The Illustrated Works of Shakespeare/Illustrated Works of Shakespeare, The (1990)(Animated Pixels)[!][CDTV-PC].iso/shakes/text/09/01_01

Text File | 1991-04-10 | 13KB | 321 lines

INDUCTION.
 Warkworth. Before Northumberland's Castle.
 Enter RUMOUR painted full of tongues.

Rumour    Open your ears; for which of you will stop
    The vent of hearing when loud Rumour speaks?
    I, from the orient to the drooping west,
    Making the wind my posthorse, still unfold
    The acts commencd on this ball of earth.
    Upon my tongues continual slanders ride,
    The which in every language I pronounce,
    Stuffing the ears of men with false reports.
    I speak of peace, while covert enmity
    Under the smile of safety wounds the world;
    And who but Rumour, who but only I,
    Make fearful musters and prepared defence
    Whiles the big year, swol'n with some other grief,
    Is thought with child by the stern tyrant war,
    And no such matter? Rumour is a pipe
    Blown by surmises, jealousies, conjectures,
    And of so easy and so plain a stop
    That the blunt monster with uncounted heads,
    The still-discordant wav'ring multitude,
    Can play upon it. But what need I thus
    My well-known body to anatomize
    Among my household? Why is Rumour here?
    I run before King Harry's victory,
    Who in a bloody field by Shrewsbury
    Hath beaten down young Hotspur and his troops,
    Quenching the flame of bold rebellion
    Even with the rebels' blood. But what mean I
    To speak so true at first? My office is
    To noise abroad that Harry Monmouth fell
    Under the wrath of noble Hotspur's sword,
    And that the king before the Douglas' rage
    Stooped his anointed head as low as death.
    This have I rumoured through the peasant towns
    Between the royal field of Shrewsbury
    And this worm-eaten hold of raggd stone
    Where Hotspur's father, old Northumberland,
    Lies crafty-sick. The posts come tiring on,
    And not a man of them brings other news
    Than they have learnt of me. From Rumour's tongues
    They bring smooth comforts false, worse than true wrongs.
                                                    [Exit.

Warkworth. Before Northumberland's Castle.
 Enter the LORD BARDOLPH at one door.

Lord Bardolph    Who keeps the gate here, ho?

                            Enter the PORTER.

                                    Where is the earl?

Porter    What shall I say you are?

Lord Bardolph                                Tell thou the earl
    That the Lord Bardolph doth attend him here.

Porter    His lordship is walked forth into the orchard.
    Please it your honour knock but at the gate,
    And he himself will answer.

                          Enter NORTHUMBERLAND.

Lord Bardolph                                        Here comes the earl.
                                                    [Exit PORTER.

Northumberland    What news, Lord Bardolph? Every minute now
    Should be the father of some stratagem.
    The times are wild; contention, like a horse
    Full of high feeding, madly hath broke loose,
    And bears down all before him.

Lord Bardolph                                        Noble earl,
    I bring you certain news from Shrewsbury.

Northumberland    Good, and God will!

Lord Bardolph                            As good as heart can wish:
    The king is almost wounded to the death;
    And, in the fortune of my lord your son,
    Prince Harry slain outright; and both the Blunts
    Killed by the hand of Douglas; young Prince John
    And Westmoreland and Stafford fled the field;
    And Harry Monmouth's brawn, the hulk Sir John,
    Is prisoner to your son. O, such a day,
    So fought, so followed, and so fairly won,
    Came not till now to dignify the times
    Since Caesar's fortunes!

Northumberland                                How is this derived?
    Saw you the field? Came you from Shrewsbury?

Lord Bardolph    I spake with one, my lord, that came from thence;
    A gentleman well bred, and of good name,
    That freely rendered me these news for true.

Northumberland    Here comes my servant Travers, who I sent
    On Tuesday last to listen after news.

                              Enter TRAVERS.

Lord Bardolph    My lord, I overrode him on the way,
    And he is furnished with no certainties
    More than he haply may retail from me.

Northumberland    Now, Travers, what good tidings comes with you?

Travers    My lord, Sir John Umfrevile turned me back
    With joyful tidings, and, being better horsed,
    Outrode me. After him came spurring hard
    A gentleman, almost forspent with speed,
    That stopped by me to breathe his bloodied horse.
    He asked the way to Chester, and of him
    I did demand what news from Shrewsbury.
    He told me that rebellion had ill luck,
    And that young Harry Percy's spur was cold.
    With that he gave his able horse the head,
    And bending forward struck his armd heels
    Against the panting sides of his poor jade
    Up to the rowel-head; and, starting so,
    He seemed in running to devour the way,
    Staying no longer question.

Northumberland                                    Ha? Again:
    Said he young Harry Percy's spur was cold?
    - Of Hotspur, Coldspur? - That rebellion
    Had met ill luck?

Lord Bardolph                        My lord, I'll tell you what:
    If my young lord your son have not the day,
    Upon mine honour, for a silken point
    I'll give my barony. Never talk of it.

Northumberland    Why should that gentleman that rode by Travers
    Give then such instances of loss?

Lord Bardolph                                            Who, he?
    He was some hilding fellow that had stol'n
    The horse he rode on, and, upon my life,
    Spoke at a venture. Look, here comes more news.

                              Enter MORTON.

Northumberland    Yea, this man's brow, like to a title-leaf,
    Foretells the nature of a tragic volume.
    So looks the strond whereon the imperious flood
    Hath left a witnessed usurpation.
    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 tremblest, 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 woebegone,
    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 my 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 an 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
    Remembered tolling 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 God I had not seen;
    But these mine eyes saw him in bloody state,
    Rend'ring faint quittance, wearied, and out-breathed,
    To Harry 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 metal 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 that noble Worcester
    So 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 Westmoreland. This is the news at full.

Northumberland    For this I shall have time enough to mourn.
    In poison there is physic; and these 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 nice crutch!
    A scaly gauntlet now with joints of steel
    Must glove this hand. And hence, thou sickly coif!
    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 raggd'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 this 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    This straind passion doth you wrong, my lord.

Morton    Sweet earl, divorce not wisdom from your honour -
    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 engagd to this loss
    Knew that we ventured on such dangerous seas
    That if we wrought out life 'twas 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 dare 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:
    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 Bolingbroke;
    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, and never yet more need.
                                                    [Exeunt.