The fly-flow hours shall not determinate
The datelefs limit of thy dear exile:
The hopeless word, of never to return,
Breathe I against thee, upon pain of life.
Mob. A heavy Sentence, my moft fovereign Liege,
And all unlook'd for from your Highness' mouth:
A dearer merit, not fo deep a maim,
As to be caft forth in the common air,
Have I deferved at your Highness' hands.
The language I have learn'd these forty years.
My native English, now I muft forgo;
And now my tongue's ufe is to me no more,
Than an unftringed viol, or a harp ;
Or, like a cunning Inftrument cas'd up,
Or being open, put into his hands
That knows no touch to tune the harmony.
Within my mouth you have engoal'd my tongue,.
Doubly port-cullis'd with my Teeth and Lips:
And dull, unfeeling, barren Ignorance
Is made my Goaler to attend on me.
I am too old to fawn upon a nurse,
Too far in years to be a Pupil now:
What is thy Sentence then, but speechlefs death,
Which robs my tongue from breathing native breath?
K. Rich. It boots thee not to be compaffionate;
After our Sentence, Plaining comes too late.
Mowb. Then thus I turn me from my Country's light, To dwell in folemn fhades of endless night.
K. Rich. Return again, and take an oath with ye.. Lay on our royal Sword your banish'd hands Swear by the duty that you owe to heav'n,
(Our part therein we banish with
To keep the oath that we administer:
You never fhall, (fo help you truth, and heav'n!)
Embrace each other's love in Banishment;
Nor ever look upon each other's face,
Nor ever write, regreet, or reconcile
This low'ring tempeft of your home-bred hate;
Nor ever by advised purpose meet,
To plot, contrive, or complot any Ill,
'Gainft us, our State, our Subjects, or our Land. Boling. I fwear.
Mowb. And I, to keep all this.
Boling. Norfolk, fo far, as to mine enemy :-
By this time, had the King permitted us,
One of our fouls had wandred in the air,
Banish'd this frail fepulchre of our flesh,
As now our flesh is banish'd from this Land.
Confefs thy treasons, ere thou fly this Realm;
Since thou haft far to go, bear not along
The clogging burthen of a guilty foul.
Mob. No, Bolingbroke; if ever I were traitor,
My Name be blotted from the Book of life,
And I from heaven banish'd as from hence!
But what thou art, heav'n, thou, and I do know,
And all too foon, I fear, the King shall rue.
Farewel, my Liege; now no way can I ftray,
Save back to England; all the world's my way. [Exit.
K. Rich. Uncle, even in the glaffes of thine eyes
I fee thy grieved heart, thy fad afpect
Hath from the number of his banish'd years
Pluck'd four away; fix frozen winters spent,
Return with Welcome home from Banishment.
Boling. How long a time lies in one little word!
Four lagging Winters, and four wanton Springs,
End in a word; fuch is the Breath of Kings.
Gaunt. I thank my Liege, that in regard of me
He shortens four years of my fon's exile:
But little vantage fhall I reap thereby ;
For ere the fix years, that he hath to spend,
Can change their moons, and bring their times about,
My oyl-dry'd lamp, and time-bewafted light,
Shall be extinct with age, and endless night:
My inch of taper will be burnt and done:
And blindfold death not let me fee my
K. Rich. Why, uncle? thou haft many years to live. Gaunt. But not a minute, King, that thou canst give Shorten my days thou canft with fullen forrow, And pluck nights from me, but not lend a morrow; Thou canst help time to furrow me with age,
But stop no wrinkle in his pilgrimage;
Thy word is current with him, for my death;
But dead, thy Kingdom cannot buy my breath.
K. Rich. Thy fon is banish'd upon good advice,
Whereto thy tongue a party-verdict gave;
Why at our juftice feem'ft thou then to low'r?
Gaunt. Things, fweet to tafte, prove in digestion
fow'r :
You urg'd me as a judge; but I had rather,
You would have bid me argue like a father.
O, had it been a stranger, not my child,
To smooth his Fault, I would have been more mild:
Alas, I look'd, when fome of you should say,
I was too strict to make mine own away:
But you gave leave to my unwilling tongue,
Against my will, to do my felf this wrong.
A partial flander fought I to avoid,
And in the Sentence my own life deftroy'd.
K. Rich. Coufin, farewel; and, uncle, bid him fo:
Six years we banish him, and he shall go.
Aum. Coufin, farewel; what prefence must not know, From where you do remain, let paper show.
Mar. My lord, no leave take I; for I will ride.
As far as land will let me, by your fide.
Gaunt. Oh, to what purpose doft thou hoard thy words,
That thou return'ft no Greeting to thy friends?
Boling. I have too few to take my leave of you,
When the tongue's office fhould be prodigal,
To breathe thabundant dolour of the heart.
Gaunt. Thy grief is but thy abfence for a time..
Boling. Joy abfent, grief is prefent for that time.
Gaunt. What is fix winters? they are quickly gone.
Boling. To men in joy; but grief makes one hour ten.
Gaunt. Call it a Travel, that thou tak'ft for pleasure.
Boling. My heart will figh, when I mifcall it fo,
Which finds it an inforced pilgrimage.
Gaunt. The fullen paffage of thy weary steps
Efteem a foil, wherein thou art to fet
The precious jewel of thy home-return.
Boling. Nay, rather, ev'ry tedious ftride I make (3)
Will but remember me, what a deal of World
I wander from the Jewels that I love.
Muft I not serve a long Apprentice-hood,
To foreign paffages, and in the End
Having my Freedom, boast of Nothing elfe
But that I was a Journeyman to Grief?
Gaunt. All Places, that the Eye of Heaven vifits,
Are to a wife man ports and happy havens.
Teach thy neceffity to reafon thus:
There is no virtue like neceffity.
Think not, the King did banish Thee;
But Thou the King. Woe doth the heavier fit,
Where it perceives It is but faintly borne.
Go fay, I sent thee forth to purchase honour,
And not, the King exil'd thee. Or fuppofe,
Devouring Peftilence hangs in our air,
And thou art flying to a fresher clime.
Look, what thy foul holds dear, imagin it
To lye that way thou go'ft, not whence thou com'ft.
Suppofe the finging birds, muficians;
The grafs whereon thou tread'ft, the presence-floor;
The fow'rs, fair ladies; and thy fteps, no more
Than a delightful measure, or a dance.
For gnarling Sorrow hath lefs Pow'r to bite
The Man, that mocks at it, and fets it light.
Boling. Oh, who can hold a fire in his hand,
By thinking on the frofty Caucafus?
Or cloy the hungry edge of appetite,
By bare imagination of a feast?
Or wallow naked in December snow,
(3) Boling. Nay, rather, ev'ry tedious Stride I make] This, and the fix Verfes which follow, I have ventur'd to fupply from the old Quarto. The Allufion, 'tis true, to an Apprentice-fhip, and becoming a Journeyman, is not in the fublime Tafte, nor, as Horace has exprefs'd it, fpirat Tragicum fatis: however as there is no Doubt of the Paffage being genuine, the Lines are not so despicable as to deserve being quite loft.
By thinking on fantastick Summer's heat?
Oh, no! the apprehenfion of the good
Gives but the greater feeling to the worse;
Fell forrow's tooth doth never rankle more
Than when it bites, but lanceth not the fore.
Gaunt. Come, come, my fon, I'll bring thee on thy
way;
Had I thy Youth, and Caufe, I would not ftay.
Boling. Then, England's Ground, farewel; fweet foil,
adieu,
My mother and my nurfe, which bears me yet.
Where-e'er I wander, boaft of this I can,
Though banish'd, yet a true-born Englishman. [Exeunt
SCENE changes to the Court.
Enter King Richard, and Bufhy, &c. at one door; and the Lord Aumerle, at the other.
K. Rich. WE did, indeed, obferve Coufin
How far brought you high Hereford on his way?
Aum. I brought high Hereford, if you call him fo,
But to the next High-way, and there I left him.
K. Rich. And fay, what store of parting tears were fhed?
Aum. 'Faith, none by me; except the north-east wind,
(Which then blew bittrly against our faces)
Awak'd the fleepy rheume; and so by chance
Did grace our hollow Parting with a tear.
K. Rich. What faid your coufin, when you parted with him?
And, for my heart difdained that my tongue
Should fo prophane the word, That taught me craft
To counterfeit oppreffion of fuch grief,
That words feem'd buried in my forrow's Grave.
Marry, would the word farewel have lengthen'd hours,
And added years to his fhort Banishment,
He should have had a volume of farewels;
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