RICHARD        [to Northumberland] We are amazed, and thus long have we stood

To watch the fearful bending of thy knee,

Because we thought ourself the lawful king.

And if we be, how dare thy joints forget

To pay their awful duty to our presence?

If we be not, show us the hand of God

That hath dismissed us from our stewardship,

For well we know no hand of blood and bone

Can gripe the sacred handle of our sceptre

Unless he do profane, steal or usurp.          (3.3.71-80)

Richard is MAGNIFICENT. Haughty, sarcastic, grand—and Northumberland is a LOWLY WORM. (The audience, and Bolingbroke too, are also in the blast zone.) The stage direction is editorial, but it’s a reasonable inference that Northumberland, not Bolingbroke, is the chief target of Richard’s royal wrath here: he’s the one at the front, probably with attendants (trumpeter? banner?) and he is also (as has been seen) very status-conscious. There may be a considerable pause before Richard speaks, even long enough to get a laugh from the audience, and Northumberland may become increasingly discomforted—or defiant. Richard’s use of the royal plural here goes without saying, and (for all its initial archness) it is a brilliantly controlled speech. (It reads like an extreme version of that quintessentially English icily polite rudeness: forgive me, I must be mistaken, but I thought for a moment that you…) We are amazed, baffled, flabbergasted at your actions, or lack thereof; we’ve been waiting for you to bow (at least) or kneel (quite possibly), to demonstrate your loyalty and respect through the fearful bending of thy knee, because we thought ourself the lawful king. I know! Outrageous! After that three-line sentence of biting hauteur, a gear-change, two lines: if we be the lawful king, how dare thy joints forget to pay their awful duty to our presence? What do you think you are doing? Who do you think you are? How VERY dare you? (Perhaps an early modern audience, more accustomed to the performance and ritual gestures of deference, might experience a twinge of muscle memory; Northumberland must look uncomfortable.) And then Richard switches again, adding accusation to outrage, and demonstrating, for the avoidance of all doubt that he knows exactly what’s at stake here, and he sets out the terms of the argument. If we be not—the lawful king—show us the hand of God that hath dismissed us from our stewardship. (The suggestion is of both a physical hand and a signature, a warrant, a document. Richard’s asking for the paperwork, and a definitive sign.) God made me king, and only God can unmake my kingship. I am king under God, His steward on earth, my power God-given. For well we know no hand of blood and bone (no human hand, rather than divine) can gripe, seize, attempt to grasp the sacred handle of our sceptre, lay hands upon the divine signs of monarchy (he doesn’t even mention the crown itself, as if it is too sacred). To do such a thing is to profane, steal, usurp. Richard is accusing his adversaries—Northumberland, Bolingbroke, his supporters—of blasphemy, in threatening the Lord’s anointed, of theft, presumably of the crown, and of usurpation, of the throne itself. Richard’s naming it, and taking the fight, in rhetorical terms at least, to Bolingbroke. And this is just the start.