SCENE V

The Tower of London.

Enter Mortimer, brought in a chair, and Jailers.

Mor. Kind keepers of my weak decaying age,
Let dying Mortimer here rest himself.
Even like a man new haled from the rack,
So fare my limbs with long imprisonment;
And these gray locks, the pursuivants of death,
Nestor-like aged in an age of care,
Argue the end of Edmund Mortimer.

These eyes, like lamps whose wasting oil is
spent,

Wax dim, as drawing to their exigent;
Weak shoulders, overborne with burthening

grief,

:

10

And pithless arms, like to a wither'd vine

That droops his sapless branches to the ground:

Yet are these feet, whose strengthless stay is

numb,

Unable to support this lump of clay, Swift-winged with desire to get a grave, As witting I no other comfort have. But tell me, keeper, will my nephew come? First Jail. Richard Plantagenet, my lord, will

come:

We sent unto the Temple, unto his chamber; And answer was return'd that he will come. 20

Mor. Enough: my soul shall then be satisfied.
Poor gentleman! his wrong doth equal mine.
Since Henry Monmouth first began to reign,
Before whose glory I was great in arms,
This loathsome sequestration have I had;
And even since then hath Richard been ob-

scured,

Deprived of honor and inheritance.
But now the arbitrator of despairs,
Just death, kind umpire of men's miseries,
With sweet enlargement doth dismiss me

hence:

I would his troubles likewise were expired,
That so he might recover what was lost.

Enter Richard Plantagenet.

30

First Jail. My lord, your loving nephew now is

come.

Mor. Richard Plantagenet, my friend, is he come? Plan. Aye, noble uncle, thus ignobly used,

Your nephew, late despised Richard, comes. Mor. Direct mine arms I may embrace his neck, And in his bosom spend my latter gasp: O, tell me when my lips do touch his cheeks, That I may kindly give one fainting kiss. And now declare, sweet stem from York's great stock,

40

Why didst thou say of late thou wert despised? Plan. First, lean thine aged back against mine

arm;

And, in that case, I'll tell thee my disease.
This day, in argument upon a case,

Some words there grew 'twixt Somerset and

me;

Among which terms he used his lavish tongue
And did upbraid me with my father's death:
With obloquy set bars before my tongue,
Else with the like I had requited him.
Therefore, good uncle, for my father's sake,
In honor of a true Plantagenet

50

And for alliance sake, declare the cause My father, Earl of Cambridge, lost his head. Mor. That cause, fair nephew, that imprison'd me And hath detain'd me all my flowering youth Within a loathsome dungeon, there to pine, Was cursed instrument of his decease.

Plan. Discover more at large what cause that was, For I am ignorant and cannot guess.

60

Mor. I will, if that my fading breath permit,
And death approach not ere my tale be done.
Henry the Fourth, grandfather to this king,
Deposed his nephew Richard, Edward's son,
The first-begotten and the lawful heir
Of Edward king, the third of that descent:
During whose reign the Percies of the north,
Finding his usurpation most unjust,
Endeavor'd my advancement to the throne.
The reason moved these warlike lords to this 70
Was, for that-young King Richard thus re-
moved,

Leaving no heir begotten of his body-
I was the next by birth and parentage;
For by my mother I derived am
From Lionel Duke of Clarence, the third son
To King Edward the Third; whereas he
From John of Gaunt doth bring his pedigree,
Being but fourth of that heroic line.
But mark: as in this haughty great attempt
They labored to plant the rightful heir,
I lost my liberty and they their lives.
Long after this, when Henry the Fifth,
Succeeding his father Bolingbroke, did reign,
Thy father, Earl of Cambridge, then derived
From famous Edmund Langley, Duke of
York,

Marrying my sister that thy mother was,

80

Again in pity of my hard distress. Levied an army, weening to redeem And have install'd me in the diadem: But, as the rest, so fell that noble earl And was beheaded. Thus the Mortimers, In whom the title rested, were suppress'd. Plan. Of which, my lord, your honor is the last. Mor. True; and thou seest that I no issue have,

90

100

And that my fainting words do warrant death: Thou art my heir; the rest I wish thee gather: But yet be wary in thy studious care. Plan. Thy grave admonishments prevail with me: But yet, methinks, my father's execution Was nothing less than bloody tyranny. Mor. With silence, nephew, be thou politic: Strong-fixed is the house of Lancaster, And like a mountain not to be removed. But now thy uncle is removing hence; As princes do their courts, when they are cloy'd With long continuance in a settled place.

Plan. O, uncle, would some part of my young

years

Might but redeem the passage of your age! Mor. Thou dost then wrong me, as that slaughter

doth

Which giveth many wounds when one will

kill.

110

88. "weening," that is, thinking. This is another departure from history. Cambridge levied no army, but was apprehended at Southampton, the night before Henry sailed from that town for France, on the information of this very earl of March.-H. Ν. Η.

96. That is, I acknowledge thee to be my heir; the consequences growing from thence I wish you to follow out for yourself.-H. N.

H.