Richard, not far from hence, hath hid his head. YORK. It would beseem the lord Northumberland To say, King Richard. Alack the heavy day, When such a sacred king should hide his head! NORTH. Your grace mistakes; only to be brief, Left I his title out.

YORK. The time hath been, Would you have been so brief with him, he would Have been so brief with you,* to shorten you, For taking so the head, your whole head's length. BOLING. Mistake not, uncle, further than you should.

YORK. Take not, good cousin, further than you should,

Lest you mis-take. The heavens are o'er our heads.+

BOLING. I know it, uncle; and oppose not myself Against their will.-But who comes here?

Why, it contains no king?

PERCY.

Yes, my good lord,
It doth contain a king; King Richard lies
Within the limits of yon lime and stone:
And with him are the lord Aumerle, lord
Salisbury,

Sir Stephen Scroop; besides a clergyman
Of holy reverence, who, I cannot learn.

NORTH. Oh! belike it is the bishop of Carlisle.
BOLING. Noble lord,"
[TO NORTH.

Go to the rude ribs of that ancient castle :
Through brazen trumpet send the breath of parle
Into his ruin'd ears, and thus deliver.
Henry Bolingbroke

On both his knees doth kiss King Richard's hand;
And sends allegiance, and true faith of heart,
To his most § royal person: hither come
Even at his feet to lay my arms and power;
Provided that, my banishment repeal'd,
And lands restor'd again, be freely granted:
If not, I'll use the advantage of my power,
And lay the summer's dust with showers of blood,
Rain'd from the wounds of slaughter'd Englishmen:
The which, how far off from the mind of Boling-
broke

It is such crimson tempest should bedrench

A parle sounded; answered by another trumpet within. Flourish. Enter on the walls, KING RICHARD, the BISHOP OF CARLISLE, AUMERLE, SCROOP, and SALISBURY. BOLING. See, see, King Richard doth himself appear,

As doth the blushing discontented sun,
From out the fiery portal of the east,
When he perceives the envious clouds are bent
To dim his glory, and to stain the track †
Of his bright passage to the occident.
YORK. Yet looks he like a king; behold, his eye,
As bright as is the eagle's, lightens forth
Controlling majesty; alack, alack, for woe,
That any harm should stain so fair a show!
K. RICH. We are amaz'd; and thus long have
we stood

To watch the fearful bending of thy knee,

[TO NORTII. Because we thought ourself thy lawful king : And if we be, how dare thy joints forget Το pay their awful duty to our presence? If we be not, show us the hand of God That hath dismiss'd us from our stewardship; For well we know, no hand of blood and bone Can gripe the sacred handle of our sceptre, Unless he do profane, steal, or usurp. And though you think that all, as you have done, Have torn their souls, by turning them from us, And we are barren, and bereft of friends; Yet know,-my master, God omnipotent, Is mustering in his clouds, on our behalf, Armies of pestilence; and they shall strike

Your children yet unborn, and unbegot,
That lift your vassal hands against my head,
And threat the glory of my precious crown.
Tell Bolingbroke, (for yond', methinks, he stands,*)
That every stride he makes upon my land
Is dangerous treason. He is come to ope
The purple testament of bleeding war;
But ere the crown he looks for, live in peace,
Ten thousand bloody crowns of mothers' sons
Shall ill become the flower of England's face,
Change the complexion of her maid-pale peace
To scarlet indignation, and bedew

Her pastures' grass with faithful English blood. NORTH. The king of heaven forbid, our lord the king

Should so with civil and uncivil arms

Be rush'd upon! Thy thrice-noble cousin,
Harry Bolingbroke, doth humbly kiss thy hand;
And by the honourable tomb he swears,
That stands upon your royal grandsire's bones;
And by the royalties of both your bloods,
Currents that spring from one most gracious head;
And by the buried hand of warlike Gaunt,
And by the worth and honour of himself,
Comprising all that may be sworn or said,-
His coming hither hath no further scope,
Than for his lineal royalties, and to beg
Enfranchisement immediate on his knees;
Which on thy royal party granted once,
His glittering arms he will commend to rust,
His barbed steeds to stables, and his heart,
To faithful service of your majesty.
This swears he, as he is a prince, is just;
And, as I am a gentleman, I credit him.

AUM. No, good my lord; let's fight with gentle words,

Till time lend friends, and friends their helpful swords.

K. RICH. 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. AUM. Northumberland comes back from Bolingbroke.

K. RICH. What must the king do now? Must he submit?

The king shall do it. Must he be depos'd?
The king shall be contented. Must he lose
The name of king? o' 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 alms-man's gown,
My figur'd 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;

C

Aumerle, thou weep'st; my tender-hearted cousin!
We'll make foul weather with despised tears;
Our sighs, and they, shall lodged 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, digg'd their graves with weeping
eyes?

e Some way of common trade,-] That is, a place of common resort, as we now talk of, "A road of frequent traffic." Thus in Lord Surrey's Translation of the Second Book of the Eneid :

"A postern with a blind wicket there was,

A common trade, to pass through Priam's house."

d Shall lodge the summer corn,-] Corn beaten down by rain or wind in modern language is said to be lay'd. Formerly lodg'd had the same import. So, in " Macbeth," Act IV. Sc. 1:"Though bladed corn be lodg'd."

And again, in "Henry VI." Part II. Act III. Sc. 2:-
"Like to the summer corn by tempest lodg'd.”

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.
NORTH. My lord, in the base court he doth
attend

To speak with you; may it please you to come down?

K. RICH. Down? down, I come; like glistering Phaeton,

Wanting the manage of unruly jades.

[NORTH, retires to BOLING.

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!

a In the base court-] Base court is simply lower court, from the French, basse cour.

They might have liv'd to bear, and he to taste, The 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, [be depos'd?

1 SERV. What, think you then,† the king shall GARD. Depress'd he is already; and depos'd, '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 press'd to death through want of speaking!-

Thou, old Adam's likeness, [Coming forward] 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 depos'd?
Dar'st thou, thou little better thing than earth,
Divine his downfall? Say where, when, and how
Cam'st thou by these || ill-tidings? speak, thou
wretch.

GARD. 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 weigh'd:
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'll find it so :
I speak no more than every one doth know. [foot,
QUEEN. Nimble mischance, that art so light of
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?
Gardener, for telling me this news of woe,
Pray God the plants thou graft'st, may never grow.
[Exeunt QUEEN and Ladies.
GARD. Poor queen! so that thy state might be

no worse,

a

I would my skill were subject to thy curse.-
Here did she fallt 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.

(*) First folio, I would.

[Exeunt.

(1) First folio, drop.

"these news." News appears to have been used by our ancestors either as singular or plural, indifferently.