANT
Yes, my lord.
FRANCISCO
Bear him these thousand ducats to his lodging.
Tell him the Pope hath sent them. Happily
That will confirm more than all the rest.
[Exit FRANCISCO.]
SERVANT
Sir – [He hands LODOVICO the money.]
LODOVICO
To me, sir?
SERVANT
His Holiness hath sent you a thousand crowns,
And wills you, if you travel, to make him
Your patron for intelligence.2
LODOVICO
His creature,
Ever to be commanded. [Exit SERVANT.]
140 Why, now ’tis come about. He railed upon me,
And yet these crowns were told out3 and laid ready,
Before he knew my voyage. Oh, the art,
The modest form1 of greatness, that do sit
Like brides at wedding-dinners, with their looks turned
From the least wanton jests, their puling2 stomach
Sick of the modesty, when their thoughts are loose,3
Even acting of those hot and lustful sports
Are to ensue about midnight – such his cunning!
He sounds my depth thus with a golden plummet.4
150 I am doubly armed now to th’act of blood.
There’s but three Furies found in spacious hell,
But in a great man’s breast three thousand dwell. [Exit.]
A passage over the stage of BRACCIANO, FLAMINIO, MARCELLO, HORTENSIO, [VITTORIA] COROMBONA [dressed as a bride], CORNELIA, ZANCHE and others.
[Enter FLAMINIO and HORTENSIO.]
FLAMINIO
In all the weary minutes of my life,
Day ne’er broke up till now. This marriage
Confirms me happy.
HORTENSIO
’Tis a good assurance.
Saw you not yet the Moor that’s come to court?
FLAMINIO
Yes, and conferred with him i’th’ Duke’s closet.
I have not seen a goodlier personage,
Nor ever talked with man better experienced
In state affairs or rudiments of war.
He hath, by report, served the Venetian
10 In Candy1 these twice seven years, and been chief
In many a bold design.
HORTENSIO
What are those two
That bear him company?
FLAMINIO
Two noblemen of Hungary that, living in the Emperor’s service as commanders, eight years since, contrary to the expectation of all the court, entered into religion, into the strict order of Capuchins.2 But being not well settled in their undertaking, they left their order and returned to court, for which, being after troubled in conscience, they vowed their service against the enemies of Christ; went to Malta; were
20 there knighted; and in their return back, at this great solemnity, they are resolved forever to forsake the world, and settle themselves here in a house of Capuchins in Padua.
HORTENSIO
’Tis strange.
FLAMINIO
One thing makes it so: they have vowed forever to wear next their bare bodies those coats of mail they served in.
HORTENSIO
Hard penance. Is the Moor a Christian?
FLAMINIO
He is.
HORTENSIO
Why proffers he his service to our Duke?