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me and the gallows, I will be an arrant thief, sure, if

I cannot pick up my crumbs by the law quickly, I will

cast away my buckram bags and be a highway lawyer now,

certainly.

Tresilian

Canst thou remember, Nimble, how by degrees I rose,

since first thou knewest me? I was first a schoolboy.

Nimble

Ay, saving your honour's speech, your worshipful

tail was whipped for stealing my dinner out of my

satchel. You were ever so crafty in your childhood,

that I knew your worship would prove a good lawyer.

Tresilian

Interrupt me not. Those days thou knewest, I say,

from whence I did become a plodding clerk,

from which I bounced, as thou dost now, in buckram

to be a pleading lawyer (and there I stayed)

till by the King I was Chief Justice made.

Nimble, I read this discipline to thee

to stir thy mind up still to industry.

Nimble

Thank your good Lordship.

Tresilian

Go to thy mistress: lady you now must call her.

Bid her remove her household up to London;

tell her our fortunes, and with how much peril

we have attained this place of eminence.

Go and remove her.

Nimble

With a habeas corpus or a surssararis, I assure ye.

And so I leave your Lordship, always hoping of your

Wonted favour, that when I have passed the London

Bridge of affliction I may arrive with you at the

Westminster hall of promotion, and then I care not.

Tresilian

Thou shalt; thou hast an executing look

and I will put the axe into thy hand.

I rule the law: thou by the law shalt stand.

Nimble

I thank your Lordship, and a fig for the rope then!

Act I, Scene 3: London, the Court]

Sound a sennet. Enter in great state King Richard and Queen Anne, crowned: Lancaster, York Arundel, Surrey, Greene, Bagot; and Woodstock very brave; the Duchess of Gloucester and the Duchess of Ireland.

King

Bagot and Greene, next to the fair Queen Anne

Take your high places, by King Richard's side

And give fair welcome to our Queen and bride.

Uncles of Woodstock, York, and Lancaster,

Make full our wishes, and salute our Queen;

Give all your welcomes to fair Anne-a-Beame.

Lancaster

I hope sweet prince, her Grace mistakes us not

To make our hearts the worser part of us:

Our tongues have in our English eloquence

(Harsh though it is) pronounced her welcomes many

By oaths and loyal protestations

To which we add a thousand infinites;

But in a word, fair Queen, forever welcome!

Woodstock

Let me prevent the rest, for mercy's sake!

If all their welcomes be as long as thine

This health will not go round this week, by the mass!

Sweet Queen, and cousin, now I will call you so,

In plain and honest phrase, welcome to England!

Think they speak all in me, and you have seen

All England cry with joy, "God bless the Queen",

And so afore my God I know they wish it.

Only I fear my duty not misconstered,

Nay, nay, King Richard, afore God I will speak the truth!

Sweet Queen, you have found a young and wanton choice,

A wild-head, yet a Kingly gentleman;

A youth unsettled; yet he is princely bred

Descended from the royalest bloods in Europe,

The Kingly stock of England and of France.

Yet he is a hare-brain, a very wag in faith,

But you must bear, Madam: alas, he is but a blossom;

But his maturity I hope you will find

True English bred, a King loving and kind.

King

I thank ye for your double praise, good Uncle.

Woodstock

Ay, ay good coz, I am plain Thomas, by the rood

I will speak the truth.

Queen

My sovereign Lord, and you true English peers

Your all-accomplished honours have so tied

My senses by a magical restraint

In the sweet spells of this your fair demeanours,

That I am bound and charmed from what I was:

My native country I no more remember

But as a tale told in my infancy,

The greatest part forgot: and that which is,

Appears to England's fair elysium

Like brambles to the cedars, coarse to fine,

Or like the wild grape to the fruitful vine.

And, having left the earth where I was bred

And English made, let me be Englished:

They best shall please me shall me English call.

My heart, great