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Eli. Thou unadviséd scold, I can produce A will that bars the title of thy son.

Const. Ay, who doubts that? A will! a wicked will;

A woman's will; a cankered grandam's will! K. Phi. Peace, lady; pause, or be more temperate:

It ill beseems this presence to cry aim

To these ill-tunéd repetitions.

Some trumpet summon hither to the walls
These men of Angiers: let us hear them speak,
Whose title they admit, Arthur's or John's.

Trumpets sound. Enter Citizens upon the walls. 1st Cit. Who is it that hath warned us to the walls?

K. Phi. "Tis France for England.

K. John.

England for itself.

You men of Angiers, and my loving subjects,— K. Phi. You loving men of Angiers, Arthur's subjects,

Our trumpet called you to this gentle parle,— K. John. For our advantage :—therefore, hear us, first.

These flags of France, that are advanced here
Before the eye and prospect of
your town,
Have hither marched to your endamagement:
The cannons have their bowels full of wrath,
And ready mounted are they to spit forth
Their iron indignation 'gainst your walls:
All preparation for a bloody siege

And merciless proceeding, by these French,
Confront your city's eyes, your winking gates;
And, but for our approach, those sleeping stones
That as a waist do girdle you about,
By the compulsion of their ordnance
By this time from their fixéd beds of lime
Had been dishabited, and wide havoc made
For bloody power to rush upon your peace.
But, on the sight of us, your lawful king,-
Who painfully, with much expedient march,
Have brought a countercheck before your gates,
To save unscratched your city's threatened cheeks,-
Behold, the French, amazed, vouchsafe a parle :
And now, instead of bullets wrapped in fire,
To make a shaking fever in your walls,
They shoot but calm words, folded up in smoke,
To make a faithless error in your ears:
Which trust accordingly, kind citizens,
And let us in, your king; whose laboured spirits,
Forwearied in this action of swift speed,
Crave harbourage within your city walls.

K. Phi. When I have said, make answer to us
both.

Lo, in this right hand, whose protection
Is most divinely vowed upon the right
Of him it holds, stands young Plantagenet;

your town:

Son to the elder brother of this man,
And king o'er him and all that he enjoys.
For this down-trodden equity, we tread
In warlike march these greens before
Being no further enemy to you,
Than the constraint of hospitable zeal,
In the relief of this oppressed child,
Religiously provokes. Be pleaséd, then,
To pay that duty which you truly owe,

To him that owes it; namely, this young prince :
And then our arms, like to a muzzled bear,
Save in aspéct, have all offence sealed up;
Our cannons' malice vainly shall be spent
Against the invulnerable clouds of heaven;
And, with a blessed and unvexed retire,
With unhacked swords and helmets all unbruised,
We will bear home that lusty blood again,
Which here we came to spout against your town,
And leave your children, wives, and you, in peace.
But if you fondly pass our proffered offer,
"Tis not the roundure of your old-faced walls
Can hide you from our messengers of war,
Though all these English and their discipline
Were harboured in their rude circumference.
Then tell us, shall your city call us lord,
In that behalf which we have challenged it;
Or shall we give the signal to our rage,
And stalk in blood to our possession?

1st Cit. In brief, we are the King of England's
subjects:

For him, and in his right, we hold this town. K. John. Acknowledge then the king, and let me in.

1st Cit. That can we not: but he that proves
the king

To him will we prove loyal: till that time
Have we rammed up our gates against the world.
K. John. Doth not the crown of England prove
the king?

And if not that, I bring you witnesses,
Twice fifteen thousand hearts of England's breed,-
Bast. Bastards and else.

K. John. To verify our title with their lives.
K. Phi. As many and as well-born bloods as

those,

Bast. Some bastards too.

K. Phi. Stand in his face, to contradict his claim. 1st Cit. Till you compound whose right is

worthiest,

We, for the worthiest, hold the right from both. K. John. Then God forgive the sin of all those souls

That to their everlasting residence,
Before the dew of evening fall, shall fleet,
In dreadful trial of our kingdom's king!

K. Phi. Amen, amen!-Mount, chevaliers :

to arms!

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Alarums and Excursions; then a Retreat. Enter
a French Herald, with trumpets, to the gates.
F. Her. You men of Angiers, open wide your
gates,

And let young Arthur, Duke of Bretagne, in;
Who, by the hand of France, this day hath made
Much work for tears in many an English mother,
Whose sons lie scattered on the bleeding ground:
Many a widow's husband grovelling lies,
Coldly embracing the discoloured earth;
And victory, with little loss, doth play
Upon the dancing banners of the French;
Who are at hand, triumphantly displayed,
To enter conquerors, and to proclaim
Arthur of Bretagne, England's king and yours.

Enter an English Herald, with trumpets. E. Her. Rejoice, you men of Angiers, ring your bells:

King John, your king and England's, doth approach,

Commander of this hot malicious day.

Their armours, that marched hence so silver

bright,

Hither return all gilt with Frenchmen's blood;
There stuck no plume in any English crest,
That is removed by a staff of France;
Our colours do return in those same hands
That did display them when we first marched forth;
And, like a jolly troop of huntsmen, come
Our lusty English, all with purpled hands,
Dyed in the dying slaughter of their foes:
Open your gates, and give the victors way.
Cit. Heralds, from off our towers we might
behold,

From first to last, the onset and retire
Of both your armies; whose equality
By our best eyes cannot be censured:
Blood hath bought blood, and blows have an-
swered blows;

Strength matched with strength, and power confronted power:

Both are alike; and both alike we like.

One must prove greatest: while they weigh so even, We hold our town for neither; yet for both. Enter, at one side, KING JOHN, with his power; ELINOR, BLANCH, and the Bastard; at the other, KING PHILIP, LEWIS, AUSTRIA, and Forces.

K. John. France, hast thou yet more blood to cast away?

Say, shall the current of our right run on? Whose passage, vexed with thy impediment, Shall leave his native channel, and o'er-swell With course disturbed even thy confining shores, Unless thou let his silver water keep

A peaceful progress to the ocean.

K. Phi. England, thou hast not saved one drop of blood,

In this hot trial, more than we of France:
Rather lost more. And by this hand I swear,
That sways the earth this climate overlooks,
Before we will lay down our just-borne arms
We'll put thee down, 'gainst whom these arms
we bear,

Or add a royal number to the dead:
Gracing the scroll that tells of this war's loss,
With slaughter coupled to the name of kings.

Bast. Ha, majesty, how high thy glory towers,
When the rich blood of kings is set on fire!
O, now doth death line his dead chaps with steel:
The swords of soldiers are his teeth, his fangs;
And now he feasts, mouthing the flesh of men,
In undetermined differences of kings.-
Why stand these royal fronts amazéd thus?
Cry havoc, Kings! back to the stained field,
You equal potents, fiery-kindled spirits!
Then let confusion of one part confirm
The other's peace: till then, blows, blood, and
death!

K. John. Whose party do the townsmen yet admit?

K. Phi. Speak, citizens, for England: who's your king?

1st Cit. The King of England, when we know the king.

K. Phi. Know him in us, that here hold up his right.

K. John. In us, that are our own great deputy, And bear possession of our person here: Lord of our presence, Angiers, and of you.

1st Cit. A greater power than we denies all this; And, till it be undoubted, we do lock

Our former scruple in our strong-barred gates:
Kinged of our fears; until our fears, resolved,
Be by some certain king purged and deposed.
Bast. By heaven, these scroyles of Angiers
flout you, Kings;

And stand securely on their battlements
As in a theatre, whence they gape and point
At your industrious scenes and acts of death.
Your royal presences be ruled by me:
Do like the mutines of Jerusalem;

Be friends awhile, and both conjointly bend
Your sharpest deeds of malice on this town:
By east and west let France and England mount
Their battering cannon, chargéd to the mouths,
Till their soul-fearing clamours have brawled down
The flinty ribs of this contemptuous city :
I'd play incessantly upon these jades,
Even till unfencéd desolation

Leave them as naked as the vulgar air.
That done, dissever your united strengths,
And part your mingled colours once again;
Turn face to face, and bloody point to point :
Then in a moment fortune shall cull forth
Out of one side her happy minion;

To whom in favour she shall give the day,
And kiss him with a glorious victory.
How like you this wild counsel, mighty states?
Smacks it not something of the policy?

K. John. Now, by the sky that hangs above our heads,

I like it well.-France, shall we knit our powers, And lay this Angiers even with the ground; Then, after, fight who shall be king of it?

Bast. And if thou hast the metal of a king, Being wronged as we are by this peevish town, Turn thou the mouth of thy artillery, As we will ours, against these saucy walls: And when that we have dashed them to the ground, Why then defy each other, and pell-mell Make work upon ourselves, for heaven or hell. K. Phi. Let it be so.-Say, where will you assault?

K. John. We from the west will send destruction Into this city's bosom.

Aust. I from the north. K. Phi. Our thunder from the south Shall rain their drift of bullets on this town. Bast. [aside]. O prudent discipline! From north to south,

Austria and France shoot in each other's mouth: I'll stir them to it.-Come, away, away! 1st Cit. Hear us, great Kings: vouchsafe awhile

to stay,

And I shall shew you peace and fair-faced league; Win you this city without stroke or wound;

Rescue those breathing lives to die in beds,
That here come sacrifices for the field.
Perséver not, but hear me, mighty Kings.
K. John. Speak on, with favour: we are bent
to hear.

1st Cit. That daughter there of Spain, the lady Blanch,

Is near to England: look upon the years
Of Lewis the Dauphin, and that lovely maid.
If lusty love should go in quest of beauty,
Where should he find it fairer than in Blanch?
If zealous love should go in search of virtue,
Where should he find it purer than in Blanch?
If love ambitious sought a match of birth,
Whose veins bound richer blood than lady Blanch?
Such as she is, in beauty, virtue, birth,
Is the young Dauphin every way complete:
If not complete, O say he is not she :
And she again wants nothing, to name want,
If want it be not that she is not he:
He is the half part of a blesséd man,
Left to be finishéd by such a she;
And she a fair divided excellence,
Whose fulness of perfection lies in him.
O, two such silver currents, when they join,
Do glorify the banks that bound them in :
And two such shores to two such streams made

one,

Two such controlling bounds, shall you be, Kings,
To these two princes, if you marry them.
This union shall do more than battery can
To our fast-closed gates: for at this match,
With swifter spleen than powder can enforce,
The mouth of passage shall we fling wide ope,
And give you entrance: but without this match,
The sea enragéd is not half so deaf,

Lions more confident, mountains and rocks
More free from motion; no, not death himself
In mortal fury half so peremptory,
As we to keep this city.

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Give with our niece a dowry large enough:
For by this knot thou shalt so surely tie
Thy now unsured assurance to the crown,
That yon green boy shall have no sun to ripe
The bloom that promiseth a mighty fruit.
I see a yielding in the looks of France:
Mark how they whisper: urge them while their
souls

Are capable of this ambition:

Lest zeal, now melted, by the windy breath
Of soft petitions, pity, and remorse,

Cool and congeal again to what it was.

1st Cit. Why answer not the double majesties This friendly treaty of our threatened town? K. Phi. Speak England first, that hath been forward first

To speak unto this city. What say you?
K. John. If that the Dauphin there, thy princely

son,

Can in this book of beauty read " I love,”
Her dowry shall weigh equal with a queen:
For Anjou, and fair Touraine, Maine, Poictiers,

And all that we upon this side the sea
(Except this city now by us besieged)
Find liable to our crown and dignity,
Shall gild her bridal bed; and make her rich
In titles, honours, and promotions,
As she in beauty, education, blood,
Holds hand with any princess of the world.
K. Phi. What sayst thou, boy? look in the
lady's face.

Lew. I do, my lord, and in her eye I find
A wonder or a wondrous miracle,
The shadow of myself formed in her eye;
Which, being but the shadow of your son,
Becomes a sun, and makes your son a shadow.
I do protest I never loved myself

Till now infixéd I beheld myself,
Drawn in the flattering table of her eye.

[Whispers with BLANCH. Bast. Drawn in the flattering table of her eye! Hanged in the frowning wrinkle of her brow! And quartered in her heart!-he doth espy

Himself love's traitor. This is pity now, That hanged, and drawn, and quartered, there should be,

In such a love, so vile a lout as he.

Blanch. My uncle's will in this respect is mine: If he see aught in you that makes him like, That anything he sees which moves his liking I can with ease translate it to my will: Or if you will, to speak more properly,

I will enforce it easily to my love. Further I will not flatter you, my lord, That all I see in you is worthy love, Than this, that nothing do I see in you (Though churlish thoughts themselves should be your judge)

That I can find should merit any hate.

K. John. What say these young ones? What say you, my niece?

Blanch. That she is bound in honour still to do What you in wisdom still vouchsafe to say.

K. John. Speak then, prince Dauphin; can you love this lady?

Lew. Nay, ask me if I can refrain from love; For I do love her most unfeignedly.

K. John. Then do I give Volquessen, Touraine,
Maine,

Poictiers and Anjou, these five provinces,
With her to thee; and this addition more,
Full thirty thousand marks of English coin.-
Philip of France, if thou be pleased withal,
Command thy son and daughter to join hands.
K. Phi. It likes us well.-Young princes, close
your hands.

Aust. And your lips too; for I am well assured That I did so, when I was first assured.

K. Phi. Now, citizens of Angiers, ope your gates,

Let in that amity, which you have made;
For at Saint Mary's chapel, presently,
The rites of marriage shall be solemnised.-
Is not the lady Constance in this troop?
I know she is not; for this match made up
Her presence would have interrupted much.
Where is she and her son? tell me, who knows.
Lew. She is sad and passionate at your high-

ness' tent.

K. Phi. And, by my faith, this league that we have made

Will give her sadness very little cure.-
Brother of England, how may we content
This widow lady? In her right we came;
Which we, God knows, have turned another way,
To our own vantage.

K. John. We will heal up all,
For we 'll create young Arthur Duke of Bretagne
And Earl of Richmond; and this rich fair town
We make him lord of.—Call the lady Constance :

Some speedy messenger bid her repair
To our solemnity.--I trust we shall,
If not fill up the measure of her will,
Yet in some measure satisfy her so
That we shall stop her exclamation.
Go we, as well as haste will suffer us,
To this unlooked for unprepared pomp.

[Exeunt all but the Bastard.-The Citizens
retire from the walls.

Bast. Mad world! mad kings! mad composition!
John, to stop Arthur's title in the whole,
Hath willingly departed with a part:
And France (whose armour conscience buckled on;
Whom zeal and charity brought to the field,
As God's own soldier!), rounded in the ear
With that same purpose-charger, that sly devil;
That broker, that still breaks the pate of faith;
That daily break-vow; he that wins of all,
Of kings, of beggars, old men, young men, maids
(Who having no external thing to lose
But the word maid,-cheats the poor maid of that);
That smooth-faced gentleman, tickling commo-
dity,—

Commodity, the bias of the world;
The world, who of itself is peiséd well,
Made to run even, upon even ground,
Till this advantage, this vile drawing bias,
This sway of motion, this commodity,
Makes it take head from all indifferency,
From all direction, purpose, course, intent:-
And this same bias, this commodity,
This bawd, this broker, this all-changing word,
Clapped on the outward eye of fickle France,
Hath drawn him from his own determined aid,
From a resolved and honourable war,
To a most base and vile-concluded peace.-
And why rail I on this commodity

But for because he hath not wooed me yet?
Not that I have the power to clutch my hand
When his fair angels would salute my palm;
But for my hand, as unattempted yet,
Like a poor beggar, raileth on the rich.
Well, whiles I am a beggar I will rail,
And say there is no sin but to be rich;
And being rich, my virtue then shall be
say there is no vice but beggary.
Such kings break faith upon commodity,
Gain, be my lord! for I will worship thee. [Exit.

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