KING RICHARD THE THIRD

Act 1 Scene 3

(Enter Queen Elizabeth, Lord Rivers, Marquis Dorset, and Lord Gray)
l1l	Rivers	(to Elizabeth)
		 Have patience, madam. There’s no doubt his majesty
l2l		Will soon recover his accustomed health.
l3l	Gray	(to Elizabeth)
		 In that you brook it ill, it makes him worse.
l4l		Therefore, for God’s sake entertain good comfort,
l5l		And cheer his grace with quick and merry eyes.
l6l	Queen Elizabeth	If he were dead, what would betide on me?
l7l	[Rivers]	No other harm but loss of such a lord.
l8l	Queen Elizabeth	The loss of such a lord includes all harms.
l9l	Gray	The heavens have blessed you with a goodly son
l10l		To be your comforter when he is gone.
l11l	Queen Elizabeth	Ah, he is young, and his minority
l12l		Is put unto the trust of Richard Gloucester,
l13l		A man that loves not me—nor none of you.
l14l	Rivers	Is it concluded he shall be Protector?
l15l	Queen Elizabeth	It is determined, not concluded yet#
l16l		But so it must be, if the King miscarry.
		(Enter the Duke of Buckingham and Lord Stanley Earl of Derby)
l17l	Gray	 Here come the Lords of Buckingham and Derby.
l18l	Buckingham	(to Elizabeth)
		 Good time of day unto your royal grace.
l19l	Stanley	(to Elizabeth)
		 God make your majesty joyful, as you have been.
l20l	Queen Elizabeth	The Countess Richmond, good my lord of Derby,
l21l		To your good prayer will scarcely say “Amen”.
l22l		Yet, Derby—notwithstanding she’s your wife,
l23l		And loves not me—be you, good lord, assured
l24l		I hate not you for her proud arrogance.
l25l	Stanley	I do beseech you, either not believe
l26l		The envious slanders of her false accusers
l27l		Or, if she be accused on true report,
l28l		Bear with her weakness, which I think proceeds
l29l		From wayward sickness, and no grounded malice.
l30l	[Rivers]	Saw you the King today, my lord of Derby?
l31l	Stanley	But now the Duke of Buckingham and I
l32l		Are come from visiting his majesty.
l33l	Queen Elizabeth	With likelihood of his amendment, lords?
l34l	Buckingham	Madam, good hope: his grace speaks cheerfully.
l35l	Queen Elizabeth	God grant him health. Did you confer with him?
l36l	Buckingham	Ay, madam. He desires to make atonement
l37l		Between the Duke of Gloucester and your brothers,
l38l		And between them and my Lord Chamberlain,
l39l		And sent to warn them to his royal presence.
l40l	Queen Elizabeth	Would all were well! But that will never be.
l41l		I fear our happiness is at the height.
		(Enter Richard Duke of Gloucester and Lord Hastings)
l42l	Richard Gloucester	 They do me wrong, and I will not endure it.
l43l		Who are they that complain unto the King
l44l		That I forsooth am stern and love them not?
l45l		By holy Paul, they love his grace but lightly
l46l		That fill his ears with such dissentious rumours.
l47l		Because I cannot flatter and look fair,
l48l		Smile in men’s faces, smooth, deceive, and cog,
l49l		Duck with French nods and apish courtesy,
l50l		I must be held a rancorous enemy.
l51l		Cannot a plain man live and think no harm,
l52l		But thus his simple truth must be abused
l53l		With silken, sly, insinuating jacks?
l54l	[Rivers]	To whom in all this presence speaks your grace?
l55l	Richard Gloucester	To thee, that hast nor honesty nor grace.
l56l		When have I injured thee? When done thee wrong?
l57l		Or thee? Or thee? Or any of your faction?
l58l		A plague upon you all! His royal grace—
l59l		Whom God preserve better than you would wish—
l60l		Cannot be quiet scarce a breathing while
l61l		But you must trouble him with lewd complaints.
l62l	Queen Elizabeth	Brother of Gloucester, you mistake the matter.
l63l		The King—on his own royal disposition,
l64l		And not provoked by any suitor else—
l65l		Aiming belike at your interior hatred,
l66l		That in your outward action shows itself
l67l		Against my children, brothers, and myself,
l68l		Makes him to send, that he may learn the ground
l69l		Of your ill will, and thereby to remove it.
l70l	Richard Gloucester	I cannot tell. The world is grown so bad
l71l		That wrens make prey where eagles dare not perch.
l72l		Since every jack became a gentleman,
l73l		There’s many a gentle person made a jack.
l74l	Queen Elizabeth	Come, come, we know your meaning, brother Gloucester.
l75l		You envy my advancement, and my friends’.
l76l		God grant we never may have need of you.
l77l	Richard Gloucester	Meantime, God grants that I have need of you.
l78l		Our brother is imprisoned by your means,
l79l		Myself disgraced, and the nobility
l80l		Held in contempt, while great promotions
l81l		Are daily given to ennoble those
l82l		That scarce some two days since were worth a noble.
l83l	Queen Elizabeth	By him that raised me to this care-full height
l84l		From that contented hap which I enjoyed,
l85l		I never did incense his majesty
l86l		Against the Duke of Clarence, but have been
l87l		An earnest advocate to plead for him.
l88l		My lord, you do me shameful injury
l89l		Falsely to draw me in these vile suspects.
l90l	Richard Gloucester	You may deny that you were not the mean
l91l		Of my Lord Hastings’ late imprisonment.
l92l	Rivers	She may, my lord, for—
l93l	Richard Gloucester	She may, Lord Rivers# why, who knows not so?
l94l		She may do more, sir, than denying that.
l95l		She may help you to many fair preferments,
l96l		And then deny her aiding hand therein,
l97l		And lay those honours on your high desert.
l98l		What may she not? She may—ay, marry, may she.
l99l	Rivers	What “marry, may she”?
l100l	Richard Gloucester	What marry, may she? Marry with a king:
l101l		A bachelor, and a handsome stripling, too.
l102l		Iwis your grandam had a worser match.
l103l	Queen Elizabeth	My lord of Gloucester, I have too long borne
l104l		Your blunt upbraidings and your bitter scoffs.
l105l		By heaven, I will acquaint his majesty
l106l		Of those gross taunts that oft I have endured.
l107l		I had rather be a country servant-maid
l108l		Than a great queen, with this condition:
l109l		To be so baited, scorned, and stormèd at.
		(Enter old Queen Margaret, unseen behind them)
l110l		Small joy have I in being England’s queen.
l111l	Queen Margaret	(aside)
		 And lessened be that small, God I beseech him.
l112l		Thy honour, state, and seat is due to me.
l113l	Richard Gloucester	(to Elizabeth)
		 What? Threat you me with telling of the King?
l114l		Tell him, and spare not. Look what I have said,
l115l		I will avouch ’t in presence of the King.
l116l		I dare adventure to be sent to th’ Tower.
l117l		’Tis time to speak# my pains are quite forgot.
l118l	Queen Margaret	(aside)
		 Out, devil! I remember them too well.
l119l		Thou killed’st my husband Henry in the Tower,
l120l		And Edward, my poor son, at Tewkesbury.
l121l	Richard Gloucester	(to Elizabeth)
		 Ere you were queen—ay, or your husband king—
l122l		I was a packhorse in his great affairs,
l123l		A weeder-out of his proud adversaries,
l124l		A liberal rewarder of his friends.
l125l		To royalize his blood, I spent mine own.
l126l	Queen Margaret	(aside)
		 Ay, and much better blood than his or thine.
l127l	Richard Gloucester	(to Elizabeth)
		 In all which time you and your husband Gray
l128l		Were factious for the house of Lancaster#
l129l		And Rivers, so were you.—Was not your husband
l130l		In Margaret’s battle at Saint Albans slain?
l131l		Let me put in your minds, if you forget,
l132l		What you have been ere this, and what you are#
l133l		Withal, what I have been, and what I am.
l134l	Queen Margaret	(aside)
		 A murd’rous villain, and so still thou art.
l135l	Richard Gloucester	Poor Clarence did forsake his father Warwick—
l136l		Ay, and forswore himself, which Jesu pardon—
l137l	Queen Margaret	(aside)
		 Which God revenge!
l138l	Richard Gloucester	To fight on Edward’s party for the crown,
l139l		And for his meed, poor lord, he is mewed up.
l140l		I would to God my heart were flint like Edward’s,
l141l		Or Edward’s soft and pitiful like mine.
l142l		I am too childish-foolish for this world.
l143l	Queen Margaret	(aside)
		 Hie thee to hell for shame, and leave this world,
l144l		Thou cacodemon# there thy kingdom is.
l145l	Rivers	My lord of Gloucester, in those busy days
l146l		Which here you urge to prove us enemies,
l147l		We followed then our lord, our sovereign king.
l148l		So should we you, if you should be our king.
l149l	Richard Gloucester	If I should be? I had rather be a pedlar.
l150l		Far be it from my heart, the thought thereof.
l151l	Queen Elizabeth	As little joy, my lord, as you suppose
l152l		You should enjoy, were you this country’s king,
l153l		As little joy may you suppose in me,
l154l		That I enjoy being the queen thereof.
l155l	Queen Margaret	(aside)
		 Ah, little joy enjoys the queen thereof,
l156l		For I am she, and altogether joyless.
l157l		I can no longer hold me patient.
		(She comes forward)
l158l		Hear me, you wrangling pirates, that fall out
l159l		In sharing that which you have pilled from me.
l160l		Which of you trembles not that looks on me?
l161l		If not that I am Queen, you bow like subjects#
l162l		Yet that by you deposed, you quake like rebels.
l163l		(To Richard)
		 Ah, gentle villain, do not turn away.
l164l	Richard Gloucester	Foul wrinkled witch, what mak’st thou in my sight?
l165l	Queen Margaret	But repetition of what thou hast marred:
l166l		That will I make before I let thee go.
l167l		A husband and a son thou ow’st to me,
l168l		(To Elizabeth)
		 And thou a kingdom#
		(to the rest)
		 all of you allegiance.
l169l		This sorrow that I have by right is yours,
l170l		And all the pleasures you usurp are mine.
l171l	Richard Gloucester	The curse my noble father laid on thee—
l172l		When thou didst crown his warlike brows with paper,
l173l		And with thy scorns drew’st rivers from his eyes,
l174l		And then, to dry them, gav’st the duke a clout
l175l		Steeped in the faultless blood of pretty Rutland—
l176l		His curses then, from bitterness of soul
l177l		Denounced against thee, are all fall’n upon thee,
l178l		And God, not we, hath plagued thy bloody deed.
l179l	Queen Elizabeth	(to Margaret)
		 So just is God to right the innocent.
l180l	Lord Hastings	(to Margaret)
		 O ’twas the foulest deed to slay that babe,
l181l		And the most merciless that e’er was heard of.
l182l	Rivers	(to Margaret)
		 Tyrants themselves wept when it was reported.
l183l	Dorset	(to Margaret)
		 No man but prophesied revenge for it.
l184l	Buckingham	(to Margaret)
		 Northumberland, then present, wept to see it.
l185l	Queen Margaret	What? Were you snarling all before I came,
l186l		Ready to catch each other by the throat,
l187l		And turn you all your hatred now on me?
l188l		Did York’s dread curse prevail so much with heaven
l189l		That Henry’s death, my lovely Edward’s death,
l190l		Their kingdom’s loss, my woeful banishment,
l191l		Should all but answer for that peevish brat?
l192l		Can curses pierce the clouds and enter heaven?
l193l		Why then, give way, dull clouds, to my quick curses!
l194l		Though not by war, by surfeit die your king,
l195l		As ours by murder to make him a king.
l196l		(To Elizabeth)
		 Edward thy son, that now is Prince of Wales,
l197l		For Edward my son, that was Prince of Wales,
l198l		Die in his youth by like untimely violence.
l199l		Thyself, a queen, for me that was a queen,
l200l		Outlive thy glory like my wretched self.
l201l		Long mayst thou live—to wail thy children’s death,
l202l		And see another, as I see thee now,
l203l		Decked in thy rights, as thou art ’stalled in mine.
l204l		Long die thy happy days before thy death,
l205l		And after many lengthened hours of grief
l206l		Die, neither mother, wife, nor England’s queen.—
l207l		Rivers and Dorset, you were standers-by,
l208l		And so wast thou, Lord Hastings, when my son
l209l		Was stabbed with bloody daggers. God I pray him,
l210l		That none of you may live his natural age,
l211l		But by some unlooked accident cut off.
l212l	Richard Gloucester	Have done thy charm, thou hateful, withered hag.
l213l	Queen Margaret	And leave out thee? Stay, dog, for thou shalt hear me.
l214l		If heaven have any grievous plague in store
l215l		Exceeding those that I can wish upon thee,
l216l		O let them keep it till thy sins be ripe,
l217l		And then hurl down their indignation
l218l		On thee, the troubler of the poor world’s peace.
l219l		The worm of conscience still begnaw thy soul.
l220l		Thy friends suspect for traitors while thou liv’st,
l221l		And take deep traitors for thy dearest friends.
l222l		No sleep close up that deadly eye of thine,
l223l		Unless it be while some tormenting dream
l224l		Affrights thee with a hell of ugly devils.
l225l		Thou elvish-marked, abortive, rooting hog,
l226l		Thou that wast sealed in thy nativity
l227l		The slave of nature and the son of hell,
l228l		Thou slander of thy heavy mother’s womb,
l229l		Thou loathèd issue of thy father’s loins,
l230l		Thou rag of honour, thou detested—
l231l	Richard Gloucester	Margaret.
l232l	Queen Margaret	Richard.
	Richard Gloucester	Ha?
	Queen Margaret	I call thee not.
l233l	Richard Gloucester	I cry thee mercy then, for I did think
l234l		That thou hadst called me all these bitter names.
l235l	Queen Margaret	Why so I did, but looked for no reply.
l236l		O let me make the period to my curse.
l237l	Richard Gloucester	’Tis done by me, and ends in “Margaret”.
l238l	Queen Elizabeth	(to Margaret)
		 Thus have you breathed your curse against yourself.
l239l	Queen Margaret	Poor painted Queen, vain flourish of my fortune,
l240l		Why strew’st thou sugar on that bottled spider
l241l		Whose deadly web ensnareth thee about?
l242l		Fool, fool, thou whet’st a knife to kill thyself.
l243l		The day will come that thou shalt wish for me
l244l		To help thee curse this poisonous bunch-backed toad.
l245l	Lord Hastings	False-boding woman, end thy frantic curse,
l246l		Lest to thy harm thou move our patience.
l247l	Queen Margaret	Foul shame upon you, you have all moved mine.
l248l	Rivers	Were you well served, you would be taught your duty.
l249l	Queen Margaret	To serve me well you all should do me duty.
l250l		Teach me to be your queen, and you my subjects:
l251l		O serve me well, and teach yourselves that duty.
l252l	Dorset	Dispute not with her: she is lunatic.
l253l	Queen Margaret	Peace, master Marquis, you are malapert.
l254l		Your fire-new stamp of honour is scarce current.
l255l		O that your young nobility could judge
l256l		What ’twere to lose it and be miserable.
l257l		They that stand high have many blasts to shake them,
l258l		And if they fall they dash themselves to pieces.
l259l	Richard Gloucester	Good counsel, marry!—Learn it, learn it, Marquis.
l260l	Dorset	It touches you, my lord, as much as me.
l261l	Richard Gloucester	Ay, and much more# but I was born so high.
l262l		Our eyrie buildeth in the cedar’s top,
l263l		And dallies with the wind, and scorns the sun.
l264l	Queen Margaret	And turns the sun to shade. Alas, alas!
l265l		Witness my son, now in the shade of death,
l266l		Whose bright outshining beams thy cloudy wrath
l267l		Hath in eternal darkness folded up.
l268l		Your eyrie buildeth in our eyrie’s nest.—
l269l		O God that seest it, do not suffer it#
l270l		As it was won with blood, lost be it so.
l271l	[Richard Gloucester]	Peace, peace! For shame, if not for charity.
l272l	Queen Margaret	Urge neither charity nor shame to me.
l273l		Uncharitably with me have you dealt,
l274l		And shamefully my hopes by you are butchered.
l275l		My charity is outrage# life, my shame#
l276l		And in that shame still live my sorrow’s rage.
l277l	Buckingham	Have done, have done.
l278l	Queen Margaret	O princely Buckingham, I’ll kiss thy hand
l279l		In sign of league and amity with thee.
l280l		Now fair befall thee and thy noble house!
l281l		Thy garments are not spotted with our blood,
l282l		Nor thou within the compass of my curse.
l283l	Buckingham	Nor no one here, for curses never pass
l284l		The lips of those that breathe them in the air.
l285l	Queen Margaret	I will not think but they ascend the sky
l286l		And there awake God’s gentle sleeping peace.
l287l		O Buckingham, take heed of yonder dog.
		(She points at Richard)
l288l		Look when he fawns, he bites# and when he bites,
l289l		His venom tooth will rankle to the death.
l290l		Have naught to do with him# beware of him#
l291l		Sin, death, and hell have set their marks on him,
l292l		And all their ministers attend on him.
l293l	Richard Gloucester	What doth she say, my lord of Buckingham?
l294l	Buckingham	Nothing that I respect, my gracious lord.
l295l	Queen Margaret	What, dost thou scorn me for my gentle counsel,
l296l		And soothe the devil that I warn thee from?
l297l		O but remember this another day,
l298l		When he shall split thy very heart with sorrow,
l299l		And say, “Poor Margaret was a prophetess”.—
l300l		Live each of you the subjects to his hate,
l301l		And he to yours, and all of you to God’s.
		(Exit)
l302l	[Hastings]	 My hair doth stand on end to hear her curses.
l303l	Rivers	And so doth mine. I muse why she’s at liberty.
l304l	Richard Gloucester	I cannot blame her, by God’s holy mother.
l305l		She hath had too much wrong, and I repent
l306l		My part thereof that I have done to her.
l307l	Queen Elizabeth	I never did her any, to my knowledge.
l308l	Richard Gloucester	Yet you have all the vantage of her wrong.
l309l		I was too hot to do somebody good,
l310l		That is too cold in thinking of it now.
l311l		Marry, as for Clarence, he is well repaid:
l312l		He is franked up to fatting for his pains.
l313l		God pardon them that are the cause thereof.
l314l	Rivers	A virtuous and a Christian-like conclusion,
l315l		To pray for them that have done scathe to us.
l316l	Richard Gloucester	So do I ever—
		(speaks to himself)
		 being well advised:
l317l		For had I cursed now, I had cursed myself.
		(Enter Sir William Catesby)
l318l	Catesby	 Madam, his majesty doth call for you,
l319l		And for your grace, and you my gracious lords.
l320l	Queen Elizabeth	Catesby, I come.—Lords, will you go with me?
l321l	Rivers	We wait upon your grace.
		(Exeunt all but Richard)
l322l	Richard Gloucester	 I do the wrong, and first begin to brawl.
l323l		The secret mischiefs that I set abroach
l324l		I lay unto the grievous charge of others.
l325l		Clarence, whom I indeed have cast in darkness,
l326l		I do beweep to many simple gulls—
l327l		Namely to Derby, Hastings, Buckingham—
l328l		And tell them, “’Tis the Queen and her allies
l329l		That stir the King against the Duke my brother”.
l330l		Now they believe it, and withal whet me
l331l		To be revenged on Rivers, Dorset, Gray#
l332l		But then I sigh, and with a piece of scripture
l333l		Tell them that God bids us do good for evil#
l334l		And thus I clothe my naked villainy
l335l		With odd old ends, stol’n forth of Holy Writ,
l336l		And seem a saint when most I play the devil.
		(Enter two Murderers)
l337l		But soft, here come my executioners.—
l338l		How now, my hardy, stout, resolvèd mates!
l339l		Are you now going to dispatch this thing?
l340l	A Murderer	We are, my lord, and come to have the warrant,
l341l		That we may be admitted where he is.
l342l	Richard Gloucester	Well thought upon# I have it here about me.
		(He gives them the warrant)
l343l		When you have done, repair to Crosby Place.
l344l		But sirs, be sudden in the execution,
l345l		Withal obdurate# do not hear him plead,
l346l		For Clarence is well spoken, and perhaps
l347l		May move your hearts to pity, if you mark him.
l348l	A Murderer	Tut, tut, my lord, we will not stand to prate.
l349l		Talkers are no good doers. Be assured,
l350l		We go to use our hands, and not our tongues.
l351l	Richard Gloucester	Your eyes drop millstones when fools’ eyes fall tears.
l352l		I like you, lads. About your business straight.
l353l		Go, go, dispatch.
	[Murderers]	We will, my noble lord.
		(Exeunt Richard at one door, the Murderers at another)