*Shall blow ten thousand souls to heaven, or hell:
And this fell tempest shall not cease to rage
*Until the golden circuit on my head,

Like to the glorious sun's transparent beams,
Do calm the fury of this mad-bred flaw.'
And, for a minister of my intent,
'I have seduc'd a headstrong Kentishman,
John Cade of Ashford,

To make commotion, as full well he can,
Under the title of John Mortimer.

*In Ireland have I seen this stubborn Cade
* Oppose himself against a troop of kernes;2

And fought so long, till that his thighs with darts * Were almost like a sharp-quill'd porcupine: *And, in the end being rescu'd, I have seen him Caper upright like a wild Morisco,3

Shaking the bloody darts, as he his bells. * Full often, like a shag-hair'd crafty kerne *Hath he conversed with the enemy; *And undiscover'd come to me again, *And given me notice of their villanies.

This devil here shall be my substitute; *For that John Mortimer, which now is dead, * In face, in gait, in speech, he doth resemble: "By this I shall perceive the commons' mind, 'How they affect the house and claim of York. 'Say, he be taken, rack'd, and tortur'd: 'I know no pain, they can inflict upon him, 'Will make him say-I mov'd him to those arms. 'Say, that he thrive (as 'tis great like he will,) Why, then from Ireland come I with my strength, 'And reap the harvest which that rascal sow'd: For, Humphrey being dead, as he shall be, And Henry put apart, the next for me. SCENE II.-Bury. A room in the palace. ter certain Murderers, hastily.

K. Hen. What, doth my lord of Suffolk comfort me?

Came he right now to sing a raven's note,

Whose dismal tune bereft my vital powers;
And thinks he, that the chirping of a wren,
'By crying comfort from a hollow breast,

[Exit. Can chase away the first-conceived sound?
*Hide not thy poison with such sugar'd words.
En-* Lay not thy hands on me; forbear, I say;
*Their touch affrights me, as a serpent's sting.
Thou baleful messenger, out of my sight!
Upon thy eye-balls murderous tyranny
Sits in grim majesty, to fright the world.
'Look not upon me, for thine eyes are wounding :-
'Yet do not go away;-Come, basilisk,

1 Mur. Run to my lord of Suffolk; let him know, We have despatch'd the duke, as he commanded. *2 Mur. O, that it were to do!-What have we done!

*Didst ever hear a man so penitent?

'Despatch'd this thing?

'1 Mur.

Now, sirs, have

you

Ay, my good lord, he's dead. 'Suff. Why, that's well said. Go, get you to my house;

'I will reward you for this venturous deed.
"The king and all the peers are here at hand :-
"Have you laid fair the bed? are all things well,
'According as I gave directions?

'1 Mur. 'Tis, my good lord.
Suff. Away, be gone! [Exeunt Murderers.
Enter King Henry, Queen Margaret, Cardinal
Beaufort, Somerset, Lords, and others.
'K. Hen. Go, call our uncle to our presence
straight:

Say, we intend to try his grace to-day,
If he be guilty, as 'tis published.

'Suff. I'll call him presently, my noble lord.

[Exit.

'K. Hen. Lords, take your places;-And,

pray you all,

'Proceed no straiter 'gainst our uncle Gloster, Than from true evidence, of good esteem, He be approv'd in practice culpable.

(1) A violent gust of wind.

(2) Irish foot-soldiers, light-armed. (3) A Moor in a morris dance.

And kill the innocent gazer with thy sight: *For in the shade of death I shall find joy; *In life, but double death, now Gloster's dead, Q. Mar. Why do you rate my lord of Suffolk thus ? Although the duke was enemy to him,

*

Yet he, most Christian-like, laments his death:
And for myself,-foe as he was to me,

* Might liquid tears, or heart-offending groans,
*Or blood-consuming sighs, recall his life,

* I would be blind with weeping, sick with groans,
Look pale as primrose, with blood-drinking sighs,
*And all to have the noble duke alive.
'What know I how the world may deem of me?
For it is known we were but hollow friends;
So shall my name with slander's tongue be
It may be judg'd, I made the duke away:
wounded,

And princes' courts be fill'd with my reproach.
This get I by his death: Ah me, unhappy!
To be a queen, and crown'd with infamy!
K. Hen. Ah, wo is me for Gloster, wretched man!
Q. Mar. Be wo for me,' more wretched than he is.
What, dost thou turn away, and hide thy face?
II am no loathsome leper, look on me.

*What, art thou, like the adder, waxen deaf?
* Be poisonous too, and kill thy forlorn queen.
*Is all thy comfort shut in Gloster's tomb?
*Why, then dame Margaret was ne'er thy joy!

* Erect his statue then, and worship it,

And make my image but an alehouse sign.
Was I, for this, nigh wreck'd upon the sea;
And twice by awkward wind from England's bank
'Drove back again unto my native clime?
What boded this, but well-forewarning wind
Did seem to say,-Seek not a scorpion's nest,
*Nor set no footing on this unkind shore?
* What did I then, but curs'd the gentle gusts,
*And he that loos'd them from their brazen caves;
* And bid them blow towards England's blessed
shore,

*Or turn our stern upon a dreadful rock?
*Yet Eolus would not be a murderer,
* But left that hateful office unto thee:

The pretty vaulting sea refus'd to drown me;
Knowing, that thou wouldst have me drown'd on
shore,

With tears as salt as sea, through thy unkindness:
The splitting rocks cower'd in the sinking sands,
And would not dash me with their ragged sides;
Because thy flinty heart, more hard than they,
*Might in thy palace perish Margaret.

As far as I could ken thy chalky cliffs,

* When from the shore the tempest beat us back, *I stood upon the hatches in the storm:

* And when the dusky sky began to rob

* My earnest-gaping sight of thy land's view,
I took a costly jewel from my neck,-

* A heart it was, bound in with diamonds,-
*And threw it towards thy land;-the sea .re-
ceiv'd it;

* And so, I wish'd, thy body might my heart:

And even with this, I lost fair England's view,
*And bid mine eves be packing with my heart;
And call'd them blind and dusky spectacles,
For losing ken of Albion's wished coast.
*How often have I tempted Suffolk's tongue
*(The agent of thy foul inconstancy,)

To sit and watch me, as Ascanius did,
When he to madding Dido would unfold
His father's acts, commenc'd in burning Troy?
Am I not witch'd like her? or thou not false like
him?

Ah me, I can no more! Die, Margaret!
*For Henry weeps, that thou dost live so long.
Noise within. Enter Warwick and Salisbury.
The Commons press to the door.

'War. It is reported, mighty sovereign,
"That good duke Humphrey traitorously is
der'd

"By Suffolk and the cardinal Beaufort's means.
"The commons, like an angry hive of bees,
'That want their leader, scatter up and down,
And care not who they sting in his revenge.
'Myself have calm'd their spleenful mutiny,
'Until they hear the order of his death.

Some violent hands were laid on Humphrey's life' If my suspect be false, forgive me, God; *For judgment only doth belong to thee!

Fain would I go to chafe his paly lips

* With twenty thousand kisses, and to drain
* Upon his face an ocean of salt tears;
*To tell my love unto his dumb deaf trunk,
And with my fingers feel his hand unfeeling:
* But all in vain are these mean obsequies;
*And, to survey his dead and earthly image,
What were it but to make my sorrow greater?
The folding-doors of an inner chamber are thrown
open, and Gloster is discovered dead in his bed:
Warwick and others standing by it.

*War. Come hither, gracious sovereign, view
this body.

*K. Hen. That is to see how deep my grave is

made:

* For, with bis soul, fled all my worldly solace; *For seeing him, I see my life in death.'

'War. As surely as my soul intends to live 'With that dread King that took our state upon him To free us from his Father's wrathful curse, 'I do believe that violent hands were laid Upon the life of this thrice-famed duke.

Suff. A dreadful oath, sworn with a solemm tongue!

'What instance gives lord Warwick for his vow?
'War. See, how the blood is settled in his face!
Oft have I seen a timely-parted ghost,?

Of ashy semblance, meagre, pale, and bloodless,
Being all descended to the labouring heart;
Who, in the conflict that it holds with death,
Attracts the same for aidance 'gainst the enemy;
Which with the heart there cools and ne'er re-
turneth

'To blush and beautify the cheek again.
But, see, his face is black, and full of blood;
His eye-balls further out than when he liv'd,
'Staring full ghastly, like a strangled man:
'His hair uprear'd, his nostrils stretch'd with
struggling;

'His hands abroad display'd, as one that grasp'd
And tugg'd for life, and was by strength subdu'd.
'Look on the sheets, his hair, you see, is sticking;
'His well-proportioned beard made rough and
rugged,

'Like to the summer's corn by tempest lodg'd.
'It cannot be, but he was murder'd here;
mur-The least of all these signs were probable.

'Suff. Why, Warwick, who should do the duke to death?

'Myself, and Beaufort, had him in protection; And we, I hope, sir, are no murderers.

War. But both of you were vow'd duke Humphrey's foes;

'And you, forsooth, had the good duke to keep:

K. Hen. That he is dead, good Warwick, 'tis Tis like, you would not feast him like a friend;

too true;

But how he died, God knows, not Henry:

'Enter his chamber, view his breathless corpse,
And comment then upon his sudden death.
War. That I shall do, my liege:-Stay, Sal-
isbury,

With the rude multitude, till I return.

[Warwick goes into an inner room,
Salisbury retires.

and

K. Hen. O thou that judgest all things, stay my thoughts:

My thoughts, that labour to persuade my soul,

(1) i. e. I see my life destroyed or endangered by nis death.

'And 'tis well seen, he found an enemy.

'Q. Mar. Then you, belike, suspect these noble

men

And sces fast by a butcher with an axe,
But will suspect, 'twas he that made the slaughter?
Who finds the partridge in the puttock's nest,
But may imagine how the bird was dead,
Although the kite soar with unbloodied beak?

(2) A body becomes inanimate in the common course of nature, to which violence has not brought la timeless end.

Even so suspicious is this tragedy.

Q. Mar. Are you a butcher, Suffolk? where's
your knife?

Is Beaufort term'd a kite? where are his talons?
Suff. I wear no knife, to slaughter sleeping nien;
But here's a vengeful sword, rusted with ease,
That shall be scoured in his rancorous heart,
That slanders me with murder's crimson badge:-
Say, if thou dar'st, proud lord of Warwickshire,
That I am faulty in duke Humphrey's death.

[Exeunt Cardinal, Som. and others. War. What dares not Warwick, if false Suffolk dare him?

Q. Mar. He dares not calm his contumelious
spirit,

Nor cease to be an arrogant controller,
Though Suffolk dare him twenty thousand times.
War. Madam, be still; with reverence may I say;
For every word, you speak in his behalf,

Is slander to your royal dignity.

Suff. Blunt-witted lord, ignoble in demeanour!
If ever lady wrong'd her lord so much,
Thy mother took into her blameful bed
Some stern untutor'd churl, and noble stock
Was graft with crab-tree slip; whose fruit thou art,
And never of the Nevils' noble race.

War. But that the guilt of murder bucklers thee,
And I should rob the deathsman of his fee,
Quitting thee thereby of ten thousand shames,
And that my sovereign's presence makes me mild,
I would, false murderous coward, on thy knee
Make thee beg pardon for thy passed speech,
And say-it was thy mother that thou meant'st,
That thou thyself wast born in bastardy:
And, after all this fearful homage done,
Give thee thy hire, and send thy soul to hell,
Pernicious blood-sucker of sleeping men!

Suff. Thou shalt be waking, while I shed
blood,

thy

If from this presence thou dar'st go with me.
War. Away even now, or I will drag thee hence:
Unworthy though thou art, I'll cope with thee,
* And do some service to duke Humphrey's ghost.
[Exeunt Suffolk and Warwick.
*K. Hen. What stronger breast-plate than a
heart untainted?

*Thrice is he arm'd, that hath his quarrel just;
*And he but naked, though lock'd up in steel,
* Whose conscience with injustice is corrupted.
[A noise within.
Q. Mar. What noise is this?
Re-enter Suffolk and Warwick, with their weapons
drawn.

'K. Hen. Why, how now, lords? your wrath-
ful weapons drawn

'Here in our presence? dare you be so bold?-
"Why, what tumultuous clamour have we here?
Suff. The traitorous Warwick, with the men of
Bury,

Set all upon me, mighty sovereign.

Noise of a crowd within. Re-enter Salisbury.
*Sal. Sirs, stand apart; the king shall know

your mind. [Speaking to those within.
Dread lord, the commons send you word by me,
Unless false Suffolk straight be done to death,
Or banish'd fair England's territories,

They will by violence tear him from your palace,
And torture him with grievious ling'ring death.
They say, by him the good duke Humphrey died;

45

They say, in him they four your highness' death ; And mere instinct of love, and loyalty,'Free from a stubborn opposite intent, 'As being thought to contradict your liking,Makes them thus forward in his banishment. They say, in care of your most royal person, That, if your highness should intend to sleep, And charge that no man should disturb your rest, In pain of your dislike, or pain of death; *Yet notwithstanding such a strait edict, Were there a serpent seen, with forked tongue, That slily glided towards your majesty, It were but necessary, you were wak'd; Lest, being suffer'd in that harmful slumber, *The mortal worm' might make the sleep eternal: * And therefore do they cry, though you forbid, That they will guard you, whe'r you will, or no, From such fell serpents as false Suffolk is; *With whose envenom'd and fatal sting, Your loving uncle, twenty times his worth, They say, is shamefully bereft of life. Commons. [Within.] An answer from the king, my lord of Salisbury.

Suff. 'Tis like the commons, rude unpolish'd

hinds,

Could send such message to their sovereign:
But you, my lord, were glad to be employ'd,
To show how quaint an orator you are:
But all the honour Salisbury hath won,
Is-that he was the lord ambassador,
Sent from a sort of tinkers, to the king.
Commons. [Within.] An answer from the king,
or we'll all break in.

'K. Hen. Go, Salisbury, and tell them all from me,
'I thank them for their tender loving care:
'And had I not been 'cited so by them,
'Yet did I purpose as they do entreat;
For sure, my thoughts do hourly prophesy
'Mischance unto my state by Suffolk's means.
And therefore,―by His majesty I swear,
Whose far unworthy deputy I am,-
'He shall not breathe infection in this air4
But three days longer, on the pain of death.
[Exit Salisbury.
'Q. Mar. O Henry, let me plead for gentle
Suffolk!

'K. Hen. Ungentle queen, to call him gentle Suffolk.

No

more, I say; if thou dost plead for him,
Thou wilt but add increase unto my wrath.
'Had I but said, I would have kept my word;
'But, when I swear, it is irrevocable:-

If, after three days' space, thou here be'st found
On any ground that I am ruler of,

The world shall not be ransom for thy life.Come, Warwick, come, good Warwick, go with me; 'I have great matters to impart to thee.

[Exeunt K. Henry, Warwick, Lords, &c. 'Q. Mar. Mischance, and sorrow, go along with you!

'Heart's discontent, and sour affliction,
Be playfellows to keep you company!
And threefold vengeance tend upon your steps!
There's two of you; the devil make a third!
*Suff. Cease, gentle queen, these execrations,
And let thy Suffolk take his heavy leave.
'Q. Mar. Fie, coward woman, and soft-hearted
wretch!

'Hast thou not spirit to curse thine enemies?
Suff. A plague upon them! wherefore should I
curse thein?

(4) i. e. He shall not contaminate this air with This infected breath.

T

Would curses kill, as doth the mandrake's groan,
'I would invent as bitter-searching terms,

As curst, as harsh, and horrible to hear,
Deliver'd strongly through my fixed teeth,
'With full as many signs of deadly hate,
As lean-faced envy in her loathsome cave:
My tongue should stumble in mine earnest words:
Mine eyes should sparkle like the beaten flint;
My hair be fix'd on end, as one distract;
Ay, every joint should seem to curse and ban:
And even now my burden'd heart would break,
Should I not curse them. Poison be their drink!
Gall, worse than gail, the daintiest that they taste!
Their sweetest shade, a grove of cypress trees!
Their chiefest prospect, murdering basilisks!
Their softest touch, as smart as lizards' stings!
Their music, frightful as the serpent's hiss;
And boding screech-owls make the concert full!
All the foul terrors in dark-seated hell-

Q. Mar. Enough, sweet Suffolk; thou torment'st
thyself;

*And these dead curses-like the sun 'gainst glass,
*Or like an overcharged gun,-recoil,

* And turn the force of them upon thyself.
Suff. You bade me ban,' and will you bid me

leave?

Now, by the ground that I am banish'd from,
Well could I curse away a winter's night,
Though standing naked on a mountain top,
Where biting cold would never let grass grow,
And think it but a minute spent in sport.

* Q. Mar. O, let me entreat thee, cease! Give
me thy hand,

That I may dew it with my mournful tears; Nor let the rain of heaven wet this place, To wash away my woful monuments. 'O, could this kiss be printed in thy hand; [Kisses his hand. That thou might'st think upon these by the seal, 'Through whom a thousand sighs are breath'd for thee!

So, get thee gone, that I may know my grief; "Tis but surmis'd whilst thou art standing by, *As one that surfeits thinking on a want. 'I will repeal thee, or, be well assur'd, Adventure to be banished myself: And banished I am, if but from thee. *Go, speak not to me; even now begone.

O, go not yet!-Even thus two friends condemn'd *Embrace, and kiss, and take ten thousand leaves, *Loather a hundred times to part than die.

Yet now farewell; and farewell life with thee!
Suff. Thus is poor Suffolk ten times banished,
Once by the king, and three times thrice by thee.
"Tis not the land I care for, wert thou hence;
A wilderness is populous enough,
So Suffolk had thy heavenly company:
For where thou art, there is the world itself,
With every several pleasure in the world;
And where thou art not, desolation.
I can no more:-Live thou to joy thy life;
Myself no joy in nought, but that thou liv'st.

Enter Vaux.

Were by his side; sometime, he calls the king,
And whispers to his pillow, as to him,

The secrets of his overcharged soul:
And I am sent to tell his majesty,
That even now he cries aloud for him.

'Q. Mar. Go, tell this heavy message to the king.
[Exit Vaux.
Ah me! what is this world? what news are these?
'But wherefore grieve I at an hour's poor loss,
Omitting Suffolk's exile, my soul's treasure?
Why only, Suffolk, mourn I not for thee,
And with the southern clouds contend in tears;
Theirs for the earth's increase, mine for my sor-
rows?

'Now, get thee hence: The king, thou know'st, is coming:

'If thou be found by me, thou art but dead.

Suff. If I depart from thee, I cannot live:
And in thy sight to die, what were it else,
But like a pleasant slumber in thy lap ?
Here could I breathe my soul into the air,
As mild and gentle as the cradle-babe,
Dying with mother's dug between its lips:
Where, from thy sight, I should be raging mad,
And cry out for thee to close up mine eyes,
'To have thee with thy lips to stop my mouth;
So should'st thou either turn my flying soul,
'Or I should breathe it so into thy body,
And then it liv'd in sweet Elysium.
To die by thee, were but to die in jest ;
From thee to die, were torture more than death;
O, let me stay, befall what may befall.

Q. Mar. Away! though parting be a fretful
corrosive,

It is applied to a deathful wound.

To France, sweet Suffolk: Let me hear from thee;
For wheresoe'er thou art in this world's globe,
I'll have an Iris3 that shall find thee out.
Suff. I go.

Q. Mar. And take my heart with thee.
Suff. A jewel lock'd into the woful'st cask
That ever did contain a thing of worth.
Even as a splitted bark, so sunder we;
This way fall I to death.
Q. Mar.

This way for me.
[Exeunt, severally.

SCENE III.-London. Cardinal Beaufort's bed-chamber. Enter King Henry, Salisbury, Warwick, and others. The Cardinal in bed; attendants with him.

* K. Hen. How fares my lord? speak, Beaufort, to thy sovereign.

'Car. If thou be'st death, I'll give thee England's
treasure,

'Enough to purchase such another island,
'So thou wilt let me live, and feel no pain.

*K. Hen. Ah, what a sign it is of evil life,
*When death's approach is seen so terrible!
* War. Beaufort, it is thy sovereign speaks to
thee.

*Car. Bring me unto my trial when you will. 'Died he not in his bed? where should he die? Can I make men live, whe'r they will or no?

'Q. Mar. Whither goes Vaux so fast? what O! torture me no more, I will confess.

news, I pr'ythee?

Vaux. To signify unto his majesty,

That cardinal Beaufort is at point of death:
'For suddenly a grievous sickness took him,
That makes him gasp, and stare, and catch the air,
Blaspheming God, and cursing men on earth.
Sometime, he talks as if duke Humprey's ghost
(2) For whereas.

(1) Ourse.

'Alive again? then show me where he is;
'I'll give a thousand pound to look upon him.-
*He hath no eves, the dust hath blinded them.-
'Comb down his hair; look! look! it stands up-
right,

Like lime-twigs set to catch my winged soul!-
Give me some drink; and bid the apothecary

(3) The messenger of Juno.

* Cap. What, think you much to pay two thou-Ay, kennel, puddle, sink; whose filth and dirt

*And bear the name and port of gentlemen?*Cut both the villains' throats;-for die you shall; The lives of those which we have lost in fight, Cannot be counterpois'd with such a petty sum. * 1 Gent. I'll give it, sir; and therefore spare' And thou, that smil'dst at good duke Humphrey's my life.

* 2 Gent. And so will I, and write home for it'Against the senseless winds shalt grin in vain,

"And so should these, if I might have my will.
* Cap. Be not so rash; take ransom, let him live.
Suff. Look on my George, I am a gentleman;
'Rate me at what thou wilt, thou shalt be paid.
Whit. And so am I; my name is-Walter
Whitmore.
"How now? why start'st thou? what, doth death*
affright?