King John by William Shakespeare (recommended reading .TXT) 📕

have believ'd him, - no tongue but Hubert's.

HUBERT.
[Stamps.] Come forth.

[Re-enter Attendants, with cords, irons, &c.]

Do as I bid you do.

ARTHUR.
O, save me, Hubert, save me! my eyes are out
Even with the fierce looks of these bloody men.

HUBERT.
Give me the iron, I say, and bind him here.

ARTHUR.
Alas, what need you be so boist'rous rough?
I will not struggle, I will stand stone-still.
For heaven sake, Hubert, let me not be bound!
Nay, hear me, Hubert! - drive these men away,
And I will sit as quiet as a lamb;
I will not stir, nor wince, nor speak a word,
Nor look upon the iron angerly:
Thrust but these men away, and I'll forgive you,
Whatever torment you do put me to.

HUBERT.
Go, stand within; let me alone with him.

FIRST ATTENDANT.
I am best pleas'd to be from such a deed.

[Exeunt Attendants.]

ARTHUR.
Alas, I then have chid away my friend!
He hath a stern look but a gentle heart: -
Let him come back, that his compassion may
Give life to yours.

HUBERT.
Come, boy, prepare yourself.

ARTHUR.
Is there no remedy?

HUBERT.
None, but to lose your eyes.

ARTHUR.
O heaven! - that there were but a mote in yours,
A grain, a dust, a gnat, a wandering hair,
Any annoyance in that precious sense!
Then, feeling what small things are boisterous there,
Your vile intent must needs seem horrible.

HUBERT.
Is this your promise? go to, hold your tongue.

ARTHUR.
Hubert, the utterance of a brace of tongues
Must needs want pleading for a pair of eyes:
Let me not hold my tongue, - let me not, Hubert;
Or, Hubert, if you will, cut out my tongue,
So I may keep mine eyes: O, spare mine eyes,
Though to no use but still to look on you! -
Lo, by my troth, the instrument is cold
And would not harm me.

HUBERT.
I can heat it, boy.

ARTHUR.
No, in good sooth; the fire is dead with grief,
Being create for comfort, to be us'd
In undeserv'd extremes: see else yourself;
There is no malice in this burning coal;
The breath of heaven hath blown his spirit out,
And strew'd repentant ashes on his head.

HUBERT.
But with my breath I can revive it, boy.

ARTHUR.
An if you do, you will but make it blush,
And glow with shame of your proceedings, Hubert.
Nay, it, perchance will sparkle in your eyes;
And, like a dog that is compell'd to fight,
Snatch at his master that doth tarre him on.
All things that you should use to do me wrong,
Deny their office: only you do lack
That mercy which fierce fire and iron extends,
Creatures of note for mercy-lacking uses.

HUBERT.
Well, see to live; I will not touch thine eye
For all the treasure that thine uncle owes:
Yet I am sworn, and I did purpose, boy,
With this same very iron to burn them out.

ARTHUR.
O, now you look like Hubert! all this while
You were disguised.

HUBERT.
Peace; no more. Adieu!
Your uncle must not know but you are dead;
I'll fill these dogged spies with false reports:
And, pretty child, sleep doubtless and secure
That Hubert, for the wealth of all the world,
Will not offend thee.

ARTHUR.
O heaven! I thank you, Hubert.

HUBERT.
Silence; no more: go closely in with me:
Much danger do I undergo for thee.

[Exeunt.]


SCENE 2.The same. A Room of State in the Palace.

[Enter KING JOHN, crowned, PEMBROKE, SALISBURY, and other LORDS.
The KING takes his State.]

KING JOHN.
Here once again we sit, once again crown'd,
And look'd upon, I hope, with cheerful eyes.

PEMBROKE.
This once again, but that your highness pleas'd,
Was once superfluous: you were crown'd before,
And that high royalty was ne'er pluck'd off;
The faiths of men ne'er stained with revolt;
Fresh expectation troubled not the land
With any long'd-for change or better state.

SALISBURY.
Therefore, to be possess'd with double pomp,
To guard a title that was rich before,
To gild refined gold, to paint the lily,
To throw a perfume on the violet,
To smooth the ice, or add another hue
Unto the rainbow, or with taper-light
To seek the beauteous eye of heaven to garnish,
Is wasteful and ridiculous excess.

PEMBROKE.
But that your royal pleasure must be done,
This act is as an ancient tale new told;
And, in the last repeating troublesome,
Being urged at a time unseasonable.

SALISBURY.
In this, the antique and well-noted face
Of plain old form is much disfigured;
And, like a shifted wind unto a sail,
It makes the course of thoughts to fetch about;
Startles and frights consideration;
Makes sound opinion sick, and truth suspected,
For putting on so new a fashion'd robe.

PEMBROKE.
When workmen strive to do better than well,
They do confound their skill in covetousness;
And oftentimes excusing of a fault
Doth make the fault the worse by the excuse, -
As patches set upon a little breach
Discredit more in hiding of the fault
Than did the fault before it was so patch'd.

SALISBURY.
To this effect, before you were new-crown'd,
We breath'd our counsel: but it pleas'd your highness
To overbear it; and we are all well pleas'd,
Since all and every part of what we would
Doth make a stand at what your highness will.

KING JOHN.
Some reasons of this double coronation
I have possess'd you with, and think them strong;
And more, more strong, when lesser is my fear,
I shall indue you with: meantime but ask
What you would have reform'd that is not well,
And well shall you perceive how willingly
I will both hear and grant you your requests.

PEMBROKE.
Then I, - as one that am the tongue of these,
To sound the purposes of all their hearts, -
Both for myself and them, - but, chief of all,
Your safety, for the which myself and them
Bend their best studies, - heartily request
The enfranchisement of Arthur, whose restraint
Doth move the murmuring lips of discontent
To break into this dangerous argument, -
If what in rest you have in right you hold,
Why then your fears, - which, as they say, attend
The steps of wrong, - should move you to mew up
Your tender kinsman, and to choke his days
With barbarous ignorance, and deny his youth
The rich advantage of good exercise?
That the time's enemies may not have this
To grace occasions, let it be our suit
That you have bid us ask his liberty;
Which for our goods we do no further ask
Than whereupon our weal, on you depending,
Counts it your weal he have his liberty.

KING JOHN.
Let it be so: I do commit his youth
To your direction.

[Enter HUBERT.]

Hubert, what news with you?

PEMBROKE.
This is the man should do the bloody deed;
He show'd his warrant to a friend of mine:
The image of a wicked heinous fault
Lives in his eye; that close aspect of his
Doth show the mood of a much-troubled breast;
And I do fearfully believe 'tis done
What we so fear'd he had a charge to do.

SALISBURY.
The colour of the king doth come and go
Between his purpose and his conscience,
Like heralds 'twixt two dreadful battles set.
His passion is so ripe it needs must break.

PEMBROKE.
And when it breaks, I fear will issue thence
The foul corruption of a sweet child's death.

KING JOHN.
We cannot hold mortality's strong hand: -
Good lords, although my will to give is living,
The suit which you demand is gone and dead:
He tells us Arthur is deceas'd to-night.

SALISBURY.
Indeed, we fear'd his sickness was past cure.

PEMBROKE.
Indeed, we heard how near his death he was,
Before the child himself felt he was sick:
This must be answer'd either here or hence.

KING JOHN.
Why do you bend such solemn brows on me?
Think you I bear the shears of destiny?
Have I commandment on the pulse of life?

SALISBURY.
It is apparent foul-play; and 'tis shame
That greatness should so grossly offer it:
So thrive it in your game! and so, farewell.

PEMBROKE.
Stay yet, Lord Salisbury, I'll go with thee
And find th' inheritance of this poor child,
His little kingdom of a forced grave.
That blood which ow'd the breadth of all this isle
Three foot of it doth hold: - bad world the while!
This must not be thus borne: this will break out
To all our sorrows, and ere long, I doubt.

[Exeunt LORDS.]

KING JOHN.
They burn in indignation. I repent:
There is no sure foundation set on blood;
No certain life achiev'd by others' death. -

[Enter a MESSENGER.]

A fearful eye thou hast: where is that blood
That I have seen inhabit in those cheeks?
So foul a sky clears not without a storm:
Pour down thy weather: - how goes all in France?

MESSENGER.
From France to England. - Never such a power
For any foreign preparation
Was levied in the body of a land.
The copy of your speed is learn'd by them;
For when you should be told they do prepare,
The tidings comes that they are all arriv'd.

KING JOHN.
O, where hath our intelligence been drunk?
Where hath it slept? Where is my mother's care,
That such an army could be drawn in France,
And she not hear of it?

MESSENGER.
My liege, her ear
Is stopp'd with dust; the first of April died
Your noble mother; and as I hear, my lord,
The Lady Constance in a frenzy died
Three days before; but this from rumour's tongue
I idly heard, - if true or false I know not.

KING JOHN.
Withhold thy speed, dreadful occasion!
O, make a league with me, till I have pleas'd
My discontented peers! - What! mother dead!
How wildly, then, walks my estate in France! -
Under whose conduct came those powers of France
That thou for truth giv'st out are landed here?

MESSENGER.
Under the Dauphin.

KING JOHN.
Thou hast made me giddy
With these in tidings.

[Enter the BASTARD and PETER OF POMFRET.]

Now! What says the world
To your proceedings? do not seek to stuff
My head with more ill news, for it is full.

BASTARD.
But if you be afear'd to hear the worst,
Then let the worst, unheard, fall on your head.

KING JOHN.
Bear with me, cousin, for I was amaz'd
Under the tide: but now I breathe again
Aloft the flood; and can give audience
To any tongue, speak it of what it will.

BASTARD.
How I have sped among the clergymen,
The sums I have collected shall express.
But as I travell'd hither through the land,
I find the people strangely fantasied;
Possess'd with rumours, full of idle dreams.
Not knowing what they fear, but full of fear;
And here's a prophet that I brought with me
From forth the streets of Pomfret, whom I found
With many hundreds treading on his heels;
To whom he sung, in rude harsh-sounding rhymes,
That, ere the next Ascension-day at noon,
Your highness should deliver up your crown.

KING JOHN.
Thou idle dreamer, wherefore didst thou so?

PETER.
Foreknowing that the truth will fall out so.

KING JOHN.
Hubert, away with him; imprison him;
And on that day at noon, whereon he says
I shall yield