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Уильям Шекспир
The First Part of Henry the Sixth
SCENE 4
London. The Temple garden
Enter the EARLS OF SOMERSET, SUFFOLK, and WARWICK;
RICHARD PLANTAGENET, VERNON, and another LAWYER
PLANTAGENET. Great lords and gentlemen, what means this
silence?
Dare no man answer in a case of truth?
SUFFOLK. Within the Temple Hall we were too loud;
The garden here is more convenient.
PLANTAGENET. Then say at once if I maintain'd the truth;
Or else was wrangling Somerset in th' error?
SUFFOLK. Faith, I have been a truant in the law
And never yet could frame my will to it;
And therefore frame the law unto my will.
SOMERSET. Judge you, my Lord of Warwick, then, between us.
WARWICK. Between two hawks, which flies the higher pitch;
Between two dogs, which hath the deeper mouth;
Between two blades, which bears the better temper;
Between two horses, which doth bear him best;
Between two girls, which hath the merriest eye
I have perhaps some shallow spirit of judgment;
But in these nice sharp quillets of the law,
Good faith, I am no wiser than a daw.
PLANTAGENET. Tut, tut, here is a mannerly forbearance:
The truth appears so naked on my side
That any purblind eye may find it out.
SOMERSET. And on my side it is so well apparell'd,
So clear, so shining, and so evident,
That it will glimmer through a blind man's eye.
PLANTAGENET. Since you are tongue-tied and so loath to speak,
In dumb significants proclaim your thoughts.
Let him that is a true-born gentleman
And stands upon the honour of his birth,
If he suppose that I have pleaded truth,
From off this brier pluck a white rose with me.
SOMERSET. Let him that is no coward nor no flatterer,
But dare maintain the party of the truth,
Pluck a red rose from off this thorn with me.
WARWICK. I love no colours; and, without all colour
Of base insinuating flattery,
I pluck this white rose with Plantagenet.
SUFFOLK. I pluck this red rose with young Somerset,
And say withal I think he held the right.
VERNON. Stay, lords and gentlemen, and pluck no more
Till you conclude that he upon whose side
The fewest roses are cropp'd from the tree
Shall yield the other in the right opinion.
SOMERSET. Good Master Vernon, it is well objected;
If I have fewest, I subscribe in silence.
PLANTAGENET. And I.
VERNON. Then, for the truth and plainness of the case,
I pluck this pale and maiden blossom here,
Giving my verdict on the white rose side.
SOMERSET. Prick not your finger as you pluck it off,
Lest, bleeding, you do paint the white rose red,
And fall on my side so, against your will.
VERNON. If I, my lord, for my opinion bleed,
Opinion shall be surgeon to my hurt
And keep me on the side where still I am.
SOMERSET. Well, well, come on; who else?
LAWYER. [To Somerset] Unless my study and my books be
false,
The argument you held was wrong in you;
In sign whereof I pluck a white rose too.
PLANTAGENET. Now, Somerset, where is your argument?
SOMERSET. Here in my scabbard, meditating that
Shall dye your white rose in a bloody red.
PLANTAGENET. Meantime your cheeks do counterfeit our
roses;
For pale they look with fear, as witnessing
The truth on our side.
SOMERSET. No, Plantagenet,
'Tis not for fear but anger that thy cheeks
Blush for pure shame to counterfeit our roses,
And yet thy tongue will not confess thy error.
PLANTAGENET. Hath not thy rose a canker, Somerset?
SOMERSET. Hath not thy rose a thorn, Plantagenet?
PLANTAGENET. Ay, sharp and piercing, to maintain his truth;
Whiles thy consuming canker eats his falsehood.
SOMERSET. Well, I'll find friends to wear my bleeding roses,
That shall maintain what I have said is true,
Where false Plantagenet dare not be seen.
PLANTAGENET. Now, by this maiden blossom in my hand,
I scorn thee and thy fashion, peevish boy.
SUFFOLK. Turn not thy scorns this way, Plantagenet.
PLANTAGENET. Proud Pole, I will, and scorn both him and
thee.
SUFFOLK. I'll turn my part thereof into thy throat.
SOMERSET. Away, away, good William de la Pole!
We grace the yeoman by conversing with him.
WARWICK. Now, by God's will, thou wrong'st him, Somerset;
His grandfather was Lionel Duke of Clarence,
Third son to the third Edward, King of England.
Spring crestless yeomen from so deep a root?
PLANTAGENET. He bears him on the place's privilege,
Or durst not for his craven heart say thus.
SOMERSET. By Him that made me, I'll maintain my words
On any plot of ground in Christendom.
Was not thy father, Richard Earl of Cambridge,
For treason executed in our late king's days?
And by his treason stand'st not thou attainted,
Corrupted, and exempt from ancient gentry?
His trespass yet lives guilty in thy blood;
And till thou be restor'd thou art a yeoman.
PLANTAGENET. My father was attached, not attainted;
Condemn'd to die for treason, but no traitor;
And that I'll prove on better men than Somerset,
Were growing time once ripened to my will.
For your partaker Pole, and you yourself,
I'll note you in my book of memory
To scourge you for this apprehension.
Look to it well, and say you are well warn'd.
SOMERSET. Ay, thou shalt find us ready for thee still;
And know us by these colours for thy foes
For these my friends in spite of thee shall wear.
PLANTAGENET. And, by my soul, this pale and angry rose,
As cognizance of my blood-drinking hate,
Will I for ever, and my faction, wear,
Until it wither with me to my grave,
Or flourish to the height of my degree.
SUFFOLK. Go forward, and be chok'd with thy ambition!
And so farewell until I meet thee next. Exit
SOMERSET. Have with thee, Pole. Farewell, ambitious
Richard. Exit
PLANTAGENET. How I am brav'd, and must perforce endure
it!
WARWICK. This blot that they object against your house
Shall be wip'd out in the next Parliament,
Call'd for the truce of Winchester and Gloucester;
And if thou be not then created York,
I will not live to be accounted Warwick.
Meantime, in signal of my love to thee,
Against proud Somerset and William Pole,
Will I upon thy party wear this rose;
And here I prophesy: this brawl to-day,
Grown to this faction in the Temple Garden,
Shall send between the Red Rose and the White
A thousand souls to death and deadly night.
PLANTAGENET. Good Master Vernon, I am bound to you
That you on my behalf would pluck a flower.
VERNON. In your behalf still will I wear the same.
LAWYER. And so will I.
PLANTAGENET. Thanks, gentle sir.
Come, let us four to dinner. I dare say
This quarrel will drink blood another day. Exeunt
SCENE 5
The Tower of London
Enter MORTIMER, brought in a chair, and GAOLERS
MORTIMER. Kind keepers of my weak decaying age,
Let dying Mortimer here rest himself.
Even like a man new haled from the rack,
So fare my limbs with long imprisonment;
And these grey locks, the pursuivants of death,
Nestor-like aged in an age of care,
Argue the end of Edmund Mortimer.
These eyes, like lamps whose wasting oil is spent,
Wax dim, as drawing to their exigent;
Weak shoulders, overborne with burdening grief,
And pithless arms, like to a withered vine
That droops his sapless branches to the ground.
Yet are these feet, whose strengthless stay is numb,
Unable to support this lump of clay,
Swift-winged with desire to get a grave,
As witting I no other comfort have.
But tell me, keeper, will my nephew come?
FIRST KEEPER. Richard Plantagenet, my lord, will come.
We sent unto the Temple, unto his chamber;
And answer was return'd that he will come.
MORTIMER. Enough; my soul shall then be satisfied.
Poor gentleman! his wrong doth equal mine.
Since Henry Monmouth first began to reign,
Before whose glory I was great in arms,
This loathsome sequestration have I had;
And even since then hath Richard been obscur'd,
Depriv'd of honour and inheritance.
But now the arbitrator of despairs,
Just Death, kind umpire of men's miseries,
With sweet enlargement doth dismiss me hence.
I would his troubles likewise were expir'd,
That so he might recover what was lost.
Enter RICHARD PLANTAGENET
FIRST KEEPER. My lord, your loving nephew now is come.
MORTIMER. Richard Plantagenet, my friend, is he come?
PLANTAGENET. Ay, noble uncle, thus ignobly us'd,
Your nephew, late despised Richard, comes.
MORTIMER. Direct mine arms I may embrace his neck
And in his bosom spend my latter gasp.
O, tell me when my lips do touch his cheeks,
That I may kindly give one fainting kiss.
And now declare, sweet stem from York's great stock,
Why didst thou say of late thou wert despis'd?
PLANTAGENET. First, lean thine aged back against mine arm;
And, in that ease, I'll tell thee my disease.
This day, in argument upon a case,
Some words there grew 'twixt Somerset and me;
Among which terms he us'd his lavish tongue
And did upbraid me with my father's death;
Which obloquy set bars before my tongue,
Else with the like I had requited him.
Therefore, good uncle, for my father's sake,
In honour of a true Plantagenet,
And for alliance sake, declare the cause
My father, Earl of Cambridge, lost his head.
MORTIMER. That cause, fair nephew, that imprison'd me
And hath detain'd me all my flow'ring youth
Within a loathsome dungeon, there to pine,
Was cursed instrument of his decease.
PLANTAGENET. Discover more at large what cause that was,
For I am ignorant and cannot guess.
MORTIMER. I will, if that my fading breath permit
And death approach not ere my tale be done.
Henry the Fourth, grandfather to this king,
Depos'd his nephew Richard, Edward's son,
The first-begotten and the lawful heir
Of Edward king, the third of that descent;
During whose reign the Percies of the north,
Finding his usurpation most unjust,
Endeavour'd my advancement to the throne.
The reason mov'd these warlike lords to this
Was, for that-young Richard thus remov'd,
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, third son
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 laboured 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 deriv'd
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 to redeem
And have install'd me in the diadem;
But, as the rest, so fell that noble earl,
And was beheaded. Thus the Mortimers,
In whom the title rested, were suppress'd.
PLANTAGENET. Of Which, my lord, your honour is the last.
MORTIMER. True; and thou seest that I no issue have,
And that my fainting words do warrant death.
Thou art my heir; the rest I wish thee gather;
But yet be wary in thy studious care.
PLANTAGENET. Thy grave admonishments prevail with me.
But yet methinks my father's execution
Was nothing less than bloody tyranny.
MORTIMER. With silence, nephew, be thou politic;
Strong fixed is the house of Lancaster
And like a mountain not to be remov'd.
But now thy uncle is removing hence,
As princes do their courts when they are cloy'd
With long continuance in a settled place.
PLANTAGENET. O uncle, would some part of my young years
Might but redeem the passage of your age!
MORTIMER. Thou dost then wrong me, as that slaughterer
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! [Dies]
PLANTAGENET. 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
Will see his burial better than his life.
Exeunt GAOLERS, hearing out the body of MORTIMER
Here dies the dusky torch of Mortimer,
Chok'd with ambition of the meaner sort;
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 of my good. Exit
ACT III.
SCENE 1
London. The Parliament House
Flourish. Enter the KING, EXETER, GLOUCESTER, WARWICK, SOMERSET, and SUFFOLK; the BISHOP OF WINCHESTER, RICHARD PLANTAGENET, and others. GLOUCESTER offers to put up a bill; WINCHESTER snatches it, and tears it
WINCHESTER. Com'st thou with deep premeditated lines,
With written pamphlets studiously devis'd?
Humphrey of Gloucester, if thou canst accuse
Or aught intend'st to lay unto my charge,
Do it without invention, suddenly;
I with sudden and extemporal speech
Purpose to answer what thou canst object.
GLOUCESTER. 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 forg'd, 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 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?
Beside, I fear me, if thy thoughts were sifted,
The King, thy sovereign, is not quite exempt
From envious malice of thy swelling heart.
WINCHESTER. Gloucester, I do defy thee. Lords, vouchsafe
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 provok'd?
No, my good lords, it is not that offends;
It is not that that incens'd hath incens'd the Duke:
It is because 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
GLOUCESTER. As good!
Thou bastard of my grandfather!
WINCHESTER. Ay, lordly sir; for what are you, I pray,
But one imperious in another's throne?
GLOUCESTER. Am I not Protector, saucy priest?
WINCHESTER. And am not I a prelate of the church?
GLOUCESTER. Yes, as an outlaw in a castle keeps,
And useth it to patronage his theft.
WINCHESTER. Unreverent Gloucester!
GLOUCESTER. Thou art reverend
Touching thy spiritual function, not thy life.
WINCHESTER. Rome shall remedy this.
WARWICK. Roam thither then.
SOMERSET. My lord, it were your duty to forbear.
WARWICK. Ay, see the bishop be not overborne.
SOMERSET. Methinks my lord should be religious,
And know the office that belongs to such.
WARWICK. Methinks his lordship should be humbler;
It fitteth not a prelate so to plead.
SOMERSET. Yes, when his holy state is touch'd so near.
WARWICK. State holy or unhallow'd, what of that?
Is not his Grace Protector to the King?
PLANTAGENET. [Aside] Plantagenet, I see, must hold his
tongue,
Lest it be said 'Speak, sirrah, when you should;
Must your bold verdict enter talk with lords?'
Else would I have a fling at Winchester.
KING HENRY. Uncles of Gloucester and of Winchester,
The special watchmen of our English weal,
I would prevail, if prayers might prevail
To join your hearts in love and amity.
O, what a scandal is it to our crown
That two such noble peers as ye should jar!
Believe me, lords, my tender years can tell
Civil dissension is a viperous worm
That gnaws the bowels of the commonwealth.
[A noise within: 'Down with the tawny coats!']
What tumult's this?
WARWICK. An uproar, I dare warrant,
Begun through malice of the Bishop's men.
[A noise again: 'Stones! Stones!']
Enter the MAYOR OF LONDON, attended
MAYOR. O, my good lords, and virtuous Henry,
Pity the city of London, pity us!
The Bishop and the Duke of Gloucester's men,
Forbidden late to carry any weapon,
Have fill'd their pockets full of pebble stones
And, banding themselves in contrary parts,
Do pelt so fast at one another's pate
That many have their giddy brains knock'd out.
Our windows are broke down in every street,
And we for fear compell'd to shut our shops.
Enter in skirmish, the retainers of GLOUCESTER and WINCHESTER, with bloody pates
KING HENRY. We charge you, on allegiance to ourself,
To hold your slaught'ring hands and keep the peace.
Pray, uncle Gloucester, mitigate this strife.
FIRST SERVING-MAN. Nay, if we be forbidden stones, we'll
fall to it with our teeth.
SECOND SERVING-MAN. Do what ye dare, we are as resolute.
[Skirmish again]
GLOUCESTER. You of my household, leave this peevish broil,
And set this unaccustom'd fight aside.
THIRD SERVING-MAN. My lord, we know your Grace to be a
man
Just and upright, and for your royal birth
Inferior to none but to his Majesty;
And ere that we will suffer such a prince,
So kind a father of the commonweal,
To be disgraced by an inkhorn mate,
We and our wives and children all will fight
And have our bodies slaught'red by thy foes.
FIRST SERVING-MAN. Ay, and the very parings of our nails
Shall pitch a field when we are dead. [Begin again]
GLOUCESTER. Stay, stay, I say!
And if you love me, as you say you do,
Let me persuade you to forbear awhile.
KING HENRY. O, how this discord doth afflict my soul!
Can you, my Lord of Winchester, behold
My sighs and tears and will not once relent?
Who should be pitiful, if you be not?
Or who should study to prefer a peace,
If holy churchmen take delight in broils?
WARWICK. Yield, my Lord Protector; yield, Winchester;
Except you mean with obstinate repulse
To slay your sovereign and destroy the realm.
You see what mischief, and what murder too,
Hath been enacted through your enmity;
Then be at peace, except ye thirst for blood.
WINCHESTER. He shall submit, or I will never yield.
GLOUCESTER. Compassion on the King commands me stoop,
Or I would see his heart out ere the priest
Should ever get that privilege of me.
WARWICK. Behold, my Lord of Winchester, the Duke
Hath banish'd moody discontented fury,
As by his smoothed brows it doth appear;
Why look you still so stem and tragical?
GLOUCESTER. Here, Winchester, I offer thee my hand.
KING HENRY. Fie, uncle Beaufort! I have heard you preach
That malice was a great and grievous sin;
And will not you maintain the thing you teach,
But prove a chief offender in the same?
WARWICK. Sweet King! The Bishop hath a kindly gird.
For shame, my Lord of Winchester, relent;
What, shall a child instruct you what to do?
WINCHESTER. Well, Duke of Gloucester, I will yield to thee;
Love for thy love and hand for hand I give.
GLOUCESTER [Aside] Ay, but, I fear me, with a hollow
heart.
See here, my friends and loving countrymen:
This token serveth for a flag of truce
Betwixt ourselves and all our followers.
So help me God, as I dissemble not!
WINCHESTER [Aside] So help me God, as I intend it not!
KING HENRY. O loving uncle, kind Duke of Gloucester,
How joyful am I made by this contract!
Away, my masters! trouble us no more;
But join in friendship, as your lords have done.
FIRST SERVING-MAN. Content: I'll to the surgeon's.
SECOND SERVING-MAN. And so will I.
THIRD SERVING-MAN. And I will see what physic the tavern
affords. Exeunt servants, MAYOR, &C.
WARWICK. Accept this scroll, most gracious sovereign;
Which in the right of Richard Plantagenet
We do exhibit to your Majesty.
GLOUCESTER. Well urg'd, my Lord of Warwick; for, sweet
prince,
An if your Grace mark every circumstance,
You have great reason to do Richard right;
Especially for those occasions
At Eltham Place I told your Majesty.
KING HENRY. And those occasions, uncle, were of force;
Therefore, my loving lords, our pleasure is
That Richard be restored to his blood.
WARWICK. Let Richard be restored to his blood;
So shall his father's wrongs be recompens'd.
WINCHESTER. As will the rest, so willeth Winchester.
KING HENRY. If Richard will be true, not that alone
But all the whole inheritance I give
That doth belong unto the house of York,
From whence you spring by lineal descent.
PLANTAGENET. Thy humble servant vows obedience
And humble service till the point of death.
KING HENRY. Stoop then and set your knee against my foot;
And in reguerdon of that duty done
I girt thee with the valiant sword of York.
Rise, Richard, like a true Plantagenet,
And rise created princely Duke of York.
PLANTAGENET. And so thrive Richard as thy foes may fall!
And as my duty springs, so perish they
That grudge one thought against your Majesty!
ALL. Welcome, high Prince, the mighty Duke of York!
SOMERSET. [Aside] Perish, base Prince, ignoble Duke of
York!
GLOUCESTER. Now will it best avail your Majesty
To cross the seas and to be crown'd in France:
The presence of a king engenders love
Amongst his subjects and his loyal friends,
As it disanimates his enemies.
KING HENRY. When Gloucester says the word, King Henry
goes;
For friendly counsel cuts off many foes.
GLOUCESTER. Your ships already are in readiness.
Sennet. Flourish. Exeunt all but EXETER
EXETER. Ay, we may march in England or in France,
Not seeing what is likely to ensue.
This late dissension grown betwixt the peers
Burns under feigned ashes of forg'd love
And will at last break out into a flame;
As fest'red members rot but by degree
Till bones and flesh and sinews fall away,
So will this base and envious discord breed.
And now I fear that fatal prophecy.
Which in the time of Henry nam'd the Fifth
Was in the mouth of every sucking babe:
That Henry born at Monmouth should win all,
And Henry born at Windsor should lose all.
Which is so plain that Exeter doth wish
His days may finish ere that hapless time. Exit
