And cited up a thousand heavy times

During the wars of York and Lancaster

That had befall’n us. As we paced along

Upon the giddy footing of the hatches,

Methought that Gloucester stumbled, and in falling

Struck me—that sought to stay him—overboard

Into the tumbling billows of the main.

O Lord! Methought what pain it was to drown,

What dreadful noise of waters in my ears,

What sights of ugly death within my eyes.

Methoughts I saw a thousand fearful wrecks,

Ten thousand men that fishes gnawed upon,

Wedges of gold, great ouches, heaps of pearl,

Inestimable stones, unvalued jewels,

All scattered in the bottom of the sea.

Some lay in dead men’s skulls; and in those holes

Where eyes did once inhabit, there were crept—

As ‘twere in scorn of eyes—reflecting gems,

Which wooed the slimy bottom of the deep

And mocked the dead bones that lay scattered by.

⌈BRACKENBURY⌉

Had you such leisure in the time of death,

To gaze upon these secrets of the deep?

CLARENCE

Methought I had, and often did I strive

To yield the ghost, but still the envious flood

Stopped-in my soul and would not let it forth

To find the empty, vast, and wand’ring air,

But smothered it within my panting bulk,

Who almost burst to belch it in the sea.

⌈BRACKENBURY⌉

Awaked you not in this sore agony?

CLARENCE

No, no, my dream was lengthened after life.

O then began the tempest to my soul!

I passed, methought, the melancholy flood,

With that sour ferryman which poets write of,

Unto the kingdom of perpetual night.

The first that there did greet my stranger soul

Was my great father-in-law, renowned Warwick,

Who cried aloud, ‘What scourge for perjury

Can this dark monarchy afford false Clarence?’

And so he vanished. Then came wand‘ring by

A shadow like an angel, with bright hair,

Dabbled in blood, and he shrieked out aloud,

‘Clarence is come: false, fleeting, perjured Clarence,

That stabbed me in the field by Tewkesbury.

Seize on him, furies! Take him unto torment!’

With that, methoughts a legion of foul fiends

Environed me, and howled in mine ears

Such hideous cries that with the very noise

I trembling waked, and for a season after

Could not believe but that I was in hell,

Such terrible impression made my dream.

⌈BRACKENBURY⌉

No marvel, lord, though it affrighted you;

I am afraid, methinks, to hear you tell it.

CLARENCE

Ah, Brackenbury, I have done these things,

That now give evidence against my soul,

For Edward’s sake; and see how he requites me.

Keeper, I pray thee, sit by me awhile.

My soul is heavy, and I fain would sleep.

⌈BRACKENBURY⌉

I will, my lord. God give your grace good rest.

Clarence sleeps

Sorrow breaks seasons and reposing hours,

Makes the night morning and the noontide night.

Princes have but their titles for their glories,

An outward honour for an inward toil,

And for unfelt imaginations

They often feel a world of restless cares;

So that, between their titles and low name,

There’s nothing differs but the outward fame.

Enter two Murderers

FIRST MURDERER Ho, who’s here?

BRACKENBURY

What wouldst thou, fellow? And how cam’st thou

hither?

SECOND MURDERER I would speak with Clarence, and I came hither on my legs.

BRACKENBURY What, so brief?

FIRST MURDERER ‘Tis better, sir, than to be tedious. (To Second Murderer) Let him see our commission, and talk no more.

Brackenbury reads

BRACKENBURY

I am in this commanded to deliver

The noble Duke of Clarence to your hands.

I will not reason what is meant hereby,

Because I will be guiltless of the meaning.

There lies the Duke asleep, and there the keys.

⌈He throws down the keys⌉

I’ll to the King and signify to him

That thus I have resigned to you my charge.

FIRST MURDERER You may, sir; ‘tis a point of wisdom.

Fare you well. Exit Brackenbury

SECOND MURDERER What, shall I stab him as he sleeps?

FIRST MURDERER No. He’ll say ‘twas done cowardly, when he wakes.

SECOND MURDERER Why, he shall never wake until the great judgement day.

FIRST MURDERER Why, then he’ll say we stabbed him sleeping.

SECOND MURDERER The urging of that word ‘judgement’ hath bred a kind of remorse in me.

FIRST MURDERER What, art thou afraid?

SECOND MURDERER Not to kill him, having a warrant, but to be damned for killing him, from the which no warrant can defend me.

FIRST MURDERER I thought thou hadst been resolute. SECOND MURDERER So I am—to let him live.

FIRST MURDERER I’ll back to the Duke of Gloucester and tell him so.

SECOND MURDERER Nay, I pray thee. Stay a little. I hope this passionate humour of mine will change. It was wont to hold me but while one tells twenty.

⌈He counts to twenty⌉

FIRST MURDERER How dost thou feel thyself now? SECOND MURDERER Some certain dregs of conscience are yet within me.

FIRST MURDERER Remember our reward, when the deed’s done.

SECOND MURDERER ‘Swounds, he dies. I had forgot the reward.

FIRST MURDERER Where’s thy conscience now?

SECOND MURDERER’ O, in the Duke of Gloucester’s purse. FIRST MURDERER When he opens his purse to give us our reward, thy conscience flies out.

SECOND MURDERER ‘Tis no matter. Let it go. There’s few or none will entertain it.

FIRST MURDERER What if it come to thee again?

SECOND MURDERER I’ll not meddle with it. It makes a man a coward. A man cannot steal but it accuseth him. A man cannot swear but it checks him. A man cannot lie with his neighbour’s wife but it detects him. ‘Tis a blushing, shamefaced spirit, that mutinies in a man’s bosom. It fills a man full of obstacles. It made me once restore a purse of gold that by chance I found. It beggars any man that keeps it. It is turned out of towns and cities for a dangerous thing, and every man that means to live well endeavours to trust to himself and live without it.