This hand hath made him proud with clapping him.
Would he not stumble? Would he not fall down,
(Since pride must have a fall,) and break the neck
Of that proud man, that did usurp his back?
Forgiveness, horse! why do I rail on thee,
Since thou, created to be aw'd by man,
Was born to bear? I was not made a horse,
And yet I bear a burden like an ass,
Spur-gall'd, and tir'd by jauncing Bolingbroke.
Enter Keeper, with a dish.

Keep. Fellow, give place; here is no longer stay.
[To the Groom.
K. Rich If thou love me, 'tis time thou wert away.
Groom. What my tongue dares not, that my heart
shall say.
[Exit.

Keep. My lord, wilt please you to fall to? K. Rich Taste of it first, as thou art wont to do. Keep. My lord, I dare not; sir Pierce of Exton, who Lately came from the king, commands the contrary; K. Rich. The devil take Henry of Lancaster, and Patience is stale, and I am weary of it. [thee! [Beats the Keeper.

Keep. Help, help, help!

Enter EXTON, and Servants, armed. K. Rich. How now? what means death in this rude assault? Villain, thy own hand yields thy death's instrument. [Snatching a weapon, and killing one. Go thou, and fill another room in hell.

[He kills another, then ExTON strikes him down. That hand shall burn in never-quenching fire, That staggers thus my person.-Exton, thy fierce hand Hath with the king's blood stain'd the king's own land. Mount, mount, my soul! thy seat is up on high; Whilst my gross flesh sinks downward, here to die. [Dies.

Exton. As full of valour, as of royal blood: Both have I spilt; O, would the deed were good! For now the devil, that told me I did well, Says, that this deed is chronicled in hell. This dead king to the living king I'll bear ;Take hence the rest, and give them burial here. [Ex.

SCENE VI.-Windsor. A Room in the Castle. Flourish. Enter BOLINGBROKE and YORK, with Lords and Attendants.

Boling. Kind uncle York, the latest news we hear

Is that the rebels have consum'd with fire
Our town of Cicester in Glostershire;
But whether they be ta'en, or slain, we hear not.
Enter NORTHUMBERLA
LAND.

Welcome, my lord? What is the news?

This play is extracted from the Chronicle of Holinshed, in which many passages may be found which Shakspeare has, with very little alteration, transplanted into his scenes; particularly a speech of the bishop of Carlisle, in defence of King Richard's alienable right, and immunity from human jurisdiction. Jonson, who, in his Catiline and Sejanus, has inserted many peeches from the Roman historians, was perhaps induced to that practice by the example of Shakspeare, who had condescendsometimes to copy more ignoble writers. But Shakspeare more of his own than Jonson; and, if he sometimes was willing to spare his labour, shewed, by what he performed at

North. First, to thy sacred state wish I all happi The next news is,-I have to London sent [ness The heads of Salisbury, Spencer, Blunt, and Kent The manner of their taking may appear At large discoursed in this paper here.

[Presenting a pape❤ Boling. We thank thee, gentle Percy, for thy pains, And to thy worth will add right worthy gains.

Enter FITZWAter.

The heads of Brocas, and sir Bennet Seely;
Fits. My lord, I have from Oxford sent to London
That sought at Oxford thy dire overthrow.
Two of the dangerous consorted traitors,

Boling. Thy pains, Fitzwater, shall not be forgot; Right noble is thy merit, well I wot.

Enter PERCY, with the BISHOP of Carlisle. With clog of conscience, and sour melancholy, Percy. The grand conspirator, abbot of Westminster, Hath yielded up his body to the grave; But here is Carlisle living, to abide Thy kingly doom, and sentence of his pride.

Boling. Carlisle, this is your doom :Choose out some secret place, some reverend room, More than thou hast, and with it joy thy life; So, as thou liv'st in peace, die free from strife: For though mine enemy thou hast ever been, High sparks of honour in thee have I seen.

Enter EXTON, with Attendants bearing a coffin. Exton. Great king, within this coffin I present Thy buried fear; herein all breathless lies The mightiest of thy greatest enemies, Richard of Bourdeaux, by me hither brought. Boling. Exton, I thank thee not; for thou hast A deed of slander, with thy fatal hand, [wrought Upon my head, and all this famous land. [deed. Exton. From your own mouth, my lord, did I this Boling. They love not poison that do poison need, Nor do I thee; though I did wish him dead, I hate the murderer, love him murdered. The guilt of conscience take thou for thy labour, But neither my good word, nor princely favour: With Cain go wander through the shade of night, And never shew thy head by day nor light.Lords, I protest, my soul is full of woe, That blood should sprinkle me, to make me grow · Come, mourn with me for what I do lament, And put on sullen black, incontinent; I'll make a voyage to the Holy land, To wash this blood off from my guilty hand :March sadly after; grace my mournings here, In weeping after this untimely bier. [Exeunt.

other times, that his extracts were made by choice or idleness rather than necessity.

This play is one of those which Shakspeare has apparently revised; but as success in works of invention is not always proportionate to labour, it is not finished at last with the happy force of some other of his tragedies, nor can be said much to affect the passions, or enlarge the understanding.-JOHNSON.

The notion that Shakspeare revised this play, though it has long prevailed, appears to me extremely doubtful; or, to peab more plainly, I do not believe it.-MALONE.

ACT I.

SCENE I.-London. A Room in the Palace.

Shakspeare has," says Dr. Johnson, "apparently designed a regular connexion of these dramatic histories, from Richard the Second, to Henry the Fifth. King Henry, at the end of Richard the Second, declares his purpose to visit the Holy Land, which he resumes in the first speech of this play. The complaint made by King Henry in the last act of Richard the Second. of the wildness of his son, prepares the reader for the frolics which are here to be recounted, and the characters which are now to be exhibited."

As far as to the sepulchre of Christ,
(Whose soldier now, under whose blessed cross
We are impressed and engag'd to right,)
Forthwith a power of English shall we levy;
Whose arms were moulded in their mothers' womb

To chase these pagans, in those holy fields,

Over whose acres walk'd those blessed feet,
Which, fourteen hundred years ago, were nail'd
For our advantage, on the bitter cross.
But this our purpose is a twelvemonth old,
And bootless 'tis to tell you,-we will go;
Therefore we meet not now:-Then let me hear
Of you, my gentle cousin Westmoreland,
What yesternight our council did decree,
In forwarding this dear expedience.

West. My liege, this haste was hot in question,
And many limits of the charge set down
But yesternight: when, all athwart, there came
A post from Wales, loaden with heavy news;
Whose worst was,-that the noble Mortimer,
Leading the men of Herefordshire to fight
Against the irregular and wild Glendower,
Was by the rude hands of that Welshman taken,
And a thousand of his people butchered:
Upon those dead corpse there was such misuse,
By those Welshwomen done, as may not be,
Such beastly, shameless transformation,
Without much shame, re-told or spoken of.

K. Hen. It seems then, that the tidings of this broil Brake off our business for the Holy land.

[lord;

BLUNT, and others.

K. Hen. So shaken as we are, so wan with care, Find we a time for frighted peace to pant, And breathe short-winded accents of new broils To be commenc'd in stronds afar remote. No more the thirsty entrance of this soil Shall daub her lips with her own children's blood; No more shall trenching war channel her fields, Nor bruise her flowrets with the armed hoofs Of hostile paces: those opposed eyes, Which,-like the meteors of a troubled heaven, All of one nature, of one substance bred,Did lately meet in the intestine shock And furious close of civil butchery, Shall now, in mutual well-beseeming ranks, March all one way; and be no more oppos'd Against acquaintance, kindred, and allies: The edge of war, like an ill-sheathed knife, No more shall cut his master. Therefore, friends,

At Holmedon met,

Where they did spend a sad and bloody hour;
As by discharge of their artillery,

And shape of likelihood, the news was told;
For he that brought them, in the very heat
And pride of their contention did take horse,
Uncertain of t.. issue any way.

K. Hen. Here luear and true-industrious friend,
Sir Walter Blunt, new lighted from his horse,
Stain'd with the variation of each soil
Betwixt that Holmedon and this seat of ours;
And he hath brought us smooth and welcome news
The earl of Douglas is discomfited;
Ten thousand bold Scots, two-and twenty knights,
Balk'd in their own blood, did sir Walter see
On Holmedon's plains: Of prisoners, Hotspur took
Mordake the earl of Fife, and eldest son

To beaten Douglas; and the earls of Athol,
Of Murray, Angus, and Menteith.

Enter POINS, at a distance.

Fal. Why, Hal, 'tis my vocation, Hal; 'tis no sin for a man to labour in his vocation. Poins!-Now shall we know if Gadshill have set a match. O, if men were to be saved by merit, what hole in hell were hot enough for him? This is the most omnipotent villain that ever cried, Stand, to a true man.

P. Hen. Good-morrow, Ned.

Poins. Good morrow, sweet Hal.-What says monsieur Remorse! What says sir John Sack-and-Sugar? Jack, how agrees the devil and thee about thy soul, that thou soldest him on Good-friday last, for a cup of Madeira, and a cold capon's leg?

P. Hen. Sir John stands to his word, the devil shall have his bargain; for he was never yet a breaker of proverbs, he will give the devil his due.

Poins. Then art thou damn'd for keeping thy word with the devil.

P. Hen. Else he had been damn'd for cozening the devil.

Poins. But, my lads, my lads, to-morrow morning, by four o'clock, early at Gadshill: There are pilgrims going to Canterbury with rich offerings, and traders riding to London with fat purses: I have visors for you all, you have horses for yourselves; Gadshill lies to-night in Rochester; I have bespoke supper to-morrow night in Eastcheap; we may do it as secure as sleep: If you will go, I will stuff your purses full of crowns; if you will not, tarry at home, and be hanged.

Fal. Hear me, Yedward; if I tarry at home and go not, I'll hang you for going. Poins. You will, chops?

Fal. Hal, wilt thou make one?

P. Hen. Who, I rob? I a thief? not I, by my faith. Fal. There's neither honesty, manhood, nor good fellowship in thee, nor thou camest not of the blood royal, if thou darest not stand for ten shillings. P. Hen. Well, then, once in my days I'll be a mad-cap.

Fal. Why, that's well said.

P. Hen. Well, come what will, I'll tarry at home. Fal. By the Lord, I'll be a traitor then, when thou art king.

P. Hen. I care not.

Poins. Sir John, I pr'ythee, leave the prince and me alone; I will lay him down such reasons for this adventure, that he shall go.

Fal. Well, may'st thou have the spirit of persuasion, and he the ears of profiting, that what thou speakest may move, and what he hears may be believed, that the true prince may (for recreation sake) prove a false thief; for the poor abuses of the time want countenance. Farewell: you shall find me in Eastcheap.

P. Hen. Farewell, thou latter spring! Farewell All-hallown summer! [Exit FALSTAFF. Poins. Now, my good sweet honey lord, ride with us to-morrow; I have a jest to execute, that I cannot manage alone. Falstaff, Bardolph, Peto, and Gadshill, shall rob those men that we have already waylaid; yourself, and I, will not be there: and when they have the booty, if you and I do not rob them, cut this head from my shoulders.

P. Hen. But how shall we part with them in setting forth?

Poins. Why, we will set forth before or after them, and appoint them a place of meeting, wherein it is at our pleasure to fail: and then will they adventure upon the exploit themselves: which they shall have no sooner achieved, but we'll set upon them.

P. Hen. Ay, but 'tis like, that they will know us, by our horses, by our habits, and by every other appointment, to be ourselves.

Poins. Tut! our horses they shall not see, I'll tie them in the wood; our visors we will change, after we leave them; and, sirrah, I have cases of buckram for the nonce, to inmask our noted outward garments.

P. Hen. But, I doubt, they will be too hard for us. Poins. Well, for two of them, I know them to be as true-bred cowards as ever turned back; and for the third, if he fight longer than he sees reason, I'll forswear arms. The virtue of this jest will be, the incomprehensible lies that this same fat rogue will tell us, when we meet at supper: how thirty, at least, he fought with; what wards, what blows, what extremities he endured; and, in the reproof of this, lies the jest.

P. Hen. Well, I'll go with thee; provide us all things necessary, and meet me to-morrow night in Eastcheap, there I'll sup. Farewell.

Poins. Farewell, my lord. [Exit POINS. P. Hen. I know you all, and will awhile uphold The unyok'd humour of your idleness; Yet herein will I imitate the sun; Who doth permit the base contagious clouds To smother up his beauty from the world, That when he please again to be himself, Being wanted, he may be more wonder'd at, By breaking through the foul and ugly mists Of vapours, that did seem to strangle him. If all the year were playing holidays, To sport would be as tedious as to work; But, when they seldom come, they wish'd-for come, And nothing pleaseth but rare accidents. So, when this loose behaviour I throw off, And pay the debt I never promised, By how much better than my word I am, By so much shall I falsify men's hopes; And, like bright metal on a sullen ground, My reformation, glittering o'er my fault, Shall shew more goodly, and attract more eyes, Than that which hath no foil to set it off. I'll so offend, to make offence a skill; Redeeming time, when men think least I will. [Ext.

SCENE III.-The same. Another Room in the Palace.
Enter KING HENRY, NORTHUMBERLAND, WORCESTER,
HOTSPUR, Sir WALTER BLUNT, and others.
K. Hen. My blood hath been too cold and temperate,
Unapt to stir at these indignities,
And you have found me; for, accordingly,
You tread upon my patience: but, be sure,
I will from henceforth rather be myself,
Mighty, and to be fear'd, than my condition;
Which hath been smooth as oil, soft as young down,
And therefore lost that title of respect,
Which the proud soul ne'er pays, but to the proud.

Wor. Our house, my sovereign liege, little deserves
The scourge of greatness to be used on it;
And that same greatness too which our own hands
Have holp to make so portly.

North. My lord,

K. Hen. Worcester, get thee gone, for I see danger And disobedience in thine eye: O, sir, Your presence is too bold and peremptory, And majesty might never yet endure The moody frontier of a servant brow. You have good leave to leave us; when we need Your use and counsel, we shall send for you.[Exit WORCESTER. [TO NORTH

You were about to speak.

North.

Yea, my good lord.
Those prisoners in your highness' name demanded,
Which Harry Percy here at Holmedon took,
Were, as he says, not with such strength denied,
As is deliver'd to your majesty:
Either envy, therefore, or misprision
Is guilty of this fault, and not my son.

Hot. My liege, I did deny no prisoners.
But, I remember, when the fight was done,
When I was dry with rage, and extreme toil,
Breathless and faint, leaning upon my sword,
Came there a certain lord, neat, trimly dress'd,
Fresh as a bridegroom; and his chin, new reap'd,
Shew'd like a stubble-land at harvest-home;
He was perfumed like a milliner;

And 'twixt his finger and his thum he held
A pouncet-box, which ever and anon

He gave his nose, and took 't away again ;-
Who, therewith angry, when it next came there,
Took it in snuff:-and still he smil'd and talk'd;
And, as the soldiers bore dead bodies by,

He call'd them-untaught knaves, unmannerly,
To bring a slovenly unhandsome corse
Betwixt the wind and his nobility.

With many holiday and lady terms

He question'd me; among the rest, demanded

My prisoners, in your majesty's behalf.

I then, all smarting with my wounds being cold,

To be so pestered with a popinjay,

Out of my grief and my impatience,
Answer'd neglectingly, I know not what ;

He should, or he should not ;-for he made me mad,
To see him shine so brisk, and smell so sweet,
And talk so like a waiting-gentlewoman,

Of guns, and drums, and wounds,(God save the mark!)
And telling me, the sovereign'st thing on earth
Was parmaceti, for an inward bruise;
And that it was great pity, so it was,
That villanous salt-petre should be digg'd
Out of the bowels of the harmless earth,
Which many a good tall fellow had destroy'd
So cowardly; and, but for these vile guns,
He would himself have been a soldier.
This bald unjointed chat of his, my lord,
I answer'd indirectly, as I said;
And, I beseech you, let not his report
Come current for an accusation,
Betwixt my love and your high majesty.

Blunt. The circumstance consider'd, good my lord,
Whatever Harry Percy then had said,
To such a person, and in such a place,
At such a time, with all the rest re-told,
May reasonably die, and never rise
To do him wrong, or any way impeach
What then he said, so he unsay it now.

K. Hen. Why, yet he doth deny his prisoners;
But with proviso, and exception,-

That we, at our own charge, shall ransome straight
His brother-in-law, the foolish Mortimer;
Who, on my soul, hath wilfully betray'd
The lives of those that he did lead to fight
Against the great magician, damn'd Glendower;
Whose daughter, as we hear, the earl of March
Hath lately married. Shall our coffers then
Be emptied, to redeem a traitor home?
Shall we buy treason? and indent with fears,
When they have lost and forfeited themselves?
No, on the barren mountains let him starve ;
For I shall never hold that man my friend,
Whose tongue shall ask me for one penny cost
To ransome home revolted Mortimer.
Hot. Revolted Mortimer!

He never did fall off, my sovereign liege,
But by the chance of war ;-To prove that true,
Needs no more but one tongue for all those wounds,
Those mouthed wounds, which valiantly be took,
When on the gentle Severn's sedgy bank,

In single opposition, hand to hand,
He did confound the best part of an hour
In changing hardiment with great Glendower:
Three times they breath'd, and three times did they
Upon agreement, of swift Severn's flood; [drink,
Who then, affrighted with their bloody looks,
Ran fearfully among the trembling reeds,
And hid his crisp head in the hollow bank
Blood-stained with these valiant combatants.
Never did bare and rotten policy
Colour her working with such deadly wounds;
Nor never could the noble Mortimer
Receive so many, and all willingly:
Then let him not be slander'd with revolt.

K. Hen. Thou dost belie him, Percy, thou dost belie
He never did encounter with Glendower;
I tell thee,

He durst as well have met the devil alone,
As Owen Glendower for an enemy.

[him,

Art not ashamed? But, sirrah, henceforth
Let me not hear you speak of Mortimer :
Send me your prisoners with the speediest means,
Or you shall hear in such a kind from me

As will displease you.-My lord Northumberland,
We licence your departure with your son :-
Send us your prisoners, or you'll hear of it.

[Exeunt KING HENRY, BLUNT, and Train.
Hot. And if the devil come and roar for them,
I will not send them :-I will after straight,
And tell him so; for I will ease my heart,
Although it be with hazard of my head.
North. What, drunk with choler? stay, and pause
Here comes your uncle.
[awhile;

Hot.

Re-enter WORCESTER.

Speak of Mortimer ? 'Zounds, I will speak of him; and let my soul Want mercy, if I do not join with him: Yea, on his part, I'll empty all these veins, And shed my blood drop by drop i' the dust, But I will lift the down-trod Mortimer As high i' the air as this unthankful king, As this ingra and canker'd Bolingbroke. North. Brother, the king hath made your nephew mad. [To WORCESTER. Wor. Who struck this heat up, after I was gone? Hot. He will, forsooth, have all my prisoners; And when I urg'd the ransome once again Of my wife's brother, then his cheek look'd pale; And on my face he turn'd an eye of death, Trembling even at the name of Mortimer.

Wor. I cannot blame him: Was he not proclaim'd, By Richard that dead is, the next of blood?

North. He was; I heard the proclamation?
And then it was, when the unhappy king
(Whose wrongs in us God pardon!) did set forth
Upon his Irish expedition;

From whence he, intercepted, did return
To be depos'd, and, shortly, murdered.

[mouth

Wor. And for whose death, we in the world's wide Live scandaliz'd, and foully spoken of. Hot. But, soft, I pray you; Did king Richard then Proclaim my brother Edmund Mortimer Heir to the crown? North. He did; myself did hear it. Hot. Nay, then I cannot blame his cousin king, That wish'd him on the barren mountains starv'd.