SCENE changes to the Palace.

Enter the Queen, Lord Rivers, and Lord Gray. Riv.TTAVE patience, Madam, there's no doubt, his Majesty

HAV

Will foon recover his accuftom'd health.

Gray. In that you brook it ill, it makes him worse;
Therefore, for God's fake, entertain good comfort,
And cheer his Grace with quick and merry eyes.
Queen. If he were dead, what would betide of me?
Gray. No other harm, but lofs of fuch a Lord.
Queen. The lofs of fuch a Lord includes all harms.
Gray. The heav'ns have bleft you with a goodly fon,
To be your comforter when he is gone.

Queen. Ah! he is young, and his minority
Is put into the truft of Richard Glo'fter,
A man that loves not me, nor none of you.
Riv. Is it concluded, he fhall be Protector?
Queen. It is determin'd, not concluded yet:
But fo it must be, if the King miscarry.

Enter Buckingham and Stanley.

Gray. Here come the Lords of Buckingham and Stanley.(5) Buck. Good time of day unto your royal Grace! Stan. God make your Majefty joyful as you have been! Queen. The Countefs Richmond, good my Lord of Stanley, To your good pray'r will fcarcely fay, amen;

(5) Here come the Lords of Buckingham and Derby.] This is a blunder of inadvertence, which has run thro' the whole chain of im-preffions. It could not well be original in Shake care, who was moft minutely intimate with his history and the intermarriages of the nobility. The perfon, here called Derby, was Thomas Lord Stanley, Lord Steward of King Edward the IVth's houfhold. He had married Margaret daughter of John Duke of Somerfet, and widow of Edmund Earl of Richmond, by whom the had Henry Earl of Richmond, afterwards King Henry VIIth. But this Thomas Lord Stanley was not created Earl of Derby till after the acceffion of that Prince; and, accordingly, afterwards in the fourth or fifth Acts of this Play, before the battle of Bofworth-field, he is every where call'd Lord Stanley. This fufficiently juftifies the change I have made in his title.

Yet,

Yet, Stanley, notwithstanding fhe's your wife,
And loves not me, be you, good Lord, affur'd,
I hate not you for her proud arrogance.

Stanley. I do befeech you, either not believe
The envious flanders of her falfe accufers:
Or, if she be accus'd on true report,

Bear with her weakness; which, I think, proceeds.
From wayward fickness, and no grounded malice.
Queen. Saw you the King to-day, my Lord of Stanley?
Stanley. But now the Duke of Buckingham and I
Are come from vifiting his Majesty.

Queen. What likelihood of his amendment, Lords?
Buck. Madam, good hope; his Grace fpeaks chearfully.
Queen. God grant him health! did you confer with him?
Buck. Madam we did; he seeks to make atonement
Between the Duke of Glofter and your brothers,
And between them and my Lord Chamberlain ;
And fent to warn them to his royal prefence.

Queen. Would all were well-but that will never be I fear, our happiness is at the height.

Enter Glocefter.

Glo. They do me wrong, and I will not endure it.
Who are they, that complain unto the King,
That I, forfooth, am ftern, and love them not
By holy Paul, they love his Grace but lightly,
That all his ears with fuch diffentious rumours.
Because I cannot flatter, and look fair,
Smile in men's faces, fmooth, deceive and cog,
Duck with French nods, and apish courtesy,
I must be held a rancorous enemy.

Cannot a plain man live and think no harm,
But thus his fimple truth must be abus'd
By filken, fly, infinuating Jacks ?

Gray. To whom in all this prefence fpeaks your Grace?
Glo. To thee, that haft nor honefty, nor grace:
When have I injur'd thee? when done thee wrong?
Or thee? or thee? or any of your faction?
A plague upon you all! his royal perfon,
Whom God preferve better than you would wish,

Cannot

Cannot be quiet fcarce a breathing while,

But you must trouble him with lewd complaints.
Queen. Brother of Glo'fter, you mistake the matter:
The King of his own royal difpofition,

And not provok'd by any fuitor elfe,
(Aiming, belike, at your interior hatred,
That in your outward action fhews itself
Against my children, brothers, and myself;)
Makes him to fend, that he may learn the ground
Of your ill will, and thereby to remove it.

Glo. I cannot tell; the world is grown fo bad, That wrens make prey, where eagles dare not perch. Since every Jack became a gentleman,

There's many a gentle perfon made a Jack.

Queen. Come, come, we know your meaning, brother Gio'fter.

You envy my advancement and my friends:

God grant, we never may have need of you!

Glo. Mean time, God grants that we have need of you. Our brother is impritoned by your means;

Myfelf difgrac'd; and the nobility

Held in contempt; while many fair promotions

Are daily given to ennoble thofe,

That fcarce, fome two days fince, were worth a noble. Queen. By him, that rais'd me to this careful height, From that contented hap which I enjoy'd,

I never did incenfe his Majefty

Against the Duke of Clarence; but have been

An earnest advocate to plead for him.

My Lord, you do me fhameful injury,

Falfely to draw me in these wild fufpects.

Glo. You may deny, that you were not the caufe

Of my Lord Haftings' late imprisonment.

Riv. She may, my Lord, for

Glo. She may, Lord Rivers-why, who knows not fo?

She may do more, Sir, than denying that:

She may help you to many fair preferments,
And then deny her aiding hand therein,
And lay those honours on your high deserts.

What may she not? the may-ay, marry, may fhe

Riv. What, marry, may fhe?

Glo. What, marry, may fhe? marry with a King, A batchelor, a handfom ftripling too :

I wis, your grandam had a worfer match.

Queen. My Lord of Glofter, I have too long borne Your blunt upbraidings, and your bitter fcoffs; By heav'n, I will acquaint his Majefty, Of thofe grofs taunts I often have endur'd. I had rather be a country fervant-maid, Than a great Queen with this condition; To be thus taunted, fcorn'd and baited at. Small joy have I in being England's Queen. Enter Queen Margaret.

Q. Mar. And leffen'd be that small, God, I beseech Thy honour, ftate, and feat is due to me.

[thee! Glo. What! threat you me with telling of the King? Tell him, and fpare not: Look, what I have faid, (6) I will avouch in prefence of the King:

'Tis time to speak, my pains are quite forgot.

Q. Mar. Out, devil! I remember them too well: Thou kill'dft my hufband Henry in the Tower, And Edward, my poor fon, at Tewksbury.

Glo. Ere you were Queen, ay, or your husband King, I was a pack-horfe in his great affairs; A weeder out of his proud adverfaries,

A liberal rewarder of his friends;

To royalize his blood, I fpilt mine own.

Q.Mar. Ay, and much better blood than his or thine. Glo. In all which time you and your hufband Gray Were factious for the house of Lancaster ;

And, Rivers, fo were you;-was not your husband,
In Margret's battle, at St. Albans flain ?

Let me put in your minds, if you forget,
What you have been ere now, and what you are;

(6) Tell him, and Spare not: Look, what I have faid,] This verfe, which was at firft left out by the players in their impreflion (in which the modern editors have follow'd them) I have reftor'd from the old quarto's; and, indeed, without it, the verfe, which immediately) follows, is hardly fenfe.

Withal,

Withal, what I have been, and what I am.

Q. Mar. A murd'rous villain, and fo ftill thou art. Glo. Poor Clarence did forfake his father Warwick, Ay, and forfwore himfelf, (which, Jefu, pardon!-) Q. Mar. Which God revenge!

Glo. To fight on Edward's party for the crown; And for his meed, poor Lord, he is mew'd up: I would to God, my heart were flint, like Edward's ; Or Edward's foft and pitiful, like mine;

I am too childish-foolish for this world.

Q. Mar. Hiethee to hell for fhame, and leave this world, Thou cacodæmon! there thy kingdom is.

Riv. My Lord of Glo'fler, in thofe bufy days,
Which here you urge to prove us enemies,
We follow'd then our Lord, our lawful King;
So fhould we you, if you should be our King.
Gl. If I fhould be!-I had rather be a pedlar;
Far be it from my heart, the thought thereof.

Queen. As little joy, my Lord, as you fuppofe
You should enjoy, were you this country's King;
As little joy you may fuppofe in me,

That I enjoy, being the Queen thereof.

Q. Mar. A little joy enjoys the Queen thereof; For I am fhe, and altogether joyless.

I can no longer hold me patient.

Hear me, you wrangling pirates, that fall out
In fharing that which you have pill'd from me;
Which of you trembles not, that looks on me?
If not that I being Queen, you bow like fubjects;
Yet that by you depos'd, you quake like rebels.
Ah, gentle villain, do not turn away!

Glo. Foul wrinkled witch, what mak'ft thou in my fight?
Q. Mar. But repetition of what thou haft marr'd,
That will I make, before I let thee go.
A husband and a fon thou ow'ft to me;
And thou, a kingdom; all of you, allegiance;

[To Glo.

[To the Queen.

The forrow, that I have, by right is yours;
And all the pleasures, you ufurp, are mine.
Glo. The curfe my noble father laid on thee,

When