Part 162

[_Throws him his purse._]

PURSUIVANT. I thank your honour.

[_Exit._]

Enter a Priest.

PRIEST. Well met, my lord; I am glad to see your honour.

HASTINGS. I thank thee, good Sir John, with all my heart. I am in your debt for your last exercise. Come the next sabbath, and I will content you.

Enter Buckingham.

PRIEST. I’ll wait upon your lordship.

[_Exit Priest._]

BUCKINGHAM. What, talking with a priest, Lord Chamberlain? Your friends at Pomfret, they do need the priest; Your honour hath no shriving work in hand.

HASTINGS. Good faith, and when I met this holy man, The men you talk of came into my mind. What, go you toward the Tower?

BUCKINGHAM. I do, my lord, but long I cannot stay there. I shall return before your lordship thence.

HASTINGS. Nay, like enough, for I stay dinner there.

BUCKINGHAM. [_Aside_.] And supper too, although thou knowest it not. Come, will you go?

HASTINGS. I’ll wait upon your lordship.

[_Exeunt._]

SCENE III. Pomfret. Before the Castle

Enter Sir Richard Ratcliffe, with Halberds, carrying the nobles Rivers, Grey and Vaughan to death at Pomfret.

RIVERS. Sir Richard Ratcliffe, let me tell thee this: Today shalt thou behold a subject die For truth, for duty, and for loyalty.

GREY. God bless the Prince from all the pack of you! A knot you are of damned bloodsuckers.

VAUGHAN You live that shall cry woe for this hereafter.

RATCLIFFE Dispatch. The limit of your lives is out.

RIVERS. O Pomfret, Pomfret! O thou bloody prison, Fatal and ominous to noble peers! Within the guilty closure of thy walls Richard the Second here was hacked to death; And, for more slander to thy dismal seat, We give to thee our guiltless blood to drink.

GREY. Now Margaret’s curse is fall’n upon our heads, When she exclaimed on Hastings, you, and I, For standing by when Richard stabbed her son.

RIVERS. Then cursed she Richard, then cursed she Buckingham, Then cursed she Hastings. O, remember, God, To hear her prayer for them, as now for us! And for my sister and her princely sons, Be satisfied, dear God, with our true blood, Which, as thou know’st, unjustly must be spilt.

RATCLIFFE. Make haste. The hour of death is expiate.

RIVERS. Come, Grey, come, Vaughan, let us here embrace. Farewell, until we meet again in heaven.

[_Exeunt._]

SCENE IV. London. A Room in the Tower

Enter Buckingham, Stanley Earl of Derby, Hastings, the Bishop of Ely, Norfolk, Ratcliffe, Lovell with others, at a table.

HASTINGS. Now, noble peers, the cause why we are met Is to determine of the coronation. In God’s name speak. When is the royal day?

BUCKINGHAM. Is all things ready for that royal time?

STANLEY. It is, and wants but nomination.

ELY. Tomorrow, then, I judge a happy day.

BUCKINGHAM. Who knows the Lord Protector’s mind herein? Who is most inward with the noble Duke?

ELY. Your Grace, we think, should soonest know his mind.

BUCKINGHAM. We know each other’s faces; for our hearts, He knows no more of mine than I of yours, Or I of his, my lord, than you of mine. Lord Hastings, you and he are near in love.

HASTINGS. I thank his Grace, I know he loves me well; But for his purpose in the coronation I have not sounded him, nor he delivered His gracious pleasure any way therein. But you, my honourable lords, may name the time, And in the Duke’s behalf I’ll give my voice, Which I presume he’ll take in gentle part.

Enter Richard.

ELY. In happy time, here comes the Duke himself.

RICHARD. My noble lords and cousins all, good morrow. I have been long a sleeper; but I trust My absence doth neglect no great design Which by my presence might have been concluded.

BUCKINGHAM. Had you not come upon your cue, my lord, William Lord Hastings had pronounced your part— I mean your voice for crowning of the King.

RICHARD. Than my Lord Hastings no man might be bolder. His lordship knows me well and loves me well. My lord of Ely, when I was last in Holborn I saw good strawberries in your garden there; I do beseech you, send for some of them.

ELY. Marry, and will, my lord, with all my heart.

[_Exit._]

RICHARD. Cousin of Buckingham, a word with you.

[_They move aside._]

Catesby hath sounded Hastings in our business, And finds the testy gentleman so hot That he will lose his head ere give consent His master’s child, as worshipfully he terms it, Shall lose the royalty of England’s throne.

BUCKINGHAM. Withdraw yourself awhile. I’ll go with you.

[_Exeunt Richard and Buckingham._]

STANLEY. We have not yet set down this day of triumph. Tomorrow, in my judgement, is too sudden, For I myself am not so well provided As else I would be, were the day prolonged.

Enter Bishop of Ely.

ELY. Where is my lord the Duke of Gloucester? I have sent for these strawberries.

HASTINGS. His Grace looks cheerfully and smooth this morning. There’s some conceit or other likes him well When that he bids good morrow with such spirit. I think there’s never a man in Christendom Can lesser hide his love or hate than he, For by his face straight shall you know his heart.

STANLEY. What of his heart perceive you in his face By any livelihood he showed today?

HASTINGS. Marry, that with no man here he is offended, For were he, he had shown it in his looks.

Enter Richard and Buckingham.

RICHARD. I pray you all, tell me what they deserve That do conspire my death with devilish plots Of damned witchcraft, and that have prevailed Upon my body with their hellish charms?

HASTINGS. The tender love I bear your Grace, my lord, Makes me most forward in this princely presence To doom th’ offenders, whosoe’er they be. I say, my lord, they have deserved death.

RICHARD. Then be your eyes the witness of their evil. Look how I am bewitched! Behold, mine arm Is like a blasted sapling withered up! And this is Edward’s wife, that monstrous witch, Consorted with that harlot, strumpet Shore, That by their witchcraft thus have marked me.

HASTINGS. If they have done this deed, my noble lord—

RICHARD. If? Thou protector of this damned strumpet, Talk’st thou to me of “ifs”? Thou art a traitor. Off with his head! Now by Saint Paul I swear I will not dine until I see the same. Lovell and Ratcliffe, look that it be done. The rest that love me, rise and follow me.

[_Exeunt all but Lovell and Ratcliffe with the Lord Hastings._]

HASTINGS. Woe, woe, for England! Not a whit for me, For I, too fond, might have prevented this. Stanley did dream the boar did raze his helm, And I did scorn it and disdain to fly. Three times today my foot-cloth horse did stumble, And started when he looked upon the Tower, As loath to bear me to the slaughter-house. O, now I need the priest that spake to me; I now repent I told the pursuivant, As too triumphing, how mine enemies Today at Pomfret bloodily were butchered, And I myself secure in grace and favour. O Margaret, Margaret, now thy heavy curse Is lighted on poor Hastings’ wretched head.

RATCLIFFE. Come, come, dispatch. The Duke would be at dinner: Make a short shrift. He longs to see your head.

HASTINGS. O momentary grace of mortal men, Which we more hunt for than the grace of God! Who builds his hope in air of your good looks Lives like a drunken sailor on a mast, Ready with every nod to tumble down Into the fatal bowels of the deep.

LOVELL. Come, come, dispatch. ’Tis bootless to exclaim.

HASTINGS. O bloody Richard! Miserable England, I prophesy the fearfull’st time to thee That ever wretched age hath looked upon. Come, lead me to the block. Bear him my head. They smile at me who shortly shall be dead.

[_Exeunt._]

SCENE V. London. The Tower Walls

Enter Richard and Buckingham in rotten armour, marvellous ill-favoured.

RICHARD. Come, cousin, canst thou quake and change thy colour, Murder thy breath in middle of a word, And then again begin, and stop again, As if thou were distraught and mad with terror?

BUCKINGHAM. Tut, I can counterfeit the deep tragedian; Speak, and look back, and pry on every side, Tremble and start at wagging of a straw, Intending deep suspicion. Ghastly looks Are at my service, like enforced smiles, And both are ready in their offices, At anytime to grace my stratagems. But what, is Catesby gone?

RICHARD. He is; and, see, he brings the Mayor along.

Enter the Lord Mayor and Catesby.

BUCKINGHAM. Lord Mayor—

RICHARD. Look to the drawbridge there!

BUCKINGHAM. Hark, a drum.

RICHARD. Catesby, o’erlook the walls.

BUCKINGHAM. Lord Mayor, the reason we have sent—

RICHARD. Look back! Defend thee, here are enemies.

BUCKINGHAM. God and our innocence defend and guard us!

Enter Lovell and Ratcliffe with Hastings’ head.

RICHARD. Be patient, they are friends, Ratcliffe and Lovell.

LOVELL. Here is the head of that ignoble traitor, The dangerous and unsuspected Hastings.

RICHARD. So dear I loved the man that I must weep. I took him for the plainest harmless creature That breathed upon the earth a Christian; Made him my book, wherein my soul recorded The history of all her secret thoughts. So smooth he daubed his vice with show of virtue That, his apparent open guilt omitted— I mean his conversation with Shore’s wife— He lived from all attainder of suspects.

BUCKINGHAM. Well, well, he was the covert’st sheltered traitor That ever lived.— Would you imagine, or almost believe, Were’t not that by great preservation We live to tell it, that the subtle traitor This day had plotted, in the council-house, To murder me and my good lord of Gloucester?

MAYOR. Had he done so?

RICHARD. What, think you we are Turks or Infidels? Or that we would, against the form of law, Proceed thus rashly in the villain’s death, But that the extreme peril of the case, The peace of England, and our persons’ safety, Enforced us to this execution?

MAYOR. Now, fair befall you! He deserved his death, And your good Graces both have well proceeded, To warn false traitors from the like attempts.

BUCKINGHAM. I never looked for better at his hands After he once fell in with Mistress Shore. Yet had we not determined he should die Until your lordship came to see his end Which now the loving haste of these our friends, Something against our meanings, have prevented, Because, my lord, we would have had you heard The traitor speak, and timorously confess The manner and the purpose of his treasons, That you might well have signified the same Unto the citizens, who haply may Misconster us in him, and wail his death.

MAYOR. But, my good lord, your Grace’s word shall serve As well as I had seen and heard him speak; And do not doubt, right noble princes both, But I’ll acquaint our duteous citizens With all your just proceedings in this case.

RICHARD. And to that end we wished your lordship here, T’ avoid the censures of the carping world.

BUCKINGHAM. But since you come too late of our intent, Yet witness what you hear we did intend. And so, my good Lord Mayor, we bid farewell.

[_Exit Lord Mayor._]

RICHARD. Go, after, after, cousin Buckingham. The Mayor towards Guildhall hies him in all post. There, at your meet’st advantage of the time, Infer the bastardy of Edward’s children; Tell them how Edward put to death a citizen Only for saying he would make his son Heir to the Crown—meaning indeed his house, Which, by the sign thereof, was termed so. Moreover, urge his hateful luxury And bestial appetite in change of lust, Which stretched unto their servants, daughters, wives, Even where his raging eye or savage heart, Without control, lusted to make a prey. Nay, for a need, thus far come near my person: Tell them, when that my mother went with child Of that insatiate Edward, noble York My princely father then had wars in France, And, by true computation of the time, Found that the issue was not his begot; Which well appeared in his lineaments, Being nothing like the noble Duke, my father. Yet touch this sparingly, as ’twere far off; Because, my lord, you know my mother lives.

BUCKINGHAM. Doubt not, my lord, I’ll play the orator As if the golden fee for which I plead Were for myself. And so, my lord, adieu.

RICHARD. If you thrive well, bring them to Baynard’s Castle, Where you shall find me well accompanied With reverend fathers and well-learned bishops.

BUCKINGHAM. I go; and towards three or four o’clock Look for the news that the Guildhall affords.

[_Exit._]

RICHARD. Go, Lovell, with all speed to Doctor Shaa. [_To Ratcliffe_.] Go thou to Friar Penker; bid them both Meet me within this hour at Baynard’s Castle.

[_Exeunt Ratcliffe and Lovell._]

Now will I go to take some privy order To draw the brats of Clarence out of sight, And to give order that no manner person Have any time recourse unto the Princes.

[_Exit._]

SCENE VI. London. A street

Enter a Scrivener.

SCRIVENER. Here is the indictment of the good Lord Hastings, Which in a set hand fairly is engrossed, That it may be today read o’er in Paul’s. And mark how well the sequel hangs together: Eleven hours I have spent to write it over, For yesternight by Catesby was it sent me; The precedent was full as long a-doing And yet within these five hours Hastings lived, Untainted, unexamined, free, at liberty. Here’s a good world the while! Who is so gross That cannot see this palpable device? Yet who so bold but says he sees it not? Bad is the world, and all will come to naught When such ill dealing must be seen in thought.

[_Exit._]

SCENE VII. London. Court of Baynard’s Castle

Enter Richard and Buckingham at several doors.

RICHARD. How now, how now? What say the citizens?

BUCKINGHAM. Now, by the holy mother of our Lord, The citizens are mum, say not a word.

RICHARD. Touched you the bastardy of Edward’s children?

BUCKINGHAM. I did; with his contract with Lady Lucy, And his contract by deputy in France; Th’ insatiate greediness of his desire, And his enforcement of the city wives; His tyranny for trifles; his own bastardy, As being got, your father then in France, And his resemblance, being not like the Duke. Withal, I did infer your lineaments, Being the right idea of your father, Both in your form and nobleness of mind; Laid open all your victories in Scotland, Your discipline in war, wisdom in peace, Your bounty, virtue, fair humility; Indeed, left nothing fitting for your purpose Untouched or slightly handled in discourse. And when mine oratory drew toward end, I bid them that did love their country’s good Cry “God save Richard, England’s royal King!”

RICHARD. And did they so?

BUCKINGHAM. No, so God help me, they spake not a word, But, like dumb statues or breathing stones, Stared each on other, and looked deadly pale. Which when I saw, I reprehended them, And asked the Mayor what meant this wilful silence. His answer was, the people were not used To be spoke to but by the Recorder. Then he was urged to tell my tale again: “Thus saith the Duke, thus hath the Duke inferred” But nothing spoke in warrant from himself. When he had done, some followers of mine own, At lower end of the hall, hurled up their caps, And some ten voices cried, “God save King Richard!” And thus I took the vantage of those few. “Thanks, gentle citizens and friends,” quoth I; “This general applause and cheerful shout Argues your wisdoms and your love to Richard.” And even here brake off and came away.

RICHARD. What, tongueless blocks were they! Would they not speak? Will not the Mayor then and his brethren, come?

BUCKINGHAM. The mayor is here at hand. Intend some fear; Be not you spoke with but by mighty suit. And look you get a prayer-book in your hand, And stand between two churchmen, good my lord, For on that ground I’ll make a holy descant. And be not easily won to our requests. Play the maid’s part: still answer nay, and take it.

RICHARD. I go, and if you plead as well for them As I can say nay to thee for myself, No doubt we bring it to a happy issue.

BUCKINGHAM. Go, go, up to the leads, the Lord Mayor knocks.

[_Exit Richard._]

Enter the Lord Mayor and Citizens.

Welcome, my lord. I dance attendance here. I think the Duke will not be spoke withal.

Enter Catesby.

Now, Catesby, what says your lord to my request?

CATESBY. He doth entreat your Grace, my noble lord, To visit him tomorrow or next day. He is within, with two right reverend fathers, Divinely bent to meditation; And in no worldly suits would he be moved To draw him from his holy exercise.

BUCKINGHAM. Return, good Catesby, to the gracious Duke; Tell him myself, the Mayor and aldermen, In deep designs, in matter of great moment, No less importing than our general good, Are come to have some conference with his Grace.

CATESBY. I’ll signify so much unto him straight.

[_Exit._]

BUCKINGHAM. Ah ha, my lord, this prince is not an Edward! He is not lolling on a lewd love-bed, But on his knees at meditation; Not dallying with a brace of courtesans, But meditating with two deep divines; Not sleeping, to engross his idle body, But praying, to enrich his watchful soul. Happy were England would this virtuous prince Take on his Grace the sovereignty thereof. But sure I fear we shall not win him to it.

MAYOR. Marry, God defend his Grace should say us nay!

BUCKINGHAM. I fear he will. Here Catesby comes again.

Enter Catesby.

Now, Catesby, what says his Grace?

CATESBY. He wonders to what end you have assembled Such troops of citizens to come to him, His Grace not being warned thereof before. He fears, my lord, you mean no good to him.

BUCKINGHAM. Sorry I am my noble cousin should Suspect me that I mean no good to him. By heaven, we come to him in perfect love, And so once more return and tell his Grace.

[_Exit Catesby._]

When holy and devout religious men Are at their beads, ’tis much to draw them thence, So sweet is zealous contemplation.

Enter Richard aloft, between two Bishops. Catesby reenters.

MAYOR. See where his Grace stands ’tween two clergymen!

BUCKINGHAM. Two props of virtue for a Christian prince, To stay him from the fall of vanity; And, see, a book of prayer in his hand, True ornaments to know a holy man. Famous Plantagenet, most gracious Prince, Lend favourable ear to our requests, And pardon us the interruption Of thy devotion and right Christian zeal.

RICHARD. My lord, there needs no such apology. I do beseech your Grace to pardon me, Who, earnest in the service of my God, Deferred the visitation of my friends. But, leaving this, what is your Grace’s pleasure?

BUCKINGHAM. Even that, I hope, which pleaseth God above, And all good men of this ungoverned isle.

RICHARD. I do suspect I have done some offence That seems disgracious in the city’s eye, And that you come to reprehend my ignorance.

BUCKINGHAM. You have, my lord. Would it might please your Grace, On our entreaties, to amend your fault.

RICHARD. Else wherefore breathe I in a Christian land?

BUCKINGHAM. Know then, it is your fault that you resign The supreme seat, the throne majestical, The sceptered office of your ancestors, Your state of fortune, and your due of birth, The lineal glory of your royal house, To the corruption of a blemished stock; Whiles in the mildness of your sleepy thoughts, Which here we waken to our country’s good, The noble isle doth want her proper limbs; Her face defaced with scars of infamy, Her royal stock graft with ignoble plants, And almost shouldered in the swallowing gulf Of dark forgetfulness and deep oblivion; Which to recure, we heartily solicit Your gracious self to take on you the charge And kingly government of this your land, Not as Protector, steward, substitute, Or lowly factor for another’s gain, But as successively, from blood to blood, Your right of birth, your empery, your own. For this, consorted with the citizens, Your very worshipful and loving friends, And by their vehement instigation, In this just cause come I to move your Grace.

RICHARD. I cannot tell if to depart in silence Or bitterly to speak in your reproof Best fitteth my degree or your condition. If not to answer, you might haply think Tongue-tied ambition, not replying, yielded To bear the golden yoke of sovereignty, Which fondly you would here impose on me; If to reprove you for this suit of yours, So seasoned with your faithful love to me, Then, on the other side, I checked my friends. Therefore, to speak, and to avoid the first, And then, in speaking, not to incur the last, Definitively thus I answer you: Your love deserves my thanks, but my desert Unmeritable shuns your high request. First, if all obstacles were cut away, And that my path were even to the crown As the ripe revenue and due of birth, Yet so much is my poverty of spirit, So mighty and so many my defects, That I would rather hide me from my greatness, Being a bark to brook no mighty sea, Than in my greatness covet to be hid, And in the vapour of my glory smothered. But, God be thanked, there is no need of me, And much I need to help you, were there need. The royal tree hath left us royal fruit, Which, mellowed by the stealing hours of time, Will well become the seat of majesty, And make, no doubt, us happy by his reign. On him I lay that you would lay on me, The right and fortune of his happy stars, Which God defend that I should wring from him.

BUCKINGHAM. My lord, this argues conscience in your Grace; But the respects thereof are nice and trivial, All circumstances well considered. You say that Edward is your brother’s son; So say we too, but not by Edward’s wife. For first was he contract to Lady Lucy Your mother lives a witness to his vow, And afterward by substitute betrothed To Bona, sister to the King of France. These both put off, a poor petitioner, A care-crazed mother to a many sons, A beauty-waning and distressed widow, Even in the afternoon of her best days, Made prize and purchase of his wanton eye, Seduced the pitch and height of his degree To base declension and loathed bigamy. By her, in his unlawful bed, he got This Edward, whom our manners call the Prince. More bitterly could I expostulate, Save that, for reverence to some alive, I give a sparing limit to my tongue. Then, good my lord, take to your royal self This proffered benefit of dignity, If not to bless us and the land withal, Yet to draw forth your noble ancestry From the corruption of abusing times Unto a lineal true-derived course.

MAYOR. Do, good my lord. Your citizens entreat you.

BUCKINGHAM. Refuse not, mighty lord, this proffered love.

CATESBY. O, make them joyful; grant their lawful suit.

RICHARD. Alas, why would you heap those cares on me? I am unfit for state and majesty. I do beseech you, take it not amiss; I cannot, nor I will not, yield to you.

BUCKINGHAM. If you refuse it, as in love and zeal Loath to depose the child, your brother’s son— As well we know your tenderness of heart And gentle, kind, effeminate remorse, Which we have noted in you to your kindred, And equally indeed to all estates— Yet know, whe’er you accept our suit or no, Your brother’s son shall never reign our king, But we will plant some other in the throne, To the disgrace and downfall of your house. And in this resolution here we leave you. Come, citizens; zounds, I’ll entreat no more.

[_Exeunt Buckingham, the Mayor and citizens._]

CATESBY. Call him again, sweet Prince; accept their suit. If you deny them, all the land will rue it.

RICHARD. Will you enforce me to a world of cares? Call them again. I am not made of stones, But penetrable to your kind entreaties, Albeit against my conscience and my soul.

Enter Buckingham and the rest.

Cousin of Buckingham, and sage grave men, Since you will buckle Fortune on my back, To bear her burden, whe’er I will or no, I must have patience to endure the load. But if black scandal or foul-faced reproach Attend the sequel of your imposition, Your mere enforcement shall acquittance me From all the impure blots and stains thereof, For God doth know, and you may partly see, How far I am from the desire of this.

MAYOR. God bless your Grace! We see it, and will say it.

RICHARD. In saying so, you shall but say the truth.

BUCKINGHAM. Then I salute you with this royal title: Long live King Richard, England’s worthy King!

ALL. Amen.