thegoodfellas/blogset-br huggingface dataset:
Though men can cover crimes with bold stern looks, Poor women's faces are their own faults' books. No man inveigh against the withered flower, But chide rough winter that the flower hath killed. Not that devoured, but that which doth devour, Is worthy blame. O, let it not be hild Poor women's faults that they are so fulfilled With men's abuses: those proud lords to blame Make weak-made women tenants to' their shame. The precedent whereof in Lucrece view, Assailed by night with circumstances strong Of present death, and shame that might ensue By that her death, to do her husband wrong. Such danger to resistance did belong, That dying fear through all her body spread; And who cannot abuse a body dead? By this, mild patience bid fair Lucrece speak To the poor counterfeit of her complaining. 'My girl,' quoth she, 'on what occasion break Those tears from thee that down thy cheeks are raining? If thou dost weep for grief of my sustaining, Know, gentle wench, it small avails my mood; If tears could help, mine own would do me good. 'But tell me, girl, when went'-and there she stayed Till after a deep groan-'Tarquin from hence?' 'Madam, ere I was up,' replied the maid, 'The more to blame my sluggard negligence. Yet with the fault I thus far can dispense: Myself was stirring ere the break of day, And ere I rose was Tarquin gone away. 'But, lady, if your maid may be so bold, She would request to know your heaviness.' 'O, peace!' quoth Lucrece: 'if it should be told, The repetition cannot make it less, For more it is than I can well express; And that deep torture may be called a hell When more is felt than one hath power to tell. 'Go, get me hither paper, ink and pen; Yet save that labour, for I have them here. What should I say? One of my husband's men Bid thou be ready by and by to bear A letter to my lord, my love, my dear. Bid him with speed prepare to carry it; The cause craves haste and it will soon be writ.' Her maid is gone, and she prepares to write, First hovering o'er the paper with her quill. Conceit and grief an eager combat fight; What wit sets down is blotted straight with will; This is too curious-good, this blunt and ill: Much like a press of people at a door, Throng her inventions, which shall go before. At last she thus begins: 'Thou worthy lord Of that unworthy wife that greeteth thee, Health to thy person! next vouchsafe t'afford- If ever, love, thy Lucrece thou wilt see- Some present speed to come and visit me. So I commend me, from our house in grief; My woes are tedious, though my words are brief.' Here folds she up the tenor of her woe, Her certain sorrow writ uncertainly. By this short schedule Collatine may know Her grief, but not her grief's true quality; She dares not thereof make discovery, Lest he should hold
it her own gross abuse, Ere she with blood had stained her stained excuse. Besides, the life and feeling of her passion She hoards, to spend when he is by to hear her, When sighs and groans and tears may grace the fashion Of her disgrace, the better so to clear her From that suspicion which the world might bear her. To shun this blot, she would not blot the letter With words, till action might become them better. To see sad sights moves more than hear them told; For then the eye interprets to the car The heavy motion that it doth behold, When every part a part of woe doth bear. 'Tis but a part of sorrow that we hear: Deep sounds make lesser noise than shallow fords, And sorrow ebbs, being blown with wind of words. Her letter now is sealed and on it writ 'At Ardea to my lord with more than haste.' The post attends, and she delivers it, Charging the sour-faced groom to hie as fast As lagging fowls before the northern blast. Speed more than speed but dull and slow she deems: Extremity still urgeth such extremes. The homely villain curtsies to her low, And blushing on her, with a steadfast eye Receives the scroll without or yea or no, And forth with bashful innocence doth hie. But they whose guilt within their bosoms lie Imagine every eye beholds their blame; For Lucrece thought he blushed to see her shame: When, silly groom, God wot, it was defect Of spirit, life and bold audacity. Such harmless creatures have a true respect To talk in deeds, while others saucily Promise more speed but do it leisurely. Even so this pattern of the worn-out age Pawned honest looks, but laid no words to gage. His kindled duty kindled her mistrust, That two red fires in both their faces blazed; She thought he blushed, as knowing Tarquin's lust, And blushing with him, wistly on him gazed; Her earnest eye did make him more amazed; The more she saw the blood his cheeks replenish, The more she thought he spied in her some blemish. But long she thinks till he return again, And yet the duteous vassal scarce is gone. The weary time she cannot entertain, For now 'tis stale to sigh, to weep and groan; So woe hath wearied woe, moan tired moan, That she her plaints a little while doth stay, Pausing for means to mourn some newer way. At last she calls to mind where hangs a piece Of skilful painting, made for Priam's Troy, Before the which is drawn the power of Greece, For Helen's rape the city to destroy, Threat'ning cloud-kissing Ilion with annoy; Which the conceited painter drew so proud As heaven, it seemed, to kiss the turrets bowed. A thousand lamentable objects there, In scorn of nature, art gave lifeless life: Many a dry drop seemed a weeping tear, Shed for the slaught'red husband by the wife; The red blood reeked, to show the painter's strife; And dying eyes gleamed forth their
ashy lights, Like dying coals burnt out in tedious nights. There might you see the labouring pioneer Begrimed with sweat and smeared all with dust; And from the towers of Troy there would appear The very eyes of men through loop-holes thrust, Gazing upon the Greeks with little lust. Such sweet observance in this work was had That one might see those far-off eyes look sad. In great commanders grace and majesty You might behold, triumphing in their faces; In youth, quick bearing and dexterity; And here and there the painter interlaces Pale cowards marching on with trembling paces, Which heartless peasants did so well resemble That one would swear he saw them quake and tremble. In Ajax and Ulysses, O what art Of physiognomy might one behold! The face of either ciphered either's heart; Their face their manners most expressly told: In Ajax's eyes blunt rage and rigour rolled; But the mild glance that sly Ulysses lent Showed deep regard and smiling government. There pleading might you see grave Nestor stand, As 'twere encouraging the Greeks to fight, Making such sober action with his hand That it beguiled attention, charmed the sight. In speech, it seemed, his beard all silver white Wagged up and down, and from his lips did fly Thin winding breath which purled up to the sky. About him were a press of gaping fades, Which seemed to swallow up his sound advice, All jointly list'ning, but with several graces, As if some mermaid did their ears entice, Some high, some low, the painter was so nice; The scalps of many, almost hid behind, To jump up higher seemed, to mock the mind. Here one man's hand leaned on another's head, His nose being shadowed by his neighbour's ear; Here one being thronged bears back, all boll'n and red; Another smothered seems to pelt and swear; And in their rage such signs, of rage of rage they bear As, but for loss of Nestor's golden words, It seemed they would debate with angry swords. For much imaginary work was there; Conceit deceitful, so compact, so kind, That for Achilles' image stood his spear Griped in an armed hand; himself behind Was left unseen, save to the eye of mind: A hand, a foot, a face, a leg, a head, Stood for the whole to be imagined. And from the walls of strong-besieged Troy When their brave hope, bold Hector, marched to field, Stood many Trojan mothers sharing joy To see their youthful sons bright weapons wield; And to their hope they such odd action yield That through their light joy seemed to appear, Like bright things stained, a kind of heavy fear. And from the strand of Dardan where they fought To Simois' reedy banks the red blood ran, Whose waves to imitate the battle sought With swelling ridges; and their ranks began To break upon the galled shore, and than Retire again, till meeting greater ranks They join and shoot their foam at Simois' banks. To this well-painted piece is Lucrece come, To find a face where
all distress is stelled. Many she sees where cares have carved some, But none where all distress and dolour dwelled, Till she despairing Hecuba beheld, Staring on Priam's wounds with her old eyes, Which bleeding under Pyrrhus' proud foot lies. In her the painter had anatomized Time's ruin, beauty's wrack, and grim care's reign; Her cheeks with chaps and wrinkles were disguised; Of what she was no semblance did remain; Her blue blood changed to black in every vein, Wanting the spring that those shrunk pipes had fed, Showed life imprisoned in a body dead. On this sad shadow Lucrece spends her eyes, And shapes her sorrow to the beldam's woes, Who nothing wants to answer her but cries, And bitter words to ban her cruel foes: The painter was no god to lend her those; And therefore Lucrece swears he did her wrong, To give her so much grief and not a tongue. 'Poor instrument', quoth she, 'without a sound, I'll tune thy woes with my lamenting tongue, And drop sweet balm in Priam's painted wound, And rail on Pyrrhus that hath done him wrong, And with my tears quench Troy that burns so long, And with my knife scratch out the angry eyes Of all the Greeks that are thine enemies. 'Show me the strumpet that began this stir, That with my nails her beauty I may tear. Thy heat of lust, fond Paris, did incur This load of wrath that burning Troy doth bear. Thy eye kindled the fire that burneth here; And here in Troy, for trespass of thine eye, The sire, the son, the dame and daughter die. 'Why should the private pleasure of some one Become the public plague of many moe? Let sin, alone committed, light alone Upon his head that hath transgressed so; Let guiltless souls be freed from guilty woe. For one's-offence why should so many fall, To plague a private sin in general? 'Lo, here weeps Hecuba, here Priam dies, Here manly Hector faints, here Troilus swounds, Here friend by friend in bloody channel lies, And friend to friend gives unadvised wounds, And one man's lust these many lives confounds. Had doting Priam checked his son's desire, Troy had been bright with fame and not with fire.' Here feelingly she weeps Troy's painted woes; For sorrow, like a heavy-hanging bell Once set on ringing, with his own weight goes; Then little strength rings out the dolefull knell; So Lucrece, set a-work, sad tales doth tell To pencilled pensiveness and coloured sorrow; She lends them words, and she their looks doth borrow. She throws her eyes about the painting round, And who she finds forlorn she doth lament. At last she sees a wretched image bound That piteous looks to Phrygian shepherds lent; His face,.though full of cares, yet showed content; Onward to Troy with the blunt swains he goes, So mild that Patience seemed to scorn his woes. In him the painter laboured with his skill To hide deceit and give the harmless show An humble gait, calm looks, eyes wailing still,
A brow unbent that seemed to welcome woe; Cheeks neither red nor pale, but mingled so That blushing red no guilty instance gave, Nor ashy pale the fear that false hearts have. But, like a constant and confirmed devil, He entertained a show so seeming just, And therein so ensconced his secret evil, That jealousy itself could not mistrust False creeping craft and perjury should thrust Into so bright a day such black-faced storms, Or blot with hell-born sin such saint-like forms. The well-skilled workman this mild image drew For perjured Sinon, whose enchanting story The credulous old Priam after slew; Whose words, like wildfire, burnt the shining glory Of rich-built Ilion, that the skies were sorry, And little stars shot from their fixed places, When their glass fell wherein they viewed their faces. This picture she advisedly perused, And chid the painter for his wondrous skill, Saying, some shape in Sinon's was abused; So fair a form lodged not a mind so ill; And still on him she gazed, and gazing still Such signs of truth in his plain face she spied That she concludes the picture was belied. 'It cannot be', quoth she, 'that so much guile'- She would have said 'can lurk in such a look'; But Tarquin's shape came in her mind the while, And from her tongue 'can lurk' from 'cannot' took; 'It cannot be' she in that sense forsook, And turned it thus, 'It cannot be, I find, But such a face should bear a wicked mind; 'For even as subtle Sinon here is painted, So sober-sad, so weary and so mild, As if with grief or travail he had fainted, To me came Tarquin armed to beguild With outward honesty, but yet defiled With inward vice. As Priam him did cherish, So did I Tarquin; so my Troy did perish. Look, look, how list'ning Priam wets his eyes, To see those borrowed tears that Sinon sheds. Priam, why art thou old and yet not wise? For every tear he falls a Trojan bleeds; His eye drops fire, no water thence proceeds; Those round clear pearls of his that move thy pity Are balls of quenchless fire to burn thy city. 'Such devils steal effects from lightless hell; For Sinon in his fire doth quake with cold, And in that cold hot-burning fire doth dwell; These contraries such unity do hold Only to flatter fools and make them bold; So Priam's trust false Sinon's tears doth flatter That he finds means to burn his Troy with water.' Here, all enraged, such passion her assails, That patience is quite beaten from her breast. She tears the senseless Sinon with her nails, Comparing him to that unhappy guest Whose deed hath made herself herself At last she smilingly with this gives o'er: 'Fool, fool!' quoth she, 'his wounds will not be sore.' Thus ebbs and flows the current of her sorrow, And time doth weary time with her complaining. She looks for night, and then she longs for morrow, And both she thinks too long with her remaining.
Short time seems long in sorrow's sharp sustaining; Though woe be heavy, yet it seldom sleeps, And they that watch see time how slow it creeps. Which all this time hath overslipped her thought That she with painted images hath spent, Being from the feeling of her own grief brought By deep surmise of others' detriment, Losing her woes in shows of discontent. It easeth some, though none it ever cured, To think their dolour others have endured. But now the mindful messenger come back Brings home his lord and other company; Who finds his Lucrece clad in mourning black, And round about her tear-distained eye Blue circles streamed, like rainbows in the sky. These water-galls in her dim element Foretell new storms to those already spent. Which when her sad-beholding husband saw, Amazedly in her sad face he stares: Her eyes, though sod in tears, looked red and raw, Her lively colour killed with deadly cares. He hath no power to ask her how she fares; Both stood, like old acquaintance in a trance, Met far from home, wond'ring each other's chance. At last he takes her by the bloodless hand, And thus begins: 'What uncouth ill event Hath thee befall'n. that thou dost trembling stand? Sweet love, what spite hath thy fair colour spent? Why art thou thus attired in discontent? Unmask, dear dear, this moody heaviness, And tell thy grief, that we may give redress.' Three times with sighs she gives her sorrow fire Ere once she can discharge one word of woe; At length addressed to answer his desire, She modestly prepares to let them know Her honour is ta'en prisoner by the foe; While Collatine and his consorted lords With sad attention long to hear her words. And now this pale swan in her wat'ry nest Begins the sad dirge of her certain ending. 'Few words', quoth she, 'shall fit the trespass best, Where no excuse can give the fault amending: In me moe woes than words are now depending; And my laments would be drawn out too long, To tell them all with one poor tired tongue. 'Then be this all the task it hath to say: Dear husband, in the interest of thy bed A stranger came, and on that pillow lay Where thou wast wont to rest thy weary head; And what wrong else may be imagined By foul enforcement might be done to me, From that, alas, thy Lucrece is not free. 'For in the dreadful dead of dark midnight, With shining falchion in my chamber came: A creeping creature with a flaming light, And softly cried "Awake, thou Roman dame, And entertain my love; else lasting shame On thee and thine this night I will inflict, If thou my love's desire do contradict. "'For some hard-favoured groom of thine," quoth he, "Unless thou yoke thy liking to my will, I'll murder straight, and then I'll slaughter thee, And swear I found you where you did fulfill The loathsome act of lust, and so did kill The lechers in their deed: this act
will be My fame, and thy perpetual infamy." 'With this, I did begin to start and cry, And then against my heart he set his sword, Swearing, unless I took all patiently, I should not live to speak another word; So should my shame still rest upon record, And never be forgot in mighty Rome Th' adulterate death of Lucrece and her groom. 'Mine enemy was strong, my poor self weak, And far the weaker with so strong a fear. My bloody judge forbade my tongue to speak; No rightful plea might plead for justice there. His scarlet lust came evidence to swear That my poor beauty had purloined his eyes, And when the judge is robbed, the prisoner dies. 'O, teach me how to make mine own excuse! Or, at the least, this refuge let me find: Though my gross blood be stained with this abuse, Immaculate and spotless is my mind; That was not forced; that never was inclined To accessary yieldings, but still pure Doth in her poisoned closet yet endure.' Lo, here, the hopeless merchant of this loss, With head declined, and voice damned up with woe, With sad-set eyes and wreathed arms across, From lips new waxen pale begins to blow The grief away that stops his answer so; But, wretched as he is, he strives in vain; What he breathes out his breath drinks up again. As through an arch the violent roaring tide Outruns the eye that doth behold his haste, Yet in the eddy boundeth in his pride Back to the strait that forced him on so fast, In rage sent out, recalled in rage, being past; Even so his sighs, his sorrows, make a saw, To push grief on and back the same grief draw. Which speechless woe of his poor she attendeth And his untimely frenzy thus awaketh: 'Dear lord, thy sorrow to my sorrow lendeth Another power; no flood by raining slaketh. My woe too sensible thy passion maketh More feeling-painful. Let it then suffice To drown one woe, one pair of weeping eyes. 'And for my sake, when I might charm thee so, For she that was thy Lucrece, now attend me: Be suddenly revenged on my foe, Thine, mine, his own; suppose thou dost defend me From what is past. The help that thou shalt lend me Comes all too late, yet let the traitor die; "For sparing justice feeds iniquity. 'But ere I name him, you fair lords', quoth she, Speaking to those that came with Collatine, 'Shall plight your honourable faiths to me, With swift pursuit to venge this wrong of mine; For 'tis a meritorious fair design To chase injustice with revengeful arms: Knights, by their oaths, should right poor ladies' harms.' At this request, with noble disposition Each present lord began to promise aid, As bound in knighthood to her imposition, Longing to hear the hateful foe bewrayed. But she, that yet her sad task hath not said, The protestation stops. 'O, speak,' quoth she, 'How may this forced stain be wiped from me? 'What
is the quality of my offence, Being constrained with dreadful circumstance? May my pure mind with the foul act dispense, My low-declined honour to advance? May any terms acquit me from this chance? The poisoned fountain clears itself again; And why not I from this compelled stain?' With this, they all at once began to say, Her body's stain her mind untainted clears; While with a joyless smile she turns. away The face, that map which deep impression bears Of hard misfortune, carved in it with tears. 'No, no,' quoth she, 'no dame hereafter living By my excuse shall claim excuse's giving.' Here with a sigh, as if her heart would break, She throws forth Tarquin's name: 'He, he,' she says, But more than 'he' her poor tongue could not speak; Till after many accents and delays, Untimely breathings, sick and short assays, She utters this: 'He, he, fair lords, 'tis he, That guides this hand to give this wound to me.' Even here, she sheathed in her harmless breast A harmful knife, that thence her soul unsheathed: That blow did bail it from the deep unrest Of that polluted prison where it breathed. Her contrite sighs unto the clouds bequeathed Her winged sprite and through her wounds doth fly Life's lasting date from cancelled destiny. Stone-still, astonished with this deadly deed, Stood Collatine and all his lordly crew; Till Lucrece' father, that beholds her bleed, Himself on her self-slaught'red body threw; And from the purple fountain Brutus drew The murd'rous knife, and, as it left the place, Her blood, in poor revenge, held it in chase; And bubbling from her breast, it doth divide In two slow rivers, that the crimson blood Circles her body in on every side, Who like a late-sacked island vastly stood Bare and unpeopled in this fearful flood. Some of her blood still pure and red remained, And some looked black, and that false Tarquin stained. About the mourning and congealed face Of that black blood a wat'ry rigol goes, Which seems to weep upon the tainted place; And ever since, as pitying Lucrece' woes, Corrupted blood some watery token shows; And blood untainted still doth red abide, Blushing at that which is so putrified. 'Daughter, dear daughter,' old Lucretius cries, 'That life was mine which thou hast here deprived. If in the child the father's image lies, Where shall I live now Lucrece is unlived? Thou wast not to this end from me derived. If children predecease progenitors, We are their offspring, and they none of ours. 'Poor broken glass, I often did behold In thy sweet semblance my old age new born; But now that fair fresh mirror, dim and old, Shows me a bare-boned death by time outworn; O, from thy cheeks my image thou hast torn, And shivered all the beauty of my glass, That I no more can see what once I was. 'O time, cease thou thy course and last no longer, If they surcease to be that should survive. Shall rotten death make conquest of the stronger, And leave