Richard II by William Shakespeare
Act 3 - Scene 4
LANGLEY. The DUKE OF YORK’s garden.
Queen : What sport shall we devise here in this garden,
[p]To drive away the
heavy thought of care?
Lady : Madam, we'll play at bowls.
Queen : 'Twill make me think the world is full of rubs,
[p]And that my fortune
rubs against the bias.
Lady : Madam, we'll dance.
Queen : My legs can keep no measure in delight,
[p]When my poor heart no
measure keeps in grief:
[p]Therefore, no dancing, girl; some other
sport.
Lady : Madam, we'll tell tales.
Queen : Of sorrow or of joy?
Lady : Of either, madam.
Queen : Of neither, girl:
[p]For of joy, being altogether wanting,
[p]It doth
remember me the more of sorrow;
[p]Or if of grief, being altogether
had,
[p]It adds more sorrow to my want of joy:
[p]For what I have I
need not to repeat;
[p]And what I want it boots not to complain.
Lady : Madam, I'll sing.
Queen : 'Tis well that thou hast cause
[p]But thou shouldst please me better,
wouldst thou weep.
Lady : I could weep, madam, would it do you good.
Queen : And I could sing, would weeping do me good,
[p]And never borrow any
tear of thee.
[p][Enter a Gardener, and two Servants]
[p]But stay,
here come the gardeners:
[p]Let's step into the shadow of these
trees.
[p]My wretchedness unto a row of pins,
[p]They'll talk of
state; for every one doth so
[p]Against a change; woe is forerun with
woe.
Gardener : Go, bind thou up yon dangling apricocks,
[p]Which, like unruly
children, make their sire
[p]Stoop with oppression of their prodigal
weight:
[p]Give some supportance to the bending twigs.
[p]Go thou, and
like an executioner,
[p]Cut off the heads of too fast growing
sprays,
[p]That look too lofty in our commonwealth:
[p]All must be
even in our government.
[p]You thus employ'd, I will go root
away
[p]The noisome weeds, which without profit suck
[p]The soil's
fertility from wholesome flowers.
Servant : Why should we in the compass of a pale
[p]Keep law and form and due
proportion,
[p]Showing, as in a model, our firm estate,
[p]When our
sea-walled garden, the whole land,
[p]Is full of weeds, her fairest
flowers choked up,
[p]Her fruit-trees all upturned, her hedges
ruin'd,
[p]Her knots disorder'd and her wholesome herbs
[p]Swarming
with caterpillars?
Gardener : Hold thy peace:
[p]He that hath suffer'd this disorder'd
spring
[p]Hath now himself met with the fall of leaf:
[p]The weeds
which his broad-spreading leaves did shelter,
[p]That seem'd in eating
him to hold him up,
[p]Are pluck'd up root and all by
Bolingbroke,
[p]I mean the Earl of Wiltshire, Bushy, Green.
Servant : What, are they dead?
Gardener : They are; and Bolingbroke
[p]Hath seized the wasteful king. O, what
pity is it
[p]That he had not so trimm'd and dress'd his land
[p]As we
this garden! We at time of year
[p]Do wound the bark, the skin of our
fruit-trees,
[p]Lest, being over-proud in sap and blood,
[p]With too
much riches it confound itself:
[p]Had he done so to great and growing
men,
[p]They might have lived to bear and he to taste
[p]Their fruits
of duty: superfluous branches
[p]We lop away, that bearing boughs may
live:
[p]Had he done so, himself had borne the crown,
[p]Which waste
of idle hours hath quite thrown down.
Servant : What, think you then the king shall be deposed?
Gardener : Depress'd he is already, and deposed
[p]'Tis doubt he will be: letters
came last night
[p]To a dear friend of the good Duke of
York's,
[p]That tell black tidings.
Queen : O, I am press'd to death through want of speaking!
[p][Coming
forward]
[p]Thou, old Adam's likeness, set to dress this
garden,
[p]How dares thy harsh rude tongue sound this unpleasing
news?
[p]What Eve, what serpent, hath suggested thee
[p]To make a
second fall of cursed man?
[p]Why dost thou say King Richard is
deposed?
[p]Darest thou, thou little better thing than
earth,
[p]Divine his downfall? Say, where, when, and how,
[p]Camest
thou by this ill tidings? speak, thou wretch.
Gardener : Pardon me, madam: little joy have I
[p]To breathe this news; yet what
I say is true.
[p]King Richard, he is in the mighty hold
[p]Of
Bolingbroke: their fortunes both are weigh'd:
[p]In your lord's scale
is nothing but himself,
[p]And some few vanities that make him
light;
[p]But in the balance of great Bolingbroke,
[p]Besides himself,
are all the English peers,
[p]And with that odds he weighs King
Richard down.
[p]Post you to London, and you will find it so;
[p]I
speak no more than every one doth know.
Queen : Nimble mischance, that art so light of foot,
[p]Doth not thy embassage
belong to me,
[p]And am I last that knows it? O, thou think'st
[p]To
serve me last, that I may longest keep
[p]Thy sorrow in my breast.
Come, ladies, go,
[p]To meet at London London's king in woe.
[p]What,
was I born to this, that my sad look
[p]Should grace the triumph of
great Bolingbroke?
[p]Gardener, for telling me these news of
woe,
[p]Pray God the plants thou graft'st may never grow.
Gardener : Poor queen! so that thy state might be no worse,
[p]I would my skill
were subject to thy curse.
[p]Here did she fall a tear; here in this
place
[p]I'll set a bank of rue, sour herb of grace:
[p]Rue, even for
ruth, here shortly shall be seen,
[p]In the remembrance of a weeping
queen.
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Next: Act 4 - Scene 1
