SCENE III. Before the Castle. Enter ARTHUR on the Walls. ARTH. The wall is high; and yet will I leap down:- [Leaps down If I get down, and do not break my limbs, Enter PEMBROKE, SALISBURY, and BIGOT. SAL. Lords, I will meet him at St. Edmund's-Bury; It is our safety, and we must embrace This gentle offer of the perilous time. PEM. Who brought that letter from the cardinal? BIG. To-morrow morning let us meet him then. Enter the Bastard. BAST. Once more to-day well met, distemper'd lords! The king, by me, requests your presence straight. SAL. The king hath dispossess'd himself of us. We will not line his thin bestained cloak With our pure honours, nor attend the foot Return, and tell him so; we know the worst. [Dies BAST. Whate'er you think, good words, I think, were best. Therefore, 't were reason you had manners now. BAST. "T is true; to hurt his master, no man else. [Seeing ARTHUR PEM. O death, made proud with pure and princely beauty! The earth had not a hole to hide this deed. SAL. Murther, as hating what himself hath done, Doth lay it open, to urge on revenge. BIG. Or, when he doom'd this beauty to a grave, Found it too precious-princely for a grave. SAL. Sir Richard, what think you? You have beheld, That you do see? could thought, without this object, The height, the crest, or crest unto the crest, The wildest savagery, the vilest stroke, That ever wall-ey'd wrath, or staring rage, PEM. All murthers past do stand excus'd in this: Shall give a holiness, a purity, To the yet-unbegotten sin of times; BAST. It is a damned and a bloody work; SAL. If that it be the work of any hand?— Till I have set a glory to this hand, PEM., BIG. Our souls religiously confirm thy words. HUB. Lords, I am hot with haste in seeking you : SAL. O, he is bold, and blushes not at death:Avaunt, thou hateful villain, get thee gone! HUB. I am no villain. SAL. Must I rob the law? BAST. Your sword is bright, sir; put it up again. Your worth, your greatness, and nobility. BIG. Out, dunghill! dar'st thou brave a nobleman? My innocent life against an emperor. SAL. Thou art a murtherer. HUB. Do not prove me so; Yet, I am none: Whose tongue soe'er speaks false, PEM. Cut him to pieces. BAST. Keep the peace, I say. SAL. Stand by, or I shall gall you, Faulconbridge. If thou but frown on me, or stir thy foot, Or teach thy hasty spleen to do me shame, I'll strike thee dead. Put up thy sword betime; HUB. Lord Bigot, I am none. BIG. Who kill'd this prince? HUB. "T is not an hour since I left him well: SAL. Trust not those cunning waters of his eyes, BIG. Away, toward Bury, to the dauphin there! [Exeunt Lords. BAST. Here's a good world!-Know you of this fair work? Beyond the infinite and boundless reach Of mercy, if thou didst this deed of death, Art thou damn'd, Hubert. HUB. Do but hear me, sir. BAST. Ha! I'll tell thee what; Thou 'rt damn'd as black—nay, nothing is so black; Thou art more deep damn'd than prince Lucifer: There is not yet so ugly a fiend of hell As thou shalt be, if thou didst kill this child. BAST. If thou didst but consent To this most cruel act, do but despair, And, if thou want'st a cord, the smallest thread That ever spider twisted from her womb Will serve to strangle thee; a rush will be A beam to hang thee on; or, wouldst thou drown thyself, Put but a little water in a spoon, And it shall be, as all the ocean, Enough to stifle such a villain up.— I do suspect thee very grievously. HUB. If I in act, consent, or sin of thought, BAST. Go, bear him in thine arms.- [Exeunt ACT V. SCENE I-A Room in the Palace. Enter KING JOHN, PANDULPH with the Crown, and [Giving JOHN the crown. From this my hand, as holding of the pope, Your sovereign greatness and authority. K. JOHN. Now keep your holy word: go meet the French; |