KING RICHARD III. William Shakespeare

RATCLIFF and others.]

       GLOSTER

       Sister, have comfort: all of us have cause

       To wail the dimming of our shining star;

       But none can help our harms by wailing them.—

       Madam, my mother, I do cry you mercy;

       I did not see your grace:—humbly on my knee

       I crave your blessing.

       DUCHESS

       God bless thee; and put meekness in thy breast,

       Love, charity, obedience, and true duty!

       GLOSTER

       Amen!

       [Aside]

       And make me die a good old man!—

       That is the butt end of a mother’s blessing;

       I marvel that her grace did leave it out.

       BUCKINGHAM

       You cloudy princes and heart-sorrowing peers,

       That bear this heavy mutual load of moan,

       Now cheer each other in each other’s love:

       Though we have spent our harvest of this king,

       We are to reap the harvest of his son.

       The broken rancour of your high-swoln hearts,

       But lately splinter’d, knit, and join’d together,

       Must gently be preserv’d, cherish’d, and kept;

       Me seemeth good that, with some little train,

       Forthwith from Ludlow the young prince be fetched

       Hither to London, to be crown’d our king.

       RIVERS

       Why with some little train, my Lord of Buckingham?

       BUCKINGHAM

       Marry, my lord, lest by a multitude,

       The new-heal’d wound of malice should break out;

       Which would be so much the more dangerous

       By how much the estate is green and yet ungovern’d:

       Where every horse bears his commanding rein

       And may direct his course as please himself,

       As well the fear of harm as harm apparent,

       In my opinion, ought to be prevented.

       GLOSTER

       I hope the king made peace with all of us;

       And the compact is firm and true in me.

       RIVERS

       And so in me; and so, I think, in all:

       Yet, since it is but green, it should be put

       To no apparent likelihood of breach,

       Which haply by much company might be urg’d:

       Therefore I say with noble Buckingham,

       That it is meet so few should fetch the prince.

       HASTINGS

       And so say I.

       GLOSTER

       Then be it so; and go we to determine

       Who they shall be that straight shall post to Ludlow.

       Madam,—and you, my mother,—will you go

       To give your censures in this business?

       [Exeunt all but BUCKINGHAM and GLOSTER.]

       BUCKINGHAM

       My lord, whoever journeys to the prince,

       For God’d sake, let not us two stay at home;

       For by the way I’ll sort occasion,

       As index to the story we late talk’d of,

       To part the queen’s proud kindred from the Prince.

       GLOSTER

       My other self, my counsel’s consistory,

       My oracle, my prophet!—my dear cousin,

       I, as a child, will go by thy direction.

       Toward Ludlow then, for we’ll not stay behind.

       [Exeunt.]

      SCENE III. London. A street

       [Enter two CITIZENS, meeting.]

       FIRST CITIZEN

       Good morrow, neighbour: whither away so fast?

       SECOND CITIZEN

       I promise you, I scarcely know myself:

       Hear you the news abroad?

       FIRST CITIZEN

       Yes,—that the king is dead.

       SECOND CITIZEN

       Ill news, by’r lady; seldom comes the better:

       I fear, I fear ‘twill prove a giddy world.

       [Enter third CITIZEN.]

       THIRD CITIZEN

       Neighbours, God speed!

       FIRST CITIZEN

       Give you good morrow, sir.

       THIRD CITIZEN

       Doth the news hold of good King Edward’s death?

       SECOND CITIZEN

       Ay, sir, it is too true; God help the while!

       THIRD CITIZEN

       Then, masters, look to see a troublous world.

       FIRST CITIZEN

       No, no; by God’s good grace, his son shall reign.

       THIRD CITIZEN

       Woe to that land that’s govern’d by a child!

       SECOND CITIZEN

       In him there is a hope of government,

       Which, in his nonage, council under him,

       And, in his full and ripen’d years, himself,

       No doubt, shall then, and till then, govern well.

       FIRST CITIZEN

       So stood the state when Henry the Sixth

       Was crown’d in Paris but at nine months old.

       THIRD CITIZEN

       Stood the state so? No, no, good friends, God wot;

       For then this land was famously enrich’d

       With politic grave counsel; then the king

       Had virtuous uncles to protect his grace.

       FIRST CITIZEN

       Why, so hath this, both by his father and mother.

       THIRD CITIZEN

       Better it were they all came by his father,

       Or by his father there were none at all;

       For emulation who shall now be nearest

       Will touch us all too near, if God prevent not.

       O, full of danger is the Duke of Gloster!

       And the queen’s sons and brothers haught and proud:

       And were they to be rul’d, and not to rule,

       This sickly land might solace as before.

       FIRST CITIZEN

       Come, come, we fear the worst; all will be well.

       THIRD CITIZEN

       When clouds are seen, wise men put on their cloaks;

       When