More than the infant that is born tonight.

I thank my God for my humility.

QUEEN ELIZABETH

A holy day shall this be kept hereafter.

I would to God all strifes were well compounded.—

My sovereign lord, I do beseech your highness

To take our brother Clarence to your grace.

RICHARD GLOUCESTER

Why, madam, have I offered love for this,

To be so flouted in this royal presence?

Who knows not that the gentle Duke is dead?

The others all start

You do him injury to scorn his corpse.

⌈RIVERS⌉

Who knows not he is dead? Who knows he is?

QUEEN ELIZABETH

All-seeing heaven, what a world is this?

BUCKINGHAM

Look I so pale, Lord Dorset, as the rest?

DORSET

Ay, my good lord, and no one in the presence

But his red colour hath forsook his cheeks.

KING EDWARD

Is Clarence dead? The order was reversed.

RICHARD GLOUCESTER

But he, poor man, by your first order died,

And that a winged Mercury did bear;

Some tardy cripple bore the countermand,

That came too lag to see him buried.

God grant that some, less noble and less loyal,

Nearer in bloody thoughts, but not in blood,

Deserve not worse than wretched Clarence did,

And yet go current from suspicion.

Enter Lord Stanley Earl of Derby

STANLEY (kneeling)

A boon, my sovereign, for my service done.

KING EDWARD

I pray thee, peace! My soul is full of sorrow.

STANLEY

I will not rise, unless your highness hear me.

KING EDWARD

Then say at once, what is it thou requests?

STANLEY

The forfeit, sovereign, of my servant’s life,

Who slew today a riotous gentleman,

Lately attendant on the Duke of Norfolk.

KING EDWARD

Have I a tongue to doom my brother’s death,

And shall that tongue give pardon to a slave?

My brother slew no man; his fault was thought;

And yet his punishment was bitter death.

Who sued to me for him? Who in my wrath

Kneeled at my feet, and bid me be advised?

Who spoke of brotherhood? Who spoke of love?

Who told me how the poor soul did forsake

The mighty Warwick and did fight for me?

Who told me, in the field at Tewkesbury,

When Oxford had me down, he rescued me,

And said, ‘Dear brother, live, and be a king’?

Who told me, when we both lay in the field,

Frozen almost to death, how he did lap me

Even in his garments, and did give himself

All thin and naked to the numb-cold night?

All this from my remembrance brutish wrath

Sinfully plucked, and not a man of you

Had so much grace to put it in my mind.

But when your carters or your waiting vassals

Have done a drunken slaughter, and defaced

The precious image of our dear redeemer,

You straight are on your knees for ‘Pardon, pardon!’—

And I, unjustly too, must grant it you.

But, for my brother, not a man would speak,

Nor I, ungracious, speak unto myself

For him, poor soul. The proudest of you all

Have been beholden to him in his life,

Yet none of you would once beg for his life.

O God, I fear thy justice will take hold

On me—and you, and mine, and yours, for this.—

Come, Hastings, help me to my closet.

Ah, poor Clarence!

Exeunt some with King and Queen

RICHARD GLOUCESTER

This is the fruits of rashness. Marked you not

How that the guilty kindred of the Queen

Looked pale, when they did hear of Clarence’ death?

O, they did urge it still unto the King.

God will revenge it. Come, lords, will you go

To comfort Edward with our company?

BUCKINGHAM We wait upon your grace. Exeunt

2.2 Enter the old Duchess of York with the two children of Clarence

BOY

Good grannam, tell us, is our father dead?

DUCHESS OF YORK No, boy.

GIRL

Why do you weep so oft, and beat your breast,

And cry, ‛O Clarence, my unhappy son’?

BOY

Why do you look on us and shake your head,

And call us orphans, wretches, castaways,

If that our noble father were alive?

DUCHESS OF YORK

My pretty cousins, you mistake me both.

I do lament the sickness of the King,

As loath to lose him, not your father’s death.

It were lost sorrow to wail one that’s lost.

BOY

Then you conclude, my grannam, he is dead.

The King mine uncle is to blame for this.

God will revenge it—whom I will importune

With earnest prayers, all to that effect.

GIRL And so will I.

DUCHESS OF YORK

Peace, children, peace! The King doth love you well.

Incapable and shallow innocents,

You cannot guess who caused your father’s death.

BOY

Grannam, we can. For my good uncle Gloucester

Told me the King, provoked to it by the Queen,

Devised impeachments to imprison him,

And when my uncle told me so he wept,

And pitied me, and kindly kissed my cheek,

Bade me rely on him as on my father,

And he would love me dearly as his child.

DUCHESS OF YORK

Ah, that deceit should steal such gentle shapes,

And with a virtuous visor hide deep vice!

He is my son, ay, and therein my shame;

Yet from my dugs he drew not this deceit.