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• 1 2016-11-13T12:53:12-08:00 Act III 11 Richard II Act 3 plain 2016-12-14T11:21:49-08:00 Scene 1
  Enter Bolingbroke, Duke of Hereford, York,
  Northumberland, with other Lords, and Bushy and
  Green prisoners.
   
  BOLINGBROKE  Bring forth these men.—
  Bushy and Green, I will not vex your souls, Since presently your souls must part your bodies, With too much urging your pernicious lives,
  For ’twere no charity; yet to wash your blood                                       5
  From off my hands, here in the view of men
  I will unfold some causes of your deaths:
  You have misled a prince, a royal king,
  A happy gentleman in blood and lineaments
  By you unhappied and disfigured clean.                                               10
  You have in manner with your sinful hours
  Made a divorce betwixt his queen and him,
  Broke the possession of a royal bed,
  And stained the beauty of a fair queen’s cheeks
  With tears drawn from her eyes by your foul wrongs.                       15
  Myself, a prince by fortune of my birth,
  Near to the King in blood, and near in love
  Till you did make him misinterpret me,
  Have stooped my neck under your injuries
  And sighed my English breath in foreign clouds,                               20
  Eating the bitter bread of banishment,
  Whilst you have fed upon my seigniories,
  Disparked my parks and felled my forest woods,
  From my own windows torn my household coat,
  Rased out my imprese, leaving me no sign,                                         25
  Save men’s opinions and my living blood,
  To show the world I am a gentleman.
  This and much more, much more than twice all
  this,
  Condemns you to the death.—See them delivered                             30
  over
  To execution and the hand of death.
  BUSHY
  More welcome is the stroke of death to me
  Than Bolingbroke to England. Lords, farewell.
  GREEN
  My comfort is that heaven will take our souls                                     35
  And plague injustice with the pains of hell.
  BOLINGBROKE
  My Lord Northumberland, see them dispatched. Northumberland exits with Bushy and Green.
  To York. Uncle, you say the Queen is at your
  house.
  For God’s sake, fairly let her be entreated.                                          40
  Tell her I send to her my kind commends.
  Take special care my greetings be delivered.
  YORK
  A gentleman of mine I have dispatched
  With letters of your love to her at large.
  BOLINGBROKE
  Thanks, gentle uncle.—Come, lords, away,                                         45
  To fight with Glendower and his complices.
  A while to work, and after holiday.
  They exit.
   
  Scene 2
  Drums. Flourish and colors. Enter the King, Aumerle,
  Carlisle, and Soldiers.
   
  KING RICHARD
  Barkloughly Castle call they this at hand?
  AUMERLE
  Yea, my lord. How brooks your Grace the air
  After your late tossing on the breaking seas?
  KING RICHARD
  Needs must I like it well. I weep for joy
  To stand upon my kingdom once again.                             He kneels.  5
  Dear earth, I do salute thee with my hand,
  Though rebels wound thee with their horses’ hoofs.
  As a long-parted mother with her child
  Plays fondly with her tears and smiles in meeting,
  So, weeping, smiling, greet I thee, my earth,                                       10
  And do thee favors with my royal hands.
  Feed not thy sovereign’s foe, my gentle earth,
  Nor with thy sweets comfort his ravenous sense,
  But let thy spiders, that suck up thy venom,
  And heavy-gaited toads lie in their way,                                              15
  Doing annoyance to the treacherous feet
  Which with usurping steps do trample thee.
  Yield stinging nettles to mine enemies,
  And when they from thy bosom pluck a flower,
  Guard it, I pray thee, with a lurking adder,                                          20
  Whose double tongue may with a mortal touch
  Throw death upon thy sovereign’s enemies.
  Mock not my senseless conjuration, lords.
  This earth shall have a feeling, and these stones
  Prove armèd soldiers, ere her native king                                             25
  Shall falter under foul rebellion’s arms.
  CARLISLE
  Fear not, my lord. That power that made you king
  Hath power to keep you king in spite of all.
  The means that heavens yield must be embraced
  And not neglected. Else heaven would,                                                30
  And we will not—heaven’s offer we refuse,
  The proffered means of succor and redress.
  AUMERLE
  He means, my lord, that we are too remiss,
  Whilst Bolingbroke, through our security,
  Grows strong and great in substance and in power.                            35
  KING RICHARD
  Discomfortable cousin, know’st thou not
  That when the searching eye of heaven is hid
  Behind the globe that lights the lower world,
  Then thieves and robbers range abroad unseen
  In murders and in outrage boldly here?                                                40
  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 plucked from off their                                 45
  backs,
  Stand bare and naked, trembling at themselves.
  So when this thief, this traitor Bolingbroke,
  Who all this while hath reveled in the night
  Whilst we were wand’ring with the Antipodes,                                  50
  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                                                 55
  Can wash the balm off from an anointed king.
  The breath of worldly men cannot depose The deputy elected by the Lord.
  For every man that Bolingbroke hath pressed
  To lift shrewd steel against our golden crown,                                    60
  God 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?
  SALISBURY
  Nor near nor farther off, my gracious lord,                                          65
  Than this weak arm. Discomfort guides my tongue
  And bids me speak of nothing but despair.
  One day too late, I fear me, noble lord,
  Hath clouded all thy happy days on earth.
  O, call back yesterday, bid time return,                                                70
  And thou shalt have twelve thousand fighting men.
  Today, today, unhappy day too late,
  Overthrows thy joys, friends, fortune, and thy state;
  For all the Welshmen, hearing thou wert dead,
  Are gone to Bolingbroke, dispersed, and fled.                                    75
  AUMERLE
  Comfort, my liege. Why looks your Grace so pale?
  KING RICHARD
  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?                                          80
  All souls that will be safe, fly from my side,
  For time hath set a blot upon my pride.
  AUMERLE
  Comfort, my liege. Remember who you are.
  KING RICHARD
  I had forgot myself. Am I not king?
  Awake, thou coward majesty, thou sleepest!                                       85
  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,
  You favorites of a king. Are we not high?
  High be our thoughts. I know my Uncle York                                     90
  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.
  KING RICHARD
  Mine ear is open and my heart prepared.                                              95
  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,                                            100
  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.                               105
  SCROOP
  Glad am I that your Highness is so armed
  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,                                        110
  So high above his limits swells the rage
  Of Bolingbroke, covering your fearful land
  With hard bright steel and hearts harder than steel.
  Whitebeards have armed their thin and hairless
  scalps                                                                                                     115
  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.                                                 120
  Yea, distaff women manage rusty bills
  Against thy seat. Both young and old rebel,
  And all goes worse than I have power to tell.
  KING RICHARD
  Too well, too well thou tell’st a tale so ill.
  Where is the Earl of Wiltshire? Where is Bagot?                             125
  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.                         130
  SCROOP
  Peace have they made with him indeed, my lord.
  KING RICHARD
  O villains, vipers, damned without redemption! Dogs easily won to fawn on any man! Snakes in my heart blood warmed, that sting my heart!                                                                                                      135
  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.                                        140
  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.                                 145
  AUMERLE
  Is Bushy, Green, and the Earl of Wiltshire dead?
  SCROOP
  Ay, all of them at Bristow lost their heads.
  AUMERLE
  Where is the Duke my father with his power?
  KING RICHARD
  No matter where. Of comfort no man speak.
  Let’s talk of graves, of worms, and epitaphs,                                    150
  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 deposèd bodies to the ground?                                            155
  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 God’s sake, let us sit upon the ground                                         160
  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 poisoned by their wives, some sleeping killed,
  All murdered. For within the hollow crown                                      165
  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 feared, and kill with looks,                                 170
  Infusing him with self and vain conceit,
  As if this flesh which walls about our life
  Were brass impregnable; and humored thus,
  Comes at the last and with a little pin
  Bores through his castle wall, and farewell, king!                            175
  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,                                                   180 Taste grief, need friends. Subjected thus, How can you say to me I am a king?
   
  CARLISLE
  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,                                 185 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.                                190
  AUMERLE
  My father hath a power. Inquire of him,
  And learn to make a body of a limb.
  KING RICHARD
  Thou chid’st me well.—Proud Bolingbroke, I come
  To change blows with thee for our day of doom.—
  This ague fit of fear is overblown.                                                       195
  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;                                                200
  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 joined with Bolingbroke,                                   205
  And all your northern castles yielded up,
  And all your southern gentlemen in arms
  Upon his party.
  KING RICHARD  Thou hast said enough.
  To Aumerle. Beshrew thee, cousin, which didst                               210
  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 anymore.                                                 215
  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                                           220
  To alter this, for counsel is but vain.
  AUMERLE
  My liege, one word.
  KING RICHARD  He does me double wrong That wounds me with the flatteries of his tongue.
  Discharge my followers. Let them hence away,                               225
  From Richard’s night to Bolingbroke’s fair day.
  They exit.
   
  Scene 3
  Enter with Drum and Colors Bolingbroke, York,
  Northumberland, with Soldiers and Attendants.
   
   
  BOLINGBROKE
  So that by this intelligence we learn
  The Welshmen are dispersed, and Salisbury
  Is gone to meet the King, who lately landed
  With some few private friends upon this coast.
  NORTHUMBERLAND
  The news is very fair and good, my lord:                                               5
  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!
  NORTHUMBERLAND
  Your Grace mistakes; only to be brief                                                  10
  Left I his title out.
  YORK
  The time hath been, would you have been so brief
  with him,
  He would have been so brief to shorten you,
  For taking so the head, your whole head’s length.                              15
  BOLINGBROKE
  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.
  BOLINGBROKE
  I know it, uncle, and oppose not myself
  Against their will. But who comes here?                                              20
   
  Enter Percy.
   
  Welcome, Harry. What, will not this castle yield?
  PERCY
  The castle royally is manned, my lord,
  Against thy entrance.
  BOLINGBROKE
  Royally? Why, it contains no king.
  PERCY  Yes, my good lord,                                                                       25
  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.                                              30
  NORTHUMBERLAND
  O, belike it is the Bishop of Carlisle.
  BOLINGBROKE, to Northumberland  Noble lord,
  Go to the rude ribs of that ancient castle,
  Through brazen trumpet send the breath of parley
  Into his ruined ears, and thus deliver:                                                   35
  Henry Bolingbroke
  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,                                          40
  Provided that my banishment repealed
  And lands restored again be freely granted.
  If not, I’ll use the advantage of my power
  And lay the summer’s dust with showers of blood
  Rained from the wounds of slaughtered                                               45
  Englishmen—
  The which how far off from the mind of Bolingbroke
  It is such crimson tempest should bedrench
  The fresh green lap of fair King Richard’s land,
  My stooping duty tenderly shall show.                                                 50
  Go signify as much while here we march
  Upon the grassy carpet of this plain.
  Northumberland and Trumpets
  approach the battlements.
  Let’s march without the noise of threat’ning drum,
  That from this castle’s tottered battlements
  Our fair appointments may be well perused.                                       55
  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;                                              60
  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.
  Bolingbroke’s Soldiers march, the trumpets sound.
  Richard appeareth on the walls with Aumerle.
  See, see, King Richard doth himself appear
  As doth the blushing discontented sun                                                  65
  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,                                            70
  As bright as is the eagle’s, lightens forth
  Controlling majesty. Alack, alack for woe
  That any harm should stain so fair a show!
  KING RICHARD, to Northumberland, below
  We are amazed, and thus long have we stood
  To watch the fearful bending of thy knee,                                            75
  Because we thought ourself thy lawful king.
  An if we be, how dare thy joints forget
  To pay their awful duty to our presence?
  If we be not, show us the hand of God
  That hath dismissed us from our stewardship,                                     80
  For well we know no hand of blood and bone
  Can gripe the sacred handle of our scepter,
  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,                                   85
  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,                                                90
  That lift your vassal hands against my head
  And threat the glory of my precious crown.
  Tell Bolingbroke—for yon methinks he stands—
  That every stride he makes upon my land
  Is dangerous treason. He is come to open                                            95
  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                               100
  To scarlet indignation, and bedew
  Her pastures’ grass with faithful English blood.
  NORTHUMBERLAND
  The King of heaven forbid our lord the King
  Should so with civil and uncivil arms
  Be rushed upon! Thy thrice-noble cousin,                                         105
  Harry Bolingbroke, 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,                          110
  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                                             115
  Enfranchisement immediate on his knees;
  Which on thy royal party granted once,
  His glittering arms he will commend to rust,
  His barbèd steeds to stables, and his heart
  To faithful service of your Majesty.                                                    120
  This swears he, as he is a prince and just,
  And as I am a gentleman I credit him.
  KING RICHARD
  Northumberland, say thus the King returns:
  His noble cousin is right welcome hither,
  And all the number of his fair demands                                             125
  Shall be accomplished without contradiction.
  With all the gracious utterance thou hast,
  Speak to his gentle hearing kind commends.
  Northumberland returns to Bolingbroke.
  To Aumerle. We do debase ourselves, cousin, do
  we not,                                                                                                   130
  To look so poorly and to speak so fair?
  Shall we call back Northumberland and send
  Defiance to the traitor and so die?
  AUMERLE
  No, good my lord, let’s fight with gentle words,
  Till time lend friends, and friends their helpful                                135
  swords.
  KING RICHARD
  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                                     140 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,                                                                                                       145
  Since foes have scope to beat both thee and me.
  AUMERLE
  Northumberland comes back from Bolingbroke.
  KING RICHARD
  What must the King do now? Must he submit?
  The King shall do it. Must he be deposed?
  The King shall be contented. Must he lose                                        150
  The name of king? I’ 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 figured goblets for a dish of wood,                                              155
  My scepter for a palmer’s walking-staff,
  My subjects for a pair of carvèd 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 highway,                                            160
  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.                          165
  We’ll make foul weather with despisèd 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?                         170
  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 digged their graves with weeping eyes.
  Would not this ill do well? Well, well, I see                                      175
  I talk but idly, and you laugh at me.
  Northumberland approaches the battlements.
  Most mighty prince, my Lord Northumberland,
  What says King Bolingbroke? Will his Majesty
  Give Richard leave to live till Richard die?
  You make a leg, and Bolingbroke says ay.                                        180
  NORTHUMBERLAND
  My lord, in the base court he doth attend
  To speak with you, may it please you to come down.
  KING RICHARD
  Down, down I come, like glist’ring Phaëton,
  Wanting the manage of unruly jades.
  In the base court—base court, where kings grow                             185
  base,
  To come at traitors’ calls and do them grace.
  In the base court come down—down court, down
  king,
  For nightowls shriek where mounting larks should                          190
  sing.
  Richard exits above
  and Northumberland returns to Bolingbroke.
  BOLINGBROKE  What says his Majesty?
  NORTHUMBERLAND  Sorrow and grief of heart Makes him speak fondly like a frantic man,
  Yet he is come.                                                                                        195
   
  Richard enters below.
   
  BOLINGBROKE  Stand all apart,
  And show fair duty to his Majesty.                               He kneels down.
  My gracious lord.
  KING RICHARD
  Fair cousin, you debase your princely knee
  To make the base earth proud with kissing it.                                   200
  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 indicating his crown, although
  your knee be low.                                                                                205
  BOLINGBROKE, standing
  My gracious lord, I come but for mine own.
  KING RICHARD
  Your own is yours, and I am yours, and all.
  BOLINGBROKE
  So far be mine, my most redoubted lord,
  As my true service shall deserve your love.
  KING RICHARD
  Well you deserve. They well deserve to have                                   210
  That know the strong’st and surest way to get.—
  Uncle, give me your hands. Nay, dry your eyes.
  Tears show their love but want their remedies.—
  Cousin, I am too young to be your father,
  Though you are old enough to be my heir.                                        215
  What you will have I’ll give, and willing too,
  For do we must what force will have us do.
  Set on towards London, cousin, is it so?
  BOLINGBROKE
  Yea, my good lord.
  KING RICHARD  Then I must not say no.                                           220
  They exit.
   
  Scene 4
  Enter the Queen with her Ladies-in-waiting.
   
  QUEEN
  What sport shall we devise here in this garden
  To drive away the heavy thought of care?
  LADY  Madam, we’ll play at bowls.
  QUEEN
  ’Twill make me think the world is full of rubs
  And that my fortune runs against the bias.                                             5
  LADY  Madam, we’ll dance.
  QUEEN
  My legs can keep no measure in delight
  When my poor heart no measure keeps in grief.
  Therefore no dancing, girl. Some other sport.
  LADY  Madam, we’ll tell tales.                                                                 10
   
  QUEEN
  Of sorrow or of joy?
  LADY  Of either, madam.
  QUEEN  Of neither, girl,
  For if of joy, being altogether wanting,
  It doth remember me the more of sorrow;                                            15
  Or if of grief, being altogether had,
  It adds more sorrow to my want of joy.
  For what I have I need not to repeat,
  And what I want it boots not to complain.
  LADY
  Madam, I’ll sing.                                                                                       20
  QUEEN  ’Tis well that thou hast cause,
  But thou shouldst please me better wouldst thou
  weep.
  LADY
  I could weep, madam, would it do you good.
  QUEEN
  And I could sing, would weeping do me good,                                   25
  And never borrow any tear of thee.
   
  Enter a Gardener and two Servingmen.
   
  But stay, here come the gardeners.
  Let’s step into the shadow of these trees.
  My wretchedness unto a row of pins,
  They will talk of state, for everyone doth so                                        30
  Against a change. Woe is forerun with woe.
  Queen and Ladies step aside.
  GARDENER, to one Servingman
  Go, bind thou up young dangling apricokes
  Which, like unruly children, make their sire
  Stoop with oppression of their prodigal weight.
  Give some supportance to the bending twigs.—                                 35
  Go thou, and like an executioner
  Cut off the heads of too-fast-growing sprays
  That look too lofty in our commonwealth.
  All must be even in our government.
  You thus employed, I will go root away                                               40
  The noisome weeds which without profit suck
  The soil’s fertility from wholesome flowers.
  MAN
  Why should we, in the compass of a pale,
  Keep law and form and due proportion,
  Showing as in a model our firm estate,                                                 45
  When our sea-wallèd garden, the whole land,
  Is full of weeds, her fairest flowers choked up,
  Her fruit trees all unpruned, her hedges ruined,
  Her knots disordered, and her wholesome herbs
  Swarming with caterpillars?                                                                   50
  GARDENER  Hold thy peace.
  He that hath suffered this disordered spring
  Hath now himself met with the fall of leaf.
  The weeds which his broad-spreading leaves did
  shelter,                                                                                                     55
  That seemed in eating him to hold him up,
  Are plucked up, root and all, by Bolingbroke—
  I mean the Earl of Wiltshire, Bushy, Green.
  MAN
  What, are they dead?
  GARDENER  They are. And Bolingbroke                                               60
  Hath seized the wasteful king. O, what pity is it
  That he had not so trimmed and dressed his land
  As we this garden! We at time of year
  Do wound the bark, the skin of our fruit trees,
  Lest, being overproud in sap and blood,                                               65
  With too much riches it confound itself.
  Had he done so to great and growing men,
  They might have lived to bear and he to taste
  Their fruits of duty. Superfluous branches
  We lop away, that bearing boughs may live.                                       70
  Had he done so, himself had borne the crown,
  Which waste of idle hours hath quite thrown down.
  MAN
  What, think you the King shall be deposed?
  GARDENER
  Depressed he is already, and deposed
  ’Tis doubt he will be. Letters came last night                                      75
  To a dear friend of the good Duke of York’s
  That tell black tidings.
  QUEEN
  O, I am pressed to death through want of speaking!
  Stepping forward.
  Thou old Adam’s likeness, set to dress this garden,
  How dares thy harsh rude tongue sound this                                       80
  unpleasing news?
  What Eve, what serpent, hath suggested thee
  To make a second fall of cursèd man?
  Why dost thou say King Richard is deposed?
  Dar’st thou, thou little better thing than earth,                                     85
  Divine his downfall? Say where, when, and how
  Cam’st thou by this ill tidings? Speak, thou wretch!
  GARDENER
  Pardon me, madam. Little joy have I
  To breathe this news, yet what I say is true.
  King Richard, he is in the mighty hold                                                 90
  Of Bolingbroke. Their fortunes both are weighed.
  In your lord’s scale is nothing but himself
  And some few vanities that make him light,
  But in the balance of great Bolingbroke,
  Besides himself, are all the English peers,                                           95
  And with that odds he weighs King Richard down.
  Post you to London and you will find it so.
  I speak no more than everyone doth know.
  QUEEN
  Nimble mischance, that art so light of foot,
  Doth not thy embassage belong to me,                                               100
  And am I last that knows it? O, thou thinkest
  To serve me last that I may longest keep
  Thy sorrow in my breast. Come, ladies, go
  To meet at London London’s king in woe.
  What, was I born to this, that my sad look                                         105
  Should grace the triumph of great Bolingbroke?—
  Gard’ner, for telling me these news of woe,
  Pray God the plants thou graft’st may never grow.
  She exits with Ladies.
  GARDENER
  Poor queen, so that thy state might be no worse,
  I would my skill were subject to thy curse.                                        110
  Here did she fall a tear. Here in this place
  I’ll set a bank of rue, sour herb of grace.
  Rue even for ruth here shortly shall be seen
  In the remembrance of a weeping queen.
  They exit.