4. "Bussy D'Ambois," a tragedy, once much applauded, was the favourite production of George Chapman. If Dryden could have exhausted every copy of this bombast performance in one holocaust, the public would have been no great losers, as may be apparent from the following quotations:
_Bussy._ I'll sooth his plots, and strew my hate with smiles, Till, all at once, the close mines of my heart Rise at full state, and rush into his blood. I'll bind his arm in silk, and rub his flesh, To make the veine swell, that his soule may gush Into some kennel, where it loves to lie; And policy be flanked with policy. Yet shall the feeling centre, where we meet. Groan with the weight of my approaching feet. I'll make the inspired threshold of his court Sweat with the weather of my horrid steps, Before I enter; yet, I will appear Like calm securitie, befor a ruin. A politician must, like lightning, melt The very marrow, and not taint the skin; His wayes must not be seen through, the superficies Of the green centre must not taste his feet, When hell is plowed up with the wounding tracts, And all his harvest reap't by hellish facts.
Montsurry, when he discovers that the Friar had acted as confident in the intrigue betwixt his lady and d'Ambois, thus elegantly expresses the common idea of the world being turned _upside down._
Now, is it true, earth moves, and heaven stands still; Even heaven itself must see and suffer ill. The too huge bias of the world hath swayed Her back-part upwards, and with _that_ she braves This hemisphere, that long her month hath mocked. The gravity of her religious face, Now grown too weighty with her sacrilege, And here discerned sophisticate enough, Turns to the antipodes, and all the forms That here allusions have impressed in her, Have eaten through her back, and now all see How she is riveted with hypocrisie.
Yet, I observe, from the prologue to the edition of 1641, that the part of D'Ambois was considered as a high test of a players' talents:
--Field is gone, Whose action first did give it name; and one Who came the neatest to him, is denied, By his grey beard, to shew the height and pride Of d'Ambois' youth and braverie. Yet to hold Our title still a-foot, and not grow cold, By giving't o'er, a third man with his best Of care and paines defends our interest. As Richard he was liked, nor do we fear, In personating d'Ambois, heile appear To faint, or goe lesse, so your free consent, As heretofore, give him encouragement.