Frenchman, fell sick at London, and perceiving that death was at hand, he called unto him certain of the English barons, which remained in the city, upon safeguard thereof, and to them made this protestation :-I lament (saith he) your destruction and desolation at hand, because you are ignorant of the perils hanging over your heads. For this uuderstand, that Lewis, and with him sixteen earls and barons of France, have secretly sworn (if it shall fortune him to conquer this realm of England, and be crowned king) that he will kill, banish, and confine all those of the English nobility which now do serve under him, and persecute their own king as traitors and rebels, and furthermore will dispossess all their lineage of such inheritance as they now hold in England. And because (saith he) you shall not have doubt hereof, I, which lie here at the point of death, do now affirm unto you, and take it on the peril of my soul, that I am one of those sixteen that have sworn to perform this thing. Wherefore I advise you to provide for your own safeties, and your realm's which you now destroy, and keep this thing secret which I have uttered unto you. After this speech was uttered he straightways died.

'There be which have written that after the king had lost his army, he came to the abbey of Swineshead, in Lincolnshire, and there understanding the cheapness and plenty of corn, showed himself greatly displeased therewith; as he that, for the hatred which he bare to the English people that had so traitorously revolted from him unto his adversary Lewis, wished all misery to light upon them, and thereupon said in his anger, that he would cause all kind of grain to be at a far higher price ere many days should pass. Whereupon a monk that heard him speak such words, being moved with zeal for the oppression of his country, gave the king poison in a cup of ale, whereof he first took the assay, to cause the king not to suspect the matter, and so they both died in manner at one time.'

KING JOHN.

B

Ladies, Citizens of Angiers, Sheriff, Heralds, Officers, Soldiers, Messengers,

and other Attendants.

SCENE-SOMETIMES IN ENGLAND; SOMETIMES IN FRANCE.

KING JOHN.

ACT I.

SCENE I.-Northampton. A Room of State in the Palace.

Enter KING JOHN, ELINOR, the Queen-Mother, PEMBROKE, ESSEX, SALISBURY, and others, with CHATILLON.

K. John. Now say, Chatillon, what would France with us?

Chat. Thus, after greeting, speaks the king of France, In my behaviour,' to the majesty—

The borrowed majesty-of England here.

Eli. A strange beginning :-borrowed majesty!
K. John. Silence, good mother; hear the embassy.
Chat. Philip of France,2 in right and true behalf
Of thy deceased brother Geffrey's son,3

Arthur Plantagenet, lays most lawful claim

To this fair island, and the territories;

1 In my behaviour.] In the tone or manner in which I speak. 2 Philip of France.] This was Philip II. who joined Richard Coeur-de-Lion in the Third Crusade, and who, in Richard's absence, intrigued with King John to get possession of Normandy in return for support of the latter's possession of the English throne.

Geffrey's son.] Geoffrey Plantagenet, John's elder brother, was killed at a tournament in France in 1186. He left a widow, Constance, by whom he had a son, Arthur, the rightful heir to the throne, born after his father's death.

To Ireland, Poictiers, Anjou, Touraine, Maine:
Desiring thee to lay aside the sword

Which sways usurpingly these several titles,
And put the same into young Arthur's hand,
Thy nephew and right royal sovereign.

K. John. What follows, if we disallow of this?
Chat. The proud control of fierce and bloody war,

To enforce these rights so forcibly withheld.

K. John. Here have we war for war, and blood for blood,

Controlment for controlment: so answer France.

Chat. Then take my king's defiance from my mouth, The farthest limit1 of my embassy.

K. John. Bear mine to him, and so depart in peace.

Be thou as lightning in the eyes of France;
For, ere thou canst report I will 2 be there,
The thunder of iny cannon shall be heard.
So hence! be thou the trumpet of our wrath,
And sullen presage of your own decay.—
An honourable conduct let him have:
Pembroke, look to 't.-Farewell, Chatillon.

[Exeunt CHATILLON and PEMBROKE.

Eli. What now, my son? have I not ever said,
How that ambitious Constance would not cease,
Till she had kindled France, and all the world,
Upon the right and party 3 of her son?
This might have been prevented and made whole
With very easy arguments of love;

1 The farthest limit.] Limit means prescribed duty.

2 Ere thou canst report I will.] Ere thou canst report that I will. An allusion to the interval between seeing the flash of lightning and hearing the report.

8

Upon the right and party.] Upon the party,' that is, on the side, is a common expression in Shakspeare.