Henry IV, Part 2 Read online

Say, Morton, didst thou come from Shrewsbury?

  MORTON I ran from Shrewsbury, my noble lord,

  Where hateful death put on his ugliest mask

  To fright our party.

  NORTHUMBERLAND How doth my son and brother?

  Thou trembl’st; and the whiteness in thy cheek

  Is apter than thy tongue to tell thy errand.

  Even such a man, so faint, so spiritless,

  So dull, so dead in look, so woe-begone,

  Drew Priam’s curtain in the dead of night,

  And would have told him half his Troy was burned.

  But Priam found the fire ere he his tongue,

  And I my Percy’s death ere thou report’st it.

  This thou wouldst say, ‘Your son did thus and thus.

  Your brother thus. So fought the noble Douglas’,

  Stopping my greedy ear with their bold deeds.

  But in the end, to stop mine ear indeed,

  Thou hast a sigh to blow away this praise,

  Ending with ‘Brother, son, and all are dead.’

  MORTON Douglas is living, and your brother, yet.

  But, for my lord your son—

  NORTHUMBERLAND Why, he is dead.

  See what a ready tongue suspicion hath!

  He that but fears the thing he would not know

  Hath by instinct knowledge from others’ eyes

  That what he feared is chanced. Yet speak, Morton—

  Tell thou thy earl his divination lies,

  And I will take it as a sweet disgrace

  And make thee rich for doing me such wrong.

  MORTON You are too great to be by me gainsaid:

  Your spirit is too true, your fears too certain.

  NORTHUMBERLAND Yet, for all this, say not that Percy’s dead.

  I see a strange confession in thine eye:

  Thou shak’st thy head and hold’st it fear or sin

  To speak a truth. If he be slain, say so:

  The tongue offends not that reports his death.

  And he doth sin that doth belie the dead,

  Not he which says the dead is not alive.

  Yet the first bringer of unwelcome news

  Hath but a losing office, and his tongue

  Sounds ever after as a sullen bell,

  Rememb’red knolling a departing friend.

  LORD BARDOLPH I cannot think, my lord, your son is dead.

  MORTON I am sorry I should force you to believe

  That which I would to heaven I had not seen.

  But these mine eyes saw him in bloody state,

  Rend’ring faint quittance, wearied and out-breathed,

  To Henry Monmouth, whose swift wrath beat down

  The never-daunted Percy to the earth,

  From whence with life he never more sprung up.

  In few, his death, whose spirit lent a fire

  Even to the dullest peasant in his camp,

  Being bruited once, took fire and heat away

  From the best tempered courage in his troops,

  For from his mettle was his party steeled;

  Which once in him abated, all the rest

  Turned on themselves, like dull and heavy lead.

  And as the thing that’s heavy in itself,

  Upon enforcement flies with greatest speed,

  So did our men, heavy in Hotspur’s loss,

  Lend to this weight such lightness with their fear

  That arrows fled not swifter toward their aim

  Than did our soldiers, aiming at their safety,

  Fly from the field. Then was the noble Worcester

  Too soon ta’en prisoner. And that furious Scot,

  The bloody Douglas, whose well-labouring sword

  Had three times slain th’appearance of the king,

  ’Gan vail his stomach and did grace the shame Of those that turned their backs, and in his flight,

  Stumbling in fear, was took. The sum of all

  Is that the king hath won, and hath sent out

  A speedy power to encounter you, my lord,

  Under the conduct of young Lancaster

  And Westmorland. This is the news at full.

  NORTHUMBERLAND For this I shall have time enough to mourn.

  In poison there is physic, and this news,

  Having been well, that would have made me sick,

  Being sick, have in some measure made me well.

  And as the wretch, whose fever-weakened joints,

  Like strengthless hinges, buckle under life,

  Impatient of his fit, breaks like a fire

  Out of his keeper’s arms, even so my limbs,

  Weakened with grief, being now enraged with grief,

  Are thrice themselves. Hence, therefore, thou

  Throws down his crutch

  nice crutch!

  A scaly gauntlet now with joints of steel

  Must glove this hand. And hence, thou sickly coif!

  Throws down his nightcap

  Thou art a guard too wanton for the head

  Which princes, fleshed with conquest, aim to hit.

  Now bind my brows with iron, and approach

  The ragged’st hour that time and spite dare bring

  To frown upon th’enraged Northumberland!

  Let heaven kiss earth! Now let not Nature’s hand

  Keep the wild flood confined! Let order die!

  And let the world no longer be a stage

  To feed contention in a ling’ring act,

  But let one spirit of the first-born Cain

  Reign in all bosoms, that, each heart being set

  On bloody courses, the rude scene may end,

  And darkness be the burier of the dead!

  LORD BARDOLPH Sweet earl, divorce not wisdom from your honour.

  MORTON The lives of all your loving complices

  Lean on your health, the which, if you give o’er

  To stormy passion, must perforce decay.

  You cast th’event of war, my noble lord,

  And summed the account of chance, before you said

  ‘Let us make head.’ It was your presurmise

  That in the dole of blows, your son might drop.

  You knew he walked o’er perils on an edge,

  More likely to fall in than to get o’er:

  You were advised his flesh was capable Of wounds and scars and that his forward spirit

  Would lift him where most trade of danger ranged:

  Yet did you say ‘Go forth’, and none of this,

  Though strongly apprehended, could restrain

  The stiff-borne action. What hath then befallen,

  Or what hath this bold enterprise brought forth,

  More than that being which was like to be?

  LORD BARDOLPH We all that are engagèd to this loss

  Knew that we ventured on such dangerous seas

  That if we wrought our life was ten to one.

  And yet we ventured, for the gain proposed

  Choked the respect of likely peril feared.

  And since we are o’erset, venture again.

  Come, we will all put forth, body and goods.

  MORTON ’Tis more than time. And, my most noble lord,

  I hear for certain, and do speak the truth:

  The gentle Archbishop of York is up

  With well-appointed powers. He is a man

  Who with a double surety binds his followers.

  My lord your son had only but the corpse,

  But shadows and the shows of men, to fight,

  For that same word, rebellion, did divide

  The action of their bodies from their souls,

  And they did fight with queasiness, constrained,

  As men drink potions, that their weapons only

  Seemed on our side. But, for their spirits and souls,

  This word, rebellion, it had froze them up,

  As fish are in a pond. But now the bishop

  Turns insurrection to religion.
r />   Supposed sincere and holy in his thoughts,

  He’s followed both with body and with mind,

  And doth enlarge his rising with the blood

  Of fair King Richard, scraped from Pomfret stones:

  Derives from heaven his quarrel and his cause:

  Tells them he doth bestride a bleeding land,

  Gasping for life under great Bullingbrook:

  And more and less do flock to follow him.

  NORTHUMBERLAND I knew of this before. But, to speak truth,

  This present grief had wiped it from my mind.

  Go in with me, and counsel every man

  The aptest way for safety and revenge.

  Get posts and letters, and make friends with speed.

  Never so few, nor never yet more need.

  Exeunt

  Act 1 Scene [2]

  running scene 2

  Location: in London, but unspecified, probably a street

  Enter Falstaff and Page

  FALSTAFF Sirrah, you giant, what says the doctor to my water?

  PAGE He said, sir, the water itself was a good healthy

  water, but, for the party that owed it, he might have more

  diseases than he knew for.

  FALSTAFF Men of all sorts take a pride to gird at me. The brain

  of this foolish-compounded clay, man, is not able to invent

  anything that tends to laughter, more than I invent or is

  invented on me. I am not only witty in myself, but the cause

  that wit is in other men. I do here walk before thee like a sow

  that hath o’erwhelmed all her litter but one. If the prince put

  thee into my service for any other reason than to set me off,

  why then I have no judgement. Thou whoreson mandrake,

  thou art fitter to be worn in my cap than to wait at my heels.

  I was never manned with an agate till now: but I will set you

  neither in gold nor silver, but in vile apparel, and send you

  back again to your master, for a jewel—the juvenal, the

  prince your master, whose chin is not yet fledged. I will

  sooner have a beard grow in the palm of my hand than he

  shall get one on his cheek, yet he will not stick to say his face

  is a face-royal. Heaven may finish it when he will, it is not a

  hair amiss yet. He may keep it still at a face-royal, for a barber

  shall never earn sixpence out of it; and yet he will be crowing

  as if he had writ man ever since his father was a bachelor. He

  may keep his own grace, but he is almost out of mine, I can

  assure him. What said Master Dombledon about the satin for

  my short cloak and slops?

  PAGE He said, sir, you should procure him better assurance

  than Bardolph: he would not take his bond and yours. He

  liked not the security.

  FALSTAFF Let him be damned, like the glutton! May his tongue

  be hotter! A whoreson Achitophel! A rascally yea-forsooth

  knave, to bear a gentleman in hand, and then stand upon

  security! The whoreson smooth-pates do now wear nothing

  but high shoes, and bunches of keys at their girdles. And if a

  man is through with them in honest taking up, then they

  must stand upon security. I had as lief they would put

  ratsbane in my mouth as offer to stop it with security. I

  looked he should have sent me two and twenty yards of

  satin, as I am true knight, and he sends me security. Well, he

  may sleep in security, for he hath the horn of abundance,

  and the lightness of his wife shines through it, and yet

  cannot he see, though he have his own lanthorn to light

  him. Where’s Bardolph?

  PAGE He’s gone into Smithfield to buy your worship a

  horse.

  FALSTAFF I bought him in Paul’s, and he’ll buy me a horse in

  Smithfield. If I could get me a wife in the stews, I were

  manned, horsed, and wived.

  Enter Chief Justice and Servant

  PAGE Sir, here comes the nobleman that committed the

  prince for striking him about Bardolph.

  FALSTAFF Wait, close. I will not see him.

  Tries to sneak away

  LORD CHIEF JUSTICE What’s he that goes there?

  SERVANT Falstaff, an’t please your lordship.

  LORD CHIEF JUSTICE He that was in question for the robbery?

  SERVANT He, my lord. But he hath since done good service at

  Shrewsbury, and, as I hear, is now going with some charge to

  the lord John of Lancaster.

  LORD CHIEF JUSTICE What, to York? Call him back again.

  SERVANT Sir John Falstaff!

  FALSTAFF Boy, tell him I am deaf.

  PAGE You must speak louder: my master is deaf.

  LORD CHIEF JUSTICE I am sure he is, to the hearing of anything

  good. Go, pluck him by the elbow, I must speak with him.

  SERVANT Sir John!

  FALSTAFF What? A young knave, and beg? Is there not wars?

  Is there not employment? Doth not the king lack subjects?

  Do not the rebels want soldiers? Though it be a shame to be

  on any side but one, it is worse shame to beg than to be on

  the worst side, were it worse than the name of rebellion can

  tell how to make it.

  SERVANT You mistake me, sir.

  FALSTAFF Why, sir, did I say you were an honest man? Setting

  my knighthood and my soldiership aside, I had lied in my

  throat, if I had said so.

  SERVANT I pray you, sir, then set your knighthood and your

  soldiership aside, and give me leave to tell you, you lie in your

  throat if you say I am any other than an honest man.

  FALSTAFF I give thee leave to tell me so? I lay aside that which

  grows to me? If thou gett’st any leave of me, hang me: if

  thou tak’st leave, thou wert better be hanged. You hunt

  counter, hence! Avaunt!

  SERVANT Sir, my lord would speak with you.

  LORD CHIEF JUSTICE Sir John Falstaff, a word with you.

  FALSTAFF My good lord! Give your lordship good time of the

  day. I am glad to see your lordship abroad. I heard say your

  lordship was sick. I hope your lordship goes abroad by

  advice. Your lordship, though not clean past your youth,

  hath yet some smack of age in you, some relish of the

  saltness of time, and I most humbly beseech your lordship to

  have a reverend care of your health.

  LORD CHIEF JUSTICE Sir John, I sent for you before your expedition

  to Shrewsbury.

  FALSTAFF If it please your lordship, I hear his majesty is

  returned with some discomfort from Wales.

  LORD CHIEF JUSTICE I talk not of his majesty: you would not come

  when I sent for you.

  FALSTAFF And I hear, moreover, his highness is fallen into this

  same whoreson apoplexy.

  LORD CHIEF JUSTICE Well, heaven mend him! I pray, let me speak

  with you.

  FALSTAFF This apoplexy is, as I take it, a kind of lethargy, a

  sleeping of the blood, a whoreson tingling.

  LORD CHIEF JUSTICE What tell you me of it? Be it as it is.

  FALSTAFF It hath it original from much grief, from study and

  perturbation of the brain. I have read the cause of his effects

  in Galen: it is a kind of deafness.

  LORD CHIEF JUSTICE I think you are fallen into the disease, for you

  hear not what I say to you.

  FALSTAFF Very well, my lord, very well. Rather, an’t please

  you, it is the disease of not listening, the malady of
not

  marking, that I am troubled withal.

  LORD CHIEF JUSTICE To punish you by the heels would amend

  the attention of your ears, and I care not if I be your physician.

  FALSTAFF I am as poor as Job, my lord, but not so patient: your

  lordship may minister the potion of imprisonment to me

  in respect of poverty, but how I should be your patient to

  follow your prescriptions, the wise may make some dram of

  a scruple, or indeed a scruple itself.

  LORD CHIEF JUSTICE I sent for you, when there were matters

  against you for your life, to come speak with me.

  FALSTAFF As I was then advised by my learned counsel in the

  laws of this land-service, I did not come.

  LORD CHIEF JUSTICE Well, the truth is, Sir John, you live in great

  infamy.

  FALSTAFF He that buckles him in my belt cannot live in less.

  LORD CHIEF JUSTICE Your means is very slender, and your waste

  great.

  FALSTAFF I would it were otherwise: I would my means were

  greater, and my waist slenderer.

  LORD CHIEF JUSTICE You have misled the youthful prince.

  FALSTAFF The young prince hath misled me. I am the fellow

  with the great belly, and he my dog.

  LORD CHIEF JUSTICE Well, I am loath to gall a new-healed wound:

  your day’s service at Shrewsbury hath a little gilded over

  your night’s exploit on Gad’s Hill. You may thank the

  unquiet time for your quiet o’er-posting that action.

  FALSTAFF My lord?

  LORD CHIEF JUSTICE But since all is well, keep it so: wake not a

  sleeping wolf.

  FALSTAFF To wake a wolf is as bad as to smell a fox.

  LORD CHIEF JUSTICE What? You are as a candle, the better part

  burnt out.

  FALSTAFF A wassail candle, my lord, all tallow: if I did say of

  wax, my growth would approve the truth.

  LORD CHIEF JUSTICE There is not a white hair on your face but

  should have his effect of gravity.

  FALSTAFF His effect of gravy, gravy, gravy.

  LORD CHIEF JUSTICE You follow the young prince up and down,

  like his evil angel.

  FALSTAFF Not so, my lord, your ill angel is light: but I hope he

  that looks upon me will take me without weighing. And yet,

  in some respects, I grant, I cannot go: I cannot tell. Virtue is

  of so little regard in these costermongers that true valour is

  turned bear-herd: pregnancy is made a tapster, and hath his

  quick wit wasted in giving reckonings: all the other gifts