Enter RICHARD, DUKE OF GLOUCESTER, solus GLOUCESTER. Now is the winter of our discontent Made glorious summer by this sun of York; And all the clouds that lour'd 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 alarums chang'd to merry meetings, Our dreadful marches to delightful measures.
Grim-visag'd war hath smooth'd his wrinkled front, And now, instead of mounting barbed steeds 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 shap'd for sportive tricks, Nor made to court an amorous looking-glass-
I-that am rudely stamp'd, and want love's majesty To strut before a wanton ambling nymph-I-that am curtail'd of this fair proportion, Cheated of feature by dissembling nature, Deform'd, unfinish'd, sent before my time Into this breathing world scarce half made up, And that so lamely and unfashionable That dogs bark at me as I halt by them-Why, I, in this weak piping time of peace, Have no delight to pass away the time, Unless to spy my shadow in the sun
