The Second Part Of King Henry The Fourth

1 Enter Lord Bardolph.
2 LORD BARDOLPH.
3 Who keeps the gate here, ho?
4 The Porter opens the gate.
5 Where is the Earl?
6 PORTER.
7 What shall I say you are?
8 LORD BARDOLPH.
9 Tell thou the Earl
10 That the Lord Bardolph doth attend him here.
11 PORTER.
12 His lordship is walk’d forth into the orchard.
13 Please it your honour knock but at the gate,
14 And he himself will answer.
15 Enter Northumberland.
16 LORD BARDOLPH.
17 Here comes the Earl.
18 [_Exit Porter._]
19 NORTHUMBERLAND.
20 What news, Lord Bardolph? Every minute now
21 Should be the father of some stratagem.
22 The times are wild; contention, like a horse
23 Full of high feeding, madly hath broke loose
24 And bears down all before him.
25 LORD BARDOLPH.
26 Noble earl,
27 I bring you certain news from Shrewsbury.
28 NORTHUMBERLAND.
29 Good, an God will!
30 LORD BARDOLPH.
31 As good as heart can wish.
32 The King is almost wounded to the death;
33 And, in the fortune of my lord your son,
34 Prince Harry slain outright; and both the Blunts
35 Kill’d by the hand of Douglas; young Prince John
36 And Westmoreland and Stafford fled the field;
37 And Harry Monmouth’s brawn, the hulk Sir John,
38 Is prisoner to your son. O, such a day,
39 So fought, so follow’d and so fairly won,
40 Came not till now to dignify the times
41 Since Caesar’s fortunes!
42 NORTHUMBERLAND.
43 How is this derived?
44 Saw you the field? Came you from Shrewsbury?
45 LORD BARDOLPH.
46 I spake with one, my lord, that came from thence,
47 A gentleman well bred and of good name,
48 That freely render’d me these news for true.
49 NORTHUMBERLAND.
50 Here comes my servant Travers, whom I sent
51 On Tuesday last to listen after news.
52 Enter Travers.
53 LORD BARDOLPH.
54 My lord, I over-rode him on the way,
55 And he is furnish’d with no certainties
56 More than he haply may retail from me.
57 NORTHUMBERLAND.
58 Now, Travers, what good tidings comes with you?
59 TRAVERS.
60 My lord, Sir John Umfrevile turn’d me back
61 With joyful tidings, and, being better horsed,
62 Out-rode me. After him came spurring hard
63 A gentleman, almost forspent with speed,
64 That stopp’d by me to breathe his bloodied horse.
65 He ask’d the way to Chester, and of him
66 I did demand what news from Shrewsbury.
67 He told me that rebellion had bad luck
68 And that young Harry Percy’s spur was cold.
69 With that he gave his able horse the head,
70 And bending forward struck his armed heels
71 Against the panting sides of his poor jade
72 Up to the rowel-head, and starting so
73 He seem’d in running to devour the way,
74 Staying no longer question.
75 NORTHUMBERLAND.
76 Ha? Again:
77 Said he young Harry Percy’s spur was cold?
78 Of Hotspur, Coldspur? That rebellion
79 Had met ill luck?
80 LORD BARDOLPH.
81 My lord, I’ll tell you what:
82 If my young lord your son have not the day,
83 Upon mine honour, for a silken point
84 I’ll give my barony, never talk of it.
85 NORTHUMBERLAND.
86 Why should that gentleman that rode by Travers
87 Give then such instances of loss?
88 LORD BARDOLPH.
89 Who, he?
90 He was some hilding fellow that had stolen
91 The horse he rode on, and, upon my life,
92 Spoke at a venture. Look, here comes more news.
93 Enter Morton.
94 NORTHUMBERLAND.
95 Yea, this man’s brow, like to a title-leaf,
96 Foretells the nature of a tragic volume.
97 So looks the strand whereon the imperious flood
98 Hath left a witness’d usurpation.
99 Say, Morton, didst thou come from Shrewsbury?
100 MORTON.
101 I ran from Shrewsbury, my noble lord,
102 Where hateful death put on his ugliest mask
103 To fright our party.
104 NORTHUMBERLAND.
105 How doth my son and brother?
106 Thou tremblest, and the whiteness in thy cheek
107 Is apter than thy tongue to tell thy errand.
108 Even such a man, so faint, so spiritless,
109 So dull, so dread in look, so woe-begone,
110 Drew Priam’s curtain in the dead of night,
111 And would have told him half his Troy was burnt;
112 But Priam found the fire ere he his tongue,
113 And I my Percy’s death ere thou report’st it.
114 This thou wouldst say: “Your son did thus and thus;
115 Your brother thus; so fought the noble Douglas”
116 Stopping my greedy ear with their bold deeds:
117 But in the end, to stop my ear indeed,
118 Thou hast a sigh to blow away this praise,
119 Ending with “Brother, son, and all are dead.”
120 MORTON.
121 Douglas is living, and your brother, yet;
122 But, for my lord your son—
123 NORTHUMBERLAND.
124 Why, he is dead.
125 See what a ready tongue suspicion hath!
126 He that but fears the thing he would not know
127 Hath by instinct knowledge from others’ eyes
128 That what he fear’d is chanced. Yet speak, Morton;
129 Tell thou an earl his divination lies,
130 And I will take it as a sweet disgrace
131 And make thee rich for doing me such wrong.
132 MORTON.
133 You are too great to be by me gainsaid,
134 Your spirit is too true, your fears too certain.
135 NORTHUMBERLAND.
136 Yet, for all this, say not that Percy’s dead.
137 I see a strange confession in thine eye.
138 Thou shakest thy head and hold’st it fear or sin
139 To speak a truth. If he be slain, say so.
140 The tongue offends not that reports his death;
141 And he doth sin that doth belie the dead,
142 Not he which says the dead is not alive.
143 Yet the first bringer of unwelcome news
144 Hath but a losing office, and his tongue
145 Sounds ever after as a sullen bell,
146 Remember’d tolling a departing friend.
147 LORD BARDOLPH.
148 I cannot think, my lord, your son is dead.
149 MORTON.
150 I am sorry I should force you to believe
151 That which I would to God I had not seen;
152 But these mine eyes saw him in bloody state,
153 Rend’ring faint quittance, wearied and outbreathed,
154 To Harry Monmouth, whose swift wrath beat down
155 The never-daunted Percy to the earth,
156 From whence with life he never more sprung up.
157 In few, his death, whose spirit lent a fire
158 Even to the dullest peasant in his camp,
159 Being bruited once, took fire and heat away
160 From the best-temper’d courage in his troops;
161 For from his metal was his party steel’d,
162 Which once in him abated, all the rest
163 Turn’d on themselves, like dull and heavy lead.
164 And as the thing that’s heavy in itself
165 Upon enforcement flies with greatest speed,
166 So did our men, heavy in Hotspur’s loss,
167 Lend to this weight such lightness with their fear
168 That arrows fled not swifter toward their aim
169 Than did our soldiers, aiming at their safety,
170 Fly from the field. Then was that noble Worcester
171 Too soon ta’en prisoner; and that furious Scot,
172 The bloody Douglas, whose well-labouring sword
173 Had three times slain th’ appearance of the King,
174 Gan vail his stomach and did grace the shame
175 Of those that turn’d their backs, and in his flight,
176 Stumbling in fear, was took. The sum of all
177 Is that the King hath won, and hath sent out
178 A speedy power to encounter you, my lord,
179 Under the conduct of young Lancaster
180 And Westmoreland. This is the news at full.
181 NORTHUMBERLAND.
182 For this I shall have time enough to mourn.
183 In poison there is physic; and these news,
184 Having been well, that would have made me sick,
185 Being sick, have in some measure made me well.
186 And as the wretch, whose fever-weaken’d joints,
187 Like strengthless hinges, buckle under life,
188 Impatient of his fit, breaks like a fire
189 Out of his keeper’s arms, even so my limbs,
190 Weaken’d with grief, being now enraged with grief,
191 Are thrice themselves. Hence, therefore, thou nice crutch!
192 A scaly gauntlet now with joints of steel
193 Must glove this hand. And hence, thou sickly coif!
194 Thou art a guard too wanton for the head
195 Which princes, flesh’d with conquest, aim to hit.
196 Now bind my brows with iron, and approach
197 The ragged’st hour that time and spite dare bring
198 To frown upon th’ enraged Northumberland!
199 Let heaven kiss earth! Now let not Nature’s hand
200 Keep the wild flood confined! Let order die!
201 And let this world no longer be a stage
202 To feed contention in a lingering act;
203 But let one spirit of the first-born Cain
204 Reign in all bosoms, that, each heart being set
205 On bloody courses, the rude scene may end,
206 And darkness be the burier of the dead!
207 LORD BARDOLPH.
208 This strained passion doth you wrong, my lord.
209 MORTON.
210 Sweet earl, divorce not wisdom from your honour.
211 The lives of all your loving complices
212 Lean on your health; the which, if you give o’er
213 To stormy passion, must perforce decay.
214 You cast th’ event of war, my noble lord,
215 And summ’d the account of chance, before you said
216 “Let us make head.” It was your presurmise
217 That in the dole of blows your son might drop.
218 You knew he walk’d o’er perils, on an edge,
219 More likely to fall in than to get o’er.
220 You were advised his flesh was capable
221 Of wounds and scars, and that his forward spirit
222 Would lift him where most trade of danger ranged.
223 Yet did you say “Go forth;” and none of this,
224 Though strongly apprehended, could restrain
225 The stiff-borne action. What hath then befall’n,
226 Or what hath this bold enterprise brought forth,
227 More than that being which was like to be?
228 LORD BARDOLPH.
229 We all that are engaged to this loss
230 Knew that we ventured on such dangerous seas
231 That if we wrought out life ’twas ten to one;
232 And yet we ventured, for the gain proposed
233 Choked the respect of likely peril fear’d;
234 And since we are o’erset, venture again.
235 Come, we will put forth, body and goods.
236 MORTON.
237 ’Tis more than time. And, my most noble lord,
238 I hear for certain, and dare speak the truth:
239 The gentle Archbishop of York is up
240 With well-appointed powers. He is a man
241 Who with a double surety binds his followers.
242 My lord your son had only but the corpse,
243 But shadows and the shows of men, to fight;
244 For that same word, “rebellion” did divide
245 The action of their bodies from their souls,
246 And they did fight with queasiness, constrain’d,
247 As men drink potions, that their weapons only
248 Seem’d on our side; but, for their spirits and souls,
249 This word, “rebellion,” it had froze them up,
250 As fish are in a pond. But now the bishop
251 Turns insurrection to religion.
252 Supposed sincere and holy in his thoughts,
253 He’s follow’d both with body and with mind,
254 And doth enlarge his rising with the blood
255 Of fair King Richard, scraped from Pomfret stones;
256 Derives from heaven his quarrel and his cause;
257 Tells them he doth bestride a bleeding land,
258 Gasping for life under great Bolingbroke;
259 And more and less do flock to follow him.
260 NORTHUMBERLAND.
261 I knew of this before; but, to speak truth,
262 This present grief had wiped it from my mind.
263 Go in with me, and counsel every man
264 The aptest way for safety and revenge.
265 Get posts and letters, and make friends with speed.
266 Never so few, and never yet more need.
267 [_Exeunt._]