SCENE III. Pomfret Castle. The Life and Death of Richard the Third  Shakespeare homepage  |  Richard III  | Act 3, Scene 3 

 Previous scene  |  Next scene  SCENE III. Pomfret Castle. 

 Enter RATCLIFF, with halberds, carrying RIVERS, GREY, and VAUGHAN to death  RATCLIFF  Come, bring forth the prisoners. 

 RIVERS  Sir Richard Ratcliff, let me tell thee this: 

 To-day shalt thou behold a subject die 

 For truth, for duty, and for loyalty. 

 GREY  God keep the prince from all the pack of you! 

 A knot you are of damned blood-suckers! 

 VAUGHAN  You live that shall cry woe for this after. 

 RATCLIFF  Dispatch; the limit of your lives is out. 

 RIVERS  O Pomfret, Pomfret! O thou bloody prison, 

 Fatal and ominous to noble peers! 

 Within the guilty closure of thy walls 

 Richard the second here was hack'd to death; 

 And, for more slander to thy dismal seat, 

 We give thee up our guiltless blood to drink. 

 GREY  Now Margaret's curse is fall'n upon our heads, 

 For standing by when Richard stabb'd her son. 

 RIVERS  Then cursed she Hastings, then cursed she Buckingham, 

 Then cursed she Richard. O, remember, God 

 To hear her prayers for them, as now for us 

 And for my sister and her princely sons, 

 Be satisfied, dear God, with our true blood, 

 Which, as thou know'st, unjustly must be spilt. 

 RATCLIFF  Make haste; the hour of death is expiate. 

 RIVERS  Come, Grey, come, Vaughan, let us all embrace: 

 And take our leave, until we meet in heaven. 



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