William Shakespeare - KING RICHARD III

Go, go, despatch.

FIRST MURDERER

We will, my noble lord.

[Exeunt.]

[Enter CLARENCE and BRAKENBURY.]

BRAKENBURY

Why looks your grace so heavily to-day?

CLARENCE

O, I have pass’d a miserable night,

So full of fearful dreams, of ugly sights,

That, as I am a Christian faithful man,

I would not spend another such a night

Though ‘twere to buy a world of happy days,—

So full of dismal terror was the time!

BRAKENBURY

What was your dream, my lord? I pray you tell me.

CLARENCE

Methoughts that I had broken from the Tower,

And was embark’d to cross to Burgundy;

And, in my company, my brother Gloster;

Who from my cabin tempted me to walk

Upon the hatches: thence we look’d toward England,

And cited up a thousand heavy times,

During the wars of York and Lancaster,

That had befall’n us. As we pac’d along

Upon the giddy footing of the hatches,

Methought that Gloster stumbled; and, in falling,

Struck me, that thought 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;

A thousand men that fishes gnaw’d upon;

Wedges of gold, great anchors, heaps of pearl,

Inestimable stones, unvalued jewels,

All scatt’red in the bottom of the sea:

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

Where eyes did once inhabit there were crept,—

As ‘twere in scorn of eyes,—reflecting gems,

That woo’d the slimy bottom of the deep,

And mock’d the dead bones that lay scatter’d by.

BRAKENBURY

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

Stopp’d in my soul, and would not let it forth

To find the empty, vast, and wandering air;

But smother’d it within my panting bulk,

Who almost burst to belch it in the sea.

BRAKENBURY

Awak’d you not in this sore agony?

CLARENCE

No, no, my dream was lengthen’d after life;

O, then began the tempest to my soul!

I pass’d, methought, the melancholy flood

With that grim ferryman which poets write of,

Unto the kingdom of perpetual night.

The first that there did greet my stranger soul

Was my great fatherin-law, renownèd Warwick;

Who spake aloud, “What scourge for perjury

Can this dark monarchy afford false Clarence?”

And so he vanish’d: then came wandering by

A shadow like an Angel, with bright hair

Dabbled in blood; and he shriek’d out aloud

“Clarence is come,—false, fleeting, perjur’d Clarence,—

That stabb’d me in the field by Tewksbury;—

Seize on him, Furies, take him to your torments!”

With that, methoughts, a legion of foul fiends

Environ’d me, and howlèd in mine ears

Such hideous cries that, with the very noise,

I trembling wak’d, and for a season after

Could not believe but that I was in hell,—

Such terrible impression made my dream.

BRAKENBURY

No marvel, lord, though it affrighted you;

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

CLARENCE

Ah, Brakenbury, I have done these things

That now give evidence against my soul,

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

O God! If my deep prayers cannot appease Thee,

But Thou wilt be aveng’d on my misdeeds,

Yet execute Thy wrath in me alone,—

O, spare my guiltless wife and my poor children!—

Keeper, I prithee sit by me awhile;

My soul is heavy, and I fain would sleep.

BRAKENBURY

I will, my lord; God give your grace good rest!—

[CLARENCE reposes himself on a chair.]

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 tides and low name,

There’s nothing differs but the outward fame.

[Enter the two MURDERERS.]

FIRST MURDERER

Ho! who’s here?

BRAKENBURY

What wouldst thou, fellow, and how cam’st thou hither?

FIRST MURDERER

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

BRAKENBURY

What, so brief?

SECOND MURDERER

‘Tis better, sir, than to be tedious.—Let him see our commission and talk no more.

[A paper is delivered to BRAKENBURY, who reads it.]

BRAKENBURY

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;

I’ll to the king and signify to him

That thus I have resign’d to you my charge.

FIRST MURDERER

You may, sir; ‘tis a point of wisdom: fare you well.

[Exit BRAKENBURY.]

SECOND MURDERER

What, shall we stab him as he sleeps?

FIRST MURDERER

No; he’ll say ‘twas done cowardly, when he wakes.

SECOND MURDERER

When he wakes! why, fool, he shall never wake until the great judgment-day.

FIRST MURDERER

Why, then he’ll say we stabb’d him sleeping.

SECOND MURDERER

The urging of that word “judgment” hath bred a kind of remorse in me.

FIRST MURDERER

What, art thou afraid?

SECOND MURDERER

Not to kill him, having a warrant for it; 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 Gloster and tell him so.

SECOND MURDERER

Nay, I pr’ythee, stay a little: I hope my holy humour will change; it was wont to hold me but while one tells twenty.

FIRST MURDERER

How dost thou feel thyself now?

SECOND MURDERER

Faith, some certain dregs of conscience are yet within me.

FIRST MURDERER

Remember our reward, when the deed’s done.

SECOND MURDERER

Zounds, he dies: I had forgot the reward.

FIRST MURDERER

Where’s thy conscience now?

SECOND MURDERER

O, in the Duke of Gloster’s purse.

FIRST MURDERER

So, 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 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 shame-faced 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.

FIRST MURDERER

Zounds,‘tis even now at my elbow, persuading me not to kill the duke.

SECOND MURDERER

Take the devil in thy mind, and believe him not; he would insinuate with thee but to make thee sigh.

FIRST MURDERER

I am strong-framed; he cannot prevail with me.