Cast

Lord Byron

John Cam Hobhouse

Scrope B. Davies

C. S. Matthews

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​Scene 1

 

Hobhouse's rooms, Cambridge, 1808 - H and S are outrageously intoxicated

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H: Good eve, Byron! (raises glass) hail, generous youth! whom Glory's sacred flame inspires, and animates to deeds of scribbling fame

S: He who feels the noble wish to raise the finger of each passer-by!

B: My - are you both not vastly amusing this evening

H: Zooks! (shivers) - I am ravenous, are you ravenous Scrope? (S is busy with a corkscrew) - pray - my Lord - have you bought us a sumptuous side of roasted Southwellian ox from your mother's commodious ovens? - heh, or perhaps some pleasant poesy, fresh from Ridges?

S: Tales of rustic fumblings in soggy graveyards? canoodling upon moonlit bridges? (recoils from corkscrew)

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B fumes and heads for door

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H: Ah, now! - stay and imbibe, our dear friend - the Methodist Matthews will be here presently

S: May a future age - admiring, yet - view a Falkland or a Clarendon in you! (bows)

H: Shut-up Scrope - good god

S: Byron, do join us - (rummages through cellarette) - what have we left? - er, some ale? mead is it?(holds bottle to light) - cider! 'tis cider - sit down my friend and tell of your latest Southwell sojourn

B(sighs, appears burdened): I detest that infamous abode and - of differing needs - must never return

S: Pr’ythee, why-ever not? Is there honour to be met? - are gouty husbands brushing their barrels quite as yet? 

H: Has your mother suggested you put to sea? Are there furious intimations of matrimony?

B: Pfft! - any of which would be manageable - 'tis but (is mortified) - 'tis but that mischievous little blind god..

H & S(gasp): ...LOVE??!

B: Be damned but (bites lip) - it is

H: Ah! why too early your careless life resign? - your morning slumber, and your evening wine? - your loved companion, and my easy, witty talk - your Muse, invoked in every peaceful walk?

S: And which Piece is the adored one - Caroline? Mary? Marion? Ann? 

B: All of the above, Scrope (paces) - I am in fathomless love with the entire Southwell clan 

H: Oons! Pish! Pfft!

S: By the Pharaoh's toe, Byron (guffaws) - this excess of attachments owes simply to your confinement in the country, deprived of the august professionals of the Town, the bawds and ballet-masters, the Veterans of the Lobby - come, (attempts a comforting hug) - you will be out of love with the entire brace ere a week's residence in the Capital - ain't that right Hobby?
H: 'Tis but too true - your blood with dangerous passion boils, beware! and fly from those vernacular Venus' silken toils
S: Let the head protect the weaker heart, and Wisdom's ægis turn on Beauty's dart

B: This wine is corked - is there no brandy? - och, Scrope - my head is at odds with my heart 

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H assumes paterfamilias in front of the fire 

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H: Harken up, Byron! (frowns) - as your early youth some time allows - nor custom yet demands you for a spouse - some hours of freedom may remain as yet, esp. for one who laughs alike at love and debt - indeed, why such haste? - put off the evil day, and snatch at youthful comforts while you may

B(horrified): I don't believe I mentioned marriage - Hobby - my passions are but a fusty mélange of love, lust and - I own it - loneliness, I fear - I would like to keep a warm and pleasing female always near

S: 'Tis fix'd that every lord must pair - you and Newstead must not want an heir - but why scour the countryside round, to seek a treasure that can ne'er be found?'
B: I require no treasure - my requisites in love are modest - not very ugly, and not very old - a little pert indeed, but not a scold

H: We shall await the advice of Matthews (checks under sopha) - as we are out of wine

 

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​​Scene 2

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Matthews enters, wheeling in the ‘Cellarette Luxe 2000™'

 

M: Good even, my friends! - my, my Scrope - Hobby - are you already fried to the tonsils? (roars) I shall have to guzzle my champagnes solo heh - oh! hail, Byron (bows) 

B: Good eve, Matthews - sit, please - you must assist in a most arithmetically amorous quandary of mine

S(whispers): My lord has four country damsels on hand and is wrastling with his choice

M: What? - do you mean to marry?! Before you reach your majority? (glares) - before you have sampled all the delights of our Botanical cullings?

B(hisses): Why do ye all speak of wedlock? I am but in love - and wedlock's the devil! as the sublime Pope said - sort of (muses) - yet still, they are country maids of good character - and their fathers are all well-known mattress-stuffers - mmm - could well fix the roof and re-stock my cellars

H: Pause! (holds up hand, somewhat like a policeman) - do not so soon the various bliss forego that single souls - and such alone - can know

M: Gentlemen, your attention! - this problem can be resolved without delay - my lord, choose four of your favourite potations - now, (looks around) use this sopha for display​​​

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The lads are puzzled - the selection is ruminated upon

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M: To you, Byron - I request that you name each one after your loves (points) - firstly, the dregs of Scrope's pale champagne?

B: The dregs - e'en yet of champagne? (ruminates) - forsooth, I must grant it to Mary Ann - didn't her father and brother attempt to coral me into in a maze of promissory verbiage re. said fair (sighs) - oons! sweet Mary Anne - her smiles restore me to rapture again and again - my soul - my existence - without her - will cause aught but pain

M: Very good, - now, to the hearty jug of cider - the most warming out our fine British beverages - who claims this prize, Byron?

B: Cider? (scratches head) - warm - ripe and fulsome - bit rough around the edges? - wakes one with a wish to jump into the lower lake at 4 am - makes cheeks with anguish glow, when sweet lips are join’d to mine - ah! - Caroline

H: Caroline it is! - erm, - is there a bottle for your Miss Mary Chaworth?

B(is savage): My MAC is now wed and begirt with offspring (brightens) - but I do have another dim and charming Mary in my eye - one whom Nature stamp’d with beauteous birth, so much perfection in her shone, too divine for earth, I fear the skies might claim her for their own

S: Such a Mary is surely worthy of the white brandy, I suspect - so much finesse in the brewing - 'ere settles gently without blame or regret

B: Only the inexplicable Marion remains - mmm, Marion - of capricious bodily temperatures and tempers - oh! that pensive brow, the cold forbidding frown (mumbles) such lips of  looks endearing, were surely form’d for better things than sneering (grinds teeth) - Pearson's Remedy will service nicely

​​​​M: Now - of them all - Byron, which libation could you do well less without, precisely?

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B sits and contemplates - 'til morn

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​​Scene 3

 

Morn - the floor is littered with crapulous scholars

 

S: Byron? - have you chosen your Dame of the Dram as yet? how thinks thou to assuage her?(smirks, shakily) I've opened a book - would you care to lay a wager?

B: 'Twould ill-behove me to empty the pockets of my friends, my dear Scrope (glares down nostrils)
H(unwraps himself from fine Persian carpet): What? you have made a choice? (panics) - shall your Newstead, shall your cloister'd bowers, the high o'erhanging arch and trembling towers - shall these, profaned with folly and with strife - 'ere host a over-fond - or ever angry wife?
M: Shall these no more confess a manly sway - but changeful woman's changing whims obey? - and quite transform, in every point complete, your Gothic abbey to - saints above spare us! - a country seat 

B: While I quite fancy the notion of plumped cushions and tea at three, yet - Matthews - my friends (frowns and paces) - I know not the state of your bone-boxes this morning - however,  judging by your greenish aspects and yellowy sockets - ne'er cider, nor champagne, nor white brandies - nor yet yon miraculous Pearson's Remedy for Inflamed Dandies - can compensate the forfeiture of ready money and shame - I am therefore - and henceforth - sworn off all four of the maids and their potations - for, undoubtedly, it would be a lifetime of pretty much the same

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M and H exchange ocular high-fives

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M: A deuced wise course to take, dear Byron - forget the fair ones, and your fate delay - if not avert, at least defer the day

H: Precisely, Matthews - for when beneath the female yoke your spirit bends - you'll lose your wit, your temper, and your friends!

S: Come, gentlemen (pulls out ‘Guide to the Milliners of Covent Garden') - now that we have banished love - and wives - and, god save us, maids! - let us take to the Town and partake of that most venerable of trades! (all bow)

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Matthews takes charge of the vanquished cellarette while the lads squabble over the evening's pecking order

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​​END

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