Heard you not, what an humble suppliant
Lord Hastings was to her for his delivery?
GLOSTER. Humbly complaining to her deity
Got my lord chamberlain his liberty.
I'll tell you what; I think, it is our way,
If we will keep in favour with the king,
To be her men, and wear her livery:
The jealous o'er-worn widow, and herself,
Since that our brother dubb'd them gentlewomen,
Are mighty gossips in our monarchy. 3

1

2

BRAKENBURY. I beseech your graces both to pardon me:

His majesty hath straitly given in charge, 4

That no man shall have private conference,
Of what degree soever, 5 with your brother.

GLOS. Even so; an 6 please your worship, Brakenbury, You may partake of any thing we say.

We speak no treason, man: we say, the king
Is wise and virtuous: and his noble queen
Well struck in years; 7 fair, and not jealous:
We say that Shore's wife hath a pretty foot,

A cherry lip, a bonny eye, a passing pleasing tongue;
And that the queen's kindred are made gentlefolks.
How say you, Sir? can you deny all this?

8

BRAK. With this, my lord, myself have nought to do. GLOS. Naught to do with mistress Shore? I tell thee, fellow, He that doth naught with her, excepting one, Were best to do it secretly, alone.

tions of a monarch. After the death of the King she lived with Lord Hastings, and being implicated by Richard III. in the conspiracy of that nobleman, she did penance on a charge of witchcraft, and ultimately, in the reign of Henry VII., died in the utmost distress; and, as is said, in the ditch, named after her Shoreditch (a street in London at the present time).

1. ie. the Queen and Jane Shore. 2. Since our brother raised them to the rank of gentlewomen.

3. Have much to say in the government of our monarchy. A gossip is a chattering person, originally at a christening.

9

4. His majesty hath strictly ordered.

5. Of whatever rank he may be.
6. An, contraction of and if
7. Advanced in years.

8. Bonny, handsome, beautiful, from the French bon; it is now almost exclusively confined to the Scotch dialect. Passing is used in old language as an adverb to enforce the meaning of another word: as, passing fair, exceedingly beautiful.

9. A play upon the words nought, nothing, and naught, bad, naughty. Nought, nothing, is now more properly written naught, and in the signification of bad it is seldom used.

BRAKENBURY. What one, my lord?

1

GLOSTER. Her husband, knave. Would'st thou betray me? BRAK. I do beseech your grace to pardon me; and withal, 1 Forbear your conference with the noble duke.

CLARENCE. We know thy charge, Brakenbury, and will obey. GLOS. We are the queen's abjects, 2 and must obey. Brother, farewell: I will unto the king;

And whatsoe'er you will employ me in,
Were it to call king Edward's widow sister,
I will perform it to enfranchise you.

3

Mean time, this deep disgrace in brotherhood
Touches me deeper than you can imagine.

CLAR. I know, it pleaseth neither of us well.
GLOS. Well, your imprisonment shall not be long;
I will deliver you, or else lie for you:

Mean time, have patience.
CLAR.

I must perforce: farewell. [Exeunt CLARENCE, BRAKENBURY, and Guard. GLOS. Go, tread the path that thou shalt ne'er return, Simple, plain Clarence! I do love thee so, That I will shortly send thy soul to heaven,

If heaven will take the present at our hands.

But who comes here? the new-deliver'd Hastings?

Enter HASTINGS.

HASTINGS. Good time of day unto my gracions lord.
GLOS. As much unto my good lord chamberlain.

Well are you welcome to this open air.

How hath your lordship brook'd imprisonment?

HAST. With patience, noble lord, as prisoners must;

But I shall live, my lord, to give them thanks,

That were the cause of my imprisonment.

GLOS. No doubt, no doubt; and so shall Clarence too, For they that were your enemies are his, And have prevail'd as much on him as you.

1. Withal, likewise

2. i. e. the most servile of her subjects, who of course must obey all her commands.

3. Even if I have to give the name of sister to the widow whom the King has married, I will do it to gain your freedom.

4. i. e. be imprisoned in your stead. To lie anciently signified to reside.

5. To prevail on, to overcome, to gain the superiority. We should now say prevailed over, or against: to prevail on signifying to persuade.

HASTINGS. More pity, that the eagles should be mew'd, ' While kites and buzzards prey at liberty.

GLOSTER. What news abroad?

HAST. No news so bad abroad, as this at home: The king is sickly, weak, and melancholy,

And his physicians fear him mightily. 2

GLOS. Now, by Saint Paul, that news is bad indeed. O! he hath kept an evil diet long,

3

And over-much consum'd his royal person:

'T is very grievous to be thought upon. Where is he? in his bed?

HAST. He is.

GLOS. Go you before, and I will follow you.

He cannot live, I hope; and must not die,

[Exit HASTINGS.

Till George be pack'd with posthorse up to heaven.
I'll in, to urge his hatred more to Clarence,
With lies well steel'd with weighty arguments;
And, if I fail not in my deep intent,
Clarence hath not another day to live:

Which done, God take king Edward to his mercy,
And leave the world for me to bustle in, 4

For then I'll marry Warwick's youngest daughter. 5
What though I kill'd her husband, and her father? 6
The readiest way to make the wench amends,

Is to become her husband, and her father:

1. A men was a place in which | weeks later, at the battle of Tewkesfalcons were kept; and being con- bury, which decided the fate of fined therein while moulting, was the Lancastrians, Edward Prince metaphorically used for any close place or places of confinement. The verb was formed from the substantive. We now call stables for horses

mens.

2. i. e. fear for him, have great fears on his account.

3. i. e. a bad regimen.

4. To bustle, to be busy, to be active.

5. Lady Ann, the betrothed widow of Edward Prince of Wales, who appears in the next scene.

6. Warwick was slain in the battle of Barnet, near London, A. D. 1471, but history does not say that it was by Gloucester's own hand. A few

of Wales was taken prisoner, and brought before the King. On being asked by the latter, in an insulting manner, how he dared to invade his dominions, the young prince, more mindful of his high birth than of his present fortune, replied that he came thither to claim his just inheritance. Hereupon the King struck him on the face with his gauntlet, and the Dukes of Clarence and Gloucester, Lord Hastings, and Sir Thomas Gray, taking the blow as a signal for further violence, hurried the prince into the next apartment, and there dispatched him with their daggers.

The which will I; not all so much for love,
As for another.secret close intent,

By marrying her which I must reach unto. 1
But yet I run before my horse to market:

Clarence still breathes; Edward still lives and reigns;
When they are gone, then must I count my gains.

SCENE II.

The Same. Another Street.

[Exit.

Enter the Corpse of KING HENRY VI., borne in an open Coffin, Gentlemen bearing Halberds 2, to guard it; and LADY ANNE as mourner.

4

ANNE. Set down, set down your honourable load,
If honour may be shrouded in a hearse,
Whilst I a while obsequiously 3 lament
Th' untimely fall of virtuous Lancaster.
Poor key-cold figure of a holy king!
Pale ashes of the house of Lancaster!
Thou bloodless remnant of that royal blood!
Be it lawful that I invocate thy ghost,
To hear the lamentations of poor Anne,
Wife to thy Edward, to thy slaughter'd son,

6

Stabb'd by the self-same hand that made these wounds! 5
Lo, in these windows, that let forth thy life,
I pour the helpless balm of my poor eyes: -
O, cursed be the hand that made these holes!
Cursed the heart, that had the heart to do it!
Cursed the blood, that let this blood from hence!
More direful hap betide that hated wretch, 7
That makes us wretched by the death of thee,
Than I can wish to adders, spiders, toads,
Or any creeping venom'd thing that lives!

1. Which I must reach unto by | tain. It is pretended, and was gemarrying her.

2. Halberd, a battle-axe fixed to a long pole.

3. Obsequiously, with funeral rites. 4. i. e. as cold as a key.

5. The historian Hume says: "King Henry expired in the Tower a few days after the battle of Tewkesbury; but whether he died a natural or violent death is uncer

nerally believed, that the Duke of Gloucester killed him with his own hands: But the universal odium which that prince has incurred, inclined perhaps the nation to aggravate his crimes without any sufficient authority."

6. i. e. the gaping wounds.

7. May a more fearful fate befal that hated wretch.

If ever he have child, abortive be it,
Prodigious, and untimely brought to light,
Whose ugly and unnatural aspect

1

May fright the hopeful mother at the view;
And that be heir to his unhappiness!
If ever he have wife, let her be made
More miserable by the death of him,

Than I am made by my young lord, and thee! - 2
Come, now toward Chertsey with your holy load,
Taken from Paul's to be interred there;

And still, as you are weary of this weight,

Rest you, whiles I lament king Henry's corse.

[The Bearers take up the Corpse and advance.

Enter GLOSTER.

GLOSTER. Stay you, that bear the corse, and set it down. ANNE. What black magician conjures up this fiend, To stop devoted charitable deeds? 4

GLOS. Villains! set down the corse; or, by Saint Paul, I'll make a corse of him that disobeys.

FIRST GENT. My lord, stand back, and let the coffin pass. GLOS. Unmanner'd dog! stand thou when I command: Advance thy halberd higher than my breast, 5

Or, by Saint Paul, I'll strike thee to my foot,
And spurn upon thee, beggar, for thy boldness.

[The Bearers set down the Coffin.

ANNE. What! do you tremble? are you all afraid?
Alas! I blame you not; for you are mortal,
And mortal eyes cannot endure the devil.
Avaunt, thou dreadful minister of hell!

Thou hadst but power over his mortal body,

His soul thou canst not have: therefore, begone.

GLOS. Sweet saint, for charity, be not so curst. 5 ANNE. Foul devil, for God's sake, hence, and trouble us not; For thou hast made the happy earth thy hell, Fill'd it with cursing cries, and deep exclaims.

1. Unhappiness here means disposition to mischief, wickedness.

2. Than I am made by the death of my young lord, and of thee!

3. Whiles, with an s, is no longer in use as an adverb.

4. To stop consecrated deeds of love.

5. i. e. put up, or raise, thy halberd (which the gentleman had pointed at Gloucester's breast).

6. Curst, malicious, i. e. be not so bitter of speech.