Edward II

Act I

Scene I

A street in London.

“My father is deceased! Come, Gaveston,
And share the kingdom with thy dearest friend.”
Ah, words that make me surfeit with delight!
What greater bliss can hap to Gaveston
Than live and be the favourite of a king!
Sweet prince, I come! these, thy amorous lines
Might have enforced me to have swum from France,
And, like Leander, gasped upon the sand,
So thou wouldst smile, and take me in thine arms.
The sight of London to my exiled eyes
Is as Elysium to a new-come soul:
Not that I love the city or the men,
But that it harbours him I hold so dear—
The king, upon whose bosom let me lie,
And with the world be still at enmity.
What need the arctic people love starlight,
To whom the sun shines both by day and night?
Farewell base stooping to the lordly peers!
My knee shall bow to none but to the king.
As for the multitude, that are but sparks,
Raked up in embers of their poverty—
Tanti; I’ll fawn first on the wind,
That glanceth at my lips, and flieth away.
But how now! what are these?

Let me see; thou wouldst do well
To wait at my trencher, and tell me lies at dinnertime;
And, as I like your discoursing, I’ll have you.—
And what art thou?