Act 4 — fda SCENE I. Before the Tower.

Enter, on one side, QUEEN ELIZABETH, DUCHESS OF YORK, and MARQUESS OF DORSET; on the other, ANNE, DUCHESS OF GLOUCESTER, leading LADY MARGARET PLANTAGENET, CLARENCE’S young daughter.

♦ Duch. Who meets us here? my niece Plantagenet

♦ Led in the hand of her kind aunt of Gloucester?

Now, for my life, she’s wandering to the Tower,

♦ On pure heart’s love to greet the tender princes.

Daughter, well met.

5 Anne. God give your graces both

A happy and a joyful time of day!

♦ Q. Eliz. As much to you, good sister! Whither away?

♦ Anne. No farther than the Tower, and, as I guess,

Upon the like devotion as yourselves,

10 To gratulate the gentle princes there.

Q. Eliz. Kind sister, thanks: we’ll enter all together.

Enter BRAKENBURY.

♦ And, in good time, here the lieutenant comes.

Master lieutenant, pray you, by your leave,

♦ How doth the prince, and my young son of York?

15 Brak. Right well, dear madam. By your patience,

♦ I may not suffer you to visit them;

♦ The king hath straitly charged the contrary.

♦ Q. Eliz. The king! why, who’s that?

♦ Brak. I cry you mercy: I mean the lord protector.

20 Q. Eliz. The Lord protect him from that kingly title!

♦ Hath he set bounds betwixt their love and me?

♦ I am their mother; who should keep me from them?

♦ Duch. I am their father’s mother; I will see them.

Anne. Their aunt I am in law, in love their mother:

25 Then bring me to their sights; I’ll bear thy blame,

And take thy office from thee, on my peril.

♦ Brak. No, madam, no; I may not leave it so:

♦ I am bound by oath, and therefore pardon me. [Exit.

Enter LORD STANLEY.

♦ Stan. Let me but meet you, ladies, one hour hence,

30 And I’ll salute your grace of York as mother,

♦ And reverend looker on, of two fair queens.

♦ [To Anne] Come, madam, you must straight to Westminster,

There to be crowned Richard’s royal queen.

♦ Q. Eliz. O, cut my lace in sunder, that my pent heart

35 May have some scope to beat, or else I swoon

♦ With this dead-killing news!

♦ Anne. Despiteful tidings! O unpleasing news!

♦ Dor. Be of good cheer: mother, how fares your grace?

♦ Q. Eliz. O Dorset, speak not to me, get thee hence!

40 Death and destruction dog thee at the heels;

♦ Thy mother’s name is ominous to children.

♦ If thou wilt outstrip death, go cross the seas,

♦ And live with Richmond, from the reach of hell:

Go, hie thee, hie thee from this slaughter-house,

45 Lest thou increase the number of the dead;

And make me die the thrall of Margaret’s curse,

♦ Nor mother, wife, nor England’s counted queen.

Stan. Full of wise care is this your counsel, madam.

♦ Take all the swift advantage of the hours;

50 You shall have letters from me to my son

♦ To meet you on the way, and welcome you.

♦ Be not ta’en tardy by unwise delay.

♦ Duch. O ill-dispersing wind of misery!

O my accursed womb, the bed of death!

55 A cockatrice hast thou hatch’d to the world,

Whose unavoided eye is murderous.

♦ Stan. Come, madam, come; I in all haste was sent.

♦ Anne. And I in all unwillingness will go.

♦ I would to God that the inclusive verge

60 Of golden metal that must round my brow

♦ Were red-hot steel, to sear me to the brain!

♦ Anointed let me be with deadly venom,

And die, ere men can say, God save the queen!

♦ Q. Eliz. Go, go, poor soul, I envy not thy glory;

65 To feed my humour, wish thyself no harm.

♦ Anne. No! why? When he that is my husband now

♦ Came to me, as I follow’d Henry’s corse,

♦ When scarce the blood was well wash’d from his hands

Which issued from my other angel husband

70 And that dead saint which then I weeping follow’d;

O, when, I say, I look’d on Richard’s face,

This was my wish: ‘Be thou,’ quoth I, ‘accursed,

For making me, so young, so old a widow!

And, when thou wed’st, let sorrow haunt thy bed;

75 And be thy wife—if any be so mad—

♦ As miserable by the life of thee

As thou hast made me by my dear lord’s death!’

♦ Lo, ere I can repeat this curse again,

♦ Even in so short a space, my woman’s heart

80 Grossly grew captive to his honey words

♦ And proved the subject of my own soul’s curse,

♦ Which ever since hath kept my eyes from rest;

For never yet one hour in his bed

♦ Have I enjoy’d the golden dew of sleep,

85 But have been waked by his timorous dreams.

Besides, he hates me for my father Warwick;

♦ And will, no doubt, shortly be rid of me.

♦ Q. Eliz. Poor heart, adieu! I pity thy complaining.

♦ Anne. No more than from my soul I mourn for yours.

90 Q. Eliz. Farewell, thou woful welcomer of glory!

♦ Anne. Adieu, poor soul, that takest thy leave of it!

♦ Duch. [To Dorset] Go thou to Richmond, and good fortune guide thee!

♦ [To Anne] Go thou to Richard, and good angels guard thee!

♦ [To Queen Eliz.] Go thou to sanctuary, and good thoughts possess thee!

95 I to my grave, where peace and rest lie with me!

♦ Eighty odd years of sorrow have I seen,

♦ And each hour’s joy wreck’d with a week of teen.

♦ Q. Eliz. Stay, yet look back with me unto the Tower.

Pity, you ancient stones, those tender babes

100 Whom envy hath immured within your walls!

Rough cradle for such little pretty ones!

♦ Rude ragged nurse, old sullen playfellow

For tender princes, use my babies well!

♦ So foolish sorrow bids your stones farewell. [Exeunt.