The Arden Shakespeare Complete Works
Page 238
GEORGE To who, my lord?
KING EDWARD Why, Clarence, to myself.
RICHARD That would be ten days’ wonder at the least.
GEORGE That’s a day longer than a wonder lasts.
RICHARD By so much is the wonder in extremes.
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KING EDWARD
Well, jest on, brothers: I can tell you both
Her suit is granted for her husband’s lands.
Enter a Nobleman.
NOBLEMAN My gracious lord, Henry your foe is taken
And brought your prisoner to your palace gate.
KING EDWARD
See that he be convey’d unto the Tower:
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And go we, brothers, to the man that took him,
To question of his apprehension.
Widow, go you along. Lords, use her honourably.
Exeunt all but Richard.
RICHARD Ay, Edward will use women honourably.
Would he were wasted, marrow, bones, and all,
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That from his loins no hopeful branch may spring,
To cross me from the golden time I look for!
And yet, between my soul’s desire and me –
The lustful Edward’s title buried –
Is Clarence, Henry, and his son young Edward,
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And all the unlook’d for issue of their bodies,
To take their rooms ere I can plant myself –
A cold premeditation for my purpose!
Why then I do but dream on sovereignty;
Like one that stands upon a promontory
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And spies a far-off shore where he would tread,
Wishing his foot were equal with his eye;
And chides the sea, that sunders him from thence,
Saying he’ll lade it dry to have his way:
So do I wish the crown, being so far off;
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And so I chide the means that keeps me from it;
And so I say I’ll cut the causes off,
Flattering me with impossibilities.
My eye’s too quick, my heart o’erweens too much,
Unless my hand and strength could equal them.
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Well, say there is no kingdom then for Richard;
What other pleasure can the world afford?
I’ll make my heaven in a lady’s lap,
And deck my body in gay ornaments,
And ’witch sweet ladies with my words and looks.
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O miserable thought! and more unlikely,
Than to accomplish twenty golden crowns.
Why, Love forswore me in my mother’s womb:
And, for I should not deal in her soft laws,
She did corrupt frail Nature with some bribe,
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To shrink mine arm up like a wither’d shrub;
To make an envious mountain on my back,
Where sits Deformity to mock my body;
To shape my legs of an unequal size;
To disproportion me in every part,
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Like to a chaos, or unlick’d bear-whelp
That carries no impression like the dam.
And am I then a man to be belov’d?
O monstrous fault to harbour such a thought!
Then, since this earth affords no joy to me
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But to command, to check, to o’erbear such
As are of better person than myself,
I’ll make my heaven to dream upon the crown;
And, whiles I live, t’account this world but hell,
Until my misshap’d trunk that bears this head
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Be round impaled with a glorious crown.
And yet I know not how to get the crown,
For many lives stand between me and home:
And I, – like one lost in a thorny wood,
That rents the thorns and is rent with the thorns,
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Seeking a way, and straying from the way;
Not knowing how to find the open air,
But toiling desperately to find it out –
Torment myself to catch the English crown:
And from that torment I will free myself,
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Or hew my way out with a bloody axe.
Why, I can smile, and murder whiles I smile,
And cry ‘Content!’ to that that grieves my heart,
And wet my cheeks with artificial tears,
And frame my face to all occasions.
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I’ll drown more sailors than the Mermaid shall;
I’ll slay more gazers than the basilisk;
I’ll play the orator as well as Nestor,
Deceive more slily than Ulysses could,
And, like a Sinon, take another Troy.
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I can add colours to the chameleon,
Change shapes with Proteus for advantages,
And set the murderous Machiavel to school.
Can I do this, and cannot get a crown?
Tut! were it further off, I’ll pluck it down.
Exit.
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3.3 Flourish. Enter LEWIS the French King, his sister BONA, his Admiral, called Bourbon; PRINCE EDWARD, QUEEN MARGARET and the EARL OF OXFORD. LEWIS sits, and riseth up again.
KING LEWIS Fair Queen of England, worthy Margaret,
Sit down with us: it ill befits thy state
And birth that thou should’st stand while Lewis doth sit.
QUEEN MARGARET
No, mighty King of France: now Margaret
Must strike her sail, and learn awhile to serve
5
Where kings command. I was, I must confess,
Great Albion’s Queen in former golden days;
But now mischance hath trod my title down
And with dishonour laid me on the ground,
Where I must take like seat unto my fortune
10
And to my humble state conform myself.
KING LEWIS
Why, say, fair Queen, whence springs this deep despair?
QUEEN MARGARET
From such a cause as fills mine eyes with tears
And stops my tongue, while heart is drown’d in cares.
KING LEWIS Whate’er it be, be thou still like thyself,
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And sit thee by our side. [Seats her by him.]
Yield not thy neck
To Fortune’s yoke, but let thy dauntless mind
Still ride in triumph over all mischance.
Be plain, Queen Margaret, and tell thy grief;
It shall be eas’d, if France can yield relief.
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QUEEN MARGARET
Those gracious words revive my drooping thoughts
And give my tongue-tied sorrows leave to speak.
Now, therefore, be it known to noble Lewis
That Henry, sole possessor of my love,
Is, of a king, become a banish’d man,
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And forc’d to live in Scotland a forlorn;
While proud ambitious Edward, Duke of York,
Usurps the regal title and the seat
Of England’s true-anointed lawful King.
This is the cause that I, poor Margaret,
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With this my son, Prince Edward, Henry’s heir,
Am come to crave thy just and lawful aid;
And if thou fail us, all our hope is done.
Scotland hath will to help, but cannot help;
Our people and our peers are both misled,
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Our treasure seiz’d, our soldiers put to flight,
And, as thou seest, ourselves in heavy plight.
KING LEWIS
Renowned Queen, with patience calm the storm,
While we bethink a means to break it off.
QUEEN MARGARET
The more we stay, the
stronger grows our foe.
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KING LEWIS The more I stay, the more I’ll succour thee.
QUEEN MARGARET
O, but impatience waiteth on true sorrow.
And see where comes the breeder of my sorrow.
Enter WARWICK.
KING LEWIS
What’s he approacheth boldly to our presence?
QUEEN MARGARET
Our Earl of Warwick, Edward’s greatest friend.
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KING LEWIS
Welcome, brave Warwick! What brings thee to France?
[He descends. She ariseth.]
QUEEN MARGARET
Ay, now begins a second storm to rise;
For this is he that moves both wind and tide.
WARWICK From worthy Edward, King of Albion,
My lord and sovereign, and thy vowed friend,
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I come, in kindness and unfeigned love,
First, to do greetings to thy royal person,
And then to crave a league of amity,
And lastly to confirm that amity
With nuptial knot, if thou vouchsafe to grant
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That virtuous Lady Bona, thy fair sister,
To England’s King in lawful marriage.
QUEEN MARGARET [aside]
If that go forward, Henry’s hope is done.
WARWICK [to Bona]
And, gracious madam, in our king’s behalf,
I am commanded, with your leave and favour,
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Humbly to kiss your hand, and with my tongue
To tell the passion of my sovereign’s heart;
Where Fame, late entering at his heedful ears,
Hath plac’d thy beauty’s image and thy virtue.
QUEEN MARGARET
King Lewis and Lady Bona, hear me speak
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Before you answer Warwick. His demand
Springs not from Edward’s well-meant honest love,
But from Deceit, bred by Necessity;
For how can tyrants safely govern home
Unless abroad they purchase great alliance?
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To prove him tyrant this reason may suffice,
That Henry liveth still; but were he dead,
Yet here Prince Edward stands, King Henry’s son.
Look, therefore, Lewis, that by this league and marriage
Thou draw not on thy danger and dishonour;
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For though usurpers sway the rule awhile,
Yet heavens are just, and time suppresseth wrongs.
WARWICK Injurious Margaret!
PRINCE And why not Queen?
WARWICK Because thy father Henry did usurp;
And thou no more art prince than she is queen.
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OXFORD
Then Warwick disannuls great John of Gaunt,
Which did subdue the greatest part of Spain;
And after John of Gaunt, Henry the Fourth,
Whose wisdom was a mirror to the wisest;
And after that wise prince, Henry the Fifth,
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Who by his prowess conquered all France:
From these our Henry lineally descends.
WARWICK
Oxford, how haps it in this smooth discourse
You told not how Henry the Sixth hath lost
All that which Henry the Fifth had gotten?
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Methinks these peers of France should smile at that.
But for the rest: you tell a pedigree
Of threescore and two years – a silly time
To make prescription for a kingdom’s worth.
OXFORD
Why, Warwick, canst thou speak against thy liege,
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Whom thou obeyed’st thirty and six years,
And not bewray thy treason with a blush?
WARWICK Can Oxford, that did ever fence the right,
Now buckler falsehood with a pedigree?
For shame! leave Henry, and call Edward king.
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OXFORD Call him my king by whose injurious doom
My elder brother, the Lord Aubrey Vere,
Was done to death? and more than so, my father,
Even in the downfall of his mellow’d years,
When Nature brought him to the door of Death?
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No, Warwick, no; while life upholds this arm,
This arm upholds the house of Lancaster.
WARWICK And I the house of York.
KING LEWIS
Queen Margaret, Prince Edward, and Oxford,
Vouchsafe at our request to stand aside,
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While I use further conference with Warwick.
[They stand aloof.]
QUEEN MARGARET
Heavens grant that Warwick’s words bewitch him not!