Have chid me from the battle; fwearing both,
They profper beft of all when I am thence.
Would I were dead, if God's good will were fo:
For what is in this world but grief and woe?
O God! methinks, it were a happy life
To be no better than a homely fwain ;
To fit upon a hill, as I do now,
To carve out dials queintly, point by point,
Thereby to fee the minutes how they run:
How many makes the hour full compleat,
How many hours bring about the day,
How many days will finish up the year,
How many years a mortal man may live.
When this is known, then to divide the time;
So many hours, muft I tend my flock;
So many hours, muft I take my reft;
So many hours, muft I contemplate;
So many hours, muft I sport myself;
So many days, my ewes have been with young;
So many weeks, ere the poor fools will yean;
So many months, ere I fhall fhear the fleece :
So minutes, hours, days, weeks, months and years,
Paft over, to the end they were created,
Would bring white hairs unto a quiet grave.
Ah! what a life were this! how fweet, how lovely!
Gives not the haw-thorn bush a sweeter shade
To fhepherds looking on their filly fheep,
Than doth a rich-embroider'd canopy
To Kings, that fear their fubjects treachery?
O, yes, it doth ; a thoufand-fold it doth.
And to conclude, the fhepherd's homely curds,
His cold thin drink out of his leather bottle,
His wonted fleep under a fresh tree's shade,
All which fecure and fweetly he enjoys,
Is far beyond a Prince's delicates,
His viands fparkling in a golden cup,
His body couched in a curious bed,
When care, miftrust and treasons wait on him.
Alarum. Enter a Son, that had kill'd his Father.
Son. Ill blows the wind, that profits no body.
This man, whom hand to hand I flew in fight,
May be poffeffed with fome ftore of crowns;
And I that, haply, take them from him now,
May yet, ere night, yield both my life and them
To fome man elfe, as this dead man doth me.
Who's this! oh God! it is my father's face,
Whom in this conflict I unwares have kill'd:
Oh heavy times, begetting fuch events!
From London by the King was I preft forth;
My father, being the Earl of Warwick's man,
Came on the part of York, preft by his master
And I, who at his hands receiv'd my life,
Have by my hands of life bereaved him.
Pardon me, God, I knew not what I did:
And pardon, father, for I knew not thee.
My tears fhall wipe away thefe bloody marks:
And no more words, till they have flow'd their fill.
K. Henry. O piteous fpectacle! O bloody times!
Whiles lions war and battle for their dens,
Poor harmless lambs abide their enmity.
Weep, wretched man, I'll aid thee tear for tear;
And let our hearts and eyes, like civil war,
Be blind with tears, and break o'er charg'd with grief.
Enter a Father, bearing his Son.
Fath. Thou, that fo ftoutly haft refifted me,
Give me thy gold, if thou haft any gold:
For I have bought it with an hundred blows.
But let me fee is this our foe-man's face?
Ah, no, no, no, it is my only fon!/
Ah, boy, if any life be left in thee,
Throw up thine eyes; fee, fee, what fhowers arife,
Blown with the windy tempeft of my heart
Upon thy wounds, that kill mine eye and heart.
O pity, God, this miferable age!
What ftratagems, how fell, how butcherly,
Erroneous, mutinous, and unnatural,
This deadly quarrel daily doth beget!
O boy! thy father gave thee life too foon,
And hath bereft thee of thy life too late.
K. Henry. Woe above woe; grief, more than common
that my death would stay these rueful deeds!
O pity, pity, gentle heaven, pity!
The red rofe and the white are on his face,
The fatal colours of our ftriving houses.
The one his purple blood right well refembles,
The other his pale cheek, methinks, prefenteth:
Wither one rofe, and let the other flourish!
If you contend, a thousand lives must wither.
Son. How will my mother, for a father's death,
Take on with me, and ne'er be fatisfy'd?
Fath. How will my wife, for flaughter of my fon,
Shed feas of tears, and ne'er be fatisfy'd? [chances,
K. Henry. How will the country, for thefe woeful
Mif-think the King, and not be fatisfy'd?
Son. Was ever fon, fo ru'd a father's death?
Fath. Was ever father, fo bemoan'd his fon?
K. Henry. Was ever King, fo griev'd for fubjects woe?
Much is your forrow; mine, ten times fo much.
Son. I'll bear thee hence, where I may weep my fill.
[Exit.
Fath. Thefe arms of mine fhall be thy winding-sheet,
My heart, fweet boy, fhall be thy fepulcher;
For from my heart thine image ne'er fhall go.
My fighing breast shall be thy funeral bell:
And fo obfequious will thy father be,
Sad for the fofs of thee, having no more,
As Priam was for all his valiant fons.
I'll bear thee hence, and let them fight that will;
For I have murder'd, where 1 fhould not kill.
K. Henry. Sad-hearted men, much overgone with care;
Here fits a King more woeful than you are.
Alarums. Excurfions. Enter the Queen, Prince of Wales,
Prince. Fly, father, fly, for all your friends are fled;
And Warwick rages like a chafed bull:
Away! for death doth hold us in purfuit,
Queen.Mount you, my Lord, towards Berwick poft amain. Edvard and Richard, like a brace of grey-hounds Having the fearful flying hare in fight, With fiery eyes fparkling for very wrath, And bloody fteel grafpt in their ireful hands, Are at our backs; and therefore hence amain. Exe. Away; for vengeance comes along with them. Nay, ftay not to expoftulate, make speed: Or elfe come after, I'll away before.
K. Henry. Nay, take me with thee, good fweet Exeter; Not that I fear to ftay, but love to go
Whither the Queen intends. Forward, away! [Exeunt. A loud Alarum. Enter Clifford wounded. (12)
Clif. Here burns my candle out; ay, here it dies,
Which, while it lafted, gave King Henry light.
O Lancaster! I fear thy overthrow,
More than my body's parting with my foul.
My love and fear glew'd many friends to thee; [Falling
And, now I fall, thy tough commixtures melt,
Impairing Henry, ftrengthning mif-proud York.
The common people fwarm like fummer flies; (13)
(12) Enter Clifford wounded.] In the 1st quarto, there is this circumstance added; Enter Clifford wounded, with an arrow in his neck. The players, in their edition, had reason to make a retrenchment of this; for, no doubt, 'twas a point of ridicule to fee an actor come upon the ftage to die, with an arrow fixt in his neck. And this paffage I find rallied by Beaumont and Fletcher in their Knight of the Burning Peftle. For Ralph, the grocer's prentice, is there introduc`d, with a forked arrow through his head; and makes a long burlesque harangue in a bantering imitation of Clifford's fpeech here. Take a fhort fample of his laft dying words.
Farewel, all you good boys in merry London,
Ne'er fhall we more upon Shrove-tuesday meet,
And pluck down houfes of iniquity.
My pain encreaseth :-I fhall never more
Hold open, whilft another pumps both legs;
Nor daub a fattin gown with rotten eggs.
Set up a flake, oh, never more I fhall;
I die: fly, fly, my foul, to Grocer's-Hall.
(13) The common people fwarm like fummer flies.] This line, which is a neceffary introduction to that which follows, and which is left ⚫ut in all the other impreffions, I have reftor'd from the old quarto.
And whither fly the gnats, but to the fun?
And who fhines now, but Henry's enemies?
O Phoebus! hadst thou never giv'n consent
That Phaeton fhould check thy fiery fteeds,
Thy burning car had never fcorch'd the earth;
And Henry, hadft thou sway'd as Kings should do,
Or as thy father and his father did,
Giving no ground unto the house of York,
They never then had fprung like fummer flies.
I, and ten thousand in this lucklefs realm,
Had left no mourning widows for our death;
And thou this day hadft kept thy chair in peace.
For what doth cherish weeds, but gentle air?
And what makes robbers bold, but too much lenity?
Bootlefs are plaints, and cureless are my wounds;
No way to fly, nor ftrength to hold out flight:
The foe is mercilefs, and will not pity:
For at their hands I have deferv'd no pity.
The air hath got into my deadly wounds,
And much effufe of blood doth make me faint:
Come York, and Richard; Warwick, and the reft;
I ftabb'd your fathers 'bofoms; fplit my breaft.
[He faints. Alarum, and Retreat. Enter Edward, Warwick, Richard, Montague, Clarence, and Soldiers.
Edw. Now breathe we, Lords, good fortune bids us paufe;
And fmooth the frowns of war with peaceful looks.
Some troops pursue the bloody-minded Queen,
That led calm Henry, though he were a King,
As doth a fail, fill'd with a fretting guft,
Command an argofy to ftem the waves.
But think you, Lords, that Clifford fled with them?
War. No, 'tis impoffible he fhould escape:
For though before his face I fpeak the word,
Your brother Richard mark'd him for the grave;
And wherefoe'er he is, he's furely dead.
Rich. Whofe foul is that, which takes her heavy leave?
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