TALBOT

  No, no, I am but shadow of myself.

  52

  You are deceived; my substance is not here,

  53

  For what you see is but the smallest part

  54

  And least proportion of humanity.

  55

  I tell you, madam, were the whole frame here,

  56

  It is of such a spacious lofty pitch

  57

  Your roof were not sufficient to contain ’t.

  58

  COUNTESS

  This is a riddling merchant for the nonce:

  59

  He will be here and yet he is not here.

  60

  How can these contrarieties agree?

  61

  TALBOT

  That will I show you presently.

  62

  Winds his horn. Drums strike up;

  a peal of ordnance.

  Enter Soldiers.

  How say you, madam? Are you now persuaded

  63

  That Talbot is but shadow of himself?

  64

  These are his substance, sinews, arms, and strength,

  65

  With which he yoketh your rebellious necks,

  66

  Razeth your cities, and subverts your towns,

  67

  And in a moment makes them desolate.

  68

  COUNTESS

  Victorious Talbot, pardon my abuse.

  69

  I find thou art no less than fame hath bruited,

  70

  And more than may be gathered by thy shape.

  71

  Let my presumption not provoke thy wrath,

  72

  For I am sorry that with reverence

  73

  I did not entertain thee as thou art.

  74

  TALBOT

  Be not dismayed, fair lady, nor misconster

  75

  The mind of Talbot as you did mistake

  76

  The outward composition of his body.

  77

  What you have done hath not offended me,

  78

  Nor other satisfaction do I crave

  79

  But only, with your patience, that we may

  80

  Taste of your wine and see what cates you have,

  81

  For soldiers’ stomachs always serve them well.

  82

  COUNTESS

  With all my heart, and think me honorèd

  83

  To feast so great a warrior in my house.

  84

  They exit.

 

  Enter Richard Plantagenet, Warwick, Somerset,

  Pole
  Vernon, a Lawyer,> and Others.

  PLANTAGENET

  Great lords and gentlemen, what means this silence?

  1

  Dare no man answer in a case of truth?

  2

  SUFFOLK

  Within the Temple Hall we were too loud;

  3

  The garden here is more convenient.

  4

  PLANTAGENET

  Then say at once if I maintained the truth,

  5

  Or else was wrangling Somerset in th’ error?

  6

  SUFFOLK

  Faith, I have been a truant in the law

  7

  And never yet could frame my will to it,

  8

  And therefore frame the law unto my will.

  9

  SOMERSET

  Judge you, my Lord of Warwick, then, between us.

  10

  WARWICK

  Between two hawks, which flies the higher pitch,

  11

  Between two dogs, which hath the deeper mouth,

  12

  Between two blades, which bears the better temper,

  13

  Between two horses, which doth bear him best,

  14

  Between two girls, which hath the merriest eye,

  15

  I have perhaps some shallow spirit of judgment;

  16

  But in these nice sharp quillets of the law,

  17

  Good faith, I am no wiser than a daw.

  18

  PLANTAGENET

  Tut, tut, here is a mannerly forbearance!

  19

  The truth appears so naked on my side

  20

  That any purblind eye may find it out.

  21

  SOMERSET

  And on my side it is so well appareled,

  22

  So clear, so shining, and so evident,

  23

  That it will glimmer through a blind man’s eye.

  24

  PLANTAGENET

  Since you are tongue-tied and so loath to speak,

  25

  In dumb significants proclaim your thoughts:

  26

  Let him that is a trueborn gentleman

  27

  And stands upon the honor of his birth,

  28

  If he suppose that I have pleaded truth,

  29

  From off this brier pluck a white rose with me.

  30

  SOMERSET

  Let him that is no coward nor no flatterer,

  31

  But dare maintain the party of the truth,

  32

  Pluck a red rose from off this thorn with me.

  33

  WARWICK

  I love no colors; and, without all color

  34

  Of base insinuating flattery,

  35

  I pluck this white rose with Plantagenet.

  36

  SUFFOLK

  I pluck this red rose with young Somerset,

  37

  And say withal I think he held the right.

  38

  VERNON

  Stay, lords and gentlemen, and pluck no more

  39

  Till you conclude that he upon whose side

  40

  The fewest roses are croppèd from the tree

  41

  Shall yield the other in the right opinion.

  42

  SOMERSET

  Good Master Vernon, it is well objected:

  43

  If I have fewest, I subscribe in silence.

  44

  PLANTAGENET  And I.

  45

  VERNON

  Then for the truth and plainness of the case,

  46

  I pluck this pale and maiden blossom here,

  47

  Giving my verdict on the white rose side.

  48

  SOMERSET

  Prick not your finger as you pluck it off,

  49

  Lest, bleeding, you do paint the white rose red,

  50

  And fall on my side so against your will.

  51

  VERNON

  If I, my lord, for my opinion bleed,

  52

  Opinion shall be surgeon to my hurt

  53

  And keep me on the side where still I am.

  54

  SOMERSET  Well, well, come on, who else?

  55

  LAWYER

  Unless my study and my books be false,

  56

  The argument you held was wrong in

  57

  In sign whereof I pluck a white rose too.

  58

  PLANTAGENET

  Now, Somerset, where is your argument?

  59

  SOMERSET

  Here in my scabbard, meditating that

  60

  Shall dye your white rose in a bloody red.

  61

  PLANTAGENET

  Meantime your cheeks do counterfeit our roses,

  62

  For pale they look with fear, as witnessing

  63

  The truth on our side.

  64

  SOMERSET No, Plantagenet.

  65

  ’Tis not for fear, but anger that thy cheeks

  66

  Blush for pure shame to counterfeit our roses,

  67

  And yet thy tongue will not confess thy error.

  68

  PLANTAGENET

  Hath not thy rose a canker, Somerset?

  69

  SOMERSET

  Hath not thy rose a thorn, Plantagenet?

  70

  PLANTAGENET

  Ay, sharp and piercing, to maintain his truth,

  71

  Whiles thy consuming canker eats his falsehood.

  72

  SOMERSET

  Well, I’ll find friends to wear my bleeding roses

  73

  That shall maintain what I have said is true,

  74

  Where false Plantagenet dare not be seen.

  75

  PLANTAGENET

  Now, by this maiden blossom in my hand,

  76

  I scorn thee and thy fashion, peevish boy.

  77

  SUFFOLK

  Turn not thy scorns this way, Plantagenet.

  78

  PLANTAGENET

  Proud Pole, I will, and scorn both him and thee.

  79

  SUFFOLK

  I’ll turn my part thereof into thy throat.

  80

  SOMERSET

  Away, away, good William de la Pole!

  81

  We grace the yeoman by conversing with him.

  82

  WARWICK

  Now, by God’s will, thou wrong’st him, Somerset.

  83

  His grandfather was Lionel, Duke of Clarence,

  84

  Third son to the third Edward, King of England.

  85

  Spring crestless yeomen from so deep a root?

  86

  PLANTAGENET

  He bears him on the place’s privilege,

  87

  Or durst not for his craven heart say thus.

  88

  SOMERSET

  By Him that made me, I’ll maintain my words

  89

  On any plot of ground in Christendom.

  90

  Was not thy father Richard, Earl of Cambridge,

  91

  For treason executed in our late king’s days?

  92

  And, by his treason, stand’st not thou attainted,

  93

  Corrupted, and exempt from ancient gentry?

  94

  His trespass yet lives guilty in thy blood,

  95

  And, till thou be restored, thou art a yeoman.

  96

  PLANTAGENET

  My father was attachèd, not attainted,

  97

  Condemned to die for treason, but no traitor;

  98

  And that I’ll prove on better men than Somerset,

  99

  Were growing time once ripened to my will.

  100

  For your partaker Pole and you yourself,

  101

  I’ll note you in my book of memory

  102

  To scourge you for this apprehension.

  103

  Look to it well, and say you are well warned.

  104

  SOMERSET

  Ah, thou shalt find us ready for thee still,

  105

  And know us by these colors for thy foes,

  106

  For these my friends in spite of thee shall wear.

  107

  PLANTAGENET

  And, by my soul, this pale and angry rose,

  108

  As cognizance of my blood-drinking hate,

  109

  Will I forever, and my faction, wear

  110

  Until it wither with me to my grave

  111

  Or flourish to the height of my degree.

  112

  SUFFOLK

  Go forward, and be choked with thy ambition!

  113

  And so farewell, until I meet thee next.

  114

  He exits.

  SOMERSET

  Have with thee, Pole.—Farewell, ambitious Richard.

  115

  He exits.

  PLANTAGENET

  How I am braved, and must perforce endure it!

  116

  WARWICK

  This blot that they object against your house

  117

  Shall be whipped out in the next parliament,

  118

  Called for the truce of Winchester and Gloucester;

  119

  And if thou be not then created York,

  120

  I will not live to be accounted Warwick.

  121

  Meantime, in signal of my love to thee,

  122

  Against proud Somerset and William Pole

  123

  Will I upon thy party wear this rose.

  124

  And here I prophesy: this brawl today,

  125

  Grown to this faction in the Temple garden,

  126

  Shall send, between the red rose and the white,

  127

  A thousand souls to death and deadly night.

  128

  PLANTAGENET

  Good Master Vernon, I am bound to you,

  129

  That you on my behalf would pluck a flower.

  130

  VERNON

  In your behalf still will I wear the same.

  131

  LAWYER

  And so will I.

  132

  PLANTAGENET   Thanks, gentle

  133

  Come, let us four to dinner. I dare say

  134

  This quarrel will drink blood another day.

  135

  They exit.

 

  Enter Mortimer, brought in a chair,

  and Jailers.

  MORTIMER

  Kind keepers of my weak decaying age,

  1

  Let dying Mortimer here rest himself.

  2

  Even like a man new-halèd from the rack,

  3

  So fare my limbs with long imprisonment;

  4

  And these gray locks, the pursuivants of death,

  5

  Nestor-like agèd in an age of care,

  6

  Argue the end of Edmund Mortimer;

  7

  These eyes, like lamps whose wasting oil is spent,

  8

  Wax dim, as drawing to their exigent;

  9

  Weak shoulders, overborne with burdening grief,

  10

  And pithless arms, like to a withered vine

  11

  That droops his sapless branches to the ground;

  12

  Yet are these feet, whose strengthless stay is numb,

  13