Puslapio vaizdai
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So fare my limbs with long imprisonment :

And these grey locks, the pursuivants 1 of death,
Nestor-like aged, in an age of care,

Argue the end of Edmund Mortimer.

These eyes,-like lamps whose wasting oil is spent,

Wax dim, as drawing to their exigent: 2

Weak shoulders, overborne with burdening grief;
And pithless arms, like to a wither'd vine
That droops his sapless branches to the ground:
Yet are these feet,-whose strengthless stay is
numb,

Unable to support this lump of clay,
Swift-winged with desire to get a grave,
As witting I no other comfort have.—
But tell me, keeper, will my nephew come?

1 Keep. Richard Plantagenet, my lord, will come : We sent unto the Temple, to his chamber; And answer was return'd, that he will come.

Mor. Enough; my soul shall then be satisfied.
Poor gentleman! his wrong doth equal mine.
Since Henry Monmouth first began to reign,
(Before whose glory I was great in arms)
This loathsome sequestration have I had;
And even since then hath Richard been obscured,
Deprived of honor and inheritance :

But now, the arbitrator of despairs,

1 Pursuivants are officers attending on heralds.

2 End.

Just death, kind umpire of men's miseries,

With sweet enlargement doth dismiss me hence :
I would, his troubles likewise were expired,
That so he might recover what was lost.

Enter RICHARD PLANTAGENET.

1 Keep. My lord, your loving nephew now is

come.

Mor. Richard Plantagenet, my friend? Is he come?

Plan. Ay, noble uncle, thus ignobly used,

Your nephew, late-despised Richard, comes.
Mor. Direct mine arms, I may embrace his neck,
And in his bosom spend my latter gasp.

O, tell me, when my lips do touch his cheeks,
That I may kindly give one fainting kiss.

And now declare, sweet stem from York's great

stock,

Why didst thou say—of late thou wert despised? Plan. First, lean thine aged back against mine

arm;

And, in that ease, I'll tell thee my disease.1
This day, in argument upon a case,

Some words there grew 'twixt Somerset and me;
Among which terms, he used his lavish tongue,
And did upbraid me with my father's death;
Which obloquy set bars before my tongue,
Else with the like I had requited him.

1 Uneasiness, discontent.

Just death, kind umpire of men's miseries,

Hamilton del.

th

HENRY 6 (FIRST PART)
Mortimer, Plantagenet &co.

da II. Scene V

Starling sc

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