The Works of Henry Fielding, vol. 12. Fielding Harold

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СКАЧАТЬ Queen. Wherefore? Oh! blood and thunder! han't you heard (What every corner of the court resounds) That little Thumb will be a great man made?

       Griz. I heard it, I confess – for who, alas! [1] Can always stop his ears? – But would my teeth, By grinding knives, had first been set on edge!

      [Footnote 1: Grizzle was not probably possessed of that glew of which

      Mr Banks speaks in his Cyrus.

      I'll glew my ears to every word.

      ]

       Queen. Would I had heard, at the still noon of night,

      The hallalloo of fire in every street!

      Odsbobs! I have a mind to hang myself,

      To think I should a grandmother be made

      By such a rascal! – Sure the king forgets

      When in a pudding, by his mother put,

      The bastard, by a tinker, on a stile

      Was dropp'd. – O, good lord Grizzle! can I bear

      To see him from a pudding mount the throne?

      Or can, oh can, my Huncamunca bear

      To take a pudding's offspring to her arms?

       Griz. Oh horror! horror! horror! cease, my queen, [1] Thy voice, like twenty screech-owls, wracks my brain.

      [Footnote 1: Screech-owls, dark ravens, and amphibious monsters, Are screaming in that voice. —Mary Queen of Scots. ]

       Queen. Then rouse thy spirit – we may yet prevent This hated match.

       Griz. – We will[1]; nor fate itself,

      Should it conspire with Thomas Thumb, should cause it.

      I'll swim through seas; I'll ride upon the clouds;

      I'll dig the earth; I'll blow out every fire;

      I'll rave; I'll rant; I'll rise; I'll rush; I'll roar;

      Fierce as the man whom[2] smiling dolphins bore

      From the prosaick to poetick shore.

      I'll tear the scoundrel into twenty pieces.

      [Footnote 1: The reader may see all the beauties of this speech in a late ode called the Naval Lyrick.]

      [Footnote 2: This epithet to a dolphin doth not give one so clear an idea as were to be wished; a smiling fish seeming a little more difficult to be imagined than a flying fish. Mr Dryden is of opinion that smiling is the property of reason, and that no irrational creature can smile:

      Smiles not allow'd to beasts from reason move.

      – State of Innocence.

      ]

       Queen. Oh, no! prevent the match, but hurt him not; For, though I would not have him have my daughter, Yet can we kill the man that kill'd the giants?

       Griz. I tell you, madam, it was all a trick;

      He made the giants first, and then he kill'd them;

      As fox-hunters bring foxes to the wood,

      And then with hounds they drive them out again.

       Queen. How! have you seen no giants? Are there not Now, in the yard, ten thousand proper giants?

       Griz. [1]Indeed I cannot positively tell, But firmly do believe there is not one.

      [Footnote 1: These lines are written in the same key with those in the

      Earl of Essex:

      Why, say'st thou so? I love thee well, indeed

      I do, and thou shalt find by this 'tis true.

      Or with this in Cyrus:

      The most heroick mind that ever was.

      And with above half of the modern tragedies. ]

       Queen. Hence! from my sight! thou traitor, hie away;

      By all my stars I thou enviest Tom Thumb.

      Go, sirrah! go, [1]hie away! hie! – thou art

      A setting dog: be gone.

      [Footnote 1: Aristotle, in that excellent work of his which is very justly stiled his masterpiece, earnestly recommends using the terms of art, however coarse or even indecent they may be. Mr Tate is of the same opinion.

       Bru. Do not, like young hawks, fetch a course about. Your game flies fair.

       Fra. Do not fear it. He answers you in your own hawking phrase. —Injured Love.

      I think these two great authorities are sufficient to justify Dollallolla in the use of the phrase, "Hie away, hie!" when in the same line she says she is speaking to a setting-dog. ]

       Griz. Madam, I go.

      Tom Thumb shall feel the vengeance you have raised.

      So, when two dogs are fighting in the streets,

      With a third dog one of the two dogs meets,

      With angry teeth he bites him to the bone,

      And this dog smarts for what that dog has done.

      SCENE VI

       Queen (sola). And whither shall I go? – Alack a day!

      I love Tom Thumb – but must not tell him so;

      For what's a woman when her virtue's gone?

      A coat without its lace; wig out of buckle;

      A stocking with a hole in't – I can't live

      Without my virtue, or without Tom Thumb.

      [1] Then let me weigh them in two equal scales;

      In this scale put my virtue, that Tom Thumb.

      Alas! Tom Thumb is heavier than my virtue.

      But hold! – perhaps I may be left a widow:

      This match prevented, then Tom Thumb is mine;

      In that dear hope I will forget my pain.

      So, when some wench to Tothill Bridewell's sent,

      With beating hemp and flogging she's content;

      She hopes in time to ease her present pain,

      At length is free, and walks the streets again.

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