Читать книгу The Duchess of Padua - Оскар Уайльд, Wilde Oscar, F. H. Cornish - Страница 4

No, my Lord Cardinal, I weary of her!

Why, she is worse than ugly, she is good.

Your Grace, there are two thousand people there

Who every moment grow more clamorous.

Tut, man, they waste their strength upon their lungs!

People who shout so loud, my lords, do nothing;

The only men I fear are silent men.

You see, Lord Cardinal, how my people love me.

Go, Petrucci,

And tell the captain of the guard below

To clear the square.  Do you not hear me, sir?

Do what I bid you.

I beseech your Grace

To listen to their grievances.

Ay! the peaches

Are not so big this year as they were last.

I crave your pardon, my lord Cardinal,

I thought you spake of peaches.

What is that?

The Duchess has gone forth into the square,

And stands between the people and the guard,

And will not let them shoot.

The devil take her!

And followed by a dozen of the citizens

Has come into the Palace.

By Saint James,

Our Duchess waxes bold!

Here comes the Duchess.

Shut that door there; this morning air is cold.

I do beseech your Grace to give us audience.

What are these grievances?

Alas, my Lord,

Such common things as neither you nor I,

Nor any of these noble gentlemen,

Have ever need at all to think about;

They say the bread, the very bread they eat,

Is made of sorry chaff.

Ay! so it is,

Nothing but chaff.

And very good food too,

I give it to my horses.

They say the water,

Set in the public cisterns for their use,

[Has, through the breaking of the aqueduct,]

To stagnant pools and muddy puddles turned.

They should drink wine; water is quite unwholesome.

Alack, your Grace, the taxes which the customs

Take at the city gate are grown so high

We cannot buy wine.

Then you should bless the taxes

Which make you temperate.

Think, while we sit

In gorgeous pomp and state, gaunt poverty

Creeps through their sunless lanes, and with sharp knives

Cuts the warm throats of children stealthily

And no word said.

Ay! marry, that is true,

My little son died yesternight from hunger;

He was but six years old; I am so poor,

I cannot bury him.

If you are poor,

Are you not blessed in that?  Why, poverty

Is one of the Christian virtues,

Is it not?

I know, Lord Cardinal, you have great revenues,

Rich abbey-lands, and tithes, and large estates

For preaching voluntary poverty.

Nay but, my lord the Duke, be generous;

While we sit here within a noble house

[With shaded porticoes against the sun,

And walls and roofs to keep the winter out],

There are many citizens of Padua

Who in vile tenements live so full of holes,

That the chill rain, the snow, and the rude blast,

Are tenants also with them; others sleep

Under the arches of the public bridges

All through the autumn nights, till the wet mist

Stiffens their limbs, and fevers come, and so —

And so they go to Abraham’s bosom, Madam.

They should thank me for sending them to Heaven,

If they are wretched here. [To the Cardinal.]

Is it not said

Somewhere in Holy Writ, that every man

Should be contented with that state of life

God calls him to? Why should I change their state,

Or meddle with an all-wise providence,

Which has apportioned that some men should starve,

And others surfeit? I did not make the world.

He hath a hard heart.

Nay, be silent, neighbour;

I think the Cardinal will speak for us.

True, it is Christian to bear misery,

Yet it is Christian also to be kind,

And there seem many evils in this town,

Which in your wisdom might your Grace reform.

What is that word reform?  What does it mean?

Marry, it means leaving things as they are; I like it not.

Reform Lord Cardinal, did you say reform?

There is a man in Germany called Luther,

Who would reform the Holy Catholic Church.

Have you not made him heretic, and uttered

Anathema, maranatha, against him?

He would have led the sheep out of the fold,

We do but ask of you to feed the sheep.

When I have shorn their fleeces I may feed them.

As for these rebels –  [Duchess entreats him.]

That is a kind word,

He means to give us something.

Is that so?

These ragged knaves who come before us here,

With mouths chock-full of treason.

Good my Lord,

Fill up our mouths with bread; we’ll hold our tongues.

Ye shall hold your tongues, whether you starve or not.

My lords, this age is so familiar grown,

That the low peasant hardly doffs his hat,

Unless you beat him; and the raw mechanic

Elbows the noble in the public streets.

Still as our gentle Duchess has so prayed us,

And to refuse so beautiful a beggar

Were to lack both courtesy and love,

Touching your grievances, I promise this —

Marry, he will lighten the taxes!

Or a dole of bread, think you, for each man?

That, on next Sunday, the Lord Cardinal

Shall, after Holy Mass, preach you a sermon

Upon the Beauty of Obedience.

I’ faith, that will not fill our stomachs!

A sermon is but a sorry sauce, when

You have nothing to eat with it.

Poor people,

You see I have no power with the Duke,

But if you go into the court without,

My almoner shall from my private purse,

Divide a hundred ducats ’mongst you all.

God save the Duchess, say I.

God save her.

And every Monday morn shall bread be set

For those who lack it.

Why, God save the Duchess again!

Come hither, fellow! what is your name?

Dominick, sir.

A good name!  Why were you called Dominick?

Marry, because I was born on St. George’s day.

A good reason! here is a ducat for you!

Will you not cry for me God save the Duke?

God save the Duke.

Nay! louder, fellow, louder.

God save the Duke!

More lustily, fellow, put more heart in it!

Here is another ducat for you.

God save the Duke!

Why, gentlemen, this simple fellow’s love

Touches me much.  [To the Citizen, harshly.]

Go!  [Exit Citizen, bowing.]

This is the way, my lords,

You can buy popularity nowadays.

Oh, we are nothing if not democratic!

Well, Madam,

You spread rebellion ’midst our citizens.

My Lord, the poor have rights you cannot touch,

The right to pity, and the right to mercy.

So, so, you argue with me?  This is she,

The gentle Duchess for whose hand I yielded

Three of the fairest towns in Italy,

Pisa, and Genoa, and Orvieto.

Promised, my Lord, not yielded: in that matter

Brake you your word as ever.

You wrong us, Madam,

There were state reasons.

What state reasons are there

For breaking holy promises to a state?

There are wild boars at Pisa in a forest

Close to the city: when I promised Pisa

Unto your noble and most trusting father,

I had forgotten there was hunting there.

At Genoa they say,

Indeed I doubt them not, that the red mullet

Runs larger in the harbour of that town

Than anywhere in Italy.

You, my lord,

Whose gluttonous appetite is your only god,

Could satisfy our Duchess on that point.

And Orvieto?

I cannot now recall

Why I did not surrender Orvieto

According to the word of my contract.

Maybe it was because I did not choose.

Why look you, Madam, you are here alone;

’Tis many a dusty league to your grey France,

And even there your father barely keeps

A hundred ragged squires for his Court.

What hope have you, I say?  Which of these lords

And noble gentlemen of Padua

Stands by your side.

There is not one.

Nor shall be,

While I am Duke in Padua: listen, Madam,

Being mine own, you shall do as I will,

And if it be my will you keep the house,

Why then, this palace shall your prison be;

And if it be my will you walk abroad,

Why, you shall take the air from morn to night.

Sir, by what right – ?

Madam, my second Duchess