KING JOHN

VOL. I

B

KING JOHN.

PERSONS REPRESENTED

PRINCE HENRY, his son.

ARTHUR, Duke of Bretagne.

WILLIAM MARESHALL, Earl of Pembroke.

WILLIAM LONGSWORD, Earl of Salisbury.

ROBERT BIGOT, Earl of Norfolk.

HUBERT DE BURGH, Chamberlain to the King.

ROBERT FAULCONBRIDGE.

PHILIP, his half-brother, afterwards knighted as SIR RICHARD.

PETER of Pomfret.

PHILIP, King of France.

LEWIS, the Dauphin.

ARCHDUKE OF AUSTRIA.

CARDINAL PANDULPH, the Pope's Legate.

MELUN, a French Lord.

CHATILLON, Ambassador from France.

ELINOR, widow of King Henry II., and mother to King John. CONSTANCE, mother to Arthur.

BLANCH, daughter to the King of Castile, and niece to King John.

KING JOHN

ACT I

SCENE I. Northampton.

A Room of State in the Castle.

Enter KING JOHN, QUEEN ELINOR, and others, with

CHATILLON.

K. John. Now, say, Chatillon, what would France with us? Chat. Thus, after greeting, speaks the King of France, In my behaviour, to the majesty,

The borrowed majesty, of England here.

Eli. A strange beginning :-'borrowed majesty'!
K. John. Silence, good mother; hear the embassy.
Chat. Philip of France, in right and true behalf

Of thy deceased brother Geffrey's son,

Arthur Plantagenet, lays most lawful claim
To this fair island, and the territories;

To Ireland, Poictiers, Anjou, Touraine, Maine;
Desiring thee to lay aside the sword

Which sways usurpingly these several titles,
And put the same into young Arthur's hand,
Thy nephew and right royal sovereign.

K. John. What follows if we disallow of this?
Chat. The proud control of fierce and bloody war,
To enforce these rights so forcibly withheld.

K. John.

Here have we war for war and blood for blood, Controlment for controlment: so answer France.

Chat. Then take my king's defiance from my mouth, The farthest limit of my embassy.

K. John.

Bear mine to him, and so depart in peace.

Be thou as lightning in the eyes of France;

For ere thou canst report I will be there,
The thunder of my cannon shall be heard.

So, hence: Be thou the trumpet of our wrath,
And sullen presage of your own decay.
An honourable conduct let him have;
Pembroke, look to 't. Farewell, Chatillon.

[Exeunt CHATILLON and PEMBROKE.

Eli. What now, my son ? Have I not ever said
How that ambitious Constance would not cease
Till she had kindled France, and all the world,

Upon the right and party of her son?

This might have been prevented, and made whole
With very easy arguments of love,

Which now the manage of two kingdoms must

With fearful bloody issue arbitrate.

K. John. Our strong possession and our right for us.
Eli. Your strong possession much more than your right,

Or else it must go wrong with you and me :

So much my conscience whispers in your ear,

Which none but Heaven and you and I shall hear.

Enter SALISBURY, with ROBERT FAULCONBRIDGE, and PHILIP, his half-brother.

Sal. My liege, here is the strangest controversy,

Come from the country to be judged by you,

That e'er I heard: shall I produce the men ?
K. John. Let them approach.

Our abbeys, and our priories shall pay

This expedition's charge.—

What men are you?

Phil. Your faithful subject I, a gentleman

Born in Northamptonshire, and eldest son,
As I suppose, to Robert Faulconbridge,
A soldier, by the honour-giving hand

Of Coeur-de-Lion knighted in the field.
K. John. What art thou?

Rob.

The son and heir to that same Faulconbridge.
K. John. Is that the elder, and art thou the heir?
You came not of one mother then, it seems.

Phil. Most certain of one mother, mighty king;
That is well known: and, as I think, one father:
But, for the certain knowledge of that truth

I put you o'er to Heaven, and to my mother:
Of that I doubt, as all men's children may.

Eli. Out on thee, rude man, thou dost shame thy mother, And wound her honour with this diffidence.

Phil. I, madam? no, I have no reason for it:

That is my brother's plea and none of mine;
The which if he can prove, 'a pops me out
At least from fair five hundred pound a year.
Heaven guard my mother's honour, and my land!

K. John. A good blunt fellow.-Why, being younger born, Doth he lay claim to thine inheritance?

Phil. I know not why, except to get the land.
And whe'r I be as true begot, or no,

That still I lay upon my mother's head;
But, that I am as well begot, my liege,
Compare our faces, and be judge yourself.
If old Sir Robert did beget us both,

And were our father, and this son like him :-
O old Sir Robert, father, on my knee

I give Heaven thanks I was not like to thee!

K. John. Why, what a madcap hath Heaven lent us here! Eli. He hath a trick of Coeur-de-Lion's face;

The accent of his tongue affecteth him.

Do you not read some tokens of my son

In the large composition of this man?

K. John.
Mine eye hath well examinéd his parts,
And finds them perfect Richard.-Sirrah, speak:
What doth move you to claim your brother's land?
Phil. Because he hath a half-face like my father?
With that half-face would he have all my land.

Rob.

My gracious liege, when that my father lived
Your brother did employ my father much,
And once despatched him in an embassy
To Germany, there, with the emperor,
To treat of high affairs touching that time.
The advantage of his absence took the king,
And in the mean time sojourned at my father's;
Where how he did prevail I shame to speak,
As I have heard my father speak himself.
Upon his death-bed he by will bequeathed
His lands to me; and took it on his death