King Richard II | Page 8

banishment.
BOLINGBROKE. Your will be done. This must my comfort be, That
sun that warms you here shall shine on me; And those his golden
beams to you here lent Shall point on me and gild my banishment.
KING RICHARD. Norfolk, for thee remains a heavier doom, Which I
with some unwillingness pronounce: The sly slow hours shall not
determinate The dateless limit of thy dear exile; The hopeless word of
'never to return' Breathe I against thee, upon pain of life.
MOWBRAY. A heavy sentence, my most sovereign liege, And all
unlook'd for from your highness' mouth: A dearer merit, not so deep a
maim As to be cast forth in the common air, Have I deserved at your
highness' hands. The language I have learn'd these forty years, My
native English, now I must forgo; And now my tongue's use is to me no
more Than an unstringed viol or a harp, Or like a cunning instrument
cas'd up Or, being open, put into his hands That knows no touch to tune
the harmony: Within my mouth you have engaol'd my tongue, Doubly
portcullis'd with my teeth and lips; And dull, unfeeling, barren

ignorance Is made my gaoler to attend on me. I am too old to fawn
upon a nurse, Too far in years to be a pupil now: What is thy sentence,
then, but speechless death, Which robs my tongue from breathing
native breath?
KING RICHARD. It boots thee not to be compassionate: After our
sentence plaining comes too late.
MOWBRAY. Then thus I turn me from my country's light, To dwell in
solemn shades of endless night.
[Retiring.]
KING RICHARD. Return again, and take an oath with thee. Lay on our
royal sword your banish'd hands; Swear by the duty that you owe to
God,-- Our part therein we banish with yourselves-- To keep the oath
that we administer: You never shall, so help you truth and God!--
Embrace each other's love in banishment; Nor never look upon each
other's face; Nor never write, regreet, nor reconcile This louring
tempest of your home-bred hate; Nor never by advised purpose meet
To plot, contrive, or complot any ill 'Gainst us, our state, our subjects,
or our land.
BOLINGBROKE. I swear.
MOWBRAY. And I, to keep all this.
BOLINGBROKE. Norfolk, so far as to mine enemy:-- By this time,
had the king permitted us, One of our souls had wand'red in the air,
Banish'd this frail sepulchre of our flesh, As now our flesh is banish'd
from this land: Confess thy treasons ere thou fly the realm; Since thou
hast far to go, bear not along The clogging burden of a guilty soul.
MOWBRAY. No, Bolingbroke: if ever I were traitor, My name be
blotted from the book of life, And I from heaven banish'd as from
hence! But what thou art, God, thou, and I, do know; And all too soon,
I fear, the king shall rue. Farewell, my liege. Now no way can I stray;
Save back to England, all the world's my way.
[Exit.]
KING RICHARD. Uncle, even in the glasses of thine eyes I see thy
grieved heart: thy sad aspect Hath from the number of his banish'd
years Pluck'd four away.--[To BOLINGBROKE.] Six frozen winters
spent, Return with welcome home from banishment.
BOLINGBROKE. How long a time lies in one little word! Four
lagging winters and four wanton springs End in a word: such is the

breath of kings.
GAUNT. I thank my liege that in regard of me He shortens four years
of my son's exile; But little vantage shall I reap thereby: For, ere the six
years that he hath to spend Can change their moons and bring their
times about, My oil-dried lamp and time-bewasted light Shall be
extinct with age and endless night; My inch of taper will be burnt and
done, And blindfold death not let me see my son.
KING RICHARD. Why, uncle, thou hast many years to live.
GAUNT. But not a minute, king, that thou canst give: Shorten my days
thou canst with sullen sorrow, And pluck nights from me, but not lend
a morrow; Thou can'st help time to furrow me with age, But stop no
wrinkle in his pilgrimage; Thy word is current with him for my death,
But dead, thy kingdom cannot buy my breath.
KING RICHARD. Thy son is banish'd upon good advice, Whereto thy
tongue a party-verdict gave. Why at our justice seem'st thou then to
lower?
GAUNT. Things sweet to taste prove in digestion sour. You urg'd me
as a judge; but I had rather You would have bid me argue like a father.
O! had it been a stranger, not my child, To smooth his fault I should
have been more mild.: A partial slander sought I to avoid,