The Oxford Shakespeare: The Complete Works

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The Oxford Shakespeare: The Complete Works Page 73

by William Shakespeare


  KING EDWARD

  Is Clarence dead? The order was reversed.

  RICHARD GLOUCESTER

  But he, poor man, by your first order died,

  And that a winged Mercury did bear;

  Some tardy cripple bore the countermand,

  That came too lag to see him buried.

  God grant that some, less noble and less loyal,

  Nearer in bloody thoughts, but not in blood,

  Deserve not worse than wretched Clarence did,

  And yet go current from suspicion.

  Enter Lord Stanley Earl of Derby

  STANLEY (kneeling)

  A boon, my sovereign, for my service done.

  KING EDWARD

  I pray thee, peace! My soul is full of sorrow.

  STANLEY

  I will not rise, unless your highness hear me.

  KING EDWARD

  Then say at once, what is it thou requests?

  STANLEY

  The forfeit, sovereign, of my servant’s life,

  Who slew today a riotous gentleman,

  Lately attendant on the Duke of Norfolk.

  KING EDWARD

  Have I a tongue to doom my brother’s death,

  And shall that tongue give pardon to a slave?

  My brother slew no man; his fault was thought;

  And yet his punishment was bitter death.

  Who sued to me for him? Who in my wrath

  Kneeled at my feet, and bid me be advised?

  Who spoke of brotherhood? Who spoke of love?

  Who told me how the poor soul did forsake

  The mighty Warwick and did fight for me?

  Who told me, in the field at Tewkesbury,

  When Oxford had me down, he rescued me,

  And said, ‘Dear brother, live, and be a king’?

  Who told me, when we both lay in the field,

  Frozen almost to death, how he did lap me

  Even in his garments, and did give himself

  All thin and naked to the numb-cold night?

  All this from my remembrance brutish wrath

  Sinfully plucked, and not a man of you

  Had so much grace to put it in my mind.

  But when your carters or your waiting vassals

  Have done a drunken slaughter, and defaced

  The precious image of our dear redeemer,

  You straight are on your knees for ‘Pardon, pardon!’—

  And I, unjustly too, must grant it you.

  But, for my brother, not a man would speak,

  Nor I, ungracious, speak unto myself

  For him, poor soul. The proudest of you all

  Have been beholden to him in his life,

  Yet none of you would once beg for his life.

  O God, I fear thy justice will take hold

  On me—and you, and mine, and yours, for this.—

  Come, Hastings, help me to my closet.

  Ah, poor Clarence!

  Exeunt some with King and Queen

  RICHARD GLOUCESTER

  This is the fruits of rashness. Marked you not

  How that the guilty kindred of the Queen

  Looked pale, when they did hear of Clarence’ death?

  O, they did urge it still unto the King.

  God will revenge it. Come, lords, will you go

  To comfort Edward with our company?

  BUCKINGHAM We wait upon your grace. Exeunt

  2.2 Enter the old Duchess of York with the two children of Clarence

  BOY

  Good grannam, tell us, is our father dead?

  DUCHESS OF YORK No, boy.

  GIRL

  Why do you weep so oft, and beat your breast,

  And cry, 'O Clarence, my unhappy son’?

  BOY

  Why do you look on us and shake your head,

  And call us orphans, wretches, castaways,

  If that our noble father were alive?

  DUCHESS OF YORK

  My pretty cousins, you mistake me both.

  I do lament the sickness of the King,

  As loath to lose him, not your father’s death.

  It were lost sorrow to wail one that’s lost.

  BOY

  Then you conclude, my grannam, he is dead.

  The King mine uncle is to blame for this.

  God will revenge it—whom I will importune

  With earnest prayers, all to that effect.

  GIRL And so will I.

  DUCHESS OF YORK

  Peace, children, peace! The King doth love you well.

  Incapable and shallow innocents,

  You cannot guess who caused your father’s death.

  BOY

  Grannam, we can. For my good uncle Gloucester

  Told me the King, provoked to it by the Queen,

  Devised impeachments to imprison him,

  And when my uncle told me so he wept,

  And pitied me, and kindly kissed my cheek,

  Bade me rely on him as on my father,

  And he would love me dearly as his child.

  DUCHESS OF YORK

  Ah, that deceit should steal such gentle shapes,

  And with a virtuous visor hide deep vice!

  He is my son, ay, and therein my shame;

  Yet from my dugs he drew not this deceit.

  BOY

  Think you my uncle did dissemble, grannam?

  DUCHESS OF YORK Ay, boy.

  BOY

  I cannot think it. Hark, what noise is this?

  Enter Queen Elizabeth with her hair about her ears

  QUEEN ELIZABETH

  Ah, who shall hinder me to wail and weep?

  To chide my fortune, and torment myself?

  I’ll join with black despair against my soul,

  And to myself become an enemy.

  DUCHESS OF YORK

  What means this scene of rude impatience?

  QUEEN ELIZABETH

  To mark an act of tragic violence.

  Edward, my lord, thy son, our king, is dead.

  Why grow the branches when the root is gone?

  Why wither not the leaves that want their sap?

  If you will live, lament; if die, be brief,

  That our swift-winged souls may catch the King‘s,

  Or like obedient subjects follow him

  To his new kingdom of ne’er-changing night.

  DUCHESS OF YORK

  Ah, so much interest have I in thy sorrow

  As I had title in thy noble husband.

  I have bewept a worthy husband’s death,

  And lived with looking on his images.

  But now two mirrors of his princely semblance

  Are cracked in pieces by malignant death,

  And I for comfort have but one false glass,

  That grieves me when I see my shame in him.

  Thou art a widow, yet thou art a mother,

  And hast the comfort of thy children left.

  But death hath snatched my husband from mine arms

  And plucked two crutches from my feeble hands,

  Clarence and Edward. O what cause have I,

  Thine being but a moiety of my moan,

  To overgo thy woes, and drown thy cries?

  BOY (to Elizabeth)

  Ah, aunt, you wept not for our father’s death.

  How can we aid you with our kindred tears?

  DAUGHTER (to Elizabeth)

  Our fatherless distress was left unmoaned;

  Your widow-dolour likewise be unwept.

  QUEEN ELIZABETH

  Give me no help in lamentation.

  I am not barren to bring forth complaints.

  All springs reduce their currents to mine eyes,

  That I, being governed by the wat’ry moon,

  May send forth plenteous tears to drown the world.

  Ah, for my husband, for my dear Lord Edward!

  CHILDREN

  Ah, for our father, for our dear Lord Clarence!

  DUCHESS OF YORK
>
  Alas, for both, both mine, Edward and Clarence!

  QUEEN ELIZABETH

  What stay had I but Edward, and he’s gone?

  CHILDREN

  What stay had we but Clarence, and he’s gone?

  DUCHESS OF YORK

  What stays had I but they, and they are gone?

  QUEEN ELIZABETH

  Was never widow had so dear a loss!

  CHILDREN

  Were never orphans had so dear a loss!

  DUCHESS OF YORK

  Was never mother had so dear a loss!

  Alas, I am the mother of these griefs.

  Their woes are parcelled; mine is general.

  She for an Edward weeps, and so do I;

  I for a Clarence weep, so doth not she.

  These babes for Clarence weep, and so do I;

  I for an Edward weep, so do not they.

  Alas, you three on me, threefold distressed,

  Pour all your tears. I am your sorrow’s nurse,

  And I will pamper it with lamentation.Enter Richard Duke of Gloucester, the Duke of

  Buckingham, Lord Stanley Earl of Derby, Lord

  Hastings, and Sir Richard Ratcliffe

  RICHARD GLOUCESTER (to Elizabeth)

  Sister, have comfort. All of us have cause

  To wail the dimming of our shining star,

  But none can help our harms by wailing them.—

  Madam, my mother, I do cry you mercy.

  I did not see your grace. Humbly on my knee

  I crave your blessing.

  DUCHESS OF YORK

  God bless thee, and put meekness in thy breast,

  Love, charity, obedience, and true duty.

  RICHARD GLOUCESTER

  Amen. (Aside) ‘And make me die a good old man.’

  That is the butt-end of a mother’s blessing;

  I marvel that her grace did leave it out.

  BUCKINGHAM

  You cloudy princes and heart-sorrowing peers

  That bear this heavy mutual load of moan,

  Now cheer each other in each other’s love.

  Though we have spent our harvest of this king,

  We are to reap the harvest of his son.

  The broken rancour of your high-swoll’n hearts

  But lately splinted, knit, and joined together,

  Must gently be preserved, cherished, and kept.

  Meseemeth good that, with some little train,

  Forthwith from Ludlow the young Prince be fet

  Hither to London to be crowned our king.

  RICHARD GLOUCESTER

  Then be it so, and go we to determine

  Who they shall be that straight shall post to Ludlow.—

  Madam, and you my sister, will you go

  To give your censures in this weighty business?

  QUEEN ELIZABETH and DUCHESS OF YORK With all our hearts.

  Exeunt all but Richard and Buckingham

  BUCKINGHAM

  My lord, whoever journeys to the Prince,

  For God’s sake let not us two stay at home,

  For by the way I’ll sort occasion,

  As index to the story we late talked of,

  To part the Queen’s proud kindred from the Prince.

  RICHARD GLOUCESTER

  My other self, my counsel’s consistory,

  My oracle, my prophet, my dear cousin!

  I, as a child, will go by thy direction.

  Towards Ludlow then, for we’ll not stay behind.

  Exeunt

  2.3 Enter one Citizen at one door and another at the other

  FIRST CITIZEN

  Good morrow, neighbour. Whither away so fast?

  SECOND CITIZEN

  I promise you, I scarcely know myself.

  Hear you the news abroad?

  FIRST CITIZEN

  Yes, that the King is dead.

  SECOND CITIZEN

  Ill news, by‘r Lady; seldom comes the better.

  I fear, I fear, ’twill prove a giddy world.

  Enter another Citizen

  THIRD CITIZEN

  Neighbours, God speed.

  FIRST CITIZEN

  Give you good morrow, sir.

  THIRD CITIZEN

  Doth the news hold of good King Edward’s death?

  SECOND CITIZEN

  Ay, sir, it is too true. God help the while.

  THIRD CITIZEN

  Then, masters, look to see a troublous world.

  FIRST CITIZEN

  No, no, by God’s good grace his son shall reign.

  THIRD CITIZEN

  Woe to that land that’s governed by a child.

  SECOND CITIZEN

  In him there is a hope of government,

  Which in his nonage council under him,

  And in his full and ripened years himself,

  No doubt shall then, and till then, govern well.

  FIRST CITIZEN

  So stood the state when Henry the Sixth

  Was crowned in Paris but at nine months old.

  THIRD CITIZEN

  Stood the state so? No, no, good friends, God wot.

  For then this land was famously enriched

  With politic, grave counsel; then the King

  Had virtuous uncles to protect his grace.

  FIRST CITIZEN

  Why, so hath this, both by his father and mother.

  THIRD CITIZEN

  Better it were they all came by his father,

  Or by his father there were none at all.

  For emulation who shall now be near’st

  Will touch us all too near, if God prevent not.

  O full of danger is the Duke of Gloucester,

  And the Queen’s sons and brothers haught and proud.

  And were they to be ruled, and not to rule,

  This sickly land might solace as before.

  FIRST CITIZEN

  Come, come, we fear the worst. All will be well.

  THIRD CITIZEN

  When clouds are seen, wise men put on their cloaks;

  When great leaves fall, then winter is at hand;

  When the sun sets, who doth not look for night?

  Untimely storms make men expect a dearth.

  All may be well, but if God sort it so

  ’Tis more than we deserve, or I expect.

  SECOND CITIZEN

  Truly the hearts of men are full of fear.

  You cannot reason almost with a man

  That looks not heavily and full of dread.

  THIRD CITIZEN

  Before the days of change still is it so.

  By a divine instinct men’s minds mistrust

  Ensuing danger, as by proof we see

  The water swell before a boist’rous storm.

  But leave it all to God. Whither away?

  SECOND CITIZEN

  Marry, we were sent for to the justices.

  THIRD CITIZEN

  And so was I. I’ll bear you company. Exeunt

  2.4 Enter ⌈Lord Cardinal⌉, young Duke of York, Queen Elizabeth, and the old Duchess of York

  ⌈CARDINAL⌉

  Last night, I hear, they lay them at Northampton.

  At Stony Stratford they do rest tonight.

  Tomorrow, or next day, they will be here.

  DUCHESS OF YORK

  I long with all my heart to see the Prince.

  I hope he is much grown since last I saw him.

  QUEEN ELIZABETH

  But I hear, no. They say my son of York

  Has almost overta’en him in his growth.

  YORK

  Ay, mother, but I would not have it so.

  DUCHESS OF YORK

  Why, my young cousin, it is good to grow.

  YORK

  Grandam, one night as we did sit at supper,

  My uncle Rivers talked how I did grow

  More than my brother. ‘Ay’, quoth my nuncle

  Gloucester,

  ‘Small herbs have grace; gross weeds do grow apace’.

  A
nd since, methinks I would not grow so fast,

  Because sweet flow’rs are slow, and weeds make

  haste.

  DUCHESS OF YORK

  Good faith, good faith, the saying did not hold

  In him that did object the same to thee.

  He was the wretched’st thing when he was young,

  So long a-growing, and so leisurely,

  That if his rule were true he should be gracious.

  ⌈CARDINAL⌉

  Why, so no doubt he is, my gracious madam.

  DUCHESS OF YORK

  I hope he is, but yet let mothers doubt.

  YORK

  Now, by my troth, if I had been remembered,

  I could have given my uncle’s grace a flout

  To touch his growth, nearer than he touched mine.

  DUCHESS OF YORK

  How, my young York? I pray thee, let me hear it.

  YORK

  Marry, they say my uncle grew so fast

  That he could gnaw a crust at two hours old.

  ’Twas full two years ere I could get a tooth.

  Grannam, this would have been a biting jest.

  DUCHESS OF YORK

  I pray thee, pretty York, who told thee this?

  YORK Grannam, his nurse.

  DUCHESS OF YORK

  His nurse? Why, she was dead ere thou wast born.

  YORK

  If ’twere not she, I cannot tell who told me.

  QUEEN ELIZABETH

  A parlous boy! Go to, you are too shrewd.

  ⌈CARDINAL⌉

  Good madam, be not angry with the child.

  QUEEN ELIZABETH

  Pitchers have ears.

  Enter ⌈Marquis Dorset⌉

  ⌈CARDINAL⌉

  Here comes your son, Lord Dorset.

  What news, Lord Marquis?

  ⌈DORSET⌉ Such news, my lord,

  As grieves me to report.

  QUEEN ELIZABETH

  How doth the Prince?

  ⌈DORSET⌉

  Well, madam, and in health.

  DUCHESS OF YORK

  What is thy news then?

  ⌈DORSET⌉

  Lord Rivers and Lord Gray are sent to Pomfret,

  And with them Thomas Vaughan, prisoners.

  DUCHESS OF YORK

  Who hath committed them?

  ⌈DORSET⌉

  The mighty dukes,

  Gloucester and Buckingham.

  ⌈CARDINAL⌉

  For what offence?

  ⌈DORSET⌉

  The sum of all I can, I have disclosed.

  Why or for what the nobles were committed

  Is all unknown to me, my gracious lord.

  QUEEN ELIZABETH

  Ay me! I see the ruin of our house.

  The tiger now hath seized the gentle hind.

  Insulting tyranny begins to jet

 

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