K. Rich. Give me another horse,-bind up my wounds, Have mercy, Jesu!-Soft; I did but dream.— Is there a murderer here? No ;—Yes; I am. I love myself. Wherefore? For any good I am a villain; yet I lie, I am not. Fool, of thyself speak well:-Fool, do not flatter. Nay, wherefore should they? since that I myself Methought the souls of all that I had murdered Rat. My lord, Enter RATCliff. K. Rich. Who's there? Rat. Ratcliff, my lord; 'tis I. The early village cock Hath twice done salutation to the morn. Your friends are up, and buckle on their armor. K. Rich. O, Ratcliff, I have dreamed a fearful dream!1 1 This and the two following lines are omitted in the folio. What thinkest thou? will our friends prove all true? Ratcliff, I fear, I fear,- [Exeunt KING RICHARD and RATCLIFF. RICHMOND wakes. Enter OXFORD and others. Lords. Good-morrow, Richmond. Richm. 'Cry mercy, lords, and watchful gentlemen, That you have ta'en a tardy sluggard here. Lords. How have you slept, my lord? Richm. The sweetest sleep, and fairest-boding dreams, That ever entered in a drowsy head, Have I since your departure had, my lords. Methought their souls, whose bodies Richard murdered, I promise you, my heart is very jocund Richm. Why, then 'tis time to arm, and give direction.- [He advances to the troops. More than I have said, loving countrymen, Forbids to dwell on. Yet, remember this,— A bloody tyrant, and a homicide; One raised in blood, and one in blood established; A base, foul stone, made precious by the foil If If You sleep in peace, the tyrant being slain; my Shall be this cold corpse on the earth's cold face; [Exeunt. Re-enter KING RICHARD, RATCLIFF, Attendants, and Forces. K. Rich. What said Northumberland, as touching Richmond? Rat. That he was never trained up in arms. K. Rich. He said the truth. And what said Surrey then ? Rat. He smiled, and said, the better for our purpose. 1 England's chair is the throne. The allusion is to the practice of setting gems of little worth, with a bright-colored foil under them. 2 Requite. 3 i. e. the fine paid by me in atonement for my rashness. K. Rich. He was i'the right; and so, indeed, it is. [Clock strikes. Tell the clock there.-Give me a calendar.- Rat. Not I, my lord. K. Rich. Then he disdains to shine; for, by the book, He should have braved1 the east an hour ago : A black day will it be to somebody.— Ratcliff, Rat. My lord? K. Rich. The sun will not be seen to-day; The sky doth frown and lower upon our army. I would these dewy tears were from the ground. Not shine to-day! Why, what is that to me, More than to Richmond? for the self-same heaven, That frowns on me, looks sadly upon him. Enter NORFOLK. Nor. Arm, arm, my lord; the foe vaunts in the field. K. Rich. Come, bustle, bustle; horse ; caparison my Call up lord Stanley; bid him bring his power :- And thus my battle shall be ordered. My foreward shall be drawn out all in length, Our archers shall be placed in the midst : In the main battle; whose puissance on either side This, and saint George to boot!-What think'st thou, Norfolk ? Nor. A good direction, warlike sovereign.This found I on my tent this morning. [Giving a scroll. 1 Baret's definition of brave, is "to look aloft and go gayly, desiring to have the preeminence." K. Rich. Jocky of Norfolk, be not too bold, [Reads. For Dickon thy master is bought and sold. A thing devised by the enemy. Go, gentlemen, every man unto his charge: And not these bastard Bretagnes; whom our fathers 1 Company. 2 To restrain is to abridge, to diminish, to withhold from. 3 Thus Holinshed:-" You see further, how a company of traitors, thieves, outlaws, and runagates, be aiders and partakers of this feate and enterprise. And to begin with the earl of Richmond, captaine of this rebellion, he is a Welsh milksop, brought up by my moother's means and mine, like a captive in a close cage in the court of Francis duke of Britaine," p. 756. Holinshed copied this verbatim from Hall, edit. 1548, fol. 54; but his printer has given us, by accident, the word moother instead of brother; as it is in the original, and ought to be in Shakspeare. In the first edition of Holinshed the word is rightly printed brother. So that this circumstance not only shows that the Poet follows Holinshed, but points out the edition used by him. |