en king,
That rules the hive, be born without a sting;
Let Guise by blood resolve to mount to power.
And he is great as Mecca's emperor.
He comes; bid him not stand on altar-vows,
But then strike deepest, when he lowest bows;
Tell him, fate's awed when an usurper springs,
And joins to crowd out just indulgent kings. [_Vanishes._

SCENE III.

_Enter the Duke of_ GUISE, _and Duke of_ MAYENNE.

_May._ All offices and dignities he gives
To your profest and most inveterate foes;
But if he were inclined, as we could wish him,
There is a lady-regent at his ear,
That never pardons.

_Gui._ Poison on her name!
Take my hand on't, that cormorant dowager
Will never rest, till she has all our heads
In her lap. I was at Bayonne with her,
When she, the king, and grisly d'Alva met.
Methinks, I see her listening now before me,
Marking the very motion of his beard,
His opening nostrils, and his dropping lids.
I hear him croak too to the gaping council,--
Fish for the great fish, take no care for frogs,
Cut off the poppy-heads, sir;--madam, charm
The winds but fast, the billows will be still[3].

_May._ But, sir, how comes it you should be thus warm,
Still pushing counsels when among your friends;
Yet, at the court, cautious, and cold as age,
Your voice, your eyes, your mien so different,
You seem to me two men?

_Gui._ The reason's plain.
Hot with my friends, because, the question given,
I start the judgment right, where others drag.
This is the effect of equal elements,
And atoms justly poised; nor should you wonder
More at the strength of body than of mind;
'Tis equally the same to see me plunge
Headlong into the Seine, all over armed,
And plow against the torrent to my point,
As 'twas to hear my judgment on the Germans,
This to another man would be a brag;
Or at the court among my enemies,
To be, as I am here, quite off my guard,
Would make me such another thing as Grillon,
A blunt, hot, honest, downright, valiant fool.

_May._ Yet this you must allow a failure in you,--
You love his niece; and to a politician
All passion's bane, but love directly death.

_Gui._ False, false, my Mayenne; thou'rt but half Guise again.
Were she not such a wond'rous composition,
A soul, so flushed as mine is with ambition,
Sagacious and so nice, must have disdained her:
But she was made when nature was in humour,
As if a Grillon got her on the queen,
Where all the honest atoms fought their way,
Took a full tin