Send me your prisoners with the speediest means,
Or
you shall hear in such a kind from me

As will displease you. My lord Northumberland,
We license your departure with your son.
Send us your prisoners, or you'll hear of it.

[Exeunt King Henry, Blunt, and Train. Hot. And if the devil come and roar for them, I will not send them. I will after straight, And tell him so; for I will ease my heart, Although it be with hazard of my head.

North. What, drunk with choler? stay, and pause awhile;

Here comes your uncle.

Hot.

Re-enter WORCESTER.

Speak of Mortimer ?

Zounds, I will speak of him; and let my soul
Want mercy, if I do not join with him:

Yea, on his part, I'll empty all these veins,
And shed my dear blood drop by drop i' the dust,
But I will lift the down-trod Mortimer

As high i' the air as this unthankful king,
As this ingrate and canker'd Bolingbroke.

North. Brother, the king hath made your nephew

mad. [to Worcester. Wor. Who struck this heat up after I was gone? Hot. He will, forsooth, have all my prisoners;

And when I urged the ransom once again
Of my wife's brother, then his cheek look'd pale;
And on my face he turn'd an eye of death,

Trembling even at the name of Mortimer.
Wor. I cannot blame him.

claim'd,

Was he not pro

By Richard that dead is, the next of blood?
North. He was; I heard the proclamation :
And then it was, when the unhappy king
(Whose wrongs in us God pardon!) did set forth
Upon his Irish expedition;

From whence he, intercepted, did return,

To be deposed, and, shortly, murdered.

Wor. And for whose death, we, in the world's ⚫ wide mouth,

Live scandalised, and foully spoken of.

Hot. But, soft, I pray you. Did king Richard

then

Proclaim my brother Edmund Mortimer

Heir to the crown?

North.

He did; myself did hear it.

Hot. Nay, then I cannot blame his cousin king, l'hat wish'd him on the barren mountains starved. But shall it be, that you,-that set the crown Upon the head of this forgetful man, And, for his sake, wear the detested blot Of murderous subornation ;-shall it be, That you a world of curses undergo; Being the agents, or base second means, The cords, the ladder, or the hangman rather?— O, pardon me, that I descend so low, To show the line, and the predicament, Wherein you range under this subtle king. Shall it. for shame, be spoken in these days,

Or fill up chronicles in time to come,
That men of your nobility and power
Did gage them both in an unjust behalf,—
As both of you, God pardon it! have done,—
To put down Richard, that sweet lovely rose,
And plant this thorn, this canker, Bolingbroke?
And shall it, in more shame, be farther spoken,
That you are fool'd, discarded, and shook off
By him, for whom these shames ye underwent ?
No; yet time serves, wherein you may redeem
Your banish'd honors, and restore yourselves
Into the good thoughts of the world again ;
Revenge the jeering and disdain'd1 contempt
Of this proud king, who studies, day and night,
To answer all the debt he owes to you,
Even with the bloody payment of your deaths.
Therefore I say,-

Wor.

Peace, cousin; say no more:

And now I will unclasp a secret book,
And to your quick-conceiving discontents
I'll read you matter deep and dangerous;
As full of peril and adventurous spirit,
As to o'erwalk a current, roaring loud,
On the unsteadfast footing of a spear.

Hot. If he fall in, good night!--or sink or swim :

Send Danger from the east unto the west,

So Honor cross it from the north to south,

1 Disdainful.

And let them grapple.—O! the blocd more stirs, To rouse a lion, than to start a hare.

North. Imagination of some great exploit Drives him beyond the bounds of patience.

Hot. By heaven, methinks, it were an easy leap To pluck bright Honor from the pale-faced moon; Or dive into the bottom of the deep,

Where fathom-line could never touch the ground,
And pluck up drowned Honor by the locks;
So he, that doth redeem her thence, might wear,
Without co-rival, all her dignities:

But out upon this half-faced fellowship!

1

Wor. He apprehends a world of figures 1 here, But not the form of what he should attend.

Good cousin, give me audience for awhile.

Hot. I cry you mercy.

Wor.

That are your prisoners,

Hot.

Those same noble Scots,

I'll keep them all:

By heaven, he shall not have a Scot of them;
No, if a Scot would save his soul, he shall not:

I'll keep them, by this hand.

You start away,

Wor.
And lend no ear unto my purposes.

Those prisoners you shall keep.

Hot.
He said, he would not ransom Mortimer;
Forbad my tongue to speak of Mortimer :

Nay, I will; that's flat :

Shapes created by his imagination.

But I will find him when he lies asleep,
And in his ear I'll holla-Mortimer!
Nay,

I'll have a starling shall be taught to speak
Nothing but Mortimer, and give it him,
To keep his anger still in motion.

Wor. Hear you, cousin; a word.

Hot. All studies here I solemnly defy,1
Save how to gall and pinch this Bolingbroke,
And that same sword-an 1-buckler 2 prince of Wales.
But that I think his father loves him not,

And would be glad he met with some mischance,
I would have him poison'd with a pot of ale.
Wor. Farewell, kinsman! I will talk to you,
When you are better temper'd to attend.

North. Why, what a wasp-tongue and impatient

fool

Art thou, to break into this woman's mood;

Tying thine ear to no tongue but thine own!

Hot. Why, look you, I am whipp'd and scourged with rods,

Nettled and stung with pismires, when I hear
Of this vile politician, Bolingbroke.

In Richard's time,-What do you call the place ?—
A plague upon 't!-it is in Glostershire ;-

'Twas where the mad-cap duke his uncle kept, His uncle York ;-where I first bow'd my knee

1 Refuse.

The term for a turbulent, quarrelsome fellow.