For, when those wantons, whose unjust desire.
Had urg'd me on so far, that to retire..
I knew was vain, as I before to lust
Had been a minister, so now I must

Join hands in blood, which they did plot and study:
O who would think that women-kind were bloody :
But then our chastity we do forego,

That lost, what then will we refuse to do?
This did that Roman proud* Sejanus know,
Who, hating Drusus as his deadly foe,
And basely seeking to betray his life,
Did first allure fair Livia, Drusus' wife,
To poison her own Lord, that in his stead
The base Sejanus might enjoy his bed;
Who, rais'd by Cæsar from ignoble place,
In Livia's lustful eye did find more grace
Than Drusus, Cesar's son, a manly youth:
O who knows how to feed a woman's tooth!
In mischief I went on, and did agree
To be an actor in thy tragedy,

Thou injur'd ghost; yet was I but a mute,
And what I did was at another's suit:
Their plots I saw, and silent kept the same,
For which my life did suffer death and shame;
For see, ah! see, this cord about my neck,
Which time sometime with precious things did deck;
Revenge hath done, and justice hath her due,
Let none then wrong the dead, let all with you,
O gentle knight, forget my great offence,
Which I have purg'd with tears of penitence:
For thousand living eyes with tears could tell,
That from my eyes true tears of sorrow fell:
Then judge my cause with charitable mind,
Who mercy seeks with faith, shall mercy find.
This said, she vanish'd from before our sight,
I think to heaven, and think, I think aright.
She gone, the poison'd ghost did seem with tears
To chide her fate: but lo, there straight appears
Another in her place, who seem'd to be,
When he did live, some man† of good degree
'Mongst men on earth; one of so solemn look,
As if true gravity that place had took
To dwell upon; his person comely was,
His stature did the meaner size surpass;
Well shap'd in every limb, well step'd in years,
As here and there appear'd by some grey hairs.
When first he did appear, with woeful look
He view'd the Tower, and his head he shook,

Tacitus Annal, Lib. iv. Cap. 2.

+ The description of Sir Jarvis Ellwis, the late Lieutenant of the Tower.

As if from thence he did derive his woe,
Which with a sigh he thus begun to show :

O thou sad building, ominous to those
Whom with thy fatal walls thou dost inclose,
For thee, I, hapless man, as for the end
Of my desire, did falsly condescend
Unto that plot, by others heads begun,

Through which in thee such wrong was lately done.
Thou that didst poison'd feel thy foes despight,
See here the ghost of that unhappy knight,
Which whilome was lieutenant of this place,
Though now a wretch, thus halter'd with disgrace.
I was, alas, what boots it that I was!
Of good report, and did with credit pass
Through every act of my life's tragedy,
Upon this world, the stage of vanity,
Till the last scene of blood by others plotted,
Concluding ill, my name and credit blotted.
I must confess I did connive at those
That were the ministers to thy proud foes,
Closely employ'd by them thy life to spill
By secret poison, though against my will:
Fear of their greatness, and no hate to thee,
Inforc'd my coward conscience to agree.
When first to me this plot they did impart,
O what a tedious combate, in my heart,
Unto my soul did feelingly appear,

"Twixt my sad conscience, and a doubtful fear!
Fear said that, if I did reveal the same,

Those great ones, great in grace, would turn the shame
Upon my head; but conscience said again,
That, if I did conceal it, murder's stain
Would spot my soul as much for my consent,
As if at first it had been my intent.
Fear said that, if the same I did disclose,
The countenance of greatness I should lose,
And be thrust out of office and of place;
But conscience said that I should lose that grace
And favour, which my God to me had given,
And be perhaps thrust ever out of heaven.
Long these two champions did maintain the field,
Till my weak conscience at the last did yield:
O let those men, that do condemn my fear
And folly, most in their remembrance bear,
What certain danger stood on either side
As I should pass, and how I should have dy'd

In either way, at least with some great fall
For ever have been crush'd; and think withal,
How prone our nature is, in fear, to rest
Upon those seeming hopes that promise best.

be

speak not this to mitigate my sin,
O no, I wish my fall may others win
From the like fear, and that my life may
A precedent to men of such degree,
To whom authority doth think it fit
The trust of such a function to commit.
Let such men to remember still be mov'd,
That which by sad experience I have prov'd;
"Tis good to fear great men, but yet 'tis better
Ever to fear God more, since God is greater:
If God's good angel had imprinted this.
Into my thoughts, I had not thought amiss;
Nor I, unhappy I, should have consented,
But all this mischief I had then prevented.
Here some perhaps will think the former race
Of my sad life t'have been debauch'd and base,
Because at last it had so base an end;
But for ourselves, might modesty contend
In opposition, I might justly say,
How many now live glorious at this day,
Whose honour greater stains do daily spot,
Then any which my
former life did blot:
Yet those my crimes which did my God offend,
For which his finger did point out this end
Unto my life, I'll shew, though to my shame,
That others as from death may fly the same.
My father from whose life my breath I drew,
When sick upon his bed he lay, and knew
That at his door of flesh death's hand did knock,
And did perceive weak nature would unlock
To let him in, did with his blessing give
This charge to me: That I, while I did live,
Should never seek for office at the court,
But with that means he left my state support:
With reverence his will I did obey,

Until, O that I might not tell the day,
In which I did with greedy-eye affect

To

That place in this great Tower, without respect
my dead sire's behest; yet, since it was
A touch to conscience, on I would not pass,
Untill by some I was resolv'd amiss,
That, as in other things, so I in this,
Which in itself was of indifference
And lawful unto others, might dispence
With my obedience to my father's will,
And that my own intent I might fulfil:
Yet one there is (O ever may he be
Belov'd of heav'n for his great love to me)
Who by the light of truth did shew the way
Which I should go, but I did not obey :

Ambitious mist did blind my weaker eyes,
I thought by this preferment I should rise;
Yet no desert but gold did gain me grace,
My own corruption purchas'd me that place:
For brib'ry in the soul a blemish makes
Of him that gives, as well as him that takes;
And bribing hands, that give, must guilty be
Of their own want of worth; for who, but he
That in himself the want of merit finds,
Will be the bawd to base corrupted minds?
Ye, that neglect performance of the will
Of
your dead parents, thinking it no ill
To disobey their precepts, now in me
The curse of disobedience ye may see;
And ye whose golden fingers, as in sport,
Like lime-twigs catch at offices in court,
In which obtain'd ye ever after live
Corrupt in mind, to gain what ye did give;
Behold untimely Death's disgraceful cord
About this neck, my bribing hands reward.
Before this sudden and unlook'd for fate
Did fall thus heavy on me, when my state
Did flourish among men, to mind I call
An accident of note which then did fall:
Bewitch'd with love to that too common vice
In this our age of hazardy and dice,
I losing once my coin (for few thereby
Have ever gainers been) did wish that I,
When I again did use the dice, might come
To die this shameful death, which by the doom
Of righteous heav'n, again I using game,
As I had wish'd, to me unlook'd for came.
Vain gamesters that too commonly do use
Strange deprecations, when ye do abuse
Yourselves in game, by my sad fall take heed,
And let your word be ever as your deed;
Lest your hand meet mine in the self-same dish,
For heav'n doth often hear when men do wish.
But of no sin had my most sinful soul
Been ever sick, yet this one sin most foul,
This act of poison, to my house a stain,
With future times for ever shall remain:
The dye of blood on murderers hand doth stay,
No tears, no time,' can wipe the same away;
But if true tears of sorrow may with you,
As all true sorrows tears with heav'n may do,
Move pitiful regard of my sad fall,

Ye then, rememb'ring how I fell withal,
Will, out of charity, with lesser blame
Censure my fault, when ye shall hear the same :

Thus quit by death from doom of law, and heaven
Out of free mercy having me forgiven,

Let all calumnious tongues their malice cease,
That so my soul may ever live in peace :
O let the world abate her sharpen'd tongue,
And, since I have done penance for thy wrong,
Thou wronged knight, what can thy ghost now crave ?
Grieve thee no more, go rest thee in thy grave:
Thy foes decline, proud Gaveston is down,
No wanton Edward wears our England's crown.
This said, he vanish'd; and another stood
In the same place, midway above the flood,
Whose strange demeanour with amazement struck
Us that beheld him; for with startled look,
And hair stiff standing, as a man aghast,
He star'd upon the knight, from whom in haste
Into the flood he would have shrunk away,
Had not, I think, that fury forc'd his stay,
Which while he liv'd his guilty soul pursu'd,
Till he his own offence had freely shew'd.
A man he was of stature meanly tall,
His body's lineaments true shap'd, and all
His limbs compacted well, and strongly knit;
Nature's kind hand no error made in it.

His beard was ruddy hue, and, from his head,
A wanton lock itself did down dis-spread
Upon his back; to which while he did live,
Th' ambiguous name of Elf-lock he did give.
And now fantastick phrensy, as before,
When he did live, did seem to vex him sore..
The shameful rope, which 'bout his shoulders hung,
Hither and thither carelessly he flung;

And, as a caitiff of that cursed crew,
Whom sad despair doth after death pursue,
Howling and yelling, while the tears did run,
Down by his cheeks, at last he thus begun:
Since that sly serpent of soul-slaying sin,
Which feeds upon the guilty mind within
Each wicked breast, doth force me to reveal,
Unto my shame what I did long conceal,
Give ear, ye cursed atheists all that been,
Ye unbelieving dogs in shape of men,
That think the name of God, and his great law,
But things devis'd to keep the world in awe;
Who mock the time's last dreadful day to come,
Which at the length your wicked deeds shall doom;
And ye blasphemous exorcists, that are
With Pluto's factors so familiar,

Here upon earth, that ye each day do deal.

* Franklin's Ghost,