I learn'd in Naples how to poison flowers;
To strangle with a lawn thrust thro' the throat;
To pierce the wind-pipe with a needle's point;
Or, whilst one is asleep, to take a quill

And blow a little powder in his ears;

Or open his mouth, and pour quick-silver down.
But yet I have a braver way than these.

[Exit.

[Enters Kenilworth prison.

K. Edw. Who's there? what light is that? Wherefore com'st thou?

Light. To comfort you, and bring you joyful news.

K. Edw. Small comfort finds poor Edward in thy looks. Villain, I know thou com'st to murder me.

Light. To murder you, my most gracious lord!

Far is it from my heart to do you harm.

The queen sent me to see how you were us’d,

For she relents at this your misery:

And what eyes can refrain from shedding tears,
To see a king in this most piteous state?

K. Edw. Weep'st thou already? list awhile to me,
And then thy heart, were it as Gurney's is,
Or as Matrevis', hewn from the Caucasus,
Yet will it melt ere I have done my tale.
This dungeon where they keep me is the sink
Wherein the filth of all the castle falls.

Light. O villains!

K. Edw. And there, in mire and puddle, have I stood This ten days' space; and, lest that I should sleep,

One plays continually upon a drum.

They give me bread and water, being a king;
So that, for want of sleep and sustenance,
My mind's distemper'd, and my body's numb'd,
And whether I have limbs or no I know not.

Oh, would my blood dropp'd out from every vein,

As doth this water from my tatter'd robes!

Tell Isabel, the queen, I look'd not thus,

When for her sake I ran at tilt in France,

And there unhors'd the Duke of Cleremont.

Light. Oh, speak no more, my lord! this breaks my heart. Lie on this bed, and rest yourself awhile.

K. Edw. These looks of thine can harbor naught but death; I see my tragedy written in thy brows.

Yet stay awhile; forbear thy bloody hand,
And let me see the stroke before it comes,

That even then when I shall lose my life,
My mind may be more steadfast on my God.

Light. What means your highness to mistrust me thus?
K. Edw. What mean'st thou to dissemble with me thus?
Light. These hands were never stain'd with innocent blood,
Nor shall they now be tainted with a king's.

K. Edw. Forgive my thought for having such a thought. One jewel have I left; receive thou this.

Still fear I, and I know not what's the cause,
But every joint shakes as I give it thee,

Oh, if thou harbor'st murder in thy heart,

Let this gift change thy mind, and save thy soul!
Know that I am a king: Oh, at that name

I feel a hell of grief! Where is my crown?

Gone, gone! and do I still remain alive?

[Giving jewel.

Light. You're overwatch'd, my lord; lie down and rest.

K. Edw. But that grief keeps me waking, I should sleep; For not these ten days have these eye-lids clos'd.

Now, as I speak, they fall; and yet with fear

Open again. Oh, wherefore sitt'st thou here?

Light. If you mistrust me, I'll be gone, my lord.

K. Edw. No, no; for, if thou mean'st to murder me, Thou wilt return again; and therefore stay.

Light. He sleeps.

[Sleeps.

K. Edw. [Waking] Oh, let me not die yet! Oh, stay awhile! Light. How now, my lord!

K. Edw. Something still buzzeth in mine ears,

And tells me, if I sleep, I never wake:

This fear is that which makes me tremble thus;
And therefore tell me, wherefore art thou come?
Light. To rid thee of thy life.-Matrevis, come!
Enter Matrevis and Gurney.

K. Edw. I am too weak and feeble to resist.-
Assist me, sweet God, and receive my soul!
Light. Run for the table.

K. Edw. Oh, spare me, or despatch me in a trice!
Light. So, lay the table down, and stamp on it,
But not too hard, lest that you bruise his body.
Mat. I fear me that this cry will raise the town,
And therefore let us take horse and away.

Light. Tell me, sirs, was it not bravely done?
Gur. Excellent well, take this for thy reward.

[Stabs Lightborn, who aies.

Enter King Edw. III., Q. Isab., lords, and attendants.

First Lord. Fear not, my lord, know that you are a king. K. Edw. III. Villain!

Y. Mort. Ho, now, my lord!

K. Edw. III. Think not that I am frighted with thy words!

My father's murdered through thy treachery;

And thou shalt die, and on his mournful hearse

Thy hateful and accursed head shall lie,

To witness to the world that by thy means
His kingly body was too soon interr❜d.

Q. Isab. Weep not, sweet son!

K. Edw. III. Forbid not me to weep, he was my father;

And had you lov'd him half so well as I,
You could not bear his death thus patiently:
But you, I fear, conspir'd with Mortimer.
Ay, Mortimer, thou know'st that he is slain;
And so shalt thou be too. Why stays he here?
Bring him unto a hurdle, drag him forth,
Hang him, I say, and set his quarters up;
But bring his head back presently to me.

Q. Isab. For my sake, sweet son, pity Mortimer!
Y. Mort. Madam, entreat not, I will rather die

Than sue for life unto a paltry boy.

K. Edw. III. Hence with the traitor! with the murderer!
Y. Mort. Base Fortune, now I see that in thy wheel

There is a point, to which when men aspire,
They tumble headlong down: that point I touch'd,
And, seeing there was no place to mount up higher,
Why should I grieve at my declining fall?—
Farewell, fair queen; weep not for Mortimer,
That scorns the world, and, as a traveller,
Goes to discover countries yet unknown.

LESSON 25.

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE.- The greatest dramatist of the world now took up the work of Marlowe, and in twenty-eight years made the drama represent the whole of human life. He was born, it is thought, April 23, 1564, the son of a comfortable burgess of Stratford-on-Avon. While he was still young, his father fell into poverty, and an interrupted education left the son an inferior scholar. He had 'small Latin and less Greek.' But by dint of genius and by living in society in which all sorts of information were attainable, he became an accomplished man. The story told of his deerstealing in Charlecote woods is without proof, but it is likely that his youth was wild and passionate. At nineteen, he

married Ann Hathaway, seven years older than himself, and was probably unhappy with her. For this reason or from poverty or from the driving of the genius that led him to the stage, he left Stratford about 1586-7, and went to London at the age of twenty-two, and, falling in with Marlowe, Greene and the rest, became an actor and a play-wright, and may have lived their unrestrained and riotous life for some years.

HIS FIRST PERIOD.-It is probable that before leaving Stratford he had sketched a part at least of his Venus and Adonis. It is full of the country sights and sounds, of the ways of birds and animals, such as he saw when wandering in Charlecote woods. Its rich and overladen poetry and its warm coloring made him, when it was published, 1591-3, at once the favorite of men like Lord Southampton, and lifted him into fame. But before that date he had done work for the stage by touching up old plays and writing new ones. We seem to trace his 'prentice hand' in many dramas of the time, but the first he is usually thought to have retouched is Titus Andronicus, and some time after, the First Part of Henry VI.

Love's Labor's Lost, the first of his original plays, in which

he quizzed and excelled the Euphuists in wit, was followed by the rapid farce of the Comedy of Errors. Out of these frolics of intellect and action he passed into pure poetry in the Midsummer Night's Dream, and mingled into fantastic beauty the classic legend, the medieval fairyland, and the clownish life of the English mechanic. Italian story then laid its charm upon him, and the Two Gentlemen of Verona preceded the southern glow of passion in Romeo and Juliet, in which he first reached tragic power. They complete, with Love's Labor's Won, afterwards recast as All's Well That Ends Well, the love plays of his early period. We may, perhaps, add to them the second act of an older play, Edward III. We should certainly read along with them, as belonging to the same passionate time, his Rape of Lucrece, a poem finally printed in 1594, one year later than the Venus and Adonis.

The same poetic succession we have traced in the poets is now found in Shakespeare. The patriotic feeling of England, also represented in Marlowe and Peele, now seized on him, and he turned from love to begin his great series of historical plays with Richard II., 1593-4. Richard III. followed quickly. To introduce it and to complete the subject, he recast the Second and Third Parts of Henry VI. (written by some unknown authors), and ended his first period with King John; five plays in a little more than two years.

HIS SECOND PERIOD, 1596-1602.-In the Merchant of Venice Shakespeare reached entire mastery over his art. A mingled woof of tragic and comic threads is brought to its highest point of color when Portia and Shylock meet in court. Pure comedy followed in his retouch of the old Taming of the Shrew, and all the wit of the world, mixed with noble history, met next in the three comedies of Falstaff, the First and Second Parts of Henry IV. and the Merry Wives of Windsor. The historical plays were then closed with Henry V.; a splendid dramatic song to the glory of England.

The Globe theatre, in which he was one of the proprietors,