Complete Plays, The

by William Shakespeare

  But as I come, I come for Lancaster.

  And, noble uncle, I beseech your grace

  Look on my wrongs with an indifferent eye:

  You are my father, for methinks in you

  I see old Gaunt alive; O, then, my father,

  Will you permit that I shall stand condemn’d

  A wandering vagabond; my rights and royalties

  Pluck’d from my arms perforce and given away

  To upstart unthrifts? Wherefore was I born?

  If that my cousin king be King of England,

  It must be granted I am Duke of Lancaster.

  You have a son, Aumerle, my noble cousin;

  Had you first died, and he been thus trod down,

  He should have found his uncle Gaunt a father,

  To rouse his wrongs and chase them to the bay.

  I am denied to sue my livery here,

  And yet my letters-patents give me leave:

  My father’s goods are all distrain’d and sold,

  And these and all are all amiss employ’d.

  What would you have me do? I am a subject,

  And I challenge law: attorneys are denied me;

  And therefore, personally I lay my claim

  To my inheritance of free descent.

  Northumberland

  The noble duke hath been too much abused.

  Lord Ross

  It stands your grace upon to do him right.

  Lord Willoughby

  Base men by his endowments are made great.

  Duke Of York

  My lords of England, let me tell you this:

  I have had feeling of my cousin’s wrongs

  And laboured all I could to do him right;

  But in this kind to come, in braving arms,

  Be his own carver and cut out his way,

  To find out right with wrong, it may not be;

  And you that do abet him in this kind

  Cherish rebellion and are rebels all.

  Northumberland

  The noble duke hath sworn his coming is

  But for his own; and for the right of that

  We all have strongly sworn to give him aid;

  And let him ne’er see joy that breaks that oath!

  Duke Of York

  Well, well, I see the issue of these arms:

  I cannot mend it, I must needs confess,

  Because my power is weak and all ill left:

  But if I could, by Him that gave me life,

  I would attach you all and make you stoop

  Unto the sovereign mercy of the king;

  But since I cannot, be it known to you

  I do remain as neuter. So, fare you well;

  Unless you please to enter in the castle

  And there repose you for this night.

  Henry Bolingbroke

  An offer, uncle, that we will accept:

  But we must win your grace to go with us

  To Bristol castle, which they say is held

  By Bushy, Bagot and their complices,

  The caterpillars of the commonwealth,

  Which I have sworn to weed and pluck away.

  Duke Of York

  It may be I will go with you: but yet I’ll pause;

  For I am loath to break our country’s laws.

  Nor friends nor foes, to me welcome you are:

  Things past redress are now with me past care.

  Exeunt

  SCENE IV. A CAMP IN WALES.

  Enter Earl Of Salisbury and a Welsh Captain

  Captain

  My lord of Salisbury, we have stay’d ten days,

  And hardly kept our countrymen together,

  And yet we hear no tidings from the king;

  Therefore we will disperse ourselves: farewell.

  Earl Of Salisbury

  Stay yet another day, thou trusty Welshman:

  The king reposeth all his confidence in thee.

  Captain

  ’Tis thought the king is dead; we will not stay.

  The bay-trees in our country are all wither’d

  And meteors fright the fixed stars of heaven;

  The pale-faced moon looks bloody on the earth

  And lean-look’d prophets whisper fearful change;

  Rich men look sad and ruffians dance and leap,

  The one in fear to lose what they enjoy,

  The other to enjoy by rage and war:

  These signs forerun the death or fall of kings.

  Farewell: our countrymen are gone and fled,

  As well assured Richard their king is dead.

  Exit

  Earl Of Salisbury

  Ah, Richard, with the eyes of heavy mind

  I see thy glory like a shooting star

  Fall to the base earth from the firmament.

  Thy sun sets weeping in the lowly west,

  Witnessing storms to come, woe and unrest:

  Thy friends are fled to wait upon thy foes,

  And crossly to thy good all fortune goes.

  Exit

  ACT III

  SCENE I. BRISTOL. BEFORE THE CASTLE.

  Enter Henry Bolingbroke, Duke Of York, Northumberland, Lord Ross, Henry Percy, Lord Willoughby, with Bushy and Green, prisoners

  Henry Bolingbroke

  Bring forth these men.

  Bushy and Green, I will not vex your souls —

  Since presently your souls must part your bodies —

  With too much urging your pernicious lives,

  For ’twere no charity; yet, to wash your blood

  From off my hands, here in the view of men

  I will unfold some causes of your deaths.

  You have misled a prince, a royal king,

  A happy gentleman in blood and lineaments,

  By you unhappied and disfigured clean:

  You have in manner with your sinful hours

  Made a divorce betwixt his queen and him,

  Broke the possession of a royal bed

  And stain’d the beauty of a fair queen’s cheeks

  With tears drawn from her eyes by your foul wrongs.

  Myself, a prince by fortune of my birth,

  Near to the king in blood, and near in love

  Till you did make him misinterpret me,

  Have stoop’d my neck under your injuries,

  And sigh’d my English breath in foreign clouds,

  Eating the bitter bread of banishment;

  Whilst you have fed upon my signories,

  Dispark’d my parks and fell’d my forest woods,

  From my own windows torn my household coat,

  Razed out my imprese, leaving me no sign,

  Save men’s opinions and my living blood,

  To show the world I am a gentleman.

  This and much more, much more than twice all this,

  Condemns you to the death. See them deliver’d over

  To execution and the hand of death.

  Bushy

  More welcome is the stroke of death to me

  Than Bolingbroke to England. Lords, farewell.

  Green

  My comfort is that heaven will take our souls

  And plague injustice with the pains of hell.

  Henry Bolingbroke

  My Lord Northumberland, see them dispatch’d.

  Exeunt Northumberland and others, with the prisoners

  Uncle, you say the queen is at your house;

  For God’s sake, fairly let her be entreated:

  Tell her I send to her my kind commends;

  Take special care my greetings be deliver’d.

  Duke Of York

  A gentleman of mine I have dispatch’d

  With letters of your love to her at large.

  Henry Bolingbroke

  Thank, gentle uncle. Come, lords, away.

  To fight with Glendower and his complices:

  Awhile to work, and after holiday.

  Exeunt

  SCENE II. THE COAST OF WALES. A CASTLE IN VIEW.

>   Drums; flourish and colours. Enter King Richard II, the Bishop Of Carlisle, Duke Of Aumerle, and Soldiers

  King Richard II

  Barkloughly castle call they this at hand?

  Duke Of Aumerle

  Yea, my lord. How brooks your grace the air,

  After your late tossing on the breaking seas?

  King Richard II

  Needs must I like it well: I weep for joy

  To stand upon my kingdom once again.

  Dear earth, I do salute thee with my hand,

  Though rebels wound thee with their horses’ hoofs:

  As a long-parted mother with her child

  Plays fondly with her tears and smiles in meeting,

  So, weeping, smiling, greet I thee, my earth,

  And do thee favours with my royal hands.

  Feed not thy sovereign’s foe, my gentle earth,

  Nor with thy sweets comfort his ravenous sense;

  But let thy spiders, that suck up thy venom,

  And heavy-gaited toads lie in their way,

  Doing annoyance to the treacherous feet

  Which with usurping steps do trample thee:

  Yield stinging nettles to mine enemies;

  And when they from thy bosom pluck a flower,

  Guard it, I pray thee, with a lurking adder

  Whose double tongue may with a mortal touch

  Throw death upon thy sovereign’s enemies.

  Mock not my senseless conjuration, lords:

  This earth shall have a feeling and these stones

  Prove armed soldiers, ere her native king

  Shall falter under foul rebellion’s arms.

  Bishop Of Carlisle

  Fear not, my lord: that Power that made you king

  Hath power to keep you king in spite of all.

  The means that heaven yields must be embraced,

  And not neglected; else, if heaven would,

  And we will not, heaven’s offer we refuse,

  The proffer’d means of succor and redress.

  Duke Of Aumerle

  He means, my lord, that we are too remiss;

  Whilst Bolingbroke, through our security,

  Grows strong and great in substance and in power.

  King Richard II

  Discomfortable cousin! know’st thou not

  That when the searching eye of heaven is hid,

  Behind the globe, that lights the lower world,

  Then thieves and robbers range abroad unseen

  In murders and in outrage, boldly here;

  But when from under this terrestrial ball

  He fires the proud tops of the eastern pines

  And darts his light through every guilty hole,

  Then murders, treasons and detested sins,

  The cloak of night being pluck’d from off their backs,

  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 wandering 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 off from an anointed king;

  The breath of worldly men cannot depose

  The deputy elected by the Lord:

  For every man that Bolingbroke hath press’d

  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 Earl Of Salisbury

  Welcome, my lord how far off lies your power?

  Earl Of Salisbury

  Nor near nor farther 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 me, noble lord,

  Hath clouded all thy happy days on earth:

  O, 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:

  For all the Welshmen, hearing thou wert dead.

  Are gone to Bolingbroke, dispersed and fled.

  Duke Of Aumerle

  Comfort, my liege; why looks your grace so pale?

  King Richard II

  But now the blood of twenty thousand men

  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.

  Duke Of Aumerle

  Comfort, my liege; remember who you are.

  King Richard II

  I had forgot myself; am I not king?

  Awake, thou coward majesty! thou sleepest.

  Is not the king’s name twenty 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 Sir Stephen Scroop

  Sir Stephen Scroop

  More health and happiness betide my liege

  Than can my care-tuned tongue deliver him!

  King Richard II

  Mine ear is open and my heart prepared;

  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:

  Cry woe, destruction, ruin and decay:

  The worst is death, and death will have his day.

  Sir Stephen Scroop

  Glad am I that your highness is so arm’d

  To bear the tidings of calamity.

  Like an unseasonable stormy day,

  Which makes the silver rivers drown their shores,

  As if the world were all dissolved to tears,

  So high above his limits swells the rage

  Of Bolingbroke, covering your fearful land

  With hard bright steel and hearts harder than steel.

  White-beards have arm’d their thin and hairless scalps

  Against thy majesty; boys, with women’s voices,

  Strive to speak big and clap their female joints

  In stiff unwieldy arms against thy crown:

  The 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.

  King Richard II

  Too well, too well thou tell’st a tale so ill.

  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?

  If we prevail, their heads shall pay for it:

  I warrant they have made peace with Bolingbroke.

  Sir Stephen Scroop

  Peace have they made with him indeed, my lord.

  King Richard II

  O villains, vipers, damn’d without redemption!

  Dogs, easily
won to fawn on any man!

  Snakes, in my heart-blood warm’d, that sting my heart!

  Three Judases, each one thrice worse than Judas!

  Would they make peace? terrible hell make war

  Upon their spotted souls for this offence!

  Sir Stephen 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, graved in the hollow ground.

  Duke Of Aumerle

  Is Bushy, Green, and the Earl of Wiltshire dead?

  Sir Stephen Scroop

  Ay, all of them at Bristol lost their heads.

  Duke Of Aumerle

  Where is the duke my father with his power?

  King Richard II

  No matter where; of comfort no man speak:

  Let’s talk of graves, of worms, and epitaphs;

  Make dust our paper and with rainy eyes

  Write sorrow on the bosom of the earth,

  Let’s choose 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,

  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 God’s sake, let us sit upon the ground

  And tell sad stories of the death of kings;

  How some have been deposed; some slain in war,

  Some haunted by the ghosts they have deposed;

  Some poison’d by their wives: some sleeping kill’d;

  All murder’d: for within the hollow crown

  That rounds the mortal temples of a king

  Keeps Death his court and there the antic 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 with bread like you, feel want,

  Taste grief, need friends: subjected thus,

  How can you say to me, I am a king?

  Bishop Of Carlisle

  My lord, wise men ne’er sit and wail their woes,