Enter SALISBURY
Welcome,my lord.How far off lies your power?SALISBURY.Nor near nor farther off,my gracious lord,Than this weak arm.Discomfort guides my tongue,And bids me speak of nothing but despair.One day too late,I fear me,noble lord,Hath clouded all thy happy days on earth.O,call back yesterday,bid time return,And thou shalt have twelve thousand fighting men!To-day,to-day,unhappy day,too late,O'erthrows thy joys,friends,fortune,and thy state;For all the Welshmen,hearing thou wert dead,Are gone to Bolingbroke,dispers'd,and fled.AUMERLE.Comfort,my liege,why looks your Grace so pale?KING RICHARD.But now the blood of twenty thousand men Did triumph in my face,and they are fled;And,till so much blood thither come again,Have I not reason to look pale and dead?All souls that will be safe,fly from my side;For time hath set a blot upon my pride.AUMERLE.Comfort,my liege;remember who you are.KING RICHARD.I had forgot myself;am I not King?Awake,thou coward majesty!thou sleepest.Is not the King's name twenty thousand names?Arm,arm,my name!a puny subject strikes At thy great glory.Look not to the ground,Ye favourites of a king;are we not high?High be our thoughts.I know my uncle York Hath power enough to serve our turn.But who comes here?
Enter SCROOP SCROOP.More health and happiness betide my liege Than can my care-tun'd tongue deliver him.KING RICHARD.Mine ear is open and my heart prepar'd.The worst is worldly loss thou canst unfold.Say,is my kingdom lost?Why,'twas my care,And what loss is it to be rid of care?Strives Bolingbroke to be as great as we?Greater he shall not be;if he serve God,We'll serve him too,and be his fellow so.Revolt our subjects?That we cannot mend;They break their faith to God as well as us.Cry woe,destruction,ruin,and decay-The worst is death,and death will have his day.SCROOP.Glad am I that your Highness is so arm'd To bear the tidings of calamity.Like an unseasonable stormy day Which makes the silver rivers drown their shores,As if the world were all dissolv'd to tears,So high above his limits swells the rage Of Bolingbroke,covering your fearful land With hard bright steel and hearts harder than steel.White-beards have arm'd their thin and hairless scalps Against thy majesty;boys,with women's voices,Strive to speak big,and clap their female joints In stiff unwieldy arms against thy crown;Thy very beadsmen learn to bend their bows Of double-fatal yew against thy state;Yea,distaff-women manage rusty bills Against thy seat:both young and old rebel,And all goes worse than I have power to tell.KING RICHARD.Too well,too well thou tell'st a tale so in.Where is the Earl of Wiltshire?Where is Bagot?
What is become of Bushy?Where is Green?That they have let the dangerous enemy Measure our confines with such peaceful steps?If we prevail,their heads shall pay for it.I warrant they have made peace with Bolingbroke.SCROOP.Peace have they made with him indeed,my lord.KING RICHARD.O villains,vipers,damn'd without redemption!Dogs,easily won to fawn on any man!Snakes,in my heart-blood warm'd,that sting my heart!Three Judases,each one thrice worse than Judas!Would they make peace?Terrible hell make war Upon their spotted souls for this offence!SCROOP.Sweet love,I see,changing his property,Turns to the sourest and most deadly hate.Again uncurse their souls;their peace is made With heads,and not with hands;those whom you curse Have felt the worst of death's destroying wound And lie full low,grav'd in the hollow ground.AUMERLE.Is Bushy,Green,and the Earl of Wiltshire dead?SCROOP.Ay,all of them at Bristow lost their heads.AUMERLE.Where is the Duke my father with his power?KING RICHARD.No matter where-of comfort no man speak.Let's talk of graves,of worms,and epitaphs;Make dust our paper,and with rainy eyes Write sorrow on the bosom of the earth.Let's choose executors and talk of wills;And yet not so-for what can we bequeath Save our deposed bodies to the ground?
