TPTT The Life and Death of King John: ACT V
Introduction
ACT I
ACT II
ACT III
ACT IV
ACT V
SCENE I. KING JOHN'S palace.
SCENE II. LEWIS's camp at St. Edmundsbury.
SCENE III. The field of battle.
SCENE IV. Another part of the field.
SCENE V. The French camp.
SCENE VI. An open place in the neighbourhood of Swinstead Abbey.
SCENE VII. The orchard in Swinstead Abbey.
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SCENE VII. The orchard in Swinstead Abbey.
Enter PRINCE HENRY, SALISBURY, and BIGOT
PRINCE HENRY
      It is too late: the life of all his blood
      Is touch'd corruptibly, and his pure brain,
      Which some suppose the soul's frail dwelling-house,
      Doth by the idle comments that it makes
5     Foretell the ending of mortality.
Enter PEMBROKE
PEMBROKE
      His highness yet doth speak, and holds belief
      That, being brought into the open air,
      It would allay the burning quality
      Of that fell poison which assaileth him.
PRINCE HENRY
10    Let him be brought into the orchard here.
      Doth he still rage?
Exit BIGOT
PEMBROKE
      He is more patient
      Than when you left him; even now he sung.
PRINCE HENRY
      O vanity of sickness! fierce extremes
15    In their continuance will not feel themselves.
      Death, having prey'd upon the outward parts,
      Leaves them invisible, and his siege is now
      Against the mind, the which he pricks and wounds
      With many legions of strange fantasies,
20    Which, in their throng and press to that last hold,
      Confound themselves. 'Tis strange that death
      should sing.
      I am the cygnet to this pale faint swan,
      Who chants a doleful hymn to his own death,
25    And from the organ-pipe of frailty sings
      His soul and body to their lasting rest.
SALISBURY
      Be of good comfort, prince; for you are born
      To set a form upon that indigest
      Which he hath left so shapeless and so rude.
Enter Attendants, and BIGOT, carrying KING JOHN in a chair
KING JOHN
30    Ay, marry, now my soul hath elbow-room;
      It would not out at windows nor at doors.
      There is so hot a summer in my bosom,
      That all my bowels crumble up to dust:
      I am a scribbled form, drawn with a pen
35    Upon a parchment, and against this fire
      Do I shrink up.
PRINCE HENRY
      How fares your majesty?
KING JOHN
      Poison'd,--ill fare--dead, forsook, cast off:
      And none of you will bid the winter come
40    To thrust his icy fingers in my maw,
      Nor let my kingdom's rivers take their course
      Through my burn'd bosom, nor entreat the north
      To make his bleak winds kiss my parched lips
      And comfort me with cold. I do not ask you much,
45    I beg cold comfort; and you are so strait
      And so ingrateful, you deny me that.
PRINCE HENRY
      O that there were some virtue in my tears,
      That might relieve you!
KING JOHN
      The salt in them is hot.
50    Within me is a hell; and there the poison
      Is as a fiend confined to tyrannize
      On unreprievable condemned blood.
Enter the BASTARD
BASTARD
      O, I am scalded with my violent motion,
      And spleen of speed to see your majesty!
KING JOHN
55    O cousin, thou art come to set mine eye:
      The tackle of my heart is crack'd and burn'd,
      And all the shrouds wherewith my life should sail
      Are turned to one thread, one little hair:
      My heart hath one poor string to stay it by,
60    Which holds but till thy news be uttered;
      And then all this thou seest is but a clod
      And module of confounded royalty.
BASTARD
      The Dauphin is preparing hitherward,
      Where heaven He knows how we shall answer him;
65    For in a night the best part of my power,
      As I upon advantage did remove,
      Were in the Washes all unwarily
      Devoured by the unexpected flood.
KING JOHN dies
SALISBURY
      You breathe these dead news in as dead an ear.
70    My liege! my lord! but now a king, now thus.
PRINCE HENRY
      Even so must I run on, and even so stop.
      What surety of the world, what hope, what stay,
      When this was now a king, and now is clay?
BASTARD
      Art thou gone so? I do but stay behind
75    To do the office for thee of revenge,
      And then my soul shall wait on thee to heaven,
      As it on earth hath been thy servant still.
      Now, now, you stars that move in your right spheres,
      Where be your powers? show now your mended faiths,
80    And instantly return with me again,
      To push destruction and perpetual shame
      Out of the weak door of our fainting land.
      Straight let us seek, or straight we shall be sought;
      The Dauphin rages at our very heels.
SALISBURY
85    It seems you know not, then, so much as we:
      The Cardinal Pandulph is within at rest,
      Who half an hour since came from the Dauphin,
      And brings from him such offers of our peace
      As we with honour and respect may take,
90    With purpose presently to leave this war.
BASTARD
      He will the rather do it when he sees
      Ourselves well sinewed to our defence.
SALISBURY
      Nay, it is in a manner done already;
      For many carriages he hath dispatch'd
95    To the sea-side, and put his cause and quarrel
      To the disposing of the cardinal:
      With whom yourself, myself and other lords,
      If you think meet, this afternoon will post
      To consummate this business happily.
BASTARD
100   Let it be so: and you, my noble prince,
      With other princes that may best be spared,
      Shall wait upon your father's funeral.
PRINCE HENRY
      At Worcester must his body be interr'd;
      For so he will'd it.
BASTARD
105   Thither shall it then:
      And happily may your sweet self put on
      The lineal state and glory of the land!
      To whom with all submission, on my knee
      I do bequeath my faithful services
110   And true subjection everlastingly.
SALISBURY
      And the like tender of our love we make,
      To rest without a spot for evermore.
PRINCE HENRY
      I have a kind soul that would give you thanks
      And knows not how to do it but with tears.
BASTARD
115   O, let us pay the time but needful woe,
      Since it hath been beforehand with our griefs.
      This England never did, nor never shall,
      Lie at the proud foot of a conqueror,
      But when it first did help to wound itself.
120   Now these her princes are come home again,
      Come the three corners of the world in arms,
      And we shall shock them. Nought shall make us rue,
      If England to itself do rest but true.
Exeunt
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