Usurp'd from you and your progenitors.

K. Hen. May I, with right and conscience, make this

claim?

Cant. The sin upon my head, dread sovereign!
For in the book of Numbers is it writ,-

When the son dies, let the inheritance
Descend unto the daughter. Gracious lord,
Stand for your own; unwind your bloody flag;
Look back unto your mighty ancestors:

Go, my dread lord, to your great grandsire's tomb,
From whom you claim; invoke his warlike spirit,
And your great uncle's, Edward the black prince;
Who on the French ground play'd a tragedy,
Making defeat on the full power of France;
Whiles his most mighty father on a hill
Stood smiling, to behold his lion's whelp
Forage in blood of French nobility.*

O noble English, that could entertain
With half their forces the full pride of France;
And let another half stand laughing by,
All out of work, and cold for action!"

Imbare, in the last line, is naturally opposed to hide in that which precedes, and it differs but little from the reading of the quarto, 1600. The objection that there is no such word as imbare, can have but little weight. It is a word so fairly deduced, and so easily understood, that an author of much less celebrity than Shakspeare, had a right to coin it. M. Mason.

In the folio the word is spelt imbarre. Imbare is, I believe, the true reading. It is formed like impaint, impawn, and many other similar words used by Shakspeare. Malone.

4 Whiles his most mighty father on a hill

Stood smiling, &c.] This alludes to the battle of Cressy, as described by Holinshed: "The earle of Northampton and others sent to the king, where he stood aloft on a windmill-hill; the king demanded if his sonne were slaine, hurt, or felled to the earth. No, said the knight that brought the message, but he is sore matched. Well, (said the king,) returne to him and them that sent you, and saie to them, that they send no more to me for any adventure that falleth, so long as my son is alive; for I will that this journeye be his, with the honour thereof. The slaugh. ter of the French was great and lamentable at the same battle, fought the 26th August, 1346."

5

Holinshed, Vol. II, p. 372, col. i. Bowle. · and cold for action!] This epithet all the commentators have passed by, and I am unable to explain. I cannot but sus

Ely. Awake remembrance of these valiant dead,
And with your puissant arm renew their feats:
You are their heir, you sit upon their throne;
The blood and courage, that renowned them,
Runs in your veins; and my thrice-puissant liege
Is in the very May-morn of his youth,

Ripe for exploits and mighty enterprizes.

Exe. Your brother kings and monarchs of the earth Do all expect that you should rouse yourself,

As did the former lions of your blood.

West. They know, your grace hath cause, and means, and might;

So hath your highness; + never king of England
Had nobles richer, and more loyal subjects;
Whose hearts have left their bodies here in England,
And lie pavilion'd in the fields of France.

Cant. O, let their bodies follow, my dear liege,
With blood, and sword, and fire, to win your right:
In aid whereof, we of the spirituality

pect it to be corrupt. A desire to distinguish themselves seems to merit the name of ardour, rather than the term here given it. If cold be the true reading, their coldness should arise from inaction; and therefore the meaning must be, cold for want of action. So Lyly, in Euphues and his England, 1581: "— if he were too long for the bed, Procrustes cut off his legs, for catching cold," i. e. for fear of catching cold. Malone.

I always regarded the epithet cold as too clear to need explanation. The soldiers were eager to warm themselves by action, and were cold for want of it. A more recondite meaning, indeed, may be found; a meaning which will be best illustrated by a line in Statius, Theb. VI, 395:

"Concurrit summos animosum frigus in artus."

Steevens.

6 So hath your highness;] i. e. your highness hath indeed what they think and know you have. Malone.

Dr. Warburton and M. Mason disagree with this explanation of Malone, but the meaning is so plain, that the insertion of opposing comments is useless; "they know, your grace hath eause, and means, and might; [and] so your highness hath;" &c. Am. Ed.

7 With blood, &c.] Old copy—bloods. Corrected in the third folio. Malone.

This and the foregoing line Dr. Warburton gives to Westmoreland, but with so little reason that I have continued them to Canterbury. The credit of old copies, though not great, is yet more than nothing. Johnson.

Will raise your highness such a mighty sum,
As never did the clergy at one time

Bring in to any of your ancestors.

K. Hen. We must not only arm to invade the French; But lay down our proportions to defend

Against the Scot, who will make road upon us

With all advantages.

Cant. They of those marches, gracious sovereign, Shall be a wall sufficient to defend

Our inland from the pilfering borderers.

K. Hen. We do not mean the coursing snatchers only, But fear the main intendment of the Scot,9

Who hath been still a giddy neighbour1 to us;
For you shall read, that my great grandfather
Never went with his forces into France,2

But that the Scot on his unfurnish'd kingdom

8 They of those marches,] The marches are the borders, the limits, the confines. Hence the Lords Marchers, i. e. the lords` presidents of the marches, &c. So, in the first canto of Drayton's Barons' Wars:

"When now the marchers well upon their way," &c.

Steevens.

9 the main intendment of the Scot,] Intendment is here perhaps used for intention, which, in our author's time, signified extreme exertion. The main intendment may, however, mean, the general disposition. Malone.

Main intendment, I believe, signifies-exertion in a body. The king opposes it to the less consequential inroads of detached par

ties.

1

Steevens.

giddy neighbour -] That is, inconstant, changeable.

Johnson.

2 Never went with his forces into France,] The quartos, 1600 and 1608, read:

never my great grandfather

“Unmask'd his power for France

What an opinion the Scots entertained of the defenceless state of England, may be known by the following passage from The Battle of Flodden, an ancient historical poem:

"For England's king, you understand,
"To France is past with all his peers:
"There is none at home left in the land,

"But joult-head monks, and bursten freers.

"Of ragged rusties, without rules,

"Of priests prating for pudding shives;

"Of milners madder than their mules,

"Of wanton clerks, waking their wives." Steevens.

Came pouring, like the tide into a breach,
With ample and brim fulness of his force;
Galling the gleaned land with hot essays;
Girding with grievous siege castles, and towns;
That England, being empty of defence,

Hath shook, and trembled at the ill neighbourhood.3 Cant. She hath been then more fear'd than harm'd, my liege:

For hear her but exampled by herself,→→
When all her chivalry hath been in France,
And she a mourning widow of her nobles,
She hath herself not only well defended,
But taken, and impounded as a stray,

The king of Scots; whom she did send to France,
To fill king Edward's fame with prisoner kings;
And make your chronicle as rich with praise,"
As is the ooze and bottom of the sea

With sunken wreck and sumless treasuries."
West. But there's a saying, very old and true,7.

3

read:

4

ut the ill neighbourhood.] The quartos, 1600 and 1608,

-fear'd —] i. e. frightened. Malone.

5 And make your chronicle as rich with praise, &c.] The similitude between the chronicle and the sea consists only in this, that they are both full, and filled with something valuable. The quarto has your, the folio their chronicle.

Your and their, written by contraction yr, are just alike, and her in the old hands, is not much unlike yr. I believe we should read her chronicle. Johnson.

Your chronicle means, I think, the chronicle of your kingdom, England. Malone.

6

read:

and sumless treasuries.] The quartos, 1600 and 1608,

and shipless treasury. Steevens.

7 West. But there's a saying, &c.] This speech, which is dissuasive of war with France, is absurdly given to one of the churchmen in confederacy to push the king upon it, as appears by the first scene in this act. Besides, the poet had here an eye to Hall, who gives this observation to the Duke of Exeter. But the editors have made Ely and Exeter change sides, and speak one another's speeches: for this, which is given to Ely, is Exeter's; and the following given to Exeter, is Ely's. Warburton.

This speech is given in the folio to the Bishop of Ely. But it appears from Holinshed, (whom our author followed) and from

If that you will France win,

Then with Scotland first begin:8

For once the eagle England being in prey,
To her unguarded nest the weasel Scot

Comes sneaking, and so sucks her princely eggs;
Playing the mouse, in absence of the cat,

To spoil and havock more than she can eat.9

Exe. It follows then, the cat must-stay at home: Yet that is but a curs'd necessity;1

Hall, that these words were the conclusion of the Earl of Westmoreland's speech; to whom, therefore, I have assigned them. In the quarto Lord only is prefixed to this speech. Dr. Warburton and the subsequent editors attributed it to Exeter, but certainly without propriety; for he, on the other hand, maintained that "he whiche would Scotland winne, with France must first beginne." Malone.

8 If that you will France win, &c.] Hall's Chronicle. Hen. V, year 2, fol. 7, (p. 2) x.

Pope.

It is likewise found in Holinshed, and in he od anonymous play of King Henry V.

Steevens.

9 To spoil and havock more than she can eat.] It is not much the quality of the mouse to tear the food it comes at, but to run over it and defile it. The old quarto reads, spoile; and the two first folios, tame: from which last corrupted word, I think, I have retrieved the poet's genuine reading, taint. Theobald.

nent.

1 Yet that is but a curs'd necessity;] So the old quarto [1600]. The folios read crush'd: neither of the words convey any tolerable idea; but give us a counter-reasoning, and not at all pertiWe should read-'scus'd necessity. It is Exeter's business to show there is no real necessity for staying at home: he must therefore mean, that though there be a seeming necessity, yet it is one that may be well excus'd and got over. Warburton.

Neither the old readings nor the emendation seem very satisfactory. A curs'd necessity has no sense; a 'scus'd necessity is so harsh that one would not admit it, if any thing else can be found. A crush'd necessity may mean a necessity which is subdued and overpowered by contrary reasons. We might read-a crude necessity, a necessity not complete, or not well considered and digested; but it is too harsh.

Sir T. Hanmer reads:

Yet that is not o' course a necessity. Johnson.

A curs'd necessity means, I believe, only an unfortunate necessity. Curs'd, in colloquial phrase, signifies any thing unfortunate. So we say, such a one leads a cursed life; another has got into a cursed scrape. It may mean, a necessity to be execrated.

This vulgarism is often used by Sir Arthur Gorges, in his translation of Lucan, 1614. So, Book VII, p. 293: