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Queen. To please the king, I did; to please myself, I cannot do it; yet I know no cause Why I should welcome such a guest as grief, Save bidding farewell to so sweet a guest As my sweet Richard. Yet, again, methinks, Some unborn sorrow, ripe in fortune's womb, Is coming towards me; and my inward soul With nothing trembles: at something it grieves, More than with parting from my lord the king.

Bushy. Each substance of a grief hath twenty shadows,

Which show like grief itself, but are not so;
For sorrow's eye, glazed with blinding tears,
Divides one thing entire to many objects;
Like pérspectives,' which, rightly gazed upon,
Show nothing but confusion; eyed awry,
Distinguish form. So your sweet majesty,
Looking awry upon your lord's departure,
Finds shapes of grief, more than himself, to wail;
Which, looked on as it is, is nought but shadows
Of what it is not. Then, thrice-gracious queen,
More than your lord's departure weep not; more's not

seen;

Or if it be, 'tis with false sorrow's eye,

Which, for things true, weeps things imaginary.
Queen. It may be so; but yet my inward soul
Persuades me it is otherwise. Howe'er it be,
I cannot but be sad: so heavy sad,

As-though, in thinking, on no thought I think 2—
Makes me with heavy nothing faint and shrink.

Bushy. 'Tis nothing but conceit, my gracious lady.
Queen. 'Tis nothing less. Conceit is still derived

1 This may have reference to that kind of optical delusion called anamorphosis; which is a perspective projection of a picture, so that at one point of view, it shall appear a confused mass, or different to what it really is; in another, an exact and regular representation. Sometimes it is made to appear confused to the naked eye, and regular when viewed in a glass or mirror of a certain form.

2 The old copies have "on thinking," which is an evident error: we should read, “ As though in thinking;” i. e. “though musing, I have no idea of calamity." The involuntary and unaccountable depression of the mind which every one has sometimes felt, is here very forcibly described.

From some forefather grief; mine is not so;
For nothing hath begot my something grief,
Or something hath the nothing that I grieve.
'Tis in reversion that I do possess ;

But what it is, that is not yet known; what
I cannot name; 'tis nameless woe, I wot.

Enter GREEN.

Green. God save your majesty!-and well met, gentlemen.

I hope the king is not yet shipped for Ireland.

Queen. Why hop'st thou so? 'tis better hope he is;
For his designs crave haste, his haste good hope;
Then wherefore dost thou hope he is not shipped?
Green. That he, our hope, might have retired his
power,1

And driven into despair an enemy's hope,
Who strongly hath set footing in this land.
The banished Bolingbroke repeals himself,
And with uplifted arms is safe arrived
At Ravenspurg.

Queen.

Now, God in heaven forbid!

Green. O, madam, 'tis too true; and that is worse,The lord Northumberland, his young son Henry

Percy,

The lords of Ross, Beaumond, and Willoughby,

With all their powerful friends, are fled to him.

Bushy. Why have you not proclaimed Northumberland,

And all the rest of the revolted faction, traitors? 2
Green. We have; whereon the earl of Worcester
Hath broke his staff, resigned his stewardship,
And all the household servants fled with him
To Bolingbroke

1 Retired, i. e. drawn it back; a French sense.

2 The first quarto, 1597, reads:

"And all the rest of the revolted faction, traitors?”

The folio, and the quarto of 1598 and 1608:

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Queen. So, Green, thou art the midwife to my woe, And Bolingbroke my sorrow's dismal heir. Now hath my soul brought forth her prodigy; And I, a gasping, new-delivered mother, Have woe to woe, sorrow to sorrow joined. Bushy. Despair not, madam. Queen.

I will despair, and be at enmity

Who shall hinder me?

With cozening hope; he is a flatterer,
A parasite, a keeper-back of death,

Who gently would dissolve the bands of life,
Which false hope lingers in extremity.

Enter YORK.

Green. Here comes the duke of York.
Queen. With signs of war about his aged neck;
O, full of careful business are his looks!

Uncle,

For Heaven's sake, speak comfortable words.

York. Should I do so, I should belie my thoughts. Comfort's in heaven; and we are on the earth, Where nothing lives but crosses, care, and grief. Your husband he is gone to save far off, Whilst others come to make him lose at home: Here am I left to underprop his land; Who, weak with age, cannot support myself. Now comes the sick hour that his surfeit made; Now shall he try his friends that flattered him.

Enter a Servant.

!

Serv. My lord, your son was gone before I came. York. He was?-Why, so !-go all which way it

will!

The nobles they are fled, the commons they are cold,
And will, I fear, revolt on Hereford's side.-

Sirrah, get thee to Plashy, to my sister Gloster;
Bid her send me presently a thousand pound.-
Hold, take my ring.

VOL. III.

50

Serv. My lord, I had forgot to tell your lordship: To-day, as I came by, I called there;

But I shall grieve you to report the rest.

York. What is it, knave?

Serv. An hour before I came, the duchess died. York. Heaven for his mercy! what a tide of woes Comes rushing on this woful land at once!

I know not what to do.-I would to Heaven

(So my untruth' had not provoked him to it)
The king had cut off my head with my brother's-
What, are there posts despatched for Ireland?
How shall we do for money for these wars ?—

Come, sister,3-cousin, I would say; pray, pardon

me.

Go, fellow, [To the Servant.] get thee home, provide

some carts,

And bring away the armor that is there.

Exit Servant.

Gentlemen, will you go muster men? If I know
How, or which way, to order these affairs,
Thus disorderly thrust into my hands,
Never believe me. Both are my kinsmen
The one's my sovereign, whom both my oath
And duty bids defend; the other, again,

Is my kinsman, whom the king hath wronged;
Whom conscience and my kindred bids to right.
Well, somewhat we must do.-Come, cousin, I'll
Dispose of you.-Gentlemen, go, muster up your men,
And meet me presently at Berkley castle.

I should to Plashy too;

But time will not permit.-All is uneven,
And every thing is left at six and seven.

[Exeunt YORK and Queen. Bushy. The wind sits fair for news to go to Ireland, But none returns. For us to levy power,

1 Disloyalty, treachery.

2 Not one of York's brothers had his head cut off, either by the king or any one else. Gloster, to whose death he probably alludes, was smothered between two beds at Calais.

3 York is talking to the queen, his cousin, but the recent death of his sister is uppermost in his mind.

Proportionable to the enemy,

Is all impossible.

Green. Besides, our nearness to the king in love, Is near the hate of those love not the king.

Bagot. And that's the wavering commons; for their love

Lies in their purses; and whoso empties them,
By so much fills their hearts with deadly hate.
Bushy. Wherein the king stands generally con-
demned.

Bagot. If judgment lie in them, then so do we,
Because we ever have been near the king.

Green. Well, I'll for refuge straight to Bristol castle;

The earl of Wiltshire is already there.

Bushy. Thither will I with you; for little office

Will the hateful commons perform for us;

Except like curs to tear us all to pieces.-
Will you go along with us?

Bagot. No; I'll to Ireland to his majesty.
Farewell; if heart's presages be not vain,
We three here part, that ne'er shall meet again.
Bushy. That's as York thrives to beat back Boling-

broke.

Green. Alas, poor duke! the task he undertakes Is-numbering sands, and drinking oceans dry; Where one on his side fights, thousands will fly. Bushy. Farewell at once; for once, for all, and ever. Green. Well, we may meet again. Bagot.

I fear me, never.

[Exeunt.

SCENE III. The Wilds in Glostershire.

Enter BOLINGBROKE and NORTHUMBERLAND, with

Forces.

Boling. How far is it, my lord, to Berkley now?

North. Believe me, noble lord,

I am a stranger here in Glostershire.

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