During whose reign, the Percies of the North,
Finding his usurpation most unjust,

Endeavour'd my advancement to the throne:
The reason moved these warlike lords to this

Was, for that young King Richard thus removed,
Leaving no heir begotten of his body

I was the next by birth and parentage ;

For by my mother I derived am

From Lionel Duke of Clarence, the third son 8

To King Edward the Third; whereas he
From John of Gaunt doth bring his pedigree,
Being but fourth of that heroic line.
But mark as, in this haughty-great attempt,
They labouréd to plant the rightful heir,
I lost my liberty, and they their lives.
Long after this, when Henry the Fifth,
Succeeding his father Bolingbroke, did reign,
Thy father, Earl of Cambridge, then derived
From famous Edmund Langley, Duke of York,
Marrying my sister, that thy mother was,
Again, in pity of my hard distress,
Levied an army, weening 9 to redeem

And have install'd me in the diadem:

8 In a previous note, I have spoken of Lionel as the second son of Edward the Third, of John of Ghent as the third, of Edmund of Langley as the fourth, and of Thomas of Woodstock as the fifth. And so historians commonly speak of them. In strictness of fact, however, the second son was William of Hatfield, who died in infancy, and so is commonly passed over in history. Hence the seeming discrepancy between the numbering in my notes and what is here and in some other places stated in Shakespeare's text. Shakespeare follows Holinshed, who speaks more "by the card" than is the use of later historians.

9 That is, thinking. This is another departure from history. Cambridge levied no army; but was apprehended at Southampton, the night before Henry sailed from that town for France, on the information of this very Earl of March.

But, as the rest, so fell that noble earl,
And was beheaded. Thus the Mortimers,
In whom the title rested, were suppress'd.

Plan. Of which, my lord, your Honour is the last.
Mor. True; and thou see'st that I no issue have,
And that my fainting words do warrant death:
Thou art my heir; the rest I wish thee gather: 10

But yet be wary in thy studious care.

Plan. Thy grave admonishments prevail with me: But yet, methinks, my father's execution

Was nothing less than bloody tyranny.

Mor. With silence, nephew, be thou politic: Strong-fixèd is the House of Lancaster,

And, like a mountain, not to be removed.

But now thy uncle is removing hence;

As princes do their Courts, when they are cloy'd

With long continuance in a settled place.

Plan. O, uncle, would some part of my young years

Might but redeem the passage of your age!

Mor. Thou dost, then, wrong me, as that slaughter doth

Which giveth many wounds when one will kill.
Mourn not, except thou sorrow for my good;
Only, give order for my funeral:

And so, farewell; and fair be all thy hopes,

And prosperous be thy life in peace and war!

Plan. And peace, no war, befall thy parting soul!

In prison hast thou spent a pilgrimage,

And like a hermit overpass'd thy days.-
Well, I will lock his counsel in my breast;
And what I do imagine, let that rest.
Keepers, convey him hence; and I myself

[Dies.

10 Meaning "I wish you to infer the legal consequences of this my bequest, or the rights that justly fall to you as my heir."

Will see his burial better than his life.

-

[Exeunt Keepers, bearing out the body of MORTIMER. Here dies the dusky torch of Mortimer, Choked with ambition of the meaner sort : 11 And for those wrongs, those bitter injuries, Which Somerset hath offer'd to my House, I doubt not but with honour to redress; And therefore haste I to the Parliament, Either to be restored to my blood,

Or make my ill th' advantage 12 of my good.

[Exit.

ACT III.

SCENE I. London. The Parliament-House.

Flourish. Enter King HENRY, EXETER, GLOSTER, WARWICK, SOMERSET, and SUFFOLK; The Bishop of WINCHESTER, RICHARD PLANTAGENET, and others. GLOSTER offers to put up a bill;1 WINCHESTER snatches it, and tears it.

Win. Comest thou with deep-premeditated lines, With written pamphlets studiously devised, Humphrey of Gloster? If thou canst accuse,

Or aught intend'st to lay unto my charge,

11 That is, oppressed by those who were of lower rank, or whose right to the crown was not so good as his.

12 My ill is here the wrong done to me. Advantage in the sense of occasion or vantage-ground.

1 Bill is the articles of accusation. This Parliament was held in 1426 at Leicester, though here represented to have been held in London. King Henry was now in the fifth year of his age. In the first Parliament, which was held at London shortly after his father's death, his mother, Queen Catharine, brought the young King from Windsor to the metropolis, and sat on the throne with the infant in her lap.

Do it without invention, suddenly;

As I with sudden and extemporal speech

Purpose to answer what thou canst object.

Glo. Presumptuous priest! this place commands my patience,

Or thou shouldst find thou hast dishonour'd me.
Think not, although in writing I preferr'd
The manner of thy vile outrageous crimes,
That therefore I have forged, or am not able
Verbatim to rehearse the method of my pen:
No, prelate; such is thy audacious wickedness,
Thy lewd, pestiferous, and dissentious pranks,
As 2 very infants prattle of thy pride.
Thou art a most pernicious usurer;
Froward by nature, enemy to peace;
Lascivious, wanton, more than well beseems
A man of thy profession and degree ;
And, for thy treachery, what's more manifest,
In that thou laid'st a trap to take my life,
As well at London-bridge as at the Tower?
Besides, I fear me, if thy thoughts were sifted,
The King, thy sovereign, is not quite exempt
From envious malice of thy swelling heart.

Lords, vouchsafe

Win. Gloster, I do defy thee.
To give me hearing what I shall reply.
If I were covetous, ambitious, or perverse,
As he will have me, how am I so poor?
Or how haps it I seek not to advance
Or raise myself, but keep my wonted calling?
And, for dissension, who preferreth peace
More than I do, except I be provoked?
No, my good lords, it is not that offends;

2 As and that, both pronoun and conjunction, were used indiscriminately by all the writers of Shakespeare's time.

It is not that that hath incensed the duke:
It is, because 3 no one should sway but he;
No one but he should be about the King;
And that engenders thunder in his breast,
And makes him roar these accusations forth.
But he shall know I am as good —

Glo.

Thou bastard of my grandfather!

As good!

Win. Ay, lordly sir; for what are you, I pray, But one imperious in another's throne?

Glo. Am I not Lord Protector, saucy priest? Win. And am not I a prelate of the Church? Glo. Yes, as an outlaw in a castle keeps,4 And useth it to patronage his theft.

Win. Unreverent Gloster !

Glo.

Thou art reverend

Touching thy spiritual function, not thy life.

Win. This Rome shall remedy.

War.

Roam 5 thither, then.

Som. My lord, it were your duty to forbear. War. Ay, see the bishop be not overborne. Som. Methinks my lord should be religious, And know the office that belongs to such.

War. Methinks his lordship should be humbler; It fitteth not a prelate so to plead.

Som. Yes, when his holy state is touch'd so near.

3 Because is here equivalent to in order that. So in St. Matthew, xx. 31: "And the multitude rebuked them, because they should hold their peace." Also in Bacon's Henry the Seventh: " 'The King began then to pare a little the privilege of the clergy, ordaining that clerks convict should be burned in the hand, both because they might taste some corporal punishment and that they might carry a brand of infamy."

4 Keeps for dwells. Often so. See vol. iii. page 182, note 2.

5 So Nash, in his Lenten Stuff, 1599: "Three hundred thousand people roamed to Rome for purgatorie pills."