Enter ARTHUR.

Arth. Good morrow, Hubert. Hub. Good morrow, little prince.

Arth. As little prince (having so great a title
To be more prince,) as may be.-You are sad.
Hub. Indeed, I have been merrier.
Arth. Mercy on me!

Methinks, nobody should be sad but I ;
Yet, I remember, when I was in France,
Young gentlemen would be as sad as night,
Only for wantonness. By my christendom,
So I were out of prison, and kept sheep,
I should be as merry as the day is long:
And so I would be here, but that I doubt
My uncle practises more harm to me;
He is afraid of me, and I of him :
Is it my fault, that I was Geffrey's son?
No, indeed, is't not; And I would to heaven,
I were your son, so you would love me, Hubert.
Hub. If I talk to him, with his innocent prate
He will awake my mercy, which lies dead:
Therefore I will be sudden, and despatch.

Aside.

Arth. Are you sick, Hubert? you look pale to-day:

In sooth, I would you were a little sick;
That I might sit all night, and watch with you:
I warrant, I love you more than you do me.
Hub. His words do take possession of my bo-

som.

Read here, young Arthur. [Showing a paper. How now, foolish rheum!

Aside.

Turning dispiteous torture out of door!
I must be brief; lest resolution drop
Out at mine eyes, in tender womanish tears.-
Can you not read it? is it not fair writ?

Arth. Too fairly, Hubert, for so foul effect: Must you with hot irons burn out both mine eyes?

Hub. Young boy, I must.
Arth. And will you!
?
Hub. And I will.

Arth. Have you the heart? When your head
did but ake,

I knit my handkerchief about your brows,
(The best I had, a princess wrought it me,)
And I did never ask it you again:

And with my hand at midnight held your head;
And, like the watchful minutes to the hour,
Still and anon cheer'd up the heavy time;
Saying, What lack you? and, Where lies your
grief?

Or, What good love may I perform for you?
Many a poor man's son would have lain still,
And ne'er have spoke a loving word to you;
But you at your sick service had a prince.
Nay, you may think, my love was crafty love,
And call it, cunning; Do, an if you will:
If heaven be pleas'd, that you must use me ill,
Why, then you must.-Will you put out mine
eyes?

Arth. Alas, what need you be so boist'rousrough?

I will not struggle, I will stand stone-still.
For heaven's sake, Hubert, let me not be bound!
Nay, hear me, Hubert! drive these men away,
And I will sit as quiet as a lamb ;

I will not stir, nor wince, nor speak a word,
Nor look upon the iron angerly:
Thrust but these men away, and I'll forgive you,
Whatever torment you do put me to.

Hub. Go, stand within; let me alone with him. 1 Attend. I am best pleas'd to be from such a deed. [Exeunt Attendants. Arth. Alas! I then have chid away my friend; He hath a stern look, but a gentle heart:→ Let him come back, that his compassion may Give life to yours.

Hub. Come, boy, prepare yourself.
Arth. Is there no remedy?

Hub. None, but to lose your eyes.

Arth. O heaven !-that there were but a mote

in yours,

A grain, a dust, a gnat, a wand'ring hair,
Any annoyance in that precious sense!
Then, feeling what small things are boist❜rous
there,

Your vile intent must needs seem horrible.
Hub. Is this your promise? go to, hold your
tongue.

Arth. Hubert, the utterance of a brace of tongues

Must needs want pleading for a pair of eyes:
Let me not hold my tongue; let me not, Hubert!
Or, Hubert, if you will, cut out my tongue,
So I may keep mine eyes; O, spare mine eyes;

Though to no use, but still to look on you!

Lo, by my troth, the instrument is cold,
And would not harm me.

Hub. I can heat it, boy.

grief,

Being create for comfort, to be us'd

In undeserv'd extremes: See else yourself;
There is no malice in this burning coal;
The breath of heaven hath blown his spirit out,
And strew'd repentant ashes on his head.
Hub. But with my breath I can revive it, boy.
Arth. And if you do, you will but make it
blush,

And glow with shame of your proceedings, Hu

bert:

Pem. But that your royal pleasure must be
done,

This act is as an ancient tale new told;
And, in the last repeating, troublesome,
Being urged at a time unseasonable.

Sal. In this, the antique and well-noted face
Of plain old form is much disfigured:
And, like a shifted wind unto a sail,
It makes the course of thoughts to fetch about;
Startles and frights consideration;
Makes sound opinion sick, and truth suspected,
For putting on so new a fashion'd robe.

Pem. When workmen strive to do better than well,

They do confound their skill in covetousness:
And, oftentimes, excusing of a fault,
Doth make the fault the worse by the excuse;
As patches, set upon a little breach,
Discredit more, in hiding of the fault,
Than did the fault before it was so patch'd.

Sal. To this effect, before you were newcrown'd,

We breath'd our counsel: but it pleas'd your highness

To overbear it; and we are all well pleas'd; Since all and every part of what we would, Doth make a stand at what your highness will K. John. Some reasons of this double coro

To sound the purposes of all their hearts,)
Both for myself and them, (but, chief of all,
Your safety, for the which myself and them
Bend their best studies,) heartily request
The enfranchisement of Arthur; whose restraint
Doth move the murmuring lips of discontent
To break into this dangerous argument,
If, what in rest you have, in right you hold,
Why then your fears, (which, as they say, attend
The steps of wrong,) should move you to mew up
Your tender kinsman, and to choke his days
With barbarous ignorance, and deny his youth
The rich advantage of good exercise?
That the time's enemies may not have this
To grace occasions, let it be our suit,
That you have bid us ask his liberty;
Which for our goods we do no further ask,
Than whereupon our weal, on you depending,
Counts it your weal, he have his liberty.

K. John. Let it be so; I do commit his youth

Enter HUBERT.

To your direction.-Hubert, what news with you? Pem. This is the man should do the bloody deed;

He show'd his warrant to a friend of mine:
The image of a wicked heinous fault

Lives in his eye; that close aspéct of his

Does show the mood of a much troubled breast;
And I do fearfully believe, 'tis done,
What we so fear'd he had a charge to do.

That such an army could be drawn in France, And she not hear of it?

Mess. My liege, her ear

Is stopp'd with dust; the first of April, died
Your noble mother: And, as I hear, my lord,
The lady Constance in a frenzy died
Three days before: but this from rumour's tongue
I idly heard; if true, or false, I know not.
K. John. Withhold thy speed, dreadful oc-
casion!

O, make a league with me, till I have pleas'd

Between his purpose and his conscience,
Like heralds 'twixt two dreadful battles set:
His passion is so ripe, it needs must break.
Pem. And, when it breaks, I fear, will issue
thence

The foul corruption of a sweet child's death.
K. John. We cannot hold mortality's strong
hand:-

Good lords, although my will to give is living, The suit which you demand is gone and dead : He tells us, Arthur is deceas'd to-night.

Sal. Indeed, we fear'd his sickness was past cure. Pem. Indeed, we heard how near his death he

was,

Before the child himself felt he was sick :
This must be answer'd either here, or hence.
K.John. Why do you bend such solemn brows
on me?

Think you, I bear the shears of destiny?
Have I commandment on the pulse of life?
Sal. It is apparent foul-play; and 'tis shame,
That greatness should so grossly offer it:
So thrive it in your game! and so farewell.
Pem. Stay yet, lord Salisbury; I'll go with thee,
And find the inheritance of this poor child,
His little kingdom of a forced grave.
That blood, which ow'd the breath of all this isle,
Three foot of it doth hold: Bad world the while!
This must not be thus borne: this will break out
To all our sorrows, and ere long, I doubt.

[Exeunt Lords.
K. John. They burn in indignation; I repent;
There is no sure foundation set in blood;
No certain life achiev'd by others' death.-

How wildly then walks my estate in France!Under whose conduct came those powers of

France,

That thou for truth giv'st out, are landed here? Mess. Under the Dauphin.

Enter the Bastard, and PETER of Pomfret.

K. John. Thou hast made me giddy With these ill tidings. Now, what says the world To your proceedings? do not seek to stuff My head with more ill news, for it is full.

Bast. But if you be afeard to hear the worst, Then let the worst, unheard, fall on your head. K. John. Bear with me, cousin; for I was amaz'd

Under the tide but now I breathe again
Aloft the flood; and can give audience
To any tongue, speak it of what it will.

Bast. How I have sped among the clergymen,
The sums I have collected shall express.
But, as I travelled hither through the land,
I find the people strangely fantasied;
Possess'd with rumours, full of idle dreams;
Not knowing what they fear, but full of fear:
And here's a prophet, that I brought with me
From forth the streets of Pomfret, whom I found
With many hundreds treading on his heels;
To whom he sung, in rude harsh-sounding rhymes,
That, ere the next Ascension-day at noon,
Your highness should deliver up your crown.
K. John. Thou idle dreamer, wherefore didst
thou so?

Peter. Foreknowing that the truth will fall

out so.

K. John. Hubert, away with him; imprison him;

And on that day at noon, whereon, he says,
I shall yield up my crown, let him be hang'd:
Deliver him to safety, and return,
For I must use thee.-O my gentle cousin,
[Exit Hubert, with Peter.
Hear'st thou the news abroad, who are arriv'd?
Bast. The French, my lord; men's mouths
are full of it:

Besides, I met lord Bigot, and lord Salisbury,
(With eyes as red as new-enkindled fire,)
And others more, going to seek the grave
Of Arthur, who, they say, is kill'd to-night
On your suggestion.

K. John. Gentle kinsman, go,
And thrust thyself into their companies:

Hub. Old men, and beldams, in the streets
Do prophesy upon it dangerously:
Young Arthur's death is common in their mouths:
And when they talk of him, they shake their
heads,

And whisper one another in the ear;
And he, that speaks, doth gripe the hearer's wrist;
Whilst he, that hears, makes fearful action,
With wrinkled brows, with nods, with rolling
eyes.

I saw a smith stand with his hammer, thus,
The whilst his iron did on the anvil cool,
With open mouth swallowing a tailor's news;
Who, with his shears and measure in his hand,
Standing on slippers, (which his nimble haste
Had falsely thrust upon contráry feet,)
Told of a many thousand warlike French,
That were embatteled and rank'd in Kent:
Another lean unwash'd artificer

Cuts off his tale, and talks of Arthur's death.
K. John. Why seek'st thou to possess me with
these fears?

Why urgest thou so oft young Arthur's death? Thy hand hath murder'd him: I had mighty

cause

To wish him dead, but thou hadst none to kill him.

Hub. Had none, my lord! why, did you not provoke me?

K. John. It is the curse of kings, to be attended By slaves, that take their humours for a warrant To break within the bloody house of life: And, on the winking of authority, To understand a law; to know the meaning Of dangerous majesty, when, perchance, it frowns More upon humour than advis'd respect.

Is to be made, then shall this hand and seal
Witness against us to damnation!

How oft the sight of means to do ill deeds,
Makes deeds ill done! Hadest not thou been by,
A fellow by the hand of nature mark'd,
Quoted, and signed, to do a deed of shame,
This murder had not come into my mind:
But, taking note of thy abhorr'd aspect,
Finding thee fit for bloody villainy,
Apt, liable, to be employ'd in danger,

I faintly broke with thee of Arthur's death;
And thou, to be endeared to a king,
Made it no conscience to destroy a prince.
Hub. My lord,-

K. John. Hadst thou but shook thy head, or
made a pause,

When I spake darkly what I purposed;
Or turn'd an eye of doubt upon my face
As bid me tell my tale in express words;
Deep shame had struck me dumb, made me break
off,

And those thy fears might have wrought fear

in me:

But thou didst understand me by my signs,
And didst in signs again parley with sin;
Yea, without stop, didst let thy heart consent,
And, consequently, thy rude hand to act
The deed, which both our tongues held vile to

name.

Out of my sight, and never see me more!
My nobles leave me ; and my state is brav'd,
Even at my gates, with ranks of foreign powers:
Nay, in the body of this fleshly land,

This kingdom, this confine of blood and breath,
Hostility and civil tumult reigns
Between my conscience, and my cousin's death.

Hub. Arm you against your other enemies,
I'll make a peace between your soul and you.
Young Arthur is alive: This hand of mine
Is yet a maiden and an innocent hand,
Not painted with the crimson spots of blood.
Within this bosom never enter'd yet
The dreadful motion of a murd'rous thought,
And you have slander'd nature in my form;
Which, howsoever rude exteriorly,
Is yet the cover of a fairer mind
Than to be butcher of an innocent child.
K. John. Doth Arthur live? O, haste thee

SCENE III.-The same. Before the castle.

Enter ARTHUR, on the walls.

Arth. The wall is high; and yet will I leap down:

Good ground, be pitiful, and hurt me not!--
There's few, or none, do know me; if they did,
This ship-boy's semblance hath disguis'd me
quite.

I am afraid; and yet I'll venture it.
If I get down, and do not break my limbs,
I'll find a thousand shifts to get away:
As good to die, and go, as die, and stay.

[Leaps down. O me! my uncle's spirit is in these stones :Heaven take my soul, and England keep my bones! [Dies.

Enter PEMBROKE, SALISBURY, and BIGOT.
Sal. Lords, I will meet him at saint Edmund's
Bury;

It is our safety, and we must embrace
This gentle offer of the perilous time.
Pem. Who brought that letter from the car-
dinal?

Sal. The count Melun, a noble lord of France; Whose private with me, of the Dauphin's love, Is much more general than these lines import. Big. To-morrow morning let us meet him then.

Sal. Or, rather then set forward: for 'twill be Two long days' journey, lords, or e'er we meet. Enter the Bastard.

Bast. Once more to-day well met, distemper'd lords!

The king, by me, requests your presence straight.
Sal. The king hath dispossess'd himself of us;
We will not line his thin bestained cloak
With our pure honours, nor attend the foot,
That leaves the print of blood where-e'er it walks:
Return, and tell him so; we know the worst.
Bast. Whate'er you think, good words, I
think, were best.

Sal. Our griefs, and not our manners, reason

Or do you almost think, although you see,
That you do see? could thought, without this
object,

Form such another? This is the very top,
The height, the crest, or crest unto the crest,
Of murder's arms: this is the bloodiest shame,
The wildest savag'ry, the vilest stroke,
That ever wall-ey'd wrath, or staring rage,
Presented to the tears of soft remorse.

Pem. All murders past do stand excus'd in this:
And this, so sole, and so unmatchable,
Shall give a holiness, a purity,

To the yet unbegotten sin of time;
And prove a deadly bloodshed but a jest,
Exampled by this heinous spectacle.

Bast. It is a damned and a bloody work;
The graceless action of a heavy hand,
If that it be the work of any hand.

Sal. If that it be the work of any hand ?—
We had a kind of light, what would ensue :
It is the shameful work of Hubert's hand;
The practice, and the purpose, of the king :-
From whose obedience I forbid my soul,
Kneeling before this ruin of sweet life,
And breathing to his breathless excellence
The incense of a vow, a holy vow;
Never to taste the pleasures of the world,
Never to be infected with delight,
Nor conversant with ease and idleness,
Till I have set a glory to this hand,
By giving it the worship of revenge.
Pem. Big. Our souls religiously confirm thy
words.

Enter HUBERT.

Hub. Lords, I am hot with haste in seeking you. Arthur doth live; the king hath sent for you. Sal. O, he is bold, and blushes not at death :Avaunt, thou hateful villain, get thee gone! Hub. I am no villain.

Sal. Must I rob the law?

[Drawing his sword. Bast. Your sword is bright, sir; put it up again. Sal. Not till I sheath it in a murderer's skin. Hub. Stand back, lord Salisbury, stand back,

I say;

By heaven, I think, my sword's as sharp as yours:
I would not have you, lord, forget yourself,
Nor tempt the danger of my true defence;
Lest I, by marking of your rage, forget
Your worth, your greatness, and nobility.
Big. Out, dunghill! dar'st thou brave a no-
bleman ?

Hub. Not for my life: but yet I dare defend
My innocent life against an emperor.
Sal. Thou art a murderer.

Hub. Do not prove me so; Yet, I am none: Whose tongue soe'er speaks false, Not truly speaks; who speaks not truly, lies. Pem. Cut him to pieces.

Bast. Keep the peace, I say.

Sal. Stand by, or I shall gall you, Faulconbridge. Bast. Thou wert better gall the devil, Salisbury: