Where words are scarce, they are seldom spent in vain; For they breathe truth, that breathe their words in pain. He, that no more must say, is listen'd more Than they whom youth and ease have taught to glose; More are men's ends mark'd, than their lives before; The setting sun, and musick at the close, As the last taste of sweets, is sweetest last: York. No; it is stopp'd with other flattering sounds, Where doth the world thrust forth a vanity, And thus, expiring, do foretell of him: Small showers last long, but sudden storms are short; 1 Report of fashions in proud Italy ;] Our author, who gives to all nations the customs of England, and to all ages the manners of his own, has charged the times of Richard with a folly not perhaps known then, but very frequent in Shakspeare's time, and much lamented by the wisest and best of our ancestors. • Where will doth mutiny with wit's regard.] Where the will rebels against the notices of the understanding. Light vanity, insatiate cormorant, Consuming means, soon preys upon itself. This fortress, built by nature for herself, This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England, Of the world's ransom, blessed Mary's son: + "Against infestion,”—MALONE. 3 Fear'd by their breed,] i. e. by means of their breed. + With inky blots,] Inky blots are written restrictions. 5 rotten parchment bonds;] Alluding to the circumstances of Richard having actually farmed out his royal realm. And it afterwards appears that the person who farmed the realm was the earl of Wiltshire, one of his own favourites. Enter King RICHARD, and Queen"; AUMERLE", BUSHY, GREEN, BAGOT, Ross, and WILLOUGHBY.9 York. The king is come: deal mildly with his youth; For young hot colts, being rag'd, do rage the more. Queen. How fares our noble uncle, Lancaster? K. Rich. What comfort, man? How is't with aged Gaunt? Gaunt. O, how that name befits my composition! And who abstains from meat, that is not gaunt? - my K. Rich. Can sick men play so nicely with their names? Gaunt. No, misery makes sport to mock itself; Since thou dost seek to kill my name in me, I mock my name, great king, to flatter thee. 6 K. Rich. Should dying men flatter with those that live? Gaunt. No, no; men living flatter those that die. Queen;] Shakspeare, as Mr. Walpole suggests, has deviated from historical truth in the introduction of Richard's queen as a woman in the present piece; for Anne, his first wife, was dead before the play commences, and Isabella, his second wife, was a child at the time of his death. 7 Aumerle,] was Edward, eldest son of Edmund duke of York, whom he succeeded in the title. He was killed at Agincourt. Ross,] was William lord Roos, (and so should be printed,) 8 of Hamlake, afterwards lord treasurer to Henry IV. 9 Willoughby,] was William lord Willoughby of Eresby, who afterwards married Joan, widow of Edmund duke of York. K. Rich. Thou, now a dying, say'st thou flatter'st me. Gaunt. Oh! no; thou diest, though I the sicker be. Of those physicians that first wounded thee: 77a9 K. Rich. a lunatick lean-witted fool, Presuming on an ague's privilege, Dar'st with thy frozen admonition Make pale our cheek; chasing the royal blood, Now by my seat's right royal majesty, Which art possess'd now to depose thyself.] Possess'd, in this second instance, was probably designed to mean- - afflicted with madness occasioned by the internal operation of a dæmon. Wert thou not brother to great Edward's son, That blood already, like the pelican, Hast thou tapp'd out, and drunkenly carous'd: That thou respect'st not spilling Edward's blood: Live in thy shame, but die not shame with thee! - [Exit, borne out by his Attendants. K. Rich. And let them die, that age and sullens have; For both hast thou, and both become the grave. York. 'Beseech your majesty +, impute his words To wayward sickliness and age in him: He loves you, on my life, and holds you dear As Harry duke of Hereford, were he here. Rich. Right; you say true: as Hereford's love, so his: As theirs, so mine; and all be as it is. Enter NORTHUMBERLAND.3 North. My liege, old Gaunt commends him to your majesty. K. Rich. What says he now ? + 2 Love they] That is, let them love. +"I do beseech" MALONE. 3 Northumberland.] Henry Percy, earl of Northumberland "What says he?" MALONE. |