This earth shall have a feeling, and these stones
Prove armed soldiers, ere her native king
Shall falter under foul rebellion's arms.

Bishop. Fear not, my lord; that Power that made you king

Hath power to keep you king, in spite of all.
The means that heaven yields must be embraced,
And not neglected; else, if heaven would,
And we will not, heaven's offer we refuse;
The proffer'd means of succour and redress.
Aum. He means, my lord, that we are too
remiss;

Whilst Bolingbroke, through our security, Grows strong and great, in substance, and in friends.

K. Rich. Discomfortable cousin! know'st thou

not,

That, when the searching eye of heaven is hid
Behind the globe, and lights the lower world,
Then thieves and robbers range abroad unseen,
In murders, and in outrage, boldly here;
But when, from under this terrestrial ball,
He fires the proud tops of the eastern pines,
And darts his light through every guilty hole,
Then murders, treasons, and detested sins,
The cloak of night being pluck'd from off their
backs,

Stand bare and naked, trembling at themselves?
So when this thief, this traitor, Bolingbroke,—
Who all this while hath revell'd in the night,
Whilst we were wandering with the antipodes,--
Shall see us rising in our throne, the east,
His treasons will sit blushing in his face,
Not able to endure the sight of day,
But, self-affrighted, tremble at his sin.
Not all the water in the rough rude sea

Can wash the balm from an anointed king:
The breath of worldly men cannot depose
The deputy elected by the Lord :

For every man that Bolingbroke hath press'd,
To lift shrewd steel against our golden crown,
Heaven for his Richard hath in heavenly pay
A glorious angel: then, if angels fight,

Weak men must fall; for heaven still guards the right.

Enter SALISBURY.

Welcome, my lord: how far off lies your power?
Sal. Nor near, nor farther off, my gracious lord,
Than this weak arm: discomfort guides my
tongue,

And bids me speak of nothing but despair.
One day too late, I fear, my noble lord,
Hath clouded all thy happy days on earth:
O, call back yesterday, bid time return,
And thou shalt have twelve thousand fighting

men:

To-day, to-day, unhappy day, too late,

O'erthrows thy joys, friends, fortune, and thy state; For all the Welshmen, hearing thou wert dead, Are gone to Bolingbroke, dispersed, and fled. Aum. Comfort, my liege; why looks your grace so pale?

K. Rich. But now, the blood of twenty thousand men

Did triumph in my face, and they are fled And, till so much blood thither come again, Have I not reason to look pale and dead? All souls that will be safe fly from my side; For time hath set a blot upon my pride.

Aum. Comfort, my liege; remember who you

are.

K. Rich. I had forgot myself: am I not king? Awake thou sluggard majesty! thou sleepest. Is not the king's name twenty thousand names? Arm, arm, my name ! a puny subject strikes At thy great glory.-Look not to the ground, Ye favourites of a king. Are we not high? High be our thoughts: I know, my uncle York Hath power enough to serve our turn. But who Comes here?

Enter SCROOP.

Scroop. More health and happiness betide my liege,

Than can my care-tuned tongue deliver him! K. Rich. Mine ear is open, and my heart prepared;

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 Bolingbroke 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, loss, 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 dissolved to tears;
So high above his limits swells the rage
Of Bolingbroke, 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; and 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 Bolingbroke.

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 offence!

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, graved in the hollow ground. Aum. Is Bushy, Green, and the earl of Wiltshire, dead?

Scroop. Yea, all of them at Bristol 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 Bolingbroke'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 heaven's sake, let us sit upon the ground,
And tell sad stories of the death of kings:-
How some have been deposed, some slain in war,
Some haunted by the ghosts they have deposed:
Some poison'd by their wives, some sleeping
kill'd;

All murder'd: ·- 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, humour'd thus,
Comes at the last, and with a little pin