THE LIFE AND DEATH OF

KING JOHN.

ACT I.

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

Enter King JOHN, Queen ELINOR, PEMBROKE, ESSEX, SALISBURY and Others, with CHATILLON.

N°

KING JOHN.

OW say, Chatillon, what would France with us?
Chatillon. Thus, after greeting, speaks the
King of France,

In my behaviour, to the majesty,

The borrowed majesty, of England here.

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

Arthur Plantagenet, lays most lawful claim
To this fair island and the territories,

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.

VOL. VI.

B

(17)

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 limit 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 be there,

The thunder of my 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 of her son?

This might have been prevented and made whole
With very easy arguments of love,

Which now the manage of two kingdoms must,
With fearful bloody issue, arbitrate.

K. John. Our strong possession and our right

Eli.

for us.

Your strong possession much more than your right;

Or else it must go wrong with you and me:

So much my conscience whispers in your ear,

Which none but Heaven and you and I shall hear.

Enter the Sheriff of Northamptonshire, who whispers

ESSEX.

Essex. My liege, here is the strangest controversy, Come from the country to be judg'd by you, That e'er I heard: shall I produce the men?

K. John.

Let them approach.

Our abbeys, and our priories, shall pay

[Exit Sheriff.

Enter Sheriff, with ROBERT FAULCONBRIDGE, and PHILIP, his bastard Brother.

This expedition's charge.

What men are you?

Bastard. Your faithful subject I; a gentleman

Born in Northamptonshire, and eldest son,

As I suppose, to Robert Faulconbridge, -
A soldier, by the honour-giving hand

Of Coeur-de-lion knighted in the field.

K. John. What art thou?

Robert. The son and heir to that same Faulconbridge.

K. John. Is that the elder, and art thou the heir? You came not of one mother, then, it seems.

Bast. Most certain of one mother, mighty King That is well known and, as I think, one father: But, for the certain knowledge of that truth, I put you o'er to Heaven, and to my mother: Of that I doubt, as all men's children may.

Eli. Out on thee, rude man! thou dost shame thy mother,

And wound her honour with this diffidence.

Bast. I, Madam? no, I have no reason for it: That is my brother's plea, and none of mine; The which if he can prove, 'a pops me out At least from fair five hundred pound a year. Heaven guard my mother's honour and my land!

K. John. A good blunt fellow. Why, being

younger born,

Doth he lay claim to thine inheritance?

Bast. I know not why, except to get the land. But once he slander'd me with bastardy: But whe'r I be as true begot, or no, That still I lay upon my mother's head; But, that I am as well begot, my liege,

(Fair fall the bones that took the pains for me!) Compare our faces, and be judge yourself.

If old Sir Robert did beget us both,

And were our father, and this son like him,
O! old Sir Robert, father, on my knee

I give Heaven thanks, I was not like to thee.
K. John. Why, what a madcap hath Heaven lent
us here!

Eli.

He hath a trick of Coeur-de-lion's face;

The accent of his tongue affecteth him.

Do you not read some tokens of my son

In the large composition of this man?

K. John. Mine eye hath well examined his parts, And finds them perfect Richard. - Sirrah, speak ; What doth move you to claim your brother's land? Bast. Because he hath a half-face, like my father, With that half-face would he have all my land: A half-fac'd groat, five hundred pound a year! Rob. My gracious liege, when that my father liv'd, Your brother did employ my father much,

Bast. Well, sir, by this you cannot get my land: Your tale must be, how he employed my mother. Rob. And once despatch'd him in an embassy To Germany, there, with the Emperor To treat of high affairs touching that time. Th' advantage of his absence took the King, And in the mean time sojourn'd at my father's;

Where how he did prevail, I shame to speak;

But truth is truth: large lengths of seas and shores
Between my father and my mother lay,

(As I have heard my father speak himself,)
When this same lusty gentleman was got.
Upon his death-bed he by will bequeath'd
His lands to me; and took it, on his death,
That this, my mother's son, was none of his :
And if he were, he came into the world
Full fourteen weeks before the course of time.
Then, good my liege, let me have what is mine,
My father's land, as was my father's will.

K. John. Sirrah, your brother is legitimate:
Your father's wife did after wedlock bear him;
And if she did play false, the fault was hers;
Which fault lies on the hazards of all husbands
That marry wives. Tell
me, how if my brother,
Who, as you say, took pains to get this son,
Had of your father claim'd this son for his?
In sooth, good friend, your father might have kept
This calf, bred from his cow, from all the world;
In sooth, he might: then, if he were my brother's,
My brother might not claim him, nor your father,
Being none of his, refuse him. This concludes, -
My mother's son did get your father's heir;
Your father's heir must have your father's land.

Rob. Shall, then, my father's will be of no force

To dispossess that child which is not his?

Bast. Of no more force to dispossess me, sir,

Than was his will to get me, as I think.

Eli. Whether hadst thou rather be a Faulconbridge,

And, like thy brother, to enjoy thy land,

Or the reputed son of Coeur-de-lion,

Lord of thy presence, and no land beside?