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Revolt our fubjects? That we cannot mend;

They break their faith to God, as well as us.
Cry, woe, deftruction, ruin, lofs, decay;
The worst is death, and death will have his day.

SCROOP. Glad am I that your Highness is so arm'd
To bear the tidings of calamity.

Like an unfeasonable stormy day,

Which makes the filver rivers drown their fhores,
As if the world were all diffolv'd to tears;

So high above his limits fwells the rage

Of Bolingbroke, cov'ring your fearful land

With hard bright fteel, and hearts more hard than steel.
White beards have arm'd their thin and hairlefs fcalps
Against thy Majefty; boys, with women's voices,
Strive to fpeak big, and clasp their female joints
In ftiff unwieldy arms, against thy crown.

Thy very
beadfmen learn to bend their bows
Of double-fatal yew, against thy ftate :
Yea, diftaff-women manage rufty bills.
Against thy feat both young and old rebel,

And all goes worfe than I have pow'r to tell.

K. RICH. Too well, too well, thou tell'ft a tale fo ill. Where is the Earl of Wiltshire? where is Bagot? What is become of Bufhy? Where is Green? -No matter where; of comfort no man speak. Let's talk of graves, of worms, and epitaphs, Make duft our paper, and with rainy eyes Write forrow on the bofom of the earth! Let's chufe executors, and talk of wills; And yet not fo-for what can we bequeath, Save our depofed bodies to the ground?

Our lands, our lives, and all, áre Bolingbroke's,

I

And

And nothing can we call our own, but death:
And that fmall model of the barren earth,
Which ferves as pafte and cover to our bones.
For heav'n's fake, let us fit upon the ground,
And tell fad ftories of the death of Kings;
How fome have been depos'd, fome flain in war;
Some haunted by the ghost they dispoffefs'd;
Some poifon'd by their wives, fome fleeping kill'd;
All murder'd.- -For within the hollow crown,

That rounds the mortal temples of a King,

Keeps Death his court; and there the antic fits,
Scoffing his ftate, and grinning at his pomp;
Allowing him a breath, a little scene.

To monarchize, be fear'd, and kill with looks:
Infufing him with felf and vain conceit,

As if this flesh which walls about our life,
Were brass impregnable; and, humour'd thus,
Comes at the last, and with a little pin

Bores through his caftle walls, and farewel King!
Cover your heads, and mock not flesh and blood
With folemn rev'rence: throw away respect,
Tradition, form, and ceremonious duty,
For you have but mistook me all this while.

I live on bread like you, feel want like you;

Tafte grief, need friends, like you: fubjected thus,

How can you fay to me I am a King?

CHA P. XIV.

HOTSPUR

AND

GLENDOWER.

GLEN. CIT, coufin, Percy;, fit good coufin Hotfpur;
SIT,
For, by that name, as oft as Lancaster

Doth speak of you, his cheek looks pale; and with
A rifing figh, he wifheth you in heav'n.

Hor. And you in hell, as often as he hears
Owen Glendower spoke of..

GLEN. I blame him not: at my nativity, The front of heaven was full of fiery shapes, Of burning creffets: know that, at my birth, The frame and the foundation of the earth Shook like a coward.

At the fame feason if your mother's cat
Had kitten'd, though yourself had ne'er been born.
GLEN. Ifay, the earth did shake when I was born.
Hor. I fay, the earth then was not of my mind;
If you fuppofe, as fearing you, it fhook.

GLEN.

The heav'ns were all on fire, the earth did tremble.

Hor. O, then the earth shook to fee the heav'ns on fire, And not in fear of your nativity.

Difeafed nature oftentimes breaks forth

In strange eruptions: and the teeming earth
Is with a kind of colick pinch'd and vex'd,

By the imprisoning of unruly wind

Within her womb; which for enlargement ftriving,
Shakes the old beldame earth, and topples down

High tow'rs and mofs-grown fteeples. At your birth,

Our

Our grandam earth, with this diftemperature,
In paffion fhook.

GLEN. Coufin, of many men

I do not bear thefe croffings: give me leave
To tell you once again, that at my birth
The front of heav'n was full of fiery shapes ;
The goats ran from the mountains, and the herds
Were ftrangely clam'rous in the frighted fields:
These figns have marked me extraordinary,
And all the courfes of my life do fhew,

I am not in the roll of common men.
Where is he living, clipt in with the sea,

That chides the banks of England, Wales, or Scotland,
Who calls me pupil, or hath read to me?
And bring him out, that is but woman's fon,
Can trace me in the tedious ways of art,

Or hold me pace in deep experiments.

HOT. I think there is no man speaks better Welch. GLEN. I can speak English, Lord, as well as you, For I was train'd up in the English court:

Where, being young, I framed to the harp,

Many an English ditty, lovely well,

And gave the tongue a helpful ornament;
A virtue that was never feen in you.

Hor. Marry, and I'm glad of it with all my heart,

I had rather be a kitten, and cry mew

!

Than one of these fame metre-ballad mongers!

I'd rather hear a brazen candlestick turn'd,

Or a dry wheel grate on the axle-tree,
And that would nothing fet my teeth on edge,
Nothing fo much as mincing poetry;
'Tis like the forc'd gait of a fhuffling nag-

GLEN. And I can call fpirits from the vasty deep.

HOT. Why, fo can I, or so can any man: But will they come when you do call for them?

GLEN. Why, I can teach thee to command the devil. HOT. And I can teach thee, coz, to fhame the devil, By telling truth; Tell truth and fhame the devil.

If thou haft pow'r to raife him, bring him hither, And I'll be fworn, I've pow'r to fhame him hence. Oh, while you live, Tell truth and fhame the devil. SHAKESPEAR.

CHA P. XV.

HOTSPUR READING A LETTER.

"BUT

UT for mine own part, my Lord, I could be weil contented to be there, in refpect of the love I bear your house." He could be contented to be there; why is he not then ? ** In refpect of the love he bears our houfe !" He fhews in this, he loves his own barn better than he loves our houfe. Let me fee fome more. The purpose you undertake is dangerous." Why, that is certain: it is dangerous to take a cold, to fleep, to drink: but I tell you, my Lord fool, out of this nettle danger, we pluck this flower fafety. The purpose you undertake is dangerous, the "friends you have named uncertain, the time itself anfort

ed, and your whole plot too light, for the counterpoife of "fo great an oppofition." Say you fo, fay you fo? I fay unto you again, you are a fhallow cowardly hind, and you lie. What a lack-brain is this? By the Lord, our plot is a good plot as ever was laid; our friends true and conftant: à good plot, good friends, and full of expectation; an excelfent plot, very good friends. What a frofty-spirited rogue