Act 5, Scene 1

Coventry.

[Enter, upon the walls, WARWICK, the Mayor of Coventry, two Messengers, and others.]
Earl of Warwick
2438 Where is the post that came from valiant Oxford?—
2439 How far hence is thy lord, mine honest fellow?
Messenger
2440 By this at Dunsmore, marching hitherward.
Earl of Warwick
2441 How far off is our brother Montague?
2442 Where is the post that came from Montague?
Messenger
2443 By this at Daintry, with a puissant troop.
[Enter SIR JOHN SOMERVILLE.]
Earl of Warwick
2444 Say, Somerville, what says my loving son?
2445 And, by thy guess, how nigh is Clarence now?
Sir John Somerville
2446 At Southam I did leave him with his forces
2447 And do expect him here some two hours hence.
[Drum heard.]
Earl of Warwick
2448 Then Clarence is at hand; I hear his drum.
Sir John Somerville
2449 It is not his, my lord; here Southam lies.
2450 The drum your honour hears marcheth from Warwick.
Earl of Warwick
2451 Who should that be? belike, unlook'd-for friends.
Sir John Somerville
2452 They are at hand, and you shall quickly know.
[March. Flourish. Enter KING EDWARD, GLOSTER, and Forces.]
Edward IV
2453 Go, trumpet, to the walls and sound a parle.
Richard Plantagenet (Gloucester)
2454 See how the surly Warwick mans the wall.
Earl of Warwick
2455 O, unbid spite! Is sportful Edward come?
2456 Where slept our scouts, or how are they seduc'd,
2457 That we could hear no news of his repair?
Edward IV
2458 Now, Warwick, wilt thou ope the city gates?
2459 Speak gentle words and humbly bend thy knee,
2460 Call Edward king and at his hands beg mercy?
2461 And he shall pardon thee these outrages.
Earl of Warwick
2462 Nay, rather, wilt thou draw thy forces hence,
2463 Confess who set thee up and pluck'd thee down?
2464 Call Warwick patron and be penitent,
2465 And thou shalt still remain the Duke of York.
Richard Plantagenet (Gloucester)
2466 I thought, at least, he would have said the king;
2467 Or did he make the jest against his will?
Earl of Warwick
2468 Is not a dukedom, sir, a goodly gift?
Richard Plantagenet (Gloucester)
2469 Ay, by my faith, for a poor earl to give;
2470 I'll do thee service for so good a gift.
Earl of Warwick
2471 'T was I that gave the kingdom to thy brother.
Edward IV
2472 Why, then, 't is mine, if but by Warwick's gift.
Earl of Warwick
2473 Thou art no Atlas for so great a weight,
2474 And, weakling, Warwick takes his gift again;
2475 And Henry is my king, Warwick his subject.
Edward IV
2476 But Warwick's king is Edward's prisoner;
2477 And, gallant Warwick, do but answer this:
2478 What is the body when the head is off?
Richard Plantagenet (Gloucester)
2479 Alas! that Warwick had no more forecast,
2480 But, whiles he thought to steal the single ten,
2481 The king was slily finger'd from the deck!
2482 You left poor Henry at the Bishop's palace,
2483 And ten to one, you'll meet him in the Tower.
Edward IV
2484 'T is even so; yet you are Warwick still.
Richard Plantagenet (Gloucester)
2485 Come, Warwick, take the time; kneel down, kneel down.
2486 Nay, when? strike now, or else the iron cools.
Earl of Warwick
2487 I had rather chop this hand off at a blow,
2488 And with the other fling it at thy face,
2489 Than bear so low a sail, to strike to thee.
Edward IV
2490 Sail how thou canst, have wind and tide thy friend,
2491 This hand, fast wound about thy coal-black hair,
2492 Shall, whiles thy head is warm and new cut off,
2493 Write in the dust this sentence with thy blood,
2494 'Wind-changing Warwick now can change no more.'
[Enter OXFORD, with Forces.]
Earl of Warwick
2495 O cheerful colours! see where Oxford comes.
Earl of Oxford
2496 Oxford, Oxford, for Lancaster!
[He and his forces enter the city.]
Richard Plantagenet (Gloucester)
2497 The gates are open; let us enter too.
Edward IV
2498 So other foes may set upon our backs.
2499 Stand we in good array, for they no doubt
2500 Will issue out again and bid us battle;
2501 If not, the city being but of small defence,
2502 We'll quietly rouse the traitors in the same.
Earl of Warwick
2503 O, welcome, Oxford, for we want thy help.
[Enter MONTAGUE, with Forces.]
Marquess of Montague
2504 Montague, Montague, for Lancaster!
[He and his forces enter the city.]
Richard Plantagenet (Gloucester)
2505 Thou and thy brother both shall buy this treason,
2506 Even with the dearest blood your bodies bear.
Edward IV
2507 The harder match'd, the greater victory;
2508 My mind presageth happy gain and conquest.
[Enter SOMERSET, with forces.]
Duke of Somerset
2509 Somerset, Somerset, for Lancaster!
[He and his forces enter the city.]
Richard Plantagenet (Gloucester)
2510 Two of thy name, both Dukes of Somerset,
2511 Have sold their lives unto the House of York;
2512 And thou shalt be the third if this sword hold.
[Enter CLARENCE, with Forces.]
Earl of Warwick
2513 And lo, where George of Clarence sweeps along,
2514 Of force enough to bid his brother battle;
2515 With whom an upright zeal to right prevails,
2516 More than the nature of a brother's love!—
[Gloster and Clarence whisper.]
Earl of Warwick
2517 Come, Clarence, come; thou wilt if Warwick call.
George, Duke of Clarence
2518 Father of Warwick, know you what this means?
[Taking the red rose out of his hat.]
George, Duke of Clarence
2519 Look here, I throw my infamy at thee;
2520 I will not ruinate my father's house,
2521 Who gave his blood to lime the stones together,
2522 And set up Lancaster. Why, trow'st thou, Warwick,
2523 That Clarence is so harsh, so blunt, unnatural,
2524 To bend the fatal instruments of war
2525 Against his brother and his lawful king?
2526 Perhaps thou wilt object my holy oath;
2527 To keep that oath were more impiety
2528 Than Jephtha's when he sacrific'd his daughter.
2529 I am so sorry for my trespass made
2530 That, to deserve well at my brother's hands,
2531 I here proclaim myself thy mortal foe,
2532 With resolution, whereso'er I meet thee—
2533 As I will meet thee, if thou stir abroad—
2534 To plague thee for thy foul misleading me.
2535 And so, proud-hearted Warwick, I defy thee,
2536 And to my brother turn my blushing cheeks.—
2537 Pardon me, Edward, I will make amends;—
2538 And, Richard, do not frown upon my faults,
2539 For I will henceforth be no more unconstant.
Edward IV
2540 Now, welcome more, and ten times more belov'd,
2541 Than if thou never hadst deserv'd our hate.
Richard Plantagenet (Gloucester)
2542 Welcome, good Clarence; this is brother-like.
Earl of Warwick
2543 O passing traitor, perjur'd and unjust!
Edward IV
2544 What, Warwick, wilt thou leave the town and fight,
2545 Or shall we beat the stones about thine ears?
Earl of Warwick
2546 Alas! I am not coop'd here for defence;
2547 I will away towards Barnet presently,
2548 And bid thee battle, Edward, if thou dar'st.
Edward IV
2549 Yes, Warwick, Edward dares and leads the way.—
2550 Lords, to the field! Saint George and victory!
[March. Exeunt.]

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Notes

TLN 2440historical topical
“By this at Dunsmore, marching hitherward”
Dunsmore Heath (Warwickshire) and Daintry (Daventry, Northamptonshire) are real staging-points on the roads converging toward Coventry. Warwick is tracking his allies — Oxford from the east and his brother Montague from the north-east — as they march to relieve the city. Holinshed records the same concentrations of Lancastrian forces before the standoff at Coventry in 1471.
historical Holinshed's Chronicles
TLN 2443archaic vocab
“puissant troop”
'Puissant' (pronounced PEW-ih-sant or PWIS-ant) means powerfully strong or mighty. It derives from French and was common in formal Tudor military writing; by the nineteenth century it had become archaic. The messenger is telling Warwick that Montague is bringing an impressively large fighting force.
TLN 2455archaic vocab
“unbid spite! Is sportful Edward come”
'Unbid' means uninvited or unexpected; 'spite' here means an act of hostility or vexation (not merely petty malice). Warwick is furious that Edward has appeared unannounced — his scouts were either asleep or bribed ('seduced'). 'Sportful' (line 2455) is biting sarcasm: Warwick calls Edward a pleasure-seeker, the king who abandoned duty for a hasty marriage, now treating warfare like sport.
TLN 2473classical allusion
“Thou art no Atlas for so great a weight”
In Greek myth, Atlas is the Titan condemned to hold up the heavens on his shoulders forever, the supreme image of bearing an immovable burden. Warwick is telling Edward that he lacks the strength to carry a kingdom he did not win by his own merit: the crown was Warwick's gift, and Warwick is now taking it back.
TLN 2478rhetorical device
“What is the body when the head is off?”
Edward's rhetorical question turns on two meanings at once. Literally, a headless body is dead — so Warwick's cause is finished because Henry, his king, is already Edward's prisoner. Figuratively, it invokes the classic political metaphor of the king as 'head' of the body politic: without the king, the state cannot function. Edward is arguing that Warwick champions a corpse.
historical The king's two bodies
TLN 2480wordplay
“whiles he thought to steal the single ten, The king was slily finger'd from the deck”
Richard mocks Warwick in the language of card-sharping: Warwick was trying to 'steal' the ten (a middling card — meaning Edward, who is not the ace, i.e. not king by Warwick's reckoning), but while he was occupied, the 'king' card was quietly palmed ('finger'd') from the deck — Henry VI has been snatched from the Bishop of London's palace and lodged in the Tower. The imagery reduces Warwick's grand political scheme to a bungled card trick.
TLN 2487rhetorical device
“I had rather chop this hand off at a blow, And with the other fling it at thy face, Than bear so low a sail, to strike to thee”
Warwick uses a nautical metaphor — to 'strike' a sail means to lower it in surrender or submission. To 'bear so low a sail' is to humble oneself. He is saying he would rather mutilate himself than bow to Edward. The hand-chopping vow is hyperbole, but it literalizes the idea: he would hand Edward his own severed fist before he would kneel. The accumulation of violent self-sacrifice is characteristic of Warwick's defiant oratory throughout the play.
TLN 2510historical topical
“Two of thy name, both Dukes of Somerset, Have sold their lives unto the House of York”
Richard is reminding the audience that two previous Dukes of Somerset both died fighting for Lancaster against York: Edmund Beaufort, the first Duke of Somerset in this cycle, was killed at the first battle of St Albans (1455), and his son Henry Beaufort, the second Duke, was executed after the battle of Hexham (1464). This third Somerset — Edmund Beaufort, styled Duke of Somerset after his brother's attainder — is being warned he will share that fate.
historical The First Battle of St Albanshistorical The Wars of the Roses
TLN 2519historical topical
“Look here, I throw my infamy at thee”
The stage direction has Clarence remove the red rose from his hat and throw it at Warwick. Roses were the heraldic badges of the rival dynasties — red for Lancaster, white for York. Wearing the red rose was a public declaration of Lancastrian loyalty; throwing it down is Clarence's visible, theatrical act of changing sides back to York. The gesture makes the moment legible to any Elizabethan audience before a single word is spoken.
historical The Wars of the Roses
TLN 2520rhetorical device
“I will not ruinate my father's house, Who gave his blood to lime the stones together”
'Ruinate' means to destroy utterly. 'Lime the stones together' is a masonry metaphor: lime mortar binds stones in a wall. The Duke of York gave his blood (i.e. died) to build the Yorkist dynasty — Clarence will not now destroy ('ruinate') the very house that blood cemented. The figure compresses family loyalty, architecture, and bloodshed into one image.
TLN 2527biblical allusion
“To keep that oath were more impiety Than Jephtha's when he sacrific'd his daughter”
In the Book of Judges, the Israelite general Jephtha vowed to sacrifice the first living thing that came from his house if God granted him victory. His only daughter came out to greet him, and he kept the vow and sacrificed her. Clarence is arguing that his oath to Warwick and Lancaster was a rash vow like Jephtha's: keeping it would be more sinful than breaking it, because it would mean making war on his own kin and lawful king.
biblical Jephthah's daughter