Our stern alarums changed to merry meetings;
Our dreadful marches to delightful measures.
Grim-visaged war hath smoothed his wrinkled
front;

And now, instead of mounting barbéd steeds,
To fright the souls of fearful adversaries,
He capers nimbly in a lady's chamber,
To the lascivious pleasing of a lute.

But I, that am not shaped for sportive tricks,
Nor made to court an amorous looking-glass;

I that am rudely stamped, and want love's majesty

To strut before a wanton ambling nymph;
I that am curtailed of this fair proportion,
Cheated of feature by dissembling nature,
Deformed, unfinished, sent before my time
Into this breathing world, scarce half made up,
And that so lamely and unfashionable
That dogs bark at me as I halt by them ;-
Why I, in this weak piping time of peace,
Have no delight to pass away the time,
Unless to spy my shadow in the sun,
And descant on mine own deformity.
And therefore, since I cannot prove a lover,
To entertain these fair well-spoken days,
I am determined to prove a villain,
And hate the idle pleasures of these days.
Plots have I laid, inductions dangerous,
By drunken prophecies, libels, and dreams,
To set my brother Clarence and the King
In deadly hate the one against the other:
And if King Edward be as true and just
As I am subtle, false, and treacherous,
This day should Clarence closely be mewed up,
About a prophecy, which says that "G
Of Edward's heirs the murderer shall be.”—
Dive, thoughts, down to my soul! here Clarence

Clar. Tendering my person's safety, hath appointed This conduct to convey me to the Tower.

Glo. Upon what cause?

Clar.

Because my name is George.

Glo. Alack, my lord, that fault is none of yours: He should for that commit your godfathers :O, belike his majesty hath some intent That you shall be new christened in the Tower. But what's the matter, Clarence: may I know? Clar. Yea, Richard, when I know; for I protest As yet I do not. But, as I can learn, He hearkens after prophecies and dreams; And from the cross-row plucks the letter G,

And says, a wizard told him that "by G
His issue disinherited should be:"
And for my name of George begins with G,
It follows in his thought that I am he.
These, as I learn, and such like toys as these,
Have moved his highness to commit me now.
Glo. Why this it is when men are ruled by

women.

'Tis not the King that sends you to the Tower:
My Lady Grey his wife, Clarence, 't is she
That tempers him to this extremity.
Was it not she, and that good man of worship
Antony Woodeville, her brother there,
That made him send Lord Hastings to the Tower:
From whence this present day he is delivered?
We are not safe, Clarence; we are not safe.

Clar. By Heaven, I think there is no man secure But the Queen's kindred, and night-walking heralds

That trudge betwixt the King and Mistress Shore: Heard you not what an humble suppliant Lord Hastings was to her, for his delivery?

Glo. Humbly complaining to her deity Got my lord chamberlain his liberty. I'll tell you what,-I think it is our way, If we will keep in favour with the King, To be her men and wear her livery. The jealous o'er worn widow and herself, Since that our brother dubbed them gentlewomen, Are mighty gossips in this monarchy.

Brak. I beseech your graces both to pardon me.
His majesty hath straitly given in charge
That no man shall have private conference,
Of what degree soever, with his brother.
Glo. Even so? An please your worship, Braken-
bury,

You may partake of anything we say.
We speak no treason, man: we say the King
Is wise and virtuous, and his noble Queen
Well struck in years, fair, and not jealous:
We
say that Shore's wife hath a pretty foot,
A cherry lip, a bonny eye, a passing-pleasing

He that doth naught with her, excepting one, Were best to do it secretly, alone. Brak. What one, my lord? Glo. Her husband, knave:—wouldst thou betray me?

Brak. I beseech your grace to pardon me; and

withal

Forbear your conference with the noble duke.

Clar. We know thy charge, Brakenbury, and will obey.

Glo. We are the Queen's abjects, and must obey.

Brother, farewell: I will unto the King:
And whatsoe'er you will employ me in,
Were it to call King Edward's widow sister,
I will perform it to enfranchise you.
Meantime, this deep disgrace in brotherhood
Touches me deeper than you can imagine.

Clar. I know it pleaseth neither of us well.
Glo. Well, your imprisonment shall not be long:
I will deliver you or else lie for you.
Meantime, have patience.

Clar. I must perforce: farewell.
[Exeunt CLARENCE, BRAKENBURY, and Guard.
Glo. Go tread the path that thou shalt ne'er
return,

Simple, plain Clarence! I do love thee so
That I will shortly send thy soul to heaven,
If heaven will take the present at our hands.
But who comes here: the new-delivered Hastings?

Enter HASTINGS.

Hast. Good time of day unto my gracious lord. Glo. As much unto my good lord chamberlain : Well are you welcome to this open air. How hath your lordship brooked imprisonment? Hast. With patience, noble lord, as prisoners

must:

But I shall live, my lord, to give them thanks That were the cause of my imprisonment.

Glo. No doubt, no doubt; and so shall Clarence too:

For they that were your enemies are his,
And have prevailed as much on him as you.

Hast. More pity, that the eagle should be mewed,

While kites and buzzards prey at liberty.

Glo. What news abroad?

Hast. No news so bad abroad as this at home: The King is sickly, weak, and melancholy, And his physicians fear him mightily.

Glo. Now by Saint Paul this news is bad indeed!

O he hath kept an evil diet long,
And over-much consumed his royal person:
'Tis very grievous to be thought upon.
What, is he in his bed?

Clarence hath not another day to live:
Which done, God take King Edward to his mercy,
And leave the world for me to bustle in:
For then I'll marry Warwick's youngest daughter.
What though I killed her husband, and her father:
The readiest way to make the wench amends
Is to become her husband and her father:
The which will I: not all so much for love
As for another secret close intent,

By marrying her, which I must reach unto.
But yet I run before my horse to market:
Clarence still breathes; Edward still lives and
reigns:

When they are gone then must I count my gains. [Exit.

SCENE II.-The same. Another Street.

Enter the corpse of KING HENRY THE SIXTH, borne in an open coffin; Gentlemen, bearing halberds, to guard it; and LADY ANNE, as

mourner.

Anne. Set down, set down your honourable load (If honour may be shrouded in a hearse), Whilst I awhile obsequiously lament The untimely fall of virtuous Lancaster.Poor key-cold figure of a holy king, Pale ashes of the house of Lancaster, Thou bloodless remnant of that royal blood, Be it lawful that I invocate thy ghost To hear the lamentations of poor Anne, Wife to thy Edward, to thy slaughtered son, Stabbed by the self-same hand that made these wounds!

I

Lo, in these windows that let forth thy life
pour the helpless balm of my poor eyes.-
O curséd be the hand that made these holes.
Cursed the heart that had the heart to do it:
Cursed the blood that let this blood from hence!
More direful hap betide that hated wretch
That makes us wretched by the death of thee,
Than I can wish to adders, spiders, toads,
Or any creeping venomed thing that lives!
If ever he have child, abortive be it,
Prodigious, and untimely brought to light;
Whose ugly and unnatural aspéct

May fright the hopeful mother at the view:
And that be heir to his unhappiness!

If ever he have wife, let her be made
More miserable by the death of him
Than I am made by my young lord and thee!—
Come, now toward Chertsey with your holy load,
Taken from Paul's to be interréd there :
And still, as you are weary of the weight,
Rest you whiles I lament King Henry's corse.
[The bearers take up the corpse, and advance.

Enter GLOSTER.

Glo. Stay you that bear the corse, and set it down.

Anne. What black magician conjures up this fiend,

To stop devoted charitable deeds?

Glo. Villains, set down the corse; or, by Saint
Paul,

I'll make a corse of him that disobeys.

1st Gent. My lord, stand back and let the coffin pass.

Glo. Unmannered dog! stand thou when I
command:

Advance thy halberd higher than my breast,
Or, by Saint Paul, I'll strike thee to my foot,
And spurn upon thee, beggar, for thy boldness.

[The bearers set down the coffin.

Anne. What, do you tremble; are you all afraid?

Alas, I blame you not; for you are mortal,
And mortal eyes cannot endure the devil.—
Avaunt, thou dreadful minister of hell!
Thou hadst but power over his mortal body;
His soul thou canst not have: therefore be gone.
Glo. Sweet saint, for charity be not so curst.
Anne. Foul devil, for God's sake hence, and
trouble us not:

For thou hast made the happy earth thy hell,
Filled it with cursing cries and deep exclaims.
If thou delight to view thy heinous deeds,
Behold this pattern of thy butcheries.-
O gentlemen, see, see! dead Henry's wounds
Open their congealed mouths and bleed afresh!—
Blush, blush, thou lump of foul deformity;
For 't is thy presence that exhales this blood
From cold and empty veins, where no blood dwells:
Thy deed, inhuman and unnatural,
Provokes this deluge most unnatural.-

O God, which this blood mad'st, revenge his death: O earth, which this blood drink'st, revenge his death!

Either Heaven with lightning strike the murderer dead,

Or earth gape open wide, and eat him quick; As thou dost swallow up this good king's blood, Which his hell-governed arm hath butchered!

Glo. Lady, you know no rules of charity, Which renders good for bad, blessings for curses. Anne. Villain, thou know'st no law of God nor

man:

No beast so fierce but knows some touch of pity.
Glo. ButIknow none, and therefore am no beast.
Anne. O wonderful, when devils tell the truth!
Glo. More wonderful when angels are so angry.
Vouchsafe, divine perfection of a woman,
Of these supposéd evils to give me leave,
By circumstance, but to acquit myself.

Anne. Thou wast the cause and most accursed effect.

Glo. Your beauty was the cause of that effect: Your beauty, which did haunt me in my sleep To undertake the death of all the world,

So I might live one hour in your sweet bosom. Anne. If I thought that, I tell thee, homicide, These nails should rend that beauty from my cheeks.

Glo. These eyes could not endure that beauty's wreck:

You should not blemish it if I stood by.
As all the world is cheeréd by the sun,
So I by that it is my day, my life.

Anne. Black night o'ershade thy day, and death thy life!

Glo. Curse not thyself, fair creature: thou art both.

Anne. I would I were, to be revenged on thee. Glo. It is a quarrel most unnatural, To be revenged on him that loveth thee.

Anne. It is a quarrel just and reasonable, To be revenged on him that killed my husband. Glo. He that bereft thee, lady, of thy husband, Did it to help thee to a better husband.

Anne. His better doth not breathe upon the earth.

Glo. He lives that loves you better than he could.

Told the sad story of my father's death,
And twenty times made pause to sob and weep,
That all the standers-by had wet their cheeks,
Like trees bedashed with rain:-in that sad time
My manly eyes did scorn an humble tear:
And what these sorrows could not thence exhale,
Thy beauty hath, and made them blind with
weeping.

I never sued to friend nor enemy;

My tongue could never learn sweet soothing word:
But now thy beauty is proposed my fee,
My proud heart sues, and prompts my tongue to
speak. [She looks scornfully at him.
Teach not thy lip such scorn: for it was made
For kissing, lady, not for such contempt.
If thy revengeful heart cannot forgive,
Lo here I lend thee this sharp-pointed sword:
Which if thou please to hide in this true breast,
And let the soul forth that adoreth thee,
I lay it naked to the deadly stroke,
And humbly beg the death upon my knee.
[He lays his breast open; she offers at
it with his sword.

Nay, do not pause; for I did kill King Henry :
But 't was thy beauty that provokéd me.
Nay, now despatch; 'twas I that stabbed young

Edward: [She again offers at his breast. But 't was thy heavenly face that set me on. [She lets fall the sword. Take up the sword again, or take up me. Anne. Arise, dissembler: though I wish thy death,

I will not be thy executioner.

Glo. Then bid me kill myself, and I will do it.
Anne. I have already.

Glo.

That was in thy rage:

Speak it again, and even with the word,
This hand, which for thy love did kill thy love,
Shall for thy love kill a far truer love :
To both their deaths shalt thou be accessary.

Anne. I would I knew thy heart.
Glo. 'Tis figured in my tongue.
Anne. I fear me both are false.
Glo. Then never man was true.
Anne. Well, well, put up your sword.
Glo. Say, then, my peace is made.
Anne. That shalt thou know hereafter.
Glo. But shall I live in hope?
Anne. All men, I hope, live so.
Glo. Vouchsafe to wear this ring.
Anne. To take is not to give.

[She puts on the ring. Glo. Look, how this ring encompasseth thy finger,

Even so thy breast encloseth my poor heart: Wear both of them, for both of them are thine And if thy poor devoted servant may

But beg one favour at thy gracious band,
Thou dost confirm his happiness for ever.
Anne. What is it?

Glo. That it may please you leave these sad
designs

To him that hath more cause to be a mourner,
And presently repair to Crosby-place:
Where, after I have solemnly interred
At Chertsey monastery this noble King,
And wet his grave with my repentant tears,
I will with all expedient duty see you.
For divers unknown reasons, I beseech you
Grant me this boon.

Anne. With all my heart: and much it joys
me too

To see you are become so penitent.-
Tressel and Berkley, go along with me.
Glo. Bid me farewell.
Anne.

"T is more than you deserve:

But since you teach me how to flatter you,
Imagine I have said farewell already.
[Exeunt LADY ANNE, TRESSEL, and BERKLEY.
Glo. Take up the corse, sirs.
Gent. Towards Chertsey, noble lord?
Glo. No, to White-friars: there attend my com-
ing. [Exeunt the rest, with the corpse.
Was ever woman in this humour woo'd?
Was ever woman in this humour won?
I'll have her, but I will not keep her long.
What! I, that killed her husband and his father,
To take her in her heart's extremest hate;
With curses in her mouth, tears in her eyes,
The bleeding witness of her hatred by;
Having God, her conscience, and these bars
against me,

And I no friends to back my suit withal
But the plain devil and dissembling looks,
And yet to win her :-all the world to nothing