Your vile intent must needs seem horrible. Hub. Is this your promise? go to, hold your tongue. So I may keep mine eyes; O, spare mine eyes ;4 Lo, by my troth, the instrument is cold, And would not harm me. Hub. I can heat it, boy. Arth. No, in good sooth; the fire is dead with grief, Being create for comfort, to be us'd In undeserv'd extremes: See else yourself; Hub. But with my breath I can revive it, boy. That mercy, which fierce fire, and iron, extends, Hub. Well, see to live; I will not touch thine eyes For all the treasure that thine uncle owes : Yet am I sworn, and I did purpose, boy, With this same very iron to burn them out. Arth. O, now you look like Hubert! all this while You were disguised. Hub. Peace: no more. Adieu ; Your uncle must not know but you are dead: [4] This is according to nature. We imagine no evil so great as that which is near us. JOHNS. [5] The sense is: the fire, being created not to hurt, but to comfort, is dead with grief for finding itself used in acts of cruelty, which, being innocent, I have not deserved. JOHNS. [6] i.e. stimulate, set him on. STEEV Arth. O heaven !—I thank you, Hubert. Hub. Silence; no more: Go closely in with me ; Much danger do I undergo for thee. SCENE II. [Exeunt. The same. K.John. Here once again we sit, once again crown'd, And look'd upon, I hope, with cheerful eyes. Pemb. This once again, but that your highness pleas'd, Was once superfluous: 7 You were crown'd before, And that high royalty was ne'er pluck'd off; The faiths of men ne'er stained with revolt; Fresh expectation troubled not the land, With any long'd-for change, or better state. Sal. Therefore, to be possess'd with double pomp, To seek the beauteous eye of heaven to garnish, Pemb. But that your royal pleasure must be done, And, in the last repeating, troublesome, Being urged at a time unseasonable. Sal. In this, the antique and well-noted face Of plain old form is much disfigured: And, like a shifted wind unto a sail, It makes the course of thoughts to fetch about; Makes sound opinion sick, and truth suspected, For putting on so new a fashion'd robe. Pemb. When workmen strive to do better than well, They do confound their skill in covetousness :9 And, oftentimes excusing of a fault, Doth make the fault the worse by the excuse; STEEV JOHNS. [7] This one time more was one time more than enough. It should be remembered, tha King John was at present crowned for the fourth time. [8] To guard, is to fringe. JOHNS. [9] i e. not by their avarice, but in an eager emulation, an intense desire of excelling. THEOBALD. As patches, set upon a little breach, Than did the fault before it was so patch'd. Sal. To this effect, before you were new-crown'd K. John. Some reasons of this double coronation I will both hear and grant you your requests. K. John. Let it be so; I do commit his youth Enter HUBERT. To your direction.-Hubert, what news with you? Pemb. This is the man should do the bloody deed: [:] To declare, to publish the desires of all those. JOHNS. [2] In the middle ages, the whole education of princes and noble youths consisted in martial exercises, &c. These could not be easily had in a prison, where mental improvements might have been afforded as well as any where else but this sort of education never entered into the thoughts of our active, warlike, but illiterate nobility. PERCY. He show'd his warrant to a friend of mine : Lives in his eye; that close aspéct of his What we so fear'd he had a charge to do. Sal. The colour of the king doth come and go, Pemb. And, when it breaks, I fear, will issue thence The foul corruption of a sweet child's death. K. John. We cannot hold mortality's strong hand :Good lords, although my will to give is living, The suit which you demand is gone and dead: He tells us, Arthur is deceas'd to-night. Sal. Indeed, we fear'd, his sickness was past cure. Pemb. Indeed, we heard how near his death he was, Before the child himself felt he was sick : This must be answer'd, either here, or hence. K. John. Why do you bend such solemn brows on me? Think you, I bear the shears of destiny? Have I commandment on the pulse of life? Sal. It is apparent foul-play; and 'tis shame, That greatness should so grossly offer it : So thrive it in your game! and so farewell! Pemb. Stay yet, lord Salisbury; I'll go with thee, That blood, which ow'd the breath of all this isle, There is no sure foundation set on blood; No certain life achiev'd by other's death. Enter a Messenger. A fearful eye thou hast ; Where is that blood, [3] The king asks how all goes in France, the messenger catches the word goes, and answers, that whatever is in France goes now into England. JOHN. For any foreign preparation, Was levy'd in the body of a land ! The copy of your speed is learn'd by them ; K. John. Q, where hath our intelligence been drunk? Where hath it slept? Where is my mother's care? That such an army could be drawn in France, And she not hear of it? Mess. My liege, her ear Is stopp'd with dust; the first of April, died Three days before: but this from rumour's tongue K John. Withhold thy speed, dreadful occasion ! Enter the Bastard, and PETER of POMFRET. With these ill tidings.-Now, what says the world Bast. But, if you be afeard to hear the worst, To any tongue, speak it of what it will. Bast. How I have sped among the clergymen, [5] This man was a hermit in great repute with the common people. Notwithstanding the event is said to have fallen out as he had prophesied, the |