POTM: Thomas of Woodstock, aka Richard II Part One
Tom Reedy
the Malone Society Reprint, _The First Part of the Reign of King
Richard the Second or Thomas of Woodstock_ (1929).
I kept the lineation of the original throughout, even if it disrupted
the verse. I also kept the Malone line numbering.
I checked my emendations with Corbin and Sedge's _Thomas of Woodstock_
(2002), but I kept mine when it disagreed with theirs, which was about
half the time. Since my main interest was to produce a readable
instead of a scholarly version, I do not show emedations of missing
copy with square brackets.
The scholarly consensus has been that Woodstock preceded Shakespeare's
R2, but MacDonald Jackson has convincingly demonstrated that the play
is more accurately dated between 1598 and 1608, and more likely the
later date, in his 2001 paper, "Shakespeare's Richard II and the
Anonymous Thomas of Woodstock" in _Medieval and Renaissance Drama in
England_ (Madison, NJ); 14.
Michael Egan has argued for Shakespeare authorship. Jackson argues for
Samuel Rowley's and I find his arguments convincing.
Thomas of Woodstock
Dramatis Personae:
Duke of Lancaster, John of Gaunt }
Duke of York, Edmund of Langley} Uncles to the King
Earl of Arundel, Lord Admiral.
Earl of Surrey
Sir Thomas Cheyney
Thomas of Woodstock, Duke of Gloucester, Lord Protector and uncle to
the King.
Lord Mayor, Richard Exton
Sir Henry Greene , later Lord Chancellor }
Sir Edward Bagot, later Lord Privy Seal } favourites of the King
Tresilian, a lawyer later Lord Chief Justice}
Nimble, his man
King Richard II
Queen Anne of Bohemia, his wife
Duchess of Gloucester, wife of Woodstock
Duchess of Ireland
Sir William Bushy }
Sir Thomas Scroope, } favourites of the King
later Lord Admiral }
Crosby }
Fleming} followers of Tresilian
A servant of Woodstock
A Courtier
Simon Ignorance, Bailiff of Dunstable
A Farmer
A Butcher
Cowtail, a grazier
A Schoolmaster
A Serving man
A Whistler
Cynthia, in the masque
Sheriff of Kent
Sheriff of Northumberland
Lapoole, Governor of Calais
Two murderers
The Ghost of the Black Prince
The Ghost of Edward III
Soldiers attending upon Lapoole
Lords, Servants, gentlemen, maids attending the Queen, a guard of
archers, officers (billmen) of Dunstable, knights in the masque,
officers attending the Sheriffs.
Tom Reedy
Act 1, Scene 1
ENTER hastily at several doors: Duke of Lancaster, Duke of York, the
Earls of Arundel and Surrey, with napkins on their arms and knives in
their hands, and Sir Thomas Cheney, with others bearing torches, and
some with cloaks and rapiers.
Omnes
Lights! Lights! Bring torches, knaves!
Lancaster
Shut to the gates,
Let no man out until the house be searched.
York
Call for our coaches, let’s away, good brother.
Now by the blessed saints, I fear we are poisoned all.
Arundel
Poisoned my Lord? 10
Lancaster
Aye, aye, good Arundel, ’tis high time begone.
May heaven be blest for this prevention.
York
God for thy mercy! Would our cousin King
So cuzen us, to poison us in our meat?
Lancaster
Has no man here some helping antidote?
For fear already we have ta’en some dram.
What thinkest thou Cheyney, thou first broughtst the tidings.
Are we not poisoned, thinkest thou?
Cheyney
Fear not, my Lords.
That mischievous potion was as yet unserved. 20
It was a liquid bane, dissolved in wine,
Which after supper should have been caroused
To young King Richard’s health.
Lancaster
Good i’faith! Are his uncles’ deaths become
Health to King Richard? How came it out?
Sir Thomas Cheyney, pray resolve us.
Cheyney
A Carmelite friar, my Lord, revealed the plot
And should have acted it, but touched in conscience,
He came to your good brother, the Lord Protector,
And so disclosed it; who straight sent me to you. 30
York
The Lord protect him for it, aye, and our cousin King.
High heaven be judge, we wish all good to him.
Lancaster
A heavy charge, good Woodstock, hast thou had
To be protector to so wild a prince
So far degenerate from his noble father
Whom the trembling French the black prince called,
Not of a swart and melancholy brow,
For sweet and lovely was his countenance,
But that he made so many funeral days
In mournful France: the warlike battles won 40
At Crecy field, Poitiers, Artoise and Maine
Made all France groan under his conquering arm.
But heaven forestalled his diadem on earth,
To place him with a royal crown in heaven.
Rise may his dust to glory! Ere he’d’ve done
A deed so base unto his enemy,
Much less unto the brothers of his father,
He’d first have lost his royal blood in drops,
Dissolved the strings of his humanity
And lost that livelihood that was preserved 50
To make his (unlike) son a wanton King.
York
Forbear, good John of Gaunt; believe me, brother,
We may do wrong unto our cousin King.
I fear his flattering minions more than him.
Lancaster
By the blessed virgin, noble Edmund York
I’m past all patience. Poison his subjects,
His royal Uncles! Why, the proud Castilian,
Where John-of-Gaunt writes king and sovereign,
Would not throw off their vile and servile yoke
By treachery so base. Patience! Gracious Heaven! 60
Arundel
A good invoke. Right princely Lancaster,
Calm thy high spleen. Sir Thomas Cheyney here
Can tell the circumstance; pray give him leave.
Lancaster
Well, let him speak.
Cheyney
’Tis certainly made known, my reverend lords,
To your loved brother, and the good Protector,
That not King Richard, but his flatterers,
Sir Henry Greene , joined with Sir Edward Bagot,
And that sly Machiavel, Tresilian,
Whom now the King elects for Lord Chief Justice, 70
Had all great hands in this conspiracy.
Lancaster
By blessed Mary, I’ll confound them all.
York
Your spleen confounds yourself.
Lancaster
By kingly Edward's soul, my royal father,
I will be revenged at full on all their lives.
York
Nay, if your rage break to such high extremes
You will prevent yourself and lose revenge.
Lancaster
Why Edmund, canst thou give a reason, yet
Though we so near in blood, his hapless uncles,
(His grandsire Edward’s sons; his father’s brothers) 80
Should thus be made away, why might it be
That Arundel and Surrey here should die?
Surrey
Some friend of theirs wanted my earldom sore.
Arundel
Perhaps my office of the admiralty,
If a better and more fortunate hand could govern it
I would it were none of mine.
Yet thus much can I say; and make my praise
No more than merit: A wealthier prize
Did never yet take harbour in our roads
Than I to England brought. You all can tell 90
Full threescore sail of tall and lusty ships
And six great carracks fraught with oil and wines
I brought King Richard in abundance home.
So much that plenty hath so staled our palates
As that a tun of high-prized wines of France
Is hardly worth a mark of English money.
If service such as this done to my country
Merit my heart to bleed, let it bleed freely.
Lancaster
We’ll bleed together, warlike Arundel.
Cousin of Surrey, princely Edmund York 100
Let’s think on some revenge: if we must die,
Ten thousand souls shall keep us company.
York
Patience, good Lancaster. Tell me, kind Cheyney,
How does thy master, our good brother Woodstock?
(Plain Thomas, for by the rood so all men call him
For his plain dealing, and his simple clothing.
Let others jet in silk and gold, says he,
A coat of English frieze best pleaseth me.)
How thinks his unsophisticated plainness
Of these bitter compounds? Fears he no drug 110
Put in his broth? Shall his healths be secure?
Cheyney
Faith, my Lord, his mind suits with his habit:
Homely and plain; both free from pride and envy,
And therein will admit distrust to none.
ENTER Thomas of Woodstock in frieze, the mace afore him, the Lord
Mayor Exton, and others with lights afore them.
Cheyney
And see his Grace himself is come to greet you.
By your leave there, room for my Lord Protector's grace.
York and Lancaster
Health to your grace. 120
Woodstock
I salute your healths, good brothers, pray pardon me,
I will speak with you anon. Hie thee, good Exton,
Good Lord Mayor, I do beseech ye prosecute
With your best care and means for all our safeties.
Mischief hath often double practices;
Treachery wants not his second stratagem.
Who knows but steel may hit, though poison fail?
Alack the day, the night is made a veil
To shadow mischief. Set, I beseech,
Strong guard and careful to attend the city. 130
Our Lady help, we know not who are friends.
Our foes are grown so mighty, pray be careful.
Lord Mayor
Your friends are great in London, good my Lord.
I’ll front all dangers, trust it on my word.
EXIT Lord Mayor
Woodstock
Thanks from my heart. I swear afore my God
I know not which way to bestow myself,
The time’s so busy and so dangerous too.
Why, how now, brothers? How fares good John-of-Gaunt?
Thou art vexed I know; thou grievest, kind Edmund York.
Arundel and Surrey, noble kinsmen, 140
I know ye all are discontented much,
But be not so: afore my God I swear
King Richard loves you all. And credit me,
The princely gentleman is innocent
Of this black deed and base conspiracy.
Speak, speak, how is’t with princely Lancaster?
Lancaster
Sick Gloucester, sick. We all are weary
And fain we would lie down to rest ourselves,
But that so many serpents lurk i’the grass,
We dare not sleep. 150
Woodstock
Enough, enough, good brother, I have found out the disease.
When the head aches, the body is not healthful.
King Richard’s wounded with a wanton humour,
Lulled and secured by flattering sycophants.
But it is not deadly yet, it may be cured.
Some vein let blood where the corruption lies
And all shall heal again.
York
Then lose no time, lest it grow ulcerous.
The false Tresilian, Greene and Bagot
Run naught but poison, brother, spill them all. 160
Lancaster
They guide the nonage king; ’tis they protect him.
Ye wear the title of protectorship,
But like an under-officer, as though
Yours were derived from theirs. Faith, you are too plain.
Woodstock
In my apparel, you’ll say.
Lancaster
Good faith, in all.
The commons murmur ’gainst the dissolute king;
Treason is whispered at each common table,
As customary as their thanks to heaven.
Men need not gaze up to the sky to see 170
Whether the sun shine clear or no: ’tis found
By the small light should beautify the ground.
Conceit you me, a blind man thus much sees:
He wants his eyes to whom we bend our knees.
Arundel
You all are princes of the royal blood,
Yet like great oaks ye let the ivy grow
To eat your hearts out with his false embraces.
Ye understand, my Lord?
Woodstock
Aye, aye, good cuz, as if ye plainly said,
Destroy those flatterers and tell King Richard 180
He does abase himself to countenance them.
Soft, soft!
Fruit that grows high is not securely plucked.
We must use ladders, and by steps ascend
’Til by degrees we reach the altitude
You conceit me to. Pray be smooth awhile;
Tomorrow is the solemn nuptial day
Betwixt the king and virtuous Anne-a-Beame,
The emperor’s daughter, a right gracious lady
That’s come to England for King Richard’s love.
Then as you love his grace and hate his flatterers, 190
Discountenance not the day with the least frown;
Be ignorant of what ye know. Afore my God,
I have good hope this happy marriage, brothers,
Of this so noble and religious princess
Will mildly calm his headstrong youth to see
And shun those stains that blurs his majesty.
If not, by good King Edward’s bones, our royal father,
I will remove those hinderers of his health, though’t cost my head.
York and Lancaster
On these conditions, brother, we agree.
Arundel: And I, Surrey, and I. 200
Lancaster
To hide our hate is soundest policy.
York
And brother Gloucester, since it is your pleasure
To have us smooth our sullen brows with smiles,
We’d have you suit your outside to your heart,
And like a courtier, cast this country habit,
For which the coarse and vulgar call your Grace
By the title of Plain Thomas. Yet we doubt not
Tomorrow we shall have good hope to see
Your high protectorship in bravery.
Woodstock
No, no, good York, this is as fair a sight; 210
My heart in this plain frieze sits true and right.
In this I’ll serve my King as true and bold
As if my outside were all trapped in gold.
Lancaster
By Mary, but you shall not, brother Woodstock.
What, the marriage day to Richard and his Queen,
And will ye so disgrace the state and realm?
We’ll have you brave, in faith!
Woodstock
Well, well, for your sakes, brothers, and this solemn day
For once I’ll sumpter a gaudy wardrobe, but ’tis more
Than I have done, I vow, this twenty years. 220
Afore my God, the King could not have entreated me
To leave this habit, but your wills be done,
Let us hie to court. You all your wishes have
One weary day; Plain Thomas will be brave.
EXEUNT omnes
Tom Reedy
Enter Greene, Bagot and Tresilian in rage
Tresilian
Nay, good sir Henry, King Richard calls for you.
Bagot
Prithee, sweet Greene,
Visit his highness and forsake these passions.
Greene
’Sblood, I am vexed. Tresilian, mad me not,
Thyself and I and all are now undone. 230
The Lords at London are secured from harm;
The plot’s revealed. Black curses seize the traitor!
Bagot
Eternal torments whip that Carmelite!
Tresilian
A deeper hell than limbo patrum hold him!
A fainting villain, confusion crush his soul!
Bagot
Could the false slave recoil, and swore their deaths!
Greene
Mischief devour him! Had it but ta’en effect
On Lancaster and Edmund Duke of York
(Those headstrong uncles to the gentle king)
The third brother, Plain Thomas, the protector 240
Had quickly been removed, but since ’tis thus,
Our safeties must be cared for, and ’tis best
To keep us near the person of the king.
Had they been dead, we’d ruled the realm and him.
Bagot
So shall we still, so long as Richard lives.
I know he cannot brook his stubborn uncles.
Come, think not on it. Cheer thee, Tresilian,
Here’s better news for thee: we have so wrought
With kingly Richard, that by his consent
You are already mounted on your footcloth, 250
Your scarlet or your purple, which ye please,
And shortly are to underprop the name.
Mark me, Tresilian: of Lord Chief Justice of England.
Tresilian
Hmm, hmm, hmm. Legit or non legit, methinks
Already I sit upon the bench with dreadful frowns,
Frighting the lousy rascals, and when the jury once cries ‘guilty,’
Could pronounce ‘Lord have mercy on thee’ with a brow
As rough and stern as surly Rhadamanth; or when a fellow talks,
Cry, ‘Take him, jailer, clap bolts of iron on his heels and hands.’
Chief Justice—my lords! Hmm, hmm, hmm. I will wear the office 260
In his true ornament.
Greene
But good your honour, as it will shortly be,
You must observe and fashion to the time
The habit of your laws. The King is young,
Aye, and a little wanton, so perhaps are we;
Your laws must not be beadles then, Tresilian,
To punish your benefactors. Look to that.
Tresilian
How sir, to punish you? The minions to the King,
The jewels of his heart, his dearest loves?
Zounds, I will screw and wind the stubborn law 270
To any fashion that shall like you best.
It shall be law what I shall say is law,
And what’s most suitable to all your pleasures.
Bagot
Thanks to your Lordship which is yet to come!
Greene
Farewell, Tresilian. Still be near the court,
Anon King Richard shall confirm thy state.
We must attend his Grace to Westminster
To the high nuptials of fair Anne-a-Beame,
That must be now his wife and England’s Queen.
EXIT Greene and Bagot. MANET Tresilian.
Tresilian
So, let them pass, Tresilian, now bethink thee. 280
Hmm, ‘Lord Chief Justice’. Methinks already
I am swelled more plump than erst I was.
Authority’s a dish that feeds men fat,
An excellent delicate. Yet best be wise:
No state is secure without some enemies.
The Dukes will frown; why, I can look as grim
As John-of-Gaunt and all that frown with him.
But yet until mine office be put on
By kingly Richard, I’ll conceal myself:
Framing such subtle laws that, Janus-like, 290
May with a double face salute them both.
I’ll search my brain and turn the leaves of law.
Wit makes us great; greatness keeps fools in awe.
My man there, ho! Where’s Nimble?
ENTER Nimble
Nimble
As nimble as an eel, sir. Did ye call, sir?
Tresilian
‘Sir’! Look out some better phrase; salute again.
Nimble
I know no other, sir, unless you will be Frenchified, and let me lay
the monsieur to your charge, or sweet Seignior.
Tresilian
Neither, t’is higher yet. Nimble, thou buckram scribe: think once
again.
Nimble
Neither ‘sir’, nor ‘monsieur,’ nor ‘Signior’. What should I call him,
trow? 300
He is monstrously translated suddenly. At first when we were
schoolfellows,
then I called him ‘sirrah’, but since he became my master I pared
away the ‘a’ and served him with the ‘sir’. What title he has
got now, I know not, but I’ll try further.
Has your worship any employment for me?
Tresilian
Thou gross uncaput, no, thou speakest not yet.
Nimble
My mouth was open I’m sure, if your honour would please to hear me.
Tresilian
Ha! ‘Honour’, sayest thou? Ay, now thou hittest it, Nimble.
Nimble
I knew I should wind about ye till I had ‘Your Honour’.
Tresilian
Nimble, bend thy knee. 310
The Lord Chief Justice of England speaks to thee.
Nimble
The Lord be praised, we shall have a flourishing commonwealth, sir.
Tresilian
Peace, let me speak to thee.
Nimble
Yes, anything, so your honour pray not for me. I care not,
for now you are Lord Chief Justice, if ever ye cry, ‘Lord have
mercy’ upon me, I shall hang for’t, sure!
Tresilian
No. Those fearful words shall not be pronounced ’gainst thee, Nimble.
Nimble
Thank ye, my Lord. Nay, and you’ll stand between me and the gallows,
I’ll be an arrant thief, sure. If I cannot pick up my crumbs
by the law quickly, I’ll cast away my buckram bags 320
and be a highway lawyer now, certainly.
Tresilian
Canst thou remember, Nimble, how by degrees I rose, since first
thou knewst me. I was first a schoolboy—
Nimble
Ay, saving your honour’s speech, your worshipful tail was whipped
for stealing my dinner out of my satchel. You were ever
so crafty in your childhood, that I knew your worship would
prove a good lawyer.
Tresilian
Interrupt me not. Those days thou knewst, I say,
From whence I did become a plodding clerk,
From which I bounced as thou dost now, in buckram 330
To be a pleading lawyer (and there I stayed)
Till by the king I was Chief Justice made.
Nimble, I read this discipline to thee
To stir thy mind up still to industry.
Nimble
Thank your good Lordship.
Tresilian
Go to thy mistress — ‘lady’ you now must call her—
Bid her remove her household up to London.
Tell her our fortunes, and with how much peril
We have attained this place of eminence.
Go and remove her. 340
Nimble
With a habeas corpus or a surssararis, I assure ye.
And so I leave your Lordship, always hoping of your wonted favour,
that when I have passed the London Bridge of Affliction,
I may arrive with you at the Westminster hall of promotion,
and then I care not.
Tresilian
Thou shalt; thou hast an executing look,
And I will put the axe into thy hand.
I rule the law: thou by the law shalt stand.
Nimble
I thank your Lordship, and a fig for the rope then.
EXEUNT
Tom Reedy
Sound a sennet. ENTER in great state King Richard, Queen Anne, 350
crowned: Lancaster, York Arundel, Surrey, Greene, Bagot.
And Woodstock very brave; the Duchess of Gloucester and the Duchess
of Ireland.
King
Bagot and Greene, next to the fair Queen Anne
Take your high places, by King Richard's side
And give fair welcome to our Queen and bride.
Uncles of Woodstock, York, and Lancaster,
Make full our wishes, and salute our Queen;
Give all your welcomes to fair Anne o’ B’hem.
Lancaster
I hope, sweet prince, her Grace mistakes us not 360
To make our hearts the worser part of us,
Our tongues have in our English eloquence
(Harsh though it is) pronounced her welcomes many
By oaths and loyal protestations,
To which we add a thousand infinites.
But in a word, fair Queen, forever welcome.
Woodstock
Let me prevent the rest, for mercy's sake.
If all their welcomes be as long as thine,
This health will not go round this week, by the mass!
Sweet Queen, and cousin, now I’ll call you so, 370
In plain and honest phrase, welcome to England.
Think they speak all in me, and you have seen
All England cry with joy, ‘God bless the Queen’,
And so, afore my God, I know they wish it.
Only I fear my duty not misconstrued.
Nay, nay, King Richard, ’fore God I’ll speak the truth.
Sweet Queen, you’ve found a young and wanton choice,
A wild-head, yet a Kingly gentleman;
A youth unsettled; yet he is princely bred,
Descended from the royalest bloods in Europe, 380
The kingly stock of England and of France.
Yet he’s a hare-brain, a very wag, i’ faith,
But you must bear, madam. ’Las, he’s but a blossom,
But his maturity, I hope you’ll find,
True English bred, a king loving and kind.
King
I thank ye for your double praise, good uncle.
Woodstock
Ay, ay good cuz, I’m Plain Thomas, by the rood
I’ll speak the truth.
Queen
My sovereign Lord, and you true English peers
Your all-accomplished honours have so tied 390
My senses by a magical restraint
In the sweet spells of thi.s your fair demeanours,
That I am bound and charmed from what I was.
My native country I no more remember
But as a tale told in my infancy,
The greatest part forgot. And that which is
Appears to England’s fair Elysium
Like brambles to the cedars, coarse to fine,
Or like the wild grape to the fruitful vine.
And, having left the earth where I was bred
And English made, let me be Englished.
They best shall please me, shall me English call.
My heart, great King, to you; my love to all.
King
Gramercy, Nan, thou highly honourest me.
York
And blest is England in this sweet accord.
Woodstock
Afore my God, sweet Queen, our English ladies
And all the women that this isle contains
Shall sing in praise of this your memory
And keep records of virtuous Anne o’ B’hem.
Whose discipline hath taught them womanhood. 410
What erst seemed well by custom, now looks rude.
Our women, till your coming, fairest cousin
Did use, like men, to straddle when they ride,
But you have taught them now to sit aside.
Yet, by your leave, young practice often reels;
I have seen some of your scholars kick up both their heels.
Duchess of Gloucester
What have you seen, my Lord?
Woodstock
Nay, nay, nothing, wife.
I see little without spectacles, thou knowest.
King
Trust him not, Aunt, for now he is grown so brave, 420
He will be courting, ay, and kissing too.
Nay, Uncle! now I’ll do as much for you,
And lay your faults all open to the world!
Woodstock
Ay, ay, do, do.
King
I’m glad you are grown so careless: now by my crown
I swear, good Uncles, York and Lancaster,
When you this morning came to visit me
I did not know him in this strange attire.
How comes this golden metamorphosis
From homespun housewifery? Speak, good uncle; 430
I never saw you hatched and gilded thus.
Woodstock
I am no stoic, my dear sovereign cousin,
To make my plainness seem canonical,
But to allow myself such ornaments
As might be fitting for your nuptial day
And coronation of your virtuous queen.
But were the eye of day once closed again
Upon this back, they never more should come.
King
You have much graced the day. But noble uncle,
I did observe what I have wondered at. 440
As we today rode on to Westminster,
Methought your horse, that wont to tread the ground
And pace as if he kicked it scornfully
Mount and curvet like strong Bucephalus,
Today he trod as slow and melancholy
As if his legs had failed to bear his load.
Woodstock
And can ye blame the beast? Afore my God,
He was not wont to bear such loads. Indeed,
A hundred oaks upon these shoulders hang
To make me brave upon your wedding day. 450
And more than that, to make my horse more tire,
Ten acres of good land are stitched up here.
You know, good cuz, this was not wont to be.
King
In your t’other hose, uncle?
Greene
No, nor his frieze coat neither!
Woodstock
Ay, ay, mock on. My t’other hose, say ye?
There is honest plain dealing in my t’other hose.
Should this fashion last, I must raise new rents,
Undo my poor tenants, turn away my servants
And guard myself with lace; nay, sell more land 460
And lordships too, by th’rood. Hear me King Richard:
If thus I jet in pride, I still shall lose;
But I will build castles in my t’other hose.
Queen
The King but jests, my Lord; and you grow angry.
Woodstock
T’other hose! Did some here wear that fashion
They would not tax and pill the commons so!
York
S’foot, he forewarned us, and will break out himself.
Lancaster
No matter, we will back him though it grows to blows.
Woodstock
Scoff ye my plainness, I’ll talk no riddles, Plain Thomas
Will speak plainly: there is Bagot there and Greene . 470
Greene, Bagot
And what of them, my Lord?
Woodstock
Upstarts, come down, you have no places there;
Here’s better men to grace King Richard’s chair,
If’t pleased him grace them so.
King
Uncle, forbear.
Woodstock
These cuts the columns that should prop thy house.
They tax the poor, and I am scandaled for it
That by my fault those late oppressions rise
To set the commons in a mutiny
That London even itself was sacked by them. 480
And who did all these rank commotions point at?
Even at these two: Bagot here, and Greene,
With false Tresilian, whom, your grace, we hear
Hath made chief justice. Well, well, be it so.
Mischief on mischief sure will shortly flow.
Pardon my speech, my Lord. Since now we are all so
Brave to grace Queen Anne, this day we will spend in sport,
But in my t’other hose, I will tickle them for’t.
Greene
Come, come, ye dote, my Lord.
Lancaster
Dote, sir? Know ye to whom ye speak? 490
King
No more, good uncles. Come, sweet Greene, ha’ done.
I’ll wring them all for this, by England’s crown.
Why is our Lord Protector so outrageous?
Woodstock
Because thy subjects have such outrage shown them
By these thy flatterers. Let the sun dry up
What th’unwholesome fog hath choked the ground with.
Here’s Arundel, thy ocean’s admiral,
Hath brought thee home a rich and wealthy prize,
Ta’en three score sail of ships and six great carracks,
All richly laden. Let those goods be sold 500
To satisfy those borrowed sums of coin
Their pride hath forced from the needy commons,
To salve which inconvenience, I beseech your Grace
You would vouchsafe to let me have the sale
And distribution of those goods.
King
Our word, good uncle, is already passed,
Which cannot with our honour be recalled.
Those wealthy prizes already are bestowed
On these our friends.
All Lords
On them, my Lord? 510
King
Yes. Who storms at it?
Woodstock
Shall cankers eat the fruit
That planting and good husbandry hath nourished?
Greene, Bagot
Cankers!
York, Arundel
Ay, cankers! Caterpillars!
Lancaster
Worse than consuming fires
That eats up all their furies falls upon.
King
Once more, be still!
Who is’t that dares encounter with our will?
We did bestow them. Hear me, kind uncles, 520
We shall ere long be past protectorship,
Then will we rule our self. And even till then
We let ye know those gifts are given to them.
We did it, Woodstock.
Woodstock
Ye have done ill, then.
King
Ha, dare ye say so?
Woodstock
Dare I? Afore my God I’ll speak, King Richard,
Were I assured this day my head should off.
I tell ye sir, my allegiance stands excused
In justice of the cause. Ye have done ill. 530
The sun of mercy never shine on me
But I speak truth. When warlike Arundel,
Beset at sea, fought for those wealthy prizes,
He did with fame advance the English cross,
Still crying. ‘Courage, in King Richard’s name.’
For thee he won them, and do thou enjoy them,
He’ll fetch more honours home. But had he known
That kites should have enjoyed the eagle’s prize
The fraught had swum unto thine enemies.
King
So, sir, we’ll soothe your vexed spleen, good uncle, 540
And mend what is amiss. To those slight gifts
Not worth acceptance, thus much more we add:
Young Henry Greene shall be Lord Chancellor,
Bagot, Lord Keeper of our privy seal,
Tresilian, learned in our kingdom’s laws,
Shall be Chief Justice. By them and their directions,
King Richard will uphold his government.
Greene
Change no more words, my Lord. Ye do deject
Your Kingly majesty to speak to such
Whose home-spun judgments, like their frosty beards, 550
Would blast the blooming hopes of all your kingdom.
Were I as you, my Lord—
Queen
Oh, gentle Greene, throw no more fuel on,
But rather seek to mitigate this heat.
Be patient, kingly Richard, quench this ire.
Would I had tears of force to stint this fire!
King
Beshrew the churls that make my Queen so sad.
But by my grandsire Edward’s kingly bones,
My princely father’s tomb, King Richard swears
We’ll make them weep these wrongs in bloody tears. 560
Come, fair Queen Anne-a-Beame. Bagot and Greene,
Keep by King Richard’s side; but as for you,
We will shortly make your stiff obedience bow.
EXEUNT King and Queen
Bagot
Remember this, my Lords:
We keep the seal: our strength you all shall know.
EXIT Bagot
Greene
And we are chancellor, we love you well, think so.
EXIT Greene
York
God for his mercy! Shall we brook these braves,
Disgraced and threatened thus by fawning knaves?
Lancaster
Shall we that were great Edward’s princely sons
Be thus outbraved by flattering sycophants? 570
Woodstock
Afore my God and holy saints! I swear
But that my tongue hath liberty to show
The inly passions boiling in my breast,
I think my overburthened heart would break.
What then may we conjecture? What’s the cause
Of this remiss and inconsiderate dealing
Urged by the King and his confederates,
But hate to virtue, and a mind corrupt
With all preposterous rude misgovernment?
Lancaster
These prizes ta’en by warlike Arundel 580
Before his face are given those flatterers.
Surrey
It is his custom to be prodigal
To any but to those do best deserve.
Arundel
Because he knew you would bestow them well
He gave it such as for their private gain,
Neglect both honour and their country’s good.
WIND HORNS WITHIN
Lancaster
How now, what noise is this?
York
Some posts, it seems: pray heaven the news be good.
ENTER Cheyney
Woodstock
Amen. I pray, for England’s happiness.
Speak, speak, what tidings, Cheyney? 590
Cheyney
Of war, my Lord, and civil dissension:
The men of Kent and Essex do rebel.
Woodstock
I thought no less; and always feared as much.
Cheyney
The shireeves in post have sent unto your grace
That order be ta’en to stay the commons,
For fear rebellion rise in open arms.
Woodstock
Now, headstrong Richard, shalt thou reap the fruit
Thy lewd licentious wilfulness hath sown.
I know not which way to bestow myself.
York
There is no standing on delay, my Lords. 600
These hot eruptions must have some redress,
Or else in time they’ll grow incurable.
Woodstock
The commons, they rebel, and the King all careless.
Here’s wrong on wrong, to stir more mutiny.
Afore my God I know not what to do.
Lancaster
Take open arms. Join with the vexed commons
And hale his minions from his wanton side.
Their heads cut off, the peoples satisfied.
Woodstock
Not so, not so! Alack the day, good brother!
We may not so affright the tender prince. 610
We’ll bear us nobly, for the kingdom’s safety
And the King’s honour. Therefore list to me.
You, brother Gaunt, and noble Arundel
Shall undertake by threats or fair entreaty
To pacify the murmuring commons’ rage.
And whiles you there employ your service hours,
We presently will call a Parliament
And have their deeds examined thoroughly.
Where if by fair means we can win no favour
Nor make King Richard leave their companies, 620
We’ll thus resolve for our dear country’s good
To right her wrongs, or for it spend our bloods.
Lancaster
About it, then! We for the commons, you for the Court.
Woodstock
Ay, ay. Good Lancaster, I pray be careful.
Come, brother York, we soon shall right all wrong
And send some headless from the court ere long.
EXUENT omnes
conra...@gmail.com
> I've completed my transcription and conversion into modern language of
> the Malone Society Reprint, _The First Part of the Reign of King
> Richard the Second or Thomas of Woodstock_ (1929).
>
> I kept the lineation of the original throughout, even if it disrupted
> the verse. I also kept the Malone line numbering.
>
> I checked my emendations with Corbin and Sedge's _Thomas of Woodstock_
> (2002), but I kept mine when it disagreed with theirs, which was about
> half the time. Since my main interest was to produce a readable
> instead of a scholarly version, I do not show emedations of missing
> copy with square brackets.
Oo. Do you have a version which distinguishes between the source text
and the emendations, with square brackets or otherwise? I'd like to
be able to track what the original text is, especially since the idea
is to check for similarities to Shakespeare.
Conrad.
Tom Reedy
wrote:
That would be the Malone Society reprint of 1929, which you should be
able to find at a good university library or through Interlibrary
Loan.
The emendations are such a small percentage of the total that they
shouldn't affect your judgment about the authorship.
TR
Tom Reedy
Trumpets SOUND
ENTER King Richard, Greene, Bagot, Bushy, Scroope, Tresilian and
others.
King
Thus shall King Richard suit his princely train
Despite his uncle’s pride. Embrace us, gentlemen. 630
Sir Edward Bagot, Bushy, Greene and Scroope:
Your youths are fitting to our tender years
And such shall beautify our princely throne.
Fear not my uncles, nor their proudest strength
For I will buckler ye against them all.
Greene
Thanks, dearest Lord. Let me have Richard’s love,
And like a rock unmoved, my state shall stand
Scorning the proudest peer that rules the land.
Bushy
Your uncles seeks to overturn your state,
To awe ye like a child, that they alone 640
May at their pleasures thrust you from the throne.
Scroope
As if the sun were forced to decline
Before his dated time of darkness comes.
Bagot
Sweet King, set courage to authority,
and let them know the power of majesty.
Greene
May not the lion roar, because he is young?
What are your uncles but as elephants
That set their aged bodies to the oak?
You are the oak against whose stock they lean;
Fall from them once, and then destroy them ever. 650
Be thou no stay, King Richard, to their strength,
But as a tyrant unto tyranny,
And so confound them all eternally.
Tresilian
Law must extend unto severity
When subjects dare to brave their sovereign.
King
Tresilian, thou art Lord Chief Justice now.
Who should be learned in the laws but thee?
Resolve us, therefore, what thou thinkest of them
That under title of protectorship
Seek to subvert their King and sovereign. 660
Tresilian
As of the King’s rebellious enemies:
As underminers of his sacred state;
Which, in the greatest prince or mightiest peer
That is a subject to your majesty,
Is nothing less than treason capital,
And he a traitor that endeavours it.
King
Attaint them then, arrest them and condemn them.
Greene
Hale them to the block and cut off all their heads,
And then King Richard claim the government.
King
See it be done, Tresilian, speedily. 670
Tresilian
That course is all too rash, my gracious Lord.
All
Too rash for what?
Tresilian
It must be done with greater policy
For fear the people rise in mutiny.
King
Ay, there’s the fear: the commons love them well
And all applaud the wily Lancaster,
The counterfeit relenting Duke of York,
Together with our fretful uncle, Woodstock,
With greater reverence than King Richard’s self.
But time shall come when we shall yoke their necks 680
And make them bend to our obedience.
How now, what readest thou, Bushy?
Bushy
The monument of English chronicles,
Containing acts and memorable deeds
Of all your famous predecessor Kings.
King
What findest thou of them?
Bushy
Examples strange and wonderful, my Lord.
The end of treason even in mighty persons,
For here ’tis said your royal grandfather,
Although but young and under government, 690
Took the protector then, proud Mortimer,
And on a gallows fifty foot in height
He hung him for his pride and treachery.
King
Why should our proud protector then presume
And we not punish him, whose treason is vilder far
Than ever was rebellious Mortimer’s?
Prithee read on. Examples such as these
will bring us to our kingly grandsire’s spirit.
What’s next?
Bushy
The battle, full of dread and doubtful fear, 700
Was fought betwixt your father and the French.
King
Read on, we’ll hear it. 702
Bushy
Then the black prince, encouraging his soldiers, being in number but
7750, gave the onset to the French king’s puissant army, which were
numbered to 68000, and in one hour got the victory, slew 6000 of the
French soldiers, took prisoners of dukes, earls, knights and gentlemen
to the number 1700, and of the common sort 10000; so the prisoners
that were taken were twice so many as the Englishmen were in number.
Besides, the thrice-renowned prince took with his own hand King John
of France and his son prisoners. This was called the Battle of
Poitiers, and was fought on Monday the 19th of September, 1356, my
Lord.
King
A victory most strange and admirable. 713
Never was conquest got with such great odds.
Oh, princely Edward, had thy son such hap,
Such fortune and success to follow him,
His daring uncles and rebellious peers
Durst not control and govern as they do.
But these bright shining trophies shall awake me,
And as we are his body’s counterfeit, 720
So will we be the image of his mind
And die but we’ll attain his virtuous deeds.
What next ensues, good Bushy? Read the rest.
Bushy
Here is set down, my princely sovereign,
The certain time and day when you were born.
King
Our birthday, sayest thou? Is that noted there?
Bushy
It is, my Lord.
King
Prithee let me hear’t,
For thereby hangs a secret mystery
Which yet our uncle strangely keeps from us. 730
On, Bushy.
Bushy
Upon the 3rd of April, 1365, was Lord Richard,
Son to the Black Prince, born at Bordeaux.
King
Stay; let me think awhile. Read it again.
Bushy
Upon the 3rd of April, 1365, was Lord Richard,
Son to the Black Prince, born at Bordeaux.
King
1365? What year is this?
Greene
It is now, my lord, 1387.
King
By that account the 3rd of April next
Our age is numbered two-and-twenty years. 740
Oh, treacherous men that have deluded us!
We might have claimed our right a twelvemonth since!
Shut up thy book, good Bushy. Bagot, Greene,
King Richard in his throne will now be seen.
This day I’ll claim my right, my kingdom’s due.
Our uncles well shall know they but intrude,
For which we’ll smite their base ingratitude.
Bagot
Edmund of Langley, Duke of York, my Lord,
Sent from the lord protector and the peers,
Doth crave admittance to your royal presence. 750
King
Our uncle Edmund. So. Were it not he,
We would not speak with him, but go admit him.
Woodstock and Gaunt are stern and troublesome,
but York is gentle, mild and generous;
And therefore we admit his conference.
ENTER York
Bagot
He comes, my lord.
King
Methinks t’is strange, my good and reverent uncle,
You and the rest should thus malign against us,
And every hour with rude and bitter taunts
Abuse King Richard and his harmless friends. 760
We had a father that once called ye brother;
A grandsire, too, that titled you his son.
But could they see how you have wronged King Richard
Their ghosts would haunt ye and in dead of night
Fright all your quiet sleeps with horrid fears.
I pray, stand up, we honour reverend years
In meaner subjects. Good uncle, rise and tell us:
What further mischiefs are there now devised
To torture and afflict your sovereign with?
York
My royal lord, even by my birth I swear, 770
My father's tomb, and faith to heaven I owe,
Your uncles’ thoughts are all most honourable.
And to that end the good protector sends me
To certify your sacred majesty
The peers of England now are all assembled
To hold a Parliament at Westminster,
And humbly crave you highness would be there
To sit in council touching such affairs
As shall concern your country’s government.
King
Have they so soon procured a Parliament? 780
Without our knowledge too? T’is somewhat strange.
Yet say, good uncle, we will meet them straight.
York
The news to all will be most wished and welcome.
I take my leave, and to your grace I swear,
As I am subject loyal, just and true,
We will nothing do to hurt the realm nor you.
King
We shall believe you, uncle. Go attend him.
EXIT York
Yes, we will meet them, but with such intent
As shall dismiss their sudden Parliament
Till we be pleased to summon and direct it. 790
Come, sirs, to Westminster, attend our state.
This day shall make you ever fortunate.
The 3rd of April, Bushy, note the time,
Our age accomplished, crown and Kingdom is mine.
EXEUNT ALL
Tom Reedy
FLOURISH. ENTER Lancaster, Arundel, Surrey, Queen, Woodstock with
petitions and the mace and his Duchess, Duchess of Gloucester. York
meets them in haste.
Woodstock
Now, brother York, what says King Richard, ha?
York
His highness will be here immediately.
Woodstock
Go, cousin Surrey, greet the Parliament.
Tell them the king is coming, give these petitions 800
To the knights and burgesses of the lower house,
Sent from each several shire of all the Kingdom.
These copies I will keep and show his highness.
Pray make haste.
Surrey
I will, my lord.
EXIT Surrey
Queen
Pity King Richard’s youth, most reverent uncles,
And in your high proceedings gently use him.
Think of his tender years. What’s now amiss
His riper judgment shall make good and perfect
To you, and to the kingdom’s benefit. 810
York
Alack, sweet Queen. You and our lord the King
Have little cause to fear our just proceedings.
We’ll fall beneath his feet and bend our knees
So he cast off those hateful flatterers
That daily ruinate his state and kingdom.
Woodstock
Go in, sweet ladies, comfort one another.
This happy parliament shall make all even
And plant sure peace betwixt the King and realm.
Queen
May heaven direct your wisdoms to provide
For England’s honour and King Richard’s good. 820
York
Believe no less, sweet Queen. Attend her highness.
Flourish. EXEUNT Queen and Duchess
Arundel
The King is come, my lords.
Woodstock
Stand from the door then: make way, Cheyney.
SOUND a flourish. ENTER King Richard, Bagot, Bushy, Greene, Scroope
and others.
Greene
Yonder’s your uncles, my lord.
King
Ay, with our plain protector!
Full of complaints, sweet Greene, I’ll wage my crown.
Bagot
Give them fair words and smooth awhile.
The toils are pitched, and you may catch them quickly.
King
Why, how now, uncle. What, disrobed again 830
Of all your golden rich habiliments?
Woodstock
Ay, ay, good cuz, I’m now in my t’other hose.
I’m now myself, Plain Thomas, and by the rood
In these plain hose I’ll do the realm more good
Than these that pill the poor to jet in gold.
King
Nay, be not angry, uncle.
Woodstock
Be you then pleased, good cuz, to hear me speak
And view thy subjects’ sad petitions.
See here, King Richard, whilst thou livest at ease
Lulling thyself in nice security, 840
Thy wronged Kingdom’s in a mutiny.
From every province are the people come
With open mouths exclaiming on the wrongs
Thou and these upstarts have imposed on them.
Shame is deciphered on thy palace gate;
Confusion hangeth o’er thy wretched head.
Mischief is coming and in storms must fall:
Th’oppression of the poor, to heaven doth call.
King
Well, well, good uncle, these your bitter taunts
Against my friends and me will one day cease. 850
But what’s the reason you have sent for us?
Lancaster
To have your grace confirm this parliament
And set your hand to certain articles
Most needful for your state and kingdom’s quiet.
King
Where are those articles?
Arundel
The states and burgesses o’th’ parliament
Attend with duty to deliver them.
York
Please you ascend your throne. We’ll call them in.
King
We’ll ask a question first, and then we’ll see them.
For trust me, reverent uncles, we have sworn 860
We will not sit upon our royal throne
Until this question be resolved at full.
Reach me that paper, Bushy. Hear me, princes.
We had a strange petition here delivered us.
A poor man’s son, his father being deceased,
Gave him in charge unto a rich man’s hands
To keep him and the little land he had
Till he attained to one-and-twenty years.
The poor revenue amounts but to three crowns,
And yet the insatiate churl denies his right 870
And bars him of his fair inheritance.
Tell me, I pray: will not our English laws
Enforce this rich man to resign his due?
Woodstock
There is no let to bar it, gracious sovereign.
Afore my god, sweet prince, it joys my soul
To see your grace in person thus to judge his cause.
York
Such deeds as this will make King Richard shine
Above his famous predecessor kings
If thus he labour to establish right.
King
The poor man then had wrong, you all confess? 880
Woodstock
And shall have right, my liege, to quit his wrong.
King
Then, Woodstock, give us right, for we are wronged.
Thou art the rich, and we the poor man’s son.
The realms of England, France, and Ireland
Are those three crowns thou yearly keepst from us.
Is’t not a wrong when every mean man’s son
May take his birthright at the time expired,
And we, the principal, being now attained
Almost to two-and-twenty years of age
Cannot be suffered to enjoy our own 890
Nor peaceably possess our father's right?
Woodstock
Was this the trick, sweet prince? Alack the day!
You need not thus have doubled with your friends.
The right I hold, even with my heart I render
And wish your grace had claimed it long ago.
Thou’dst rid mine age of mickle care and woe,
And yet I think I have not wronged your birthright:
For if the times were searched, I guess your grace
Is not so full of years till April next.
But be it as it will. Lo, here, King Richard, 900
I thus yield up my sad protectorship:
A heavy burthen hast thou ta’en from me.
Long mayst thou live in peace and keep thine own
That truth and justice may attend thy throne.
GIVES the mace up
King
Then in the name of heaven we thus ascend it,
And here we claim our fair inheritance
Of fruitful England, France, and Ireland,
Superior Lord of Scotland; and the rights
Belonging to our great dominions.
Here, uncles, take the crown from Richard’s hand 910
And once more place it on our Kingly head.
This day we will be new enthronished.
Woodstock
With all our hearts, my lord. Trumpets, be ready.
A Flourish
All
Long live King Richard, of that name the second,
The sovereign lord of England’s ancient rights!
King
We thank ye all. So now we feel our self.
Our body could not fill this chair till now,
T’was scanted to us by protectorship.
But now we let ye know King Richard rules
And will elect and choose, place and displace 920
Such officers as we our self shall like of.
And first, my lords, because your age is such
As pity ’twere, ye should be further pressed
With weighty business of the common weal.
We here dismiss ye from the council table
And will that you remain not in our court.
Deliver up your staves, and hear ye, Arundel:
We do discharge ye of the admiralty.
Scroope, take his office and his place in council.
Scroope
I thank your highness. 930
York
Here, take my staff, good cousin. York thus leaves thee.
Thou leanst on staves that will at length deceive thee.
Lancaster
There lie the burthen of old Lancaster,
And may he perish that succeeds my place!
King
So, sir, we will observe your humour.
Sir Henry Greene succeed our uncle York,
And Bushy take the staff of Lancaster.
Bushy
I thank your grace: his curses frights not me.
I’ll keep it to defend your majesty.
Woodstock
What transformation do mine eyes behold 940
As if the world were topsy-turvy turned!
Hear me, King Richard.
King
Plain Thomas, I’ll not hear ye.
Greene
Ye do not well to move his majesty.
Woodstock
Hence, flatterer, or by my soul I’ll kill thee!
Shall England, that so long was governed
By grave experience of white-headed age,
Be subject now to rash unskilful boys?
Then force the sun run backward to the east,
Lay Atlas’ burthen on a pigmy’s back, 950
Appoint the sea his times to ebb and flow;
And that as easily may be done as this.
King
Give up your council staff, we’ll hear no more.
Woodstock
My staff, King Richard? See, cuz, here it is.
Full ten years’ space within a prince’s hand,
A soldier and a faithful councillor,
This staff hath always been discreetly kept.
Nor shall the world report an upstart groom
Did glory in the honours Woodstock lost.
And therefore, Richard, thus I sever it. 960
There let him take it, shivered, cracked and broke
As will the state of England be ere long
By this rejecting true nobility.
Farewell, King Richard, I’ll to Plashy. Brothers,
If ye ride through Essex, call and see me.
If once the pillars and supporters quail
How can the strongest castle choose but fail?
All lords
And so will he ere long. Come, come, let us leave them.
EXEUNT the lords.
Bushy
Ay, ay, your places are supplied sufficiently.
Scroope
Old doting graybeards, ’fore God, my lord, had they not 970
been your uncles, I’ll broke my council staff about their heads.
Greene
We’ll have an act for this: it shall be henceforth counted high
treason
for any fellow with a gray beard to come within forty foot of the
court gates.
Bagot
Ay, or a great-bellied doublet. We’ll alter the kingdom presently.
Greene
Pox on’t, we’ll not have a beard amongst us, we’ll shave the
country and the city too, shall we not, Richard?
King
Do what ye will, we’ll shield and buckler ye,
We’ll have a guard of archers to attend us.
And they shall daily wait on us and you. 980
Send proclamations straight in Richard’s name
T’abridge the laws our late protector made.
Let some be sent to seek Tresilian forth.
Bagot
Seek him? Hang him, he lurks not far off I warrant,
and this news come abroad once, ye shall have him here presently.
King
Would he were come. His counsel would direct you well.
Greene
Troth, I think I shall trouble myself but with a few counselors.
What cheer shall we have to dinner, King Richard?
King
No matter what today. We’ll mend it shortly.
The hall at Westminster shall be enlarged 990
And only serve us for a dining room,
Wherein I’ll daily feast ten thousand men.
Greene
An excellent device. The commons have murmured against us
a great while, and there is no such means as meat to stop their
mouths.
Scroope
’Sfoot, make their gate wider, let’s first fetch their money
and bid them to dinner afterwards.
Greene
’Sblood, and I were not a councillor, I could find in myself
to dine at a tavern today, sweet King.
Shall’s be merry?
Scroope
We must have money to buy new suits, my lord. 1000
The fashion that we wear are gross and stale,
We’ll go sit in council to devise some new.
All
A special purpose to be thought upon! It shall be the first thing
we’ll do.
King
Come, wantons, come. If Gloucester hear of this
He’ll say our council guides us much amiss.
Dismiss the parliament our uncles called
And tell the peers it is our present pleasure
That each man parts unto his several home.
When we are pleased, they shall have summons sent,
And with King Richard hold a parliament. Set forward. 1010
Greene
You of the council, march before the King;
I will support his arm.
King
Gramercy, Greene.
Trumpets SOUND. EXEUNT omnes.
Tom Reedy
ENTER the Queen, the Duchess of Gloucester, the Duchess of Ireland and
other maids with shirts and bands and other linen.
Queen
Tell me, dear aunt, has Richard so forgot
The types of honour and nobility
So to disgrace his good and reverent uncles?
Duchess of Gloucester
Madam, it is true. No sooner had he claimed
The full possession of his government 1020
But my dear husband and his noble brethren
Were all dismissed from the council table,
Banished the court, and even before their faces
Their offices bestowed on several grooms.
Duchess of Ireland
My husband Ireland, that unloving lord
(God pardon his amiss, he now is dead)
King Richard was the cause he left my bed.
Queen
No more, good cousin. Could I work the means,
He should not so disgrace his dearest friends.
Alack the day! Though I am England’s queen 1030
I meet sad hours and wake when others sleep.
He meets content, but care with me must keep.
Distressed poverty overspreads the Kingdom.
In Essex, Surrey, Kent and Middlesex
Are seventeen thousand poor and indigent
Which I have numbered; and to help their wants
My jewels and my plate are turned to coin
And shared amongst them. Oh riotous Richard,
A heavy blame is thine for this distress,
That dost allow thy polling flatterers 1040
To gild themselves with others’ miseries.
Duchess of Gloucester
Wrong not yourself with sorrow, gentle queen,
Unless that sorrow were a helping means
To cure the malady you sorrow for.
Queen
The sighs I vent are not mine own, dear aunt.
I do not sorrow in mine own behalf
Nor now repent with peevish frowardness
And wish I ne’er had seen this English shore,
but think me happy in King Richard’s love.
No, no, good aunt, this troubles not my soul, 1050
’Tis England’s subjects’ sorrow I sustain,
I fear they grudge against their sovereign.
Duchess of Gloucester
Fear not that, madam, England’s not mutinous;
’Tis peopled all with subjects, not with outlaws.
Though Richard, much misled by flatterers,
Neglects and throws his sceptre carelessly,
Yet none dares rob him of his kingly rule.
Duchess of Ireland
Besides, your virtuous charity, fair Queen,
So graciously hath won the common’s love
As only you have power to stay their rigour. 1060
Queen
The wealth I have shall be the poor’s revenue
as sure as ’twere confirmed by Parliament.
This mine own industry, and sixty more
I daily keep at work, is all their own.
The coin I have, I send them. Would ’twere more!
To satisfy my fears, or pay those sums
My wanton lord hath forced from needy subjects,
I’d want myself. Go, let those trunks be filled
With those our labours to relieve the poor.
Let them be carefully distributed. 1070
For those that now shall want, we’ll work again,
And tell them ere two days we shall be furnished.
ENTER Cheyney
Cheyney
What, is the court removing? Whither goes that trunk?
Maid
’Tis the Queen’s charity, sir, of needful clothing
To be distributed amongst the poor.
Cheyney
Why, there’s one blessing yet, that England hath
A virtuous Queen, although a wanton King.
Good health, sweet princess. Believe me, madam,
You have quick utterance for your huswifery.
Your grace affords good pennyworths sure, ye sell so fast. 1080
Pray heaven your gettings quit your swift return.
Queen
Amen; for ’tis from heaven I look for recompense.
Cheyney
No doubt, fair Queen, the righteous powers will quit you
For these religious deeds of charity.
But to my message: my lord the Duke
Entreats your grace prepare with him to horse.
He will this night ride home to Plashy House.
Duchess of Gloucester
Madam, ye hear I’m sent for.
Queen
Then begone.
Leave me alone in desolation. 1090
Duchess of Ireland
Adieu, good aunt, I’ll see ye shortly there.
King Richard’s kindred are not welcome here.
Queen
Will ye all leave me then? Oh woe is me,
I now am crowned a Queen of misery.
Duchess of Gloucester
Where didst thou leave my husband, Cheyney? Speak!
Cheyney
Accompanied with the Dukes of York and Lancaster
Who, as I guess, intend to ride with him,
For which he wished me haste your grace's presence.
Duchess of Gloucester
Thou seest the passions of the Queen are such
I may not too abruptly leave her highness; 1100
But tell my lord I’ll see him presently.
Queen
Sawst thou King Richard, Cheyney? Prithee, tell me,
What revels keeps his flattering minions?
Cheyney
They sit in council to devise strange fashions,
And suit themselves in wild and antic habits
Such as this kingdom never yet beheld:
French hose, Italian cloaks, and Spanish hats,
Polonian shoes with peaks a handful long
Tied to their knees with chains of pearl and gold.
Their plumed tops fly waving in the air 1110
A cubit high above their wanton heads.
Tresilian with King Richard likewise sits
Devising taxes, and strange shifts for money
To build again the hall at Westminster
To feast and revel in; and when abroad they come,
Four hundred archers in a guard attends them.
Queen
Oh, certain ruin of this famous kingdom!
Fond Richard, thou buildest a hall to feast in
And starvest thy wretched subjects to erect it.
Woe to those men that thus incline thy soul 1120
To these remorseless acts and deeds so foul.
A flourish
Duchess of Gloucester
The trumpets tell us that King Richard’s coming.
I’ll take my leave, fair Queen, but credit me;
Ere many days, again I’ll visit ye.
Duchess of Ireland
I’ll home to Langley, with my uncle York,
And there lament alone my wretched state.
EXEUNT both the Duchesses
Queen
Blest heaven conduct ye both. Queen Anne alone
For Richard’s follies still must sigh and groan.
EXIT Queen
Tom Reedy
> Act 2 Scene 1
<snip>
> Greene
> Thanks, dearest Lord. Let me have Richard’s love,
> And like a rock unmoved, my state shall stand
> Scorning the proudest peer that rules the land.
>
> Bushy
> Your uncles seeks to overturn your state,
> To awe ye like a child, that they alone 640
> May at their pleasures thrust you from the throne.
>
> Scroope
> As if the sun were forced to decline
> Before his dated time of darkness comes.
>
> Bagot
> Sweet King, set courage to authority,
> and let them know the power of majesty.
>
> Greene
> May not the lion roar, because he is young?
> What are your uncles but as elephants
> That set their aged bodies to the oak?
> You are the oak against whose stock they lean;
> Fall from them once, and then destroy them ever. 650
> Be thou no stay, King Richard, to their strength,
> But as a tyrant unto tyranny,
> And so confound them all eternally.
<snip>
Does this remind anyone else besides me of the munchkin scene in
Wizard of Oz?
Munchkin #1
We thank you very sweetly, for doing it so neatly.
Munchkin #2
You've killed her so completely, that we thank you very sweetly.
Glinda
Let the joyous news be spread, The Wicked Old Witch at last is dead!
Mayor
As Mayor of the Munchkin City, In the County of the Land of Oz, I
welcome you most regally.
Barrister
But we've got to verify it legally, to see
Mayor
To see?
Barrister
If she
Mayor
If she?
Barrister
Is morally, ethic'lly
Father No.1
Spiritually, physically
Father No. 2
Positively, absolutely
Munchkins
Undeniably and reliably Dead
Coroner
As Coroner I must aver, I thoroughly examined her. And she's not only
merely dead, she's really most sincerely dead.
Mayor
Then this is a day of Independence For all the Munchkins and their
descendants
Barrister
If any.
Mayor
Yes, let the joyous news be spread The wicked Old Witch at last is
dead!
TR
conra...@gmail.com
Some first impressions:
> York
> God for thy mercy! Would our cousin King
> So cuzen us, to poison us in our meat?
Seems kinda rough for Shakespeare.
> Lancaster
> Has no man here some helping antidote?
> For fear already we have ta’en some dram.
> What thinkest thou Cheyney, thou first broughtst the tidings.
> Are we not poisoned, thinkest thou?
>
> Cheyney
> Fear not, my Lords.
> That mischievous potion was as yet unserved. 20
> It was a liquid bane, dissolved in wine,
> Which after supper should have been caroused
> To young King Richard’s health.
It seems to me that Shakespeare wouldn't resolve this question without
first introducing a new conflict.
Conrad.
Tom Reedy
SOUND a sennet. ENTER King Richard, Bagot, Bushy, Greene and Scroope,
very richly attired in new fashions, and Treslian whispering with the
King. 1130
A guard of archers after them.
King
Come, my Tresilian.
Thus like an emperor shall King Richard reign,
And you, so many kings attendant on him.
Our guard of archers, keep the doors, I charge ye;
Let no man enter to disturb our pleasures.
Thou told’st me, kind Tresilian, thou’dst devised
Blank charters to fill up our treasury,
Opening the chests of hoarding cormorants
That laugh to see their Kingly sovereign lack. 1140
Let’s know the means we may applaud thy wit.
Tresilian
See here, my lord: only with parchment, innocent sheepskins.
Ye see here’s no fraud, no clause, no deceit in the writing.
All
Why, there’s nothing writ!
Tresilian
There’s the trick on’t!
These blank charters shall be forthwith sent
To every shrieve through all the shires of England,
With charge to call before them presently
All landed men, freeholders, farmers, grasiers,
Or any else that have ability. 1150
Then in your highness’ name they shall be charged
To set their names and forthwith seal these blanks.
That done, these shall return to court again,
But cartloads of money soon shall follow them.
Scroope
Excellent Tresilian!
Bushy
Noble lord chief justice!
Bagot
Where should his grace get such a councillor!
Greene
Not if his beard were off! Prithee Tresilian, off with it.
’Sfoot, thou seest we have not a beard amongst us!
Thou send’st our barbers there to poll the whole country. 1160
’Sfoot, let some shave thee!
Bushy
’Twould become thee better i’faith, and make thee
look more grim when thou sit’st in judgment.
Tresilian
I tell ye, gallants: I will not lose a hair of my lordship
and King Richard’s favour for the Pope’s revenues.
ENTER the Queen
Greene
By your leave there, give way to the Queen!
King
Now, Anne-a-Beame, how cheers my dearest Queen?
Is’t holiday, my love? Believe me, lords,
’Tis strange to take her from her sempstery;
She and her maids are all for housewif’ry. 1170
Shalt work no more, sweet nan, now Richard’s King,
And peer and people all shall stoop to him.
We’ll have no more protecting uncles, trust me.
Prithee look smooth and bid these nobles welcome.
Queen
Whom my lord favours must to me be welcome.
King
These are our councillors, I tell ye, lady,
And these shall better grace King Richard’s court
Than all the doting heads that late controlled us.
Thou seest already we begin to alter
The vulgar fashions of our homespun kingdom. 1180
I tell thee, Nan, the states of Christendom
Shall wonder at our English royalty.
We held a council to devise these suits—
Sir Henry Greene devised this fashion shoe,
Bushy this peak; Bagot and Scroope set forth
This kind coherence twixt the toe and knee
To have them chained together lovingly;
And we as sovereign did confirm them all.
Suit they not quaintly, Nan? Sweet Queen, resolve me.
Queen
I see no fault that I dare call a fault. 1190
But would your grace consider with advice
What you have done unto your reverent uncles?
(My fears provoke me to be bold, my Lord)
They are your noble kinsmen, to revoke the sentence were—
King
An act of folly, Nan. King’s words are laws.
If we infringe our word, we break our law.
No more of them, sweet Queen.
Tresilian
Madam, what’s done was with advice enough.
The king is now at years and hath shook off
The servile yoke of mean protectorship. 1200
Bushy
His highness can direct himself sufficient.
Why should his pleasures then be curbed by any,
As if he did not understand his state?
King
They tell thee true, sweet love. Come ride with me
And see today my hall at Westminster,
Which we have builded now to feast our friends.
Greene
Do, do, good madam. Prithee sweet king, let’s ride somewhither
an’ it be but to show ourselves. ’Sfoot, our devices here are like
jewels kept in caskets, or good faces in masks, that grace not
the owners because they’re obscured. If our fashions be not
published, 1210
what glory’s in the wearing?
King
We’ll ride through London only to be gazed at.
Fair Anne-a-Beame, you shall, along with us,
At Westminster shalt see my sumptuous hall,
My royal tables richly furnished
Where every day I feast ten thousand men;
To furnish out which feast I daily spend
Thirty fat oxen and three hundred sheep,
With fish and fowl in numbers numberless.
Not all our chronicles shall point a King 1220
To match our bounty, state, and royalty.
Or let all our successors yet to come
Strive to exceed me, and if they forbid it,
Let records say, only King Richard did it.
Queen
Oh but, my lord, it will tire your revenues
To keep this festival a year together.
King
As many days as I writ England’s king,
We will maintain that bounteous festival.
Tresilian, look to your blank charters speedily,
Send them abroad with trusty officers. 1230
And Bagot, see a messenger be sent
To call our uncle Woodstock home to the court.
Not that we love his meddling company,
But that the raged commons loves his plainness
And should grow mutinous about these blanks,
We’ll have him near us. Within his arrow’s length,
We stand secure; we can restrain his strength.
See it be done. Come, Anne, to our great hall
Where Richard keeps his gorgeous festival.
Trumpets SOUND.
EXEUNT
MANET Tresilian 1240
Tresilian
Within there, ho!
ENTER Crosby and Fleming
Crosby
Your lordship’s pleasure.
Tresilian
What, are those blanks dispatched?
Fleming
They are all trussed up, my lord, in several packets.
Tresilian
Where’s Nimble? Where is that varlet?
ENTER Nimble
Nimble
As nimble as a Morris dancer, now my bells are on.
How do ye like the rattling of my chains, my lord?
Tresilian
Oh, villain, thou wilt hang in chains for this.
Art thou crept into the court fashion, knave?
Nimble
Alas, my lord, ye know I have followed your lordship without 1250
ever a rag since ye run away from the court once; and I pray,
let me follow the fashion a little, to show myself a courtier.
Tresilian
Go spread those several blanks throughout the kingdom,
and here’s commission with the council’s hands
with charge to every shrieve and officer,
to assist and aid you. And when they’re sealed and signed,
see ye note well such men’s ability
as set their hands to them. Inquire what rents,
what lands, or what revenues they spend by the year,
and let me straight receive intelligence. 1260
Besides, I’d have you use yourselves so cunningly
to mark who grudges, or but speaks amiss
of good King Richard, myself, or any of his new councillors.
Attach them all for privy whisperers,
and send them up. I have a trick in law
shall make King Richard seize into his hands
the forfeiture of all their goods and lands. Nimble,
take thou these blanks, and see you take especial note of them.
Nimble
I’ll take the ditty, sir, but you shall set a note to’t, for if any
man shall speak but an ill word of anything that’s written here— 1270
Tresilian
Why, ass, there’s nothing.
Nimble
And would ye have them speak ill of nothing? That’s strange.
But I mean, my lord, if they should but give this paper an ill word,
as to say, ‘I will tear this paper’, or worse, ‘I will rend this
paper’,
or fouler words than that, as to say, ‘I will bumfiddle your paper’.
If there be any such, I have a black book for them, my lord,
I warrant ye.
Tresilian
Be it your greatest care to be severe.
Crosby and Fleming, pray be diligent.
Crosby
We shall, my lord. 1280
Nimble
But how if we meet with some ignoramus fellows, my lord,
that cannot write their minds. What shall they do?
Tresilian
If they but set to their marks, ’tis good.
Nimble
We shall meddle with no women in the blanks, shall we?
Tresilian
Rich widows, none else; for a widow is as much as man and wife.
Nimble
Then a widow is a hermaphrodite, both cut and long tail.
And if she cannot write, she shall set her mark to it?
Tresilian
What else, sir?
Nimble
But if she have a daughter, she shall set her mother’s mark to’t?
Tresilian
Meddle with none but men and widows, sir, I charge ye. 1290
Nimble
Well sir, I shall see a widow’s mark then: I ne’er saw none yet!
Tresilian
You have your lessons perfect, now begone:
Be bold and swift in execution.
EXIT Tresilian
Nimble
God b’ye, my lord. We will domineer over the vulgar like
so many Saint Georges over the poor dragons. Come, sirs,
we are like to have a flourishing commonwealth, i’faith!
EXEUNT
Tom Reedy
ENTER Woodstock, Lancaster and York, at Plashy.
Woodstock
Come, my good brothers, here at Plashy House
I’ll bid you welcome with as true a heart
As Richard, with a false, and mind corrupt, 1300
Disgraced our names and thrust us from his court.
Lancaster
Beshrew him that repines, my lord, for me.
I lived with care at court; I now am free.
York
Come, come, let’s find some other talk; I think Not on it.
I ne’er slept soundly when I was amongst them,
So let them go. This house of Plashy, brother,
Stands in a sweet and pleasant air, i’faith.
’Tis near the Thames and circled round with trees
That in the summer serve for pleasant fans
To cool ye, and in winter strongly break 1310
The stormy winds that else would nip ye too.
Woodstock
And in faith, old York,
We have all need of some kind wintering.
We are beset, heaven shield, with many storms.
And yet these trees at length will prove to me
Like Richard and his riotous minions:
Their wanton heads so oft play with the winds,
Throwing their leaves so prodigally down,
They’ll leave me cold at last; and so will they
Make England wretched; and, in the end, themselves. 1320
Lancaster
If Westminster Hall devour as it has begun
’Twere better it were ruined lime and stone.
Woodstock
Afore my God, I late was certified
That at one feast was served ten thousand dishes.
York
He daily feasts, they say, ten thousand men,
And every man must have his dish, at least.
Woodstock
Thirty fat oxen and three hundred sheep serve but one day’s expenses.
Lancaster
A hundred scarcely can suffice his guard.
A camp of soldiers feeds not like those bowmen.
Woodstock
But how will these expenses be maintained? 1330
York
Oh, they say there are strange tricks come forth
To fetch in money. What they are, I know not.
Woodstock
You’ve heard of the fantastic suits they wear.
Never was English king so habited.
Lancaster
We could allow his clothing, brother Woodstock,
But we have four kings more are equalled with him.
There’s Bagot, Bushy, wanton Greene and Scroope,
In state and fashion, without difference.
York
Indeed, they’re more than kings; for they rule him.
Woodstock
Come, come, our breaths reverberate the wind. 1340
We talk like good divines, but cannot cure
The grossness of the sin. Or shall we speak
Like all-commanding wise astronomers,
And flatly say, such a day shall be fair,
And yet it rains, whether he will or no.
So may we talk; but thus will Richard do.
ENTER Cheyney, with blanks
Lancaster
How now, Cheyney, what drives thee on so fast?
Cheyney
If I durst, I would say, my lord,
Tresilian drives me. One half as ill,
I’m still the pursuivant of unhappy news. 1350
Here’s blank charters, my lord. I pray behold them,
Sent from King Richard and his councillors.
Woodstock
Thou mak’st me blank at very sight of them!
What must these?
Lancaster
They appear in shape of obligations.
Cheyney
They are no less; the country’s full of them.
Commissions are come down to every shrieve
To force the richest subjects of the land
To set their hands, and forthwith seal these blanks.
And then the bond must afterwards be paid
That shall confirm a due debt to the king, 1360
As much or little as they please to ’point it.
Lancaster
Oh, strange unheard-of vild taxation!
Woodstock
Who is’t can help my memory a little?
Has not this e’er been held a principle:
‘There’s nothing spoke or done that has not been?’
York
It was a maxim ere I had a beard.
Woodstock
’Tis now found false, an open heresy;
This is a thing was never spoke nor done.
Blank charters, call ye them? If any age
Keep but a record of this policy— 1370
I phrase it too, too well—flat villainy,
Let me be chronicled apostata,
Rebellious to my God and country both!
Lancaster
How do the people entertain these blanks?
Cheyney
With much dislike, yet some for fear have signed them,
Others there be refuse and murmur strongly.
Woodstock
Afore my God, I cannot blame them for it;
He might as well have sent defiance to them.
Oh, vulture England, wilt thou eat thine own?
Can they be rebels called, that now turn head? 1380
I speak but what I fear, not what I wish.
This foul oppression will withdraw all duty,
And in the commons’ hearts, hot rancours breed,
To make our country’s bosom shortly bleed.
Lancaster
What shall we do to seek for remedy?
York
Let each man hie him to his several home
Before the people rise in mutiny,
And, in the mildest part of lenity,
Seek to restrain them from rebellion.
For what can else be looked for? Promise redress, 1390
That eloquence is best in this distress.
Lancaster
York counsels well. Let’s haste away.
The time is sick; we must not use delay.
York
Let’s still confer by letters.
Woodstock
Content, content,
So friends may parley, even in banishment.
Farewell, good brothers. Cheyney, conduct them forth.
EXEUNT all but Woodstock
Adieu, good York and Gaunt, farewell forever.
I have a sad presage comes suddenly
That I shall never see these brothers more. 1400
On earth, I fear, we never more shall meet.
Of Edward the Third’s seven sons, we three are left
To see our father’s kingdom ruinate.
I would my death might end the misery;
My fear presageth to my wretched country.
The commons will rebel without all question,
And before my God, I have no eloquence
To stay this uproar. I must tell them plain
We all are struck, but must not strike again.
ENTER a servant
How now? What news? 1410
Servant
There’s a horseman at the gate, my lord.
He comes from the king, he says, to see your grace.
Woodstock
To see me, say’st thou? A’ God’s name, let him come,
He brings no blank charters with him.
Prithee, bid him ’light and enter.
Servant
I think he dares not for fouling on his feet, my lord,
I would have had him ’light, but he swears as he’s a courtier,
he will not off on’s horseback till the inner gate be open.
Woodstock
Passion of me, that is strange. I prithee, give him
satisfaction, open the inner gate. What might this fellow be? 1420
Servant
Some fine fool: he’s attired very fantastically,
and talks as foolishly.
Woodstock
Go let him in, and when your have done, bid Cheyney come and speak
with me.
Servant
I will, my lord.
ENTER a spruce courtier on horseback
Come on, sir, ye may ride into my lord’s cellar now, and ye will sir.
Courtier
Prithee, fellow, stay and take my horse.
Servant
I have business for my lord, sir, I cannot.
EXIT servant
Courtier
A rude swain, by heaven, but stay, here walks another.
Hear’st ta thou, fellow. Is this Plashy House?
Woodstock
Ye should have asked that question before ye came in, sir. But this is
it. 1430
Courtier
The hinds are all most rude and gross. I prithee, walk my horse.
Woodstock
I have a little business, sir.
Courtier
Thou shalt not lose by’t. I’ll give thee a tester for thy pains.
Woodstock
I shall be glad to earn money, sir.
Courtier
Prithee, do, and know thy duty. Thy head’s too saucy.
Woodstock
Cry ye mercy, I did not understand your worship’s calling.
Courtier
The Duke of Gloucester lies here, does he not?
Woodstock
Marry, does he, sir.
Courtier
Is he within?
Woodstock
He’s not far off, sir. He was here even now. 1440
Courtier
Ah, very good, walk my horse well, I prithee, he’s travelled hard
and he’s hot i’faith. I’ll in and speak with the Duke, and pay thee
presently.
Woodstock
I make no doubt sir.
EXIT courtier
Oh, strange metamorphosis!
Is’t possible that this fellow that’s all made of fashions
should be an Englishman? No marvel if he know not me,
being so brave, and I so beggarly.
Well, I shall earn money to enrich me now,
and t’is the first I earned, by th’rood, this forty year.
Come on, sir, you have sweat hard about this haste,
yet I think you know little of the business. Why, so I say, 1450
you’re a very indifferent beast, you’ll follow any man that will lead
you.
Now, truly, sir, you look but e’en leanly on’t. You feed not
in Westminster hall a-days where so many sheep and oxen are devoured.
I’m afraid they’ll eat you shortly, if you tarry amongst them.
You’re pricked more with the spur than the provender, I see that.
I think your dwelling be at Hackney when you’re at home, is’t not?
You know not the Duke neither, no more than your master,
and yet I think you have as much wit as he. Faith, say a man
should steal ye and feed ye fatter, could ye run away with him
lustily?
Ah, your silence argues a consent, I see, by th’mass. 1460
Here comes company; we had been both taken if we had, I see.
ENTER Cheyney, courtier, and servants
Cheyney
Saw ye not my lord at the gate, say ye?
Why, I left him there but now.
Courtier
In sooth I saw no creature, sir, only an old groom
I got to walk my horse.
Cheyney
A groom, say ye! ’Sfoot, t’is my lord, the Duke. What have ye done?
This is somewhat too coarse, your grace should be an hostler to this
fellow!
Courtier
I do beseech your grace's pardon. The error was in the mistake;
your plainness did deceive me. Please it your grace to redeliver.
Woodstock
No, by my faith. I’ll have my money first. Promise is a promise. 1470
Courtier
I know your grace’s goodness will refuse it.
Woodstock
Think not so nicely of me; indeed, I will not.
Courtier
If so you please, there is your tester.
Woodstock
If so you please, there is your horse, sir.
Now pray you tell me is your haste to me.
Courtier
Most swift and serious from his majesty.
Woodstock
What, from King Richard, my dear lord and kinsman? Go, sirrah,
take you his horse, lead him to the stable, meat him well.
I’ll double his reward; there’s twelve pence for ye.
Servant
I thank your grace. 1480
EXIT servant with the horse
Woodstock
Now, sir, your business.
Courtier
His majesty commends him to your grace.
Woodstock
This same’s a rare fashion you have got at court.
Of whose devising was’t, I pray?
Courtier
I assure your grace, the king his council
sat three days about it.
Woodstock
By my faith, their wisdoms took great pains, I assure ye.
The state was well employed the whiles, by th’rood.
Then this at court is all the fashion now?
Courtier
The king himself doth wear it; 1490
Whose most gracious majesty sent me in haste.
Woodstock
This peak doth strangely well become the foot.
Courtier
This peak, the king doth likewise wear, being a Polonian peak;
and me did his highness pick from forth the rest.
Woodstock
He could not have picked out such another, I assure ye.
Courtier
I thank your grace, that picks me out so well.
But as I said, his highness would request—
Woodstock
But this most fashionable chain, that links, as it were,
the toe and knee together—
Courtier
In a most kind coherence, so it like your grace; 1500
for these two parts, being in operation and quality different,
as for example: the toe a disdainer or spurner;
the knee a dutiful and most humble orator.
This chain doth, as it were, so toeify the knee,
and so kneeify the toe, that between both
it makes a most methodical coherence, or coherent method.
Woodstock
’Tis most excellent, sir, and full of art. Please ye walk in.
Courtier
My message tendered, I will tend your grace.
Woodstock
Cry ye mercy, have you a message to me?
Courtier
His majesty, most affectionately, and like a royal kinsman, 1510
entreats your grace’s presence at the court.
Woodstock
Is that your message, sir? I must refuse it, then.
My English plainness will not suit that place;
The court’s too fine for me. My service here
Will stand in better stead, to quench the fire
Those blanks have made. I would they were all burnt,
Or he were hanged that first devised them, sir,
They stir the country so. I dare not come
And so excuse me, sir. If the king think it ill,
He thinks amiss. I am Plain Thomas still; 1520
The rest I’ll tell ye as ye sit at meat.
Furnish a table, Cheyney, call for wine.
Come, sir, ye shall commend me to the king.
Tell him I’ll keep these parts in peace to him.
EXEUNT omnes
Tom Reedy
ENTER Master Ignorance the Bailey of Dunstable, Crosby, Fleming, and
Nimble, with blanks.
Crosby
Dispatch, good Master Bailey, the market is almost done, you see. ’Tis
rumored
that the blanks are come and the rich chuffs begin to flock out o’the
town
already. You have seen the high shrieve's warrant and the council’s
commission,
and therefore I charge ye in the king’s name, be ready to assist us.
Bailey
Nay, look ye sir. be not too pestiferous, I beseech ye. I have begun
1530
myself and sealed one of your blanks already, and by my example
there’s more
shall follow. I know my place and calling, my name is Ignorance
and I am Bailey of Dunstable. I cannot write nor read, I confess it,
no more could my father, nor his father nor none of the Ignorants
this hundred year, I assure ye.
Nimble
Your name proclaims no less, sir, and it has been a most learned
generation.
Bailey
Though I cannot write, I have set my mark, ecce signum.
Read it, I beseech ye.
Nimble
The mark of Simon Ignorance, the Bailey of Dunstable,
being a sheephook with a tarbox at end on’t. 1540
Bailey
Very right. it was my mark ever since I was an innocent,
and therefore, as I say, I have begun and will assist ye. For here be
rich whoresons i’th’ town, I can tell ye, that will ye the slip
an’ ye look not to it.
Fleming
We therefore presently will divide ourselves. You two shall stay here
whiles we, Master Ignorance, with some of your brethren, the men of
Dunstable,
walk through the town noting the carriage of the people.
They say there are strange songs and libels cast about the market
place
against my lord Tresilian and the rest of the king’s young
counsellors.
If such there be, we’ll have some aid and attach them speedily. 1550
Bailey
Ye shall do well, sir, and for your better aiding, if you can but find
out
my brother, Master Ignoramus, he will be most pestiferous unto ye, I
assure ye.
Crosby
I’m afraid he will not be found, sir, but we’ll inquire. Come, fellow
Fleming and Nimble; look to the whisperers, I charge ye.
EXIT Crosby and Fleming
Nimble
I warrant ye. Come, Master Bailey, let your billmen retire
till we call them; and you and I will here shadow ourselves and write
down their speeches.
Bailey
Nay, you shall write and I will mark, sir.
ENTER a farmer, a butcher, and a grasier, very hastily
Bailey
And see, see, here come some already, all rich chubs, by the mass.
I know them all, sir. 1560
Farmer
Tarry, tarry, good neighbours, take a knave with ye! What a murrain!
Is there a bear broke loose i’th’ town, that ye make such haste from
the market?
Grasier
A bear? No, nor a lion baited neither. I tell ye, neighbour, I am more
afraid
of the bee than the bear; there is wax to be used today, and I have no
seal
about me. I may tell you in secret, here’s a dangerous world towards.
Neighbour, you’re a farmer, and I hope here’s none but God and good
company.
We live in such a state, I am e’en almost weary of all, I assure ye.
Here’s my other neighbour, the butcher, that dwells at Hockley,
has heard his landlord tell strange tidings. We shall be all hoisted
and we tarry here, I can tell ye. 1570
Nimble
They begin to murmur. I’ll put them down all for whisperers.
Master Bailey, what’s he that talks so?
Bailey
His name is Cowtail, a rich grasier, and dwells here hard by
at Leighton Buzzard.
Nimble
Cowtail, a grasier, dwelling at Leighton . . . Buzzard, Master
Bailey?
Bailey
Right, sir. Listen again, sir.
Farmer
Ah, sirrah, and what said the good knight your landlord, neighbour?
Butcher
Marry, he said—but I’ll not stand to anything, I tell ye that aforehand
—
he said that King Richard’s new counsellors (God amend them) had
crept
into honester men’s places than themselves were; and that the king’s
1580
uncles and the old lords were all banished the court, and he said
flatly
we should never have a merry world as long as it was so.
Nimble
Butcher, you and your landlord will be both hanged for’t.
Butcher
And then he said there’s one Tresilian, a lawyer, that has crept
in amongst them and is now a lord, forsooth, and he has sent down
into every country of England a sort of black chapters.
Farmer
Black chapters? A God’s name, neighbour, out of what black book were
they taken?
Grasier
Come, come, they are blank charters, neighbours. I heard of them
afore, and therefore I made such haste away. They’re sent down to the
high shrieve with special charge that every man that is of any credit
1590
or worship i’th’ country must set their hands and seal to them,
for what intent I know not. I say no more; I smell something.
Farmer
Well, well, my masters, let’s be wise; we are not all one man’s
sons. They say there are whispering knaves abroad, let’s hie us home,
for I assure ye, ’twas told me where I broke my fast this afternoon
that there were above three score gentlemen in our shire that had set
their hands and seals to those blank charters already.
Grasier
Now God amend them for it, they have given an ill example
we shall be forced to follow.
Butcher
I would my wife and children were at Jerusalem with all the wealth.
1600
I’d make shift for one, I warrant them. Come, neighbours, let’s be
gone.
Nimble
Step forward with your bills, Master Bailey. Not too fast, sirs!
I charge ye i’th’ king’s name to stand till we have done with ye.
Omnes
Saint Benedicite! What must we do now, trow?
Bailey
Be not so pestiferous, my good friends and neighbours.
You are men of wealth and credit in the country,
and therefore as I myself and others have begun, I charge ye in his
Highness’ name presently to set your hands and seals to these blank
charters.
Grasier
Jesu, receive my soul, I’m departed!
Farmer
I’m e’en struck to at heart, too. 1610
Butcher
Alas, sir, we are poor men. What should our hands do?
Bailey
There is no harm, I warrant ye. what need you fear, when ye see
Bailey Ignorance has sealed before ye?
Grasier
I pray ye, let’s see them, sir.
Nimble
Here, ye bacon-fed pudding-eaters, are ye afraid of a sheepskin?
Grasier
Mass! ’Tis somewhat darkly written.
Farmer
Ay, ay, ’twas done in the night, sure.
Grasier
Mass, neighbours, here’s nothing that I see.
Butcher
And can it be any harm, think ye, to set your hands to nothing?
These blank charters are but little pieces of parchment. 1620
Let’s set our marks to them, and be rid of a knave’s company.
Farmer
As good at first as last, we can be but undone.
Grasier
Ay, and our own hands undoes us, that is the worst on’t. Lend’s your
pen, sir.
Butcher
We must all venture, neighbours, there’s no remedy.
Nimble
They grumble as they do it. I must put them down
for whisperers and grumblers. Come, have you done yet?
Grasier
Ay, sir. (Would you and they were sodden for my swine.)
Nimble
Here’s wax, then. I’ll seal them for ye, and you shall severally take
them off,
and then deliver them as your deeds.
SEAL them.
Come you boar’s grease, take off this seal here. So! This is your
deed. 1630
Farmer
Faith, sir, in some respect it is and it is not.
Nimble
And this is yours.
Grasier
Ay, sir, against my will, I swear.
Nimble
Ox-jaw, take off this seal. You’ll deliver your deed with a good
conscience.
Butcher
There ’tis, sir, against my conscience, God’s my witness.
I hope ye have done with us now, sir.
Nimble
No, ye caterpillars, we have worse matters against ye yet.
Sirrah, you know what your landlord told ye concerning my lord
Tresilian,
and King Richard’s new favourites; and more than that, you know your
own speeches; and therefore Master Bailey, let some of your billmen
away with them to the 1640
high shrieve’s presently, either to put in bail, or be sent up to th’
court
for privy whisperers.
Bailey
Their offenses are most pestiferous. Away with them!
Omnes
Now out alas, we shall all to hanging, sure!
EXEUNT officers with the three men.
Nimble
Hanging? Nay, that’s the least on’t, ye shall tell me
that a twelvemonth hence else.
Stand close, Master Bailey; we shall
catch more of these traitors presently.
Bailey
You shall find me most pestiferous to assist ye; and so I pray ye,
commend my service to your good lord and master. Come, sir, stand
close; I see—
ENTER a schoolmaster and a serving-man 1650
Serving-man
Nay, sweet Master Schoolmaster, let us hear it again, I beseech ye.
Schoolmaster
Patientia. You are a serving man, I’m a scholar. I have shown art and
learning in these verses, I assure ye, and yet if they were well
searched
they’re little better than libels. but the carriage of a thing is all,
sir.
I have covered them rarely.
Serving-man
’Sfoot, the country’s so full of intelligencers that two men
can scarce walk together but they’re attached for whisperers.
Schoolmaster
This paper shall wipe their noses, and they shall not boo to a goose
for’t;
for I’ll have these verses sung to their faces by one of my
schoolboys, wherein I’ll tickle them all, i’faith. shalt hear else.
But first 1660
let’s look there be no pitchers with ears, nor needles with eyes about
us.
Serving-man
Come, come, all is safe I warrant ye.
Schoolmaster
Mark, then. Here I come over them for their blank charters;
shalt hear else:
Will ye buy any parchment knives?
We sell for little gain.
Whoever are weary of their lives,
They’ll rid them of their pain.
Blank charters they are called,
A vengeance on the villain, 1670
I would he were both flayed and balled:
God bless my lord Tresilian.
Is’t not rare?
Nimble
Oh, rascals! They’re damned three hundred fathom deep already.
Schoolmaster
Nay, look ye, sir, there can be no exceptions taken, for this last
line helps all,
wherein with a kind of equivocation I say, ‘God bless my lord
Tresilian’.
Do ye mark, sir: Now here, in the next verse, I run o’er all the
flatterers in the court by name. Ye shall see else:
A poison may be Greene ,
but Bushy can be no fagot: 1680
God mend the King and bless the Queen,
And ’tis no matter for Bagot.
For Scroope, he does no good;
But if you’ll know the villain,
His name is now to be understood:
God bless my lord Tresilian.
How like ye this, sir?
Servant
Most excellent, i’faith, sir.
Nimble
Oh, traitors! Master Bailey, do your authority!
Bailey
Two most pestiferous traitors. lay hold of them, I charge ye. 1690
Serving-man
What mean ye, sir?
Nimble
Nay, talk not, for if ye had a hundred lives, they were all hanged.
Ye have spoken treason in the ninth degree.
Schoolmaster
Treason? Patientia, good sir, we spoke not a word.
Bailey
Be not so pestiferous. Mine ears have heard your examinations
wherein you uttered most shameful treason, for ye said, ‘God bless my
lord Tresilian’.
Schoolmaster
I hope there’s no treason in that, sir.
Nimble
That shall be tried. Come, Master Bailey: their hands shall be bound
under
a horse’s belly and sent up to him presently, they’ll both be hanged,
I warrant them. 1700
Serving-man
Well, sir, if we be, we’ll speak more ere we be hanged, in spite of
ye.
Nimble
Ay, ay, when you’re hanged, speak what you will, we care not.
Away with them.
EXEUNT the schoolmaster and serving-man
Ye see, Master Bailey, what knaves are abroad
now you are here. ’Tis time to look about, ye see.
Bailey
I see there are knaves abroad indeed, sir. I speak for mine own part.
I will do my best to reform the pestiferousness of the time,
and as for example I have set my mark to the charters,
so will I set mine eyes to observe these dangerous cases.
ENTER one a-whistling
Nimble
Close again, Master Bailey: here comes another whisperer, I see by
some.
Oh villain! He whistles treason! I’ll lay hold of him myself. 1710
Whistler
Out, alas! What do ye mean, sir?
Nimble
A rank traitor, Master Bailey. Lay hold on him, for he has
most erroneously and rebelliously whistled treason.
Whistler
Whistled treason! Alas, sir, how can that be?
Bailey
Very easily, sir. There’s a piece of treason that flies up and down
the country
in the likeness of a ballad, and this being the very tune of it, thou
hast whistled treason.
Whistler
Alas, sir, ye know I spake not a word.
Nimble
That’s all one, if any man whistles treason ’tis as ill as speaking
it.
Mark me, Master Bailey: the bird whistles that cannot speak, and yet
there be birds in a manner that can speak, too. Your raven will call
ye
rascal, your crow will call ye knave, Master Bailey, ergo, he that can
whistle
can speak, and therefore this fellow hath both spoke and whistled
treason.
How say you, Bailey Ignorance?
Bailey
Ye have argued well, sir, but ye shall hear me sift him nearer,
for I do not think but there are greater heads in this matter,
and therefore, my good fellow, be not pestiferous, but say and tell
the truth.
Who did set you a-work? Or who was the cause of your whistling?
Or did any man say to you, ‘Go whistle’?
Whistler
Not any man, woman or child, truly, sir.
Bailey
No? How durst you whistle, then? Or what cause had ye to do so? 1730
Whistler
The truth is, sir. I had lost two calves out of my pasture,
and being in search for them, from the top of the hill I might spy
you two i’th’ bottom here, and took ye for my calves, sir;
and that made me come whistling down for joy in hope I had found them.
Nimble
More treason yet! He take a courtier and a Bailey for two calves!
To limbo with him! He shall be quartered and then hanged.
Whistler
Good Master Bailey, be pitiful!
Bailey
Why law ye, sir, he makes a pitiful fellow of a Bailey too!
Away with him. yet stay awhile, here comes your fellows, sir.
ENTER Crosby and Fleming
Crosby
Now, Master Bailey, are your blanks sealed yet? 1740
Bailey
They are, sir, and we have done this day most strange and pestiferous
service,
I assure ye, sir.
Fleming
Your care shall be rewarded. Come, fellow Nimble, we must to court
about other employments. There are already thirteen thousand blanks
signed
and returned to the shrieves, and seven hundred sent up to’th’ court
for whisperers,
out of all which my lord will fetch a round sum, I doubt it not.
Come, let us away.
Nimble
Ay, ay. We’ll follow. Come, ye sheepbiter. Here’s a traitor of all
traitors
that not only speaks, but has whistled treason. Come, come, sir,
I’ll spoil your whistle, I warrant ye! 1750
EXEUNT omnes
Tom Reedy
ENTER Tresilian with writings, and a man with bags of money.
Tresilian
Sirrah, are the bags sealed?
Servant
Yes, my lord.
Tresilian
Then take my keys; and lock the money in my study safe.
Bar and make sure, I charge ye, so, be gone.
Servant
I will, my lord.
EXIT servant
Tresilian
So, seven thousand pounds from Bedford, Buckingham and Oxford shires,
These blanks already have returned the king.
So then there’s four for me and three for him;
Our pains in this must needs be satisfied. 1760
Good husbands will make hay, while the sun shines
And so must we, for thus conclude these times.
So men be rich enough, they are good enough.
Let fools make conscience how they get their coin.
I’ll please the king and keep me in his grace,
For princes’ favours purchase land apace.
These blanks that I have scattered in the realm
Shall double his revenues to the crown.
ENTER Bushy and Scroope
Scroope
Now, lord Tresilian, is this coin come yet? 1770
Bushy
King Richard wants money. You are too slack, Tresilian.
Tresilian
Some shires have sent; and more, my lords, will follow.
These sealed blanks I now have turned to bonds,
And these shall down to Norfolk presently.
The chuffs with much ado have signed and sealed,
And here’s a secret note my men have sent
Of all their yearly ’states amounts unto,
And by this note I justly tax their bonds.
Here’s a fat whoreson in his russet slops
And yet may spend three hundred pounds b’th’ year, 1780
The third of which the hog’s-face owes the king;
Here’s his bond for it, with his hand and seal.
And so by this I’ll sort each several sum,
The thirds of all shall to King Richard come.
How like you this, my lords?
Scroope
Most rare, Tresilian. Hang them, cods-heads,
Shall they spend money and King Richard lack it?
Bushy
Are not their lives and lands and livings his?
Then rack them thoroughly.
Tresilian
Oh, my lords, I have set a trick afoot for ye; and ye follow it hard
1790
and get the king to sign it, you will be all kings by it.
Bushy
The farming out the kingdom? Tush, Tresilian,
it is half granted already, and had been fully concluded
had not the messenger returned so unluckily from the Duke of
Gloucester,
which a little moved the king at his uncle’s stubbornness.
But to make all whole, we have left that smooth-faced
flattering Greene to follow him close, and he’ll never leave
till he has done it, I warrant ye.
Scroope
There’s no question on’t; King Richard will betake himself to a
yearly stipend, and we four by lease must rent the kingdom. 1800
ENTER Bagot
Bushy
Rent it, ay rack it too, ere we forfeit our leases,
and we had them once. How now, Bagot, what news?
Bagot
All rich and rare. The realm must be divided presently,
and we four must farm it. The leases are a-making and for £7000
a month the kingdom is our own, boys.
Bushy
’Sfoot, let’s differ for no price an’ it were £70,000 a month,
We’ll make somebody pay for it.
Scroope
Where is his highness?
Bagot
He will be here presently to seal the writings. He’s a little angry
that the duke comes not, but that will vanish quickly. 1810
On with your soothest faces, ye wenching rascals. Humour him finely,
and you’re all made by it.
ENTER King Richard, Greene, and others
Bushy
See, see! He comes; and that flattering hound Greene close at’s
elbow.
Scroope
Come, come, we must all flatter if we mean to live by it.
King
Our uncle will not come, then?
Greene
That was his answer, flat and resolute.
King
Was ever subject so audacious?
Bagot
And can your grace, my lord, digest these wrongs?
King
Yes, as a mother that beholds her child 1820
Dismembered by a bloody tyrant’s sword!
I tell thee, Bagot, in my heart remains
Such deep impressions of his churlish taunts
As nothing can remove the gall thereof
Till with his blood mine eyes be satisfied.
Greene
’Sfoot, raise powers, my lord, and fetch him thence perforce.
King
I dare not, Greene, for whilst he keeps i’ th’ country,
There is no meddling, he’s so well beloved
As all the realm will rise in arms with him.
Tresilian
’Ssfoot, my lord, an’ you’d fain have him, I have a trick shall 1830
fetch him from his house at Plashy in spite of all his favourites.
Greene
Let’s ha’it, Tresilian! Thy wit must help or all’s dashed else.
Tresilian
Then thus, my lord: whiles the Duke securely revels i’ th’ country,
we’ll have some trusty friends disguise themselves like masquers
and this night ride down to Plashy, and in the name of some near
adjoining friends, offer their sports to make him merry, which he
no doubt will thankfully accept. Then in the masque, we’ll have
it so devised, the dance being done and the room voided,
then upon some occasion single the duke alone, thrust him
in a masquing suit, clap a vizard on his face, and so convey him 1840
out o’ th’ house at pleasure.
Scroope
How if he cry and call for help?
Tresilian
What serves your drums but to drown his cries?
And being in a masque, ’twill never be suspected.
Greene
Good, i’faith, and to help it, my lord: Lapoole, the governor of
Calais,
is new come over, who, with a troop of soldiers closely ambushed
in the woods near the house, shall shroud themselves till the masque
be ended. Then the Duke being attacked, he shall be there ready to
receive him, hurry him away to the Thames’ side, where a ship
shall be laid ready for his coming; so clap him under hatches, 1850
hoist sails, and secretly convey him out o’ th’ realm to Calais,
and so by this means ye shall prevent all mischief,
for neither of your uncles nor any of the kingdom
shall know what’s become of him.
King
I like it well, sweet Greene; and by my crown
We’ll be i’ th’ masque ourself, and so shall you. Get horses ready,
This night we’ll ride to Plashy; but see ye carry it close
and secretly, for whilst this plot is a-working for the duke,
I’ll set a trap for York and Lancaster. Go, Tresilian!
Let proclamations straight be sent 1860
wherein thou shalt accuse the dukes of treason,
and then attach, condemn, and close imprison them.
Lest the commons should rebel against us,
We’ll send unto the King of France for aid,
And in requital we’ll surrender up
Our forts of Guynes and Calais to the French.
Let crown and kingdom waste, yea life and all,
Before King Richard see his true friends fall.
Give order our disguises be made ready,
And let Lapoole provide the ship and soldiers. 1870
We will not sleep, by heaven, till we have seized him.
Bushy
(’Sfoot, urge our suit again, he will forget it else.)
King
These traitors once surprised, then all is sure:
Our kingdom quiet and your states secure.
Greene
Most true, sweet king: and then your grace, as you promised,
farming out the kingdom to us four shall not need to trouble yourself
with any business, this old turkey-cock Tresilian shall look to the
law,
and we’ll govern the land most rarely.
King
So, sir, the love of thee and these, my dearest Greene,
Hath won King Richard to consent to that 1880
For which all foreign kings will point at us.
And of the meanest subject of our land
We shall be censured strangely, when they tell
How our great father toiled his royal person
Spending his blood to purchase towns in France;
And we, his son, to ease our wanton youth,
Become a landlord to this warlike realm,
Rent out our kingdom like a pelting farm
That erst was held as fair as Babylon,
The maiden conqueress to all the world. 1890
Greene
’Sfoot, what need you care what the world talks? You still retain the
name of king, and if any disturb ye, we four comes presently from the
four parts of the kingdom with four puissant armies to assist you.
King
You four must be all then, for I think nobody else will follow you,
unless it be to hanging.
Greene
Why Richard, King Richard, will ye be as good as your word, and seal
the writings? ’Sfoot, and thou dost not and I do not join with
thine uncles and turn traitor, would I might be turned to a
toadstool.
King
Very well, sir. They did well to choose you for their orator, that
has
King Richard’s love and heart in keeping. Your suit is granted, sir.
1900
Let’s see the writings.
All
They’re here, my lord.
King
View them Tresilian, then we’ll sign and seal them. Look to your
bargain, Greene, and be no loser, for if ye forfeit or run
behind hand with me, I swear I’ll both imprison
and punish ye soundly.
Greene
Forfeit, sweet King? ’Sblood, I’ll sell their houses ere I’ll forfeit
my lease, I warrant thee.
King
If they be stubborn, do, and spare not. Rack them soundly,
and we’ll maintain it. Remember ye not the proviso enacted in 1910
our last parliament, that no statute, were it never so profitable for
the commonwealth, should stand in any force against our proceedings?
Greene
’Tis true, my lord, then what should hinder ye to accomplish anything
that may best please your kingly spirit to determine?
King
True, Greene, and we will do it in spite of them.
Is’t just, Tresilian?
Tresilian
Most just, my liege. These gentlemen here, Sir Henry Greene,
Sir Edward Bagot, Sir William Bushy, and Sir Thomas Scroope,
all jointly here stand bound to pay your majesty, or your deputy,
wherever
you remain, £7000 a month for this your kingdom. For which 1920
your grace, by these writings, surrenders to their hands all your
crown lands, lordships, manors, rents, taxes, subsidies, fifteens,
imposts, foreign customs, staples for wool, tin, lead, and cloth;
all forfeitures of goods or lands confiscate, and all other duties
that
is, shall, or may appertain to the king or crown’s revenues,
and for non-payment of the sum or sums aforesaid, your majesty
to seize the lands and goods of the said gentlemen above named,
and their bodies to be imprisoned at your grace’s pleasure.
King
How like you that, Greene? Believe me, if you fail, I’ll not favour ye
a day.
Greene
I’ll ask no favour at your hands, sir. Ye shall have your money at
your day, 1930
and then do your worst, sir!
King
’Tis very good. Set to your hands and seals. Tresilian, we make you
our deputy to receive this money. Look strictly to them, I charge ye.
Tresilian
If the money come not to my hands at the time appointed,
I’ll make them smoke for’t.
Greene
Ay, ay, you’re an upright justice, sir, we fear ye not.
Here, my lord, they are ready, signed and sealed.
Tresilian
Deliver them to his majesty all together as your special deeds.
Omnes
We do with humble thanks unto his majesty
that makes us tenants to so rich a lordship. 1940
King
Keep them, Tresilian; now will we sign and seal to you.
Never had English subjects such a landlord.
Greene
Nor ever had English king such subjects as we four, that are
able to farm a whole kingdom and pay him rent for’t.
King
Look that ye do; we shall expect performance speedily.
There’s your indenture, signed and sealed, which as our kingly deed
we here deliver.
Greene
Thou never didst a better deed in thy life, sweet bully, thou mayst
now live at ease, we’ll toil for thee, and send thy money in
tumbling.
King
We shall see your care, sir. Reach me the map, we may allot 1950
their portions and part the realm amongst them equally.
You four shall here by us divide yourselves into the 39 shires and
counties of my Kingdom, parted thus. Come stand by me
and mark those shires assigned ye. Bagot, thy lot:
betwixt the Thames and sea thus lies: Kent, Surrey, Sussex,
Hampshire,
Berkshire, Wiltshire, Dorsetshire, Somersetshire, Devonshire,
Cornwall. Those parts are thine
as ample, Bagot, as the crown is mine.
Bagot
All thanks, love, duty to my princely sovereign.
King
Bushy, from thee shall stretch his government over these 1960
lands that lie in Wales, together with our counties of Gloucester,
Worcester,
Hereford, Shropshire, Staffordshire and Cheshire. There’s thy lot.
Bushy
Thanks to my King that thus hath honoured me.
King
Sir Thomas Scroope, from Trent to Tweed thy lot is parted thus:
all Yorkshire, Derbyshire, Lancashire, Cumberland, Westmoreland, and
Northumberland.
Receive thy lot, thy state and government.
Scroope
With faith and duty to your highness’ throne.
King
Now, my Greene, what have I left for thee?
Greene
’Sfoot, and you’ll give me nothing, then goodnight landlord! Since ye
have
served me last, and I be not the last shall pay your rent, ne’er trust
me! 1970
King
I kept thee last to make thy part the greatest. See here, sweet
Greene,
these shires are thine, even from the Thames to Trent,
thou here shalt lie, i’ th’ middle of my land.
Greene
That’s best in the winter. Is there any pretty wenches in my
government?
King
Guess that by this: thou hast London, Middlesex, Essex, Suffolk,
Norfolk,
Cambridgeshire, Hertfordshire, Bedfordshire, Buckinghamshire,
Oxfordshire, Northamptonshire; Rutlandshire, Leicestershire,
Warwickshire,
Huntingdonshire, and Lincolnshire. There’s your portion, sir.
Greene
’Slid, I will rule like a king amongst them,
And thou shalt reign like an emperor over us. 1980
King
Thus have I parted my whole realm amongst ye.
Be careful of your charge and government.
And now to attach our stubborn uncles,
Let warrants be sent down, Tresilian,
For Gaunt and York, Surrey and Arundel
Whiles we this night at Plashy suddenly
Surprise plain Woodstock. Being parted thus
We shall with greater ease arrest and take them.
Your places are not sure while they have breath;
Therefore pursue them hard. Those traitors gone, 1990
The staves are broke the people lean upon,
And you may guide and rule then at your pleasures.
Away to Plashy, let our masque be ready.
Beware, Plain Thomas, for King Richard comes
Resolved with blood to wash all former wrongs.
SOUND
EXEUNT omnes
Tom Reedy
ENTER Woodstock and his Duchess, with a gentleman, Cheyney and others
Woodstock
The queen so sick! Come, come, make haste good wife,
Thou’t be belated, sure, ’tis night already.
On with thy cloak and mask. To horse, to horse!
Duchess of Gloucester
Good troth, my lord. I have no mind to ride. 2000
I have been dull and heavy all this day,
My sleeps were troubled with sad dreams last night,
And I am full of fear and heaviness. Pray let me ride tomorrow.
Woodstock
What, and the queen so sick? Away for shame!
Stay for a dream? Thou’st dreamt I’m sure ere this.
Duchess of Gloucester
Never so fearful were my dreams till now.
Had they concerned myself, my fears were past;
But you were made the object of mine eye,
And I beheld you murdered cruelly.
Woodstock
Ha, murdered? Alack, good lady, didst thou dream of me? 2010
Take comfort, then; all dreams are contrary.
Duchess of Gloucester
Pray god it prove so, for my soul is fearful,
The vision did appear so lively to me.
Methoughts as you were ranging through the woods
An angry lion with a herd of wolves
Had in an instant round encompassed you;
When to your rescue, against the course of kind,
A flock of silly sheep made head against them
Bleating for help, against whom the forest king
Roused up his strength and slew both you and them. This fear affrights
me. 2020
Woodstock
Afore my God, thou’rt foolish. I’ll tell thee all thy dream:
Thou knowst last night we had some private talk
About the blanks the country is taxed withal,
Where I compared the state as now it stands,
Meaning King Richard and his harmful flatterers,
Unto a savage herd of ravening wolves,
The commons to a flock of silly sheep
Who, whilst their slothful shepherd careless stood,
Those forest thieves broke in and sucked their blood.
And this thy apprehension took so deep, 2030
The form was portrayed lively in thy sleep.
Come, come, ’tis nothing. What, are the horses ready?
Cheyney
They are, my lord.
Woodstock
Where is the gentleman that brought this message?
Where lies the queen, sir?
Servant
At Sheen, my lord, most sick, and so much altered
As those about her fears her sudden death.
Woodstock
Forfend, it heaven! Away, make haste I charge ye.
What, weeping now? Afore my God, thou’rt fond!
Come, come, I know thou art no augurer of ill.
Dry up thy tears, this kiss, and part, farewell! 2040
Duchess of Gloucester
That farewell from your lips to me sounds ill.
Wherever I go, my fears will follow still.
Woodstock
See her to horseback, Cheyney.
EXEUNT Duchess and the rest. MANET Woodstock
’Fore my God, ’tis late,
And but the important business craves such haste,
She had not gone from Plashy House tonight.
But woe is me, the good Queen Anne is sick
and (by my soul) my heart is sad to hear it;
So good a lady, and so virtuous,
This realm for many ages could not boast of. 2050
Her charity hath stayed the commons’ rage
That would ere this have shaken Richard’s chair
Or set all England on a burning fire.
A ’fore my god, I fear, when she is gone
This woeful land will all to ruin run.
ENTER Cheney
How now, Cheyney! What, is thy lady gone yet?
Cheyney
She is, my lord, with much unwillingness,
And ’tis so dark I cannot blame her grace.
The lights of heaven are shut in pitchy clouds
And flakes of fire run tilting through the sky 2060
Like dim ostents to some great tragedy.
Woodstock
God bless good Anne-a-Beame. I fear her death
Will be the tragic scene the sky foreshows us.
When kingdoms change, the very heavens are troubled.
Pray God King Richard’s wild behaviour
Force not the powers of heaven to frown upon us.
My prayers are still for him. What thinkest thou,
Cheyney? May not Plain Thomas live a time, to see
This state attain her former royalty?
’Fore God, I doubt it not. My heart is merry, 2070
And I am suddenly inspired for mirth. Ha,
What sport shall we have tonight, Cheyney?
Cheyney
I’m glad to see your grace addicted so,
For I have news of sudden mirth to tell ye,
Which till I heard ye speak, I durst not utter:
We shall have a masque tonight, my lord.
Woodstock
Ha, a masque sayest thou? What are they, Cheyney?
Cheyney
It seems, my lord, some country gentlemen
To show their dear affection to your grace,
Proffer their sports this night to make you merry. 2080
Their drums have called for entrance twice already.
Woodstock
Are they so near? I prithee let them enter.
Tell them we do embrace their loves most kindly.
Give order through the house that all observe them.
We must accept their loves, although the times
Are no way suited now for masks and revels.
What, ho, within there!
ENTER servants
Servant
My lord?
Woodstock
Prepare a banquet; call for lights and music.
They come in love, and we’ll accept it so. 2090
Some sports does well; we’re all too full of woe.
ENTER Cheyney
Cheyney
They’re come, my lord.
Woodstock
They all are welcome. Cheyney, set me a chair.
We will behold their sports, in spite of care.
SOUND A flourish, then a great shout and winding of horns. Then ENTERS
Cynthia
Cynthia
From the clear orb of our ethereal sphere,
Bright Cynthia comes to hunt and revel here.
The groves of Calydon and Arden woods
Of untamed monsters, wild and savage herds,
We and our knights have freed, and hither come 2100
To hunt these forests, where we hear there lies
A cruel tusked boar, whose terror flies
Through this large kingdom, and with fear and dread
Strikes her amassed greatness pale and dead.
And having viewed from far these towers of stone,
We heard the people midst their joy and moan
Extol to heaven a faithful prince and peer
That keeps a court of love and pity here,
Reverent and mild his looks. If such there be,
This state directs, great prince, that you are he; 2110
And ere our knights to this great hunting go,
Before your grace they would some pastime show
In sprightly dancing. Thus they bade me say
And wait an answer to return or stay.
Woodstock
Nay, for heaven’s pity let them come, I prithee.
Pretty device, i’faith! Stand by, make room there!
Stir, stir, good fellows, each man to his task!
We shall have a clear night, the moon directs the masque.
Music. ENTER King Richard, Greene, Bushy, Bagot, like Diana’s knights,
led in by four other knights in green, with horns about their necks
and boar spears in their hands. 2120
Woodstock
Ha, country sports say ye? ’Fore God, it is courtly.
A general welcome, courteous gentlemen,
And when I see your faces, I’ll give each man more particular
If your entertainment fail your merit.
I must ask pardon: my lady is from home
And most of my attendance waiting on her.
But we’ll do what we can to bid you welcome.
Afore my God, it joys my heart to see
Amidst these days of woe and misery
Ye find a time for harmless mirth and sport. 2130
But ’tis your loves, and we’ll be thankful for it. Ah, sirrah,
Ye come like knights to hunt the boar indeed;
And heaven he knows we had need of helping hands,
So many wild boars roots and spoil our lands
That England almost is destroyed by them.
I care not if King Richard heard me speak it:
I wish his grace all good, high heaven can tell,
But there’s a fault in some, alack the day,
His youth is led by flatterers much astray.
But he’s our king and God’s great deputy, 2140
And if ye hunt to have me second ye
In any rash attempt against his state,
Afore my God, I’ll never consent unto it.
I ever yet was just and true to him,
And so will still remain. What’s now amiss
Our sins have caused, and we must bide heaven’s will.
I speak my heart; I am Plain Thomas still.
Come, come, a hall and music there! Your dance being done,
A banquet stands prepared to bid you welcome.
Music. Then they dance. ENTER Cheyney.
Woodstock
How now, Cheyney! Is this banquet ready? 2050
Cheyney
There is no time, I fear, for banqueting.
A drum afar off.
My lord, I wish your grace be provident,
I fear your person is betrayed, my lord.
The house is round beset with armed soldiers.
Woodstock
Ha, soldiers? Afore my God, the commons all are up, then.
They will rebel against the king, I fear me,
And flock to me to back their bold attempts.
Go arm the household, Cheyney.
EXIT Cheyney
Hear me, gentlemen—
’Fore God, I do not like this whispering.
If your intents be honest, show your faces. 2160
King
Guard fast the doors and seize him presently!
This is the cave that keeps the tusked boar
That roots up England’s vineyards uncontrolled.
Bagot, arrest him! If for help he cry,
Drown all his words with drums, confusedly.
Woodstock
Am I betrayed?
Bagot
Ye cannot ’scape, my lord, the toils are pitched
And all your household fast in hold ere this.
Thomas of Woodstock, Duke of Gloucester, Earl of Cambridge and of
Buckingham, I here arrest thee in King Richard’s name, 2170
Of treason to the crown, his state and realm.
Woodstock
I’ll put in bail, and answer to the law. Speak, is King Richard here?
All
No, no, my lord, away with him.
Woodstock
Villains, touch me not! I am descended of the royal blood,
King Richard’s uncle, his grandsire’s son, his princely father’s
brother.
Becomes it princes to be led like slaves?
King
Put on a vizard. Stop his cries.
Woodstock
Ha, who bids them so? I know that voice full well.
Afore my god, false men, King Richard’s here.
Turn thee, thou headstrong youth, and speak again. 2180
By thy dead father’s soul, I charge thee hear me,
So heaven may help me at my greatest need
As I have wished thy good and England’s safety.
Bagot
You’re still deceived, my lord, the king is not here.
Bushy
On with his masquing suit, and bear him hence.
We’ll lead ye fairly to King Richard’s presence.
Woodstock
Nay, from his presence to my death you’ll lead me;
And I am pleased I shall not live to see
My country’s ruin, and his misery.
Thou hear’st me well, proud king, and well mayst boast 2190
That thou betray’dst me here so suddenly,
For had I known thy secret treachery
Nor thou, nor these thy flattering minions,
With all your strengths had wronged plain Woodstock thus.
But use your wills. Your uncles Gaunt and York
Will give you thanks for this, and the poor commons,
When they shall hear of these your unjust proceedings—
King
Stop’s mouth, I say, we’ll hear no more.
Woodstock
Good heaven, forgive me, pray ye forbear awhile.
I’ll speak but one word more, indeed I will. 2200
Some man commend me to my virtuous wife;
Tell her her dreams have ta’en effect indeed:
By wolves and lions now must Woodstock bleed.
King
Deliver him to Lapoole. The ship lies ready.
Convey him over to Calais speedily;
There use him as we gave directions.
Sound up your drums, our hunting sports are done,
And when you’re past the house, cast by your habits
And mount your horses with all swiftest haste;
The boar is taken, and our fears are past. 2210
Sound. EXEUNT omnes.
Tom Reedy
ENTER Crosby, Fleming, and Nimble
Crosby
Come sirs, attend, my lord is coming forth.
The high shrieves of Kent and Northumberland
With twenty gentlemen are all arrested
For privy whisperers against the state;
In which I know my lord will find some trick
To seize their goods, and then there’s work for us.
Nimble
Nay, there will be work for the hangman first; then we rifle the
goods,
and my lord seizes the lands. If these 700 whisperers that
are taken come off lustily, he’ll have the devil and all shortly.
2220
ENTER Tresilian, with the shrieves of Kent and Northumberland, with
officers.
Fleming
See, see, they’re coming.
Tresilian
Call for a marshal there. Commit the traitors.
Shrieves
We do beseech your honour hear us speak.
Tresilian
Sir, we’ll not hear ye. The proof’s too plain against ye.
Becomes it you, sir, being shrieve of Kent,
To stay the blanks King Richard sent abroad,
Revile our messengers, refuse the charters,
And spurn like traitors against the king’s decrees?
Shrieve of Kent
My lord, I plead our ancient liberties 2230
Recorded and enrolled in the king’s crown office,
Wherein the men of Kent are clear discharged
Of fines, fifteens, or any other taxes,
forever given them by the conqueror.
Tresilian
You’re still deceived, those charters were not sent
To abrogate your ancient privilege,
But for his highness’ use they were devised
To gather and collect amongst his subjects
Such sums of money as they well might spare,
And he in their defence must hourly spend. 2240
Is not the subjects' wealth at the king’s will?
What, is he lord of lives, and not of lands?
Is not his high displeasure present death,
And dare ye stir his indignation so?
Shrieve of Northumberland
We are free-born, my lord, yet do confess
Our lives and goods are at the king’s dispose.
But how, my lord, like to a gentle prince
To take or borrow what we best may spare,
And not like bondslaves, force it from our hands.
Tresilian
Presumptuous traitors, that will we try on you. 2250
Will you set limits to the King's high pleasure?
Away to prison! Seize their goods and lands.
Shrieve of Kent
Much good may it do ye, my lord. The care is ta’en;
As good die there as here abroad be slain.
Shrieve of Northumberland
Well, God forgive both you and us, my lord;
Your hard oppressions have undone the state
And made all England poor and desolate.
Tresilian
Why suffer ye their speech? To prison hie;
There let them perish, rot, consume, and die.
EXEUNT with the shrieves
Art thou there, Nimble? 2260
Nimble
I am here, my lord, and since your lordship is now employed
to punish traitors, I am come to present myself unto you.
Tresilian
What, for a traitor?
Nimble
No, my lord, but for a discoverer of the strangest traitor that was
ever heard of, for by the plain arithmetic of my capacity,
I have found out the very words a traitor spoke that has whistled
treason.
Tresilian
How is that, whistle treason?
Nimble
Most certain, my lord, I have a trick for’t: if a carman do
but whistle, I’ll find treason in it, I warrant ye.
Tresilian
Thou’rt a rare statesman. Nimble, thou’ast a reaching head. 2270
Nimble
I’ll put treason into any man’s head, my lord, let him answer it as
he
can. And then, my lord, we have got a schoolmaster that teaches all
the country
to sing treason, and like a villain he says, ‘God bless your
lordship.’
Tresilian
Thou’rt a most strange discoverer. Where are these traitors?
Nimble
All in prison, my lord. Master Ignorance, the bailey of Dunstable, and
I,
have taken great pains about them. Besides, here’s a note of 700
whisperers, most on them sleepy knaves. We pulled them out of
Bedfordshire.
Tresilian
Let’s see the note. Seven hundred whispering traitors,
Monstrous villains! We must look to these.
Of all the sort these are most dangerous 2280
To stir rebellion against the king and us.
What are they, Crosby? Are the rebels wealthy?
Crosby
Fat chuffs, my lord, all landed men. Rich farmers, grasiers and such
fellows, that having been but a little pinched with imprisonment,
begin already to offer their lands for liberty.
Tresilian
We’ll not be nice to take their offers, Crosby.
Their lands are better than their lives to us,
And without lands they shall not ransom lives.
Go sirs, to terrify the traitors more,
Ye shall have warrants straight to hang them all; 2290
Then if they proffer lands and put in bail
To make a just surrender speedily,
Let them have lives, and after, liberty.
But those that have nor lands nor goods to pay,
Let them be whipped, then hanged. Make haste away.
Nimble
Well, then, I see my whistler must be whipped: he has but two
calves to live on, and has lost them too. And for my schoolmaster,
I’ll
have him march about the market place with ten dozen of rods
at’s girdle the very day he goes a-feasting, and every one of his
scholars shall have a jerk at him. Come, sirs. 2300
Tresilian
Away and leave us.
EXIT Nimble and the rest. MANET Tresilian.
Here comes Sir Edward Bagot.
ENTER Bagot.
Bagot
Right happily met, my lord Tresilian.
Tresilian
You’re well returned to court, Sir Edward,
To this sad house of Sheen, made comfortless
By the sharp sickness of the good Queen Anne.
Bagot
King Richard’s come and gone to visit her.
Sad for her weak estate, he sits and weeps.
Her speech is gone. Only at sight of him
She heaved her hands and closed her eyes again, 2310
And whether alive or dead is yet uncertain.
ENTER Bushy
Tresilian
Here comes Sir William Bushy. What tidings, sir?
Bushy
The king’s a widower, sir. Fair Anne-a-Beame
Hath breathed her last farewell to all the realm.
Tresilian
Peace with her soul, she was a virtuous lady.
How takes King Richard this her sudden death?
Bushy
Fares like a madman: rends his princely hair,
Beats his sad breast, falls grovelling on the earth
All careless of his state, wishing to die,
And even in death to keep her company. 2320
But that which makes his soul more desperate
Amidst this heat of passion, weeping comes
His aunt the duchess, Woodstock’s hapless wife, with tender love and
comfort,
At sight of whom his grief’s again redoubled,
Calling to mind the lady's woeful state,
As yet all ignorant of her own mishap.
He takes her in his arms, weeps on her breast,
And would have there revealed her husband’s fall
Amidst his passions, had not Scroope and Greene
By violence borne him to an inward room, 2330
Where still he cries to get a messenger
To send to Calais to reprieve his uncle.
Bagot
I do not like those passions.
If he reveal the plot, we all shall perish. Where is the Duchess?
Bushy
With much ado we got her leave the presence
With an intent in haste to ride to Plashy.
Tresilian
She’ll find sad comforts there. Would all were well.
A thousand dangers round enclose our state.
Bagot
And we’ll break through, my lord, in spite of fate.
Come, come, be merry, good Tresilian. 2340
Here comes King Richard, all go comfort him.
ENTER the King and Scroope
Scroope
My dearest lord, forsake these sad laments.
No sorrows can suffice to make her live.
King
Then let sad sorrow kill King Richard, too.
For all my earthly joys with her must die,
And I am killed with cares eternally,
For Anne-a-Beame is dead, forever gone.
She was too virtuous to remain with me,
And heaven hath given her higher dignity.
Oh, God! I fear even here begins our woe. 2350
Her death’s but chorus to some tragic scene
That shortly will confound our state and realm.
Such sad events black mischief still attend,
And bloody acts I fear must crown the end.
Bagot
Presage not so, sweet prince. Your state is strong,
Your youthful hopes with expectation crowned.
Let not one loss so many comforts drowned.
King
Despair and madness seize me. Oh, my dear friends,
What loss can be compared to such a queen?
Down with this house of Sheen, go ruin all, 2360
Pull down her buildings, let her turrets fall!
Forever lay it waste and desolate
That English king may never here keep court,
But to all ages leave a sad report.
When men shall see these ruined walls of Sheen,
And sighing say, ‘Here died King Richard’s Queen.’
For which we’ll have it wasted lime and stone
To keep a monument of Richard’s moan. Oh, torturing grief!
Bushy
Dear liege, all tears for her are vain oblations,
Her quiet soul rests in celestial peace:. 2370
With joy of that, let all your sorrows cease.
King
Send post to Calais and bid Lapoole forbear,
On pain of life, to act our sad decree.
For heaven’s love, go! Prevent the tragedy!
We have too much provoked the powers divine
And here repent thy wrongs, good uncle Woodstock;
The thought whereof confounds my memory.
If men might die when they would ’point the time,
The time is now King Richard would be gone;
For as a fearful thunderclap doth strike 2380
The soundest body of the tallest oak,
Yet harmless leaves the outward bark untouched,
So is King Richard struck. Come, come let us go.
My wounds are inward; inward burns my woe.
EXEUNT omnes
Tom Reedy
ENTER Lapoole with a light, after him the two murderers.
Lapoole
Come sirs, be resolute. The time serves well
To act the business you have ta’en in hand.
The duke is gone to rest, the room is voided,
No ear can hear his cries, be fearless bold
And win King Richard’s love, with heaps of gold. 2390
Are all your instruments for death made ready?
First Murderer
All fit to th’ purpose. See, my lord, here’s first a towel
with which we do intend to strangle him. But if he strive
and this should chance to fail, I’ll maul his old mazzard with his
hammer,
knock him down like an ox, and after cut’is throat. How like ye this?
Lapoole
No, wound him not, it must be done so fair and cunningly
As if he died a common natural death,
For so we must give out to all that ask.
Second Murderer
There is no way then, but to smother him.
Lapoole
I like that best, yet one thing let me tell ye: 2400
Think not your work contrived so easily
As if ye were to match some common man.
Believe me, sirs, his countenance is such
So full of dread and lordly majesty,
Mixed with such mild and gentle behaviour
As will (except you be resolved at full)
Strike you with fear even with his princely looks.
First Murderer
Not an’ he looked as grim as Hercules,
As stern and terrible as the devil himself.
Lapoole
’Tis well resolved. Retire yourselves awhile. 2410
Stay in the next withdrawing chamber there,
And when occasion serves, I’ll call ye forth.
Second Murderer
Do but beckon with your finger, my lord, and like vultures
we come flying and seize him presently.
EXEUNT two murderers
Lapoole
Do so. And yet now by all my fairest hopes, I swear
The boldness of these villains to this murder
Makes me abhor them and the deed forever.
Horror of conscience with the king’s command
Fights a fell combat in my fearful breast.
The king commands his uncle here must die, 2420
And my sad conscience bids the contrary
And tells me that his innocent blood, thus spilt,
Heaven will revenge. Murder’s a heinous guilt,
A seven-times crying sin. Accursed man!
The further that I wade in this foul act,
My troubled senses are the more distract,
Confounded and tormented past my reason.
But there’s no lingering, either he must die
or great King Richard vows my tragedy.
Then twixt two evils ’tis good to choose the least. 2430
Let danger fright faint fools; I’ll save mine own
And let him fall to black destruction.
He DRAWS the curtains.
He sleeps upon his bed. The time serves fitly,
I’ll call the murderers in. Sound music there
To rock his senses in eternal slumbers.
Music
Sleep, Woodstock, sleep. Thou never more shalt wake.
This town of Calais shall forever tell,
Within her castle walls Plain Thomas fell.
EXIT Lapoole
Thunder and lightning. Enter the ghost of the Black Prince.
First Ghost
Night, horror, and the eternal shrieks of death 2440
Intended to be done this dismal night
Hath shook fair England’s great cathedral,
And from my tomb elate at Canterbury,
The ghost of Edward, the Black Prince, is come
To stay King Richard’s rage. My wanton son,
Thomas of Woodstock, wake! Thy brother calls thee.
Thou royal issue of King Edward’s loins,
Thou art beset with murder, rise and fly.
If here thou stay, death comes and thou must die.
Still dost thou sleep. Oh, I am nought but air! 2450
Had I the vigour of my former strength
When thou beheldest me fight at Crecy field,
where hand-to-hand I took King John of France
and his bold sons my captive prisoners,
I’d shake these stiff supporters of thy bed
And drag thee from this dull security.
Oh, yet for pity, wake! Prevent thy doom!
Thy blood upon my son will surely come,
For which, dear brother Woodstock, haste and fly,
prevent his ruin and thy tragedy. 2460
Thunder. EXIT Ghost
Woodstock
Oh!
ENTER Edward the Third’s ghost.
Second Ghost
Sleep’st thou so soundly, and pale death so nigh?
Thomas of Woodstock, wake, my son, and fly!
Thy wrongs have roused thy royal father’s ghost,
And from his quiet grave King Edward is come
To guard thy innocent life, my princely son.
Behold me here, sometimes-fair England’s lord.
Seven war-like sons I left, yet being gone,
No one succeeded in my kingly throne.
Richard of Bordeaux, my accursed grandchild, 2470
Cut off your titles to the kingly state
And now your lives and all would ruinate;
Murders his grandsire’s sons, his father’s brothers;
Becomes a landlord to my kingly titles,
Rents out my crown’s revenues, racks my subjects
That spent their bloods with me in conquering France,
Beheld me ride in state through London streets
And at my stirrup lowly footing by
Four captive kings to grace my victory.
Yet that nor this his riotous youth can stay 2480
Till death hath ta’en his uncles all away.
Thou fifth of Edward’s sons, get up and fly!
Haste thee to England, close and speedily!
Thy brothers York and Gaunt are up in arms;
Go join with them; prevent thy further harms.
The murderers are at hand; awake, my son!
This hour foretells thy sad destruction.
EXIT Ghost
Woodstock
Oh, good angels, guide me, stay thou blessed spirit,
Thou royal shadow of my kingly father,
Return again! I know thy reverent looks. 2490
With thy dear sight, once more recomfort me!
Put by the fears my trembling heart foretells
And here is made apparent to my sight
By dreams and visions of this dreadful night.
Upon my knees I beg it. Ha! Protect me, heaven!
The doors are all made fast. ’Twas but my fancy;
All is whist and still, and nothing here appears
But the vast circuit of this empty room.
Thou blessed hand of mercy, guide my senses.
Afore my God, methoughts as here I slept 2500
I did behold in lively form and substance
My father Edward and my war-like brother,
Both gliding by my bed and cried to me
To leave this place, to save my life, and fly.
Lighten my fears, dear lord. I here remain
A poor old man, thrust from my native country,
Kept and imprisoned in a foreign kingdom.
If I must die, bear record, righteous heaven,
How I have nightly waked for England’s good,
And yet to right her wrongs would spend my blood. 2510
Send thy sad doom, King Richard: take my life.
I wish my death might ease my country's grief.
ENTER Lapoole and the murderers
Lapoole
(We are prevented: back retire again,
He’s risen from his bed. What fate preserves him?)
My lord, how fare you?
Woodstock
Thou canst not kill me villain!
God’s holy angel guards a just man’s life,
And with his radiant beams as bright as fire
Will guard and keep his righteous innocence.
I am a prince. Thou dar’st not murder me. 2520
Lapoole
Your grace mistakes, my lord.
Woodstock
What art thou, speak!
Lapoole
Lapoole, my lord, this city’s governor.
Woodstock
Lapoole, thou art King Richard’s flatterer.
Oh, you just gods. Record their treachery,
Judge their foul wrongs that under show of friendship
Betrayed my simple, kind intendiments
My heart misgave. It was no time for revels
When you, like masquers, came disguised to Plashy,
Joined with that wanton king to trap my life.
For that I know is the end his malice aims at.
This castle, and my secret sending hither
Imports no less. Therefore I charge ye tell me,
Even by the virtue of nobility,
And partly, too, on that allegiance
Thou ow’st the offspring of King Edward’s house,
If aught thou know’st to prejudice my life
Thou presently reveal, and make it known.
Lapoole
Nay, good my lord, forbear that fond suspicion.
Woodstock
I tell thee, Poole: there is no less intended. 2540
Why am I sent thus from my native country,
But here at Calais to be murdered?
And that Lapoole, confounds my patience.
This town of Calais, where I spent my blood
To make it captive to the English king,
Before whose walls great Edward lay encamped
With his seven sons almost for fourteen months;
Where the black prince, my brother, and myself,
The peers of England and our royal father,
Fearless of wounds, never left till it was won. 2550
And was’t to make a prison for his son?
Oh, righteous heavens, why do you suffer it?
Lapoole
Disquiet not your thoughts, my gracious lord.
There is no hurt intended, credit me.
Although awhile your freedom be abridged,
I know the King: if you would but submit
And write your letters to his majesty,
Your reconcilement might be easily wrought.
Woodstock
For what should I submit, or ask his mercy?
Had I offended, with all low submission 2560
I’d lay my neck under the block before him
And willingly endure the stroke of death.
But if not so, why should my fond entreaties
Make my true loyalty appear like treason?
No, no, Lapoole, let guilty men beg pardons,
My mind is clear. And I must tell ye, sir,
Princes have hearts like pointed diamonds
That will in sunder burst afore they bend,
And such lives here, though death King Richard send.
Yet fetch me pen and ink, I’ll write to him, 2570
Not to entreat, but to admonish him
That he forsake his foolish ways in time
And learn to govern like a virtuous prince,
Call home his wise and reverent counsellors,
Thrust from his court those cursed flatterers
That hourly work the realm’s confusion.
This counsel, if he follow, may in time
Pull down those mischiefs that so fast do climb.
Lapoole
Here’s pen and paper, my lord, will’t please ye write?
Woodstock
Anon I will. Shut to the doors and leave me. 2580
Goodnight, Lapoole, and pardon me, I prithee,
That my sad fear made question of thy faith.
My state is fearful, and my mind was troubled
Even at thy entrance with most fearful visions
Which made my passions more extreme and hasty
Out of my better judgment. I repent it
And will reward thy love. Once more, good-night.
Lapoole
Good rest unto your grace, (I mean in death.
This dismal night thou breathest thy latest breath.
He sits to write; I’ll call the murderers in 2590
To steal behind and closely strangle him.)
EXIT Lapoole
Woodstock
So help me heaven, I know not what to write,
What style to use, nor how I should begin.
My method is too plain to greet a king.
I’ll nothing say to excuse or clear myself,
For I have nothing done that needs excuse,
But tell him plain, though here I spend my blood.
I wish his safety and all England’s good.
ENTER both the murderers
First Murderer
Creep close to his back, ye rogue, be ready with the towel,
when I have knocked him down, to strangle him. 2600
Second Murderer
Do it quickly whilst his back is towards ye, ye damned villain.
If thou let’st him speak but a word, we shall not kill him.
First Murderer
I’ll watch him for that, down of your knees and creep, ye rascal.
Woodstock
Have mercy, God! My sight o’the sudden fails me.
I cannot see my paper, my trembling fingers will not hold
My pen, a thick congealed mist o’erspreads the chamber.
I’ll rise and view the room.
First Murderer
Not too fast for falling!
STRIKES him
Woodstock
What villain hand hath done a deed so bad
To drench his black soul in a prince’s blood? 2610
First Murderer
Do ye prate, sir? Take that and that. Zounds, put the towel
About’s throat and strangle him quickly, ye slave, or by the
heart of hell, I’ll fell thee too.
Second Murderer
’Tis done, ye damned slave. Pull, ye dog, and pull thy soul to hell
in doing it, for thou hast killed the truest subject
that ever breathed in England.
First Murderer
Pull, rogue, pull! Think of the gold we shall have for doing it,
and then let him and thee go to the devil together. Bring in
the featherbed and roll him up in that till he be smothered and
stifled, and life and soul pressed out together. Quickly, ye
hellhound! 2620
Second Murderer
Here here, ye cannibal. Zounds, he kicks and sprawls.
Lie on his breast, ye villain.
First Murderer
Let him sprawl and hang. He’s sure enough for speaking.
Pull off the bed now, smooth down his hair and beard.
Close his eyes and set his neck right, why so, all fine and cleanly.
Who can say that this man was murdered now?
Lapoole
What, is he dead?
Second Murderer
As a doornail, my lord. What will ye do with his body?
Lapoole
Take it up gently, lay him in his bed,
Then shut the door as if he there had died. 2630
First Murderer
It cannot be perceived otherwise, my lord. Never was
murder done with such rare skill. At our return we shall
expect reward, my lord.
Lapoole
’Tis ready told. Bear in the body, then return and take it.
EXEUNT with the body
Within there, ho!
Soldier
My lord?
Lapoole
Be ready with your weapons, soldiers. Guard the room.
There’s two false traitors entered the duke’s chamber,
Plotting to bear him thence, betray the castle,
Deliver up the town and all our lives 2640
To the French forces that are hard at hand
To second their attempts. Therefore stand close,
And as they enter, seize them presently.
Our will’s your warrant: use no further words
But hew them straight in pieces with your swords.
Soldier
I warrant ye, my lord, an’ their skins were scaled with brass,
we have swords will pierce them. Come sirs, be ready.
ENTER the murderers
First Murderer
Come, ye miching rascal. The deed’s done and all things performed
rarely.
We’ll take our reward, steal close out o’th’ town, buy us fresh
geldings,
Spur, cut and ride till we are past all danger, I warrant thee. 2650
Lapoole
Give their reward there! Quick, I say!
Soldier
Down with the traitors! Kill the villains!
Both
Hell and the devil! Zounds! Hold, ye rascals!
They KILL the murderers
Lapoole
Drag hence their bodies, hurl them in the sea.
The black reward of death’s a traitor’s pay.
EXEUNT soldiers with their bodies
So, this was well performed. Now who but we
Can make report of Woodstock’s tragedy?
Only he died a natural death at Calais;
So must we give it out, or else King Richard
Through Europe’s kingdoms will be hardly censured. 2660
His headstrong uncles, York and Lancaster,
Are up, we hear, in open arms against him;
The gentlemen and commons of the realm,
Missing the good old duke, their plain protector,
Break their allegiance to their sovereign lord
And all revolt upon the baron’s sides;
To help which harm, I’ll over to England straight,
And with the old troops of soldiers taken from Calais,
I’ll back King Richard’s power. For should he fail
(And his great uncles get the victory), 2670
His friends are sure to die; but if he win,
they fall, and we shall rise whilst Richard is king.
EXEUNT
Tom Reedy
Drums. March within. ENTER Tresilian and Nimble with armour.
Tresilian
These proclamations we have sent abroad
Wherein we have accused the dukes of treason
Will daunt their pride and make the people leave them.
I hope no less, at least. Where art thou, Nimble?
Nimble
So loaden with armour I cannot stir, my lord.
Tresilian
Whose drums were those that beat even now?
Nimble
King Richard’s drums, my lord: the young lords are pressing soldiers.
2680
Tresilian
Oh, and do they take their press with willingness?
Nimble
As willing as a punk that’s pressed on a feather-bed, they take their
pressing
a piece with great patience. Marry, the lords no sooner turn their
backs
but they run away like sheep, sir.
Tresilian
They shall be hanged like dogs for’t.
What dares the slaves refuse their sovereign?
Nimble
They say the proclamation’s false, my lord,
And they’ll not fight against the king’s friends.
Tresilian
So I feared as much, and since ’tis come to this
I must provide betime and seek for safety, 2690
For now the king and our audacious peers
Are grown to such a height of burning rage
As nothing now can quench their kindled ire
But open trial by the sword and lance,
And then I fear King Richard’s part will fail,
Nimble. Our soldiers run, thou sayest?
Nimble
Ay, by my troth, my lord. And I think ’tis our best course to run
after them,
for if they run now, what will they do when the battle begins?
If we tarry here and the king’s uncles catch us, we are sure to be
hanged.
My lord, have ye no trick of law to defend us? No demur 2700
or writ of error to remove us?
Tresilian
Nimble, we must be wise.
Nimble
Then let’s not stay to have more wit beaten into our heads, I like not
that, my lord.
Tresilian
I am a man for peace, and not for war.
Nimble
And yet they say you have made more wrangling i’th’ land
than all the wars have done these seven years.
Tresilian
This battle will revenge their base exclaims.
But hear’st thou, Nimble, I’ll not be there today.
One man amongst so many is no maim,
Therefore I’ll keep aloof, till all be done, 2710
If good, I stay; if bad, away I run.
Nimble, it shall be so. I’ll neither fight nor die;
But thus resolved, disguise myself and fly.
EXIT Tresilian
Nimble
’Tis the wisest course, my lord.
And I’ll go put off mine armour that I may run lustily too.
EXIT Nimble
Act 5 Scene 3
ENTER with drum and colours: York, Lancaster, Arundel, Surrey, with
the Duchess of Gloucester, and soldiers and Cheyney.
Lancaster
Go to our tents, dear sister. Cease your sorrows,
We will revenge our noble brother’s wrongs
And force that wanton tyrant to reveal 2720
The death of his dear uncle, harmless Woodstock,
So traitorously betrayed.
York
Alack, good man,
It was an easy task to work on him;
His plainness was too open to their view.
He feared no wrong, because his heart was true.
Good sister, cease your weeping. There’s none here
But are as full of woe and touched as near.
Conduct and guard her, Cheyney, to the tent.
Expect to hear severest punishment 2730
On all their heads that have procured his harms,
Struck from the terror of our threatening arms.
Duchess of Gloucester
May all the powers of heaven assist your hands,
And may their sins sit heavy on their souls
That they in death this day, may perish all
That traitorously conspired good Woodstock’s fall.
EXEUNT Cheyney and the Duchess
Lancaster
If he be dead, by good King Edward’s soul,
We’ll call King Richard to a strict account
For that and for his realm’s misgovernment.
You peers of England, raised in righteous arms 2740
Here to re-edify our country’s ruin,
Join all your hearts and hands, never to cease
Till with our swords we work fair England’s peace.
DRUMS
Arundel
Most princely Lancaster, our lands and lives
Are to these just proceedings ever vowed.
Surrey
Those flattering minions that o’er turns the state
This day in death shall meet their endless fate.
York
Never such vipers were endured so long
To grip, and eat the hearts of all the kingdom.
DRUMS
Lancaster
This day shall here determinate all wrongs. 2750
The meanest man taxed by their foul oppressions
Shall be permitted freely to accuse,
And right they shall have to regain their own,
Or all shall sink to dark confusion.
DRUMS SOUNDS within
Arundel
How now, what drums are these?
ENTER Cheyney
Cheyney
To arms, my lords! The minions of the king
Are swiftly marching on to give ye battle.
Lancaster
They march to death then, Cheyney. Dare the traitors
Presume to brave the field with English princes?
York
Where is King Richard? He was resolved but lately 2760
To take some hold of strength, and so secure him.
Cheyney
Knowing their states were all so desperate,
It seems they have persuaded otherwise,
For now he comes with full resolve to fight.
Lapoole this morning is arrived at court
With the Calais soldiers and some French supplies
To back this now intended enterprise.
Lancaster
Those new supplies have spurred their forward hopes
And thrust their resolutions boldly on
To meet with death and sad destruction. 2770
York
Their drums are near. Just heaven, direct this deed
And as our cause deserves, our fortunes speed.
MARCH about
ENTER with drum and colours, the King, Greene, Bushy, Bagot, Scroope,
Lapoole,
and soldiers. They march about all.
King
Although we could have easily surprised,
Dispersed and overthrown your rebel troops
That draw your swords against our sacred person,
The highest God’s anointed deputy,
Breaking your holy oaths to heaven and us,
Yet of our mild and princely clemency 2780
We have forborne; that by this parliament
We might be made partaker of the cause
That moved ye rise in this rebellious sort.
Lancaster
Hast thou, King Richard, made us infamous?
By proclamations false and impudent,
Hast thou condemned us in our absence too
As most notorious traitors to the crown,
Betrayed our brother Woodstock’s harmless life,
And sought base means to put us all to death,
And dost thou now plead dotish ignorance 2790
Why we are banded thus in our defense?
Greene
Methinks your treasons to his majesty,
Raising his subjects against his royal life,
Should make ye beg for mercy at his feet.
King
You have forgotten, uncle Lancaster,
How you in prison murdered cruelly
A friar Carmelite because he was
To bring in evidence against your grace
Of most ungracious deeds and practices.
Lancaster
And you, my lord, remember not so well 2800
That by that Carmelite at London once,
When at a supper, you’d have poisoned us.
York
For shame, King Richard, leave this company
That like dark clouds obscure the sparkling stars
Of thy great birth and true nobility.
Arundel
Yield to your uncles. Who but they should have
The guidance of your sacred state and council?
Bagot
Yield first your heads, and so he shall be sure
To keep his person and his state secure.
King
And by my crown, if still you thus persist, 2810
Your heads and hearts ere long shall answer it.
Arundel
Not till ye send for more supplies from France,
For England will not yield ye strength to do it.
York
Thou well mayst doubt their loves that lost their hearts.
Ungracious prince, cannot thy native country
Find men to back this desperate enterprise?
Lancaster
His native country! Why, that is France my lords!
At Bordeaux was he born, which place allures
And ties his deep affections still to France.
Richard is English blood, not English born. 2820
Thy mother travailed in unhappy hours
When she, at Bordeaux, left her heavy load.
The soil is fat for wines, not fit for men,
And England now laments that heavy time.
Her royalties are lost; her state made base;
And thou no king, but landlord now become
To this great state that terrored Christendom.
King
I cannot brook these braves. Let drums sound death,
And strike at once to stop this traitor’s breath.
Bagot
Stay, my dear lord; and once more hear me, princes. 2830
The king was minded, ere this brawl began,
To come to terms of composition.
Lancaster
Let him revoke the proclamations,
Clear us of all supposed crimes of treason,
Reveal where our good brother Gloucester keeps,
And grant that these pernicious flatterers
May by the law be tried, to quit themselves
Of all such heinous crimes alleged against them,
And we’ll lay down our weapons at thy feet.
King’s Men
Presumptuous traitors! 2840
Lord’s Men
Traitors!
King
Again we double it: rebellious traitors!
Traitors to heaven and us. Draw all your swords
And fling defiance to those traitorous lords.
King’s Men
Let our drums thunder and begin the fight.
Lord’s Men
Just heaven protect us and defend the right.
EXEUNT omnes
Tom Reedy
Alarum. ENTER Greene and Cheyney: meets armed.
Cheyney
Stand, traitor! For thou canst not ’scape my sword.
Greene
What villain fronts me with the name of traitor?
Was’t thou, false Cheyney? Now by King Richard’s love 2850
I’ll tilt thy soul out for that base reproach.
I would thy master and the late protector
With both his treacherous brothers, Gaunt and York,
Were all opposed with thee, to try these arms.
I’d seal’t on all your hearts.
Alarum
Cheyney
This shall suffice
To free the kingdom from thy villainies.
They FIGHT
ENTER Arundel
Arundel
Thou hunt’st a noble game, right war-like Cheyney.
Cut but this ulcer off, thou heal’st the kingdom.
Yield thee, false traitor, most detested man 2860
That settest King Richard ’gainst his reverent uncles
To shed the royal blood and make the realm
Weep for their timeless desolation.
Cast down thy weapons, for by this my sword
We’ll bear thee from this place, alive or dead.
Greene
Come both then. I’ll stand firm and dare your worst.
He that flies from it, be his soul accursed!
They FIGHT and Greene is slain
Arundel
So may the foes of England fall in blood.
Most desolate traitor! Up with his body, Cheyney,
And hale it to the tent of Lancaster.
ENTER King, Bagot, Bushy, Scroope and soldiers
Cheyney
Stand firm, my lord. Here’s rescue.
Arundel
Courage, then. We’ll bear his body hence in spite of them.
They FIGHT
To them ENTER Lancaster, York, and Surrey, and beats them away.
MANET the King
King
Oh, princely youth, King Richard’s dearest friend!
What heavy star this day had dominance
To cut off all thy flowering youthful hopes?
Prosper, proud rebels! As you dealt by him,
Hard-hearted uncles, unrelenting churls, 2880
That here have murdered all my earthly joys.
Oh my dear Greene, wert thou alive to see
How I’ll revenge thy timeless tragedy
On all their heads that did but lift a hand
To hurt this body, that I held so dear
Even by this kiss and by my crown I swear.
Alarum. ENTER Bagot, Bushy, and Scroope to the King
Bagot
Away, my lord! Stand not to wail his death.
The field is lost; our soldiers shrink and fly:
Lapoole is taken prisoner by the lords. 2890
Hie to the tower. There is no help in swords.
Scroope
Still to continue war were childishness.
Their odds a mountain, ours a molehill is.
Bushy
Let’s fly to London and make strong the tower.
Loud proclamations post throughout the camp
With promise of reward to all that take us.
Get safety for our lives, my princely lord.
If here we stay, we shall be all betrayed.
King
Oh my dear friends, the fearful wrath of heaven
Sits heavy on our heads for Woodstock’s death. 2900
Blood cries for blood, and that almighty hand
Permits not murder unrevenged to stand. Come, come,
We yet may hide ourselves from worldly strength,
But heaven will find us out, and strike at length.
Each lend a hand to bear this load of woe,
That erst King Richard loved and tendered so.
EXEUNT omnes
Act 5 Scene 5
ENTER Tresilian disguised and Nimble
Tresilian
Where art thou, Nimble?
Nimble
As light as a feather, my lord. I have put off my shoes
that I might run lustily. The battle’s lost and they are 2910
all prisoners. What shall we do, my lord? Yonder’s a ditch;
we may run along that and ne’er be seen, I warrant ye.
Tresilian
I did suspect no less; and so ’tis fallen.
The day is lost; and dashed are all our hopes.
King Richard’s taken prisoner by the peers.
Oh that I were upon some steepy rock
Where I might tumble headlong to the sea
Before those cruel lords do seize on me.
Nimble
Oh that I were transformed into a mouse, that I might creep
into any hole i’th’ house, and I cared not. 2920
Tresilian
Come, Nimble, ’tis no time to use delay.
I’ll keep me in this poor disguise a while
And so, unknown, prolong my weary life
In hope King Richard shall conclude my peace.
SOUND retreat
Hark, hark, the trumpets call the soldiers back.
Retreat is sounded, now the time serves fit
And we may steal from hence. Away good Nimble.
Nimble
Nay, stay my lord! ’Slid, and ye go that way, farewell.
But an’ you’ll be ruled by me, I have thought of a trick
that ye shall ’scape them all most bravely. 2930
Tresilian
Bethink thyself, good Nimble. Quickly, man!
Nimble
I’ll meditate, my lord; and then I’m for ye. (Now, Nimble,
show thyself a man of valour. Think of thy fortunes.
’Tis a hanging matter if thou conceal him. Besides there’s
a thousand marks for him that takes him, with the duke’s
favours, and free pardon. Besides he’s but a coward; he would
ne’er have run from the battle else. Saint Antony, assist me,
I’ll set upon him presently.) My lord, I have thought upon
this trick: I must take ye prisoner.
Tresilian
How, prisoner? 2940
Nimble
There’s no way to ’scape else. Then must I carry ye to the king’s
uncles, who presently condemns ye for a traitor, sends ye away
to hanging, and then ‘God bless my lord Tresilian’.
Tresilian
Wilt thou betray thy master, villain?
Nimble
Ay, if my master be a villain. You think ’tis nothing for a man
to be hanged for his master. You hear not the proclamation?
Tresilian
What proclamation?
Nimble
Oh, sir, all the country’s full of them, that whosoever sees you,
does not presently take ye, and bring ye to the lords, shall be
hanged for his labour. Therefore no more words, lest I raise 2950
the whole camp upon ye. Ye see one of your own swords of
justice drawn over ye. therefore go quietly lest I
cut your head off and save the hangman a labour.
Tresilian
Oh villain!
Nimble
No more words. Away, sir!
EXEUNT
Act 5 Scene 6
SOUND a retreat then a flourish. ENTER with victory Lancaster,
Cheyney, Arundel, Surrey and soldiers, with Lapoole, Bushy, and
Scroope prisoners. Drums and colours.
Lancaster
Thus princely Edward’s sons in tender care
Of wanton Richard and their father’s realm
Have toiled to purge fair England’s pleasant field 2960
Of all those rancorous weeds that choked the grounds
And left her pleasant meads like barren hills.
Who is it can tell us which way Bagot fled?
Arundel
Some say to Bristol to make strong the castle.
Lancaster
See that the port’s belayed. He’ll fly the land,
For England hath no hold can keep him from us.
Had we Tresilian hanged, then all were sure.
Where slept our scouts that he escaped the field?
Cheyney
He fled, they say, before the fight began.
FLOURISH within
Lancaster
Our proclamations soon shall find him forth, 2970
The root and ground of all these vild abuses.
ENTER Nimble with Tresilian bound and guarded
Lancaster
How now, what traitor’s there?
Nimble
The traitor now is ta’en. I here present the villain,
and if ye needs will know his name,
‘God bless my lord Tresilian’.
Cheyney
Tresilian, my lord, attached and apprehended by his man!
Nimble
Yes, and it please ye, my lord, ’twas I that took him.
I was once a trampler in the law after him, and I thank
him he taught me this trick, to save myself from hanging. 2980
Lancaster
Thou’rt a good lawyer and hast removed the cause from thyself fairly.
Nimble
I have removed it with a habeas corpus; and then I took him
with surssararis, and bound him in this bond to answer it.
Nay, I have studied for my learning, I can tell ye, my lord.
There was not a stone between Westminster Hall and Temple Bar
but I have told them every morning.
Arundel
What moved thee, being his man, to apprehend him?
Nimble
Partly for these causes: first, the fear of the proclamation,
for I have plodded in Plowden and can find no law
[…]
Tom Reedy
Anybody else have an opinion?
TR
Peter Groves
news:d99af361-76e0-4a80...@z66g2000hsc.googlegroups.com...
> So is it Shakespeare? I think not, not even close.
>
> Anybody else have an opinion?
>
> TR
<Prima facie> I'd say no: the verse, for a start, is very pedestrian, and
rather wooden in its movement, and these characteristics are not typical of
Shakespeare.
--
Peter G.
lackpurity
> "Tom Reedy" <tom.re...@gmail.com> wrote in message
MM:
My opinion is that the Divine Bard of Stratford was the author, and
that is beyond any shadow of a doubt.
Michael Martin
Tom Reedy
Also the characters are relatively flat. He doesn't have Shakespeare's
sense of timing, either. The comic "blanks" scene goes on too long.
The assasination scene was quite good, though.
Overall I thought it was pretty good considering a lot of the plays
I've read. Much better than Greene, for example, and along the same
line but better than Famous Victories. Not as good as most Middleton.
I give it a C+. Good journeyman effort.
TR
> --
> Peter G.
John W Kennedy
> So is it Shakespeare? I think not, not even close.
I think not, too. It certainly isn't "Richard II, Part 1" -- the two
plays are almost wholly inconsistent in characterizing the common
historical personalities, the one does not anticipate the other, the
themes are different, the ending of the one does not lead to the
beginning of the other, and there's something wrong about the meter,
too; trisyllabic "sovereign" as a masculine ending just doesn't sound
like Shakespeare. If there is any organic relationship between them at
all, it is one based on a vague memory (or mere show-business gossip),
and I see no need even for that.
--
John W. Kennedy
"Give up vows and dogmas, and fixed things, and you may grow like
That. ...you may come to think a blow bad, because it hurts, and not
because it humiliates. You may come to think murder wrong, because it
is violent, and not because it is unjust."
-- G. K. Chesterton. "The Ball and the Cross"
John W Kennedy
Will you please stop offering your opinion of works you haven't even read?
--
John W. Kennedy
"The pathetic hope that the White House will turn a Caligula into a
Marcus Aurelius is as naïve as the fear that ultimate power inevitably
corrupts."
-- James D. Barber (1930-2004)
Jim KQKnave
> and there's something wrong about the meter,
> too; trisyllabic "sovereign" as a masculine ending just doesn't sound
> like Shakespeare.
R3
Act 3, Scene 1
GLOUCESTER Welcome, dear cousin, my thoughts' sovereign
The weary way hath made you melancholy.
Act 5, Scene 3
NORFOLK A good direction, warlike sovereign.
R2
Act 2, Scene 3
DUKE OF YORK
Thou art a banish'd man, and here art come
Before the expiration of thy time,
In braving arms against thy sovereign.
AWEW
Act 1, Scene 1
HELENA There shall your master have a thousand loves,
A mother and a mistress and a friend,
A phoenix, captain and an enemy,
A guide, a goddess, and a sovereign,
And about a million other examples. This play isn't by
Shakespeare, but it's not because of "sovereign".
*************
see also
The Droeshout portrait is not unusual at all!
http://hometown.aol.com/kqknave/shakenbake.html
See my demolition of Monsarrat's RES paper!
http://hometown.aol.com/kqknave/monsarr1.html
Agent Jim
Peter Groves
news:484053f9$0$15166$607e...@cv.net...
> Tom Reedy wrote:
>> So is it Shakespeare? I think not, not even close.
>
> I think not, too. It certainly isn't "Richard II, Part 1" -- the two plays
> are almost wholly inconsistent in characterizing the common historical
> personalities, the one does not anticipate the other, the themes are
> different, the ending of the one does not lead to the beginning of the
> other, and there's something wrong about the meter, too; trisyllabic
> "sovereign" as a masculine ending just doesn't sound like Shakespeare.
I would have agreed with you, but a quick check shows we're both wrong:
A guide, a goddess, and a sovereign,
Dear lady daughter, peace!- Sweet sovereign,
Runs far before them. Good my sovereign,
Commend my service to my sovereign.'
To do my duty to my sovereign;
Hath he forgot he is his sovereign?
When thou wert Regent for our sovereign,
That shall salute our rightful sovereign
WARWICK. It is reported, mighty sovereign,
Set all upon me, mighty sovereign.
YORK. He rose against him, being his sovereign,
But far unfit to be a sovereign.
Thy nephew and right royal sovereign.
In braving arms against thy sovereign.
GLOUCESTER. He may command me as my sovereign;
NORFOLK. A good direction, warlike sovereign.
We thus submit unto,--our sovereign.
Strange things happen in that final position.
--
Peter G.
John W Kennedy
I feared this might happen, but didn't have any reasonable check to
hand. Perhaps it's partly that
Where John-of-Gaunt writes King and sovereign,
when subjects dare to brave their sovereign.
seek to subvert their King and sovereign.
are such thumping lines, especially the last, that it makes the
soverEIGN stand out.
--
John W. Kennedy
"There are those who argue that everything breaks even in this old
dump of a world of ours. I suppose these ginks who argue that way hold
that because the rich man gets ice in the summer and the poor man gets
it in the winter things are breaking even for both. Maybe so, but I'll
swear I can't see it that way."
-- The last words of Bat Masterson
Peter Groves
I suppose, too, that the end of the line is favoured for prolations because
if a potentially trisyllabic word begins in position 8 it's easier for the
reader to predict on the fly that it *must* be prolated. There are 102
lines with "Romeo" in them, 22 with the prolated form "Ro-me-o", and in 19
of those it's the last word in the line:
Romeo! my cousin Romeo! Romeo!
Romeo! humours! madman! passion! lover!
Henceforth I never will be Romeo.
They say Jove laughs. O gentle Romeo,
Here's such a coil! Come, what says Romeo?
There lies the man, slain by young Romeo,
Retorts it. Romeo he cries aloud,
But by-and-by comes back to Romeo,
That runaway eyes may wink, and Romeo
Though heaven cannot. O Romeo, Romeo!
Who ever would have thought it? Romeo!
Hie to your chamber. I'll find Romeo
Where is my lady's lord, where's Romeo?
Ere I again behold my Romeo!
With Romeo till I behold him- dead-
I wake before the time that Romeo
Welcome from Mantua. What says Romeo?
Who bare my letter, then, to Romeo?
She will beshrew me much that Romeo
And there I am. Where is my Romeo?
The people in the street cry 'Romeo,'
Than this of Juliet and her Romeo.
--
Peter G.
Ann
> So is it Shakespeare? I think not, not even close.
At the time I thought it had similaries to Kyd's "Spanish Tragedy,"
though that was probably mostly because I read the two relatively
close together.
Tom, what can you share about the style of Samuel Rowley?
Though inferior to Shakespeare, Marlowe, and others in language and
characterization, I think the plot pulls one through, and I would like
to see it staged -- depending, of course, on how one would handle the
missing ending.