Q. Mar.
And lessen'd be that small, God I beseech thee:
Thy honour, state, and seat is due to me.

Glo.
What! threat you me with telling of the King?

I will avouch in presence of the King:
'Tis time to speak, my pains are quite forgot.

Q. Mar.
Out devil! I remember them too well:
Thou kill'dst my husband Henry in the Tower,
And Edward, my poor son, at Tewksbury.

Glo.
Ere you were Queen, ay, or your husband King,
I was a pack-horse in his great affairs;
A weeder out of his proud adversaries,
A liberal rewarder of his friends;
To royalize his blood I spilt mine own.

Q. Mar.
Ay, and much better blood than his or thine.

Glo.
In all which time you and your husband Gray
Were factious for the house of Lancaster;
And Rivers, so were you; was not your husband,
In Marg'ret's battel, at St. Albans slain?
Let me put in your minds, if you forget,
What you have been ere now, and what you are;
Withal, what I have been, and what I am.

Q. Mar.
A murth'rous villain, and so still thou art.

Glo.
Poor Clarence did forsake his father Warwick,
Ay, and forswore himself, (which Jesu pardon)—

Q. Mar.
Which God revenge.

Glo.
To fight on Edward's party for the crown,
And for his meed, poor lord, he is mew'd up:
I would to God my heart were flint, like Edward's,
Or Edward's soft and pitiful, like mine;
I am too childish, foolish for this world.

Q. Mar.
Hie thee to hell for shame, and leave this world,
Thou Cacodæmon, there thy kingdom is.

Riv.
My lord of Glo'ster, in those busie days,
Which here you urge to prove us enemies,
We follow'd then our lord, our Sov'reign King;
So should we you, if you should be our King.

Glo.
If I should be!—I had rather be a pedlar;
Far be it from my heart, the thought thereof.

Queen.
As little joy, my lord, as you suppose
You should enjoy, were you this country's King,
As little joy you may suppose in me,
That I enjoy, being the Queen thereof.

Q. Mar.
A little joy enjoys the Queen thereof;
For I am she, and altogether joyless.
I can no longer hold me patient.
Hear me, you wrangling pyrates, that fall out
In sharing that which you have pill'd from me;
Which of you trembles not that looks on me?
If not that I being Queen, you bow like subjects;
Yet that by you depos'd, you quake like rebels.
Ah gentle villain do not turn away?

Glo.
Foul wrinkled witch, what mak'st thou in my sight?

Q. Mar.
But repetition of what thou hast marr'd,
That will I make, before I let thee go.
A husband and a son thou ow'st to me, [To Glo.
And thou a kingdom; all of you allegiance; [To the Queen.
The sorrow that I have, by right is yours,
And all the pleasures you usurp, are mine.

Glo.
The curse my noble father laid on thee,
When thou didst crown his warlike brows with paper,
And with thy scorns drew'st rivers from his eyes,
And then to dry them gav'st the Duke a clout,
Steep'd in the faultless blood of pretty Rutland;
His curses, then from bitterness of soul
Denounc'd against thee, are now fall'n upon thee;
And God, not we, has plagu'd thy bloody deed.

Q. Mar.
So just is God, to right the innocent.

Hast.
O, 'twas the foulest deed to slay that babe,
And the most merciless that e'er was heard of.

Riv.
Tyrants themselves wept, when it was reported.

Dors.
No man but prophesy'd revenge for it.

Buck.
Northumberland, then present, wept to see it.

Q. Mar.
What! were you snarling all before I came,
Ready to catch each other by the throat,
And turn you all your hatred now on me?
Did York's dread curse prevail so much with heav'n,
That Henry's death, my lovely Edward's death,
Their kingdom's loss, my woful banishment,
Could all but answer for that peevish brat?
Can curses pierce the clouds, and enter heav'n?
Why then give way, dull clouds, to my quick curses.
If not by war, by surfeit die your King,
As ours by murther to make him a King.
Edward thy son, that now is Prince of Wales,
For Edward our son, that was Prince of Wales,
Die in his youth, by like untimely violence.
Thy self a Queen, for me that was a Queen,
Out-live thy glory, like my wretched self:
Long may'st thou live to wail thy children's loss,
And see another, as I see thee now,
Deck'd in thy rights, as thou art stall'd in mine.
Long die thy happy days before thy death
And after many length'ned hours of grief,
Die, neither mother, wife, nor England's Queen.
Rivers and Dorset, you were standers-by,
And so wast thou, lord Hastings, when my son
Was stabb'd with bloody daggers; God, I pray him,
That none of you may live your natural age,
But by some unlook'd accident cut off.

Glo.
Have done thy charm, thou hateful wither'd hag.

Q. Mar.
And leave out thee? stay dog, for thou shalt hear me.
If heav'ns have any grievous plague in store,

Exceeding those that I can wish upon thee,
O let them keep it, 'till thy sins be ripe,
And then hurl down their indignation
On thee, thou troubler of the poor world's peace.
The worm of conscience still be-gnaw thy soul;
Thy friends suspect for traitors while thou liv'st,
And take deep traitors for thy dearest friends:
No sleep close up that deadly eye of thine,
Unless it be while some tormenting dream
Affrights thee with a hell of ugly devils.
Thou elvish-markt, abortive, rooting hog,
Thou that wast seal'd in thy nativity
The slave of nature, and the son of hell:
Thou slander of thy heavy mother's womb,
Thou loathed issue of thy father's loins,
Thou rag of honour, thou detested—

Glo.
Margaret.

Q. Mar.
Richard.

Glo.
Ha!

Q. Mar.
I call thee not.

Glo.
I cry thee mercy then; for I did think
That thou had'st call'd me all these bitter names.

Q. Mar.
Why so I did, but look'd for no reply.
Oh let me make the period to my curse.

Glo.
'Tis done by me, and ends in Margaret.

Queen.
Thus have you breath'd your curse against your self.

Q. Mar.
Poor painted Queen, vain flourish of my fortune,
Why strew'st thou sugar on that bottel'd spider,
Whose deadly web ensnareth thee about?
Fool, fool, thou whet'st a knife to kill thy self:
The day will come that thou shalt wish for me,
To help thee curse this pois'nous bunch-back'd toad.

Hast.
False boading woman, end thy frantick curse,

Left to thy harm thou move our patience.

Q. Mar.
Foul shame upon you, you have all mov'd mine.

Riv.
Were you well serv'd, you would be taught your duty.

Q. Mar.
To serve me well, you all should do me duty,
Teach me to be your Queen, and you my subjects:
O serve me well, and teach your selves that duty.

Dors.
Dispute not with her, she is lunatick.

Q. Mar.
Peace, master Marquiss, you are malapert;
Your fire-new stamp of honour is scarce currant.
O that your young nobility could judge
What 'twere to lose it, and be miserable.
They that stand high have many blasts to shake them,
And if they fall, they dash themselves to pieces.

Glo.
Good counsel marry, learn it, learn it, Marquiss.

Dors.
It touches you, my lord, as much as me.

Glo.
Ay, and much more; but I was born so high,
Our Airy buildeth in the cedar's top,
And dallies with the wind, and scorns the sun.

Q. Mar.
And turns the sun to shade; alas! alas!
Witness my son now in the shade of death,
Whose bright out-shining beams thy cloudy wrath
Hath in eternal darkness folded up.
Your Airy buildeth in our Airies nest;
O God, that seest it, do not suffer it.
As it was won with blood, so be it lost.

Buck.
Peace, peace for shame, if not for charity.

Q. Mar.
Urge neither charity nor shame to me;
Uncharitably with me have you dealt,
And shamefully my hopes, by you, are butcher'd.
My charity is outrage, life my shame,
And in my shame still live my sorrow's rage.

Buck.
Have done, have done.

Q. Mar.
O Princely Buckingham, I'll kiss thy hand,

In sign of league and amity with thee:
Now fair befall thee and thy noble house;
Thy garments are not spotted with our blood;
Nor thou within the compass of my curse.

Buck.
Nor no one here; for curses never pass
The lips of those that breathe them in the air.

Q. Mar.
I'll not believe but they ascend the sky,
And there awake God's gentle sleeping peace.
O Buckingham, beware of yonder dog;
Look when he fawns, he bites; and when he bites
His venom tooth will rankle to the death;
Have not to do with him, beware of him,
Sin, death, and hell have set their marks upon him,
And all their ministers attend on him.

Glo.
What doth she say, my lord of Buckingham?

Buck.
Nothing that I respect, my gracious lord.

Q. Mar.
What, dost thou scorn me for my gentle counsel?
And sooth the devil that I warn thee from?
O but remember this another day;
When he shall split thy very heart with sorrow;
And say poor Marg'ret was a prophetess.
Live each of you the subject to his hate,
And he to yours, and all of you to God's. [Exit.

Buck.
My hair doth stand an end to hear her curses.

Riv.
And so doth mine: I wonder she's at liberty.

Glo.
I cannot blame her, by God's holy mother,
She hath had too much wrong, and I repent
My part thereof, that I have done to her.

Dors.
I never did her any, to my knowledge.

Glo.
Yet you have all the vantage of her wrong:
I was too hot to do some body good,
That is too cold in thinking of it now.
Marry, for Clarence, he is well repay'd;

He is † ^note

Riv.
A virtuous and a christian-like conclusion,
To pray for them that have done ‡ ^notescathe to us.

Glo.
So do I ever, being well advis'd;
For had I curst now, I had curst my self. [Aside. Enter Catesby.

Cates.
Madam, his Majesty doth call for you,
And for your grace, and you, my noble lord.

Queen.
Catesby, we come; lords, will you go with us?

Riv.
Madam, we will attend your grace. [Exeunt all but Gloucester.

Glo.
I do the wrong, and first begin to brawl.
The secret mischiefs that I set a-broach
I lay unto the grievous charge of others.
Clarence, whom I indeed have laid in darkness,
I do beweep to many simple gulls,
Namely to Derby, Hastings, Buckingham;
And tell them, 'tis the Queen and her allies
That stir the King against the Duke my brother.
Now they believe it, and withal whet me
To be reveng'd on Rivers, Dorset, Gray.
But then I sigh, and with a piece of scripture,
Tell them that God bids us do good for evil:
And thus I cloathe my naked villany
With old odd ends, stoln forth of holy writ,
And seem a Saint, when most I play the Devil.

Enter two Villains.
But soft, here come my executioners.
How now my hardy, stout, resolved mates,
Are you now going to dispatch this deed?

1 Vil.
We are, my lord, and come to have the warrant
That we may be admitted where he is.

Glo.
Well thought upon, I have it here about me:
When you have done, repair to Crosby place.
But, Sirs, be sudden in the execution,
Withal obdurate, do not hear him plead;
For Clarence is well-spoken, and perhaps
May move your hearts to pity, if you mark him.

Vil.
Fear not my lord, we will not stand to prate,
Talkers are no good doers; be assur'd,
We go to use our hands, and not our tongues.

Glo.
Your eyes drop mill-stones, when fools eyes drop tears.
I like you lads; about your business; go. [Exeunt.

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