Anne. Some dungeon.
Glou.
Your bed-chamber.
Anne. Ill rest betide the chamber where thou
liest !

Glou. So will it, madam, till I lie with you.
Anne. I hope so.

Glou. I know so. But, gentle Lady Anne, To leave this keen encounter of our wits, And fall somewhat into a slower method, Is not the causer of the timeless deaths Of these Plantagenets, Henry and Edward, As blameful as the executioner?

Anne. Thou art the cause, and most accursed effect.

120

Glou. Your beauty was the cause of that effect; Your beauty, which did haunt me in my sleep To undertake the death of all the world, So I might live one hour in your sweet bosom. Anne. If I thought that, I tell thee, homicide, These nails should rend that beauty from my cheeks.

Glou. These eyes could never endure sweet beauty's wreck;

You should not blemish it, if I stood by:
As all the world is cheered by the sun,
So I by that; it is my day, my life.

130

Anne. Black night o'ershade thy day, and death thy life!

Glou. Curse not thyself, fair creature; thou art both.

Anne. I would I were, to be revenged on thee. Glou. It is a quarrel most unnatural, To be revenged on him that loveth you.

Anne. It is a quarrel just and reasonable, To be revenged on him that slew my husband. Glou. He that bereft thee, lady, of thy husband, Did it to help thee to a better husband.

Anne. His better doth not breathe upon the earth.

140 Glou. He lives that loves thee better than he could.

Anne. Never hung poison on a fouler toad. Out of my sight! thou dost infect my eyes. Glou. Thine eyes, sweet lady, have infected mine. 150

Anne. Would they were basilisks, to strike thee dead!

Glou. I would they were, that I might die at

once;

For now they kill me with a living death. Those eyes of thine from mine have drawn salt tears,

160

Shamed their aspect with store of childish drops:
These eyes, which never shed remorseful tear,
No, when my father York and Edward wept,
To hear the piteous moan that Rutland made
When black-faced Clifford shook his sword at him;
Nor when thy warlike father, like a child,
Told the sad story of my father's death,
And twenty times made pause to sob and weep,
That all the standers-by had wet their cheeks,
Like trees bedash'd with rain: in that sad time.
My manly eyes did scorn an humble tear;
And what these sorrows could not thence exhale,
Thy beauty hath, and made them blind with weep-
ing.

I never sued to friend nor enemy;

My tongue could never learn sweet smoothing words;

170

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 lips such scorn, for they were 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 bosom,
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 'twas thy beauty that provoked me. Nay, now dispatch; 'twas I that stabb'd young Edward,

181

But 'twas thy heavenly face that set me on. [Here she lets fall the sword.

Take up the sword again, or take up me. Anne. Arise, dissembler: though I wish thy death,

I will not be the executioner.

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

Glou.

191

Tush, that was in thy rage:
Speak it again, and, even with the word,
That hand, which, for thy love, did kill thy love,
Shall, for thy love, kill a far truer love;
To both their deaths thou shalt be accessary.
Anne. I would I knew thy heart.
Glou. 'Tis figured in my tongue.
Anne. I fear me both are false.
Glou. Then never man was true.
Anne. Well, well, put up your sword.
Glou. Say, then, my peace is made.

That shall you know hereafter.
But shall I live in hope?

nature.

Anne.

Glou.

Anne. Glou.

Anne. To take is not to give.

Why dost thou spit at me? Anne. Would it were mortal poison, for thy sake!

Glou. Never came poison from so sweet a place.

All men, I hope, live so. Vouchsafe to wear this ring.

200

Gent. Glou.

Towards Chertsey, noble lord?

230

No, to White-Friars; there attend my
coming
[Exeunt all but Gloucester.
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 nothing to back my suit at all,
But the plain devil and dissembling looks,
And yet to win her, all the world to nothing!
Ha!

240

251

Hath she forgot already that brave prince,
Edward,herlord, whom I, some three months since,
Stabb'd in my angry mood at Tewksbury?
A sweeter and a lovelier gentleman,
Framed in the prodigality of nature,
Young, valiant, wise, and, no doubt, right royal,
The spacious world cannot again afford:
And will she yet debase her eyes on me,
That cropp'd the golden prime of this sweet prince
And made her widow to a woful bed?
On me, whose all not equals Edward's moiety?
On me, that halt and am unshapen 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 some 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.

260

[Exit.

SCENE III. 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 words. Q. Eliz. If he were dead, what would betide of me?

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

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

To be your comforter when he is gone.

ΤΟ

Q. Eliz. Oh, he is young, and his minority Is put unto the trust of Richard Gloucester, A man that loves not me, nor none of you. Riv. Is it concluded he shall be protector? Q. Eliz. It is determined, not concluded yet: But so it must be, if the king miscarry.

Enter BUCKINGHAM and DERBY. Grey. Here come the lords of Buckingham and Derby.

Buck. Good time of day unto your royal grace! Der. God make your majesty joyful as you have been!

Q. Eliz. The Countess Richmond, good my
Lord of Derby,

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

20

Der. I do beseech you, either not believe The envious slanders of her false accusers; Or, if she be accused in true report, Bear with her weakness, which, I think, proceeds From wayward sickness, and no grounded malice. Riv. Saw you the king to-day, my Lord of Derby?

30

Der. 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. Did you

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

Buck. Madam, we did: he desires to make atonement

Betwixt the Duke of Gloucester and your brothers, And betwixt them and my lord chamberlain ; 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 highest.

40

Enter GLOUCESTER, HASTINGS, and DORSET. Glou. They do me wrong, and I will not endure 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

60

Cannot be quiet scarce a breathing-while,
But you must trouble him with lewd complaints.
Q. Eliz.
Brother of Gloucester, you mistake

the matter.
The king, of his own royal disposition,
And not provoked by any suitor else;
Aiming, belike, at your interior hatred,
Which in your outward actions shows itself
Against my kindred, brothers, and myself,
Makes him to send; that thereby he may gather
The ground of your ill-will, and so remove it.
Glou. I cannot tell: the world is grown so
bad,

70

That wrens make prey where eagles dare not perch:

Since every Jack became a gentleman,
There's many a gentle person made a Jack.

Q. Eliz. Come, come, we know your meaning, brother Gloucester;

You envy my advancement and my friends':
God grant we never may have need of you!
Glou. Meantime, God grants that we have
need of you:

Our brother is imprison'd by your means,
Myself disgraced, and the nobility

Held in contempt; whilst many fair promotions
Are daily given to ennoble those

81

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

Q. Eliz. By Him that raised 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.

cause

90

Enter QUEEN MARGARET, behind. Small joy have I in being England's queen. Q. Mar. And lessen'd be that small, God, I beseech thee!

Thy honour, state and seat is due to me. Glou. 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 remember them too well:

120

Thou slewest my husband Henry in the Tower,
And Edward, my poor son, at Tewksbury.
Glou. Ere you were queen, yea, or your hus-
band king,

I was a pack-horse in his great affairs;
A weeder-out of his proud adversaries,
A liberal rewarder of his friends:
To royalise his blood I spilt mine own.
Q. Mar. Yea, and much better blood than his
or thine.

Glou. In all which time
you and
your husband
Grey
Were factious for the house of Lancaster;
And, Rivers, so were you. Was not your husband
In Margaret's battle at Saint Alban's slain? 130
Let me put in your minds, if you forget,
What you have been ere now, and what you are;
Withal, what I have been, and what I am.

Q. Mar. A murderous villain, and so still

thou art.

140

Of my Lord Hastings' late imprisonment.

Riv. She may, my lord, for

knows not so?

She may do more, sir, than denying that:
She may help you to many fair preferments,
And then deny her aiding hand therein,
And lay those honours on your high deserts.
What may she not? She may, yea, marry, may
she,-

Riv. What, marry, may she?

Glou. What, marry, may she! marry with a king,

100

Riv. My Lord of Gloucester, in those busy days

Which here you urge to prove us enemies,
We follow'd then our lord, our lawful king:
So should we you, if you should be our king.
Glou. If I should be! I had rather be a pedlar:
Far be it from my heart, the thought of it!

150

Q. Eliz. As little joy, my lord, as you suppose You should enjoy, were you this country's king, As little joy may you 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? 160 If not, that, I being queen, you bow like subjects, Yet that, by you deposed, you quake like rebels? O gentle villain, do not turn away!

Glou. Foul wrinkled witch, what makest thou in my sight?

Q. Mar. marr'd; That will I make before I let thee go. Glou. Wert thou not banished on pain of death?

But repetition of what thou hast

Q. Mar. I was; but I do find more pain in banishment

170

Than death can yield me here by my abode.
A husband and a son thou owest to me;
And thou a kingdom; all of you allegiance :
The sorrow that I have, by right is yours,
And all the pleasures you usurp are mine.
Glou. 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, gavest the duke a clout Steep'd in the faultless blood of pretty Rutland,

201

If not by war, by surfeit die your king,
As ours by murder, to make him a king!
Edward thy son, which now is Prince of Wales,
For Edward my son, which 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 mayst thou live to wail thy children's loss;
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,

210

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

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

220

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 begnaw thy soul!
Thy friends suspect for traitors while thou livest,
And take deep traitors for thy dearest friends!
No sleep close up that deadly eye of thine,
Unless it be whilst some tormenting dream
Affrights thee with a hell of ugly devils!
Thou elvish-mark'd, abortive, rooting hog!
Thou that wast seal'd in thy nativity
The slave of nature and the son of hell!
Thou slander of thy mother's heavy womb!
Thou loathed issue of thy father's loins!
Thou rag of honour! thou detested-
Glou. Margaret.
Q. Mar.
Glou.
Q. Mar.

Richard!

Ha!

230

I call thee not. Glou. I cry thee mercy then, for I had thought

That thou hadst call'd me all these bitter names. Q. Mar. Why, so I did; but look'd for no reply.

O, let me make the period to my curse!

Glou. 'Tis done by me, and ends in 'Margaret.'

Q. Eliz. Thus have you breathed your curse against yourself.

240

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 time will come when thou shalt wish for me
To help thee curse that poisonous bunch-back'd
toad.

Hast. False-boding woman, end thy frantic