North. My lord,

King. Worcester, get thee gone; for I do see 18 Danger and disobedience in thine eye.

O, sir, your presence is too bold and peremptory,
And majesty might never yet endure

The moody frontier of a servant brow.

You have good leave to leave us; when we need 20 Your use and counsel, we shall send for you.

You were about to speak.

North.

[Exit Wor.

[To North.

Yea, my good lord.

Those prisoners in your highness' name demanded, Which Harry Percy here at Holmedon took,

Were, as he says, not with such strength denied 25 As is deliver'd to your majesty.

Either envy, therefore, or misprision

Is guilty of this fault, and not my son.
Hot. My liege, I did deny no prisoners.

But I remember, when the fight was done,
When I was dry with rage and extreme toil,
Breathless and faint, leaning upon my sword,
Came there a certain lord, neat, and trimly dress'd,
Fresh as a bridegroom; and his chin new reap'd
Show'd like a stubble-land at harvest-home.

He was perfumed like a milliner,

And 'twixt his finger and his thumb he held

A pouncet-box, which ever and anon

He

gave his nose and took 't away again;

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35

Who therewith angry, when it next came there, 40 Took it in snuff; and still he smiled and talk'd,

And as the soldiers bore dead bodies by,
He call'd them untaught knaves, unmannerly,
To bring a slovenly unhandsome corse
Betwixt the wind and his nobility.

With many holiday and lady terms

He question'd me; amongst the rest, demanded
My prisoners in your majesty's behalf.

I then, all smarting with my wounds being cold,
To be so pester'd with a popinjay,

Out of my grief and my impatience

Answer'd neglectingly I know not what,

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50

He should, or he should not; for he made me

mad

To see him shine so brisk, and smell so sweet,
And talk so like a waiting-gentlewoman

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Of guns and drums and wounds, God save the

mark!

And telling me the sovereign'st thing on earth
Was parmaceti for an inward bruise;

And that it was great pity, so it was,
This villanous salt-petre should be digg'd
Out of the bowels of the harmless earth,
Which many a good tall fellow had destroy'd
So cowardly; and but for these vile guns,
He would himself have been a soldier.
This bald unjointed chat of his, my lord,
I answer'd indirectly, as I said;
And I beseech you, let not his report
Come current for an accusation

Betwixt my love and your high majesty.

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Blunt. The circumstance consider'd, good my

lord,

Whate'er Lord Harry Percy then had said
To such a person and in such a place,
At such a time, with all the rest re-told,
May reasonably die and never rise
To do him wrong, or any way impeach

What then he said, so he unsay

it now.

King. Why, yet he doth deny his prisoners,
But with proviso and exception,

That we at our own charge shall ransom straight
His brother-in-law, the foolish Mortimer;

Who, on my soul, hath wilfully betray'd
The lives of those that he did lead to fight
Against that great magician, damn'd Glendower,
Whose daughter, as we hear, the Earl of March
Hath lately married. Shall our coffers, then,
Be emptied to redeem a traitor home?
Shall we buy treason, and indent with fears,
When they have lost and forfeited themselves?
No, on the barren mountains let him starve;
For I shall never hold that man my friend

Whose tongue shall ask me for one penny cost
To ransom home revolted Mortimer.

Hot. Revolted Mortimer!

He never did fall off, my sovereign liege,

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75

80

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But by the chance of war. To prove that true Needs no more but one tongue for all those wounds, Those mouthed wounds, which valiantly he took When on the gentle Severn's sedgy bank,

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In single opposition, hand to hand,

He did confound the best part of an hour

In changing hardiment with great Glendower.

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Three times they breathed, and three times did they

drink,

Upon agreement, of swift Severn's flood;

Who then, affrighted with their bloody looks,

Ran fearfully among the trembling reeds,

And hid his crisp head in the hollow bank
Bloodstained with these valiant combatants.
Never did base and rotten policy

Colour her working with such deadly wounds;
Nor never could the noble Mortimer

Receive so many, and all willingly.

Then let not him be slander'd with revolt.

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King. Thou dost belie him, Percy, thou dost belie

him;

He never did encounter with Glendower.

I tell thee,

He durst as well have met the devil alone

As Owen Glendower for an enemy.

Art thou not ashamed? But, sirrah, henceforth
Let me not hear you speak of Mortimer.
Send me your prisoners with the speediest means,
Or you shall hear in such a kind from me

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As will displease you. My Lord Northumber

land,

We license your departure with your son.

Send us your prisoners, or you will hear of it.

[Exeunt King Henry, Blunt, and train.

Hot. And if the devil come and roar for them,

I will not send them. I will after straight

And tell him so; for I will ease my heart,
Albeit I make a hazard of my head.

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North. What, drunk with choler? stay and pause a while.

'Zounds, I will speak of him; and let my soul
Want mercy, if I do not join with him!
Yea, on his part I 'll empty all these veins,
And shed my dear blood drop by drop in the dust,

But I will lift the down-trod Mortimer

As high in the air as this unthankful king,

As this ingrate and canker'd Bolingbroke.

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North. Brother, the king hath made your nephew

mad.

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Wor. Who struck this heat up after I was gone? Hot. He will, forsooth, have all my prisoners; And when I urged the ransom once again Of my wife's brother, then his cheek look'd pale, And on my face he turn'd an eye of death, Trembling even at the name of Mortimer.

Wor. I cannot blame him; was not he pro

claim'd

By Richard that dead is the next of blood?

North.

He was; I heard the proclamation:

And then it was when the unhappy king

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