The danger of the day's but newly gone,
Whose memory is written on the earth
With yet-appearing blood; and the examples
Of every minute's inftance, prefent now,
Have put us in these ill-befeeming arms :
Not to break peace, or any branch of it,
But to establish here a peace indeed,
Concurring both in name and quality.

Weft. When ever yet was your appeal deny'd?
Wherein have you been galled by the King?
What Peer hath been fuborn'd to grate on you,
That you should feal this lawless bloody book
Of forg'd rebellion with a feal divine?

York. My brother General, the common-wealth
I make my quarrel in particular.

Weft. There is no need of any fuch redress;
Or if there were, it not belongs to you.

Mowb. Why not to him in part, and to us all,
That feel the bruifes of the days before,
And fuffer the condition of these times
To lay an heavy and unequal hand
Upon our honours ?

Weft. O my good Lord Mowbray,
Conftrue the times to their neceffities,
And you fhall fay, indeed, it is the time,
And not the King, that doth you injuries.
Yet, for your part, it not appears to me,
Or from the King, or in the present time,
That you should have an inch of any ground
To build a grief on. Were you not reftor'd
To all the Duke of Norfolk's feigniories,
Your noble and right-well-remember'd father?
Mob. What thing, in honour, had my father løft
That need to be reviv'd and breath'd in me?
The King that lov'd him, as the state stood then,
Was forc'd, perforce compell'd to banish him.
And then, when Henry Bolingbroke and he
Being mounted and both rowfed in their feats,
Their neighing courfers daring of the fpur,
Their armed ftaves in charge, their beavers down,
M 3

Their

Their eyees of fire fparkling through fights of steel,
And the loud trumpet blowing them together;
Then, then, when there was nothing could have ftaid
My father from the breaft of Bolingbroke;

O, when the King did throw his warder down,
His own life hung upon the staff he threw ;
Then threw he down himself, and all their lives,
That by indictment or by dint of sword

Have fince mifcarried under Bolingbroke.

Weft. You fpeak, Lord Mowbray, now, you know not what.

The Earl of Hereford was reputed then

In England the most valiant gentleman.

Who knows on whom fortune would then have fmil'd?
But if your father had been victor there,
He ne'er had born it out of Coventry,
For all the country in a general voice

Cry'd hate upon him; all their prayers and love
Were fet on Hereford, whom they doted on,
And blefs'd and grac'd indeed more than the King,
But this is meer digreffion from my purpose.
Here come I from our princely General,

To know your griefs to te'l you from his Grace,
That he will give you audience; and wherein
It fhall appear that your demands are juft,
You fhall enjoy them; every thing fet off
That might fo much as mark you enemies.

Mowb. But he hath forc'd us to compel this offer,
And it proceeds from policy, not love.

Weft. Mowbray, you over-ween to take it fo:
This offer comes from mercy, not from fear.
For lo! within a ken our army lyes;
Upon mine honour, all too confident
To give admittance to a thought of fear.
Our battel is more full of names than yours,
Our men more perfect in the use of arms,
Our armour all as ftrong, our cause the best;
Then reafon wills, our hearts fhould be as good.
Say you not then our offer is compell'd.

Mowb. Well, by my will we shall admit no parley.

W.

Weft. That argues but the shame of your offence: A rotten cafe abides no handling.

Haft. Hath the Prince Jobn a full commission, In very ample virtue of his father,

To hear and abfolutely to determine

Of what conditions we fhall ftand upon?

Weft. That is intended in the General's name :

I muse you make so flight a question.

York. Then take, my Lord of Westmorland, this schedule, For this contains our general grievances :

Each feveral article herein redress'd,

All members of our caufe, both here and hence,
That are infinewed into this action,
Acquitted by a true fubftantial form;
And prefent executions of our wills,
To us, and to our properties confirm'd;
We come within our awful banks again,
And knit our powers to the arm of peace.
Weft. This will I fhew the General.
In fight of both our battels, we may meet;
And either end in peace, which heav'n fo frame!
Or to the place of difference call the fwords
Which must decide it.

York. My Lord, we will do fo.

Please you, Lords,

[Exit Weft.

Mowb. There is a thing within my bofom tells me, That no conditions of our peace can stand.

Haft. Fear you not that: if we can make our peace Upon fuch large terms and fo abfolute,

As our conditions shall infift upon,

Our peace fhall ftand as firm as rocky mountains.
Mob. Ay, but our valuation fhall be fuch,
That ev'ry flight and falfe-derived cause,
Yea, ev'ry idle, nice and wanton reason,
Shall to the King taste of this action.
That, were our loyal faiths martyrs in love,
We shall be winnow'd with fo rough a wind,
That ev'n our corn fhall feem as light as chaff,
And good from bad find no partition.

York. No, no, my Lord, note this; the King is weary

Of

Of dainty and fuch picking grievances:
For he hath found, to end one doubt by death,
Revives two greater in the heirs of life.
And therefore will he wipe his tables clean,
And keep no tell-tale to his memory,
That may repeat and hiftory his lofs

To new remembrance. For full well he knows,
He cannot fo precifely weed this land,
As his mifdoubts present occafion :
His foes are fo enrooted with his friends,
That plucking to unfix an enemy

He doth unfaften fo and shake a friend.
So that this land, like an offenfive wife,
That hath enrag'd him on to offer strokes,
As he is ftriking, holds his infant up,
And hangs refolv'd correction in the arm
That was uprear'd to execution.

Haft. Befides, the King hath wafted all his rods
On late offenders, that he now doth lack
The very inftruments of chaftifement:

So that his pow'r, like to a fangless Lion,
May offer, but not hold.

York. 'Tis very true:

And therefore be affur'd, my good Lord Marshal,
If we do now make our atonement well,

Our peace will, like a broken limb united,

Grow ftronger for the breaking.

Mowb. Be it fo.

Here is return'd my Lord of Westmorland.

Enter Weftmorland.

Weft. The Prince is here at hand: pleaseth your Lordship To meet his Grace, juft diftance 'tween our armies? Mowb. Your Grace of York in God's name then fet for.

ward.

York. Before, and greet his Grace; my Lord, we come. SCENE IV.

Enter Prince John of Lancaster.

Lan. You're well encounter'd here, my coufin Mowbray; Good day to you, my gentle Lord Arch-bishop,

And

And fo to you, Lord Haftings, and to all!
My Lord of York, it better fhew'd with you,
When that your flock affembled by the bell
Encircled you, to hear with reverence
Your expofition on the holy text;
Than now to fee you here an iron man,
Cheering a rout of rebels with your drum,
Turning the word to sword, and life to death.
That man that fits within a monarch's heart,
And ripens in the fun-fhine of his favour,
Would he abuse the count'nance of the King,
Alack, what mischiefs might he fet abroach,
In fhadow of fuch greatnefs? With you, Lord Bishop,
It is ev'n fo. Who hath not heard it spoken,
How deep you were within the books of heav'n?
To us, the speaker in his parliament;

To us, th' imagin'd voice of heav'n it self;
The very opener, and intelligencer

Between the grace, the fanctities of heav'n,
And our dull workings. O, who shall believe
But you mifufe the rev'rence of your place,
Employ the countenance and grace of heav'n,
As a falfe favourite doth his Prince's name,
In deeds difhon'rable? you've taken up,
Under the counterfeited zeal of God,
The fubjects of his fubftitute, my father;
And both against the peace of heav'n and him
Have here up-fwarm'd them.

York. Good my Lord of Lancaster,

I am not here against your father's peace:
But, as I told my Lord of Weftmerland,
The time mif-order'd doth in common fenfe
Crowd us and crufh us to this monstrous form,
To hold our fafety up. I fent your Grace
The parcels and particulars of our grief,

The which hath been with fcorn fhov'd from the Court: Whereon this Hydra-fon of war is born,

Whofe dangerous eyes may well be charm'd asleep

With grant of our most just and right defire;
And true obedience, of this madness cur'd,

Stoop