JOHN OF GAUNT	I thank my liege, that in regard of me
	He shortens four years of my son's exile:
	But little vantage shall I reap thereby;
	For, ere the six years that he hath to spend
	Can change their moons and bring their times about
	My oil-dried lamp and time-bewasted light
	Shall be extinct with age and endless night;
	My inch of taper will be burnt and done,
	And blindfold death not let me see my son.

KING RICHARD II	Why uncle, thou hast many years to live.

JOHN OF GAUNT	But not a minute, king, that thou canst give:
	Shorten my days thou canst with sullen sorrow,
	And pluck nights from me, but not lend a morrow;
	Thou canst help time to furrow me with age,
	But stop no wrinkle in his pilgrimage;
	Thy word is current with him for my death,
	But dead, thy kingdom cannot buy my breath.

KING RICHARD II	Thy son is banish'd upon good advice,
	Whereto thy tongue a party-verdict gave:
	Why at our justice seem'st thou then to lour?

JOHN OF GAUNT	Things sweet to taste prove in digestion sour.
	You urged me as a judge; but I had rather
	You would have bid me argue like a father.
	O, had it been a stranger, not my child,
	To smooth his fault I should have been more mild:
	A partial slander sought I to avoid,
	And in the sentence my own life destroy'd.
	Alas, I look'd when some of you should say,
	I was too strict to make mine own away;
	But you gave leave to my unwilling tongue
	Against my will to do myself this wrong.

KING RICHARD II	Cousin, farewell; and, uncle, bid him so:
	Six years we banish him, and he shall go.

	[Flourish. Exeunt KING RICHARD II and train]

DUKE OF AUMERLE	Cousin, farewell: what presence must not know,
	From where you do remain let paper show.

Lord Marshal	My lord, no leave take I; for I will ride,
	As far as land will let me, by your side.

JOHN OF GAUNT	O, to what purpose dost thou hoard thy words,
	That thou return'st no greeting to thy friends?

HENRY BOLINGBROKE	I have too few to take my leave of you,
	When the tongue's office should be prodigal
	To breathe the abundant dolour of the heart.

JOHN OF GAUNT	Thy grief is but thy absence for a time.

HENRY BOLINGBROKE	Joy absent, grief is present for that time.

JOHN OF GAUNT	What is six winters? they are quickly gone.

HENRY BOLINGBROKE	To men in joy; but grief makes one hour ten.

JOHN OF GAUNT	Call it a travel that thou takest for pleasure.

HENRY BOLINGBROKE	My heart will sigh when I miscall it so,
	Which finds it an inforced pilgrimage.

JOHN OF GAUNT	The sullen passage of thy weary steps
	Esteem as foil wherein thou art to set
	The precious jewel of thy home return.

HENRY BOLINGBROKE	Nay, rather, every tedious stride I make
	Will but remember me what a deal of world
	I wander from the jewels that I love.
	Must I not serve a long apprenticehood
	To foreign passages, and in the end,
	Having my freedom, boast of nothing else
	But that I was a journeyman to grief?

JOHN OF GAUNT	All places that the eye of heaven visits
	Are to a wise man ports and happy havens.
	Teach thy necessity to reason thus;
	There is no virtue like necessity.
	Think not the king did banish thee,
	But thou the king. Woe doth the heavier sit,
	Where it perceives it is but faintly borne.
	Go, say I sent thee forth to purchase honour
	And not the king exiled thee; or suppose
	Devouring pestilence hangs in our air
	And thou art flying to a fresher clime:
	Look, what thy soul holds dear, imagine it
	To lie that way thou go'st, not whence thou comest:
	Suppose the singing birds musicians,
	The grass whereon thou tread'st the presence strew'd,
	The flowers fair ladies, and thy steps no more
	Than a delightful measure or a dance;
	For gnarling sorrow hath less power to bite
	The man that mocks at it and sets it light.