Buck. Go, go, up to the leads; the lord mayor [Exit GLOSTER.

knocks.

Enter the Lord Mayor, Aldermen, and Citizens.
Welcome, my lord: I dance attendance here;
I think, the duke will not be spoke withal.-

Enter, from the Castle, CATESBY.

Now, Catesby! what says your lord to my request?
Cate. He doth entreat your grace, my noble lord,
To visit him to-morrow, or next day :

He is within, with two right reverend fathers,
Divinely bent to meditation :

And in no worldly suit would he be mov'd,
To draw him from his holy exercise.

Buck. Return, good Catesby, to the gracious duke;
Tell him, myself, the mayor and aldermen,
In deep designs, in matter of great moment,
No less importing than our general good,
Are come to have some conference with his grace.
Cate. I'll signify so much unto him straight.

[Exit. Buck. Ah, ha, my lord, this prince is not an Edward!

He is not lolling on a lewd day-bed,3
But on his knees at meditation;

Not dallying with a brace of courtezans,
But meditating with two deep divines;
Not sleeping, to engross his idle body,
But praying, to enrich his watchful soul:
Happy were England, would this virtuous prince
Take on himself the sovereignty thereof:

poses, shall seem to deny your suit, there is no doubt but we shall bring all to a happy issue.

day-bed, i. e. a couch, or sofa.

to engross] To fatten, to pamper.

7

But, sure, I fear, we shall ne'er win him to it. May. Marry, God defend, his grace should say us nay!

Buck. I fear, he will: Here Catesby comes again;→

Re-enter CATESBY.

Now, Catesby, what says his grace ?

Cate. He wonders to what end you have assembled Such troops of citizens to come to him, His grace not being warn'd thereof before, He fears, my lord, you mean no good to him. Buck. Sorry I am, my noble cousin should Suspect me, that I mean no good to him: By heaven, we come to him in perfect love; And so once more return and tell his grace.

[Exit CATESBY. When holy and devout religious men Are at their beads, 'tis hard to draw them thence; So sweet is zealous contemplation.

Enter GLOSTER, in a Gallery above, between Two Bishops. CATESBY returns.

May. See, where his grace stands 'tween two clergymen !

Buck. Two props of virtue for a christian prince, To stay him from the fall of vanity:

And, see, a book of prayer in his hand;
True ornaments to know a holy man.-
Famous Plantagenet, most gracious prince,
Lend favourable ear to our requests;
And pardon us the interruption

Of thy devotion, and right christian zeal.

God defend, his grace should say us nay!] This pious

and courtly mayor was Edmund Shaw, brother to Dr. Shaw, whom Richard had employed to prove his title to the crown, the pulpit at Saint Paul's Cross.

from

Glo. My lord, there needs no such apology;
I rather do beseech you pardon me,
Who, earnest in the service of my God,
Neglect the visitation of my friends.

But, leaving this, what is your grace's pleasure? Buck. Even that, I hope, which pleaseth God above,

And all good men of this ungovern'd isle.

Glo. I do suspect, I have done some offence, That seems disgracious in the city's eye; And that you come to reprehend my ignorance. Buck. You have, my lord; Would it might please your grace,

On our entreaties to amend your fault!

Glo. Else wherefore breathe I in a Christian land? Buck. Know, then, it is your fault, that you resign

The supreme seat, the throne majestical,
The scepter'd office of your ancestors,
Your state of fortune, and your due of birth,
The lineal glory of your royal house,
To the corruption of a blemish'd stock:
Whilst, in the mildness of your sleepy thoughts,
(Which here we waken to our country's good,)
The noble isle doth want her proper limbs;
Her face defac'd with scars of infamy,
Her royal stock graft with ignoble plants,
And almost shoulder'd in the swallowing gulf
Of dark forgetfulness and deep oblivion.
Which to recure,' we heartly solicit
Your gracious self to take on you the charge
And kingly government of this your land:
Not as protector, steward, substitute,

Or lowly factor for another's gain :

And almost shoulder'd in the swallowing gulph -] Shoulder'd has the same meaning as rudely thrust into.

7 Which to recure,] To recure is to recover,

But as successively, from blood to blood,
Your right of birth, your empery, your own.
For this, consorted with the citizens,
Your very worshipful and loving friends,
And by their vehement instigation,

In this just suit come I to move your grace.
Glo. I cannot tell, if to depart in silence,
Or bitterly to speak in your reproof,
Best fitteth my degree, or your condition:
If, not to answer,—you might haply think,
Tongue-tied ambition, not replying, yielded
To bear the golden yoke of sovereignty,
Which fondly you would here impose on me;
If to reprove you for this suit of yours,
So season'd with your faithful love to me,
Then, on the other side, I check'd my friends.
Therefore, to speak, and to avoid the first;
And then, in speaking, not to incur the last,-
Definitively thus I answer you.

Your love deserves my thanks; but
thanks; but my desert
Unmeritable, shuns your high request.
First, if all obstacles were cut away,
And that my path were even to the crown,
As the ripe revenue and due of birth;
Yet so much is my poverty of spirit,
So mighty, and so many, my defects,

That I would rather hide me from my greatness,
Being a bark to brook no mighty sea,
Than in my greatness covet to be hid,
And in the vapour of my glory smother'd.
But, God be thank'd, there is no need of me;
(And much I need to help you, if need were ;)
The royal tree hath left us royal fruit,
Which, mellow'd by the stealing hours of time,

8

8 And much I need to help you,] And I want much of the ability requisite to give you help, if help were needed.

Will well become the seat of majesty,
And make, no doubt, us happy by his reign.
On him I lay what you would lay on me,
The right and fortune of his happy stars,-
Which, God defend, that I should wring from him!
Buck. My lord, this argues conscience in your

grace;

But the respects thereof are nice and trivial,
All circumstances well considered.

You say, that Edward is your brother's son;
So say we too, but not by Edward's wife:
For first he was contract to lady Lucy,
Your mother lives a witness to his vow;
And afterwards by substitute betroth'd
To Bona, sister to the king of France.
These both put by, a poor petitioner,
A care-craz'd mother to a many sons,
A beauty-waning and distressed widow,
Even in the afternoon of her best days,
Made prize and purchase of his wanton eye,
Seduc'd the pitch and height of all his thoughts
To base declension and loath'd bigamy;'
By her, in his unlawful bed, he got

This Edward, whom our manners call-the prince.
More bitterly could I expostulate,

Save that, for reverence to some alive,
I give a sparing limit to my tongue.

Then, good my lord, take to your royal self
This proffer'd benefit of dignity:

If not to bless us and the land withal,
Yet to draw forth your noble ancestry

9

are nice and trivial,] Nice is generally used by Shakspeare in the sense of minute, trifling, of petty import.

loath'd bigamy,] Bigamy, by a canon of the council of Lyons, A. D. 1274, (adopted in England by a statute in 4 Edw. I.) was made unlawful and infamous. It differed from polygamy, or having two wives at once: as it consisted in either marrying two virgins successively, or once marrying a widow.