William Shakespeare: The Complete Works 2nd Edition (171 page)
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Authors: William Shakespeare
Tags: #Drama, #Literary Criticism, #Shakespeare
BOOK: William Shakespeare: The Complete Works 2nd Edition
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KING RICHARD
Northumberland, say thus the King returns:
His noble cousin is right welcome hither,
And all the number of his fair demands
Shall be accomplished without contradiction.
With all the gracious utterance thou hast,
Speak to his gentle hearing kind commends.
His noble cousin is right welcome hither,
And all the number of his fair demands
Shall be accomplished without contradiction.
With all the gracious utterance thou hast,
Speak to his gentle hearing kind commends.
Northumberland and the trumpeter return to Bolingbroke
(To Aumerle)
We do debase ourself, cousin, do we not,
To look so poorly and to speak so fair?
Shall we call back Northumberland, and send
Defiance to the traitor, and so die?
We do debase ourself, cousin, do we not,
To look so poorly and to speak so fair?
Shall we call back Northumberland, and send
Defiance to the traitor, and so die?
AUMERLE
No, good my lord, let’s fight with gentle words
Till time lend friends, and friends their helpful swords.
Till time lend friends, and friends their helpful swords.
KING RICHARD
O God, O God, that e‘er this tongue of mine,
That laid the sentence of dread banishment
On yon proud man, should take it off again
With words of sooth! O, that I were as great
As is my grief, or lesser than my name,
Or that I could forget what I have been,
Or not remember what I must be now!
Swell’st thou, proud heart? I’ll give thee scope to beat,
Since foes have scope to beat both thee and me.
That laid the sentence of dread banishment
On yon proud man, should take it off again
With words of sooth! O, that I were as great
As is my grief, or lesser than my name,
Or that I could forget what I have been,
Or not remember what I must be now!
Swell’st thou, proud heart? I’ll give thee scope to beat,
Since foes have scope to beat both thee and me.
Northumberland advances to the walls
AUMERLE
Northumberland comes back from Bolingbroke.
KING RICHARD
What must the King do now? Must he submit?
The King shall do it. Must he be deposed?
The King shall be contented. Must he lose
The name of King? A God’s name, let it go.
I’ll give my jewels for a set of beads,
My gorgeous palace for a hermitage,
My gay apparel for an almsman’s gown,
My figured goblets for a dish of wood,
My sceptre for a palmer’s walking staff,
My subjects for a pair of carved saints,
And my large kingdom for a little grave,
A little, little grave, an obscure grave;
Or I’ll be buried in the King’s highway,
Some way of common trade where subjects’ feet
May hourly trample on their sovereign’s head,
For on my heart they tread now, whilst I live,
And buried once, why not upon my head?
Aumerle, thou weep‘st, my tender-hearted cousin.
We’ll make foul weather with despised tears.
Our sighs and they shall lodge the summer corn,
And make a dearth in this revolting land.
Or shall we play the wantons with our woes,
And make some pretty match with shedding tears;
As thus to drop them still upon one place
Till they have fretted us a pair of graves
Within the earth, and therein laid? ‘There lies
Two kinsmen digged their graves with weeping eyes.’
Would not this ill do well? Well, well, I see
I talk but idly and you mock at me.
Most mighty prince, my lord Northumberland,
What says King Bolingbroke? Will his majesty
Give Richard leave to live till Richard die?
You make a leg, and Bolingbroke says ‘Ay’.
The King shall do it. Must he be deposed?
The King shall be contented. Must he lose
The name of King? A God’s name, let it go.
I’ll give my jewels for a set of beads,
My gorgeous palace for a hermitage,
My gay apparel for an almsman’s gown,
My figured goblets for a dish of wood,
My sceptre for a palmer’s walking staff,
My subjects for a pair of carved saints,
And my large kingdom for a little grave,
A little, little grave, an obscure grave;
Or I’ll be buried in the King’s highway,
Some way of common trade where subjects’ feet
May hourly trample on their sovereign’s head,
For on my heart they tread now, whilst I live,
And buried once, why not upon my head?
Aumerle, thou weep‘st, my tender-hearted cousin.
We’ll make foul weather with despised tears.
Our sighs and they shall lodge the summer corn,
And make a dearth in this revolting land.
Or shall we play the wantons with our woes,
And make some pretty match with shedding tears;
As thus to drop them still upon one place
Till they have fretted us a pair of graves
Within the earth, and therein laid? ‘There lies
Two kinsmen digged their graves with weeping eyes.’
Would not this ill do well? Well, well, I see
I talk but idly and you mock at me.
Most mighty prince, my lord Northumberland,
What says King Bolingbroke? Will his majesty
Give Richard leave to live till Richard die?
You make a leg, and Bolingbroke says ‘Ay’.
NORTHUMBERLAND
My lord, in the base court he doth attend
To speak with you. May it please you to come down?
To speak with you. May it please you to come down?
KING RICHARD
Down, down I come like glist’ring Phaethon,
Wanting the manage of unruly jades.
In the base court: base court where kings grow base
To come at traitors’ calls, and do them grace.
In the base court, come down: down court, down
King,
For night-owls shriek where mounting larks should sing.
Wanting the manage of unruly jades.
In the base court: base court where kings grow base
To come at traitors’ calls, and do them grace.
In the base court, come down: down court, down
King,
For night-owls shriek where mounting larks should sing.
Exeunt King Richard and his party
Northumberland returns to Bolingbroke
BOLINGBROKE
What says his majesty?
NORTHUMBERLAND Sorrow and grief of heart
Makes him speak fondly, like a frantic man.
Enter King Richard
⌈
and his party
⌉
below
Yet he is come.
BOLINGBROKE Stand all apart,
And show fair duty to his majesty.
He kneels down
My gracious lord.
KING RICHARD
Fair cousin, you debase your princely knee
To make the base earth proud with kissing it.
Me rather had my heart might feel your love
Than my unpleased eye see your courtesy.
Up, cousin, up. Your heart is up, I know,
Thus high at least, although your knee be low.
To make the base earth proud with kissing it.
Me rather had my heart might feel your love
Than my unpleased eye see your courtesy.
Up, cousin, up. Your heart is up, I know,
Thus high at least, although your knee be low.
BOLINGBROKE
My gracious lord, I come but for mine own.
KING RICHARD
Your own is yours, and I am yours, and all.
BOLINGBROKE
So far be mine, my most redoubted lord,
As my true service shall deserve your love.
As my true service shall deserve your love.
KING RICHARD
Well you deserve. They well deserve to have
That know the strong’st and surest way to get.
That know the strong’st and surest way to get.
⌈
Bolingbroke rises
⌉
(To York) Uncle, give me your hands. Nay, dry your
eyes.
Tears show their love, but want their remedies.
(
To Bolingbroke
) Cousin, I am too young to be your father,
Though you are old enough to be my heir.
What you will have I’ll give, and willing too;
For do we must what force will have us do.
Set on towards London, cousin: is it so?
eyes.
Tears show their love, but want their remedies.
(
To Bolingbroke
) Cousin, I am too young to be your father,
Though you are old enough to be my heir.
What you will have I’ll give, and willing too;
For do we must what force will have us do.
Set on towards London, cousin: is it so?
BOLINGBROKE
Yea, my good lord.
KING RICHARD Then I must not say no.
Flourish. Exeunt
Enter the Queen, with her two Ladies
QUEEN
What sport shall we devise here in this garden,
To drive away the heavy thought of care?
To drive away the heavy thought of care?
⌈first⌉ LADY Madam, we’ll play at bowls.
QUEEN
’Twill make me think the world is full of rubs,
And that my fortune runs against the bias.
And that my fortune runs against the bias.
⌈SECOND⌉ LADY Madam, we’ll dance.
QUEEN
My legs can keep no measure in delight
When my poor heart no measure keeps in grief;
Therefore no dancing, girl. Some other sport.
When my poor heart no measure keeps in grief;
Therefore no dancing, girl. Some other sport.
⌈FIRST⌉ LADY Madam, we’ll tell tales.
QUEEN Of sorrow or of joy?
⌈FIRST⌉ LADY Of either, madam.
QUEEN Of neither, girl.
For if of joy, being altogether wanting,
It doth remember me the more of sorrow.
Or if of grief, being altogether had,
It adds more sorrow to my want of joy.
For what I have I need not to repeat,
And what I want it boots not to complain.
It doth remember me the more of sorrow.
Or if of grief, being altogether had,
It adds more sorrow to my want of joy.
For what I have I need not to repeat,
And what I want it boots not to complain.
⌈SECOND⌉ LADY
Madam, I’ll sing.
QUEEN
’Tis well that thou hast cause;
But thou shouldst please me better wouldst thou weep.
⌈SECOND⌉ LADY
I could weep, madam, would it do you good.
QUEEN
And I could sing, would weeping do me good,
And never borrow any tear of thee.
And never borrow any tear of thee.
Enter a Gardener and two Men
But stay; here come the gardeners.
Let’s step into the shadow of these trees.
My wretchedness unto a row of pins
They will talk of state, for everyone doth so
Against a change. Woe is forerun with woe.
Let’s step into the shadow of these trees.
My wretchedness unto a row of pins
They will talk of state, for everyone doth so
Against a change. Woe is forerun with woe.
The Queen and her Ladies stand apart
GARDENER ⌈
to First Man
⌉
to First Man
⌉
Go, bind thou up young dangling apricots
Which, like unruly children, make their sire
Stoop with oppression of their prodigal weight.
Give some supportance to the bending twigs.
⌈
To Second Man
⌉ Go thou, and, like an executioner,
Cut off the heads of too fast-growing sprays
That look too lofty in our commonwealth.
All must be even in our government.
You thus employed, I will go root away
The noisome weeds which without profit suck
The soil’s fertility from wholesome flowers.
Which, like unruly children, make their sire
Stoop with oppression of their prodigal weight.
Give some supportance to the bending twigs.
⌈
To Second Man
⌉ Go thou, and, like an executioner,
Cut off the heads of too fast-growing sprays
That look too lofty in our commonwealth.
All must be even in our government.
You thus employed, I will go root away
The noisome weeds which without profit suck
The soil’s fertility from wholesome flowers.
⌈FIRST⌉ MAN
Why should we, in the compass of a pale,
Keep law and form and due proportion,
Showing as in a model our firm estate,
When our sea-wallèd garden, the whole land,
Is full of weeds, her fairest flowers choked up,
Her fruit trees all unpruned, her hedges ruined,
Her knots disordered, and her wholesome herbs
Swarming with caterpillars?
Keep law and form and due proportion,
Showing as in a model our firm estate,
When our sea-wallèd garden, the whole land,
Is full of weeds, her fairest flowers choked up,
Her fruit trees all unpruned, her hedges ruined,
Her knots disordered, and her wholesome herbs
Swarming with caterpillars?
GARDENER Hold thy peace.
He that hath suffered this disordered spring
Hath now himself met with the fall of leaf.
The weeds which his broad spreading leaves did
shelter,
That seemed in eating him to hold him up,
Are plucked up, root and all, by Bolingbroke—
I mean the Earl of Wiltshire, Bushy, Green.
Hath now himself met with the fall of leaf.
The weeds which his broad spreading leaves did
shelter,
That seemed in eating him to hold him up,
Are plucked up, root and all, by Bolingbroke—
I mean the Earl of Wiltshire, Bushy, Green.
⌈SECOND⌉ MAN
What, are they dead?
GARDENER They are; and Bolingbroke
Hath seized the wasteful King. O, what pity is it
That he had not so trimmed and dressed his land
As we this garden! We at time of year
Do wound the bark, the skin of our fruit trees,
Lest, being over-proud in sap and blood,
With too much riches it confound itself.
Had he done so to great and growing men,
They might have lived to bear, and he to taste,
Their fruits of duty. Superfluous branches
We lop away, that bearing boughs may live.
Had he done so, himself had borne the crown,
Which waste of idle hours hath quite thrown down.
That he had not so trimmed and dressed his land
As we this garden! We at time of year
Do wound the bark, the skin of our fruit trees,
Lest, being over-proud in sap and blood,
With too much riches it confound itself.
Had he done so to great and growing men,
They might have lived to bear, and he to taste,
Their fruits of duty. Superfluous branches
We lop away, that bearing boughs may live.
Had he done so, himself had borne the crown,
Which waste of idle hours hath quite thrown down.
⌈FIRST⌉ MAN
What, think you then the King shall be deposed?
GARDENER
Depressed he is already, and deposed
’Tis doubt he will be. Letters came last night
To a dear friend of the good Duke of York’s
That tell black tidings.
’Tis doubt he will be. Letters came last night
To a dear friend of the good Duke of York’s
That tell black tidings.
QUEEN
O, I am pressed to death through want of speaking!
She comes forward
Thou, old Adam’s likeness, set to dress this garden,
How dares thy harsh rude tongue sound this unpleasing news?
What Eve, what serpent hath suggested thee
To make a second fall of cursed man?
Why dost thou say King Richard is deposed?
Dar‘st thou, thou little better thing than earth,
Divine his downfall? Say where, when, and how
Cam’st thou by this ill tidings? Speak, thou wretch!
How dares thy harsh rude tongue sound this unpleasing news?
What Eve, what serpent hath suggested thee
To make a second fall of cursed man?
Why dost thou say King Richard is deposed?
Dar‘st thou, thou little better thing than earth,
Divine his downfall? Say where, when, and how
Cam’st thou by this ill tidings? Speak, thou wretch!
GARDENER
Pardon me, madam. Little joy have I
To breathe this news, yet what I say is true.
King Richard he is in the mighty hold
Of Bolingbroke. Their fortunes both are weighed.
In your lord’s scale is nothing but himself
And some few vanities that make him light.
But in the balance of great Bolingbroke,
Besides himself, are all the English peers,
And with that odds he weighs King Richard down.
Post you to London and you will find it so.
I speak no more than everyone doth know.
To breathe this news, yet what I say is true.
King Richard he is in the mighty hold
Of Bolingbroke. Their fortunes both are weighed.
In your lord’s scale is nothing but himself
And some few vanities that make him light.
But in the balance of great Bolingbroke,
Besides himself, are all the English peers,
And with that odds he weighs King Richard down.
Post you to London and you will find it so.
I speak no more than everyone doth know.
QUEEN
Nimble mischance that art so light of foot,
Doth not thy embassage belong to me,
And am I last that knows it? O, thou think‘st
To serve me last, that I may longest keep
Thy sorrow in my breast. Come, ladies, go
To meet at London London’s king in woe.
What, was I born to this, that my sad look
Should grace the triumph of great Bolingbroke?
Gard’ner, for telling me these news of woe,
Pray God the plants thou graft’st may never grow.
Doth not thy embassage belong to me,
And am I last that knows it? O, thou think‘st
To serve me last, that I may longest keep
Thy sorrow in my breast. Come, ladies, go
To meet at London London’s king in woe.
What, was I born to this, that my sad look
Should grace the triumph of great Bolingbroke?
Gard’ner, for telling me these news of woe,
Pray God the plants thou graft’st may never grow.
Exit with her Ladies
GARDENER
Poor Queen, so that thy state might be no worse
I would my skill were subject to thy curse.
Here did she fall a tear. Here in this place
I’ll set a bank of rue, sour herb-of-grace.
Rue even for ruth here shortly shall be seen
In the remembrance of a weeping queen.
I would my skill were subject to thy curse.
Here did she fall a tear. Here in this place
I’ll set a bank of rue, sour herb-of-grace.
Rue even for ruth here shortly shall be seen
In the remembrance of a weeping queen.
Exeunt
4.1Enter, as to Parliament, Bolingbroke Duke of Lancaster and Hereford, the Duke of Aumerle, the Earl of Northumberland, Harry Percy, Lord Fitzwalter, the Duke of Surrey, the Bishop of Carlisle, and the Abbot of Westminster
BOLINGBROKE
Call forth Bagot.
Enter Bagot, with officers
Now, Bagot, freely speak thy mind:
What thou dost know of noble Gloucester’s death,
Who wrought it with the King, and who performed
The bloody office of his timeless end.
What thou dost know of noble Gloucester’s death,
Who wrought it with the King, and who performed
The bloody office of his timeless end.
BAGOT
Then set before my face the Lord Aumerle.
BOLINGBROKE (
to Aumerle)
to Aumerle)
Cousin, stand forth, and look upon that man.
Aumerle stands forth
BAGOT
My lord Aumerle, I know your daring tongue
Scorns to unsay what once it hath delivered.
In that dead time when Gloucester’s death was plotted
I heard you say ‘Is not my arm of length,
That reacheth from the restful English court
As far as Calais, to mine uncle’s head?’
Amongst much other talk that very time
I heard you say that you had rather refuse
The offer of an hundred thousand crowns
Than Bolingbroke’s return to England,
Adding withal how blest this land would be
In this your cousin’s death.
Scorns to unsay what once it hath delivered.
In that dead time when Gloucester’s death was plotted
I heard you say ‘Is not my arm of length,
That reacheth from the restful English court
As far as Calais, to mine uncle’s head?’
Amongst much other talk that very time
I heard you say that you had rather refuse
The offer of an hundred thousand crowns
Than Bolingbroke’s return to England,
Adding withal how blest this land would be
In this your cousin’s death.
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