Complete Plays, The (229 page)

Falstaff

My lord, I beseech you, give me leave to go
Through Gloucestershire: and, when you come to court,
Stand my good lord, pray, in your good report.

Lancaster

Fare you well, Falstaff: I, in my condition,
Shall better speak of you than you deserve.

Exeunt all but Falstaff

Falstaff

I would you had but the wit: ’twere better than your dukedom. Good faith, this same young sober- blooded boy doth not love me; nor a man cannot make him laugh; but that’s no marvel, he drinks no wine. There’s never none of these demure boys come to any proof; for thin drink doth so over-cool their blood, and making many fish-meals, that they fall into a kind of male green-sickness; and then when they marry, they get wenches: they are generally fools and cowards; which some of us should be too, but for inflammation. A good sherris sack hath a two-fold operation in it. It ascends me into the brain; dries me there all the foolish and dull and curdy vapours which environ it; makes it apprehensive, quick, forgetive, full of nimble fiery and delectable shapes, which, delivered o’er to the voice, the tongue, which is the birth, becomes excellent wit. The second property of your excellent sherris is, the warming of the blood; which, before cold and settled, left the liver white and pale, which is the badge of pusillanimity and cowardice; but the sherris warms it and makes it course from the inwards to the parts extreme: it illumineth the face, which as a beacon gives warning to all the rest of this little kingdom, man, to arm; and then the vital commoners and inland petty spirits muster me all to their captain, the heart, who, great and puffed up with this retinue, doth any deed of courage; and this valour comes of sherris. So that skill in the weapon is nothing without sack, for that sets it a-work; and learning a mere hoard of gold kept by a devil, till sack commences it and sets it in act and use. Hereof comes it that Prince Harry is valiant; for the cold blood he did naturally inherit of his father, he hath, like lean, sterile and bare land, manured, husbanded and tilled with excellent endeavour of drinking good and good store of fertile sherris, that he is become very hot and valiant. If I had a thousand sons, the first humane principle I would teach them should be, to forswear thin potations and to addict themselves to sack.

Enter Bardolph

How now Bardolph?

Bardolph

The army is discharged all and gone.

Falstaff

Let them go. I’ll through Gloucestershire; and there will I visit Master Robert Shallow, esquire: I have him already tempering between my finger and my thumb, and shortly will I seal with him. Come away.

Exeunt

S
CENE
IV. W
ESTMINSTER
. T
HE
J
ERUSALEM
C
HAMBER
.

Enter King Henry IV, the Princes Thomas of Clarence and Humphrey of Gloucester, Warwick, and others

King Henry IV

Now, lords, if God doth give successful end
To this debate that bleedeth at our doors,
We will our youth lead on to higher fields
And draw no swords but what are sanctified.
Our navy is address’d, our power collected,
Our substitutes in absence well invested,
And every thing lies level to our wish:
Only, we want a little personal strength;
And pause us, till these rebels, now afoot,
Come underneath the yoke of government.

Warwick

Both which we doubt not but your majesty
Shall soon enjoy.

King Henry IV

 
Humphrey, my son of Gloucester,
Where is the prince your brother?

Gloucester

I think he’s gone to hunt, my lord, at Windsor.

King Henry IV

And how accompanied?

Gloucester

I do not know, my lord.

King Henry IV

Is not his brother, Thomas of Clarence, with him?

Gloucester

No, my good lord; he is in presence here.

Clarence

What would my lord and father?

King Henry IV

Nothing but well to thee, Thomas of Clarence.
How chance thou art not with the prince thy brother?
He loves thee, and thou dost neglect him, Thomas;
Thou hast a better place in his affection
Than all thy brothers: cherish it, my boy,
And noble offices thou mayst effect
Of mediation, after I am dead,
Between his greatness and thy other brethren:
Therefore omit him not; blunt not his love,
Nor lose the good advantage of his grace
By seeming cold or careless of his will;
For he is gracious, if he be observed:
He hath a tear for pity and a hand
Open as day for melting charity:
Yet notwithstanding, being incensed, he’s flint,
As humorous as winter and as sudden
As flaws congealed in the spring of day.
His temper, therefore, must be well observed:
Chide him for faults, and do it reverently,
When thou perceive his blood inclined to mirth;
But, being moody, give him line and scope,
Till that his passions, like a whale on ground,
Confound themselves with working. Learn this, Thomas,
And thou shalt prove a shelter to thy friends,
A hoop of gold to bind thy brothers in,
That the united vessel of their blood,
Mingled with venom of suggestion —
As, force perforce, the age will pour it in —
Shall never leak, though it do work as strong
As aconitum or rash gunpowder.

Clarence

I shall observe him with all care and love.

King Henry IV

Why art thou not at Windsor with him, Thomas?

Clarence

He is not there to-day; he dines in London.

King Henry IV

And how accompanied? canst thou tell that?

Clarence

With Poins, and other his continual followers.

King Henry IV

Most subject is the fattest soil to weeds;
And he, the noble image of my youth,
Is overspread with them: therefore my grief
Stretches itself beyond the hour of death:
The blood weeps from my heart when I do shape
In forms imaginary the unguided days
And rotten times that you shall look upon
When I am sleeping with my ancestors.
For when his headstrong riot hath no curb,
When rage and hot blood are his counsellors,
When means and lavish manners meet together,
O, with what wings shall his affections fly
Towards fronting peril and opposed decay!

Warwick

My gracious lord, you look beyond him quite:
The prince but studies his companions
Like a strange tongue, wherein, to gain the language,
’Tis needful that the most immodest word
Be look’d upon and learn’d; which once attain’d,
Your highness knows, comes to no further use
But to be known and hated. So, like gross terms,
The prince will in the perfectness of time
Cast off his followers; and their memory
Shall as a pattern or a measure live,
By which his grace must mete the lives of others,
Turning past evils to advantages.

King Henry IV

’Tis seldom when the bee doth leave her comb
In the dead carrion.

Enter Westmoreland

Who’s here? Westmoreland?

Westmoreland

Health to my sovereign, and new happiness
Added to that that I am to deliver!
Prince John your son doth kiss your grace’s hand:
Mowbray, the Bishop Scroop, Hastings and all
Are brought to the correction of your law;
There is not now a rebel’s sword unsheath’d
But peace puts forth her olive every where.
The manner how this action hath been borne
Here at more leisure may your highness read,
With every course in his particular.

King Henry IV

O Westmoreland, thou art a summer bird,
Which ever in the haunch of winter sings
The lifting up of day.

Enter Harcourt

Look, here’s more news.

Harcourt

From enemies heaven keep your majesty;
And, when they stand against you, may they fall
As those that I am come to tell you of!
The Earl Northumberland and the Lord Bardolph,
With a great power of English and of Scots
Are by the sheriff of Yorkshire overthrown:
The manner and true order of the fight
This packet, please it you, contains at large.

King Henry IV

And wherefore should these good news make me sick?
Will fortune never come with both hands full,
But write her fair words still in foulest letters?
She either gives a stomach and no food;
Such are the poor, in health; or else a feast
And takes away the stomach; such are the rich,
That have abundance and enjoy it not.
I should rejoice now at this happy news;
And now my sight fails, and my brain is giddy:
O me! come near me; now I am much ill.

Gloucester

Comfort, your majesty!

Clarence

O my royal father!

Westmoreland

My sovereign lord, cheer up yourself, look up.

Warwick

Be patient, princes; you do know, these fits
Are with his highness very ordinary.
Stand from him. Give him air; he’ll straight be well.

Clarence

No, no, he cannot long hold out these pangs:
The incessant care and labour of his mind
Hath wrought the mure that should confine it in
So thin that life looks through and will break out.

Gloucester

The people fear me; for they do observe
Unfather’d heirs and loathly births of nature:
The seasons change their manners, as the year
Had found some months asleep and leap’d them over.

Clarence

The river hath thrice flow’d, no ebb between;
And the old folk, time’s doting chronicles,
Say it did so a little time before
That our great-grandsire, Edward, sick’d and died.

Warwick

Speak lower, princes, for the king recovers.

Gloucester

This apoplexy will certain be his end.

King Henry IV

I pray you, take me up, and bear me hence
Into some other chamber: softly, pray.

S
CENE
V. A
NOTHER
CHAMBER
.

King Henry IV lying on a bed: Clarence, Gloucester, Warwick, and others in attendance

King Henry IV

Let there be no noise made, my gentle friends;
Unless some dull and favourable hand
Will whisper music to my weary spirit.

Warwick

Call for the music in the other room.

King Henry IV

Set me the crown upon my pillow here.

Clarence

His eye is hollow, and he changes much.

Warwick

Less noise, less noise!

Enter Prince Henry

Prince Henry

Who saw the Duke of Clarence?

Clarence

I am here, brother, full of heaviness.

Prince Henry

How now! rain within doors, and none abroad!
How doth the king?

Gloucester

Exceeding ill.

Prince Henry

 
Heard he the good news yet?
Tell it him.

Gloucester

He alter’d much upon the hearing it.

Prince Henry

If he be sick with joy, he’ll recover without physic.

Warwick

Not so much noise, my lords: sweet prince, speak low; The king your father is disposed to sleep.

Clarence

Let us withdraw into the other room.

Warwick

Will’t please your grace to go along with us?

Prince Henry

No; I will sit and watch here by the king.

Exeunt all but Prince Henry

Why doth the crown lie there upon his pillow,
Being so troublesome a bedfellow?
O polish’d perturbation! golden care!
That keep’st the ports of slumber open wide
To many a watchful night! sleep with it now!
Yet not so sound and half so deeply sweet
As he whose brow with homely biggen bound
Snores out the watch of night. O majesty!
When thou dost pinch thy bearer, thou dost sit
Like a rich armour worn in heat of day,
That scalds with safety. By his gates of breath
There lies a downy feather which stirs not:
Did he suspire, that light and weightless down
Perforce must move. My gracious lord! my father!
This sleep is sound indeed, this is a sleep
That from this golden rigol hath divorced
So many English kings. Thy due from me
Is tears and heavy sorrows of the blood,
Which nature, love, and filial tenderness,
Shall, O dear father, pay thee plenteously:
My due from thee is this imperial crown,
Which, as immediate as thy place and blood,
Derives itself to me. Lo, here it sits,
Which God shall guard: and put the world’s whole strength
Into one giant arm, it shall not force
This lineal honour from me: this from thee
Will I to mine leave, as ’tis left to me.

Exit

King Henry IV

Warwick! Gloucester! Clarence!

Re-enter Warwick, Gloucester, Clarence, and the rest

Clarence

Doth the king call?

Warwick

What would your majesty? How fares your grace?

King Henry IV

Why did you leave me here alone, my lords?

Clarence

We left the prince my brother here, my liege,
Who undertook to sit and watch by you.

King Henry IV

The Prince of Wales! Where is he? let me see him:
He is not here.

Warwick

This door is open; he is gone this way.

Gloucester

He came not through the chamber where we stay’d.

King Henry IV

Where is the crown? who took it from my pillow?

Warwick

When we withdrew, my liege, we left it here.

King Henry IV

The prince hath ta’en it hence: go, seek him out.
Is he so hasty that he doth suppose
My sleep my death?
Find him, my Lord of Warwick; chide him hither.