Now, what says the world To your proceedings?

King John, to Bastard
Now, what says the world
To your proceedings? Do not seek to stuff
My head with more ill news, for it is full.
Bastard
But if you be afeard to hear the worst,
Then let the worst, unheard, fall on your head.
King John
Bear with me, cousin, for I was amazed
Under the tide, but now I breathe again
Aloft the flood and can give audience
To any tongue, speak it of what it will.
Bastard
How I have sped among the clergymen
The sums I have collected shall express.
But as I traveled hither through the land,
I find the people strangely fantasied,
Possessed with rumors, full of idle dreams,
Not knowing what they fear, but full of fear.
And here's a prophet that I brought with me
From forth the streets of Pomfret, whom I found
With many hundreds treading on his heels,
To whom he sung in rude harsh-sounding rhymes
That ere the next Ascension Day at noon,
Your Highness should deliver up your crown.
King John, to Peter
Thou idle dreamer, wherefore didst thou so?
Peter
Foreknowing that the truth will fall out so.
King John
Hubert, away with him! Imprison him.
And on that day at noon, whereon he says
I shall yield up my crown, let him be hanged.
Deliver him to safety and return,
For I must use thee.