Those mouthed wounds, which valiantly he took
	When on the gentle Severn's sedgy bank,
	In single opposition, hand to hand,
	He did confound the best part of an hour
	In changing hardiment with great Glendower:
	Three times they breathed and three times did
	they drink,
	Upon agreement, of swift Severn's flood;
	Who then, affrighted with their bloody looks,
	Ran fearfully among the trembling reeds,
	And hid his crisp head in the hollow bank,
	Bloodstained with these valiant combatants.
	Never did base and rotten policy
	Colour her working with such deadly wounds;
	Nor could the noble Mortimer
	Receive so many, and all willingly:
	Then let not him be slander'd with revolt.

KING HENRY IV	Thou dost belie him, Percy, thou dost belie him;
	He never did encounter with Glendower:
	I tell thee,
	He durst as well have met the devil alone
	As Owen Glendower for an enemy.
	Art thou not ashamed? But, sirrah, henceforth
	Let me not hear you speak of Mortimer:
	Send me your prisoners with the speediest means,
	Or you shall hear in such a kind from me
	As will displease you. My Lord Northumberland,
	We licence your departure with your son.
	Send us your prisoners, or you will hear of it.

	[Exeunt King Henry, Blunt, and train]

HOTSPUR	An if the devil come and roar for them,
	I will not send them: I will after straight
	And tell him so; for I will ease my heart,
	Albeit I make a hazard of my head.

NORTHUMBERLAND	What, drunk with choler? stay and pause awhile:
	Here comes your uncle.

	[Re-enter WORCESTER]

HOTSPUR	Speak of Mortimer!
	'Zounds, I will speak of him; and let my soul
	Want mercy, if I do not join with him:
	Yea, on his part I'll empty all these veins,
	And shed my dear blood drop by drop in the dust,
	But I will lift the down-trod Mortimer
	As high in the air as this unthankful king,
	As this ingrate and canker'd Bolingbroke.

NORTHUMBERLAND	Brother, the king hath made your nephew mad.

EARL OF WORCESTER	Who struck this heat up after I was gone?

HOTSPUR	He will, forsooth, have all my prisoners;
	And when I urged the ransom once again
	Of my wife's brother, then his cheek look'd pale,
	And on my face he turn'd an eye of death,
	Trembling even at the name of Mortimer.

EARL OF WORCESTER	I cannot blame him: was not he proclaim'd
	By Richard that dead is the next of blood?

NORTHUMBERLAND	He was; I heard the proclamation:
	And then it was when the unhappy king,
	--Whose wrongs in us God pardon!--did set forth
	Upon his Irish expedition;
	From whence he intercepted did return
	To be deposed and shortly murdered.

EARL OF WORCESTER	And for whose death we in the world's wide mouth
	Live scandalized and foully spoken of.

HOTSPUR	But soft, I pray you; did King Richard then
	Proclaim my brother Edmund Mortimer
	Heir to the crown?

NORTHUMBERLAND	He did; myself did hear it.

HOTSPUR	Nay, then I cannot blame his cousin king,
	That wished him on the barren mountains starve.
	But shall it be that you, that set the crown
	Upon the head of this forgetful man
	And for his sake wear the detested blot
	Of murderous subornation, shall it be,
	That you a world of curses undergo,
	Being the agents, or base second means,
	The cords, the ladder, or the hangman rather?
	O, pardon me that I descend so low,
	To show the line and the predicament
	Wherein you range under this subtle king;
	Shall it for shame be spoken in these days,
	Or fill up chronicles in time to come,
	That men of your nobility and power
	Did gage them both in an unjust behalf,
	As both of you--God pardon it!--have done,
	To put down Richard, that sweet lovely rose,
	An plant this thorn, this canker, Bolingbroke?