Chapter: Scoena Quinta.

Flourish. Enter Bullingbrooke, Yorke, with other Lords &
attendants.

  Bul. Kinde Vnkle Yorke, the latest newes we heare,
Is that the Rebels haue consum'd with fire
Our Towne of Cicester in Gloucestershire,
But whether they be tane or slaine, we heare not.
Enter Northumberland.

Welcome my Lord: What is the newes?
  Nor. First to thy Sacred State, wish I all happinesse:
The next newes is, I haue to London sent
The heads of Salsbury, Spencer, Blunt, and Kent:
The manner of their taking may appeare
At large discoursed in this paper heere

   Bul. We thank thee gentle Percy for thy paines,
And to thy worth will adde right worthy gaines.
Enter Fitzwaters.

  Fitz. My Lord, I haue from Oxford sent to London,
The heads of Broccas, and Sir Bennet Seely,
Two of the dangerous consorted Traitors,
That sought at Oxford, thy dire ouerthrow

   Bul. Thy paines Fitzwaters shall not be forgot,
Right Noble is thy merit, well I wot.
Enter Percy and Carlile.

  Per. The grand Conspirator, Abbot of Westminster,
With clog of Conscience, and sowre Melancholly,
Hath yeelded vp his body to the graue:
But heere is Carlile, liuing to abide
Thy Kingly doome, and sentence of his pride

   Bul. Carlile, this is your doome:
Choose out some secret place, some reuerend roome
More then thou hast, and with it ioy thy life:
So as thou liu'st in peace, dye free from strife:
For though mine enemy, thou hast euer beene,
High sparkes of Honor in thee haue I seene.
Enter Exton with a Coffin.

  Exton. Great King, within this Coffin I present
Thy buried feare. Heerein all breathlesse lies
The mightiest of thy greatest enemies
Richard of Burdeaux, by me hither brought

   Bul. Exton, I thanke thee not, for thou hast wrought
A deede of Slaughter, with thy fatall hand,
Vpon my head, and all this famous Land.

Ex.

From your owne mouth my Lord, did I this deed

   Bul. They loue not poyson, that do poyson neede,
Nor do I thee: though I did wish him dead,
I hate the Murtherer, loue him murthered.
The guilt of conscience take thou for thy labour,
But neither my good word, nor Princely fauour.
With Caine go wander through the shade of night,
And neuer shew thy head by day, nor light.
Lords, I protest my soule is full of woe,
That blood should sprinkle me, to make me grow.
Come mourne with me, for that I do lament,
And put on sullen Blacke incontinent:
Ile make a voyage to the Holy-land,
To wash this blood off from my guilty hand.
March sadly after, grace my mourning heere,
In weeping after this vntimely Beere.

Exeunt.

FINIS. The life and death of King Richard the Second.

 The scene shows Richard imprisoned in Pomfret Castle soliloquizing his present state. He ruefully reflects upon his fallen condition. He establishes a parallel between his prison cell and the world outside: "I have been studying how I may compare / This prison where I live unto the world." He says that the world is filled with people while he is alone in his prison cell. Thus the comparison between the two is apparently untenable. But Richard pursues the parallel further. His brain acts as the female to his soul, the father, and the result of the consummation of their union is "a generation of still-breeding thoughts" which people his world. Richard is alone for the first time and is thus confronted with himself as he has no other role to play. He "plays in one person many people / And none contented." The drifting notes of music being played outside his prison have a contradictory effect upon Richard, who exclaims, "This music mads me: let it sound no more." Music is a sign of love, and for Richard love "is a strange brooch in this all-hating world." His soliloquy is rudely interrupted by the entrance of a sympathetic groom who had been one of his former servants. The groom reminisces about the past when Richard was the king. He tells Richard how hurt he was when Bolingbroke rode on Richard's favorite horse, roan Barbary, on the day of his coronation. The groom recalls having tended to the horse in the past. Richard loses control when the groom tells him that the horse carried Bolingbroke majestically on its back. Richard curses the horse that had eaten bread from his royal hand for its treachery but soon forgives it. A keeper enters and tells the groom to leave. He offers Richard his food. But Richard declines to eat it until his food is first tasted by the keeper, as is the usual practice. The keeper says that Exton, who has lately arrived from the king, has given him orders to the contrary. Richard loses patience and strikes the keeper. Hearing the keeper's cries for help, Exton enters with servants, who are armed. Richard perceives that they have come to murder him and kills the servants. Then Exton strikes Richard, killing him. Richard curses Exton before dying. Exton repents of having spilled royal blood and laments, "O ! would the deed were good; For now the devil, that told me I did well, / Says this deed is chronicled in hell." He decides to take Richard's body to Bolingbroke.

