William Shakespeare - KING RICHARD III

And spurn upon thee, beggar, for thy boldness.

[The Bearers set down the coffin.]

ANNE

What, do you tremble? are you all afraid?

Alas, I blame you not; for you are mortal,

And mortal eyes cannot endure the devil.—

Avaunt, thou dreadful minister of hell!

Thou hadst but power over his mortal body,

His soul thou canst not have; therefore, be gone.

GLOSTER

Sweet saint, for charity, be not so curst.

ANNE

Foul devil, for God’s sake, hence and trouble us not;

For thou hast made the happy earth thy hell,

Fill’d it with cursing cries and deep exclaims.

If thou delight to view thy heinous deeds,

Behold this pattern of thy butcheries.—

O, gentlemen, see, see! dead Henry’s wounds

Open their congeal’d mouths and bleed afresh!

Blush, blush, thou lump of foul deformity;

For ‘tis thy presence that exhales this blood

From cold and empty veins, where no blood dwells;

Thy deeds, inhuman and unnatural,

Provokes this deluge most unnatural.—

O God, which this blood mad’st, revenge his death!

O earth, which this blood drink’st, revenge his death!

Either, heaven, with lightning strike the murderer dead;

Or, earth, gape open wide and eat him quick,

As thou dost swallow up this good king’s blood,

Which his hell-govern’d arm hath butchered!

GLOSTER

Lady, you know no rules of charity,

Which renders good for bad, blessings for curses.

ANNE

Villain, thou knowest nor law of God nor man:

No beast so fierce but knows some touch of pity.

GLOSTER

But I know none, and therefore am no beast.

ANNE

O wonderful, when devils tell the truth!

GLOSTER

More wonderful when angels are so angry.—

Vouchsafe, divine perfection of a woman,

Of these supposèd crimes to give me leave,

By circumstance, but to acquit myself.

ANNE

Vouchsafe, diffus’d infection of a man,

Of these known evils but to give me leave,

By circumstance, to accuse thy cursèd self.

GLOSTER

Fairer than tongue can name thee, let me have

Some patient leisure to excuse myself.

ANNE

Fouler than heart can think thee, thou canst make

No excuse current but to hang thyself.

GLOSTER

By such despair I should accuse myself.

ANNE

And by despairing shalt thou stand excus’d;

For doing worthy vengeance on thyself,

That didst unworthy slaughter upon others.

GLOSTER

Say that I slew them not?

ANNE

Then say they were not slain:

But dead they are, and, devilish slave, by thee.

GLOSTER

I did not kill your husband.

ANNE

Why, then he is alive.

GLOSTER

Nay, he is dead; and slain by Edward’s hand.

ANNE

In thy foul throat thou liest: Queen Margaret saw

Thy murderous falchion smoking in his blood;

The which thou once didst bend against her breast,

But that thy brothers beat aside the point.

GLOSTER

I was provokèd by her slanderous tongue

That laid their guilt upon my guiltless shoulders.

ANNE

Thou wast provokèd by thy bloody mind,

That never dreamt on aught but butcheries:

Didst thou not kill this king?

GLOSTER

I grant ye.

ANNE

Dost grant me, hedgehog? then, God grant me too

Thou mayst be damnèd for that wicked deed!

O, he was gentle, mild, and virtuous.

GLOSTER

The better for the king of Heaven, that hath him.

ANNE

He is in heaven, where thou shalt never come.

GLOSTER

Let him thank me that holp to send him thither,

For he was fitter for that place than earth.

ANNE

And thou unfit for any place but hell.

GLOSTER

Yes, one place else, if you will hear me name it.

ANNE

Some dungeon.

GLOSTER

Your bedchamber.

ANNE

Ill rest betide the chamber where thou liest!

GLOSTER

So will it, madam, till I lie with you.

ANNE

I hope so.

GLOSTER

I know so.—But, gentle Lady Anne,—

To leave this keen encounter of our wits,

And fall something into a slower method,—

Is not the causer of the timeless deaths

Of these Plantagenets, Henry and Edward,

As blameful as the executioner?

ANNE

Thou wast the cause and most accurs’d effect.

GLOSTER

Your beauty was the cause of that effect;

Your beauty, that did haunt me in my sleep

To undertake the death of all the world,

So I might live one hour in your sweet bosom.

ANNE

If I thought that, I tell thee, homicide,

These nails should rend that beauty from my cheeks.

GLOSTER

These eyes could not endure that beauty’s wreck;

You should not blemish it if I stood by:

As all the world is cheerèd by the sun,

So I by that; it is my day, my life.

ANNE

Black night o’ershade thy day, and death thy life!

GLOSTER

Curse not thyself, fair creature; thou art both.

ANNE

I would I were, to be reveng’d on thee.

GLOSTER

It is a quarrel most unnatural,

To be reveng’d on him that loveth thee.

ANNE

It is a quarrel just and reasonable,

To be reveng’d on him that kill’d my husband.

GLOSTER

He that bereft thee, lady, of thy husband,

Did it to help thee to a better husband.

ANNE

His better doth not breathe upon the earth.

GLOSTER

He lives that loves thee better than he could.

ANNE

Name him.

GLOSTER

Plantagenet.

ANNE

Why, that was he.

GLOSTER

The selfsame name, but one of better nature.

ANNE

Where is he?

GLOSTER

Here.

[She spits at him.]

Why dost thou spit at me?

ANNE

Would it were mortal poison, for thy sake!

GLOSTER

Never came poison from so sweet a place.

ANNE

Never hung poison on a fouler toad.

Out of my sight! thou dost infect mine eyes.

GLOSTER

Thine eyes, sweet lady, have infected mine.

ANNE

Would they were basilisks to strike thee dead!

GLOSTER

I would they were, that I might die at once;

For now they kill me with a living death.

Those eyes of thine from mine have drawn salt tears,

Sham’d their aspects with store of childish drops:

These eyes, which never shed remorseful tear,

No, when my father York and Edward wept,

To hear the piteous moan that Rutland made

When black-fac’d Clifford shook his sword at him;

Nor when thy warlike father, like a child,

Told the sad story of my father’s death,

And twenty times made pause, to sob and weep,

That all the standers-by had wet their cheeks,

Like trees bedash’d with rain; in that sad time

My manly eyes did scorn an humble tear;

And what these sorrows could not thence exhale,

Thy beauty hath, and made them blind with weeping.

I never su’d to friend nor enemy;

My tongue could never learn sweet smoothing word;

But, now thy beauty is propos’d my fee,

My proud heart sues, and prompts my tongue to speak.

[She looks scornfully at him.]

Teach not thy lip such scorn; for it was made

For kissing, lady, not for such contempt.

If thy revengeful heart cannot forgive,

Lo, here I lend thee this sharp-pointed sword;

Which if thou please to hide in this true breast

And let the soul forth that adoreth thee,

I lay it naked to the deadly stroke,

And humbly beg the death upon my knee,

Nay, do not pause; for I did kill King Henry,—

[He lays his breast open; she offers at it with his sword.]

But ‘twas thy beauty that provokèd me.

Nay, now dispatch; ‘twas I that stabb’d young Edward,—