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Stand bare and naked, trembling at themselves?
So when this thief, this traitor, Bolingbroke,-
Who all this while hath revell'd in the night,
Whilst we were wand'ring with the antipodes,-
Shall see us rising in our throne the east,
His treasons will sit blushing in his face,
Not able to endure the sight of day,
But, self-affrighted, tremble at his sin.
Not all the water in the rough rude sea
Can wash the balm from an anointed king;
The breath of worldly men cannot depose
The deputy elected by the Lord:

For every man that Bolingbroke hath prest,
To lift shrewd steel against our golden crown,
God for his Richard hath in heavenly pay
A glorious angel: then, if angels fight,
Weak men must fall; for heaven still guards the
right.

Enter Salisbury.

Cry, woe, destruction, ruin, loss, 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.

5 Like an unseasonable stormy day,

Which makes the silver rivers drown their shores,
As if the world were alì dissolv'd to tears;
So high above his limits swells the rage.
Of Bolingbroke, covering your fearful land
10 With hard bright steel, and hearts harder than steel.
Whitebeardshavearm'dtheir thin and hairlessscalps
Against thy majesty; boys, with women's voices,
Strive to speak big, and clasp their female joints
In stiff unwieldy arms against thy crown:
15 Thy very beadsmen' learn to bend their bows
Of double-fatal yew against thy state;
Yea, distaff women manage rusty bills
Against thy seat: both young and old rebel,
And all goes worse than I have power to tell. [ill.
K. Rich. Too well, too well, thou tell'st a tale so
Where is the earl of Wiltshire? where is Bagot?
What is become of Bushy? where is Green
That they have let the dangerous enemy
Measure our confines with such peaceful steps?
25 If we prevail, their heads shall pay for it.
I warrant,they have made peace with Bolingbroke.
Scroop. Peace have they made with him, in-
[demption!

Welcome, my lord; How far off lies your power? 20
Sal. Nor near, nor further off, my gracious lord,
Than this weak arm: Discomfort guides my

tongue,

And bids me speak of nothing but despair.
One day too late, I fear, my noble lord,
Hath clouded all thy happy days on earth:
Oh, call back yesterday, bid time return,
And thou shalt have twelve thousand fighting men!
To-day, to-day, unhappy day, too late,
O'erthrows thy joys,friends, fortune, and thy state; 30
For all the Welshmen, hearing thou wert dead,
Are gone to Bolingbroke, dispers'd, and fled.
Aum. Comfort, my liege; Why looks your
grace so pale?
[men

K. Rich. But now the blood of twenty thousand 35
Did triumph in my face, and they are fled;
And 'till so much blood thither come again,

Have I not reason to look pale and dead?
All souls that will be safe, fly from my side;
For time hath set a blot upon my pride.

[are. 40

Aum. Comfort, my liege; remember who you
K. Rich. I had forgot myself: am I not king?
Awake, thou cowardly majesty! thou sleepest.
Is not the king's name forty thousand names?
Arm, arm, my name; a puny subject strikes
At thy great glory.-Look not to the ground,
Ye favourites of a king; Are we not high?
High be our thoughts: I know, my uncle York
Hath power enough to serve our turn. But who
Comes here?

Enter Scroop.
[liege,
Scroop. More health and happiness betide my
Than can my care-tun'd tongue deliver him!
K. Rich. Mine ear is open, and my heart prepar'd;
The worst is worldly loss, thou canst unfold.
Say, is my kingdom lost? why, 'twas my care;
And what loss is it, to be rid of care?
Strives Bolingbroke to be as great as we?
Greater he shall not be; if he serve God,
We'll serve him too, and be his fellow so.
Revolt our subjects? that we cannot mend;
They break their faith to God, as well as us:

145

deed, my lord.

K. Rich. O villains, vipers, damned without reDogs, easily won to fawn on any man! [heart! Snakes, in my heart-blood warm'd, that sting my Three Judases, each one thrice worse than Judas! Would they make peace? Terrible hell make war Upon their spotted souls for this offence!

Scroop. Sweet love, I see, changing his property,
Turns to the sourest and most deadly hate:-
Again uncurse their souls; their peace is made
With heads, and not with hands; those whom you
curse,

Have felt the worst of death's destroying wound,
And lie full low, grav'd in the hollow ground.

Aum. Is Bushy, Green, and the earl of Wilt

shire dead?

Scroop. Yea,all of them at Bristol lost their heads.
Aum. Where is the duke my father with his
power?
[speak:
K. Rich. No matter where; of comfort no man
Let's talk of graves, of worms, and epitaphs;
Make dust our paper, and with rainy eyes
50 Write sorrow on the bosom of the earth.
Let's chuse executors, and talk of wills:-
And yet not so,-for what can we bequeath,
Save our deposed bodies to the ground?
Our lands, our lives, and all are Bolingbroke's,
55 And nothing can we call our own but death;
And that small model' of the barren earth,
Which serves as paste and cover to our bones,
For heaven's sake, let us sit upon the ground,
And tell sad stories of the death of kings:---
60 How some have been depos'd, some slain in war;
Some haunted by the ghosts they have depos'd;
Some poison'd by their wives, some sleeping kill'd;

1 The king's beadsmen were his chaplains. and the wood is employed for instruments of death.

* Called so, because the leaves of the yew are poison, i. e, mould. All

All murder'd:-For within the hollow crown,
That rounds the mortal temples of the king,
Keeps Death his court: and there the antic1 sits
Scoffing his state, and grinning at his pomp;
Allowing him a breath, a little scene
To monarchize, be fear'd, and kill with looks;
Infusing him with self 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 castle wall, and-farewell king
Cover your heads, and mock not flesh and blood
With solemn reverence; 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, taste grief,
Need friends; Subjected thus,
How can you say to me-I am a king?

Carl. My lord, wise men ne'er wail their pre

sent woes,

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15

20

But presently prevent the ways to wail.
To fear the foe, since fear oppresseth strength,
Gives, in your weakness, strength unto your foe,
And so your follies fight against yourself.
Fear, and be slain: no worse can come, to fight:25
And fight and die, is death destroying death';
Where fearing dying, pays death servile breath.

Aum. My father hath a power, enquire of him ;
And learn to make a body of a limb.

K. Rich. Thou chid'st ine well:-Proud Bo-30 lingbroke, I come

To change blows with thee for our day of doom.
This ague-fit of fear is over-blown;
An easy task it is, to win our own.
Say, Scroop, where lies our uncle with his power
Speak sweetly, man, although thy looks be sour.
Scroop. Men judge by the complexion of the sky
The state and inclination of the day;
So may you by my dull and heavy eye,

My tongue hath but a heavier tale to say.
I play the torturer, by small and small,
To lengthen out the worst that must be spoken:-
Your uncle York hath join'd with Bolingbroke';
And all your northern castles yielded up;
And all your southern gentlemen in arms
Upon his party.

K. Rich. Thou hast said enough.———
Beshrew thee, cousin, which didst lead me forth
[To Aumerle.

Of that sweet way I was in to despair!
What say you now? what comfort have we now?
By heaven, I'll hate him everlastingly,
That bids me be of comfort any more.
Go, to Flint castle; there I'll pine away;
A king, woe's slave, shall kingly woe obey.
That power I have, discharge; and let them go
To ear the land' that hath some hope to grow,
For I have none:-Let no man speak again
To alter this, for counsel is but vain.
Aum. My liege, one word.

35

Boling. So that by this intelligence we learn,
The Welshmen are dispers'd; and Salisbury
Is gone to meet the king, who lately landed,
With some few private friends upon this coast.
North. The news is very fair and good, my lord;
Richard, not far from hence, hath hid his head.
York. It would beseem the lord Northumberland
To say-king Richard:-Alack the heavy day,
When such a sacred king should hide his head!
North. Your grace mistakes; only to be brief,
Left I his title out.

York. The time hath been,

Would you have been so brief with him, he would
Have been so brief with you, to shorten you,
For taking so the head', the whole head's length.
Boling. Mistake not, uncle, farther than you
should.

[should,

York. Take not, good cousin, farther than you
Lest you mis-take: The heavens are o'er your head.
Boling. I know it, uncle; and oppose not
Myself against their will.-But who comes here?
Enter Percy.

Welcome, Harry; what, will not this castle yield?
Percy. The castle royally is mann'd, my lord,
Against thy entrance.

Boling. Royally! Why, it contains no king?
Percy. Yes, my good lord,

It doth contain a king; king Richard lies
Within the limits of yon lime and stone;
40 And with him lord Aumerle, lord Salisbury,
Sir Stephen Scroop; besides a clergyman
Of holy reverence, who, I cannot learn.
North. Belike, it is the bishop of Carlisle.
Boling. Noble lord,
[To North.
45 Go to the rude ribs of that ancient castle:
Through brazen trumpet send the breath of parle
Into his ruin'd ears, and thus deliver:
Harry of Bolingbroke, on both his knees,
Doth kiss king Richard's hand;

50 And sends allegiance, and true faith of heart,
To his most royal person; hither come
Even at his feet to lay my arms and power;
Provided that, my banishment repeal'd,
And lands restor❜d again, be freely granted:
55 If not, I'll use the advantage of my power,
And lay the summer's dust with showers of blood,
Rain'd from the wounds of slaughter'd Englishmen:
The which, how far off from the mind of Boling-
broke
60 It is, such crimson tempest should bedrench

This alludes to the antic or fool of old farces, whose principal business is to ridicule the graver and more splendid personages. Tradition seems here used for traditional practices. The meaning is, to die fighting, is to return the evil that we suffer, to destroy the destroyers. i. e. to plough it. "To take the head is, is to take undue liberties.

The

The fresh green lap of fair king Richard's land,
My stooping duty tenderly shall shew.
Go, signify as much: while here we march
Upon the grassy carpet of this plain.-
Let's march without the noise of threat'ning drum,
That from this castle's totter'd battlements
Our fair appointments may be well perus'd.
Methinks, king Richard and myself should meet
With no less terror than the elements
Of fire and water, when their thund'ring shock
At meeting tears the cloudy cheeks of heaven.
Be he the fire, I'll be the yielding water:
The rage be his, while on the earth I rain
My waters; on the earth, and not on him.
March on, and mark king Richard how he looks.
A parle sounded, and answered by another trum-
pet within. Flourish. Enter on the walls King
Richard, the Bishop of Carlisle, Aumerle,
Scroop, and Salisbury.

we stood

Harry Bolingbroke, doth humbly kiss thy hand,
And by the honourable tomb he swears,
That stands upon thy royal grandsire's bones;
And by the royalties of both your bloods,
5 Currents that spring from one most gracious head;
And by the bury'd hand of warlike Gaunt;
And by the worth and honour of himself,
Comprising all that may be sworn or said;—
His coming hither hath no farther scope,
10 Than for his lineal royalties, and to beg
Enfranchisement immediate on his knees:
Which on thy royal party granted once,
His glittering arms he will commend to rust,
His barbed steeds to stables, and his heart
To faithful service of your majesty.
This swears he, as he is a prince, is just;
And as I am a gentleman, I credit him.

15

K. Rich. Northumberland, say,-thus the king

returns:

His noble cousin is right welcome hither;
And all the number of his fair demands
Shall be accomplish'd without contradiction:
With all the gracious utterance thou hast,
Speak to his gentle hearing kind commends—
25 We do debase ourself, cousin, do we not, [To Aum.
To look so poorly, and to speak so fair?
Shall we call back Northumberland, and send
Defiance to the traitor, and so die? [words,
Aum. No, good my lord; let's fight with gentle
Till time lend friends, and friends their helpful
[of mine,

swords.

K. Rich. Oh God! oh God! that e'er this tongue
That laid the sentence of dread banishment
On yon proud man, should take it off again
35 With words of sooth'! Oh, that I were as great
As is my grief, or lesser than my name!
Or that I could forget what I have been !
Or not remember what I must be now! [beat,
Swell'st thou, proud heart? I'll give thee scope to
40 Since foes have scope to beat both thee and me.
Aum. Northumberland comes back from Bo-

York. See, see, king Richard doth himself appear, 20
As doth the blushing discontented sun
From out the fiery portal of the east;
When he perceives, the envious clouds are bent
To dim his glory, and to stain the tract
Of his bright passage to the occident.
Yet looks he like a king; behold, his eye,
As bright as is the eagle's, lightens forth
Controling majesty: Alack, alack, for woe,
That any harm should stain so fair a show!
K. Rich. We are amaz'd; and thus long have 30
[To North.
To watch the fearful bending of thy knee,
Because we thought ourself thy lawful king;
And if we be, how dare thy joints forget
To pay their awful duty to our presence?
If we be not, shew us the hand of God
That hath dismiss'd us from our stewardship;
For well we know, no hand of blood and bone
Can gripe the sacred handle of our sceptre;
Unless he do prophane, steal, or usurp.
And though you think, that all, as you have done,
Have torn their souls, by turning them from us,
And we are barren, and bereft of friends ;-
Yet know, my master, God omnipotent,
Is must'ring in his clouds, on our behalf,
Armies of pestilence; and they shall strike
Your children yet unborn, and unbegot,
That lift your vassal hands against my head,
And threat the glory of my precious crown.
Tell Bolingbroke (for yond', methinks, he is)
That every stride he makes upon my land,
Is dangerous treason: He is come to ope
The purple testament of bleeding war;
But ere the crown he looks for live in peace,
Ten thousand bloody crowns of mothers' sons
Shall ill become the flower of England's face';
Change the complexion of her maid-pale peace
To scarlet indignation, and bedew

lingbroke.

[submit? K. Rich. What must the king do now? Must he The king shall do it. Must he be depos'd? 145 The king shall be contented. Must he lose The name of king? o' God's name, let it go: I'll give my jewels for a set of beads; My gorgeous palace, for a hermitage; My gay apparel, for an alms-man's gown; 50 My figur'd goblets, for a dish of wood; My sceptre, for a palmer's walking-staff; My subjects, for a pair of carved saints; And my large kingdom, for a little grave, A little little grave, an obscure grave :55 Or I'll be bury'd in the king's highway,

Her pasture's grass with faithful English blood.
North. The King of heaven forbid, our lord 60
the king

Should so with civil and uncivil arms
Be rush'd upon! Thy thrice noble cousin,

i.e. the flowery surface of England's soil.

Some way of common trade, where subjects' feet
May hourly trample on their sovereign's head:
For on my heart they tread, now whilst I live;
And, bury'd once, why not upon my head?
Aumerle, thou weep'st; My tender-hearted

cousin!

We'll make foul weather with despised tears; Our sighs, and they, shall lodge the summer corn, In this place sooth means sweetness or softness.

And

SCENE
Langley.

IV.

And make a dearth in this revolting land.
Or shall we play the wantons with our woes,
And make some pretty match with shedding tears?
As thus;-To drop them still upon one place,
"Till they have fretted us a pair of graves
Within the earth; and, therein laid,--There lies
Two kinsmen digg'd their graves with weeping eyes?
Would not this ill do well?-Well, well, I see
I talk but idly, and you mock at me.

5

[North. advances. 10
Most mighty prince, my lord Northumberland,
What says king Bolingbroke? Will his majesty
Give Richard leave to live 'till Richard die?
You make a leg, and Bolingbroke says―ay.

The Duke of York's garden.

Enter the Queen, and two Ladies.
Queen. What sport shall we devise here in this
garden,

To drive away the heavy thought of care?
Lady. Madam, we'll play at bowls.
Queen. Twill make me think, the world is full
of rubs,

And that my fortune runs against the bias.
Lady. Madam, we'll dance.

Queen. My legs can keep no measure in delight,

North. My lord, in the base court' he doth 15 When my poor heart no measure keeps in grief;

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Boling. Stand all apart,

[Enter Richard, &c. below.

And shew fair duty to his majesty.

My gracious lord,—

30

[Kneels. 35

K. Rich. Fair cousin, you debase your princely
knee,

To make the base earth proud with kissing it:
Me rather had, my heart might feel your love,
Than my unpleas'd eye see your courtesy.
Up, cousin, up; your heart is up, I know,
Thus high at least, although your knee be low.
[Touching his own head.
Boling. My gracious lord, I come but for mine

own.

K. Rich. Your own is yours, and I am yours, and all.

Therefore, no dancing, girl; some other sport.
Lady. Madam, we will tell tales.
Queen. Of sorrow, or of joy?
Lady. Of either, madam.
2en. Of neither, girl:

For if of joy, being altogether wanting,
It doth remember me the more of sorrow;
Or if of grief, being altogether had,
It adds more sorow to my want of joy:
For what I have, I need not to repeat;
And what I want, it boots not to complain.
Lady. Madam, I'll sing.

Queen. 'Tis well, that thou hast cause:
But thou should'st please me better, would'st thou
weep.
[good.
Lady. I could weep, madam, would it do you
Queen. And I could weep, would weeping do

me good,

And never borrow any tear of thee.
But stay, here come the gardeners:
Let's step into the shadow of these trees.—
My wretchedness unto a row of pins,

Enter a Gardener, and two servants.
They'll talk of state; for every one doth so
40 Against a change; Woe is fore-run with woe.
[Queen and Ladies retire.
Gard. Go, bind thou up yon dangling apricocks,
Which, like unruly children, make their sire
Stoop with oppression of their prodigal weight;
Give some supportance to the bending twigs.→
Go thou, and like an executioner,

45

Boling. So far be mine, my most redoubted lord,|
As my true service shall deserve your love.
K. Rich. Well you deserve:-They well de-50
serve to have,

That know the strongest and surest way to get.-
Uncle, give me your hand: nay, dry your eyes;
Tears shew their love, but want their remedies.-
Cousin, I am too young to be your father,
Though you are old enough to be my heir.
What you will have, I'll give, and willing too;
For do we must, what force will have us do.
Set on towards London:-Cousin, is it so?
Boling. Yea, my good lord.

K. Rich. Then I must not say, no.
[Flourish. Exeunt.

Bas cour, Fr.

Cut off the heads of too-fast growing sprays,
That look too lofty in our commonwealth:
All must be even in our government.-
You thus employ'd, I will go root away
The noisome weeds, that without profit suck
The soil's fertility from wholesome flowers.

Serv. Why should we, in the compass of a pale,
Keep law, and form, and due proportion,
55 Shewing, as in a model, our firm state;
When our sea-walled garden, the whole land,
Is full of weeds; her fairest flowers choak'd up,
Her fruit-trees all unprun'd, her hedges ruin'd,
Her knots disorder'd, and her wholesome herbs
60 Swarming with caterpillars?

Gard. Hold thy peace:
He that hath suffer'd this disorder'd spring,

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Hath now himself met with the fall of leaf:
The weeds, that his broad spreading leaves did
shelter,

That seem'd, in eating him, to hold him up,
Are pull'd up, root and all, by Bolingbroke;
I mean, the earl of Wiltshire, Bushy, Green.
Serv. What, are they dead?

Gard. They are; and Bolingbroke
Hath seiz'd the wasteful king.-What pity is it,
That he had not so trimm'd and dress'd his land,
As we this garden! who at time of year
Do wound the bark, the skin of our fruit-trees;
Lest, being over-proud with sap and blood,
With too much riches it confound itself:
Had he done so to great and growing men,
They might have liv'd to bear, and he to taste
Their fruits of duty. All superfluous branches
We lop away, that bearing boughs may live:
Had he done so, himself had borne the crown,
Whichwaste and idle hours hath quite thrown down.
Sero. What think you then, the king shall be
depos'd?

Gard. Depress'd he is already; and depos'd, 'Tis doubt, he will be: Letters came last night To a dear friend of the good duke of York's, That tell black tidings.

Queen. Oh, I am press'd to death, through want of speaking!

5

[Dar'st thou, thou little better thing than earth, Divine his downfal? Say, where, wheu, and how, Cam'st thou by these ill tidings? Speak, thou wretch.

Gard. Pardon me, madam: little joy have I To breathe these news, yet, what I say is true. King Richard, he is in the mighty hold

Of Boingbroke; their fortunes both are weigh'd: In your lord's scale is nothing but himself, 10 And some few vanities that make him light; But in the balance of great Bolingbroke, Besides himself, are all the English peers, And with that odds he weighs king Richard down.~~ Post you to London, and you'll find it so: 15I speak no more than every one doth know.

20

Queen. Nimble mischance, that art so light of Doth not thy embassage belong to me, [foot, And am I last that knows it? Oh, thou think'st To serve me last, that I may longest keep Thy sorrow in my breast.-Come, ladies, go, To meet at London London's king in woe.What, was I born to this! that my sad look Should grace the triumph of great Bolingbroke !— Gard'ner, for telling me these news of woe, 25I would, the plants, thou graft'st, may never grow. [Exeunt Queen and Ladies. Gard. Poor queen! so that thy state might be

[Coming from her concealment. Thou old Adam's likeness, set to dress this garden, 30 How dares thy harsh tongue sound this unpleasing

news?

What Eve, what serpent hath suggested thee To make a second fall of cursed man?

Why dost thou say, king Richard is depos'd?

no worse,

I would my skill were subject to thy curse.--
Here did she drop a tear; here, in this place,
I'll set a bank of rue, sour herb of grace:
Rue, even for ruth, here shortly shall be seen,
In the remembrance of a weeping queen.

[Exeunt Gard. and Sers.

SCENE I

АСТ

London. The Parliament-House.

Enter Bolingbroke, Aumerle, Northumberland,

IV.

I heard you say, "You rather had refuse "The offer of an hundred thousand crowns, "Than Bolingbroke return to England;

Percy, Fitzwater, Surry, Bishop of Carlisle, 45" Adding withal, how blest this land would be,

Abbot of Westminster, Herald, Officers, and Bagot.

Boling. CALL forth Bagot:

Now, Bagot, freely speak thy mind; What thou dost know of noble Gloster's death; Who wrought it with the king, and who perform'd The bloody office of his timeless' end.

Bagot. Then set before my face the lordAumerle, Boling. Cousin, stand forth, and look upon that

man.

"In this your cousin's death."

Aum. Princes, and noble lords,
What answer shall I make to this base man?
Shall I so much dishonour my fair stars2,
50 On equal terms to give him chastisement?
Either I must, or have mine honour soil'd
With the attainder of his sland'rous lips.-
There is my gage, the manual seal of death,
That marks thee out for hell: Thou liest, and
I will maintain what thou hast said, is false,
In thy heart-blood, though being all too base
To stain the temper of my knightly sword.

[tongue 55

Bagot. My lord Aumerle, I know, your daring Scorns to unsay what once it hath deliver❜d. In that dead time when Gloster's death was plotted, I heard you say," Is not my arm of length, "That reacheth from the restful English court "As far as Calais, to my uncle's head?" Amongst much other talk, that very time,

Timeless for untimely.

Boling. Bagot, forbear, thou shalt not take it up. Aum. Excepting one, I would he were the best 60 In all this presence, that hath mov'd me so.

Fitzw. If that thy valour stand on sympathies, There is my gage, Aumerle, in gage to thine:

Meaning, his high or noble birth. i. e. upon equality of blood.

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