BOLING. What fate awaits the duke of Suffolk ? SPIR. By water fhall he die, and take his end. BOLING. What shall befall the duke of Somerset ? SPIR. Let him fhun caftles;

Safer fhall he be upon the fandy plains

Than where caftles mounted stand.5

'Have done, for more I hardly can endure. BOLING. Defcend to darkness, and the burning lake:

False fiend, avoid !6

[Thunder and Lightning. Spirit defcends.

Than where caftles mounted ftand.] I remember to have read this prophecy in fome old Chronicle, where, I think, it ran thus:

"Safer fhall he be on fand,

"Than where caftles mounted ftand:"

at prefent I do not recollect where. STEEVENS.

6

Falfe fiend, avoid !] Inftead of this short speech at the difmiffion of the fpirit, the old quarto gives us the following:

"Then down, I fay, unto the damned pool
"Where Pluto in his fiery waggon fits,

Riding amidst the fing'd and parched fmoaks,

"The road of Dytas, by the river Styx;

"There howle and burn for ever in those flames :
"Rife, Jordane, rife, and ftay thy charming spells :-
" "Zounds! we are betray'd!"

Dytas is written by miftake for Ditis, the genitive case of Dis, which is ufed inftead of the nominative by more than one ancient author.

So, in Thomas Drant's translation of the fifth Satire of Horace, 1567:

And by that meanes made manye foules lord Ditis hall to feeke." STEEVENS.

Here again we have fuch a variation as never could have arisen from an imperfe&t tranfcript. MALONE.

Enter YORK and BUCKINGHAM, haftily, with their Guards, and Others.

"YORK. Lay hands upon these traitors, and their trash.

Beldame, I think, we watch'd you at an inch.What, madam, are you there? the king and commonweal

"Are deeply indebted for this piece of pains;

6

My lord protector will, I doubt it not,

• See you well guerdon'd for thefe good deferts.

* DUCH. Not half fo bad as thine to England's

king,

you this?

* Injurious duke; that threat'ft where is no cause. * BUCK. True, madam, none at all. What call [Shewing her the papers. Away with them; let them be clapp'd up close, And kept afunder :-You, madam, shall with us :— Stafford, take her to thee.—

[Exit. Duchefs from above. "We'll fee your trinkets here all forth-coming; • All.-Away!

[Exeunt Guards, with SOUTH. BOLING. &c. * YORK. Lord Buckingham, methinks," you watch'd her well:

* A pretty plot, well chosen to build upon !

? Lord Buckingham, methinks, &c.] This repetition of the prophecies, which is altogether unneceffary, after what the fpectators had heard in the scene immediately preceding, is not to be found in the first edition of this play. POPE.

They are not, it is true, found in this scene, but they are repeated in the fubfequent scene, in which Buckingham brings an account of this proceeding to the King. This alfo is a variation that only could proceed from various authors. MALONE.

Now, pray, my lord, let's fee the devil's writ.
What have we here?

The duke yet lives, that Henry fhall depofe;
But him outlive, and die a violent death.
*Why, this is juft,

* Aio te, Eacida, Romanos vincere posse.
Well, to the reft:

[Reads.

Tell me, what fate awaits the duke of Suffolk?
By water fhall he die, and take his end.-
What shall betide the duke of Somerfet?

Let him fhun cafiles;

Safer fhall he be upon the fandy plains,
Than where caftles mounted ftand.

* Come, come, my lords;

* These oracles are hardily attain'd, * And hardly understood.9

'The king is now in progrefs toward Saint Albans,

Tell me, &c.] Yet these two words were not in the paper read by Bolingbroke, which York has now in his hand; nor are they in the original play. Here we have a species of inaccuracy peculiar to Shakspeare, of which he has been guilty in other places. See p. 188-9, where Glofter and Winchester read the fame paper differently. See alfo Vol. V. p. 327, n. 6. MALONE. 9 Thefe oracles are hardily attain'd,

And hardly understood.] The folio reads-hardly.

MALONE.

Not only the lameness of the verfification, but the imperfection of the fenfe too, made me fufpect this paffage to be corrupt. York, feizing the parties and their papers, fays, he'll fee the devil's writ; and finding the wizard's answers intricate and ambiguous, he makes this general comment upon such fort of intelligence, as I have restored the text:

Thefe oracles are hardily attain'd,

And hardly understood.

i. e. A great rifque and hazard is run to obtain them; and yet, after thefe hardy fteps taken, the informations are so perplexed that they are hardly to be understood. THEOBALD.

The correction made by Mr. Theobald has been adopted by the fubfequent editors. MALONE.

'With him, the husband of this lovely lady: 'Thither go these news, as faft as horfe can carry

them ;

A sorry breakfast for my lord protector.

'BUCK. Your grace fhall give me leave, my lord of York,

'To be the poft, in hope of his reward.

"YORK. At your pleasure, my good lord.-Who's 'within there, ho!

Enter a Servant.

'Invite my lords of Salisbury, and Warwick, To fup with me to-morrow night.-Away!

[Exeunt.

ACT II. SCENE I.

Saint Albans.

Enter King HENRY, Queen MARGARET, GLOSTER, Cardinal, and SUFFOLK, with Falconers hollaing.

'Q. MAR. Believe me, lords, for flying at the brook,!

'I faw not better sport these seven years' day: 'Yet, by your leave, the wind was very high ;

I

-for flying at the brook,] The falconer's term for hawking at water-fowl. JOHNSON.

And, ten to one, old Joan had not gone out.".

'K. HEN. But what a point, my lord, your falcon made,

"And what a pitch fhe flew above the rest !3To fee how God in all his creatures works! *Yea, man and birds, are fain of climbing high.4

And, ten to one, old Joan had not gone out.] I am told by a gentleman, better acquainted with falconry than myself, that the meaning, however expreffed, is, that the wind being high, it was ten to one that the old hawk had flown quite away; a trick which hawks often play their masters in windy weather. JOHNSON.

old Joan had not gone out.] i. e. the wind was fo high it was ten to one that old Joan would not have taken her flight at the game. PERCY.

The ancient books of hawking do not enable me to decide on the merits of fuch difcordant explanations. It may yet be remarked, that the terms belonging to this once popular amusement were in general fettled with the utmoft precifion; and I may at least venture to declare, that a mistress might have been kept at a cheaper rate than a falcon. To compound a medicine to cure one of these birds of worms, it was necessary to destroy no fewer animals than a lamb, a culver, a pigeon, a buck and a cat. I have this intelligence from the Booke of Haukinge, &c. bl. 1. no date. This work was written by dame Julyana Bernes, priorefs of the nunnery of Sopwell, near St. Albans, (where Shakspeare has fixed the prefent scene,) and one of the editions of it was prynted at Wefimeftre by Wynkyn de Worde, 1496, together with an additional treatise on Fishing. STEEVENS.

3 But what a point, my lord, your falcon made,

And what a pitch fhe flew above the reft!] The variation. between these lines and thofe in the original play on which this is founded, is worth notice:

4

66

Uncle Glofter, how high your hawk did foar, "And on a fudden fouc'd the partridge down."

MALONE.

are fain of climbing high.] Fain, in this place, figni

fies fond. So, in Heywood's Epigrams on Proverbs, 1562:

Fayre words make fooles faine."