Enter CHORUS. O, for a muse of fire, that would ascend Leash'd in like hounds, should famine, sword, and fire, Crouch for employment. But pardon, gentles all, O, for a muse of fire, &c.] This goes upon the notion of the Peripatetic system, which imagines several heavens one above another; the last and highest of which was one of fire. WARBURTON. It alludes likewise to the aspiring nature of fire, which, by its levity, at the separation of the chaos, took the highest seat of all the elements. JOHNSON. "This," says Dr. Warburton, "goes upon the notion of the Peripatetic system, which imagines several heavens one above another; the last and highest of which was one of fire." We have here one of the very best specimens of the doctor's flights of fancy. Shakspeare, in all probability, knew nothing of the Peripatetic philosophy; he simply wishes for poetic fire, and a due portion of inventive genius. The other explanation by Dr. Johnson seems likewise too refined. DOUCE. princes to act, And monarchs to behold-] Shakspeare does not seem to set distance enough between the performers and spectators. JOHNSON. 3 Leash'd in like hounds, should FAMINE, SWORD, and FIRE, Crouch for employment.] In King Henry VI. “Lean famine, quartering steel, and climbing fire," are called the three attendants on the English General, Lord Talbot; and, as I suppose, are the dogs of war mentioned in Julius Cæsar. This image of the warlike Henry very much resembles Montfaucon's description of the Mars discovered at Bresse, who leads a lion and a lioness in couples, and crouching as for employment. TOLLET. Warner, in his Albion's England, 1602, speaking of King Henry V. says: "He led good fortune in a line, and did but war and win.” The flat unraised spirit that hath dar'd, Holinshed, (p. 567,) when the people of Roan petitioned King Henry V. has put this sentiment into his mouth: "He declared that the goddesse of battell, called Bellona, had three handmaidens, ever of necessitie attending upon her, as blood, fire, and famine." STEEvens. •-spirit,] Old copy-spirits. Corrected by Mr. Rowe. MALONE. s Within this wooden O,] Nothing shows more evidently the power of custom over language, than that the frequent use of calling a circle an O could so much hide the meanness of the metaphor from Shakspeare, that he has used it many times where he makes his most eager attempts at dignity of style. JOHNSON. Johnson's criticism on Shakspeare's calling a circle an O, is rather injudiciously introduced in this place, where it was evidently the poet's intention to represent the circle in which they acted in as contemptible a light as he could. M. MASON. "Within this wooden O." An allusion to the theatre where this history was exhibited, being, from its circular form, called The Globe. The same expression is applied, for the like reason, to the world, in Antony and Cleopatra : "A sun and moon which kept their course, and lighted I know not whether Shakspeare calls the Globe playhouse a cock-pit, from its being a round building, or else from its serving that purpose also: the latter appears probable, from his styling the floor an unworthy scaffold, which suggests the idea of its being temporary, and that the edifice answered both turns, by means of a slight alteration. HENLEY. This theatre, like all our ancient ones, was denominated from its sign, viz. The Globe, and not from its shape. Had playhouses been named with reference to their form of construction, what sort of building could have corresponded with the title of a Red Bull, a Curtain, a Fortune, Cross Keys, a Phænix, &c. ?” Shakspeare, meaning to degrade the stage he was describing, may call it a cock-pit, because a cock-pit was the most diminutive enclosure present to his mind; or, perhaps, because there was a playhouse called The Cock-pit, at which King Henry V. might first have been acted. N. B. From Mr. Henley's own drawing of The Globe, the outside of it, at least, appears to have been octagonal. STEEVENS. That did affright the air at Agincourt 7? And let us, ciphers to this great accompt, 8 Suppose, within the girdle of these walls Mr. Steevens's first explanation was the right one. The playhouse called the Cock-pit was not built till several years after the appearance of Henry V. See the History of the English Stage, vol. iii. MALONE. 6 the very CASQUES,] The helmets. JOHNSON. "The very casques," does not mean the identical casques, but the casques only, the casques alone. So, in The Taming of the Shrew, Katharine says to Grumio: 66 Thou false deluding slave, "That feed'st me with the very name of meat." The very name, means here, the name only. M. MASON. "The very casques," are-even the casques or helmets; much less the men by whom they were worn. So, in Macbeth: 66 66 for fear Thy very stones prate of my whereabout." MALONE. 7- casques, That did AFFRIGHT THE AIR machia, 297: -] Thus Prudentius, in Psycho clypeo dum territat auras. STEEVENS. 8 — IMAGINARY forces-] Imaginary for imaginative, or your powers of fancy. Active and passive words are by this author frequently confounded. JOHNSON. 9 Whose high upreared and abutting fronts The PERILOUS, NARROW Ocean parts asunder.] Perilous narrow, in burlesque and common language, meant no more than very narrow. In old books this mode of expression occurs perpetually. A perilous broad brim to a hat, a perilous long sword, &c. So, in Beaumont and Fletcher's Humourous Lieutenant : She is perilous crafty." 66 Thus, villainous is only used to exaggerate, in The Tempest: be turn'd to barnacles or apes 66 "With foreheads villainous low." Again, in John Florio's Preface to his translation of Montaigne : 66 in this perilous crook'd passage—.” Piece out our imperfections with your thoughts; Think, when we talk of horses, that you see them The narrow seas, however, were always reckoned dangerous, insomuch that Golding, in his version of the 14th book of Ovid's Metamorphosis, translates-Savior illa freto surgente, 66 the lady crueller "Than are the rising narrow seas." Again, in Burton's Anatomie of Melancholy, edit. 1632, p. 326: "How full of feare, how furious? "The narrow seas are not so boisterous." STEEVENS. The present reading is right, but there should be a comma between the words perilous and narrow, as it was by no means Shakspeare's intention to join them together, and to make a burlesque phrase of them, such as Steevens describes. The perilousness of the ocean to be passed by the army, before the meeting of the kings, adds to the grandeur and interest of the scene; and it is well known that narrow seas are the most perilous. So, the Chorus in the next Act insinuates that it was necessary, To charm the narrow seas "To give them gentle pass." And in The Merchant of Venice, the narrow seas are made the scene of shipwrecks, where Salarino says, “Antonio hath a ship of rich lading wrecked on the narrow seas; the Goodwins I think they call the place; a very dangerous flat, and fatal," &c. M. MASON. Into a thousand parts divide one man,] The meaning of this is, Suppose every man to represent a thousand;' but it is very ill expressed. M. MASON. And make imaginary puissance :] This shows that Shakspeare was fully sensible of the absurdity of showing battles on the theatre, which, indeed, is never done, but tragedy becomes farce. Nothing can be represented to the eye, but by something like it, and within a wooden O nothing very like a battle can be exhibited. JOHNSON. Other authors of that age seem to have been sensible of the same absurdities. In Heywood's Fair Maid of the West, 1631, a Chorus enters and says: "Our stage so lamely can express a sea, "That we are forc'd by Chorus to discourse "What should have been in action," &c. STEEVENS. Carry them here and there3; jumping o'er times1; Who, prologue-like, your humble patience pray, 3 For 'tis your THOUGHTS that now must deck our KINGS, Carry them here and there;] We may read king for kings. The prologue relates only to this single play. The mistake was made by referring them to kings, which belongs to thoughts. The sense is, your thoughts must give the king his proper greatness; carry therefore your thoughts here and there, jumping over time, and crouding years into an hour.' JOHNSON. I am not sure that Dr. Johnson's observation is just. In this play the king of France, as well as England, makes his appearance; and the sense may be this :-" It must be to your imaginations that our kings are indebted for their royalty.' Let the fancy of the spectator furnish out those appendages to greatness which the poverty of our stage is unable to supply. The poet is still apologizing for the defects of theatrical representation. 66 STEEVENS. Johnson is, in my opinion, mistaken also in his explanation of the remainder of the sentence. Carry them here and there" does not mean, as he supposes, Carry your thoughts here and there;' for the Chorus not only calls upon the imagination of the audience to adorn his kings, but to carry them also from one place to another, though by a common poetical licence the copulative be omitted. M. MASON. 4 JUMPING O'ER times;] So, in the prologue to Troilus and Cressida : "Leaps o'er the vaunt and firstlings of those broils—." STEEVENS. |