Have done me shame; brave foldier, pardon me,
That any accent breaking from thy tongue
Should 'scape the true acquaintance of mine ear.
Baft. Come, come; fans complement, what news abroad?
Hub. Why here walk I, in the black brow of night,
Baft. Brief then and what's the news?
Hub. O my sweet Sir, news fitting to the night,
Black, fearful, comfortless, and horrible.
Baft. Shew me the very wound of this ill news,
I am no woman, I'll not fwoon at it.
Hub. The King, I fear, is poison'd by a Monk :
I left him almost speechless, and broke out
T' acquaint you with this evil; that you might
The better arm you to the fudden time,
Than if you had at leisure known of this.
Bast. How did he take it? who did taste to him?
Hub. A Monk, I tell you, a refolved villain,
Whose bowels suddenly burst out; the King
Yet speaks, and peradventure may recover.
Baft. Whom didst thou leave to tend his Majesty ?
Hub, Why, know you not? the Lords are all come back,
And brought Prince Henry in their company,
At whose request the King hath pardon'd them,
And they are all about his Majesty.
Baft. With-hold thine indignation, mighty heav'n!
And tempt us not to bear above our power.
I'll tell thee, Hubert, half my pow'rs this night
Passing these flats, are taken by the tide,
These Lincoln-washes have devoured them;
My felf, well mounted, hardly have escap'd.
Away before: conduct me to the King,
I doubt he will be dead, or e'er I come.
SCENE IX. Changes to the Orchard at Swinstead Abby.
Enter Prince Henry, Salisbury and Bigot.
Henry. It is too late, the life of all his blood
Is touch'd corruptibly; and his pure brain,
Which some suppose the foul's frail dwelling-house,
Doth, by the idle comments that it makes,
Foretel the ending of mortality.
Pemb. His Highness yet doth speak, and holds belief
That being brought into the open air,
It would allay the burning quality
Of that fell poison which assaileth him.
Henry. Let him be brought into the orchard here; Doth he still rage ?
Than when you left him; even now he sung.
Henry. Oh vanity of fickness! fierce extreams
In their continuance will not feel themselves.
Death having prey'd upon the outward parts
Leaves them insensible; his siege is now
Against the mind, the which he pricks and wounds
With many legions of strange fantafies,
Which, in their throng and press to that last hold,
Confound themselves. 'Tis strange that death should fing :
I am the Cygnet to this pale, faint Swan,
Who chaunts a doleful hymn to his own death,
And from the organ-pipe of frailty sings
His foul and body to their lasting reft.
Sal. Be of good comfort, Prince, for you are born
To fet a form upon that Indigest
Which he hath left so shapeless and so rude.
King John brought in.
K. John. Ay marry, now my foul hath elbow-room; It would not out at windows, nor at doors. There is so hot a summer in my bosom, That all my bowels crumble up to duft: I am a scribbled form drawn with a pen Upon a parchment, and against this fire Do I shrink up.
Henry. How fares your Majesty?
K. Jobn. Poifon'd, ill fare! oh! dead, forfook, caft off,
And none of you will bid the winter come
To thrust his icy fingers in my maw;
Nor let my kingdom's rivers take their course
Through my burn'd bosom: nor intreat the north
To make his bleak winds kiss my parched lips,
And comfort me with cold. I ask not much,
I beg cold comfort; and you are so strait
And so ungrateful, you deny me that.
Henry. Oh that there were some virtue in my tears,
That might relieve you!
K. Jobn. The falt of them is hot.
Within me is a hell, and there the poison
Is as a fiend, confin'd to tyrannize
On unreprievable, condemned blood.
SCENE X. Enter Bastard.
Baft. Oh, I am scalded with my violent motion,
And spleen of speed to see your Majefty.
K. John. Oh cousin thou art come to fet mine eye:
The tackle of my heart is crackt and burnt,
And all the shrouds wherewith my life shou'd sail
Are turned to one thread, one little hair:
My heart hath one poor string to stay it by,
Which holds but 'till thy news be uttered;
And then all this thou feest is but a clod,
And model of confounded royalty.
Baft. The Dauphin is preparing hitherward,
Where heav'n he knows how we shall answer him.
For, in a night, the best part of my power,
As I upon advantage did remove,
Were in the washes all, unwarily,
Devoured by the unexpected flood.
Sal. You breathe these dead news in as dead an ear:
My Liege! my Lord! - but now a King - now thus.
Henry. Ev'n so must I runon, and ev'n so stop. *
Baft. Art thou gone so? I do but stay behind
To do the office for thee of revenge :
And then my foul shall wait on thee to heav'n,
As it on earth hath been thy servant still.
Now, now, you stars, that move in your right spheres
Where be your powers? shew now your mended faiths,
And instantly return with me again,
To push destruction and perpetual shame
Out of the weak door of our fainting land :
Strait let us seek, or strait we shall be fought;
What furety of the world, what hope, what stay,
When this was now a Ning, and now is clay t
The Dauphin rages at our very heels.
Sal. It seems you know not then so much as we:
The Cardinal Pandulph is within at rest,
Who half an hour fince came from the Dauphini
And brings from him such offers of our peace,
As we with honour and respect may take,
With purpose presently to leave this war.
Bast. He will the rather do it, when he sees
Our selves well finewed to our defence.
Sal. Nay, it is in a manner done already;
For many carriages he hath dispatch'd
To the fea-fide, and put his cause and quarrel
To the difpofing of the Cardinal :
With whom your self, my self, and other Lords,
If you think meet, this afternoon will post
To confummate this business happily.
Bast. Let it be so; and you, my noble Prince,
With other Princes that may best be spar'd,
Shall wait upon your father's funeral.
Henry. At Worcester must his body be interr'd,
For fo he will'd it.
Baft. Thither shall it then.
And happily may your sweet self put on
The lineal state and glory of the land!
To whom with all fubmiffion, on my knee,
I do bequeath my faithful services,
And true subjection everlastingly.
Sal. And the like tender of our love we make,
To rest without a spot for evermore.
Henry. I have a kind soul that would give you thanks,
And knows not how to do it, but with tears.
Bast. Oh, let us pay the time but needful woe,
Since it hath been before-hand with our griefs.
Thus England never did, and never shall,
Lye at the proud foot of a Conqueror,
But when it first did help to wound it self.
Now these her Princes are come home again,
Come the three corners of the world in arms
And we shall shock them. Nought shall make us rue,
If England to it self do rest but true.
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