The Tragedy of King Richard the Second Read Online

RICH.

Mine ear is open, and my heart prepar'd,

The worst is worldly loss thou canst unfold.

Say, is my kingdom lost? Why, 'twas my care,

And what loss is it to be rid of care?

Strives Bullingbrook to be as great as we?

Greater he shall not be; if he serve God,

We'll serve Him too, and be his fellow so.

Revolt our subjects? That we cannot mend,

They break their faith to God as well as us.

Cry woe, destruction, ruin, and decay:

The worst is death, and death will have his day.

SCROOP.

Glad am I that your Highness is so arm'd

To bear the tidings of calamity.

Like an unseasonable stormy day,

Which makes the silver rivers drown their shores,

As if the world were all dissolv'd to tears,

So high above his limits swells the rage

Of Bullingbrook, covering your fearful land

With hard bright steel, and hearts harder than steel.

White-beards have arm'd their thin and hairless scalps

Against thy majesty; boys, with women's voices,

Strive to speak big, and clap their female joints

In stiff unwieldy arms against thy crown;

Thy very beadsmen learn to bend their bows

Of double-fatal yew against thy state;

Yea, distaff-women manage rusty bills

Against thy seat: both young and old rebel,

And all goes worse than I have power to tell.

K. RICH.

Too well, too well thou tell'st a tale so ill.

Where is the Earl of Wiltshire? Where is Bagot?

What is become of Bushy? Where is Green?

That they have let the dangerous enemy

Measure our confines with such peaceful steps?

If we prevail, their heads shall pay for it.

I warrant they have made peace with Bullingbrook.

SCROOP.

Peace have they made with him indeed, my lord.

K. RICH.

O villains, vipers, damn'd without redemption!

Dogs, easily won to fawn on any man!

Snakes, in my heart-blood warm'd, that sting my heart!

Three Judases, each one thrice worse than Judas!

Would they make peace? Terrible hell

Make war upon their spotted souls for this!

SCROOP.

Sweet love, I see, changing his property,

Turns to the sourest and most deadly hate.

Again uncurse their souls, their peace is made

With heads, and not with hands. Those whom you curse

Have felt the worst of death's destroying wound,

And lie full low, grav'd in the hollow ground.

AUM.

Is Bushy, Green, and the Earl of Wiltshire dead?

SCROOP.

Ay, all of them at Bristow lost their heads.

AUM.

Where is the Duke my father with his power?

K. RICH.

No matter where – of comfort no man speak:

Let's talk of graves, of worms, and epitaphs,

Make dust our paper, and with rainy eyes

Write sorrow on the bosom of the earth.

Let's choose executors and talk of wills;

And yet not so, for what can we bequeath

Save our deposed bodies to the ground?

Our lands, our lives, and all are Bullingbrook's,

And nothing can we call our own but death,

And that small model of the barren earth

Which serves as paste and cover to our bones.

For God's sake let us sit upon the ground

And tell sad stories of the death of kings:

How some have been depos'd, some slain in war,

Some haunted by the ghosts they have deposed,

Some poisoned by their wives, some sleeping kill'd,

All murthered – for within the hollow crown

That rounds the mortal temples of a king

Keeps Death his court, and there the antic sits,

Scoffing his state and grinning at his pomp,

Allowing him a breath, a little scene,

To monarchize, be fear'd, and kill with looks,

Infusing him with self and vain conceit,

As if this flesh which walls about our life

Were brass impregnable; and humor'd thus,

Comes at the last and with a little pin

Bores thorough his castle wall, and farewell king!

Cover your heads, and mock not flesh and blood

With solemn reverence, throw away respect,

Tradition, form, and ceremonious duty,

For you have but mistook me all this while.

I live with bread like you, feel want,

Taste grief, need friends: subjected thus,

How can you say to me I am a king?

CAR.

My lord, wise men ne'er sit and wail their woes,

But presently prevent the ways to wail;

To fear the foe, since fear oppresseth strength,

Gives in your weakness strength unto your foe,

And so your follies fight against yourself.

Fear, and be slain – no worse can come to fight,

And fight and die is death destroying death,

Where fearing dying pays death servile breath.

AUM.

My father hath a power, inquire of him,

And learn to make a body of a limb.

K. RICH.

Thou chid'st me well. Proud Bullingbrook, I come

To change blows with thee for our day of doom.

This ague fit of fear is overblown,

An easy task it is to win our own.

Say, Scroop, where lies our uncle with his power?

Speak sweetly, man, although thy looks be sour.

SCROOP.

Men judge by the complexion of the sky

The state and inclination of the day;

So may you by my dull and heavy eye:

My tongue hath but a heavier tale to say.

I play the torturer by small and small

To lengthen out the worst that must be spoken:

Your uncle York is join'd with Bullingbrook,

And all your northern castles yielded up,

And all your southern gentlemen in arms

Upon his party.

K. RICH.

Thou hast said enough.

[To Aumerle.]

Beshrew thee, cousin, which didst lead me forth

Of that sweet way I was in to despair!

What say you now? What comfort have we now?

By heaven, I'll hate him everlastingly

That bids me be of comfort any more.

Go to Flint castle, there I'll pine away –

A king, woe's slave, shall kingly woe obey.

That power I have, discharge, and let them go

To ear the land that hath some hope to grow,

For I have none. Let no man speak again

To alter this, for counsel is but vain.

AUM.

My liege, one word.

K. RICH.

He does me double wrong

That wounds me with the flatteries of his tongue.

Discharge my followers, let them hence away,

From Richard's night to Bullingbrook's fair day.

[Exeunt.]

[Scene III]

Enter, [with Drum and Colors,] Bullingbrook, York, Northumberland, [Attendants, and forces].

BULL.

So that by this intelligence we learn

The Welshmen are dispers'd, and Salisbury

Is gone to meet the King, who lately landed

With some few private friends upon this coast.

NORTH.

The news is very fair and good, my lord:

Richard not far from hence hath hid his head.

YORK.

It would beseem the Lord Northumberland

To say King Richard. Alack the heavy day

When such a sacred king should hide his head!

NORTH.

Your Grace mistakes; only to be brief

Left I his title out.

YORK.

The time hath been,

Would you have been so brief with him, he would

Have been so brief [with you] to shorten you,

For taking so the head, your whole head's length.

BULL.

Mistake not, uncle, further than you should.

YORK.

Take not, good cousin, further than you should,

Lest you mistake the heavens are over our heads.

BULL.

I know it, uncle, and oppose not myself

Against their will. But who comes here?

Enter [Harry] Percy.

Welcome, Harry. What, will not this castle yield?

PERCY.

The castle royally is mann'd, my lord,

Against thy entrance.

BULL.

Royally?

Why, it contains no king.

PERCY.

Yes, my good lord,

It doth contain a king. King Richard lies

Within the limits of yon lime and stone,

And with him are the Lord Aumerle, Lord Salisbury,

Sir Stephen Scroop, besides a clergyman

Of holy reverence, who, I cannot learn.

NORTH.

O, belike it is the Bishop of Carlisle.

BULL [To Northumberland.]

Noble [lord],

Go to the rude ribs of that ancient castle;

Through brazen trumpet send the breath of parley

Into his ruin'd ears, and thus deliver:

Henry Bullingbrook

On both his knees doth kiss King Richard's hand,

And sends allegiance and true faith of heart

To his most royal person; hither come

Even at his feet to lay my arms and power,

Provided that my banishment repeal'd

And lands restor'd again be freely granted.

If not, I'll use the advantage of my power,

And lay the summer's dust with show'rs of blood

Rain'd from the wounds of slaughtered Englishmen,

The which, how far off from the mind of Bullingbrook

It is, such crimson tempest should bedrench

The fresh green lap of fair King Richard's land,

My stooping duty tenderly shall show.

Go signify as much, while here we march

Upon the grassy carpet of this plain.

[Northumberland advances to the castle, with a Trumpet.]

Let's march without the noise of threat'ning drum,

That from this castle's tottered battlements

Our fair appointments may be well perus'd.

Methinks King Richard and myself should meet

With no less terror than the elements

Of fire and water, when their thund'ring shock

At meeting tears the cloudy cheeks of heaven.

Be he the fire, I'll be the yielding water;

The rage be his, whilst on the earth I rain

My waters – on the earth, and not on him.

March on, and mark King Richard how he looks.

The trumpets sound [parle without and answer within; then a flourish]. Richard appeareth on the walls [with Carlisle, Aumerle, Scroop, Salisbury].

See, see, King Richard doth himself appear,

As doth the blushing discontented sun

From out the fiery portal of the east,

When he perceives the envious clouds are bent

To dim his glory and to stain the track

Of his bright passage to the occident.

YORK.

Yet looks he like a king! Behold, his eye,

As bright as is the eagle's, lightens forth

Controlling majesty. Alack, alack for woe,

That any harm should stain so fair a show!

K. RICH [To Northumberland.]

We are amaz'd, and thus long have we stood

To watch the fearful bending of thy knee,

Because we thought ourself thy lawful king;

And if we be, how dare thy joints forget

To pay their aweful duty to our presence?

If we be not, show us the hand of God

That hath dismiss'd us from our stewardship,

For well we know no hand of blood and bone

Can gripe the sacred handle of our sceptre,

Unless he do profane, steal, or usurp.

And though you think that all, as you have done,

Have torn their souls by turning them from us,

And we are barren and bereft of friends,

Yet know, my master, God omnipotent,

Is mustering in his clouds on our behalf

Armies of pestilence, and they shall strike

Your children yet unborn and unbegot,

That lift your vassal hands against my head,

And threat the glory of my precious crown.

Tell Bullingbrook – for yon methinks he stands –

That every stride he makes upon my land

Is dangerous treason. He is come to open

The purple testament of bleeding war;

But ere the crown he looks for live in peace,

Ten thousand bloody crowns of mothers' sons

Shall ill become the flower of England's face,

Change the complexion of her maid-pale peace

To scarlet indignation, and bedew

Her pasters' grass with faithful English blood.

NORTH.

The King of heaven forbid our lord the King

Should so with civil and uncivil arms

Be rush'd upon! Thy thrice-noble cousin,

Harry Bullingbrook, doth humbly kiss thy hand,

And by the honorable tomb he swears

That stands upon your royal grandsire's bones,

And by the royalties of both your bloods,

Currents that spring from one most gracious head,

And by the buried hand of warlike Gaunt,

And by the worth and honor of himself,

Comprising all that may be sworn or said,

His coming hither hath no further scope

Than for his lineal royalties, and to beg

Enfranchisement immediate on his knees,

Which on thy royal party granted once,

His glittering arms he will commend to rust,

His barbed steeds to stables, and his heart

To faithful service of your Majesty.

This swears he, as he is [a prince, is] just,

And as I am a gentleman I credit him.

K. RICH.

Northumberland, say thus the King returns:

His noble cousin is right welcome hither,

And all the number of his fair demands

Shall be accomplish'd without contradiction.

With all the gracious utterance thou hast

Speak to his gentle hearing kind commends.

[Northumberland withdraws to Bullingbrook.]

[To Aumerle.]

We do debase ourselves, cousin, do we not,

To look so poorly and to speak so fair?

Shall we call back Northumberland, and send

Defiance to the traitor, and so die?

AUM.

No, good my lord, let's fight with gentle swords.

Till time lend friends, and friends their helpful swords.

K. RICH.

O God, O God, that e'er this tongue of mine

That laid the sentence of dread banishment

On yon proud man should take it off again

With words of sooth! O that I were as great

As is my grief, or lesser than my name!

Or that I could forget what I have been!

Or not remember what I must be now!

Swell'st thou, proud heart? I'll give thee scope to beat,

Since foes have scope to beat both thee and me.

AUM.

Northumberland comes back from Bullingbrook.

K. RICH.

What must the King do now? Must he submit?

The King shall do it. Must he be depos'd?

The King shall be contented. Must he lose

The name of king? a' God's name let it go.

I'll give my jewels for a set of beads,

My gorgeous palace for a hermitage,

My gay apparel for an almsman's gown,

My figur'd goblets for a dish of wood,

My sceptre for a palmer's walking-staff,

My subjects for a pair of carved saints,

And my large kingdom for a little grave,

A little little grave, an obscure grave –

Or I'll be buried in the king's high way,

Some way of common trade, where subjects' feet

May hourly trample on their sovereign's head;

For on my heart they tread now whilst I live,

And buried once, why not upon my head?

Aumerle, thou weep'st, my tender-hearted cousin!

We'll make foul weather with despised tears;

Our sighs and they shall lodge the summer corn,

And make a dearth in this revolting land.

Or shall we play the wantons with our woes

And make some pretty match with shedding tears?

As thus to drop them still upon one place,

Till they have fretted us a pair of graves

Within the earth, and, therein laid – there lies

Two kinsmen digg'd their graves with weeping eyes.

Would not this ill do well? Well, well, I see

I talk but idlely, and you laugh at me.

Most mighty prince, my Lord Northumberland,

What says King Bullingbrook? Will his Majesty

Give Richard leave to live till Richard die?

You make a leg, and Bullingbrook says ay.

NORTH.

My lord, in the base court he doth attend

To speak with you, may it please you to come down.

K. RICH.

Down, down I come, like glist'ring Phaëton,

Wanting the manage of unruly jades.

In the base court? Base court, where kings grow base,

To come at traitors' calls and do them grace.

In the base court, come down? Down court! down king!

For night-owls shriek where mounting larks should sing.

[Exeunt above.]

BULL.

What says his Majesty?

NORTH.

Sorrow and grief of heart

Makes him speak fondly like a frantic man,

Yet he is come.

[Enter King Richard and his Attendants below.]

BULL.

Stand all apart,

And show fair duty to his Majesty.

He kneels down.

My gracious lord –

K. RICH.

Fair cousin, you debase your princely knee

To make the base earth proud with kissing it.

Me rather had my heart might feel your love

Than my unpleased eye see your courtesy.

Up, cousin, up, your heart is up, I know,

Thus high at least

[touching his crown]

although your knee be low.

BULL.

My gracious lord, I come but for mine own.

K. RICH.

Your own is yours, and I am yours, and all.

BULL.

So far be mine, my most redoubted lord,

As my true service shall deserve your love.

K.