📔 King John

I am the cygnet to this pale faint swan, / Who chants a doleful hymn to his own death, / And from the organ-pipe of frailty sings / His soul and body to their lasting rest.

[…] this is the bloodiest shame, / The wildest savagery, the vilest stroke, / That ever wall-eyed wrath or staring rage / Presented to the tears of soft remorse.

The Dolphin is too wilfull opposite, / And will not temporize with my intreaties: / He flatly saies, heell not lay downe his Armes.

If but a dozen French / Were there in arms, they would be as a call / To train ten thousand English to their side.