Act I

SCENE I. London. The palace.

Enter KING HENRY, LORD JOHN OF LANCASTER, the EARL of WESTMORELAND, SIR WALTER BLUNT, and others

KING HENRY IV

So shaken as we are, so wan with care,
 Find we a time for frighted peace to pant,
 And breathe short-winded accents of new broils
 To be commenced in strands afar remote.
 No more the thirsty entrance of this soil
 Shall daub her lips with her own children’s blood;
 Nor more shall trenching war channel her fields,
 Nor bruise her flowerets with the armed hoofs
 Of hostile paces: those opposed eyes,
 Which, like the meteors of a troubled heaven,
 All of one nature, of one substance bred,
 Did lately meet in the intestine shock
 And furious close of civil butchery
 Shall now, in mutual well-beseeming ranks,
 March all one way and be no more opposed
 Against acquaintance, kindred and allies:
 The edge of war, like an ill-sheathed knife,
 No more shall cut his master. Therefore, friends,
 As far as to the sepulchre of Christ,
 Whose soldier now, under whose blessed cross
 We are impressed and engaged to fight,
 Forthwith a power of English shall we levy;
 Whose arms were moulded in their mothers’ womb
 To chase these pagans in those holy fields
 Over whose acres walk’d those blessed feet
 Which fourteen hundred years ago were nail’d
 For our advantage on the bitter cross.
 But this our purpose now is twelve month old,
 And bootless ’tis to tell you we will go:
 Therefore we meet not now. Then let me hear
 Of you, my gentle cousin Westmoreland,
 What yesternight our council did decree
 In forwarding this dear expedience.

WESTMORELAND

My liege, this haste was hot in question,
 And many limits of the charge set down
 But yesternight: when all athwart there came
 A post from Wales loaden with heavy news;
 Whose worst was, that the noble Mortimer,
 Leading the men of Herefordshire to fight
 Against the irregular and wild Glendower,
 Was by the rude hands of that Welshman taken,
 A thousand of his people butchered;
 Upon whose dead corpse there was such misuse,
 Such beastly shameless transformation,
 By those Welshwomen done as may not be
 Without much shame retold or spoken of.

KING HENRY IV

It seems then that the tidings of this broil
 Brake off our business for the Holy Land.

WESTMORELAND

This match’d with other did, my gracious lord;
 For more uneven and unwelcome news
 Came from the north and thus it did import:
 On Holy-rood day, the gallant Hotspur there,
 Young Harry Percy and brave Archibald,
 That ever-valiant and approved Scot,
 At Holmedon met,
 Where they did spend a sad and bloody hour,
 As by discharge of their artillery,
 And shape of likelihood, the news was told;
 For he that brought them, in the very heat
 And pride of their contention did take horse,
 Uncertain of the issue any way.

KING HENRY IV

Here is a dear, a true industrious friend,
 Sir Walter Blunt, new lighted from his horse.
 Stain’d with the variation of each soil
 Betwixt that Holmedon and this seat of ours;
 And he hath brought us smooth and welcome news.
 The Earl of Douglas is discomfited:
 Ten thousand bold Scots, two and twenty knights,
 Balk’d in their own blood did Sir Walter see
 On Holmedon’s plains. Of prisoners, Hotspur took
 Mordake the Earl of Fife, and eldest son
 To beaten Douglas; and the Earl of Athol,
 Of Murray, Angus, and Menteith:
 And is not this an honourable spoil?
 A gallant prize? ha, cousin, is it not?

WESTMORELAND

In faith,
 It is a conquest for a prince to boast of.

KING HENRY IV

Yea, there thou makest me sad and makest me sin
 In envy that my Lord Northumberland
 Should be the father to so blest a son,
 A son who is the theme of honour’s tongue;
 Amongst a grove, the very straightest plant;
 Who is sweet Fortune’s minion and her pride:
 Whilst I, by looking on the praise of him,
 See riot and dishonour stain the brow
 Of my young Harry. O that it could be proved
 That some night-tripping fairy had exchanged
 In cradle-clothes our children where they lay,
 And call’d mine Percy, his Plantagenet!
 Then would I have his Harry, and he mine.
 But let him from my thoughts. What think you, coz,
 Of this young Percy’s pride? the prisoners,
 Which he in this adventure hath surprised,
 To his own use he keeps; and sends me word,
 I shall have none but Mordake Earl of Fife.

WESTMORELAND

This is his uncle’s teaching; this is Worcester,
 Malevolent to you in all aspects;
 Which makes him prune himself, and bristle up
 The crest of youth against your dignity.

KING HENRY IV

But I have sent for him to answer this;
 And for this cause awhile we must neglect
 Our holy purpose to Jerusalem.
 Cousin, on Wednesday next our council we
 Will hold at Windsor; so inform the lords:
 But come yourself with speed to us again;
 For more is to be said and to be done
 Than out of anger can be uttered.

WESTMORELAND

I will, my liege.

Exeunt

SCENE II. London. An apartment of the Prince’s.

Enter the PRINCE OF WALES and FALSTAFF

FALSTAFF

Now, Hal, what time of day is it, lad?

PRINCE HENRY

Thou art so fat-witted, with drinking of old sack
 and unbuttoning thee after supper and sleeping upon
 benches after noon, that thou hast forgotten to
 demand that truly which thou wouldst truly know.
 What a devil hast thou to do with the time of the
 day? Unless hours were cups of sack and minutes
 capons and clocks the tongues of bawds and dials the
 signs of leaping-houses and the blessed sun himself
 a fair hot wench in flame-coloured taffeta, I see no
 reason why thou shouldst be so superfluous to demand
 the time of the day.

FALSTAFF

Indeed, you come near me now, Hal; for we that take
 purses go by the moon and the seven stars, and not
 by Phoebus, he,’that wandering knight so fair.’ And,
 I prithee, sweet wag, when thou art king, as, God
 save thy grace,—majesty I should say, for grace
 thou wilt have none,—

PRINCE HENRY

What, none?

FALSTAFF

No, by my troth, not so much as will serve to
 prologue to an egg and butter.

PRINCE HENRY

Well, how then? come, roundly, roundly.

FALSTAFF

Marry, then, sweet wag, when thou art king, let not
 us that are squires of the night’s body be called
 thieves of the day’s beauty: let us be Diana’s
 foresters, gentlemen of the shade, minions of the
 moon; and let men say we be men of good government,
 being governed, as the sea is, by our noble and
 chaste mistress the moon, under whose countenance we steal.

PRINCE HENRY

Thou sayest well, and it holds well too; for the
 fortune of us that are the moon’s men doth ebb and
 flow like the sea, being governed, as the sea is,
 by the moon. As, for proof, now: a purse of gold
 most resolutely snatched on Monday night and most
 dissolutely spent on Tuesday morning; got with
 swearing ‘Lay by’ and spent with crying ‘Bring in;’
 now in as low an ebb as the foot of the ladder
 and by and by in as high a flow as the ridge of the gallows.

FALSTAFF

By the Lord, thou sayest true, lad. And is not my
 hostess of the tavern a most sweet wench?

PRINCE HENRY

As the honey of Hybla, my old lad of the castle. And
 is not a buff jerkin a most sweet robe of durance?

FALSTAFF

How now, how now, mad wag! what, in thy quips and
 thy quiddities? what a plague have I to do with a
 buff jerkin?

PRINCE HENRY

Why, what a pox have I to do with my hostess of the tavern?

FALSTAFF

Well, thou hast called her to a reckoning many a
 time and oft.

PRINCE HENRY

Did I ever call for thee to pay thy part?

FALSTAFF

No; I’ll give thee thy due, thou hast paid all there.

PRINCE HENRY

Yea, and elsewhere, so far as my coin would stretch;
 and where it would not, I have used my credit.

FALSTAFF

Yea, and so used it that were it not here apparent
 that thou art heir apparent—But, I prithee, sweet
 wag, shall there be gallows standing in England when
 thou art king? and resolution thus fobbed as it is
 with the rusty curb of old father antic the law? Do
 not thou, when thou art king, hang a thief.

PRINCE HENRY

No; thou shalt.

FALSTAFF

Shall I? O rare! By the Lord, I’ll be a brave judge.

PRINCE HENRY

Thou judgest false already: I mean, thou shalt have
 the hanging of the thieves and so become a rare hangman.

FALSTAFF

Well, Hal, well; and in some sort it jumps with my
 humour as well as waiting in the court, I can tell
 you.

PRINCE HENRY

For obtaining of suits?

FALSTAFF

Yea, for obtaining of suits, whereof the hangman
 hath no lean wardrobe. ‘Sblood, I am as melancholy
 as a gib cat or a lugged bear.

PRINCE HENRY

Or an old lion, or a lover’s lute.

FALSTAFF

Yea, or the drone of a Lincolnshire bagpipe.

PRINCE HENRY

What sayest thou to a hare, or the melancholy of
 Moor-ditch?

FALSTAFF

Thou hast the most unsavoury similes and art indeed
 the most comparative, rascalliest, sweet young
 prince. But, Hal, I prithee, trouble me no more
 with vanity. I would to God thou and I knew where a
 commodity of good names were to be bought. An old
 lord of the council rated me the other day in the
 street about you, sir, but I marked him not; and yet
 he talked very wisely, but I regarded him not; and
 yet he talked wisely, and in the street too.

PRINCE HENRY

Thou didst well; for wisdom cries out in the
 streets, and no man regards it.

FALSTAFF

O, thou hast damnable iteration and art indeed able
 to corrupt a saint. Thou hast done much harm upon
 me, Hal; God forgive thee for it! Before I knew
 thee, Hal, I knew nothing; and now am I, if a man
 should speak truly, little better than one of the
 wicked. I must give over this life, and I will give
 it over: by the Lord, and I do not, I am a villain:
 I’ll be damned for never a king’s son in
 Christendom.

PRINCE HENRY

Where shall we take a purse tomorrow, Jack?

FALSTAFF

‘Zounds, where thou wilt, lad; I’ll make one; an I
 do not, call me villain and baffle me.

PRINCE HENRY

I see a good amendment of life in thee; from praying
 to purse-taking.

FALSTAFF

Why, Hal, ’tis my vocation, Hal; ’tis no sin for a
 man to labour in his vocation.

Enter POINS

Poins! Now shall we know if Gadshill have set a
 match. O, if men were to be saved by merit, what
 hole in hell were hot enough for him? This is the
 most omnipotent villain that ever cried ‘Stand’ to
 a true man.

PRINCE HENRY

Good morrow, Ned.

POINS

Good morrow, sweet Hal. What says Monsieur Remorse?
 what says Sir John Sack and Sugar? Jack! how
 agrees the devil and thee about thy soul, that thou
 soldest him on Good-Friday last for a cup of Madeira
 and a cold capon’s leg?

PRINCE HENRY

Sir John stands to his word, the devil shall have
 his bargain; for he was never yet a breaker of
 proverbs: he will give the devil his due.

POINS

Then art thou damned for keeping thy word with the devil.

PRINCE HENRY

Else he had been damned for cozening the devil.

POINS

But, my lads, my lads, to-morrow morning, by four
 o’clock, early at Gadshill! there are pilgrims going
 to Canterbury with rich offerings, and traders
 riding to London with fat purses: I have vizards
 for you all; you have horses for yourselves:
 Gadshill lies to-night in Rochester: I have bespoke
 supper to-morrow night in Eastcheap: we may do it
 as secure as sleep. If you will go, I will stuff
 your purses full of crowns; if you will not, tarry
 at home and be hanged.

FALSTAFF

Hear ye, Yedward; if I tarry at home and go not,
 I’ll hang you for going.

POINS

You will, chops?

FALSTAFF

Hal, wilt thou make one?

PRINCE HENRY

Who, I rob? I a thief? not I, by my faith.

FALSTAFF

There’s neither honesty, manhood, nor good
 fellowship in thee, nor thou camest not of the blood
 royal, if thou darest not stand for ten shillings.

PRINCE HENRY

Well then, once in my days I’ll be a madcap.

FALSTAFF

Why, that’s well said.

PRINCE HENRY

Well, come what will, I’ll tarry at home.

FALSTAFF

By the Lord, I’ll be a traitor then, when thou art king.

PRINCE HENRY

I care not.

POINS

Sir John, I prithee, leave the prince and me alone:
 I will lay him down such reasons for this adventure
 that he shall go.

FALSTAFF

Well, God give thee the spirit of persuasion and him
 the ears of profiting, that what thou speakest may
 move and what he hears may be believed, that the
 true prince may, for recreation sake, prove a false
 thief; for the poor abuses of the time want
 countenance. Farewell: you shall find me in Eastcheap.

PRINCE HENRY

Farewell, thou latter spring! farewell, All-hallown summer!

Exit Falstaff

POINS

Now, my good sweet honey lord, ride with us
 to-morrow: I have a jest to execute that I cannot
 manage alone. Falstaff, Bardolph, Peto and Gadshill
 shall rob those men that we have already waylaid:
 yourself and I will not be there; and when they
 have the booty, if you and I do not rob them, cut
 this head off from my shoulders.

PRINCE HENRY

How shall we part with them in setting forth?

POINS

Why, we will set forth before or after them, and
 appoint them a place of meeting, wherein it is at
 our pleasure to fail, and then will they adventure
 upon the exploit themselves; which they shall have
 no sooner achieved, but we’ll set upon them.

PRINCE HENRY

Yea, but ’tis like that they will know us by our
 horses, by our habits and by every other
 appointment, to be ourselves.

POINS

Tut! our horses they shall not see: I’ll tie them
 in the wood; our vizards we will change after we
 leave them: and, sirrah, I have cases of buckram
 for the nonce, to immask our noted outward garments.

PRINCE HENRY

Yea, but I doubt they will be too hard for us.

POINS

Well, for two of them, I know them to be as
 true-bred cowards as ever turned back; and for the
 third, if he fight longer than he sees reason, I’ll
 forswear arms. The virtue of this jest will be, the
 incomprehensible lies that this same fat rogue will
 tell us when we meet at supper: how thirty, at
 least, he fought with; what wards, what blows, what
 extremities he endured; and in the reproof of this
 lies the jest.

PRINCE HENRY

Well, I’ll go with thee: provide us all things
 necessary and meet me to-morrow night in Eastcheap;
 there I’ll sup. Farewell.

POINS

Farewell, my lord.

Exit Poins

PRINCE HENRY

I know you all, and will awhile uphold
 The unyoked humour of your idleness:
 Yet herein will I imitate the sun,
 Who doth permit the base contagious clouds
 To smother up his beauty from the world,
 That, when he please again to be himself,
 Being wanted, he may be more wonder’d at,
 By breaking through the foul and ugly mists
 Of vapours that did seem to strangle him.
 If all the year were playing holidays,
 To sport would be as tedious as to work;
 But when they seldom come, they wish’d for come,
 And nothing pleaseth but rare accidents.
 So, when this loose behavior I throw off
 And pay the debt I never promised,
 By how much better than my word I am,
 By so much shall I falsify men’s hopes;
 And like bright metal on a sullen ground,
 My reformation, glittering o’er my fault,
 Shall show more goodly and attract more eyes
 Than that which hath no foil to set it off.
 I’ll so offend, to make offence a skill;
 Redeeming time when men think least I will.

Exit

SCENE III. London. The palace.

Enter the KING, NORTHUMBERLAND, WORCESTER, HOTSPUR, SIR WALTER BLUNT, with others

KING HENRY IV

My blood hath been too cold and temperate,
 Unapt to stir at these indignities,
 And you have found me; for accordingly
 You tread upon my patience: but be sure
 I will from henceforth rather be myself,
 Mighty and to be fear’d, than my condition;
 Which hath been smooth as oil, soft as young down,
 And therefore lost that title of respect
 Which the proud soul ne’er pays but to the proud.

EARL OF WORCESTER

Our house, my sovereign liege, little deserves
 The scourge of greatness to be used on it;
 And that same greatness too which our own hands
 Have holp to make so portly.

NORTHUMBERLAND

My lord.—

KING HENRY IV

Worcester, get thee gone; for I do see
 Danger and disobedience in thine eye:
 O, sir, your presence is too bold and peremptory,
 And majesty might never yet endure
 The moody frontier of a servant brow.
 You have good leave to leave us: when we need
 Your use and counsel, we shall send for you.

Exit Worcester

You were about to speak.

To North

NORTHUMBERLAND

Yea, my good lord.
 Those prisoners in your highness’ name demanded,
 Which Harry Percy here at Holmedon took,
 Were, as he says, not with such strength denied
 As is deliver’d to your majesty:
 Either envy, therefore, or misprison
 Is guilty of this fault and not my son.

HOTSPUR

My liege, I did deny no prisoners.
 But I remember, when the fight was done,
 When I was dry with rage and extreme toil,
 Breathless and faint, leaning upon my sword,
 Came there a certain lord, neat, and trimly dress’d,
 Fresh as a bridegroom; and his chin new reap’d
 Show’d like a stubble-land at harvest-home;
 He was perfumed like a milliner;
 And ‘twixt his finger and his thumb he held
 A pouncet-box, which ever and anon
 He gave his nose and took’t away again;
 Who therewith angry, when it next came there,
 Took it in snuff; and still he smiled and talk’d,
 And as the soldiers bore dead bodies by,
 He call’d them untaught knaves, unmannerly,
 To bring a slovenly unhandsome corse
 Betwixt the wind and his nobility.
 With many holiday and lady terms
 He question’d me; amongst the rest, demanded
 My prisoners in your majesty’s behalf.
 I then, all smarting with my wounds being cold,
 To be so pester’d with a popinjay,
 Out of my grief and my impatience,
 Answer’d neglectingly I know not what,
 He should or he should not; for he made me mad
 To see him shine so brisk and smell so sweet
 And talk so like a waiting-gentlewoman
 Of guns and drums and wounds,—God save the mark!—
 And telling me the sovereign’st thing on earth
 Was parmaceti for an inward bruise;
 And that it was great pity, so it was,
 This villanous salt-petre should be digg’d
 Out of the bowels of the harmless earth,
 Which many a good tall fellow had destroy’d
 So cowardly; and but for these vile guns,
 He would himself have been a soldier.
 This bald unjointed chat of his, my lord,
 I answer’d indirectly, as I said;
 And I beseech you, let not his report
 Come current for an accusation
 Betwixt my love and your high majesty.

SIR WALTER BLUNT

The circumstance consider’d, good my lord,
 Whate’er Lord Harry Percy then had said
 To such a person and in such a place,
 At such a time, with all the rest retold,
 May reasonably die and never rise
 To do him wrong or any way impeach
 What then he said, so he unsay it now.

KING HENRY IV

Why, yet he doth deny his prisoners,
 But with proviso and exception,
 That we at our own charge shall ransom straight
 His brother-in-law, the foolish Mortimer;
 Who, on my soul, hath wilfully betray’d
 The lives of those that he did lead to fight
 Against that great magician, damn’d Glendower,
 Whose daughter, as we hear, the Earl of March
 Hath lately married. Shall our coffers, then,
 Be emptied to redeem a traitor home?
 Shall we but treason? and indent with fears,
 When they have lost and forfeited themselves?
 No, on the barren mountains let him starve;
 For I shall never hold that man my friend
 Whose tongue shall ask me for one penny cost
 To ransom home revolted Mortimer.

HOTSPUR

Revolted Mortimer!
 He never did fall off, my sovereign liege,
 But by the chance of war; to prove that true
 Needs no more but one tongue for all those wounds,
 Those mouthed wounds, which valiantly he took
 When on the gentle Severn’s sedgy bank,
 In single opposition, hand to hand,
 He did confound the best part of an hour
 In changing hardiment with great Glendower:
 Three times they breathed and three times did
 they drink,
 Upon agreement, of swift Severn’s flood;
 Who then, affrighted with their bloody looks,
 Ran fearfully among the trembling reeds,
 And hid his crisp head in the hollow bank,
 Bloodstained with these valiant combatants.
 Never did base and rotten policy
 Colour her working with such deadly wounds;
 Nor could the noble Mortimer
 Receive so many, and all willingly:
 Then let not him be slander’d with revolt.

KING HENRY IV

Thou dost belie him, Percy, thou dost belie him;
 He never did encounter with Glendower:
 I tell thee,
 He durst as well have met the devil alone
 As Owen Glendower for an enemy.
 Art thou not ashamed? But, sirrah, henceforth
 Let me not hear you speak of Mortimer:
 Send me your prisoners with the speediest means,
 Or you shall hear in such a kind from me
 As will displease you. My Lord Northumberland,
 We licence your departure with your son.
 Send us your prisoners, or you will hear of it.

Exeunt King Henry, Blunt, and train

HOTSPUR

An if the devil come and roar for them,
 I will not send them: I will after straight
 And tell him so; for I will ease my heart,
 Albeit I make a hazard of my head.

NORTHUMBERLAND

What, drunk with choler? stay and pause awhile:
 Here comes your uncle.

Re-enter WORCESTER

HOTSPUR

Speak of Mortimer!
 ‘Zounds, I will speak of him; and let my soul
 Want mercy, if I do not join with him:
 Yea, on his part I’ll empty all these veins,
 And shed my dear blood drop by drop in the dust,
 But I will lift the down-trod Mortimer
 As high in the air as this unthankful king,
 As this ingrate and canker’d Bolingbroke.

NORTHUMBERLAND

Brother, the king hath made your nephew mad.

EARL OF WORCESTER

Who struck this heat up after I was gone?

HOTSPUR

He will, forsooth, have all my prisoners;
 And when I urged the ransom once again
 Of my wife’s brother, then his cheek look’d pale,
 And on my face he turn’d an eye of death,
 Trembling even at the name of Mortimer.

EARL OF WORCESTER

I cannot blame him: was not he proclaim’d
 By Richard that dead is the next of blood?

NORTHUMBERLAND

He was; I heard the proclamation:
 And then it was when the unhappy king,
 —Whose wrongs in us God pardon!—did set forth
 Upon his Irish expedition;
 From whence he intercepted did return
 To be deposed and shortly murdered.

EARL OF WORCESTER

And for whose death we in the world’s wide mouth
 Live scandalized and foully spoken of.

HOTSPUR

But soft, I pray you; did King Richard then
 Proclaim my brother Edmund Mortimer
 Heir to the crown?

NORTHUMBERLAND

He did; myself did hear it.

HOTSPUR

Nay, then I cannot blame his cousin king,
 That wished him on the barren mountains starve.
 But shall it be that you, that set the crown
 Upon the head of this forgetful man
 And for his sake wear the detested blot
 Of murderous subornation, shall it be,
 That you a world of curses undergo,
 Being the agents, or base second means,
 The cords, the ladder, or the hangman rather?
 O, pardon me that I descend so low,
 To show the line and the predicament
 Wherein you range under this subtle king;
 Shall it for shame be spoken in these days,
 Or fill up chronicles in time to come,
 That men of your nobility and power
 Did gage them both in an unjust behalf,
 As both of you—God pardon it!—have done,
 To put down Richard, that sweet lovely rose,
 An plant this thorn, this canker, Bolingbroke?
 And shall it in more shame be further spoken,
 That you are fool’d, discarded and shook off
 By him for whom these shames ye underwent?
 No; yet time serves wherein you may redeem
 Your banish’d honours and restore yourselves
 Into the good thoughts of the world again,
 Revenge the jeering and disdain’d contempt
 Of this proud king, who studies day and night
 To answer all the debt he owes to you
 Even with the bloody payment of your deaths:
 Therefore, I say—

EARL OF WORCESTER

Peace, cousin, say no more:
 And now I will unclasp a secret book,
 And to your quick-conceiving discontents
 I’ll read you matter deep and dangerous,
 As full of peril and adventurous spirit
 As to o’er-walk a current roaring loud
 On the unsteadfast footing of a spear.

HOTSPUR

If he fall in, good night! or sink or swim:
 Send danger from the east unto the west,
 So honour cross it from the north to south,
 And let them grapple: O, the blood more stirs
 To rouse a lion than to start a hare!

NORTHUMBERLAND

Imagination of some great exploit
 Drives him beyond the bounds of patience.

HOTSPUR

By heaven, methinks it were an easy leap,
 To pluck bright honour from the pale-faced moon,
 Or dive into the bottom of the deep,
 Where fathom-line could never touch the ground,
 And pluck up drowned honour by the locks;
 So he that doth redeem her thence might wear
 Without corrival, all her dignities:
 But out upon this half-faced fellowship!

EARL OF WORCESTER

He apprehends a world of figures here,
 But not the form of what he should attend.
 Good cousin, give me audience for a while.

HOTSPUR

I cry you mercy.

EARL OF WORCESTER

Those same noble Scots
 That are your prisoners,—

HOTSPUR

I’ll keep them all;
 By God, he shall not have a Scot of them;
 No, if a Scot would save his soul, he shall not:
 I’ll keep them, by this hand.

EARL OF WORCESTER

You start away
 And lend no ear unto my purposes.
 Those prisoners you shall keep.

HOTSPUR

Nay, I will; that’s flat:
 He said he would not ransom Mortimer;
 Forbad my tongue to speak of Mortimer;
 But I will find him when he lies asleep,
 And in his ear I’ll holla ‘Mortimer!’
 Nay,
 I’ll have a starling shall be taught to speak
 Nothing but ‘Mortimer,’ and give it him
 To keep his anger still in motion.

EARL OF WORCESTER

Hear you, cousin; a word.

HOTSPUR

All studies here I solemnly defy,
 Save how to gall and pinch this Bolingbroke:
 And that same sword-and-buckler Prince of Wales,
 But that I think his father loves him not
 And would be glad he met with some mischance,
 I would have him poison’d with a pot of ale.

EARL OF WORCESTER

Farewell, kinsman: I’ll talk to you
 When you are better temper’d to attend.

NORTHUMBERLAND

Why, what a wasp-stung and impatient fool
 Art thou to break into this woman’s mood,
 Tying thine ear to no tongue but thine own!

HOTSPUR

Why, look you, I am whipp’d and scourged with rods,
 Nettled and stung with pismires, when I hear
 Of this vile politician, Bolingbroke.
 In Richard’s time,—what do you call the place?—
 A plague upon it, it is in Gloucestershire;
 ‘Twas where the madcap duke his uncle kept,
 His uncle York; where I first bow’d my knee
 Unto this king of smiles, this Bolingbroke,—
 ‘Sblood!—
 When you and he came back from Ravenspurgh.

NORTHUMBERLAND

At Berkley castle.

HOTSPUR

You say true:
 Why, what a candy deal of courtesy
 This fawning greyhound then did proffer me!
 Look,’when his infant fortune came to age,’
 And ‘gentle Harry Percy,’ and ‘kind cousin;’
 O, the devil take such cozeners! God forgive me!
 Good uncle, tell your tale; I have done.

EARL OF WORCESTER

Nay, if you have not, to it again;
 We will stay your leisure.

HOTSPUR

I have done, i’ faith.

EARL OF WORCESTER

Then once more to your Scottish prisoners.
 Deliver them up without their ransom straight,
 And make the Douglas’ son your only mean
 For powers in Scotland; which, for divers reasons
 Which I shall send you written, be assured,
 Will easily be granted. You, my lord,

To Northumberland

Your son in Scotland being thus employ’d,
 Shall secretly into the bosom creep
 Of that same noble prelate, well beloved,
 The archbishop.

HOTSPUR

Of York, is it not?

EARL OF WORCESTER

True; who bears hard
 His brother’s death at Bristol, the Lord Scroop.
 I speak not this in estimation,
 As what I think might be, but what I know
 Is ruminated, plotted and set down,
 And only stays but to behold the face
 Of that occasion that shall bring it on.

HOTSPUR

I smell it: upon my life, it will do well.

NORTHUMBERLAND

Before the game is afoot, thou still let’st slip.

HOTSPUR

Why, it cannot choose but be a noble plot;
 And then the power of Scotland and of York,
 To join with Mortimer, ha?

EARL OF WORCESTER

And so they shall.

HOTSPUR

In faith, it is exceedingly well aim’d.

EARL OF WORCESTER

And ’tis no little reason bids us speed,
 To save our heads by raising of a head;
 For, bear ourselves as even as we can,
 The king will always think him in our debt,
 And think we think ourselves unsatisfied,
 Till he hath found a time to pay us home:
 And see already how he doth begin
 To make us strangers to his looks of love.

HOTSPUR

He does, he does: we’ll be revenged on him.

EARL OF WORCESTER

Cousin, farewell: no further go in this
 Than I by letters shall direct your course.
 When time is ripe, which will be suddenly,
 I’ll steal to Glendower and Lord Mortimer;
 Where you and Douglas and our powers at once,
 As I will fashion it, shall happily meet,
 To bear our fortunes in our own strong arms,
 Which now we hold at much uncertainty.

NORTHUMBERLAND

Farewell, good brother: we shall thrive, I trust.

HOTSPUR

Uncle, Adieu: O, let the hours be short
 Till fields and blows and groans applaud our sport!

Exeunt