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King John: Act V, Scene 2

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King John
Act V, Scene 2

The French camp at St. Edmundsbury.

Costume designs for the Earl of Salisbury

Costume designs for the Earl of Salisbury

From Charles Kean's scrapbook

19th century

  1. Enter, in arms, Lewis the Dauphin, Salisbury, Melune,
  2. Pembroke, Bigot, Soldiers.

Lewis

1 - 7
  1. My Lord Melune, let this be copied out,
  2. And keep it safe for our remembrance.
  3. Return the president to these lords again,
  4. That having our fair order written down,
  5. Both they and we, perusing o’er these notes,
  6. May know wherefore we took the sacrament,
  7. And keep our faiths firm and inviolable.

Earl of Salisbury

8 - 39
  1. Upon our sides it never shall be broken.
  2. And, noble Dauphin, albeit we swear
  3. A voluntary zeal and an unurg’d faith
  4. To your proceedings, yet believe me, Prince,
  5. I am not glad that such a sore of time
  6. Should seek a plaster by contemn’d revolt,
  7. And heal the inveterate canker of one wound
  8. By making many. O, it grieves my soul,
  9. That I must draw this metal from my side
  10. To be a widow-maker! O, and there
  11. Where honorable rescue and defense
  12. Cries out upon the name of Salisbury!
  13. But such is the infection of the time,
  14. That for the health and physic of our right,
  15. We cannot deal but with the very hand
  16. Of stern injustice and confused wrong.
  17. And is’t not pity, O my grieved friends,
  18. That we, the sons and children of this isle,
  19. Were born to see so sad an hour as this,
  20. Wherein we step after a stranger, march
  21. Upon her gentle bosom, and fill up
  22. Her enemies’ ranks—I must withdraw and weep
  23. Upon the spot of this enforced cause—
  24. To grace the gentry of a land remote,
  25. And follow unacquainted colors here?
  26. What, here? O nation, that thou couldst remove!
  27. That Neptune’s arms, who clippeth thee about,
  28. Would bear thee from the knowledge of thyself,
  29. And gripple thee unto a pagan shore,
  30. Where these two Christian armies might combine
  31. The blood of malice in a vein of league,
  32. And not to spend it so unneighborly!

Lewis

40 - 68
  1. A noble temper dost thou show in this,
  2. And great affections wrestling in thy bosom
  3. Doth make an earthquake of nobility.
  4. O, what a noble combat hast thou fought
  5. Between compulsion and a brave respect!
  6. Let me wipe off this honorable dew,
  7. That silverly doth progress on thy cheeks.
  8. My heart hath melted at a lady’s tears,
  9. Being an ordinary inundation;
  10. But this effusion of such manly drops,
  11. This show’r, blown up by tempest of the soul,
  12. Startles mine eyes, and makes me more amaz’d
  13. Than had I seen the vaulty top of heaven
  14. Figur’d quite o’er with burning meteors.
  15. Lift up thy brow, renowned Salisbury,
  16. And with a great heart heave away this storm.
  17. Commend these waters to those baby eyes
  18. That never saw the giant world enrag’d,
  19. Nor met with fortune other than at feasts,
  20. Full warm of blood, of mirth, of gossiping.
  21. Come, come; for thou shalt thrust thy hand as deep
  22. Into the purse of rich prosperity
  23. As Lewis himself; so, nobles, shall you all,
  24. That knit your sinews to the strength of mine.
  25. Enter Pandulph.
  26. And even there, methinks an angel spake.
  27. Look where the holy legate comes apace,
  28. To give us warrant from the hand of heaven,
  29. And on our actions set the name of right
  30. With holy breath.
John Philip Kemble as King John facing the Old Price Rioters

John Philip Kemble as King John facing the Old Price Rioters

Isaac Cruikshank, circa 1810

Cardinal Pandulph

69 - 78
  1.                   Hail, noble Prince of France!
  2. The next is this: King John hath reconcil’d
  3. Himself to Rome, his spirit is come in,
  4. That so stood out against the holy Church,
  5. The great metropolis and see of Rome;
  6. Therefore thy threat’ning colors now wind up,
  7. And tame the savage spirit of wild war,
  8. That like a lion fostered up at hand,
  9. It may lie gently at the foot of peace,
  10. And be no further harmful than in show.

Lewis

79 - 109
  1. Your Grace shall pardon me, I will not back.
  2. I am too high-born to be propertied,
  3. To be a secondary at control,
  4. Or useful servingman and instrument
  5. To any sovereign state throughout the world.
  6. Your breath first kindled the dead coal of wars
  7. Between this chastis’d kingdom and myself,
  8. And brought in matter that should feed this fire;
  9. And now ’tis far too huge to be blown out
  10. With that same weak wind which enkindled it.
  11. You taught me how to know the face of right,
  12. Acquainted me with interest to this land,
  13. Yea, thrust this enterprise into my heart,
  14. And come ye now to tell me John hath made
  15. His peace with Rome? What is that peace to me?
  16. I, by the honor of my marriage-bed,
  17. After young Arthur, claim this land for mine,
  18. And now it is half conquer’d, must I back
  19. Because that John hath made his peace with Rome?
  20. Am I Rome’s slave? What penny hath Rome borne?
  21. What men provided? What munition sent,
  22. To underprop this action? Is’t not I
  23. That undergo this charge? Who else but I,
  24. And such as to my claim are liable,
  25. Sweat in this business and maintain this war?
  26. Have I not heard these islanders shout out
  27. “Vive le roi!” as I have bank’d their towns?
  28. Have I not here the best cards for the game,
  29. To win this easy match play’d for a crown?
  30. And shall I now give o’er the yielded set?
  31. No, no, on my soul, it never shall be said.

Cardinal Pandulph

110
  1. You look but on the outside of this work.

Lewis

111 - 118
  1. Outside or inside, I will not return
  2. Till my attempt so much be glorified
  3. As to my ample hope was promised
  4. Before I drew this gallant head of war,
  5. And cull’d these fiery spirits from the world,
  6. To outlook conquest and to win renown
  7. Even in the jaws of danger and of death.
  8. Trumpet sounds.
  9. What lusty trumpet thus doth summon us?
  1. Enter Bastard.

Bastard

119 - 124
  1. According to the fair play of the world,
  2. Let me have audience. I am sent to speak:
  3. My holy Lord of Milan, from the King
  4. I come to learn how you have dealt for him;
  5. And, as you answer, I do know the scope
  6. And warrant limited unto my tongue.

Cardinal Pandulph

125 - 127
  1. The Dauphin is too willful-opposite,
  2. And will not temporize with my entreaties.
  3. He flatly says he’ll not lay down his arms.
Costume designs for King John

From: Costume designs for King John

John Miller, George Scharf, 1823

Bastard

128 - 159
  1. By all the blood that ever fury breath’d,
  2. The youth says well. Now hear our English King,
  3. For thus his royalty doth speak in me:
  4. He is prepar’d, and reason too he should—
  5. This apish and unmannerly approach,
  6. This harness’d masque and unadvised revel,
  7. This unhair’d sauciness and boyish troops,
  8. The King doth smile at, and is well prepar’d
  9. To whip this dwarfish war, this pigmy arms,
  10. From out the circle of his territories.
  11. That hand which had the strength, even at your door,
  12. To cudgel you and make you take the hatch,
  13. To dive like buckets in concealed wells,
  14. To crouch in litter of your stable planks,
  15. To lie like pawns lock’d up in chests and trunks,
  16. To hug with swine, to seek sweet safety out
  17. In vaults and prisons, and to thrill and shake
  18. Even at the crying of your nation’s crow,
  19. Thinking this voice an armed Englishman;
  20. Shall that victorious hand be feebled here,
  21. That in your chambers gave you chastisement?
  22. No! Know the gallant monarch is in arms,
  23. And like an eagle o’er his aery tow’rs,
  24. To souse annoyance that comes near his nest;
  25. And you degenerate, you ingrate revolts,
  26. You bloody Neroes, ripping up the womb
  27. Of your dear mother England, blush for shame;
  28. For your own ladies and pale-visag’d maids
  29. Like Amazons come tripping after drums,
  30. Their thimbles into armed gauntlets change,
  31. Their needl’s to lances, and their gentle hearts
  32. To fierce and bloody inclination.

Lewis

160 - 163
  1. There end thy brave, and turn thy face in peace;
  2. We grant thou canst outscold us. Fare thee well!
  3. We hold our time too precious to be spent
  4. With such a brabbler.

Cardinal Pandulph

164
  1.                       Give me leave to speak.

Bastard

165
  1. No, I will speak.

Lewis

166 - 168
  1.                   We will attend to neither.
  2. Strike up the drums, and let the tongue of war
  3. Plead for our interest and our being here.

Bastard

169 - 181
  1. Indeed your drums, being beaten, will cry out;
  2. And so shall you, being beaten. Do but start
  3. An echo with the clamor of thy drum,
  4. And even at hand a drum is ready brac’d
  5. That shall reverberate all as loud as thine.
  6. Sound but another, and another shall
  7. (As loud as thine) rattle the welkin’s ear,
  8. And mock the deep-mouth’d thunder; for at hand
  9. (Not trusting to this halting legate here,
  10. Whom he hath us’d rather for sport than need)
  11. Is warlike John; and in his forehead sits
  12. A bare-ribb’d death, whose office is this day
  13. To feast upon whole thousands of the French.

Lewis

182
  1. Strike up our drums, to find this danger out.

Bastard

183
  1. And thou shalt find it, Dauphin, do not doubt.
  1. Exeunt.
Costume designs for King John

From: Costume designs for King John

John Miller, George Scharf, 1823

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