RICHARD        Norfolk, for thee remains a heavier doom,

Which I with some unwillingness pronounce.

The sly slow hours shall not determinate

The dateless limit of thy dear exile;

The hopeless word of ‘never to return’

Breathe I against thee, upon pain of life.

MOWBRAY     A heavy sentence, my most sovereign liege,

And all unlooked for from your highness’ mouth.

A dearer merit, not so deep a maim

As to be cast forth in the common air,

Have I deserved at your highness’ hands. (1.3.148-158)

King Richard’s pronouncements continue to be weighty, ponderous, and elaborately expressed: Mowbray’s doom, his sentence, is heavier, more severe, than Bolingbroke’s, but Richard is taking his time, and professing his unwillingness in pronouncing such a stern judgement. Which is appropriate in the circumstances, because he is telling Mowbray that there will be no end to the period of his banishment, no matter how slyly or slowly its hours pass; it will be dateless. (In Sonnet 30, the speaker mourns ‘precious friends hid in death’s dateless night’, and thus lost forever.) Mowbray’s banishment is dear because he will find it painful: he can never return to England so long as he lives, on pain of death. And Mowbray himself is taken aback, having not expected Richard to be quite so harsh. He is put out; he deserved better, he says, a dearer merit, a better reward, even, rather than this deep maim, this injury. Cast forth in the common air, the wide world, the world outside England (let alone the court), he will be no one; he will lose his identity, any mark of distinction, this man who has been so committed to the principles of honour, loyalty, gentleman-like conduct. He will be common, just a man like anyone else.