 All the world's a stage from as you like it at one scene seven by William Shakespeare This is a LibriVox recording for more information or to volunteer. Please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Alexander Husson all the world's a stage And all the men and women merely players you have their exits and their entrances And one man in his time plays many parts His acts being seven ages First the infant mulling and puking in the nurse's arms and then the whining schoolboy with his Satchel and shining morning face creeping like snail unwillingly to school And then the lover Sighing like furnace with a waffle ballad made to his mistress's eyebrow Then a soldier Full of strangles and bearded like the pard jealous in honor sudden and quick and quarrel Seeking the bubble reputation even in the cannon's mouth and Then the justice in fair-round belly with good cape and lined with I severe and beard of formal cut Full of wise saws and modern instances And so he plays his part The sixth age shifts into the lean and slippered pantaloon with spectacles and nose and pouch on side His youthful hose well saved a world too wide for his shrunk shank And his big manly voice turning again toward childish trouble Pipes and whistles in his sand last scene of all that ends the strange eventful history His second childishness and mere oblivion Sounds teeth sounds eyes sounds taste Sounds everything End off all the world's a stage from as you like it act one scene seven This recording is in the public domain Come on Narissa from the merchant of Venice act three scene four By William Shakespeare This is a LibriVox recording for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Charlene v. Smith Come on Narissa. I have work in hand that you yet. No, not all we'll see our husbands before they think of us But in such a habit that they don't think we are Accomplished with that we lack I'll hold the any wager when we are both accoutred like young men I'll prove the prettier fellow of the two and wear my dagger with a brave of grace and speak between the change of Man and boy with a reed voice and turn to mincing steps Into a manly stride and speak a phrase like a fine bragging youth and tell quaint lies How honorable ladies sought my love which I denying they fell sick and died I could not do with all then I'll repent and wish for all that that I had not killed them and 20 of these puny lies I'll tell that man shall swear I've discontinued school above a 12 month I've within my mind a thousand raw tricks of these bragging jacks, which I will practice But come I'll tell the all my whole device when I am in my coach which stays for us at the park gate And therefore haste away for we must measure 20 miles today End of come on Narissa from the merchant of Venice Act 3 scene 4 This recording is in the public domain Recording by Charlene V Smith Even or odd of all days in the year nurses monologue from Romeo and Juliet Act 1 scene 3 by William Shakespeare This is a LibriVox recording for more information or to volunteer. Please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Ruth Golding Even or odd of all days in the year come Lama see that night shall she be 14 Susan and she God rest all Christian souls were of an age Well Susan is with God. She was too good for me But as I said on Lama's Eve at night shall she be 14 that shall she marry I Remember it well Since the earthquake now 11 years and she was weaned I never shall forget it of all the days of the year upon that day For I had then laid wormwood to my dug sitting in the sun under the dubhouse wall My Lord and you were then at Mantua. Nay, I do bear a brain But as I said when it did taste the wormwood on the nipple of my dug and felt it bitter Pretty full to see it touchy and fall out with the dug Shake close the dubhouse was no need I throw to bid me trudge and Since that time it is 11 years For then she could stand alone. Nay, by the rude she could have run and mottled all about For even the day before she broke her brow and then my husband God be with his soul He was a merry man took up the child. Yay, close he, does thou fall upon thy face? Thou wilt fall backward when thou hast more wit, wilt thou not duel? And by my holy dame the pretty wretch left crying and said, Aye, to see now how a jest shall come about. I warrant and I should live a thousand years I never should forget it wilt thou not duel, close he, and pretty fall it stinted and said, Aye, end of even or odd of all days in the year From Romeo and Juliet Act One, Scene Three This recording is in the public domain. Five, five, unknit that threatening unkind brow From the taming of the shrew Act Five, Scene Two, by William Shakespeare. This is a LibriVox recording. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Ruth Golding Five, five, unknit that threatening unkind brow, And dart not scornful glances from those eyes To wound thy lord, thy king, thy governor. It blots thy beauty, as frosts to bite the meads, Confound thy fame as whirlwinds shake fair buds, And in no sense is meat or amiable. A woman moved is like a fountain troubled, Muddy, ill-seeming, thick, bereft of beauty. And while it is so, none so dry or thirsty Will dame to sip or touch one drop of it. Thy husband is thy lord, thy life, thy keeper, Thy head, thy suffering. One that cares for thee, and for thy maintenance, Commits his body to painful labour both by sea and land. To watch the night in storms, The day in cold, whilst thou liest warm at home, secure and safe. And craves no other tribute at thy hands but love, Fair looks and true obedience, Too little payment for so great a debt. Such duty as the subject owes the prince, Even such a woman o'eth to her husband. And when she is thro'ward, peevish, sullen, sour, And not obedient to his honest will, What is she but a foul, contending rebel, And graceless traitor to her loving lord? I am ashamed that women are so simple To offer war where they should kneel for peace, Or seek for rule, supremacy, and sway When they are bound to serve, love, and obey. Why are our bodies soft and weak and smooth, Unapped to toil and trouble in the world, But that our soft conditions and our hearts Should well agree with our external parts? Come, calm, you fro'ward and unable worms, My mind hath been as big as one of yours, My heart is great, my reason haply more To bandy word for word and frown for frown. But now I see our lances are but straws, Our strength as weak, our weakness past compare, That seeming to be most, which we indeed least are. Then veil your stomachs, for it is no boot, And place your hands below your husband's foot, In token of which duty, if he please, My hand is ready, may it do him ease. End of five-five, unknit that threatening unkind brow, From the taming of the shrew Act five, scene two. This recording is in the public domain. Recording by Ruth Golding. Friends, Romans, Countrymen, lend me your ears, From Julius Caesar, Act three, scene two, By William Shakespeare. This is a LibriVox recording. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Hattie Lennox. Friends, Romans, Countrymen, lend me your ears. I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him. The evil that men do lives after them. The good is oft interred with their bones. So let it be with Caesar. The noble Brutus hath told you that Caesar was ambitious. If it were so, it was a grievous fault. And grievously hath Caesar answered it. Here, under leave of Brutus and the rest, For Brutus is an honorable man. So are they all, all honorable men. Come I to speak at Caesar's funeral. He was my friend, faithful and just to me. But Brutus says he was ambitious. And Brutus is an honorable man. He hath brought many captives home to Rome, Whose ransoms did the general coffers fill. Did this in Caesar seem ambitious? When that the poor have cried, Caesar hath wept. Ambition should be made of sterner stuff. Yet Brutus says he was ambitious. And Brutus is an honorable man. You all did see that on the looper call, I thrice presented him a kingly crown, Which he did thrice refuse, was this ambition. Yet Brutus says he was ambitious. And sure, he is an honorable man. I speak not to disprove what Brutus spoke, But here I am to speak what I do know. You all did love him once, not without cause. What cause withholds you then to mourn for him? O judgment thou art fled to Brutus beasts, And men have lost their reason. Bear with me. My heart is in the coffin there with Caesar, And I must pause till it come back to me. End of Friends, Romans, Countrymen, lend me your ears. From Julius Caesar, Act 3, Scene 2. This recording is in the public domain. Recording by Hattie Lennox. Fire Lawrence's Herbs to Men monologue from Romeo and Juliet, Act 2, Scene 3. Recorded for the book of box.org by Chateau. The gray eyed mourn smiles on the frowning night, Checkering the eastern clouds with streaks of light, And fleckled darkness like a drunkard reels, From fourth day's path, And tightened fiery wheels. Now ere the sun advances burning eye, The day to cheer and night's dink due to dry, I must upfill this ausier cage of ours, With baleful weeds and precious juiced flowers. The earth is nature's mother is her tomb. What is her burying grave that is her womb? And from her womb children I've diverse kind, We sucking on her natural bosom find. Many for many virtue's excellent, None but for some and yet all different. Oh, Michael is the powerful grace that lies and Herbs plant stones in their true qualities. For not so vile that on the earth doth live, But to the earth some special good doth give. Nor ought so good but strained from that fair use, Revolts from true birth, stumbling on abused. Virtue itself turns vice, being misapplied, And vice sometimes by action dignified. Within the infant rind of this weak flower, Poison hath residence and medicine power. For this being smelt, with that part cheers each part. Being tasted stays all senses with the heart. Two such opposed kings encamp them still, In men as well as in herbs, grace and rude will. And where the worser is predominant, Full soon the kink or death eats up that plant. End of monologue. This recording is in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Here's A Knocking Indeed, from Macbeth, Act 2, Scene 3, by William Shakespeare. This is a LibriVox recording. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Tatiana. Here's A Knocking Indeed, the man with the portal of hell gate, He should have old turning the key. Knock, knock, knock, who's there in the name of Beelzebub? He's a farmer that hanged himself on the expectation of plenty. Come in time, have napkins enough about you for he you'll sweat for. Knock, knock, who's there in the devil's name? Faith is an equivocator that could swear in both scales against either scale, who committed treason enough for God's sake, it could not equivocate him. Come in equivocator. Knock, knock, knock, who's there? Faith is an English tailor. Come hither for stealing out of a French hose. Come in, tailor, he may roast your goose. Knock, knock, never a quiet. What are you? Oh, but this place is too cold for hell, old devil porter, no further. I had thought to have led in some of all professions that go the primrose way to the everlasting bonfire. Ah, no, no, no, I pray you remember the porter? Was it so late, friend air, you went to bed that you do lie so late? Faith, sir, we were carousing till the second cock, and drink, sir, is a great provoker of three things. What three things does drink especially provoke? Marry, sir. Nose painting, sleep, and urine. Literary, sir, it provokes and unprovokes. It provokes the desire that takes away from the performance. Therefore much drink may be said to be an equivocator with lechery. It makes him and it marrs him. It sets him on and takes him off. It persuades him and disheartens him, makes him stand to and not stand to. In conclusion, it equivocates him in asleep and giving in the lie leaves him. I believe drink gave thee the lie last night. That it did, sir, in the very throat of me, but I requited him for his lie, and I think being too strong for him though he took up my legs some time, yet I made a shift to cast him. Is they master-stirring? End of Here's a Knocking, indeed, from Macbeth, Act II, Scene III. This recording is in the public domain and was recorded by Tatiana. Shall I speak ill of him that is my husband? From Romeo and Juliet, Act III, Scene II, by William Shakespeare. This is a LibriVox recording. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Victoria Grace. Shall I speak ill of him that is my husband? Ah, poor my lord, what tongue shall smooth thy name, when I, thy three-hour's wife, have mangled it? But wherefore, villain, didst thou kill my cousin? That villain-cousin would have killed my husband. Back, foolish tears, back to your native spring. Your tributary drops belong to woe, which you, mistaking, offer up to joy. My husband lives, that Tybalt would have slain, and Tybalt's dead, that would have slain my husband. All this is comfort. Wherefore, wheat by then? Some word there was, worse than Tybalt's death, that murdered me, I would forget it, fame. But, oh, it presses to my memory, like damned, guilty deeds to sinner's minds. Tybalt is dead, and Romeo banished. That banished, that one word banished, hath slain ten thousand Tybalt's. Tybalt's death was woe enough if it had ended there, or if sour woe delights in fellowship and needly will be ranked with other griefs. Why followed not when she said Tybalt's dead, thy father, or thy mother, may, or both, which modern lamentations might have moved. But with a rear ward following Tybalt's death, Romeo was banished. To speak that word, his father, mother, Tybalt, Romeo, Juliet, all slain, all dead, Romeo is banished. There is no end, no limit, measure, bound in that word's death. No words can outrose sound. Where is my father and my mother-nurse? End of Shall I Speak Elephant That Is My Husband, from Romeo and Juliet. Act III, Scene II, by William Shakespeare. This recording is in public domain. I know that virtue to be in you, Brutus. From Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare. Act I, Scene II. This is a LibriVox recording. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Neil Donnelly. I know that virtue to be in you, Brutus, as well as I do know your outward favor. Well, honor is the subject of my story. I cannot tell what you and other men think of this life, but for my single self, I had as leave not be, as live to be in awe of such a thing as I myself. I was born free as Caesar, so were you. We both have fed as well, and we can both endure the winter's cold as well as he. For once upon a raw and gusty day, the troubled Tybalt chafing with her shores, Caesar said to me, Darest, thou casious, now leap in with me into this angry flood and swim to yonder point. Upon the word, accoutred as I was, I plunged in and bade him follow. So indeed he did. The torrent roared, and we did buffet it with lusty sinews, throwing it aside and stemming it with hearts of controversy. But ere we could arrive the point proposed, Caesar cried, Help me, casious, or I sink. I, as Aeneas, our great ancestor, did from the flames of Troy upon his shoulder, the old Ancyces bear, so from the waves of Tybalt did I the tired Caesar, and this man is now become a god, and casious is a wretched creature, and must bend his body if Caesar carelessly but nod on him. He had a fever when he was in Spain, and when the fit was on him I did mark how he did shake. To his true, this god did shake. His coward lips did from their color fly, and at that same eye whose bend doth awe the world, did lose his luster. I did hear him groan, ay, and that tongue of his, that bad the Romans mark him, and write his speeches in their books, alas it cried, Give me some drink, Titanius, as a sick girl. Ye gods, it doth amaze me, a man of such a feeble temper should so get the start of the majestic world, and bear the palm alone. And of, I know that virtue to be in you, Brutus, from Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare. Act one, scene two. This recording is in the public domain. Is this a dagger? From Macbeth. Act two, scene one, by William Shakespeare. This is a LibriVox recording. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org, recording by Alexander Houston. Is this a dagger which I see before me? The handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch thee. I have thee not, and yet I see thee still. Are thou not fatal vision, sensible to feeling as to sight? Are thou but a dagger of the mind, a false creation, proceeding from the heat of pressed brain? I see thee yet in form as palpable as this which now I draw. And marshlessed me, the way that I was going, and such an instrument I was to use. My eyes are made the fools of the other senses. While it's worth all the rest, I see thee still. And on thy blade and dungeon gouts of blood, which was not so before, there's no such thing. It is the bloody business which informs thus to my eyes. Now over the one half world, nature seems dead, and wicked dreams abuse the curtain's sleep. Witchcraft celebrates, pale I crat his offerings, and with her murder, alarmed by his sentinel the wolf, whose house has watched thus with his stealthy pace. Tarquin's ravishing strides towards his design moves like a ghost. For sure and firm set earth hear not my steps, which way they walk for fear thy very stone's plate of my whereabouts, and take the present horror from the time, which now suits with it. While's I threat he lives, worse to the heat of deeds too cold breath gives. I go, and it is done, the bell invites me. Hear it not dunking, for it is a now, some's thee to heaven, or to hell. This is a LibriVox recording. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org, recording by Sheldon Greaves. Now is the winter of our discontent made glorious summer by this sun of York, and all the clouds that lowered upon our house in the deep bosom of the ocean buried. Now are our brows bound with victorious wreaths, our bruised arms hung up for monuments, our stern alarm's changed to merry meetings, our dreadful marches to delightful measures. Grim visaged war hath smoothed his wrinkled front, and now instead of mounting barred its deeds to fright the souls of fearful adversaries, he capers nimbly in a lady's chamber to the lascivious pleasing of a lute. But I, that am not shaped for sportive tricks, doer made to court an amorous looking-glass, I that am rudely stamped and want, loves majesty, to strut before a wanton ambling nymph, I that am curtailed of this fair proportion, cheated of feature by dissembling nature, deformed, unfinished, sent before my time into this breathing world, scarce half made up, and that, so vainly and unfashionable, that dogs bark at me as I halt by them. Why I, in this weak and piping time of peace, have no delight to pass away the time, unless to see my shadow in the sun and descant on mine own deformity. And therefore, since I cannot prove a lover to entertain these fair well-spoken days, I am determined to prove a villain, and hate the idle pleasures of these days. Plots have I laid, and inductions dangerous, by drunken prophecies, libels, and dreams, to set my brother Clarence and the king in deadly hate, the one against the other. And if King Edward be as true and just as I am, subtle, false, and treacherous, this day should Clarence closely be mewed up, about a prophecy which says that G of Edward's heirs the murderer shall be. Dive, thoughts, down to my soul, here Clarence comes. End of Now is the Winter of our Discontent from Richard III Act I, Scene I, by William Shakespeare. This recording is in the public domain. Now the Hungry Lion Roars, from our Midsummer Night's Dream, Act V, Scene II, by William Shakespeare. Now the Hungry Lion Roars, and the Wolf be howls the moon, whilst the heavy plowmen snores all with weary task for Don. Now the wasted hands do glow, while the scree-chowel screeching loud, puts the wretch that lies in woe in remembrance of a shroud. Now it is the time of night that the grave's all gaping wide. Every one lets forth his sprite in the churchway paths to glide. And we ferries that do run by the triple heck-eight's team, from the presence of the sun, following darkness like a dream. Now our frolic, not a mouse, shall disturb this hallowed house. I am sent with brim before to sweep the dust behind the door. End of Now the Hungry Lion Roars, from our Midsummer Night's Dream, Act V, Scene II. This recording is in the public domain. No matter where of comfort no man speak. From Richard II Act III, Scene II, by William Shakespeare. This is a LibriVox recording. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org, recording by Sheldon Greaves. No matter where of comfort no man speak. Let's talk of graves and worms and epitaphs, make dust our paper, and with rainy eyes write sorrow on the bosom of the earth. Let's choose executors and talk of wills, and yet not so, for what can we bequeath save our deposed bodies to the ground? Our lands, our lives, and all, our bolling-brooks, and nothing can we call our own but death, and that small model of the barren earth which serves as paste and cover to our bones. For God's sake, let us sit upon the ground and tell sad stories of the death of kings, how some have been deposed, some slain in war, some haunted by the ghosts they have deposed, some poisoned by their wives, some sleeping killed, all murdered. For within the hollow crown that rounds the mortal temples of a king keeps death his court, and there the antics sits scoffing his state and grinning at his pomp, allowing him a breath, a little scene, to monarchize, be feared, and kill with looks, infusing him with self and vain conceit, as if this flesh which walls about our life were brass impregnable and humored thus comes at the last, and with a little pin bores through his castle wall and farewell king. Cover your heads, and mock nut flesh in blood with solemn reverence, throw away respect, tradition, form, and ceremonious duty. For you have but mistook me all this while. I live with bread, like you. Feel want, taste grief, need friends. Subjected thus, how can you say to me, I am a king, end of no matter where of comfort no man speak, from Richard II, Act III, Scene II. This recording is in the public domain. Oh, God of Battles, from the life of King Henry V, Act IV, Scene I, by William Shakespeare. This is a LibriVox recording. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Michael MacDonald. Oh, God of Battles, steal my soldier's hearts, possess them not with fear, take from them now the sense of reckoning if the opposed numbers pluck their hearts from them. Not today, O Lord. Oh, not today. Think not upon the fault my father made encompassing the crown. I, Richard's body, have interred anew, and on it have bestowed more contrite tears than from it issued forced drops of blood. Five hundred poor I have in yearly pay, who twice a day their withered hands hold up toward heaven to pardon blood, and I have built two chantries where the sad and solemn priests sing still for Richard's soul. More will I do, though all that I can do is nothing worth since that my penitence comes after all in flooring pardon. End of Oh, God of Battles, from the life of King Henry V, Act IV, Scene I. This recording is in the public domain. Recording by Michael MacDonald. Oh, that this two-two solid flesh would melt from Hamlet. Act I, Scene II, by William Shakespeare. This is a LibriVox recording. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Caitlin Cooper. Oh, that this two-two solid flesh would melt, thaw, and resolve itself into a dew. Or that the everlasting had not fixed his can and gained self-slaughter. Oh, God, God, how weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable seem to me all the uses of this world. Fie on it, ah, fie. Tis an unweeded garden that grows to seed. Things rank and gross in nature possess it merely. That it should come to this. But two months dead, nay, not so much, not to. So excellent a king that was to this Hyperion to a sadder. So loving to my mother that he might not but team the winds of heaven visit her face too roughly. Heaven and earth must I remember? Why, she would hang on him as if increase of appetite had grown by what it fed on. And yet, within a month, let me not think on it. Frailty thy name is woman, a little month. Or ere those shoes were old with what she followed my poor father's body. Like Niob, all tears. Why, she, even she. Oh, God, a beast that once discourse of reason would have mourned longer. Married with my uncle, my father's brother. But no more like my father than I to Hercules. Within a month ere yet the salt of most unrighteous tears had left the flushing in her galled eyes. She married. Oh, most wicked speed to post with such dexterity to incestuous sheets. It is not nor can not come to good, but break my heart for I must hold my tongue. And of, oh, that this two-two solid flesh should melt. From Hamlet, Act One, Scene Two, this recording is in the public domain. So many journeys made the sun and moon from Hamlet, Act Three, Scene Two, by William Shakespeare. This is a LibriVox recording. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Read by Rebecca Fritz. So many journeys made the sun and moon make us again count ere or love be done. But, whoa, is me. You are so sick of late. So far from cheer and your former state that I distrust you. Yet, though I distrust, discomfort you, my lord, it nothing must. For woman's fear and love holds quantity in neither ought or in extremity. Now, what my love is, proof hath made you known. And as my love is sized, my fear is so. Where love is great, the littlest doubts are fear. Where little fear grows great, great love grows there. End of so many journeys made the sun and moon from Hamlet, Act Three, Scene Two, this recording is in the public domain. Recording by Brianna Rook. Mayest prove false, at lovers' perjuries, Then say, jovie laughs, oh gentle Romeo, If thou dost love, pronounce it faithfully, Or if thou thinkest I am too quickly one, Of frown and be perverse, and say thee nay, So thou wilt woo, but else not for the world. And truth be mocked you, I am too fond. And therefore thou mayest think my haviour light. But trust me, gentlemen, I'll prove more true, And those that I have more cunning to be strange. I should have been more strange, I must confess, But that thou hover hath air I was wear, My true love's passion, therefore pardon me, And not impute this yielding to light love, Which the dark night hath so discovered. End of thou knowest the mask of night is on my face. From Romeo and Juliet, Act Two, Scene Two. This recording is in the public domain. Recording by Brianna Rook of Surgeon Bay, Wisconsin. Brianna, the raven himself is horse, That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan under my battlements. Calm you spirits, that tend on mortal thoughts. Unsex me here, and fill me from the crown to the toe, Top full of direst cruelty. Make thick my blood. Stop up the access and passage to remorse, That no compunctious visitings of nature shake my fell purpose, Nor keep peace between the effect and it. Come to my woman's breasts, And take my milk for gall, you murdering ministers. Wherever in your sightless substances you wait on nature's mischief. Come, thick night, and pawl thee in the dunnest smoke of hell, But my keen knife see not the wound it makes, Nor heaven peep through the blanket of the dark to cry, Hold, hold. Great glams, worthy Kordor, greater than both by the all hail hereafter. Thy letters have transported me beyond this ignorant present, And I feel now the future in the instant. By William Shakespeare. Seekest the greatness that will overwhelm thee. Stay but a little, for my cloud of dignity is held from falling with so weak a wind That it will quickly drop. My day is dim. Thou hast stolen that which after some few hours were thine without offence, And at my death thou hast sealed up my expectation. Thy life did manifest, thou lovest me not, And thou wilt have me die assured of it. Thou hideest a thousand daggers in thy thoughts, Which thou hast wetted on thy stony heart, To stab at half an hour of my life. What, can't thou not forbear me half an hour? Then get thee gone, and dig my grave thyself, And bid the merry bells ring to thine ear, That thou art crowned, not that I am dead. Let all the tears that should be due my hearse be drops of bomb to sanctify thy head, Only compound me with forgotten dust. Give that which gave thee life unto the worms. Pluck down my officers, break my decrees, For now a time is to come to mock at form. Harry the Fifth is crowned, up vanity, Down royal state, all usage counselors, hence, And to the English court assemble now, From every region apes of idleness. Now, neighbor confines, purge you of your scum. Have you a ruffian that will swear, Drink, dance, revel the night, Rob, murder, and commit the oldest sins, The newest kind of ways? Be happy, he will trouble you no more. England shall double-guild his trouble-guilt. England shall give him office, honor, might. For the Fifth Harry, from curved license, Plucks the muzzle of restraint, And the wild dog shall flesh his tooth on every innocent. Oh, my poor kingdom, sick with civil blows, When that my care could not withhold thy riots, What will thou do when riot is thy care? Oh, thou wilt be a wilderness again, Peopled with wolves, thy old inhabitants. And of thy wish was father, Harry, to that thought, From Henry the Fourth Part II, Act IV, Scene V, by William Shakespeare. This recording is in the public domain. This is a LibriVox recording. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org, recording by Carolyn Francis. Oh, my good lord, why are you thus alone? For what offence have I this fortnight been a banished woman from my Harry's bed? Tell me, sweet lord, what is't that takes from thee thy stomach, Pleasure and thy golden sleep? Why dost thou bend thine eyes upon the earth, And start so often when thou sits'd alone? Why hast thou lost the fresh blood in thy cheeks, And given my treasures and my rites of thee To thick-eyed musing and cursed melancholy? In thy faint slumbers I by thee have watched, And heard thee murmur tales of ironed wars, Speak terms of manage to thy bounding steed, Cry courage to the field, And thou hast talked of sallies and retires, Of trenches, tents, Of palesettios, frontiers, parapets, Of basilis, of cannon, culverin, Of prisoner's ransom, and of soldier's slain, And all the currents of a heady fight? Thy spirit within thee hath been so at war, And thus has so bestur'd thee in thy sleep, That beads of sweat have stood upon thy brow, Like bubbles in a late-disturbed stream. And in thy face strange motions have appeared, Such as we see when men restrain their breath On some great sudden haste. Oh, what portents are these? Some heavy business hath my lord in hand, And I must know it, else he loves me not! End of, O my good lord, why are you thus alone, From Henry IV, Part I, Act II, Scene III