SCENE VII. The Orchard of Swinstead-Abbey

Enter Prince HENRY,' SALISBURY, and Bigot.

Hen. It is too late: the life of all his blood Is touch'd corruptibly; and his poor brain (Which some suppose the soul's frail dwelling-house) Doth, by the idle comments that it makes, Foretell the ending of mortality.

Enter PEMBROKE.
Pem. His highness yet doth speak; and holds

belief,
That being brought into the open air,
It would allay the burning quality
Of that fell poison which assaileth him.

Hen. Let him be brought into the orchard here. Doth he still rage ?

[Erit Bigor Pem.

He is more patient Than when you left him: even now he sung.

Hen. O, vanity of sickness ! fierce extremes
In their continuance will not feel themselves.
Death, having prey'd upon the outward parts,
Leaves them insensible ; ? and his siege is now
Against the mind, the which he pricks and wounds
With many legions of strange fantasies,
Which, in their throng and press to that last hold,
Confound themselves. "Tis strange that death should

sing. –
I am the cygnet to this pale faint swan,
Who chants a doleful hymn to his own death,
And from the organ-pipe of frailty sings
His soul and body to their lasting rest.

Prince Henry was only nine years old when bis father died. ? The old copy reads invisible. Si: T. Hanmer proposed the reading admitted into the text.

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Sal. Be of good comfort, prince ; for you are born To set a form upon that indigest Which he hath left so shapeless and so rude. Re-enter Bigot and Attendants, who bring in King

John in a Chair.
John. Ay, marry, now, my soul hath elbow-room ;
It would not out at windows, nor at doors.
There is so hot a summer in my

bosom,
That all my bowels crumble up to dust :
I am a scribbled form, drawn with a pen
Upon a parchment, and against this fire
Do I shrink up.
Hen.

How fares your majesty ?
John. Poison'd, -ill fare ; dead, forsook, cast

off; And none of you will bid the winter come, To thrust his icy fingers in my maw; Nor let my kingdom's rivers take their course Through my burn'd bosom; nor entreat the north To make his bleak winds kiss my parched lips, And comfort me with cold. – I do not ask you much: I beg cold comfort; and you are so strait, And so ingrateful, you deny me that.

Hen. O, that there were some virtue in my tears, That might relieve you ! John.

The salt in them is hot. Within me is a hell; and there the poison Is, as a fiend, confiu'd to tyrannize On unreprievable condemned blood.

Enter the Bastard. Bast. O! I am scalded with my violent motion, And spleen of speed to see your majesty.

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John. O cusin! thou art come to set nine eye: The tackle of my heart is crack'd and burr'd; And all the shrouds, wherewith my life should sni!, Are turned to one thread, one little hair : My heart hath one poor string to stay it by, Which holds but till thy news be uttered, And then all this thou seest is but a clod, And module of confounded royalty.

Bast. The Dauphin is preparing bitherward, Where Heaven he knows how we shall answer him For, in a night, the best part of my power, As I upon advantage did remove, Were in the washes, all unwarily, Devoured by the unexpected flood."

[The King dies. Sal. You breathe these dead news in as dead an

ear.

now thus.

My liege! my lord ! But now a king,

Hen. Even so must I run on, and even so 'stop. What surety of the world, what hope, what stay, When this was now a king, and now is clay !

Bast. Art thou gone so? I do but stay behind, To do the office for thee of revenge ; And then

my

soul shall wait on thee to heaven, As it on earth bath been thy servant still. Now, now, you stars, that move in your right spheres, Where be your powers ? Show now your mended

faiths ; And instantly return with me again,

4 Module and model were only different modes of spelling the şame word. Model signified not an archetype, after which some. thing was to be formed, but the thing formed after an archetype, a copy or representation. In the London Prodigal a woman, kiss. ing the picture of her dead husband, says, -« How like him is

this model !”

H.

To push destruction and perpetual shame
Out of the weak door of our fainting land:
Straight let us seek, or straight we shall be sought,
The Dauphin rages at our very heels.

Sal. It seems you know not, then, so much as we
The cardival Pandulph is within at rest,
Who half an hour since came from the Dauphin,
And brings from him such offers of our peace
As we with honour and respect may take,
With purpose presently to leave this war.

Bast. He will the rather do it, when he sees
Ourselves well sinewed to our defence.

Sal. Nay, it is in a manner done already ;
For many carriages he hath despatch'd
To the seaside, and put his cause and quarrel
To the disposing of the cardinal;
With whom yourself, myself, and other lords,
If

you think meet, this afternoon will post To consummate this business happily.

Bast. Let it be so : - And you, my noble prince, With other princes that may best be spar'd, Shall wait upon your father's funeral.

Hen. At Worcester must bis body be interr’d;'
For so he will'd it.
Bast.

Thither shall it, then.
And happily may your sweet self put on
The lineal state and glory of the land !
To whom, with all submission, on my knee,
I do bequeath my faithful services
And true subjection everlastingly.

Sal. And the like tender of our love we make, To rest without a spot for evermore.

Hen. I have a kind soul that would give you thanks, And knows not how to do it, but with tears.

а

6 A stone coffin, containing the body of King Jolir, was dis. covered in the cathedral church of Worcester, July 17, 1797.

Bast. O! let us pay the time but needful woe, Since it hath been beforehand with our griefr.?. This England never did, nor never shall, . Lie at the proud foot of a conqueror, But when it first did help to wound itself. Now these her princes are come home again, Come the three corners of the world in armis, And we shall shock them: Nought shall make us

rue,

If England to itself do rest but true.

(Ereunt.

? As previously we have found sufficient cause for lamentation, let us uut waste the time in superfluous sorrow.

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