Scroop.
More health and happiness betide my Liege,
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.
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.
Like an unseasonable stormy day,
Which makes the silver rivers drown their shores,
As if the world were all dissolv'd to tears;
So high above his limits swells the rage
Of Bolingbroke, cov'ring your fearful land
With hard bright steel, and hearts more hard than steel.
White beards have arm'd their thin and hairless scalps
Against thy majesty, boys with womens voices
Strive to speak big, and clasp their female joints
In stiff unwieldy arms, against thy crown:
The very beadsmen learn to bend their bows
Of double fatal Ewe, against thy state:
Yea distaff-women manage rusty bills.
Against thy seat both young and old rebel,
And all goes worse than I have pow'r to tell.

K. Rich.
To 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 dang'rous enemy
Measure our confines with such peaceful steps?

If we prevail, their heads shall pay for it.
I warrant they've made peace with Bolingbroke.

Scroop.
Peace they have made with him, indeed, my lord.

K. Rich.
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 Judasses, 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 sow'rest 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 hand,
And lye full low, grav'd in the hollow ground.

Aum.
Is Bushy, Green, and th'Earl of Wiltshire dead?

Scroop.
Yea, all of them at Bristol lost their heads.

Aum.
Where is the Duke my father, with his power?

K. Rich.
No matter where; of comfort no man speak:
&plquo;Let's talk of graves, of worms, and epitaphs,
&plquo;Make dust our paper, and with rainy eyes
&plquo;Write sorrow in the bosom of the earth!
&plquo;Let's chuse executors, and talk of wills;
&plquo;And yet not so—for what can we bequeath,
&plquo;Save our deposed bodies to the ground?
&plquo;Our lands, our lives, and all are Bolingbroke's,
&plquo;And nothing can we call our own, but death;
&plquo;And that small model of the barren earth
&plquo;Which serves as paste and cover to our bones.
&plquo;For heav'ns sake let us sit upon the ground,
&plquo;And tell sad stories of the death of Kings:
&plquo;How some have been depos'd, some slain in war:
&plquo;Some haunted by the ghosts they dispossess'd:

&plquo;Some poison'd by their wives, some sleeping kill'd,
&plquo;All murther'd.—For within the hollow crown,
&plquo;That rounds the mortal temples of a King,
&plquo;Keeps Death his court, and there the Antick sits
&plquo;Scoffing his state, and grinning at his pomp:
&plquo;Allowing him a breath, a little scene
&plquo;To monarchize, be fear'd, and kill with looks;
&plquo;Infusing him with self and vain conceit,
&plquo;As if this flesh, which walls about our life,
&plquo;Were brass impregnable: and humour'd thus,
&plquo;Comes at the last, and with a little pin
&plquo;Boars through his castle-walls, and farewel King!
&plquo;Cover your heads, and mock not flesh and blood
&plquo;With solemn rev'rence: throw away respect,
&plquo;Tradition, form, and ceremonious duty,
&plquo;For you have but mistook me all this while:
&plquo;I live on bread like you, feel want like you,
&plquo;Taste grief, need friends, like you: subjected thus,
&plquo;How can you say to me I am a King?

Carl.
My lord, wise men ne'er wail their present woes,
But presently prevent the ways to wail:
To fear the foe, since fear oppresseth strength,
Gives, in your weakness, strength unto your foe;* ^note

^{e note}And so your follies fight against your self.

K. Rich.
Thou chid'st me well: proud Bolingbroke, I come—
Say, Scroop, where lyes our uncle with his power?

Scroop.
I play the torturer, by small and small
To lengthen out the worst, that must be spoken.
Your uncle York is join'd with Bolingbroke,
And all your northern castles yielded up,
And all your southern gentlemen in arms
Upon his faction.

K. Rich.
Thou hast said enough.
Beshrew thee, cousin, which didst lead me forth
Of that sweet way I was in to despair.
What say you now? what comfort have we now?
By heav'n 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 pow'r I have, discharge, and let 'em go
To † ^noteear 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.

K. Rich.
He does me double wrong,
That wounds me with the flatt'ries of his tongue.
Discharge my followers: let them away,
From Richard's night to Bolingbroke's fair day. [Exeunt.

Previous section

Next section