________________________________________________
_ ACT I - SCENE III
SCENE III.--TOM THUMB to them, with Officers, Prisoners,
and Attendants.
King.
[1] Oh! welcome most, most welcome to my arms.
What gratitude can thank away the debt
Your valour lays upon me?
[Footnote 1:
This figure is in great use among the tragedians:
'Tis therefore, therefore 'tis.--_Victim_.
I long, repent, repent, and long again.--_Busiris_.]
Queen.
----------[1] Oh! ye gods!
[Aside.]
[Footnote 1: A tragical exclamation.]
Thumb.
When I'm not thank'd at all, I'm thank'd enough.
[1] I've done my duty, and I've done no more,
[Footnote 1: This line is copied verbatim in the Captives.]
Queen.
Was ever such a godlike creature seen?
[Aside.]
King.
Thy modesty's a [1]candle to thy merit,
It shines itself, and shews thy merit too.
But say, my boy, where didst thou leave the giants?
[Footnote 1:
We find a candlestick for this candle
in two celebrated authors:
------Each star withdraws
His golden head, and burns within the socket.--_Nero_.
A soul grown old and sunk into the socket.--_Sebastian_.]
Thumb.
My liege, without the castle gates they stand,
The castle gates too low for their admittance.
King.
What look they like?
Thumb.
Like nothing but themselves.
Queen.
[1]And sure thou art like nothing but thyself.
[Aside.]
[Footnote 1:
This simile occurs very frequently among the dramatic
writers of both kinds.]
King.
Enough! the vast idea fills my soul.
I see them--yes, I see them now before me:
The monstrous, ugly, barb'rous sons of whores.
But ha! what form majestick strikes our eyes?
[1]So perfect, that it seems to have been drawn
By all the gods in council: so fair she is,
That surely at her birth the council paused,
And then at length cry'd out, This is a woman!
[Footnote 1:
Mr Lee hath stolen this thought from our author:
This perfect face, drawn by the gods in council,
Which they were long a making.--_Luc. Jun. Brut_.
--At his birth the heavenly council paused,
And then at last cry'd out, This is a man!
Dryden hath improved this hint to the utmost perfection:
So perfect, that the very gods who form'd you wonder'd
At their own skill, and cry'd, A lucky hit
Has mended our design! Their envy hindered,
Or you had been immortal, and a pattern,
When Heaven would work for ostentation sake,
To copy out again.--_All for Love_.
Banks prefers the works of Michael Angelo to that of the gods:
A pattern for the gods to make a man by,
Or Michael Angelo to form a statue.]
Thumb.
Then were the gods mistaken--she is not
A woman, but a giantess----whom we,
[1] With much ado, have made a shift to hawl
Within the town:[2] for she is by a foot
Shorter than all her subject giants were.
[Footnote 1:
It is impossible, says Mr W----, sufficiently to admire
this natural easy line.]
[Footnote 2:
This tragedy, which in most points resembles the
ancients, differs from them in this--that it
assigns the same honour to lowness of stature
which they did to height. The gods and heroes in
Homer and Virgil are continually described higher
by the head than their followers, the contrary of
which is observed by our author. In short, to
exceed on either side is equally admirable;
and a man of three foot is as wonderful a sight
as a man of nine.]
Glum.
We yesterday were both a queen and wife,
One hundred thousand giants own'd our sway,
Twenty whereof were married to ourself.
Queen.
Oh! happy state of giantism where husbands
Like mushrooms grow, whilst hapless we are forced
To be content, nay, happy thought, with one.
Glum.
But then to lose them all in one black day,
That the same sun which, rising, saw me wife
To twenty giants, setting should behold
Me widow'd of them all.----[1]My worn-out heart,
That ship, leaks fast, and the great heavy lading,
My soul, will quickly sink.
[Footnote 1:
My blood leaks fast, and the great heavy lading
My soul will quickly sink.--_Mithridates_.
My soul is like a ship.--_Injured Love_.]
Queen.
Madam, believe
I view your sorrows with a woman's eye:
But learn to bear them with what strength you may,
To-morrow we will have our grenadiers
Drawn out before you, and you then shall choose
What husbands you think fit.
Glum.
[1]Madam, I am
Your most obedient and most humble servant.
[Footnote 1:
This well-bred line seems to be copied
in the Persian Princess:--
To be your humblest and most faithful slave.]
King.
Think, mighty princess, think this court your own,
Nor think the landlord me, this house my inn;
Call for whate'er you will, you'll nothing pay.
[1]I feel a sudden pain within my breast,
Nor know I whether it arise from love
Or only the wind-cholick. Time must shew.
O Thumb! what do we to thy valour owe!
Ask some reward, great as we can bestow.
[Footnote 1:
This doubt of the king puts me in mind of a passage in
the Captives, where the noise of feet is mistaken for
the rustling of leaves.
------Methinks I hear
The sound of feet:
No; 'twas the wind that shook yon cypress boughs.]
Thumb.
[1] I ask not kingdoms, I can conquer those;
I ask not money, money I've enough;
For what I've done, and what I mean to do,
For giants slain, and giants yet unborn,
Which I will slay---if this be called a debt,
Take my receipt in full: I ask but this,--
[2] To sun myself in Huncamunca's eyes.
[Footnote 1:
Mr Dryden seems to have had this passage in his eye
in the first page of Love Triumphant.]
[Footnote 2:
Don Carlos, in the Revenge, suns himself in the
charms of his mistress:
While in the lustre of her charms I lay.]
King.
Prodigious bold request.
[Aside.]
Queen.
--------[1]
Be still, my soul.
[Aside.]
[Footnote 1: A tragical phrase much in use.]
Thumb.
[1]My heart is at the threshold of your mouth,
And waits its answer there.--Oh! do not frown.
I've try'd to reason's tune to tune my soul,
But love did overwind and crack the string.
Though Jove in thunder had cry'd out, YOU SHAN'T,
I should have loved her still--for oh, strange fate,
Then when I loved her least I loved her most!
[Footnote 1:
This speech hath been taken to pieces by several tragical
authors, who seem to have rifled it, and shared its beauties
among them.
My soul waits at the portal of thy breast,
To ravish from thy lips the welcome news.--_Anna Bullen_.
My soul stands list'ning at my ears.--_Cyrus the Great_.
Love to his tune my jarring heart would bring,
But reason overwinds, and cracks the string.--_D. of Guise_.
-------I should have loved,
Though Jove, in muttering thunder, had forbid it.
--_New Sophonisba_.
And when it (_my heart_) wild resolves to love no more,
Then is the triumph of excessive love.--_Ibid_.]
King.
It is resolv'd--the princess is your own.
Thumb.
Oh! [1]happy, happy, happy, happy Thumb.
[Footnote 1:
Massinissa is one-fourth less happy than Tom Thumb.
Oh! happy, happy, happy!--_Ibid_.]
Queen.
Consider, sir; reward your soldier's merit,
But give not Huncamunca to Tom Thumb.
King.
Tom Thumb! Odzooks! my wide-extended realm,
Knows not a name so glorious as Tom Thumb.
Let Macedonia Alexander boast,
Let Rome her Caesars and her Scipios show,
Her Messieurs France, let Holland boast Mynheers,
Ireland her O's, her Macs let Scotland boast,
Let England boast no other than Tom Thumb.
Queen.
Though greater yet his boasted merit was,
He shall not have my daughter, that is pos'.
King.
Ha! sayst thou, Dollallolla?
Queen.
---------I say he shan't.
King.
[1]Then by our royal self we swear you lie.
[Footnote 1: No by myself.---Anna Bullen.]
Queen. [1] Who but a dog, who but a dog
Would use me as thou dost? Me, who have lain
[2] These twenty years so loving by thy side!
But I will be revenged. I'll hang myself.
Then tremble all who did this match persuade,
[3] For, riding on a cat, from high I'll fall,
And squirt down royal vengeance on you all.
[Footnote 1:
----------Who caused
This dreadful revolution in my fate.
Ulamar. Who but a dog--who but a dog?--_Liberty As_.]
[Footnote 2:
------------A bride,
Who twenty years lay loving by your side.--_Banks_.]
[Footnote 3:
For, borne upon a cloud, from high I'll fall,
And rain down royal vengeance on you all.--_Alb. Queens_.]
Food.
[1]Her majesty the queen is in a passion.
[Footnote 1: An information very like this we have
in the tragedy of Love, where, Cyrus having stormed in
the most violent manner, Cyaxares observes very calmly,
Why, nephew Cyrus, you are moved.]
King.
[1] Be she, or be she not, I'll to the girl
And pave thy way, oh Thumb--Now by ourself,
We were indeed a pretty king of clouts
To truckle to her will--For when by force
Or art the wife her husband over-reaches,
Give him the petticoat, and her the breeches.
[Footnote 1: 'Tis in your choice.
Love me, or love me not.--_Conquest of Granada_.]
Thumb.
[1] Whisper ye winds, that Huncamunca's mine!
Echoes repeat, that Huncamunca's mine!
The dreadful bus'ness of the war is o'er,
And beauty, heav'nly beauty! crowns my toils!
I've thrown the bloody garment now aside
And hymeneal sweets invite my bride.
So when some chimney-sweeper all the day
Hath through dark paths pursued the sooty way,
At night to wash his hands and face he flies,
And in his t'other shirt with his Brickdusta lies.
[Footnote 1:
There is not one beauty in this charming speech but what
hath been borrow'd by almost every tragick writer.] _
Read next: Act 1 - Scene 4
Read previous: Act 1 - Scene 2
Table of content of Tragedy Of Tragedies; Or, The Life And Death Of Tom Thumb The Great
GO TO TOP OF SCREEN
Post your review
Your review will be placed after the table of content of this book
