Page 227 - Shakespeare - Vol. 2

By making many. O, it grieves my soul, [15]
That I must draw this metal from my side
To be a widow-maker! O, and there
Where honourable rescue and defence

Cries out upon the name of Salisbury!
But such is the infection of the time, [20]
That, for the health and physic of our right,
We cannot deal but with the very hand

Of stern injustice and confused wrong.
And is’t not pity, O my grieved friends,
That we, the sons and children of this isle, [25]
Was born to see so sad an hour as this;

Wherein we step after a stranger, march
Upon her gentle bosom, and fill up
Her enemies’ ranks − I must withdraw and weep
Upon the spot of this enforced cause − [30]

To grace the gentry of a land remote,
And follow unacquainted colours here?
What, here? O nation, that thou couldst remove!
That Neptune’s arms, who clippeth thee about,

Would bear thee from the knowledge of thyself − [35]
And grapple thee-unto a pagan shore,
Where these two Christian armies might combine
The blood of malice in a vein of league,

And not to spend it so unneighbourly!

LEWIS
A noble temper dost thou show in this; [40]
And great affections wrastling in thy bosom
Doth make an earthquake of nobility.
O, what a noble combat hast thou fought

Between compulsion and a brave respect!
Let me wipe off this honourable dew, [45]
That silverly doth progress on thy cheeks:

My heart hath melted at a lady’s tears,
Being an ordinary inundation;
But this effusion of such manly drops,
This shower, blown up by tempest of the soul, [50]