Small time, but, in that small, most greatly lived
This star of England: Fortune made his sword;
By which the world's best garden he achieved,
And of it left his son imperial lord.

Henry the Sixth, in infant bands crown'd King
Of France and England, did this King succeed;
Whose State so many had the managing,

That they lost France, and made his England bleed :
Which oft our stage hath shown; 29 and, for their sake,
In your fair minds let this acceptance take.

[Exit.

29 The three Parts of King Henry VI. were written several years before this play, and often acted.

CRITICAL NOTES.

PROLOGUE.

Page 38. O, pardon! since a crooked figure may
Attest in little place a million.

Lettsom conjectures place to

be an erratum for space. Rightly, I suspect.

ACT I., SCENE 1.

P. 40. We lose the better half of our possessions. - So Hanmer and Collier's second folio. The old text has possession.

P. 40. Cant. The King is full of grace and fair regard,

And a true lover of the holy Church.

Ely. The courses of his youth promised it not.

Cant. The breath no sooner left his father's body, &c.— In the old text, the second of these lines is assigned to Ely, and the last two to Canterbury; an arrangement, I think, that badly unhinges the dialogue. The correction is Keightley's.

P. 41. Never came reformation in a flood,

With such a heady current, scouring faults. —So the second folio. The first has currance, which may be from the old French courance, and so may yield a fitting sense. But, as Lettsom remarks, “it is plain from the context that the scouring of a river is meant. Current, therefore, seems much the safer reading."

P. 41. So that the art and practic part of life

The

Must be the mistress to his theoric.-So the third folio. earlier editions read "to this theoric." The context readily shows his to be right.

P. 43. The several and unhidden passages

Of his true titles to some certain dukedoms, &c. - The old text has severals, which is sometimes explained details or particulars. But the context seems fairly to require several, which is Pope's reading. Here, as in divers other places, and, I take it, is simply redundant. So that the meaning is "The several open and apparent derivations," &c.

ACT I., SCENE 2.

-

-So the quartos.

P. 47. To fine his title with some show of truth. The folio reads "To find his title." Neither fine nor find yields a very appropriate sense. Johnson at one time conjectured line, but afterwards withdrew the conjecture. As the Poet repeatedly uses to line for to strengthen, I should make no scruple of adopting that word but that line occurs in a very different sense just before. Perhaps bind is the right word. To fix, to confirm, to secure are among the ordinary senses of to bind; so that the word would fit the context very well. And in my experience the letters b and ƒ are apt to be confounded. Collier's second folio substitutes found. See foot-note 9.

P. 48. And rather choose to hide them in a net

Than amply to imbar their crooked titles, &c.-So the Cambridge Editors. The first two quartos have imbace, the third embrace, and the folio imbarre. Warburton proposed imbare, and most of the recent editors have adopted that reading. Of course to imbare must mean to lay bare, to expose. But I think imbar, in the sense of bar, that is, exclude or set aside, accords quite as well with the context, and with less of departure from authority.

P. 48. For in the Book of Numbers it is writ,

When the man dies, let the inheritance

Descend unto the daughter. So the folio. The quartos read "When the sonne dyes." In our common version of the Bible, the passage referred to stands thus: "If a man die, and have no son, then ye shall cause the inheritance to pass unto his daughter." For the same as given by Holinshed, see foot-note 13. As Dyce observes, "There is not a word in Scripture about the contingency of the son dying; and the law was declared in consequence of the claim put in

by the daughters of Zelophehad, 'who had no sons.' So I think there can be no doubt that we ought to read with the folio; where the having no son is fairly implied.

P. 49. Your brother kings and monarchs of the Earth

Do all expect that you should rouse yourself,

As did the former lions of your blood:

They know your Grace hath cause and means and might.

West. So hath your Highness, &c. - So Walker, and with evident propriety. The old text sets the prefix "West." before the last line of the preceding speech.

P. 50. The King of Scots; whom she did send to France,
To fill King Edward's fame with prisoner kings,

And make her chronicle as rich with praise, &c.·

The quar

tos read “your chronicle," the folio “their chronicle." The correction is fully justified by the context. It was proposed by Johnson. In the second line, Collier's second folio substitutes train for fame. Not an improvement, I think.

P. 51. Playing the mouse in absence of the cat,

To tear and havoc more than she can eat.-Instead of tear, the quartos have spoil, the folio tame; the latter being no doubt a misprint for tear, which is Rowe's correction.

P. 51. Yet that is but a crush'd necessity,

So the folio. In

Since we have locks to safeguard necessaries, And pretty traps to catch the petty thieves. stead of crush'd, the quartos have curst. Several changes have been made or proposed, the best of which, I think, is Mason's, "that is not a curst necessity." Of recent editors, Collier, White, and Dyce read curst; Singer, Staunton, and the Cambridge Editors, crush'd. On the whole, I find it not easy to choose between the two readings. The sense which the context seems to require is that of a forced or strained necessity; that is, the necessity is apparent only: it is not really necessary that the cat should stay at home, since we have other means of security against the mousing weasel. Can this sense be fairly got out of crush'd, by taking the word to be used proleptically? a necessity