And quite lost their hearts: the nobles hath he fin'd For ancient quarrels, and quite lost their hearts. But basely yielded upon compromise That which his ancestors achiev'd with blows: More hath he spent in peace, than they in wars. Ross. The earl of Wiltshire hath the realm in farm. WILLO. The king's grown bankrupt, like a broken man. NORTH. Reproach, and dissolution, hangeth over him. Ross. He hath not money for these Irish wars, His burdenous taxations notwithstanding, But by the robbing of the banish'd duke. NORTH. His noble kinsman: most degenerate king! But, lords, we hear this fearful tempest sing", 5 And lost their hearts:] The old copies erroneously and unmetrically read: "And quite lost their hearts." The compositor's eye had caught the adverb-quite, from the following line. STEEVENS. 6 daily new exactions are devis'd; As blanks, benevolences, and I wot not what :] Stow records, that Richard II. "compelled all the Religious, Gentlemen, and Commons, to set their seales to blankes, to the end he might, if it pleased him, oppresse them severally, or all at once: some of the Commons paid 1000 markes, some 1000 pounds," &c. Chronicle, p. 319, fol. 1639. HOLT WHITE. we HEAR this fearful TEMPEST SING,] So, in The Tem another storm brewing; I hear it sing in the wind." STEEVENS. We see the wind sit sore upon our sails, And yet we strike not, but securely perish. fer; 1 And unavoided is the danger1 now, For suffering so the causes of our wreck. NORTH. Not so; even through the hollow eyes of death, I spy life peering; but I dare not say WILLO. Nay, let us share thy thoughts, as thou dost ours. Ross. Be confident to speak, Northumberland: We three are but thyself; and, speaking so, Thy words are but as thoughts; therefore, be bold. NORTH. Then thus:-I have from Port le Blanc, a bay In Britanny, receiv'd intelligence, That Harry Hereford, Reignold lord Cobham, 8 And yet we STRIKE not,] To strike the sails, is, to contract them when there is too much wind. So, in King Henry VI. Part III. : 9 - 66 JOHNSON. Than bear so low a sail, to strike to thee." STEEVENS. but SECURELY perish.] We perish by too great confidence in our security. The word is used in the same sense in The Merry Wives of Windsor: "Though Page be a secure fool," &c. Again, in Troilus and Cressida, Act IV. Sc. V. : ""Tis done like Hector, but securely done." See Dr. Farmer's note on this passage. MALONE. I And UNAVOIDED is the danger -] Unavoided is, I believe, here used for unavoidable. MALONE. 2 [The son of Richard Earl of Arundel,] That late broke from the duke of Exeter,] I suspect that some of these lines are transposed, as well as that the poet has made a blunder in his enumeration of persons. No copy that I have seen, will authorize me to make an alteration, though according to Holinshed, whom Shakspeare followed in great measure, more than one is necessary. His brother, archbishop late of Canterbury 3, All the persons enumerated in Holinshed's account of those who embarked with Bolingbroke, are here mentioned with great exactness, except "Thomas Arundell, sonne and heire to the late earle of Arundell, beheaded at the Tower-hill." See Holinshed. And yet this nobleman, who appears to have been thus omitted by the poet, is the person to whom alone that circumstance relates of having "broke from the duke of Exeter," and to whom alone, of all mentioned in the list, the archbishop was related, he being uncle to the young lord, though Shakspeare by mistake calls him his brother. See Holinshed, p. 496. From these circumstances here taken notice of, which are applicable only to this lord in particular, and from the improbability that Shakspeare would omit so principal a personage in his historian's list, I think it can scarce be doubted but that a line is lost in which the name of this Thomas Arundel had originally a place. Mr. Ritson, with some probability, supposes Shakspeare could not have neglected so fair an opportunity of availing himself of a rough ready-made verse which offers itself in Holinshed: 66 [The son and heir of the late earl of Arundel,]" STEEVENS. For the insertion of the line included within crotchets, I am answerable; it not being found in the old copies. The passages in Holinshed relative to this matter run thus: "Aboute the same time the Earl of Arundell's sonne, named Thomas, which was kept in the Duke of Exeter's house, escaped out of the realme, by meanes of one William Scot," &c. "Duke Henry,-chiefly through the earnest persuasion of Thomas Arundell, late Archbishoppe of Canterburie, (who, as before you have heard, had been removed from his sea, and banished the realme by King Richardes means,) got him downe to Britaine :-and when all his provision was made ready, he tooke the sea, together with the said Archbishop of Canterburie, and his nephew Thomas Arundelle, sonne and heyre to the late Earle of Arundelle, beheaded on Tower-hill. There were also with him Reginalde Lord Cobham, Sir Thomas Erpingham," &c. Holinshed, p. 1105, edit. 1577. There cannot, therefore, I think, be the smallest doubt, that a line was omitted in the copy of 1597, by the negligence of the transcriber or compositor, in which not only Thomas Arundel, but his father, was mentioned; for his in a subsequent line (His brother) must refer to the old Earl of Arundel. Rather than leave a lacuna, I have inserted such words as render the passage intelligible. In Act V. Sc. II. of the play before us, VOL. XVI. Sir John Norbery, sir Robert Waterton, and Francis All these well furnish'd by the duke of Bretagne, If then we shall shake off our slavish yoke, 4 Imp out our drooping country's broken wing, a line of a rhyming couplet was passed over by the printer of the first folio: "Ill may'st thou thrive, if thou grant any grace." It has been recovered from the quarto. So also, in K. Henry VI. Part II. the first of the following lines was omitted, as is proved by the old play on which that piece is founded, and (as in the present instance,) by the line which followed the omitted line: [Suf. Jove sometimes went disguis'd, and why not I?] "Cap. But Jove was never slain, as thou shalt be." 66 In Coriolanus, vol. xiv. p. 102, a line was in like manner omitted, and it has very properly been supplied. The christian name of Sir Thomas Ramston is changed to John, and the two following persons are improperly described as knights in all the copies. These perhaps were likewise mistakes of the press, but are scarcely worth correcting. MALONE. 3 archbishop LATE of Canterbury,] Thomas Arundel, Archbishop of Canterbury, brother to the Earl of Arundel who was beheaded in this reign, had been banished by the parliament, and was afterwards deprived by the Pope of his see, at the request of the king; whence he is here called “late of Canterbury." STEEVENS. 4 IMP Out-] As this expression frequently occurs in our author, it may not be amiss to explain the original meaning of it. When the wing-feathers of a hawk were dropped, or forced out by any accident, it was usual to supply as many as were deficient. This operation was called, to imp a hawk. So, in The Devil's Charter, 1607: "His plumes only imp the muse's wings." Again, in Albumazar, 1615: 66 when we desire "Time's haste, he seems to lose a match with lobsters; "With feathers plum'd with thought." Redeem from broking pawn the blemish'd crown, Stay, and be secret, and myself will go. Ross. To horse, to horse! urge doubts to them that fear. WILLO. Hold out my horse, and I will first be [Exeunt. there. SCENE II. The Same. A Room in the Palace. Enter QUEEN, BUSHY, and Bagot. BUSHY. Madam, your majesty is too much sad: You promis'd, when you parted with the king, To lay aside life-harming heaviness, And entertain a cheerful disposition. QUEEN. To please the king, I did; to please myself, I cannot do it; yet I know no cause Turbervile has a whole chapter on The Way and Manner howe to ympe a Hawke's Feather, how-soever it be broken or broosed. STEEVENS. 5-gilt,] i. e. gilding, superficial display of gold. So, in Timon of Athens: "When thou wast in thy gilt and thy perfume," &c. STEEVENS. 6-LIFE-harming heaviness,] Thus the quarto 1597. The quartos 1608, and 1615-halfe-harming; the folio-self-harming. STEEVENS. This is a good specimen of the gradual progress of corruption. The revisor of the folio, perceiving that "half-harming," (the corrupt reading of the copy of 1608, from which the folio copy appears to have been printed,) afforded no sense, substituted "selfharming," a word that is not very distant from the other, without a thought of consulting the earliest printed copy. MALONE. |