Page 1165 - Shakespeare - Vol. 1
P. 1165
Lord Rivers and Lord Grey
Are sent to Pomfret, and with them
Sir Thomas Vaughan, prisoners.
DUCHESS
Who hath committed them?
MESSENGER
The mighty Dukes,
Gloucester and Buckingham.
ARCHBISHOP
For what offence? [45]
MESSENGER
The sum of all I can I have disclos’d:
Why or for what the nobles were committed
Is all unknown to me, my gracious lord.
ELIZABET H
Ay me! I see the ruin of my House:
The tiger now hath seiz’d the gentle hind; [50]
Insulting tyranny begins to jut
Upon the innocent and aweless throne.
Welcome destruction, blood, and massacre;
I see, as in a map, the end of all.
DUCHESS
Accursed and unquiet wrangling days, [55]
How many of you have mine eyes beheld!
My husband lost his life to get the crown,
And often up and down my sons were toss’d
For me to joy and weep their gain and loss;
And being seated, and domestic broils [60]
Clean over-blown, themselves, the conquerors,
Make war upon themselves, brother to brother,
Blood to blood, self against self. O preposterous
And frantic outrage, end thy damned spleen,
Or let me die, to look on earth no more. [65]
