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Dorset, embrace him,-Hastings, love lord marquis.

Now, princely Buckingham, seal thou this league
With thy embracements to my wife's allies,
And make me happy in your unity.

K. RICHARD III., A. 2, s. 1.

THE KING'S DESPAIR.

I KNOW you; Where's the king?
Contending with the fretful elements;
Bids the wind blow the earth into the sea,
Or swell the curled waters 'bove the main,
That things might change, or cease: tears his
white hair;

Which the impetuous blasts, with eyeless rage,
Catch in their fury, and make nothing of:
Strives in his little world of man to out-scorn
The to-and-fro conflicting wind and rain.

This night, wherein the cub-drawn bear would couch,

The lion and the belly-pinched wolf

Keep their fur dry, unbonneted he runs,

And bids what will take all.

KING LEAR, A. 3, s. 1.

THE KING'S GRIEF THAT HE HAD NOT SEEN THE FAITH SOONER. QUEEN. This way the king will come; this is the way

To Julius Caesar's ill-erected tower,

To whose flint bosom my condemned lord
Is doom'd a prisoner by proud Bolingbroke :
Here let us rest, if this rebellious earth
Have any resting for her true king's queen.

Enter KING RICHARD and Guards.
But soft, but see, or rather do not see,
My fair rose wither: Yet look up; behold;
That you in pity may dissolve to dew,

And wash him fresh again with true-love tears.Ah, thou, the model where old Troy did stand; Thou map of honour; thou king Richard's tomb, And not king Richard; thou most beauteous Inn, Why should hard-favour'd grief be lodg'd in thee,

When triumph is become an alehouse guest? K. RICHARD. Join not with grief, fair woman, do not so,

To make my end too sudden: learn, good soul,
To think our former state a happy dream;

From which awak'd, the truth of what we are
Shows us but this: I am sworn brother, sweet,
To grim necessity; and he and I
Will keep a league till death.

France,

Hie thee to

And cloister thee in some religious house:
Our holy lives must win a new world's crown,
Which our profane hours here have stricken down.
QUEEN. What, is my Richard both in shape
and mind

Transform'd, and weaken'd? Hath Bolingbroke Depos'd thine intellect? Hath he been in thy heart?

The lion, dying, thrusteth forth his paw,

And wounds the earth, if nothing else, with rage
To be overpower'd; and wilt thou, pupil-like,
Take thy correction mildly? kiss the rod;
And fawn on rage with base humility,
Which art a lion, and a king of beasts?

K. RICH. A king of beasts, indeed; if aught but beasts,

I had been still a happy king of men.

Good sometime queen, prepare thee hence for
France:

Think, I am dead; and that even here thou takʼst,
As from my death-bed, my last living leave.
In winter's tedious nights, sit by the fire

With good old folks; and let them tell thee tales
Of woeful ages, long ago betid:

And, ere thou bid good night, to quit their grief,
Tell thou the lamentable fall of me,

And send the hearers weeping to their beds.
For why, the senseless brands will sympathize
The heavy accent of thy moving tongue,
And, in compassion, weep the fire out:

And some will mourn in ashes, some coal-black,
For the deposing of a rightful king.

K. RICHARD II., A. 5, s. 1.

THE KING'S LAMENT FOR A
FAITHFUL SERVANT.

K. HENRY. My lords, what to your wisdoms
seemeth best,

Do, or undo, as if ourself were here.

Q. MARGARET. What, will your highness leave the parliament ?

K. HEN. Ay, Margaret; my heart is drown'd
with grief,

Whose flood begins to flow within mine eyes;
My body round engirt with misery;

For what's more miserable than discontent ?—
Ah, uncle Humphrey! in thy face I see
The map of honour, truth, and loyalty;
And yet, good Humphrey, is the hour to come,
That e'er I proved thee false, or fear'd thy faith.

What low'ring star now envies thy estate,
That these great lords, and Margaret our queen,
Do seek subversion of thy harmless life?

Thou never didst them wrong, nor no man

wrong:

And as the butcher takes away the calf,

And binds the wretch, and beats it when it strays,
Bearing it to the bloody slaughter-house;
Even so, remorseless, have they borne him hence.
And as the dam runs lowing up and down,
Looking the way her harmless young one went,
And can do nought but wail her darling's loss ;
Even so myself bewails good Gloster's case,
With sad unhelpful tears; and with dimm'd eyes
Look after him, and cannot do him good;
So mighty are his vowed enemies.

His fortunes I will weep; and, 'twixt each groan,
Say-Who's a traitor, Gloster he is none.

[Exit. Q. MAR. Free lords, cold snow melts with the sun's hot beams.

Henry my lord is cold in great affairs,
Too full of foolish pity: and Gloster's show
Beguiles him, as the mournful crocodile
With sorrow snares relenting passengers;
Or as the snake, roll'd in a flowering bank,
With shining checker'd slough, doth sting a
child,

That, for the beauty, thinks it excellent.

Believe me, lords, were none more wise than I, (And yet, herein, I judge mine own wit good,) This Gloster should be quickly rid the world, To rid us from the fear we have of him.

CARDINAL. That he should die, is worthy policy:

But yet we want a colour for his death:

'Tis meet he be condemn'd by course of law. SUFFOLK. But, in my mind, that were no policy:

The king will labour still to save his life;
The commons haply rise to save his life;
And we yet have but trivial argument,

More than mistrust, that shows him worthy death.

K. HENRY VI., PART II., A. 3, s. 1.

THE KING'S LIVING DEATH. 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 biggin 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!

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This sleep is sound indeed; this is a sleep,
That from this golden rigol hath divorc'd
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 from thy place and blood,

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