Glo. Well thought upon; I have it here about me;

[Gives the warrant.

When you have done, repair to Crosby-place.
But, sirs, be sudden in the execution,
Withal obdurate, do not hear him plead ;
For Clarence is well spoken, and, perhaps,
May move your hearts to pity, if you mark him.

1 Murd. Tut, tut, my lord, we will not stand to prate,

Talkers are no good doers; be assured,

We go to use our hands, and not our tongues.

Glo. Your eyes drop mill-stones, when fools' eyes drop tears.1

I like you, lads;-about your business straight.
Go, go, despatch.

1 Murd.

We will, my noble lord. [Exeunt.

SCENE IV. London. A Room in the Tower.

Enter CLARENCE and BRAKENBURY.

Brak. Why looks your grace so heavily to-day?
Clar. O, I have passed a miserable night,
So full of fearful dreams, of ugly sights,
That, as I am a Christian faithful man,
I would not spend another such a night,
Though 'twere to buy a world of happy days;
So full of dismal terror was the time.

Brak. What was your dream, my lord? I pray you,

tell me.

Clar. Methought that I had broken from the Tower, And was embarked to cross to Burgundy;2

1 This appears to have been a proverbial saying. It occurs again in the tragedy of Cæsar and Pompey, 1607:-

"Men's eyes must mill-stones drop when fools shed tears."

2 Clarence was desirous to assist his sister Margaret against the French king, who invaded her jointure lands after the death of her husband, Charles duke of Burgundy, who was killed at Nancy, in January, 1476–7. Isabel, the wife of Clarence, being then dead (poisoned by the duke of Gloucester, as it has been conjectured), he wished to have married Mary,

And, in my company, my brother Gloster;
Who from my cabin tempted me to walk

Upon the hatches; thence we looked toward England, And cited up a thousand heavy times,

During the wars of York and Lancaster,

That had befallen us. As we paced along

Upon the giddy footing of the hatches,

Methought that Gloster stumbled; and, in falling,
Struck me, that thought to stay him, overboard,
Into the tumbling billows of the main.

O Lord! methought what pain it was to drown!
What dreadful noise of water in mine ears!
What sights of ugly death within mine eyes!
Methought I saw a thousand fearful wrecks;
A thousand men, that fishes gnawed upon;
Wedges of gold, great anchors, heaps of pearl,
Inestimable stones, unvalued1 jewels,

All scattered in the bottom of the sea.

Some lay in dead men's skulls; and in those holes
Where eyes did once inhabit, there were crept
(As 'twere in scorn of eyes) reflecting gems,
That wooed the slimy bottom of the deep,
And mocked the dead bones that lay scattered by.
Brak. Had you such leisure in the time of death,
To gaze upon these secrets of the deep?

Clar. Methought I had; and often did I strive
To yield the ghost; but still the envious flood
Kept in my soul, and would not let it forth
To seek the empty, vast, and wandering air;
But smothered it within my panting bulk,3
Which almost burst to belch it in the sea.

Brak. Awaked you not with this sore agony?
Clar. O, no, my dream was lengthened after life;

the daughter and heir of the duke of Burgundy; but the match was opposed by Edward, who hoped to have obtained her for his brother-in-law, lord Rivers; and this circumstance has been suggested as the principal cause of the breach between Edward and Clarence. Mary of Burgundy, however, chose a husband for herself, having married, in 1477, Maximilian, son of the emperor Frederic.

1 Unvalued for invaluable.
2 Vast is waste, desolate.
3 Bulk, i. e. breast.

O, then began the tempest to my soul!
I passed, methought, the melancholy flood,
With that grim ferryman which poets write of,
Unto the kingdom of perpetual night.

The first that there did greet my stranger soul,
Was my great father-in-law, renowned Warwick ;
Who cried aloud,-What scourge for perjury
Can this dark monarchy afford false Clarence?
And so he vanished. Then came wandering by
A shadow like an angel, with bright hair
Dabbled in blood, and he shrieked out aloud,—
Clarence is come, false, fleeting,' perjured Clarence,
That stabbed me in the field by Tewksbury;-
Seize on him, furies, take him to your torments!
With that, methought a legion of foul fiends
Environed me, and howled in mine ears
Such hideous cries, that, with the very noise,
I trembling waked, and, for a season after,
Could not believe but that I was in hell;
Such terrible impression made my dream.
Brak. No marvel, lord, though it affrighted you!
I am afraid, methinks, to hear you tell it.

Clar. O, Brakenbury, I have done these things-
That now give evidence against my soul-
For Edward's sake; and, see, how he requites me!
O God! if my deep prayers cannot appease thee,
But thou wilt be avenged on my misdeeds,

Yet execute thy wrath on me alone;

O, spare my guiltless wife, and my poor children.I pray thee, gentle keeper, stay by me;

My soul is heavy, and I fain would sleep.

Brak. I will, my lord; God give your grace good

rest!

[CLARENCE reposes himself on a chair. Sorrow breaks seasons and reposing hours,

Makes the night morning, and the noontide night.

1 Fleeting or flitting, in old language, was used for uncertain, inconstant, fluctuating.

2 The wife of Clarence died before he was apprehended and confined in the Tower.

Princes have but their titles for their glories,
An outward honor for an inward toil;
And, for unfelt imaginations,

They often feel a world of restless cares;1
So that, between their titles, and low name,
There's nothing differs but the outward fame.

Enter the Two Murderers.

1 Murd. Ho! who's here?

Brak. What wouldst thou, fellow? and how cam'st thou hither?

1 Murd. I would speak with Clarence, and I came hither on my legs.

Brak. What, so brief?

2 Murd. O, sir, 'tis better to be brief than tedious.— Let him see our commission; talk no more.

[A paper is delivered to BRAKENBURY, who
reads it.

Brak. I am, in this, commanded to deliver
The noble duke of Clarence to your hands;
I will not reason what is meant hereby,
Because I will be guiltless of the meaning.
Here are the keys;—there sits the duke asleep.
I'll to the king; and signify to him,

That thus I have resigned to you my charge.

1 Murd. You may, sir; 'tis a point of wisdom. Fare you well. [Exit BRAKENBury. 2 Murd. What, shall we stab him as he sleeps? 1 Murd. No; he'll say, 'twas done cowardly, when

he wakes.

2 Murd. When he wakes! why, fool, he shall never wake until the great judgment day.

1 Murd. Why, then he'll say, we stabbed him sleeping.

2 Murd. The urging of that word, judgment, hath bred a kind of remorse in me.

1 Murd. What? art thou afraid?

1 They often suffer real miseries for imaginary and unreal gratifications.

2 Murd. Not to kill him, having a warrant for it, but to be damned for killing him, from the which no warrant can defend me.

1 Murd. I thought thou hadst been resolute.

2 Murd. So I am, to let him live.

1 Murd. I'll back to the duke of Gloster, and tell him so.

2 Murd. Nay, I pr'ythee, stay a little. I hope this holy humor of mine will change; it was wont to hold me but while one would tell twenty.

1 Murd. How dost thou feel thyself now?

2 Murd. 'Faith, some certain dregs of conscience are yet within me.

1 Murd. Remember our reward, when the deed's done.

2 Murd. Come, he dies; I had forgot the reward. 1 Murd. Where's thy conscience now?

2 Murd. In the duke of Gloster's purse.

1 Murd. So, when he opens his purse to give us our reward, thy conscience flies out.

2 Murd. 'Tis no matter; let it go; there's few, or none, will entertain it.

1 Murd. What if it come to thee again?

2 Murd. I'll not meddle with it; it is a dangerous thing; it makes a man a coward; a man cannot steal, but it accuseth him; a man cannot swear, but it checks him; a man cannot lie with his neighbor's wife, but it detects him. 'Tis a blushing, shame-faced spirit, that mutinies in a man's bosom; it fills one full of obstacles; it made me once restore a purse of gold that by chance I found; it beggars any man that keeps it; it is turned out of all towns and cities for a dangerous thing; and every man that means to live well, endeavors to trust to himself, and live without it.

1 Murd. 'Zounds, it is even now at my elbow, persuading me not to kill the duke.

2 Murd. Take the devil in thy mind, and believe him not; he would insinuate with thee, but to make thee sigh.