The Complete Works of William Shakespeare

Enter Keeper, with a dish.
Keep. Fellow, give place; here is no longer

stay.

K. Rich. If thou love me, 'tis time thou wert
away.

Groom. What my tongue dares not, that my
heart shall say.
[Exit.

Keep. My lord, will't please you to fall to?
K. Rich. Taste of it first, as thou art wont
to do.
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Keep. My lord, I dare not: Sir Pierce of Exton, who lately came from the king, commands the contrary.

K. Rich. The devil take Henry of Lancaster
and thee!

Patience is stale, and I am weary of it.
[Beats the keeper.

Keep. Help, help, help!

Enter EXTON and Servants, armed.
K. Rich. How now! what means death in
this rude assault?
Villain, thy own hand yields thy death's instru-

Flourish.

SCENE VI. Windsor castle.

[Exeunt.

Boling. Kind uncle York, the latest news we hear

The next news is, I have to London sent
The heads of Oxford, Salisbury, Blunt, and Kent:
The manner of their taking may appear
At large discoursed in this paper here.

ΙΟ

Boling. We thank thee, gentle Percy, for thy
pains:

And to thy worth will add right worthy gains.
Enter FITZWATER.

Fitz. My lord, I have from Oxford sent to
London

The heads of Brocas and Sir Bennet Seely,
Two of the dangerous consorted traitors
That sought at Oxford thy dire overthrow.
Boling. Thy pains, Fitzwater, shall not be
forgot;
Right noble is thy merit, well I wot.

Enter PERCY, and the BISHOP of Carlisle.
Percy. The grand conspirator, Abbot of
Westminster,

With clog of conscience and sour melancholy 20
Hath yielded up his body to the grave;
But here is Carlisle living, to abide
Thy kingly doom and sentence of his pride.
Boling. Carlisle, this is your doom:
Choose out some secret place, some reverend
room,
More than thou hast, and with it joy thy life;
So as thou livest in peace, die free from strife:
For though mine enemy thou hast ever been,
High sparks of honor in thee have I seen.
Enter EXTON, with persons bearing a coffin.
Exton. Great king, within this coffin I pre-

sent

Thy buried fear: herein all breathless lies
The mightiest of thy greatest enemies,
Richard of Bordeaux, by me hither brought.
Boling. Exton, I thank thee not; for thou
hast wrought

A deed of slander with thy fatal hand
Upon my head and all this famous land.

Exton. From your own mouth, my lord, did
I this deed.

Boling. They love not poison that do poison
need,

Nor do I thee: though I did wish him dead,
I hate the murderer, love him murdered.

Enter BOLINGBROKE, YORK, with The guilt of conscience take thou for thy labor,
other Lords, and Attendants.
But neither my good word nor princely favor:
With Cain go wander thorough shades of night,
And never show thy head by day nor light.
Lords, I protest, my soul is full of woe,
That blood should sprinkle me to make me grow:
Come, mourn with me for that I do lament,
And put on sullen black incontinent:
I'll make a voyage to the Holy Land,
To wash this blood off from my guilty hand: 50

Is that the rebels have consumed with fire
Our town of Cicester in Gloucestershire;
But whether they be ta'en or slain we hear not.
Enter NORTHUMBERLAND.

Welcome, my lord: what is the news?

North. First, to thy sacred state wish I all March sadly after; grace my mournings here;

happiness.

In weeping after this untimely bier. [Exeunt.

ACT I.

POINS.
GADSHILL.

PETO.
BARDOLPH.

LADY PERCY, wife to Hotspur, and sister to
Mortimer.

LADY MORTIMER, daughter to Glendower,
and wife to Mortimer.

MISTRESS QUICKLY, hostess of a tavern in
Eastcheap.

Lords, officers, Sheriff, Vintner, Chamberlain, Drawers, two Carriers, Travellers, and Attendants.

SCENE-England.

SCENE I. London. The palace.
Enter KING HENRY, LORD JOHN OF LANCAS-
TER, the EARL OF WESTMORELAND, SIR WAL-
TER BLUNT, and others.

King. So shaken as we are, so wan with care,
Find we a time for frighted peace to pant,
And breathe short-winded accents of new broils
To be commenced in strands afar remote.
No more the thirsty entrance of this soil
Shall daub her lips with her own children's blood;
No more shall trenching war channel her fields,
Nor bruise her flowcrets with the armed hoofs
Of hostile paces: those opposed eyes,

In forwarding this dear expedience.

West. My liege, this haste was hot in question,
And many limits of the charge set down
But yesternight when all athwart there came
A post from Wales loaden with heavy news;
Whose worst was, that the noble Mortimer,
Leading the men of Herefordshire to fight
Against the irregular and wild Glendower, 40
Was by the rude hands of that Welshman taken,
A thousand of his people butchered;
Upon whose dead corpse there was such misuse,
Such beastly shameless transformation,
By those Welshwomen done as may not be
Without much shame retold or spoken of.
King. It seems then that the tidings of this
broil

West. This match'd with other did, my gracious lord;

Which, like the meteors of a troubled heaven, 10 Brake off our business for the Holy Land.
All of one nature, of one substance bred,
Did lately meet in the intestine shock
And furious close of civil butchery
Shall now, in mutual well-beseeming ranks,
March all one way and be no more opposed
Against acquaintance, kindred and allies:
The edge of war, like an ill-sheathed knife,
No more shall cut his master. Therefore, friends,
As far as to the sepulchre of Christ,
Whose soldier now, under whose blessed cross 20
We are impressed and engaged to fight,
Forthwith a power of English shall we levy;
Whose arms were moulded in their mothers 'womb
To chase these pagans in those holy fields
Over whose acres walk'd those blessed feet
Which fourteen hundred years ago were nail'd
For our advantage on the bitter cross.
But this our purpose now is twelvemonth old,
And bootless 'tis to tell you we will go:
Therefore we meet not now. Then let me hear 30
Of you, my gentle cousin Westmoreland,
What yesternight our council did decree

For more uneven and unwelcome news
Came from the north, and thus it did import:
On Holy-rood day, the gallant Hotspur there,
Young Harry Percy and brave Archibald,
That ever-valiant and approved Scot,
At Holmedon met,
Where they did spend a sad and bloody hour
As by discharge of their artillery,
And shape of likelihood, the news was told;
For he that brought them, in the very heat
And pride of their contention did take horse, 60
Uncertain of the issue any way.

King. Here is a dear, a true industrious friend,
Sir Walter Blunt, new lighted from his horse,
Stain'd with the variation of each soil
Betwixt that Holmedon and this seat of ours:
And he hath brought us smooth and welcome
The Earl of Douglas is discomfited: [news.
Ten thousand boldScots, two and twenty knights,
Balk'd in their own blood did Sir Walter see

On Holmedon's plains. Of prisoners, Hotspur took

Mordake the Earl of Fife, and eldest son
To beaten Douglas; and the Earl of Athol,
Of Murray, Angus, and Menteith:
And is not this an honorable spoil?

A gallant prize? ha, cousin, is it not?
West. In faith,

It is a conquest for a prince to boast of.

Fal. No, by my troth, not so much as will serve to be prologue to an egg and butter. Prince. Well, how then? come, roundly, roundly.

Fal. Marry, then, sweet wag, when thou art king, let not us that are squires of the night's body be called thieves of the day's beauty: let us be Diana's foresters, gentlemen of the shade, minions of the moon; and let men say we be men

King, Yea, there thou makest me sad and of good government, being governed, as the sea makest me in

A son who is the theme of honor's tongue;
Amongst a grove, the very straightest plant;
Who is sweet Fortune's minion and her pride:
Whilst I, by looking on the praise of him,
See riot and dishonor stain the brow
Of my yong Harry. O that it could be proved
That some night-tripping fairy had exchanged
In cradle-clothes our children where they lay,
And call'd mine Percy, his Plantagenet!
Then would I have his Harry, and he mine. 90
But let him from my thoughts. What think,

you, coz,

Of this young Percy's pride? the prisoners,
Which he in his adventure hath surprised,
To his own use he keeps; and sends me word,
I shall have none but Mordake Earl of Fife.
West. This is his uncle's teaching: this is
Worcester,

Malevolent to you in all aspects;
Which makes him prune himself, and bristle up
The crest of youth against your dignity.

King. But I have sent for him to answer this: And for this cause awhile we must neglect 101 Our holy purpose to Jerusalem.

Cousin, on Wednesday next our council we
Will hold at Windsor; so inform the lords:
But come yourself with speed to us again;
For more is to be said and to be done
Than out of anger can be uttered.
West. I will, my liege.

[Exeunt.

SCENE II. London. An apartment of the Prince's.

Enter the PRINCE OF WALES and FALSTAFF. Fal. Now, Hal, what time of day is it, lad? Prince. Thou art so fat-witted, with drinking of old sack and unbuttoning thee after supper, and sleeping upon benches after noon, that thou hast forgotten to demand that truly which thou wouldst truly know. What a devil hast thou to do with the time of the day? Unless hours were cups of sack, and minutes capons, and clocks the tongues of bawds, and dials the signs of leaping-houses, and the blessed sun himself a fair hot wench in flame-colored taffeta, I see no reason why thou shouldst be so superfluous to demand the time of the day.

Fal. Indeed, you come near me now, Hal; for we that take purses go by the moon and the seven stars, and not by Phoebus, he, that wandering knight so fair. And, I prithee, sweet wag, when thou art king, as, God save thy grace,-majesty I should say, for grace thou wilt have none,

Prince. What, none?

is, by our noble and chaste mistress the moon, under whose countenance we steal.

Prince Thou sayest well, and it holds well too: for the fortune of us that are the moon's men doth ebb and flow like the sea, being governed, as the sea is, by the moon. As, for proof, now: a purse of gold most resolutely snatched on Monday night and most dissolutely spent on Tuesday morning; got with swearing Lay by, and spent with crying 'Bring in; now in as low an ebb as the foot of the ladder and by and by in as high a flow as the ridge of the gallows.

Fal. By the Lord, thou sayest true, lad. And is not my hostess of the tavern a most sweet

wench?

Prince. As the honey of Hybla, my old lad of the castle. And is not a buff jerkin a most sweet robe of durance? 49

Fal. How now, how now, mad wag! what, in thy quips and thy quiddities? what a plague have I to do with a buff jerkin?

Prince. Why, what a pox have I to do with my hostess of the tavern?

Fal. Well, thou hast called her to a reckoning many a time and oft.

Prince. Did I ever call for thee to pay thy part?

Fal. No; I'll give thee thy due, thou hast paid all there. Prince. Yea, and elsewhere, so far as my coin would stretch; and where it would not, I have used my credit.

Fal. Yea, and so used it that, were it not here apparent that thou art heir apparent-But, I prithee, sweet wag, shall there be gallows standing in England when thou art king? and resolution thus fobbed as it is with the rusty curb of old father antic the law? Do not thou, when thou art king, hang a thief. 70

Prince. No; thou shalt.

Fal. Shall I O rare! By the Lord, I'll be a brave judge.

Prince. Thou judgest false already: I mean, thou shalt have the hanging of the thieves, and so become a rare hangman.

Fal. Well, Hal, well; and in some sort it jumps with my humor as well as waiting in the court, I can tell you.

Prince. For obtaining of suits?

Fal. Yea, for obtaining of suits, whereof the hangman hath no lean wardrobe. 'Sblood, I am as melancholy as a gib cat or a lugged bear. Prince. Or an old lion, or a lover's lute. Fal. Yea, or the drone of a Lincolnshire bagpipe.

Prince. What sayest thou to a hare, or the melancholy of Moor-ditch?

Fal. Thou hast the most unsavory similes, and art indeed the most comparative, rascalliest,

100

sweet young prince. But, Hal, I prithee, trou-, ble me no more with vanity. I would to God thou and I knew where a commodity of good names were to be bought. An old lord of the council rated me the other day in the street about you, sir, but I marked him not; and yet he talked very wisely, but I regarded him not; and yet he talked wisely, and in the street too. Prince. Thou didst well; for wisdom cries out in the streets, and no man regards it. Fal. O, thou hast damnable iteration, and art indeed able to corrupt a saint. Thou hast done much harm upon me, Hal; God forgive thee for it! Before I knew thee, Hal, I knew nothing; and now am I, if a man should speak truly, little better than one of the wicked. I must give over this life, and I will give it over; by the Lord, an I do not, I am a villain: I'll be damned for never a king's son in Christendom. Prince. Where shall we take a purse tomorrow, Jack?

Fal. Zounds, where thou wilt, lad; I'll make one; an I do not, call me villain and baffle me.

Prince. I see a good amendment of life in thee; from praying to purse-taking.

Fal. Why, Hal, 'tis my vocation, Hal; 'tis no sin for a man to labor in his vocation.

Enter POINS.

Poins! Now shall we know if Gadshill have set a match. O, if men were to be saved by merit, what hole in hell were hot enough for him? This is the most omnipotent villain that ever cried Stand' to a true man.

Prince. Good morrow, Ned.

Poins. Good morrow, sweet Hal. What says Monsieur Remorse? what says Sir John Sack and Sugar? Jack! how agrees the devil and thee about thy soul, that thou soldest him on Good-Friday last for a cup of Maderia and a cold capon's leg?

129

Prince. Sir John stands to his word, the devil shall have his bargain; for he was never yet a breaker of proverbs: he will give the devil his due.

Poins. Then art thou damned for keeping thy word with the devil.

Prince. Else he had been damned for cozening the devil.

Poins. But, my lads, my lads, to-morrow morning, by four o'clock, early at Gadshill! there are pilgrims going to Canterbury with rich offerings, and traders riding to London with fat purses: I have vizards for you all; you have horses for yourselves: Gadshill lies to-night in Rochester: I have bespoke supper to-morrow night in Eastcheap: we may do it as secure as sleep. If you will go, I will stuff your purses full of crowns; if you will not, tarry at home and be hanged.

Fal. Hear ye, Yedward; if I tarry at home and go not, I'll hang you for going.

Poins. You will, chops?

150

Fal. Hal, will thou make one? Prince. Who, I rob? I a thief? not I, by my faith.

Fal. There's neither honesty, manhood, nor good fellowship in thee, nor thou camest not of

the blood royal, if thou darest not stand for ten shillings.

Prince. Well then, once in my days I'll be a madcap. 160

Fal. Why, that's well said.

Prince. Well, come what will, I'll tarry at home.

Fal. By the Lord, I'll be a traitor then, when thou art king.

Prince. I care not.

Poins. Sir John, I prithee, leave the prince and me alone: I will lay him down such reasons for this adventure that he shall go. 169

Fal. Well, God give thee the spirit of persuasion and him the ears of profiting, that what thou speakest may move and what he hears may be believed, that the true prince may, for recreation sake, prove a false thief; for the poor abuses of the time want countenance. Farewell: you shall find me in Eastcheap.

Prince. Farewell, thou latter spring! farewell, All-hallown summer! [Exit Falstaff

Poins. Now, my good sweet honey lord, ride with us to-morrow: I have a jest to execute that I cannot manage alone. Falstaff, Bardolph, Peto and Gadshill shall rob those men that we have already waylaid; yourself and I will not be there; and when they have the booty, if you and I do not rob them, cut this head off from my shoulders.

Prince. How shall we part with them in setting forth?

Poins. Why, we will set forth before or after them, and appoint them a place of meeting, wherein it is at our pleasure to fail, and then will they adventure upon the exploit themselves; which they shall have no sooner achieved, but we'll set upon them.

Prince. Yea, but 'tis like that they will know us by our horses, by our habits and by every other appointment, to be ourselves.

Poins. Tut! our horses they shall not see: I'll tie them in the wood; our vizards we will change after we leave them: and, sirrah, I have cases of buckram for the nonce, to immask our noted outward garments.

Prince. Yea, but I doubt they will be too hard for us.

Poins. Well, for two of them, I know them to be as true-bred cowards as ever turned back: and for the third, if he fight longer than he sees reason, I'll forswear arms. The virtue of this jest will be, the incomprehensible lies that this same fat rogue will tell us when we meet at supper: how thirty, at least, he fought with: what wards, what blows, what extremities he endured; and in the reproof of this lies the jest.

Prince. Well, I'll go with thee; provide us all things necessary, and meet me to-morrow night in Eastcheap; there I'll sup. Farewell. Poins. Farewell, my lord.

22C

[Exit. Prince. I know you all, and will awhile uphold The unyoked humor of your idleness: Yet herein will I imitate the sun, Who doth permit the base contagious clouds To smother up his beauty from the world, That, when he please again to be himself, Being wanted, he may be more wonder'd at,

FIRST PART OF KING HENRY IV.

By breaking through the foul and ugly mists
Of vapors that did seem to strangle him.
If all the year were playing holidays,
To sport would be as tedious as to work;
But when they seldom come, they wish'd for

come,

230

And nothing pleaseth but rare accidents.
So, when this loose behavior I throw off
And pay the debt I never promised,
By how much better than my word I am,
By so much shall I falsify men's hopes;
And like bright metal on a sullen ground,
My reformation, glittering o'er my fault,
Shall show more goodly and attract more eyes
Than that which hath no foil to set it off.
I'll so offend, to make offence a skill:
Redeeming time when men think least I will.
240
[Exit.

SCENE III. London. The palace.
Enter the KING, NorthumberlAND, WORCES-
TER, HOTSPUR, SIR WALTER BLUNT, with
others.

King. My blood hath been too cold and
temperate,

Unapt to stir at these indignities,
And you have found me; for accordingly
You tread upon my patience: but be sure
I will from henceforth rather be myself,
Mighty and to be fear'd, than my condition;
Which hath been smooth as oil, soft as young
down,

And therefore lost that title of respect
Which the proud soul ne'er pays but to the proud.
War. Our house, my sovereign liege, little
deserves

The scourge of greatness to be used on it;
And that same greatness too which our own
hands

Have holp to make so portly.

North. My lord,

King. Worcester, get thee gone; for I do

see

Danger and disobedience in thine eye:

O, sir, your presence is too bold and peremptory,
And majesty might never yet endure
The moody frontier of a servant brow.
You have good leave to leave us: when we need
Your use and counsel, we shall send for you.
You were about to speak.
[Exit Worcester.
North.
(To North.
Those prisoners in your highness' name de-
Yea, my good lord.
manded,

Which Harry Percy here at Holmedon took,
Were, as he says, not with such strength denied
As is deliver'd to your majesty:
Either envy, therefore, or misprision
Is guilty of this fault and not my son.
Hot. My liege, I did deny no prisoners.
But I remember, when the fight was done, 30
When I was dry with rage and extreme toil,
Breathless and faint. leaning upon my sword,
Came there a certain lord, neat, and trimly
dress'd,

Fresh as a bridegroom; and his chin new reap'd
Show'd like a stubble-land at harvest-home;
He was perfumed like a milliner;

385

And 'twixt his finger and his thumb he held
A pouncet-box, which ever and anon
Took it in snuff: and still he smiled and talk'd,
He gave his nose and took't away again;
Who therewith angry, when it next came there,
39
And, as the soldiers bore dead bodies by,
He call'd them untaught knaves, unmannerly,
To bring a slovenly unhandsome corse
Betwixt the wind and his nobility.
With many holiday and lady terms

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

I then, all smarting with my wounds being cold,
To be so pester'd with a popinjay,
Out of my grief and my impatience,
Answer'd neglectingly I know not what,

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

To see him shine so brisk and smell so sweet,
Of guns and drums and wounds,-God save the
And talk so like a waiting-gentlewoman
mark!-
And telling me the sovereign'st thing on earth
Was parmaceti for an inward bruise:
And that it was great pity, so it was,
This villanous saltpetre should be digg'd
Out of the bowels of the harmless earth,
Which many a good tall fellow had destroy'd
So cowardly; and but for these vile guns,
I answer'd indirectly, as I said;
He would himself have been a soldier.
This bald unjointed chat of his, my lord,
And I beseech you, let not his report
Come current for an accusation
Betwixt my love and your high majesty.
Blunt. The circumstance consider'd, good
my lord,
Whate'er Lord Harry Percy then had said
To such a person and in such a place,
At such a time, with all the rest retold,
May reasonably die, and never rise
To do him wrong or any way impeach
What then he said, so he unsay it now.

That we at our own charge shall ransom straight
King Why, yet he doth deny his prisoners,
But with proviso and exception,
His brother-in-law, the foolish Mortimer;
Who, on my soul, hath wilfully betray'd
The lives of those that he did lead to fight
Against that great magician, damn'dGlendower,
Whose daughter, as we hear, the Earl of March
Shall we buy treason? and indent with fears,
Hath lately married.
Be emptied to redeem a traitor home?
Shall our coffers, then,
For I shall never hold that man my friend
When they have lost and forfeited themselves?
No, on the barren mountains let him starve;
Whose tongue shall ask me for one penny cost
To ransom home revolted Mortimer.
Hot, Revolted Mortimer!

He never did fall off, my sovereign liege,
But by the chance of war: to prove that true
Needs no more but one tongue for all those
wounds,

Those mouthed wounds, which valiantly he took,
In single opposition, hand to hand,
When on the gentle Severn's sedgy bank,
He did confound the best part of an hour
In changing hardiment with great Glendower:

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