K. Hen. Worcester, get thee gone, for I do see Danger and disobedience in thine eye.

O, sir, your presence is too bold and peremptory,
And majesty might never yet endure

The moody frontier1 of a servant brow.

You have good leave to leave us; when we need
Your use and counsel, we shall send for you.

You were about to speak.

North.

[Exit Worcester.

[to Northumberland.

Yea, my good lord.

Those prisoners, in your highness' name demanded,
Which Harry Percy here at Holmedon took,
Were, as he says, not with such strength denied
As is deliver'd to your majesty.

Either envy, therefore, or misprision

Is guilty of this fault, and not my son.
Hot. My liege, I did deny no prisoners.
But, I remember, when the fight was done,
When I was dry with rage and extreme toil,
Breathless and faint, leaning upon my sword,
Came there a certain lord, neat, trimly dress'd,
Fresh as a bridegroom; and his chin, new reap'd,
Show'd like a stubble land at harvest-home.
He was perfumed like a milliner;

And, 'twixt his finger and his thumb, he held
A pouncet-box, which ever and anon

He

gave his nose, and took 't away again ;Who, therewith angry, when it next came there,

1 Forehead.

2 A small box for perfumes.

Took it in snuff: 1-and still he smiled, and talk'd ;
And, as the soldiers bore dead bodies by,

He call'd them-untaught knaves, unmannerly,
To bring a slovenly unhandsome corse
Betwixt the wind and his nobility.

With many holyday and lady terms

He question'd me; among the rest, demanded
My prisoners, in your majesty's behalf.

I then, all smarting, with my wounds being cold,
To be so pester'd with a popinjay,2

3

Out of my grief and my impatience,

Answer'd neglectingly, I know not what ;

He should, or he should not ;-for he made me mad, To see him shine so brisk, and smell so sweet,

And talk so like a waiting-gentlewoman,

Of guns, and drums, and wounds, (God save the

mark!)

And telling me, the sovereign'st thing on earth
Was parmaceti for an inward bruise;

And that it was great pity, so it was,
That villanous saltpetre should be digg'd
Out of the bowels of the harmless earth,
Which many a good tall fellow had destroy'd
So cowardly; and, but for these vile guns,
He would himself have been a soldier.
This bald, unjointed chat of his, my lord,
I answer'd indirectly, as I said:

1 Snuff is equivocally used for anger, and a powder taken up the nose.

2 Parrot.

3 Pain.

And, I beseech you, let not his report
Come current for an accusation

Betwixt my love and your high majesty.

Blunt. The circumstance consider'd, good my lord,

Whatever Harry Percy then had said,
To such a person, and in such a place,
At such a time, with all the rest retold,
May reasonably die, and never rise
To do him wrong, or any way impeach
What then he said, so he unsay it now.

K. Hen. Why, yet he doth deny his prisoners; But with proviso, and exception,

That we, at our own charge, shall ransom straight
His brother-in-law, the foolish Mortimer;

Who, on my soul, hath wilfully betray'd
The lives of those, that he did lead to fight
Against the great magician, damn'd Glendower;
Whose daughter, as we hear, the earl of March
Hath lately married. Shall our coffers then
Be emptied, to redeem a traitor home?
Shall we buy treason, and indent1 with fears,
When they have lost and forfeited themselves?
No, on the barren mountains let him starve ;
For I shall never hold that man my friend,
Whose tongue shall ask me for one penny cost
To ransom home revolted Mortimer.

Hot. Revolted Mortimer!

1 Sign an indenture or compact.

He never did fall off, my sovereign liege,

But by the chance of war;-to prove that true,

Needs no more but one tongue for all those wounds,
Those mouthed wounds, which valiantly he took,
When, on the gentle Severn's sedgy bank,
In single opposition, hand to hand,

He did confound1 the best part of an hour

In changing hardiment with great Glendower. Three times they breathed, and three times did they drink,

Upon agreement, of swift Severn's flood;

Who then, affrighted with their bloody looks,
Ran fearfully among the trembling reeds,
And hid his crisp 3 head in the hollow bank,
Blood-stained with these valiant combatants.
Never did bare and rotten policy

Color her working with such deadly wounds;
Nor never could the noble Mortimer
Receive so many, and all willingly.

Then let him not be slander'd with revolt.

K. Hen. Thou dost belie him, Percy, thou dost

belie him.

He never did encounter with Glendower;

I tell thee,

He durst as well have met the devil alone,

As Owen Glendower for an enemy.

Art thou not ashamed? But, sirrah, henceforth

Let me not hear you speak of Mortimer :

Expend.

2 Bravery, stoutness.

• Curled.

Send me your prisoners with the speediest means,
Or you shall hear in such a kind from me
As will displease you. My lord Northumberland,
We license your departure with your son.
Send us your prisoners, or you'll hear of it.

[Exeunt King Henry, Blunt, and Train. Hot. And if the devil come and roar for them, I will not send them. I will after straight, And tell him so; for I will ease my heart, Although it be with hazard of my head.

North. What, drunk with choler? stay, and pause awhile;

Here comes your uncle.

Hot.

Re-enter Worcester.

Speak of Mortimer ?

Zounds, I will speak of him; and let my soul
Want mercy, if I do not join with him :

Yea, on his part, I'll empty all these veins,

And shed my dear blood drop by drop i' the dust,
But I will lift the down-trod Mortimer

As high i' the air as this unthankful king,
As this ingrate and canker'd Bolingbroke.

North. Brother, the king hath made your nephew

mad. [to Worcester. Wor. Who struck this heat up after I was gone? Hot. He will, forsooth, have all my prisoners;

And when I urged the ransom once again

Of my wife's brother, then his cheek look'd pale ;
And on my face he turn'd an eye of death,