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That he will give you audience; and wherein

It shall appear that your demands are just,

You shall enjoy them, everything set off

That might so much as think you enemies.

MOWBRAY.

But he hath forc'd us to compel this offer;

And it proceeds from policy, not love.

WESTMORELAND.

Mowbray. you overween to take it so.

This offer comes from mercy, not from fear;

For, lo! within a ken our army lies-

Upon mine honour, all too confident

To give admittance to a thought of fear.

Our battle is more full of names than yours,

Our men more perfect in the use of arms,

Our armour all as strong, our cause the best;

Then reason will our hearts should be as good.

Say you not, then, our offer is compell'd.

MOWBRAY.

Well, by my will we shall admit no parley.

WESTMORELAND.

That argues but the shame of your offence:

A rotten case abides no handling.

HASTINGS.

Hath the Prince John a full commission,

In very ample virtue of his father,

To hear and absolutely to determine

Of what conditions we shall stand upon?

WESTMORELAND.

That is intended in the general's name.

I muse you make so slight a question.

ARCHBISHOP.

Then take, my Lord of Westmoreland, this schedule,

For this contains our general grievances.

Each several article herein redress'd,

All members of our cause, both here and hence,

That are insinewed to this action,

Acquitted by a true substantial form,

And present execution of our wills

To us and to our purposes confin'd-

We come within our awful banks again,

And knit our powers to the arm of peace.

WESTMORELAND.

This will I show the general. Please you, lords,

In sight of both our battles we may meet;

And either end in peace- which God so frame!-

Or to the place of diff'rence call the swords

Which must decide it.

ARCHBISHOP.

My lord, we will do so. Exit WESTMORELAND

MOWBRAY.

There is a thing within my bosom tells me

That no conditions of our peace can stand.

HASTINGS.

Fear you not that: if we can make our peace

Upon such large terms and so absolute

As our conditions shall consist upon,

Our peace shall stand as firm as rocky mountains.

MOWBRAY.

Yea, but our valuation shall be such

That every slight and false-derived cause,

Yea, every idle, nice, and wanton reason,

Shall to the King taste of this action;

That, were our royal faiths martyrs in love,

We shall be winnow'd with so rough a wind

That even our corn shall seem as light as chaff,

And good from bad find no partition.

ARCHBISHOP.

No, no, my lord. Note this: the King is weary

Of dainty and such picking grievances;

For he hath found to end one doubt by death

Revives two greater in the heirs of life;

And therefore will he wipe his tables clean,

And keep no tell-tale to his memory

That may repeat and history his los

To new remembrance. For full well he knows

He cannot so precisely weed this land

As his misdoubts present occasion:

His foes are so enrooted with his friends

That, plucking to unfix an enemy,

He doth unfasten so and shake a friend.

So that this land, like an offensive wife

That hath enrag'd him on to offer strokes,

As he is striking, holds his infant up,

And hangs resolv'd correction in the arm

That was uprear'd to execution.

HASTINGS.

Besides, the King hath wasted all his rods

On late offenders, that he now doth lack

The very instruments of chastisement;

So that his power, like to a fangless lion,

May offer, but not hold.

ARCHBISHOP.

'Tis very true;

And therefore be assur'd, my good Lord Marshal,

If we do now make our atonement well,

Our peace will, like a broken limb united,

Grow stronger for the breaking.

MOWBRAY.

Be it so.

Here is return'd my Lord of Westmoreland.

Re-enter WESTMORELAND

WESTMORELAND.

The Prince is here at hand. Pleaseth your lordship

To meet his Grace just distance 'tween our armies?

MOWBRAY.

Your Grace of York, in God's name then, set forward.

ARCHBISHOP.

Before, and greet his Grace. My lord, we come.

Exeunt

SCENE II. Another part of the forest

Enter, from one side, MOWBRAY,