For which your honor and your faith is pawned;
The earldom of Hereford, and the movables,
Which you have promised I shall possess.

K. Rich. Stanley, look to your wife; if she convey Letters to Richmond, you shall answer it.

Buck. What says your highness to my just request? K. Rich. I do remember me,-Henry the Sixth Did prophesy, that Richmond should be king, When Richmond was a little peevish boy. A king?-perhaps

Buck. My lord,

K. Rich. How chance, the prophet could not, at that time,

Have told me, I being by, that I should kill him?
Buck. My lord, your promise for the earldom,-
K. Rich. Richmond!-When last I was at Exeter,
The mayor in courtesy showed me the castle,
And called it-Rouge-mont;' at which name, I started;
Because a bard of Ireland told me once,

I should not live long after I saw Richmond.

Το

Buck. My lord,

K. Rich.

Buck.

Ay, what's o'clock?

I am thus bold

put your grace in mind of what you promised me. K. Rich. Well, but what is't o'clock?

Buck.

Of ten.

K. Rich. Well, let it strike.

Upon the stroke

Why let it strike?

Buck.
K. Rich. Because that, like a Jack, thou keep'st

2

the stroke

1 Hooker, who wrote in queen Elizabeth's time, in his description of Exeter, mentions this as a "very old and antient castle, named Rugemont; that is to say, Red Hill, taking the name of the red soil or earth whereupon it is situated." It was first built, he adds, as some think, by Julius Cæsar, but rather, and in truth, by the Romans after him.

2 This alludes to the jack of the clock house, mentioned before in King Richard II. Act v. Sc. 5. It was a figure made in old public clocks to strike the bell on the outside; of the same kind as those still preserved at St. Dunstan's church in Fleet-street. Richard compares Buckingham to one of the automatons, and bids him not to suspend the stroke on the clock bell, but strike, that the noise may be past, and himself at liberty to

Betwixt thy begging and my meditation.

I am not in the giving vein to-day.

Buck. Why, then resolve me whe'r you will, or no. K. Rich. Thou troublest me; I am not in the vein. [Exeunt KING RICHARD and Train.

Buck. And is it thus? Repays he my deep service With such contempt? Made I him king for this? O, let me think on Hastings; and be gone

To Brecknock,' while my fearful head is on. [Exit.

SCENE III. The same.

Enter TYRREL.

Tyr. The tyrannous and bloody act is done;
The most arch deed of piteous massacre,
That ever yet this land was guilty of.
Dighton, and Forrest, whom I did suborn
To do this piece of ruthless butchery,
Albeit they were fleshed villains, bloody dogs,
Melting with tenderness and mild compassion,
Wept like two children, in their death's sad story.
O thus, quoth Dighton, lay the gentle babes,——
Thus, thus, quoth Forrest, girdling one another
Within their alabaster, innocent arms:

Their lips were four red roses on a stalk,
Which, in their summer beauty, kissed each other.
A book of prayers on their pillow lay;

Which once, quoth Forrest, almost changed my mind ;
But, O, the devil-there the villain stopped;
When Dighton thus told on-we smothered
The most replenished, sweet work of nature,
That, from the prime creation, e'er she framed.-
Hence both are gone with conscience and remorse,
They could not speak; and so I left them both,
To bear this tidings to the bloody king.

pursue his meditations. Jack was a term of contempt, occurring before in this play.

1 His castle in Wales.

Enter KING RICHARD.

And here he comes :-all health, my sovereign lord! K. Rich. Kind Tyrrel! am I happy in thy news? Tyr. If to have done the thing you gave in charge Beget your happiness, be happy then,

For it is done.

K. Rich. But didst thou see them dead?
Tyr. I did, my lord.

K. Rich.
And buried, gentle Tyrrel?
Tyr. The chaplain of the Tower hath buried them;
But where, to say the truth, I do not know.

K. Rich. Come to me, Tyrrel, soon, at after supper, When thou shalt tell the process of their death. Mean time, but think how I may do thee good, And be inheritor of thy desire.

Farewell, till then.

[Exit.

Tyr. I humbly take my leave. K. Rich. The son of Clarence have I penned up close. His daughter meanly have I matched in marriage; The sons of Edward sleep in Abraham's bosom, And Anne my wife hath bid the world good night. Now, for I know the Bretagne1 Richmond aims At young Elizabeth, my brother's daughter, And, by that knot, looks proudly on the crown, To her go I, a jolly, thriving wooer.

Cate. My lord,

Enter CATESBY.

K. Rich. Good news or bad, that thou com'st in so bluntly?

Cate. Bad news, my lord; Morton is fled to Richmond;

And Buckingham, backed with the hardy Welshmen, Is in the field, and still his power increaseth.

1 Richmond, after the battle of Tewksbury, had taken refuge in the court of Francis II., duke of Bretagne, where he was kept a long time in honorable custody.

2 Bishop of Ely.

K. Rich. Ely with Richmond troubles me more near
Than Buckingham and his rash-levied strength.
Come, I have learned that fearful commenting
Is leaden servitor to dull delay;

Delay leads impotent and snail-paced beggary:
Then fiery expedition be my wing,
Jove's Mercury, and herald for a king!
Go, muster men. My counsel is my shield;
We must be brief when traitors brave the field.

[Exeunt.

SCENE IV. The same. Before the Palace.

Enter QUEEN Margaret.

Q. Mar. So, now prosperity begins to mellow,
And drop into the rotten mouth of death.
Here in these confines slyly have I lurked,
To watch the waning of mine enemies.
A dire induction' am I witness to,

And will to France, hoping the consequence
Will prove as bitter, black, and tragical.

Withdraw thee, wretched Margaret! Who comes here?

Enter QUEEN ELIZABETH and the DUCHESS of YORk.

Q. Eliz. Ah, my poor princes! ah, my tender babes!

My unblown flowers, new-appearing sweets!

If

yet your gentle souls fly in the air,

And be not fixed in doom perpetual,
Hover about me with your airy wings,
And hear your mother's lamentation!

Q. Mar. Hover about her; say, that right for right Hath dimmed your infant morn to aged night.

Duch. So many miseries have crazed my voice,
That my woe-wearied tongue is still and mute!-
Edward Plantagenet, why art thou dead?

1 Induction is preface, introduction, or prologue.
? Justice answering to the claims of justice.

2

Q. Mar. Plantagenet doth quit Plantagenet, Edward for Edward pays a dying debt.

Q. Eliz. Wilt thou, O God, fly from such gentle lambs,

And throw them in the entrails of the wolf?

When didst thou sleep, when such a deed was done? Q. Mar. When holy Harry died, and my sweet son. Duch. Dead life, blind sight, poor, mortal-living

ghost,

Woe's scene, world's shame, grave's due by life usurped,
Brief abstract and record of tedious days,
Rest thy unrest on England's lawful earth,

[Sitting down. Unlawfully made drunk with innocent blood!

Q. Eliz. Ah, that thou wouldst as soon afford a

grave,

As thou canst yield a melancholy seat;

Then would I hide my bones, not rest them here!
Ah, who hath any cause to mourn, but we?

[Sitting down by her.
Q. Mar. If ancient sorrow be most reverent,
Give mine the benefit of seniory,
And let my griefs frown on the upper hand.
If sorrow can admit society,

[Sitting down with them. Tell o'er your woes again by viewing mine :I had an Edward, till a Richard killed him ; I had a husband, till a Richard killed him : Thou hadst an Edward, till a Richard killed him: Thou hadst a Richard, till a Richard killed him.

Duch. I had a Richard too, and thou didst kill him
I had a Rutland too, thou holp'st to kill him.
Q. Mar. Thou hadst a Clarence too, and Richard
killed him ;

From forth the kennel of thy womb hath crept
A hell-hound, that doth hunt us all to death:
That dog that had his teeth before his eyes,
To worry lambs, and lap their gentle blood;
That foul defacer of God's handiwork;
That excellent grand tyrant of the earth,

;