Thy death, which is no more.

Thou'rt not thyself;

For thou exift'ft on many a thousand grains,
That iffue out of duft. Happy thou art not;
For what thou haft not, ftill thou ftriv'ft to get;
And what thou hast, forget'ft. Thou art not certain ;
For thy complexion shifts to strange effects,

After the moon.

If thou art rich, thou'rt poor;

For, like an afs, whose back with ingots bows,

Thou bear'ft thy heavy riches but a journey,
And death unloadeth thee. Friend thou haft none;
For thy own bowels, which do call thee fire,

The mere effufion of thy proper loins,

Do curfe the Gout, Serpigo, and the Rheum,

For ending thee no fooner. Thou haft nor youth nor age;
But as it were an after-dinner's fleep,

Dreaming on both; for all thy blessed youth
Becomes as aged, and doth beg the alms

Of palfied Eld; and when thou'rt old and rich,
Thou haft neither heat, affection, limb, nor bounty,
To make thy riches pleasant. What's yet in this
That bears the name of life? yet in this life
Lie hid more thousand deaths; yet death we fear,
That makes thefe odds all even.

SHAKESPEAR.

I

CHA P. XXI.

HOTSPUR's DESCRIPTION OF A FOP.

REMEMBER, when the fight was done,

When I was dry with rage, and extreme toil, Breathlefs and faint, leaning upon my sword;

Came there a certain Lord, neat, trimly drefs'd;
Fresh as a bridegroom, and his chin, new reap'd,
Shew'd like a stubble-land at harvest home.
He was perfumed like a milliner;

And 'twixt his finger and his thumb he held
A pouncet-box, which ever and anon

He gave his nofe; and took't away again;
Who, therewith angry, when it next came there,
Took it in fnuff.-And ftill he fmil'd, and talk'd;
And as the foldiers bare dead bodies by,
He call'd them untaught knaves, unmannerly,
To bring a flovenly, unhandfome corfe
Betwixt the wind and his nobility.

With many holiday and lady terms

He question'd me: amongst the reft demanded
My prisoners, in your majesty's behalf.

I then, all fmarting with the wounds; being gall'd
To be fo pefter'd with a popinjay,

Out of my grief, and my impatience,

Anfwer'd, neglectingly, I know not what:

He fhould, or fhould not; for he made me mad,

To fee him fhine fo brifk, and smell fo fweet,

And talk fo like a waiting gentlewoman,

Of guns, and drums, and wounds; (God fave the mark) And telling me, the fovereign't thing on earth

Was parmacity, for an inward bruife;

And that it was great pity, fo it was,
This villainous falt-petre fhould be digg'd
Out of the bowels of the harmless earth,
Which many a good tall fellow had deftroy'd

Se

So cowardly and but for thefe vile guns,

He would himself have been a foldier.

BRAK.

CLARENCE AND BRAKENBURY,

HY looks your Grace fo heavily to-day?

WHY
W CLAR. O, I

CLAR. O, I have pass'd a miserable night,

So full of ugly fights, of ghaftly dreams,
That as I am a Christian faithful man,

I would not spend another fuch a night,
Though 'twere to buy a world of happy days;

So full of difmal terror was the time.

BRAK. What was your dream, my Lord? I pray you

tell me.

CLAR. Methought that I had broken from the tow'r And was imbark'd to cross to Burgundy, And in my company my brother Glo'fter; Who from my cabbin tempted me to walk

Upon the hatchets. Thence we look'd tow'rd England, And cited up a thousand heavy times,

During the wars of York and Lancaster,

That had befall'n us. As we pafs'd along

Upon the giddy footing of the hatchets,

Methought that Glo'fter ftumbled, and in falling

Struck me (that fought to stay him) over-board,

Into the tumbling billows of the main.

Lord, Lord, methought, what pain it was to drown! What dreadful noife of waters in my ears!

What fights of ugly death within mine eyes!
I thought I faw a thousand fearful wrecks ;

A thousand men, that fishes gnaw'd upon;
Wedges of gold, great anchors, heaps of pearl,
Ineftimable ftones, unvalued jewels;

Some lay in dead men's fculls; and in thofe holes
Where eyes did once inhabit, there were crept,
As 'twere in fcorn of eyes, reflecting gems;
That woo'd the flimy bottom of the deep,
And mock'd the dead bones that lay fcatter'd by.
BRAK. Had you fuch leifure in the time of death,
To gaze upon the fecrets of the deep?

CLAR. Methought I had; and often did I ftrive
To yield the ghoft; but ftill the envious flood
Kept in my foul, and would not let it forth
To find the empty, vaft, and wand'ring air;
But fmother'd it within my panting bulk,
Which almoft burft to belch it in the fea.

BRAK. Awak'd you not with this fore agony ?
CLAR. No, no; my dream was lengthen'd after life,
O then began the tempeft to my foul:

I pafs'd, methought, the melancholy flood,
With that grim ferryman which poets write of,
Unto the kingdom of perpetual night.
The first that there did greet my ftranger-foul,
Was my great father-in-law, renowned Warwick,
Who cry'd aloud" What fcourge for perjury
Can this dark monarchy afford false Clarence ?"
And fo he vanish'd. Then came wand'ring by
A shadow like an angel, with bright hair
Dabbled in blood, and he shriek'd out aloud—————
"Clarence is come, falfe, fleeting, perjured Clarence,
That ftabb'd me in the field by Tewksbury;

Seize on him, furies, take him to your torments !".

With

With that, methought, a legion of foul fiends

Inviron'd me, and howled in mine ears

Such hideous cries, that with the

very noife I trembling wak'd; and for a seafon after Could not believe but that I was in hell: Such terrible impreflion made my dream.

BRAK. No marvel, Lord, that it affrighted you; I am afraid, methinks, to hear you tell it.

CLAR. Ah! Brakenbury, I have done thofe things
That now give evidence against my foul,

For Edward's fake; and see how he requites me!
O God! if my deep prayers cannot appease thee,
But thou wilt be avenged on my inifdeeds,

Yet execute thy wrath on me alone:

O fpare my guiltlefs wife, and my poor children!
I pr'ythee, Brakenbury, stay by me;

My foul is heavy, and I fain would fleep.

CHA P. XXII.

QUEEN

SHAKESPEAR.

MA B.

THEN I fee Queen Mab hath been with you.
She is the fancy's midwife, and she comes

In fhape no bigger than an agate-stone
On the fore-finger of an alderman';
Drawn with a team of little atomies,

Athwart men's nofes as they lie asleep :
Her waggon ípokes made of long spinners' legs;
The cover of the wings of grafshoppers;
The traces of the smallest spider's web;
The collars of the moonshine's watery beams;

Her