| ACT III 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. | 5 |
| 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, | 10 |
| 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, | 15 |
| 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 | 20 |
| 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 | 25 |
| 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, | 30 |
| 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. | 35 |
| 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; | 40 |
| 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, | 45 |
| 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, | 50 |
| 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; | 55 |
| 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 | 60 |
| 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 | 65 |
| 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! | 70 |
| 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? | 75 |
| 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, | 80 |
| 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? | 85 |
| 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? | 90 |
| [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 | 95 |
| 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; | 100 |
| 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. | 105 |
| 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 | 110 |
| 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: | 115 |
| 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. | 120 |
| 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? | 125 |
| 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! | 130 |
| 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, | 135 |
| 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. | 140 |
| 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; | 145 |
| 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? | 150 |
| 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 | 155 |
| 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 | 160 |
| 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, | 165 |
| 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! | 170 |
| 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, | 175 |
| 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, |
| But presently prevent the ways to wail. |
| To fear the foe, since fear oppresseth strength, | 180 |
| Gives in your weakness strength unto your foe, |
| And so your follies fight against yourself. |
| Fear and be slain; no worse can come to fight: |
| And fight and die is death destroying death; |
| Where fearing dying pays death servile breath. | 185 |
| DUKE OF AUMERLE | My father hath a power; inquire of him |
| And learn to make a body of a limb. |
| KING RICHARD II | Thou chidest me well: proud Bolingbroke, I come |
| To change blows with thee for our day of doom. |
| This ague fit of fear is over-blown; | 190 |
| An easy task it is to win our own. |
| Say, Scroop, where lies our uncle with his power? |
| Speak sweetly, man, although thy looks be sour. |
| SIR STEPHEN SCROOP | Men judge by the complexion of the sky |
| The state and inclination of the day: | 195 |
| So may you by my dull and heavy eye, |
| My tongue hath but a heavier tale to say. |
| 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, | 200 |
| And all your northern castles yielded up, |
| And all your southern gentlemen in arms |
| Upon his party. |
| KING RICHARD II | Thou hast said enough. |
| Beshrew thee, cousin, which didst lead me forth | 205 |
[To DUKE OF AUMERLE] |
| Of that sweet way I was in to despair! |
| What say you now? what comfort have we now? |
| By heaven, I'll hate him everlastingly |
| That bids me be of comfort any more. |
| Go to Flint castle: there I'll pine away; | 210 |
| A king, woe's slave, shall kingly woe obey. |
| That power I have, discharge; and let them go |
| To ear 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. | 215 |
| DUKE OF AUMERLE | My liege, one word. |
| KING RICHARD II | He does me double wrong |
| That wounds me with the flatteries of his tongue. |
| Discharge my followers: let them hence away, |
| From Richard's night to Bolingbroke's fair day. | 220 |
| [Exeunt] |
