With mine own tongue deny my sacred state,
With mine own breath release all duteous oaths:
All pomp and majesty I do forswear;

My manors, rents, revenues, I forego;
My acts, decrees, and statutes, I deny:

God pardon all oaths, that are broke to me!
God keep all vows unbroke, are made to thee!
Make me, that nothing have, with nothing grieved;
And thou with all pleased, that hast all achieved!
Long mayst thou live in Richard's seat to sit,
And soon lie Richard in an earthly pit!
God save king Henry, unking'd Richard says,
And send him many years of sunshine days!-
What more remains?

[Offering a Paper.

North. No more, but that you read
These accusations, and these grievous crimes,
Committed by your person, and your followers,
Against the state and profit of this land;
That by confessing them, the souls of men
May deem that you are worthily deposed.

K. Rich. Must I do so? and must I ravel out
My weaved-up follies? Gentle Northumberland,
If thy offences were upon record,

Would it not shame thee in so fair a troop,
To read a lecture of them? If thou wouldst,
There shouldst thou find one heinous article,-
Containing the deposing of a king,

And cracking the strong warrant of an oath,-
Mark'd with a blot, damn'd in the book of heaven:-
Nay all of you, that stand and look upon me,
Whilst that my wretchedness doth bait myself,-
Though some of you, with Pilate, wash your hands,
Showing an outward pity; yet you Pilates
Have here deliver'd me to my sour cross,

And water cannot wash away your sin.

North. My lord, dispatch; read o'er these articles.
K. Rich. Mine eyes are full of tears, I cannot see:

And yet salt water blinds them not so much,

But they can see a sort* of traitors here.
Nay, if I turn mine eyes upon myself,
I find myself a traitor with the rest:
For I have given here my soul's consent,
To undeck the pompous body of a king;
Make glory base; and sovereignty, a slave;
Proud majesty, a subject; state, a peasant.
North. My lord-

K. Rich. No lord of thine, thou haught, insulting man,
Nor no man's lord; I have no name, no title,-

No, not that name was given me at the font,-
But 'tis usurp'd:-Alack the heavy day,

That I have worn so many winters out,

And know not now what name to call myself!
O, that I were a mockery king of snow,
Standing before the sun of Bolingbroke,

To melt myself away in water-drops!

Good king,-great king (and yet not greatly good),
And if my word be sterling yet in England,
Let it command a mirror hither straight;
That it may show me what a face I have,
Since it is bankrupt of his majesty.

Boling. Go some of you, and fetch a looking-glass.

[Exit an Attendant. North. Read o'er this paper, while the glass doth come. K. Rich. Fiend! thou torment'st me ere I come to hell. Boling. Urge it no more, my lord Northumberland. North. The commons will not then be satisfied.

K. Rich. They shall be satisfied: I'll read enough, When I do see the very book indeed

Where all my sins are writ, and that's-myself.

Re-enter Attendant with a Glass.

Give me that glass, and therein will I read.-
No deeper wrinkles yet? Hath sorrow struck
So many blows upon this face of mine,

And made no deeper wounds ?-O, flattering glass,
Like to my followers in prosperity,

Thou dost beguile ine! Was this face the face,
That every day under his household roof

Did keep ten thousand men? Was this the face,
That, like the sun, did make beholders wink?
Was this the face, that faced so many follies,
And was at last out-faced by Bolingbroke?
A brittle glory shineth in this face
As brittle as the glory is the face;

[Dashes the glass against the ground.

For there it is, crack'd in a hundred shivers.-
Mark, silent king, the moral of this sport,-
How soon my sorrow hath destroy'd my face.
Boling. The shadow of your sorrow hath destroy'd

The shadow of your face.

K. Rich. Say that again.

The shadow of my sorrow? Ha! let's see:

'Tis very true, my grief lies all within ;

And these external manners of lament

Are merely shadows to the unseen grief,

That swells with silence in the tortured soul;

There lies the substance: and I thank thee, king,
For thy great bounty, that not only giv❜st
Me cause to wail, but teachest me the way
How to lament the cause. I'll beg one boon,
And then be gone, and trouble you no more.
Shall I obtain it?

Boling. Name it, fair cousin.

K. Rich. Fair cousin? Why, I am greater than a king:

For, when I was a king, my flatterers

Were then but subjects; being now a subject,
I have a king here to my flatterer.

Being so great, I have no need to beg.
Boling. Yet ask.

K. Rich. And shall I have?

Boling. You shall.

K. Rich. Then give me leave to go.

Boling. Whither?

K. Rich. Whither you will, so I were from your sights.
Boling. Go, some of you, convey him to the Tower.
K. Rich. O, good! Convey ?-Conveyers* are you all,
That rise thus nimbly by a true king's fall.

[Exeunt KING RICHARD, Some Lords, and a Guard. Boling. On Wednesday next, we solemnly set down Our coronation : lords, prepare yourselves.

[Exeunt all but the ABBOT, Bishop of CARLISLE, and
AUMERLE.

Abbot. A woeful pageant have we here beheld.
Car. The woe's to come; the children yet unborn
Shall feel this day as sharp to them as thorn.

Aum. You holy clergyman, is there no plot

To rid the realm of this pernicious blot?

Abbot. Before I freely speak my mind herein,
You shall not only take the sacrament
To bury mine intents, but to effect
Whatever I shall happen to devise:-
I see your brows are full of discontent,
Your hearts of sorrow, and your eyes of tears;
Come home with me to supper; I will lay
A plot, shall show us all a merry day.

[Exevnt.

ACT V.

SCENE I.-London. A Street leading to the Tower.
Enter QUEEN and LADIES.

Queen. This way the king will come; this is the way
To Julius Cæsar's ill-erected+ Tower,

To whose flint bosom my condemned lord
Is doom'd a prisoner, by proud Bolingbroke;
Here let us rest, if this rebellious earth
Have any resting for her true king's queen.

Enter KING RICHARD, and Guards.

But soft, but see, or rather do not see,
My fair rose wither: Yet look up; behold;
That you in pity may dissolve to dew,

*Thieves.

+ Erected for evil purposes.

And wash him fresh again with true-love tears.-
Ah, thou, the model where old Troy did stand;
Thou map of honour; thou king Richard's tomb,
And not king Richard; thou most beauteous inn,
Why should hard-favour'd grief be lodged in thee,
When triumph is become an ale-house guest?

K. Rich. Join not with grief, fair woman, do not so,
To make my end too sudden: learn, good soul,
To think our former state a happy dream;
From which awaked, the truth of what we are
Shows us but this: I am sworn brother, sweet,
To grim necessity; and he and I

Will keep a league till death. Hie thee to France,
And cloister thee in some religious house:
Our holy lives must win a new world's crown,
Which our profane hours here have stricken down.

Queen. What, is my Richard both in shape and mind
Transform'd, and weaken'd? Hath Bolingbroke
Deposed thine intellect? hath he been in thy heart?
The lion, dying, thrusteth forth his paw,

And wounds the earth, if nothing else, with rage
To be o'erpower'd; and wilt thou, pupil-like,
Take thy correction mildly? kiss the rod;
And fawn on rage with base humility,
Which art a lion, and a king of beasts?

K. Rich. A king of beasts, indeed; if aught but beasts,
I had been still a happy king of men.

Good sometime queen, prepare thee hence for France:
Think I am dead; and that even here thou tak'st,
As from my death-bed, my last living leave.

In winter's tedious nights, sit by the fire

With good old folks; and let them tell thee tales
Of woeful ages, long ago betid:†

And, ere thou bid good night, to quit their grief,
Tell thou the lamentable fall of me,

And send the hearers weeping to their beds.

For why, the senseless brands will sympathize
The heavy accent of thy moving tongue,

And, in compassion, weep the fire out:

And some will mourn in ashes, some coal-black,

For the deposing of a rightful king.

Enter NORTHUMBERLAND, attended.

North. My lord, the mind of Bolingbroke is changed; You must to Pomfret, not unto the Tower.

And, Madam, there is order ta'en for you;

With all swift speed you must away to France.

K. Rich. Northumberland, thou ladder wherewithal
The mounting Bolingbroke ascends my throne,
The time shall not be many hours of age
More than it is, ere foul sin, gathering head,

*Picture of greatness.

VOL. II.

† Passed.

2 C

Be quits with them

Shall break into corruption: thou shalt think,
Though he divide the realm, and give thee half,
It is too little, helping him to all;

And he shall think, that thou, which know'st the way
To plant unrightful kings, wilt know again,
Being ne'er so little urged, another way

To pluck him headlong from the usurped throne.
The love of wicked friends converts to fear;
That fear, to hate; and hate turns one, or both,
To worthy danger, and deserved death.

North. My guilt be on my head, and there an end.
Take leave, and part; for you must part forthwith.
K. Rich. Doubly divorced?-Bad man, ye violate
A twofold marriage; 'twixt my crown and me;
And then, betwixt me and my married wife.—
Let me unkiss the oath 'twixt thee and me;
And yet not so, for with a kiss 'twas made.-
Part us, Northumberland; I towards the north,
Where shivering cold and sickness pines the clime,
My wife to France; from whence set forth in pomp,
She came adorned hither like sweet May,

Sent back like Hallowmas, or short'st of day.

Queen. And must we be divided? must we part?

K. Rich. Ay, hand from hand, my love, and heart from heart.
Queen. Banish us both, and send the king with me.
North. That were some love, but little policy.
Queen. Then whither he goes, thither let me go.
K. Rich. So two, together weeping, make one woe.
Weep thou for me in France, I for thee here;
Better far off, than-near, be ne'er the near'.*

Go, count thy way with sighs; I, mine with groans.
Queen. So longest way shall have the longest moans.

K. Rich. Twice for one step I'll groan, the way being short,

And piece the way out with a heavy heart.

Come, come, in wooing sorrow let's be brief,

Since, wedding it, there is such length in grief.

[They kiss.

Queen. Give me mine own again; 'twere no good part,

One kiss shall stop our mouths, and dumbly part;

Thus give I mine, and thus I take thy heart.

To take on me to keep, and kill thy heart.

So, now I have my own again, begone,

That I may strive to kill it with a groan.

Once more, adieu; the rest let sorrow say.

[Kiss again.

K. Rich. We make woe wanton with this fond delay:

[Exeunt.

SCENE II.- The same. A Room in the Duke of YORK'S

Palace.

Enter YORK, and his DUCHESS.

Duch. My lord, you told me, you would tell the rest,

When weeping made you break the story off

Of our two cousins coming into London.

* Nigher.