FRIAR TUCK

Here sir. what is your desire? Master I will, no longer will I stay. It was my Master's whole desire That maiden, yeoman, swain and friar Their arts and wits should all apply, For pleasure of your Majesty. read. When Harold harefoot reigned king, About my neck he put this ring. One shall suffice, and this is he. No man that comes in this wood, To feast, or dwell with Robin Hood, Shall call him Earl, Lord, Knight, or Squire, He no such titles does desire, But Robin Hood, plain Robin Hood, That honest yeoman stout and good, Oh pain of forfetting a mark, That must be paid to me his Clarke. My liege, my liege, this law you broke, Almost in the last word you spoke. That crime may not acquitted be, Till Friar Tuck receive his fee. If thus you pay y Clarke his hire, Oft may you forfeit, I desire. You are a perfect penitent, And well you do your wrong repent: For this your Highness liberal gift, I here absolve you without shrift. But you found much, when you found me. Madam, I dare not call him liar, He may be bold with me, he knows. How now Prince John, how goes, how goes This wod-mans life with you to day? My fellow Wodnet you would be. Nay, and you shall. Sir Doncaster, sir Doncaster? I pray you, did you see the Prior? The king is heated in the chase, And posteth hitherward apace. He told my master he was dry, And he desires you, presently To send the drink whereof you spoke. Horns blow. Come murderous Prior. Ah my liege Lord, the Friar faints, And hath no words to make complaints: But since he must forsake this place, He will await, and thanks your Grace. Weep, weep, you wod-men wail, Your hands with sorrow wring: Your master Robin Hood lies dead, Therefore sighs as you sing. Here lies his Primer and his beads, His bent bow and his arrows keen, His good sword and his holy cross, Now cast on flowers fresh and green: And as they fallen, shed tears and say, Wella, wella day, wella, wella day: Thus cast ye flowers and sing, And on to Wakefield take your way. Here doth the Friar leave with grievance: Robin is dead, that graced his entrance: And being dead he craves his audience, With this short play, they would have patience. Off then, I wish you, with your Kendall green: Let not sad grief, in fresh array be seen. Matilda's story is repleat with tears, Wrongs, desolations, ru ns, deadly fears. In, and attire ye: though I tired be, Yet will I tell my mistress Tragedy. Apollo's master done I invocate: To whom henceforth my deeds I dedicate: That of his Godhead, above all Gods divine, With his rich spirit he would lighten mine: That I may sing true lays of trothless deeds, Which to conceive, my heart through sorrow bleeds. Cheer thee, sad soul, and in a lofty line, Thunder out wrong, compassed in cloudy tears. Show to the eyes, fill the beholders ears, With all the lively acts of lustful rage, Restrained by modest tears, and chastities intreats, And let king John that ill partly personage, By suits, devices, practices and threats: And when he sees all serveth to no end, Of chaste Matilda let him make and end. Well art thou suited: would my order would Permit me habit equal to my heart. Oh what is he, thats sworn affections slave, That will not violate all laws, all oaths? And being mighty, what will he omit, To compass his intents, though never so ill? You must suppose king Richard now is dead, And John (resistless) is fair England's Lord: Who striving to forget Matilda's love, Takes to his wife the beauteous Isabel, Betrothed to Hugh de Briu, Earl of North March: And picking quarrels under show of kin, Wholly divorces his first Queen away: But yet Matilda, still, still troubles him, And being in the Court, so oft he courts her, That by her noble father, old Fitzwater, She is removed from his lust-tempting eye. But tides restrained, oreswell their bounds with rage: Her absence adds more fuel to his fire. In sleep he sees her, and his waking thoughts, Study by day to compass his desire. Ambition, that had ever waited on king John, Now brings him Austria, easy to be taken, Being wholly tamed by Richard's warlike hand, And bids him add that Dukedom to his crown: But he puts by Ambition, and contemnes All other kingdoms, but the English crown, Which he holds fast, as if he would not lose. The last appearance shadowed the fair Queen, And her two children, at whose sighed king John Showed neither sign nor show of passion: But when the sun came masked in a cloud, And veiled beauty, joined with chastity, Appeared in Matilda's lovely shape, He starts, he clasps, he wakes, he calls, he seeks The shadow of that substance he affects: To her he sews, but she his suit rejects: To him she sews, but he her suit neglects: He sues to be her love, she does despise: She sues to live a maid, which he denies. What follows of this wilful will, and shall, This no and nay, this quenchless, bootless fire, This cold affection, and this hight desire, The act it self shall tell, and the poor Friar, Your partial favours humbly does require. A forfeit, a forfeit, my liege Lord. My Master's laws are on record, The Court-roll here your Grace may see. With them I will begin: draw but that veil, And there king John sits sleeping in his chair. Gone w to a trice, on such good vnsinesse. The Lady and the child that did ascend, Striving in vain to take the crown from John, Were Constance, and her son the Duke of Britain, Heir to the elder brother of the king. Yet he sleeps on, and with a little spurn, The mother and the Prince does overturn, Again when Insurrection them assists, Stirred by the French king, and the wronged Earl, Whose trothplight wife, king John had taken to wife, He only claps his hand upon his sword Mocks their threatenings, and in their attempts, The harmless Prince receives recureless death Whom they too late with bootless tears lament. My cousin Bruise hath be your Broker, Lester, At least hath broke the matter to my girl. Now by my troth, if any troth I have, I amas merry at Matilda's mirth, As I was glad to see her first days birth. For till this hour, so help me holidam, Since the too timely death of Huntington, Not a blithe word had passage through her lips.