ACT IV

       Table of Contents

      SCENE I. London. Before the Tower

       [Enter, on one side, QUEEN ELIZABETH, DUCHESS of YORK, and MARQUIS of DORSET; on the other, ANNE DUCHESS of GLOSTER, leading LADY MARGARET PLANTAGENET, CLARENCE’s young daughter.]

       DUCHESS

       Who meets us here?—my niece Plantagenet,

       Led in the hand of her kind aunt of Gloster?

       Now, for my life, she’s wandering to the Tower,

       On pure heart’s love, to greet the tender princes.—

       Daughter, well met.

       ANNE

       God give your graces both

       A happy and a joyful time of day!

       QUEEN ELIZABETH

       As much to you, good sister! Whither away?

       ANNE

       No farther than the Tower; and, as I guess,

       Upon the like devotion as yourselves,

       To gratulate the gentle princes there.

       QUEEN ELIZABETH

       Kind sister, thanks; we’ll enter all together:—

       And in good time, here the lieutenant comes.

       [Enter BRAKENBURY.]

       Master Lieutenant, pray you, by your leave,

       How doth the prince, and my young son of York?

       BRAKENBURY

       Right well, dear madam. By your patience,

       I may not suffer you to visit them.

       The king hath strictly charg’d the contrary.

       QUEEN ELIZABETH

       The king! who’s that?

       BRAKENBURY

       I mean the lord protector.

       QUEEN ELIZABETH

       The Lord protect him from that kingly title!

       Hath he set bounds between their love and me?

       I am their mother; who shall bar me from them?

       DUCHESS

       I am their father’s mother; I will see them.

       ANNE

       Their aunt I am in law, in love their mother:

       Then bring me to their sights; I’ll bear thy blame,

       And take thy office from thee on my peril.

       BRAKENBURY

       No, madam, no,—I may not leave it so:

       I am bound by oath, and therefore pardon me.

       [Exit.]

       [Enter STANLEY.]

       STANLEY

       Let me but meet you, ladies, one hour hence,

       And I’ll salute your grace of York as mother

       And reverend looker-on of two fair queens.—

       [To the DUCHESS OF GLOSTER.]

       Come, madam, you must straight to Westminster,

       There to be crownèd Richard’s royal queen.

       QUEEN ELIZABETH

       Ah, cut my lace asunder,

       That my pent heart may have some scope to beat,

       Or else I swoon with this dead-killing news!

       ANNE

       Despiteful tidings! O unpleasing news!

       DORSET

       Be of good cheer: mother, how fares your grace?

       QUEEN ELIZABETH

       O Dorset, speak not to me, get thee gone!

       Death and destruction dog thee at thy heels;

       Thy mother’s name is ominous to children.

       If thou wilt outstrip death, go cross the seas,

       And live with Richmond, from the reach of hell:

       Go, hie thee, hie thee from this slaughterhouse,

       Lest thou increase the number of the dead;

       And make me die the thrall of Margaret’s curse,

       Nor mother, wife, nor England’s counted queen.

       STANLEY

       Full of wise care is this your counsel, madam.—

       Take all the swift advantage of the hours;

       You shall have letters from me to my son

       In your behalf, to meet you on the way:

       Be not ta’en tardy by unwise delay.

       DUCHESS

       O ill-dispersing wind of misery!—

       O my accursèd womb, the bed of death!

       A cockatrice hast thou hatch’d to the world,

       Whose unavoided eye is murderous.

       STANLEY

       Come, madam, come; I in all haste was sent.

       ANNE

       And I with all unwillingness will go.—

       O, would to God that the inclusive verge

       Of golden metal that must round my brow

       Were red-hot steel, to sear me to the brain !

       Anointed let me be with deadly venom,

       And die ere men can say God save the queen!

       QUEEN ELIZABETH

       Go, go, poor soul; I envy not thy glory;

       To feed my humour, wish thyself no harm.

       ANNE

       No, why?—When he that is my husband now

       Came to me, as I follow’d Henry’s corse;

       When scarce the blood was well wash’d from his hands

       Which issued from my other angel husband,

       And that dear saint which then I weeping follow’d;

       O, when, I say, I look’d on Richard’s face,

       This was my wish,—“Be thou,” quoth I, “accurs’d

       For making me, so young, so old a widow!

       And when thou wedd’st, let sorrow haunt thy bed;

       And be thy wife,—if any be so mad,—

       More miserable by the life of thee

       Than thou hast made me by my dear lord’s death!”

       Lo, ere I can repeat this curse again,