But now thy beauty is proposed my fee,
My proud heart sues, and prompts my tongue to
speak. [She looks scornfully at him.
Teach not thy lip such scorn; for it was made
For kissing, lady, not for such contempt.
If thy revengeful heart cannot forgive,
Lo! here I lend thee this sharp-pointed sword;
Which if thou please to hide in this true breast,
And let the soul forth that adoreth thee,
I lay it naked to the deadly stroke,
And humbly beg the death upon my knee.

[He lays his breast open; she offers at it
with his sword.

Nay, do not pause; for I did kill king Henry ;— But 't was thy beauty that provoked me. Nay, now despatch; 't was I that stabb'd young Edward::- [She again offers at his breast.

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

I will not be thy executioner.

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

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

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

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

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

To see you are become so penitent.
Tressel, and Berkley, go along with me.

Glo. Bid me farewell.
Anne.

'Tis more than you deserve: But, since you teach me how to flatter you, Imagine I have said farewell already.

[Exeunt Lady ANNE, TRESSEL, and BERKLEY.
Glo. Take up
the corse, sirs.d

Gent.
Towards Chertsey, noble lord?
Glo. No, to White-Friars; there attend my
coming.

[Exeunt the rest, with the corse.
Was ever woman in this humour woo'd?
Was ever woman in this humour won?
I'll have her, but I will not keep her long.
What! I, that kill'd her husband and his father,
To take her in her heart's extremest hate;
With curses in her mouth, tears in her eyes,
The bleeding witness of her hatred by;
Having God, her conscience, and these bars
against me,

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

Hath she forgot already that brave prince,
Edward, her lord, whom I, some three months

That cropp'd the golden prime of this sweet prince,

And made her widow to a woeful bed?

On me, whose all not equals Edward's moiety?
On me, that halt, and am mis-shapen thus ?
My dukedom to a beggarly denier,
I do mistake my person all this while :
Upon my life, she finds, although I cannot,
Myself to be a marvellous proper man.
I'll be at charges for a looking glass;
And entertain a score or two of tailors
To study fashions to adorn my body:
Since I am crept in favour with myself,
I will maintain it with some little cost.
But, first, I'll turn yon' fellow in his grave;
And then return lamenting to my love.
Shine out, fair sun, till I have bought a glass,
That I may see my shadow as I pass. [Exit.

a

SCENE III.-The same. A room in the Palace.

Enter QUEEN ELIZABETH, LORD RIVERS, and LORD GREY.

Riv. Have patience, madam; there's no doubt his majesty

Will soon recover his accustom'd health.

Grey. In that you brook it ill it makes him

worse:

Therefore, for God's sake, entertain good comfort,

And cheer his grace with quick and merry eyes.b

Q. Eliz. If he were dead, what would betide on me?

Grey. No other harm but loss of such a lord. Q. Eliz. The loss of such a lord includes all harms.

Grey. The heavens have bless'd you with a goodly son,

To be your comforter when he is gone.

Q. Eliz. Ah, he is young; and his minority Is put unto the trust of Richard Gloster, A man that loves not me, nor none of you.

Riv. Is it concluded he shall be protector? Q. Eliz. It is determin'd, not concluded yet: But so it must be if the king miscarry.

Enter BUCKINGHAM and STANLEY.

Grey. Here come the lords of Buckingham and Stanley.

a In-into.

b Eyes in the folio; words in the quartos.

c Stanley. In the early part of this play, Lord Stanley, who is named such in the fourth and fifth acts, is called Derby. He was not created Earl of Derby till after the accession of Henry VII. The necessary correction throughout was made by Theobald.

Buck. Good time of day unto your royal grace!

Stan. God make your majesty joyful as you have been!

Q. Eliz. The countess Richmond, good my lord of Stanley,

To your good prayer will scarcely say amen.
Yet, Stanley, notwithstanding she's your wife,
And loves not me, be you, good lord, assur'd
I hate not you for her proud arrogance.

Stan. I do beseech you, either not believe
The envious slanders of her false accusers;
Or, if she be accus'd on true report,
Bear with her weakness, which, I think, pro-
ceeds

From wayward sickness, and no grounded malice.

Q. Eliz. Saw you the king to-day, my lord of Stanley?

Stan. But now, the duke of Buckingham and I Are come from visiting his majesty.

Q. Eliz. What likelihood of his amendment, lords ?

Buck. Madam, good hope; his grace speaks cheerfully.

Q. Eliz. God grant him health! did you confer with him?

Buck. Ay, madam: ho desires to make atone

ment

a

Between the duke of Gloster and your brothers,
And between them and my lord chair.berlain ;
And sent to warn them to his royal presence.
Q. Eliz. 'Would all were well!--but that will
never be!

I fear our happiness is at the height.

Enter GLOSTER, HASTINGS, and DORSET.
Glo. They do me wrong, and I will not en-
dure it :

Who are they that complain unto the king,
That I, forsooth, am stern and love them not?
By holy Paul, they love his grace but lightly
That fill his ears with such dissensious rumours.
'Because I cannot flatter, and look fair,
Smile in men's faces, smooth, deceive, and cog,
Duck with French nods and apish courtesy,
I must be held a rancorous enemy.
Cannot a plain man live, and think no harm,
But thus his simple truth must be abus'd
By silken, sly, insinuating Jacks ?

Grey. To whom in all this presence speaks
your grace?

Glo. To thee, that hast nor honesty nor grace.

a Warn-summon.

bLook, in the folio; the quartos, speak.

When have I injur'd thee? when done thee wrong ?

Or thee?-or thee ?
-or any of your faction?
A plague upon you all! His royal grace,
Whom God preserve better than you would wish!
Cannot be quiet scarce a breathing-while,
But you must trouble him with lewd complaints.
Q. Eliz. Brother of Gloster, you mistake the
matter:

The king, of his own royal disposition,
And not provok'd by any suitor else;
Aiming, belike, at your interior hatred,
That in your outward action shows itself
Against my children, brothers, and myself,
Makes him to send; that thereby he may gather
The ground of your ill-will, and so remove it."
Glo. I cannot tell:-The world is grown so
bad

of you:

Our brother is imprison'd by your means,
Myself disgrac'd, and the nobility
Held in contempt; while great promotions
Are daily given, to ennoble those

That scarce, some two days since, were worth a noble.

Q. Eliz. By Him that rais'd me to this careful height

From that contented hap which I enjoy'd,
I never did incense his majesty
Against the duke of Clarence, but have been
An earnest advocate to plead for him.
My lord, you do me shameful injury
Falsely to draw me in these vile suspects.
Glo. You may deny that you were not the

mean

Of my lord Hastings' late imprisonment.
Riv. She may, my lord; for--

Glo. She may, lord Rivers ?—why, who knows not so?

She may do more, sir, than denying that:

a We print the passage as in the quartos. The folio has only one line, instead of the amplified reading of the quartos; -it is,

"Makes him to send, that he may learn the ground."

b Make prey-so in the folio, and the two first quartos.

The reading of many modern reprints was may prey,

c Mean, in the folio; the quartos, cause.

She may help you to many fair preferments;
And then deny her aiding hand therein,
And lay those honours on your high desert.
What may she not? She may,-ay, marry, may
she,-

Riv. What, marry, may she?
Glo. What, marry, may slie ? marry

king,

A bachelor, and a handsome stripling too:

I wis your grandam had a worser match.

with a

Q. Eliz. My lord of Gloster, I have too long
borne

Your blunt upbraidings and your bitter scoffs:
By heaven, I will acquaint his majesty
Of those gross taunts that oft I have endur'd.
I had rather be a country servant-maid
Than a great queen, with this condition,
To be so baited, scorn'd, and stormed at:
Small joy have I in being England's queen.

Enter QUEEN MARGARET, behind.

Q. Mar. And lessen'd be that small, God, I beseech him a

Thy honour, state, and seat, is due to me. Glo. What? threat you me with telling of the king?

Tell him, and spare not look, what I have said I will avouch, in presence of the king:

I dare adventure to be sent to the Tower. 'Tis time to speak, my pains are quite forgot. Q. Mar. Out, devil! I do remember them

Thou kill'dst my husband Henry in the Tower, And Edward, my poor son, at Tewkesbury.

Glo. Ere you were queen, ay, or your husband king,

I was a pack-horse in his great affairs;
A weeder out of his proud adversaries,
A liberal rewarder of his friends;
To royalize his blood I spilt mine own.

Q. Mar. Ay, and much better blood than his, or thine.

Glo. In all which time, you, and your husband Grey,

Were factious for the house of Lancaster ;-
And, Rivers, so were you :-Was not your hus-
band

In Margaret's battle at Saint Alban's slain?
Let me put in your minds, if you forget,
What have been ere this, and what you are;
you
Withal, what I have been, and what I am.

с

a Him, in the folio; the quartos, thee.

b This line is not found in the folio. The omission is evi

dently a typographical error.

o This, in the folio; the quartos, now.

pose

You should enjoy, were you this country's king;
As little joy you may suppose in me
That I enjoy, being the queen thereof.

Q. Mar. A little joy enjoys the queen thereof!
For I am she, and altogether joyless.
I can no longer hold me patient. [Advancing.
Hear me, you wrangling pirates, that fall out
In sharing that which you have pill'd from me :
Which of you trembles not that looks on me?
If not, that I being queen you bow like subjects,
Yet that by you depos'd you quake like rebels ?—
Ah, gentle villain, do not turn away !

Glo. Foul wrinkled witch, what mak'st thou in my sight?

Q. Mar. But repetition of what thou hast marr'd;

That will I make, before I let thee go.b

Glo. Wert thou not banished on pain of death?
Q. Mar. I was; but I do find more pain in
banishment

Than death can yield me here by my abode.
A husband, and a son, thou ow'st to me,-
And thou, a kingdom;-all of you, allegiance:

a Sovereign, in the folio; the quartos, lawful. The correction of the folio was certainly necessary; for Rivers would scarcely have ventured to use the epithet lawful (legitimate) in the presence of Gloster.

b The double acceptation of the verb make is also exemplified in As You Like It:

"Now, sir, what make you here?

Nothing: I am not taught to make anything."

This sorrow that I have by right is yours;
And all the pleasures you usurp are mine.

Glo. The curse my noble father laid on thee, When thou didst crown his warlike brows with paper,

And with thy scorns drew'st rivers from his eyes, And then, to dry them, gav'st the duke a clout, Steep'd in the faultless blood of pretty Rutland;

His curses, then from bitterness of soul Denounc'd against thee, are all fallen upon thee ; And God, not we, hath plagued thy bloody deed. Q. Eliz. So just is God, to right the innocent. Hast. O, 't was the foulest deed, to slay that babe,

And the most merciless, that e'er was heard of. Riv. Tyrants themselves wept when it was reported.

Dors. No man but prophesied revenge for it. Buck. Northumberland, then present, wept to

see it.

Q. Mar. What were you snarling all, before
I came,

Ready to catch each other by the throat,
And turn you all your hatred now on me?
Did York's dread curse prevail so much with
heaven

That Henry's death, my lovely Edward's death,
Their kingdom's loss, my woful banishment,
Should all but answer for that peevish brat?
Can curses pierce the clouds, and enter heaven?
Why, then give way, dull clouds, to my quick
curses!

Though not by war, by surfeit die your king,
As ours by murther, to make him a king!
Edward, thy son, that now is prince of Wales,
For Edward, our son, that was prince of Wales,
Die in his youth by like untimely violence!
Thyself a queen, for me that was a queen,
Outlive thy glory, like my wretched self!
Long may'st thou live, to wail thy children's
death a

And see another, as I see thee now,
Deck'd in thy rights, as thou art stall'd in mine!
Long die thy happy days before thy death;
And, after many lengthen'd hours of grief,
Die neither mother, wife, nor England's queen!
Rivers, and Dorset, you were standers by,-
And so wast thou, lord Hastings,—when my son
Was stabb'd with bloody daggers: God, I pray

him,

That none of you may live your natural age, But by some unlook'd accident cut off!

Death, in the folio; the quartos, loss.

Glo. Have done thy charm, thou hateful wither'd hag.

Q. Mar. And leave out thee? stay, dog, for thou shalt hear me.

If heaven have any grievous plague in store,
Exceeding those that I can wish upon thee,
O, let them keep it, till thy sins be ripe,
And then hurl down their indignation
On thee, the troubler of the poor world's peace!
The worm of conscience still be-gnaw thy soul!
Thy friends suspect for traitors while thou liv'st,
And take deep traitors for thy dearest friends!
No sleep close up that deadly eye of thine,
Unless it be while some tormenting dream
Affrights thee with a hell of ugly devils!
Thou elvish-mark'd, abortiye, rooting hog!
Thou that wast seal'd in thy nativity
The slave of nature, and the son of hell!
Thou slander of thy heavy mother's womb!"
Thou loathed issue of thy father's loins!
Thou rag
of honour thou detested-
Glo. Margaret.

Q. Mar. Why, so I did; but look'd for no reply.

O, let me make the period to my curse.

Glo. 'Tis done by me; and ends in-Margaret. Q. Eliz. Thus have you breath'd your curse against yourself.

Q. Mar. Poor painted queen, vain flourish of
my fortune!

Why strew'st thou sugar on that bottled spider,
Whose deadly web ensnareth thee about?
Fool, fool! thou whet'st a knife to kill thyself.
The day will come that thou shalt wish for me
To help thee curse this pois'nous bunch-back'd
toad.

Hast. False-boding woman, end thy frantic

curse,

Lest to thy harm thou move our patience.

Q. Mar. Foul shame upon you! you have all mov'd mine.

Riv. Were you well serv'd, you would be taught your duty.

Q. Mar. To serve me well, you all should do me duty,

Teach me to be your queen, and you my subjects: O, serve me well, and teach yourselves that duty. Dor. Dispute not with her, she is lunatic.

a So the folio; the quartos, mother's heavy womb.

Q. Mar. Peace, master marquis, you are malapert:

Your fire-new stamp of honour is scarce current : O, that your young nobility could judge

What 't were to lose it, and be miserable! They that stand high have many blasts to shake them;

And if they fall they dash themselves to pieces. Glo. Good counsel, marry; learn it, learn it, marquis.

Dor. It touches you, my lord, as much as me. Glo. Ay, and much more: But I was born so high,

Our aiery buildeth in the cedar's top,
And dallies with the wind, and scorns the sun.
Q. Mar. And turns the sun to shade ;-alas !
alas!

Witness my son, now in the shade of death;
Whose bright out-shining beams thy cloudy wrath
Hath in eternal darkness folded up.

Your aiery buildeth in our aiery's nest:
O God, that see'st it, do not suffer it;
As it was won with blood, lost be it so!
Buck. Peace, peace, for shame, if not for
charity.

Q. Mar. Urge neither charity nor shame to me; Uncharitably with me have you dealt, And shamefully my hopes by you are butcher'd, My charity is outrage, life my shame,— And in that shame still live my sorrow's rage! Buck. Have done, have done.

Q. Mar. O princely Buckingham, I'll kiss thy hand,

In sign of league and amity with thee:
Now fair befal thee and thy noble house!
Thy garments are not spotted with our blood,
Nor thou within the compass of my curse.

Buck. Nor no one here; for curses never pass
The lips of those that breathe them in the air.
Q. Mar. I will not think but they ascend the
sky,

And there awake God's gentle-sleeping peace.
O Buckingham, take heed° of yonder dog;
Look, when he fawns he bites; and, when he

bites,

His venom tooth will rankle to the death:
Have not to do with him, beware of him;
Sin, death, and hell, have set their marks on him ;
And all their ministers attend on him.

We print the passage as in the folio; in the quartos we read,

"And shamefully by you my hopes are butcher'd."

b So the folio; the quartos, "I'll not believe."

e Take heed, in the folio; the quartos, beware. The correction was evidently made to avoid the repetition of the word, three lines below.