I will not live to be accounted Warwick.

Mean time, in signal of my love to thee,
Against proud Somerset, and William Poole,
Will I upon thy party wear this rose:
And here I prophesy,-This brawl to-day,
Grown to this faction, in the Temple garden,
Shall send, between the red rose and the white,
A thousand souls to death and deadly night.
Plan. Good master Vernon, I am bound to you,
That you on my behalf would pluck a flower.
Ver. In your behalf still will I wear the same.
Law. And so will I.

Plan. Thanks, gentle sir.

Come, let us four to dinner: I dare say,
This quarrel will drink blood another day.

SCENE V.

The same. A Room in the Tower.

[Exeunt.

Enter MORTIMER1, brought in a Chair by two Keepers.

Mor. Kind keepers of my weak decaying age, Let dying Mortimer here rest himself.

1 This is at variance with the strict truth of history. Edmund Mortimer, who was trusted and employed by Henry V. throughout his reign, died of the plague in his own castle at Trim, in Ireland, in 1424-5; being then only thirty-two years old. Sandford says that he was confined there by the jealousy of Henry; but this is a mistake. His uncle, Sir John Mortimer, was indeed a prisoner in the Tower, and was executed not long before the earl of March's death, being charged with an attempt to make his escape in order to stir up an insurrection in Wales. The writer has been led into error by the popular historians of his time. Hall relates that, in the third year of Henry VI. (1425), 'came to London Peter duke of Quimber [Coimbra], whiche of the duke of Exeter, &c. was highly feasted. Duringe whych season Edmond Mortimer, the last earl of Marche of that name (whiche long time had bene restrayned from his liberty, and finally

Even like a man new haled from the rack,
So fare my limbs with long imprisonment:
And these gray locks, the pursuivants of death,
Nestor-like aged, in an age of care,

Argue the end of Edmund Mortimer.

These eyes,-like lamps whose wasting oil is spent,Wax dim, as drawing to their exigent3:

Weak shoulders, overborne with burd'ning grief, And pithless arms, like to a wither'd vine

4

That droops his sapless branches to the ground:-
Yet are these feet-whose strengthless stay is numb,
Unable to support this lump of clay,-
Swift-winged with desire to get a grave,
As witting I no other comfort have.-
But tell me, keeper, will my nephew come?

1 Keep. Richard Plantagenet, my lord, will come : We sent unto the Temple, to his chamber; And answer was return'd that he will come.

Mor. Enough; my soul shall then be satisfied.Poor gentleman! his wrong doth equal mine. Since Henry Monmouth first began to reign (Before whose glory I was great in arms),

waxed lame) deceased without issue, whose inheritance descended to the Lord Richard Plantagenet,' &c. And in a previous passage he has observed, The erle of Marche was ever kepte in the courte under such a keeper that he could neither do nor attempt any thyng agaynste the kyng wythout his knowledge, and died without issue.' The same error occurs in the Legend of Richard Plantagenet, Duke of Yorke, in the Mirror for Magistrates, 1575:

'His cursed son ensued his cruel path,

And kept my guiltless cousin strait in durance.'

&c. &c.

2 The heralds that, fore-running death, proclaim its approach. 3 Exigent is here used for end; as in Doctor Dodypoll, a comedy, 1600:

Hath driven her to some desperate exigent.'

4 Pith is used figuratively for strength. Nervosus, sinewy, strongly made in body, pithy.'-COOPER. The word is still used in Scotland in this sense.

This loathsome sequestration have I had;

And even since then hath Richard been obscur'd, Deprived of honour and inheritance:

But now, the arbitrator of despairs,

Just death, kind umpire of men's miseries,
With sweet enlargement doth dismiss me hence;
I would, his troubles likewise were expir'd,
That so he might recover what was lost.

Enter RICHARD PLANTAGENET.

1 Keep. My lord, your loving nephew now is come. Mor. Richard Plantagenet, my friend? Is he come? Plan. Ay, noble uncle, thus ignobly us'd, Your nephew, late-despised Richard, comes. Mor. Direct mine arms, I may embrace his neck, And in his bosom spend my latter gasp:

6

O, tell me, when my lips do touch his cheeks,
That I may kindly give one fainting kiss.-

And now declare, sweet stem from York's great stock,

Why didst thou say—of late thou wert despis'd?
Plan. First, lean thine aged back against mine arm;
And, in that ease, I'll tell thee my disease?.
This day, in argument upon a case,

5 That is, he who terminates or concludes misery. The expression is harsh and forced here; but occurs with greater propriety in Romeo and Juliet:

'Twixt my extremes and me this bloody knife

Shall play the umpire, arbitrating that,' &c.

6 Lately despised.

7 Disease for uneasiness, trouble, or grief. It is used in this sense by other ancient writers. Thus Spenser's Faerie Queene, vi. v. 40:

'That night they pass'd in great disease,

Till that the morning bringing early light,

To guide men's labours, brought them also ease.'

So in Coriolanus, Act i. Sc. 3:

'As she is now, she will disease our better mirth.'

Some words there grew 'twixt Somerset and me:
Among which terms he used his lavish tongue,
And did upbraid me with my father's death;
Which obloquy set bars before my tongue,
Else with the like I had requited him:
Therefore, good uncle, -for my father's sake,
In honour of a true Plantagenet,

And for alliance' sake,-declare the cause
My father, earl of Cambridge, lost his head.

Mor. That cause, fair nephew, that imprison'd me, And hath detain'd me, all my flow'ring youth, Within a loathsome dungeon, there to pine, Was cursed instrument of his decease.

Plan. Discover more at large what cause that was; For I am ignorant, and cannot guess.

Mor. I will; if that my fading breath permit, And death approach not ere my tale be done. Henry the Fourth, grandfather to this king, Depos'd his nephew Richard; Edward's son, The first-begotten, and the lawful heir

8

Of Edward king, the third of that descent:
During whose reign, the Percies of the north,
Finding his usurpation most unjust,

Endeavour'd my advancement to the throne:
The reason mov'd these warlike lords to this,
Was-for that (young King Richard thus remov'd,
Leaving no heir begotten of his body)

8 Nephew has sometimes the power of the Latin nepos, signifying grandchild, and is used with great laxity among our ancient English writers. It is here used instead of cousin. Ritson has remarked that both uncle and nephew might formerly signify cousin; for in The Troublesome Raigne of King John, Part II. Prince Henry calls his cousin, the bastard, uncle. In French, as in Latin, neveu signified grandchild, and by a prefix several other degrees of consanguinity. See The Menagiana, vol. ii. p. 191, &c. ed. Amst. 1713. Malone thinks that the mistake here arose from the author's ignorance in conceiving Richard to be Henry's nephew.

I was the next by birth and parentage;
For by my mother I derived am

From Lionel duke of Clarence, the third son
To King Edward the Third, whereas he,
From John of Gaunt doth bring his pedigree,
Being but fourth of that heroick line.

But mark; as, in this haughty9 great attempt,
They laboured to plant the rightful heir,
I lost my liberty, and they their lives.
Long after this, when Henry the Fifth,-
Succeeding his father Bolingbroke,—did reign,
Thy father, earl of Cambridge,-then deriv'd
From famous Edmund Langley, duke of York,-
Marrying my sister, that thy mother was,
Again, in pity of my hard distress,
Levied an army; weening 10 to redeem,
And have install'd me in the diadem:
But, as the rest, so fell that noble earl,
And was beheaded. Thus the Mortimers,
In whom the title rested, were suppress'd.

Plan. Of which, my lord, your honour is the last. Mor. True; and thou seest, that I no issue have; And that my fainting words do warrant death: Thou art my heir; the rest, I wish thee gather11: But yet be wary in thy studious care.

Plan. Thy grave admonishments prevail with me: But yet, methinks, my father's execution Was nothing less than bloody tyranny.

Mor. With silence, nephew, be thou politick;

9 Haughty is high, lofty. So in the fourth act:-
'Valiant and virtuous, full of haughty courage.'

10 i. e. thinking. This is another falsification of history. Cambridge levied no army; but was apprehended at Southampton, the night before Henry sailed from that town for France, on the information of this very earl of March.

1 i. e. I acknowledge thee to be my heir; the consequences which may be collected from thence I recommend it thee to draw.