Grey. True: those that were your father's enemies, Have steep'd their galls in honey, and do serve you With hearts create of duty and of zeal.

K. Hen. We therefore have great cause of thankful

ness,

And shall forget the office of our hand,
Sooner than quittance of desert and merit,
According to the weight and worthiness.

Scroop. So service shall with steeled sinews toil,
And labour shall refresh itself with hope,
To do your grace incessant services.

K. Hen. We judge no less.-Uncle of Exeter,
Enlarge the man committed yesterday,
That rail'd against our person: we consider,
It was excess of wine that set him on ;
And, on his more advice, we pardon him.

Scroop. That's mercy, but too much security:
Let him be punish'd, sovereign; lest example
Breed by his sufferance more of such a kind.
K. Hen. O! let us yet be merciful.

Cam. So may your highness, and yet punish too. Grey. Sir, you show great mercy, if you give him life

After the taste of much correction.

K. Hen. Alas! your too much love and care of me Are heavy orisons 'gainst this poor wretch.

If little faults, proceeding on distemper,

Shall not be wink'd at, how shall we stretch our eye, When capital crimes, chew'd, swallow'd, and digested, Appear before us?-We'll yet enlarge that man, Though Cambridge, Scroop, and Grey, in their dear

care,

And tender preservation of our person,

Would have him punish'd. And now to our French

causes:

Who are the late commissioners?

Cam. I one, my lord:

Your highness bade me ask for it to-day.
Scroop. So did you me, my liege.

Grey. And I, my royal sovereign.

K. Hen. Then, Richard, earl of Cambridge, there is

yours;

There yours, lord Scroop of Marsham :—and, sir knight,
Grey of Northumberland, this same is yours:-
Read them; and know, I know your worthiness.-
My lord of Westmoreland, and uncle Exeter,

We will aboard to-night.-Why, how now, gentlemen!
What see you in those papers, that

you lose So much complexion?-look ye, how they change: Their cheeks are paper.-Why, what read you there, That hath so cowarded and chas'd your blood Out of appearance?

Cam.

I do confess my fault,

And do submit me to your highness' mercy.
Grey. Scroop. To which we all appeal.

K. Hen. The mercy that was quick in us but late,
By your own counsel is suppress'd and kill'd:
You must not dare, for shame, to talk of mercy;
For your own reasons turn into your bosoms,
As dogs upon their masters, worrying you1.—
See you, my princes, and my noble peers,

These English monsters! My lord of Cambridge here,—
You know, how apt our love was to accord
To furnish him with all appertinents5
Belonging to his honour; and this man
Hath, for a few light crowns, lightly conspir'd,
And sworn unto the practices of France,
To kill us here in Hampton: to the which,
This knight, no less for bounty bound to us
Than Cambridge is, hath likewise sworn.-But O!

4 - worrying you.] The quartos have them for "you ;" but that of the folio seems the better reading.

5 To furnish HIM with all appertinents] "Him" is omitted in the folio, 1623, and properly inserted in that of 1632.

What shall I say to thee, lord Scroop? thou cruel,
Ingrateful, savage, and inhuman creature!
Thou that didst bear the key of all my counsels,
That knew'st the very bottom of my soul,
That almost might'st have coin'd me into gold,
Would'st thou have practis'd on me for thy use.
May it be possible, that foreign hire

Could out of thee extract one spark of evil,
That might annoy my finger? 'tis so strange,
That, though the truth of it stands off as gross
As black and white, my eye will scarcely see it.
Treason and murder ever kept together,
As two yoke-devils sworn to either's purpose,
Working so grossly in a natural cause,
That admiration did not whoop at them:
But thou, 'gainst all proportion, didst bring in
Wonder to wait on treason, and on murder:
And whatsoever cunning fiend it was,
That wrought upon thee so preposterously,
Hath got the voice in hell for excellence,
And other devils, that suggest by treasons,
Do botch and bungle up damnation

With patches, colours, and with forms, being fetch'd
From glistering semblances of piety:

But he that temper'd thee bade thee stand up,
Gave thee no instance why thou should'st do treason,
Unless to dub thee with the name of traitor.

If that same demon, that hath gull'd thee thus,
Should with his lion gait walk the whole world,
He might return to vasty Tartar back,
And tell the legions-I can never win
A soul so easy as that Englishman's.
O, how hast thou with jealousy infected
The sweetness of affiance! Show men dutiful?
Why, so didst thou: seem they grave and learned?
Why, so didst thou: come they of noble family?
Why, so didst thou: seem they religious?

Why, so didst thou: or are they spare in diet;
Free from gross passion, or of mirth, or anger;
Constant in spirit, not swerving with the blood;
Garnish'd and deck'd in modest complement;
Not working with the eye without the car,
And but in purged judgment trusting neither?
Such, and so finely bolted, didst thou seem;
And thus thy fall hath left a kind of blot,
To mark the full-fraught man, and best indued",
With some suspicion. I will weep for thee,
For this revolt of thine, methinks, is like
Another fall of man'.-Their faults are open:
Arrest them to the answer of the law,

And God acquit them of their practices!

Exe. I arrest thee of high treason, by the name of Richard earl of Cambridge.

I arrest thee of high treason, by the name of Henry lords Scroop, of Marsham.

I arrest thee of high treason, by the name of Thomas Grey, knight of Northumberland.

Scroop. Our purposes God justly hath discover'd, And I repent my fault more than my death; Which I beseech your highness to forgive,

Although my body pay the price of it.

Cam. For me, the gold of France did not seduce, Although I did admit it as a motive,

The sooner to effect what I intended:

But God be thanked for prevention;

Which I in sufferance' heartily will rejoice,

6 TO MARK the full-fraught man, and best indued,] The folio reads make for "mark," which was Theobald's amendment. Pope's rather forced reading of the original text was this:

"To make the full fraught man, and best, indued

7 Another fall of man.] Of this hemistich, and the thirty-seven preceding lines, there is no trace in the quartos.

8 HENRY lord, &c.] Thus the quarto. The folio, erroneously, Thomas.

9 Which I in sufferance-] The folio, 1623, omits " I," which was added in the folio, 1632.

Beseeching God and you to pardon me.

Grey. Never did faithful subject more rejoice At the discovery of most dangerous treason, Than I do at this hour joy o'er myself,

Prevented from a damned enterprize.

My fault, but not my body, pardon, sovereign.

K. Hen. God quit you in his mercy! Hear your

sentence.

You have conspir'd against our royal person,

Join'd with an enemy proclaim'd, and from his coffers Receiv'd the golden earnest of our death;

Wherein you would have sold your king to slaughter,
His princes and his peers to servitude,

His subjects to oppression and contempt,
And his whole kingdom into desolation'.
Touching our person, seek we no revenge;
But we our kingdom's safety must so tender,
Whose ruin you have sought, that to her laws
We do deliver you. Get you therefore hence,
Poor miserable wretches, to your death;
The taste whereof, God, of his mercy, give you
Patience to endure, and true repentance
Of all your dear offences.-Bear them hence.

[Exeunt Conspirators, guarded. Now, lords, for France; the enterprize whereof Shall be to you, as us, like glorious.

We doubt not of a fair and lucky war,
Since God so graciously hath brought to light
This dangerous treason, lurking in our way
To hinder our beginnings: we doubt not now,
But every rub is smoothed on our way.
Then, forth, dear countrymen: let us deliver

1 And his whole kingdom INTO desolation.] So the folio: perhaps we ought to read unto. On a previous page, 473, we also have "into," where to modern ears unto would seem preferable.

2 Whose ruin you HAVE sought,] "Have" we take from the quarto impressions, and it is required by the measure. Malone, without any authority from the quartos or folios, printed "Whose ruin you three sought."