Your brother did employ my father much –
BASTARD Well sir, by this you cannot get my land:
Your tale must be how he employ’d my mother.
ROBERT – And once dispatch’d him in an embassy
To Germany, there with the emperor
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To treat of high affairs touching that time.
Th’advantage of his absence took the king
And in the mean time sojourn’d at my father’s,
Where how he did prevail I shame to speak;
But truth is truth: large lengths of seas and shores
105
Between my father and my mother lay,
As I have heard my father speak himself,
When this same lusty gentleman was got.
Upon his death-bed he by will bequeath’d
His lands to me, and took it on his death
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That this my mother’s son was none of his;
And if he were, he came into the world
Full fourteen weeks before the course of time.
Then, good my liege, let me have what is mine,
My father’s land, as was my father’s will.
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KING JOHN Sirrah, your brother is legitimate;
Your father’s wife did after wedlock bear him,
And if she did play false, the fault was hers;
Which fault lies on the hazards of all husbands
That marry wives. Tell me, how if my brother,
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Who, as you say, took pains to get this son,
Had of your father claim’d this son for his?
In sooth, good friend, your father might have kept
This calf, bred from his cow, from all the world;
In sooth he might; then, if he were my brother’s,
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My brother might not claim him; nor your father,
Being none of his, refuse him: this concludes;
My mother’s son did get your father’s heir;
Your father’s heir must have your father’s land.
ROBERT Shall then my father’s will be of no force
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To dispossess that child which is not his?
BASTARD Of no more force to dispossess me, sir,
Than was his will to get me, as I think.
ELEANOR
Whether hadst thou rather be a Faulconbridge,
And like thy brother, to enjoy thy land,
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Or the reputed son of Coeur-de-lion,
Lord of thy presence and no land beside?
BASTARD Madam, and if my brother had my shape,
And I had his, Sir Robert’s his like him;
And if my legs were two such riding-rods,
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My arms such eel-skins stuff’d, my face so thin
That in mine ear I durst not stick a rose
Lest men should say ‘Look, where three-farthings goes!’
And, to his shape, were heir to all this land,
Would I might never stir from off this place,
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I would give it every foot to have this face:
It would not be Sir Knob in any case.
ELEANOR
I like thee well: wilt thou forsake thy fortune,
Bequeath thy land to him and follow me?
I am a soldier and now bound to France.
150
BASTARD
Brother, take you my land, I’ll take my chance.
Your face hath got five hundred pound a year,
Yet sell your face for five pence and ’tis dear.
Madam, I’ll follow you unto the death.
ELEANOR Nay, I would have you go before me thither.
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BASTARD Our country manners give our betters way.
KING JOHN What is thy name?
BASTARD Philip, my liege, so is my name begun;
Philip, good old Sir Robert’s wive’s eldest son.
KING JOHN
From henceforth bear his name whose form thou bearest:
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Kneel thou down Philip, but rise more great,
Arise Sir Richard, and Plantagenet.
BASTARD
Brother by th’ mother’s side, give me your hand:
My father gave me honour, yours gave land.
Now blessed be the hour, by night or day,
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When I was got, Sir Robert was away!
ELEANOR The very spirit of Plantagenet!
I am thy grandam, Richard; call me so.
BASTARD
Madam, by chance but not by truth; what though?
Something about, a little from the right,
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In at the window, or else o’er the hatch:
Who dares not stir by day must walk by night,
And have is have, however men do catch.
Near or far off, well won is still well shot,
And I am I, howe’er I was begot.
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KING JOHN
Go, Faulconbridge: now hast thou thy desire;
A landless knight makes thee a landed squire.
Come, madam, and come, Richard, we must speed
For France, for France, for it is more than need.
BASTARD Brother, adieu: good fortune come to thee!
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For thou wast got i’th’ way of honesty.
Exeunt all but Bastard.
A foot of honour better than I was,
But many a many foot of land the worse.
Well, now can I make any Joan a lady.
‘Good den, Sir Richard!’ – ‘God-a-mercy, fellow!’ –
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And if his name be George, I’ll call him Peter;
For new-made honour doth forget men’s names:
’Tis too respective and too sociable
For your conversion. Now your traveller,
He and his toothpick at my worship’s mess,
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And when my knightly stomach is suffic’d,
Why then I suck my teeth and catechize
My picked man of countries: ‘My dear sir,’ –
Thus, leaning on mine elbow, I begin,
‘I shall beseech you,’ – that is Question now;
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And then comes Answer like an Absey book:
‘O sir,’ says Answer, ‘at your best command;
At your employment; at your service, sir:’
‘No, sir,’ says Question, ‘I, sweet sir, at yours:’
And so, ere Answer knows what Question would,
200
Saving in dialogue of compliment,
And talking of the Alps and Apennines,
The Pyrenean and the river Po,
It draws toward supper in conclusion so.
But this is worshipful society,
205
And fits the mounting spirit like myself;
For he is but a bastard to the time
That doth not smack of observation;
And so am I, whether I smoke or no.
And not alone in habit and device,
210
Exterior form, outward accoutrement,
But from the inward motion to deliver
Sweet, sweet, sweet poison for the age’s tooth:
Which, though I will not practise to deceive,
Yet, to avoid deceit, I mean to learn;
215
For it shall strew the footsteps of my rising.
But who comes in such haste in riding-robes?
What woman-post is this? hath she no husband
That will take pains to blow a horn before her?
Enter LADY FAULCONBRIDGE and JAMES GURNEY.
O me! ’tis my mother. – How now, good lady?
220
What brings you here to court so hastily?
LADY FAULCONBRIDGE
Where is that slave, thy brother? where is he,
&
nbsp; That holds in chase mine honour up and down?
BASTARD My brother Robert? old Sir Robert’s son?
Colbrand the giant, that same mighty man?
225
Is it Sir Robert’s son that you seek so?
LADY FAULCONBRIDGE
Sir Robert’s son! Ay, thou unreverend boy –
Sir Robert’s son? – why scorn’st thou at Sir Robert?
He is Sir Robert’s son, and so art thou.
BASTARD
James Gurney, wilt thou give us leave awhile?
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GURNEY Good leave, good Philip.
BASTARD Philip? – sparrow! – James,
There’s toys abroad: anon I’ll tell thee more.
Exit Gurney.
Madam, I was not old Sir Robert’s son:
Sir Robert might have ate his part in me
Upon Good Friday and ne’er broke his fast:
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Sir Robert could do – well, marry, to confess –
Could … get me? Sir Robert could not do it.
We know his handiwork: therefore, good mother,
To whom am I beholding for these limbs?
Sir Robert never holp to make this leg.
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LADY FAULCONBRIDGE
Hast thou conspired with thy brother too,
That for thine own gain shouldst defend mine honour?
What means this scorn, thou most untoward knave?
BASTARD Knight, knight, good mother, Basilisco-like:
What! I am dubb’d! I have it on my shoulder.
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But, mother, I am not Sir Robert’s son:
I have disclaim’d Sir Robert and my land;
Legitimation, name and all is gone.
Then, good my mother, let me know my father;
Some proper man, I hope: who was it, mother?
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LADY FAULCONBRIDGE
Hast thou denied thyself a Faulconbridge?
BASTARD As faithfully as I deny the devil.
LADY FAULCONBRIDGE
King Richard Coeur-de-lion was thy father:
By long and vehement suit I was seduc’d
To make room for him in my husband’s bed.
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Heaven, lay not my transgression to my charge
That art the issue of my dear offence,
Which was so strongly urg’d past my defence!
BASTARD Now, by this light, were I to get again,
Madam, I would not wish a better father.
260
Some sins do bear their privilege on earth,
And so doth yours: your fault was not your folly.
Needs must you lay your heart at his dispose,
Subjected tribute to commanding love,
Against whose fury and unmatched force
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The aweless lion could not wage the fight,
Nor keep his princely heart from Richard’s hand.
He that perforce robs lions of their hearts
May easily win a woman’s. Ay, my mother,
With all my heart I thank thee for my father!
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Who lives and dares but say thou didst not well
When I was got, I’ll send his soul to hell.
Come, lady, I will show thee to my kin;
And they shall say, when Richard me begot,
If thou hadst said him nay, it had been sin;
275
Who says it was, he lies: I say ’twas not! Exeunt.
2.1 Enter, on one side, the Archduke of AUSTRIA, and forces; on the other, PHILIP, King of France, and forces, LEWIS, CONSTANCE, ARTHUR and attendants.
LEWIS Before Angiers well met, brave Austria.
KING PHILIP Arthur, that great forerunner of thy blood,
Richard, that robb’d the lion of his heart
And fought the holy wars in Palestine,
By this brave duke came early to his grave:
5
And for amends to his posterity
At our importance hither is he come,
To spread his colours, boy, in thy behalf,
And to rebuke the usurpation
Of thy unnatural uncle, English John:
10
Embrace him, love him, give him welcome hither.
ARTHUR
God shall forgive you Coeur-de-lion’s death
The rather that you give his offspring life,
Shadowing their right under your wings of war:
I give you welcome with a powerless hand,
15
But with a heart full of unstained love:
Welcome before the gates of Angiers, duke.
LEWIS Ah, noble boy, who would not do thee right?
AUSTRIA Upon thy cheek lay I this zealous kiss,
As seal to this indenture of my love:
20
That to my home I will no more return,
Till Angiers and the right thou hast in France,
The Arden Shakespeare Complete Works Page 262
