William Shakespeare: The Life and Death of King Richard III

ACT I. 3. SCENE III. London. A Room in the Palace. (continued)

DORSET.
It touches you, my lord, as much as me.

GLOSTER.
Ay, and much more: but I was born so high,
Our aery buildeth in the cedar's top,
And dallies with the wind, and scorns the sun.

QUEEN MARGARET.
And turns the sun to shade;--alas! alas!--
Witness my son, now in the shade of death;
Whose bright out-shining beams thy cloudy wrath,
Hath in eternal darkness folded up.
Your aery buildeth in our aery's nest:--
O God that seest it, do not suffer it;
As it is won with blood, lost be it so!

BUCKINGHAM.
Peace, peace, for shame, if not for charity.

QUEEN MARGARET.
Urge neither charity nor shame to me:
Uncharitably with me have you dealt,
And shamefully my hopes by you are butcher'd.
My charity is outrage, life my shame,--
And in that shame still live my sorrow's rage!

BUCKINGHAM.
Have done, have done.

QUEEN MARGARET.
O princely Buckingham, I'll kiss thy hand,
In sign of league and amity with thee:
Now fair befall thee and thy noble house!
Thy garments are not spotted with our blood,
Nor thou within the compass of my curse.

BUCKINGHAM.
Nor no one here; for curses never pass
The lips of those that breathe them in the air.

QUEEN MARGARET.
I will not think but they ascend the sky,
And there awake God's gentle-sleeping peace.
O Buckingham, take heed of yonder dog!
Look, when he fawns he bites; and when he bites,
His venom tooth will rankle to the death:
Have not to do with him, beware of him;
Sin, death, and hell have set their marks on him,
And all their ministers attend on him.

GLOSTER.
What doth she say, my Lord of Buckingham?

BUCKINGHAM.
Nothing that I respect, my gracious lord.