Agrippina
A Fragment of a Tragedy
Dramatis Personae
Agrippina, the Empress-mother.
Nero, the Emperor.
Poppaea, believed to be in love with Otho.
Otho, a young man of quality, in love with Poppaea.
Seneca, the Emperor’s Preceptor.
Anicetus, Captain of the Guards.
Demetrius, the Cynic, friend to Seneca.
Aceronia, Confidant to Agrippina.
The Argument
The drama opens with the indignation of Agrippina at receiving her son’s orders from Anicetus to remove from Baiae, and to have her guard taken from her. At this time Otho having conveyed Poppaea from the house of her husband Rufus Crispinus, brings her to Baiae, where he means to conceal her among the crowd; or, if his fraud is discovered, to have recourse to the Emperor’s authority; but, knowing the lawless temper of Nero, he determines not to have recourse to that expedient but on the utmost necessity. In the meantime he commits her to the care of Anicetus, whom he takes to be his friend, and in whose age he thinks he may safely confide. Nero is not yet come to Baiae; but Seneca, whom he sends before him, informs Agrippina of the accusation concerning Rubellius Plancus, and desires her to clear herself, which she does briefly, but demands to see her son, who, on his arrival, acquits her of all suspicion, and restores her to her honours.
In the mean while, Anicetus, to whose care Poppaea had been entrusted by Otho, contrives the following plot to ruin Agrippina; he betrays his trust to Otho, and brings Nero, as it were by chance, to the sight of the beautiful Poppaea. The Emperor is immediately struck with her charms, and she, by a feigned resistance, increases his passion; though, in reality, she is from the first dazzled with the prospect of empire, and forgets Otho. She therefore joins with Anicetus in his design of ruining Agrippina, soon perceiving that it will be for her interest. Otho hearing that the Emperor had seen Poppaea, is much enraged; but not knowing that this interview was obtained through the treachery of Anicetus, is readily persuaded by him to see Agrippina in secret, and acquaint her with his fears that her son Nero would marry Poppaea. Agrippina, to support her own power, and to wean the Emperor from the love of Poppaea, gives Otho encouragement, and promises to support him. Anicetus secretly introduces Nero to hear their discourse; who resolves immediately on his mother’s death, and, by Anicetus’s means, to destroy her by drowning. A solemn feast, in honour of their reconciliation, is to be made; after which she being to go by sea to Bauli, the ship is so contrived as to sink or crush her; she escapes by accident, and returns to Baiae.
In this interval Otho has an interview with Poppaea; and being duped a second time by Anicetus and her, determines to fly with her into Greece, by means of a vessel which is to be furnished by Anicetus; but he, pretending to remove Poppaea on board in the night, conveys her to Nero’s apartment; she there encourages and determines Nero to banish Otho, and finish the horrid deed he had attempted on his mother. Anicetus undertakes to execute his resolves; and, under pretence of a plot upon the Emperor’s life, is sent with a guard to murder Agrippina, who is still at Baiae in imminent fear, and irresolute how to conduct herself. The account of her death, and the Emperor’s horror and fruitless remorse, finishes the drama.
Agrippina
’Tis well, begone! your errand is performed,
Speaks as to Anicetus entering.
The message needs no comment. Tell your master,
His mother shall obey him. Say you saw her
Yielding due reverence to his high command;
Alone, unguarded and without a lictor,
As fits the daughter of Germanicus.
Say, she retired to Antium; there to tend
Her household cares, a woman’s best employment.
What if you add, how she turned pale and trembled;
You think, you spied a tear stand in her eye,
And would have dropped, but that her pride restrained it?
(Go! you can paint it well) ’twill profit you,
And please the stripling. Yet ’twould dash his joy
To hear the spirit of Britannicus
Yet walks on earth; at least there are who know
Without a spell to raise, and bid it fire
A thousand haughty hearts, unused to shake
When a boy frowns, nor to be lured with smiles
To taste of hollow kindness, or partake
His hospitable board; they are aware
Of the unpledged bowl, they love not aconite.
Aceronia
He’s gone; and much I hope these walls alone
And the mute air are privy to your passion.
Forgive your servant’s fears, who sees the danger
Which fierce resentment cannot fail to raise
In haughty youth, and irritated power.
Agrippina
And dost thou talk to me, to me, of danger,
Of haughty youth and irritated power,
To her that gave it being, her that armed
This painted Jove, and taught his novice hand
To aim the forked bolt; while he stood trembling,
Scared at the sound, and dazzled with its brightness?
’Tis like, thou hast forgot, when yet a stranger
To adoration, to the grateful steam
Of flattery’s incense, and obsequious vows
From voluntary realms, a puny boy,
Decked with no other lustre, than the blood
Of Agrippina’s race, he lived unknown
To fame, or fortune; haply eyed at distance
Some edileship, ambitious of the power
To judge of weights and measures; scarcely dared
On Expectation’s strongest wing to soar
High as the consulate, that empty shade
Of long-forgotten liberty; when I
Oped his young eye to bear the blaze of greatness;
Showed him where empire towered, and bade him strike
The noble quarry. Gods! then was the time
To shrink from danger; fear might then have worn
The mask of prudence; but a heart like mine,
A heart that glows with the pure Julian fire,
If bright Ambition from her craggy seat
Display the radiant prize, will mount undaunted,
Gain the rough heights, and grasp the dangerous honour.
Aceronia
Through various life I have pursued your steps,
Have seen your soul, and wondered at its daring;
Hence rise my fears. Nor am I yet to learn
How vast the debt of gratitude which Nero
To such a mother owes; the world, you gave him,
Suffices not to pay the obligation.
I well remember too (for I was present)
When in a secret and dead hour of night,
Due sacrifice performed with barb’rous rites
Of muttered charms, and solemn invocation,
You bade the Magi call the dreadful powers,
That read futurity, to know the fate
Impending o’er your son; their answer was,
If the son reign, the mother perishes.
Perish (you cried) the mother! reign the son!
He reigns, the rest is heaven’s; who oft has bad,
Even when its will seemed wrote in lines of blood,
Th’ unthought event disclose a whiter meaning.
Think too how oft in weak and sickly minds
The sweets of kindness lavishly indulged
Rankle to gall; and benefits too great
To be repaid, sit heavy on the soul,
As unrequited wrongs. The willing homage
Of prostrate Rome, the senate’s joint applause,
The riches of the earth, the train of pleasures
That wait on youth, and arbitrary sway;
These were your gift, and with them you bestowed
The very power he has to be ungrateful.
Agrippina
Thus ever grave and undisturbed reflection
Pours its cool dictates in the madding ear
Of rage, and thinks to quench the fire it feels not.
Say’st thou I must be cautious, must be silent,
And tremble at the phantom I have raised?
Carry to him thy timid counsels. He
Perchance may heed ’em. Tell him, too, that one,
Who had such liberal power to give, may still
With equal power resume that gift, and raise
A tempest that shall shake her own creation
To its original atoms—tell me, say!—
This mighty emperor, this dreaded hero,
Has he beheld the glittering front of war?
Knows his soft ear the trumpet’s thrilling voice,
And outcry of the battle? Have his limbs
Sweat under iron harness? Is he not
The silken son of dalliance, nursed in ease
And pleasure’s flowery lap?—Rubellius lives,
And Sylla has his friends, though schooled by fear
To bow the supple knee, and court the times
With shows of fair obeisance; and a call,
Like mine, might serve belike to wake pretensions
Drowsier than theirs, who boast the genuine blood
Of our imperial house.
Aceronia
Did I not wish to check this dangerous passion,
I might remind my mistress that her nod
Can rouse eight hardy legions, wont to stem
With stubborn nerves the tide, and face the rigour
Of bleak Germania’s snows. Four, not less brave,
That in Armenia quell the Parthian force
Under the warlike Corbulo, by you
Marked for their leader; these, by ties confirmed,
Of old respect and gratitude, are yours.
Surely the Masians too, and those of Egypt,
Have not forgot your sire; the eye of Rome
And the Praetorian camp have long revered,
With customed awe, the daughter, sister, wife,
And mother of their Caesars.
Agrippina
Ha! by Juno,
It bears a noble semblance. On this base
My great revenge shall rise; or say we sound
The trump of Liberty; there will not want,
Even in the servile senate, ears to own
Her spirit-stirring voice; Soranus there,
And Cassius, Vetus too, and Thrasea,
Minds of the antique cast, rough, stubborn souls,
That struggle with the yoke. How shall the spark
Unquenchable, that glows within their breasts,
Blaze into freedom, when the idle herd
(Slaves from the womb, created but to stare,
And bellow in the Circus) yet will start,
And shake ’em at the name of Liberty,
Stung by a senseless word, a vain tradition,
As there were magic in it! Wrinkled beldams
Teach it their grandchildren, as somewhat rare
That anciently appeared, but when, extends
Beyond their chronicle—oh! ’tis a cause
To arm the hand of childhood, and rebrace
The slackened sinews of time-wearied age.
Yes, we may meet, ingrateful boy, we may!
Again the buried Genius of old Rome
Shall from the dust uprear his reverend head,
Roused by the shout of millions; there before
His high tribunal thou and I appear.
Let majesty sit on thy awful brow,
And lighten from thy eye; around thee call
The gilded swarm that wantons in the sunshine
Of thy full favour; Seneca be there
In gorgeous phrase of laboured eloquence
To dress thy plea, and Burrhus strengthen it.
With his plain soldier’s oath, and honest seeming.
Against thee, Liberty and Agrippina;
The world, the prize; and fair befall the victors.
But soft! why do I waste the fruitless hours
In threats unexecuted? Haste thee, fly
These hated walls that seem to mock my shame,
And cast me forth in duty to their lord.
My thought aches at him; not the basilisk
More deadly to the sight, than is to me
The cool injurious eye of frozen kindness.
I will not meet its poison. Let him feel
Before he sees me. Yes, I will be gone,
But not to Antium—all shall be confessed,
Whate’er the frivolous tongue of giddy fame
Has spread among the crowd; things, that but whispered
Have arched the hearer’s brow, and riveted
His eyes in fearful ecstasy; no matter
What; so’t be strange, and dreadful.—Sorceries,
Assassinations, poisonings—the deeper
My guilt, the blacker his ingratitude.
And you, ye manes of Ambition’s victims,
Enshrined Claudius, with the pitied ghosts
Of the Syllani, doomed to early death,
(Ye unavailing horrors, fruitless crimes!)
If from the realms of night my voice ye hear,
In lieu of penitence, and vain remorse,
Accept my vengeance. Though by me ye bled,
He was the cause. My love, my fears for him,
Dried the soft springs of pity in my heart,
And froze them up with deadly cruelty.
Yet if your injured shades demand my fate,
If murder cries for murder, blood for blood,
Let me not fall alone; but crush his pride,
And sink the traitor in his mother’s ruin.
Exeunt.
Act
I
Scene
II
Otho, Poppaea
Otho
Thus far we’re safe. Thanks to the rosy queen
Of amorous thefts; and had her wanton son
Lent us his wings, we could not have beguiled
With more elusive speed the dazzled sight
Of wakeful jealousy. Be gay securely;
Dispel, my fair, with smiles, the tim’rous cloud
That hangs on thy clear brow. So Helen looked,
So her white neck reclined, so was she borne
By the young Trojan to his gilded bark
With fond reluctance, yielding modesty,
And oft reverted eye, as if she knew not
Whether she feared, or wished to be pursued.