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P. 525.-316.-324.

War. Myself have often heard him

say,
and swear,

That this his love was an eternal plant;

Whereof the root was fix'd in virtue's ground,
The leaves and fruit maintain'd with beauty's sun;
Exempt from envy, but not from disdain,

Unless the lady Bona quit his pain.

These words I confess I do not yet understand.

K. Edw.

P. 532.-323.-334.

I am Edward,

Your king and Warwick's, and must have my will.
Glo. And shall have your will, because our king:
Yet hasty marriage seldom proveth well.

I think we should read (as it is printed in the edition of 1785) and you shall have

P. 536.-327.-340.

your will.

K. Edw. But say, is Warwick friends with Margaret?
Mess. Ay, gracious sovereign; they are so link'd in friendship,
That young prince Edward marries Warwick's daughter.
Clar. Belike, the elder; Clarence will have the younger.

I think Mr. Theobald did rightly.

P. 546.-358.-355.

War. And, Clarence, now then it is more than needful,
Forthwith that Edward be pronounc'd a traitor,
And all his lands and goods be confiscate.

I think the reading of the second folio should be received. It is in the edition of 1785.

P. 548.-360.-358.

K. Edw. Now, brother Richard, lord Hastings, and the rest;
Yet thus far fortune maketh us amends.

I concur with Mr. Steevens. Mr. Malone has no title to say 66 Digitis callemus et aure;" provided he can by any means make out ten syllables, he is perfectly careless of the harmony of the

*

verse. I think, however, that the word lord may possibly be permitted to stand in this verse, the Richard (and not brother, the difference being easily perceptible by any one who has an ear) being pronounc'd short, as equal in time to one long syllable.

P. 553.-364.-364.

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War. What counsel, lords? Edward from Belgia,
With hasty Germans, and blunt Hollanders,
Hath pass'd in safety through the narrow seas,
And with his troops doth march amain to London;
And many giddy people flock to him.

Oxf. Let's levy men, and beat him back again.

Every reader must agree that this speech could not be given to the king by Shakespeare. I think Mr. Malone has regulated the passage properly, for the reason he assigns, though there is nothing in the first speech which may not very well come from the king.

I

P. 555.-367.-368.

K. Edw. The sun shines hot, and, if we use delay,
Cold biting winter mars our hop'd-for hay.

agree with Mr. Steevens.

P. 562.-374.-377.

War. Lo, now my glory smear'd in dust and blood!
My parks, my walks, my manors that I had,
Even now forsake me; and, of all my lands,
Is nothing left me, but my body's length !

Dr. Johnson, who censures this passage as diminishing the pathetic of the foregoing lines, seem'd to believe it not improbable that dying men should think on such things, when on Mr. Garrick's shewing him his elegant villa and

* Were Shakespeare alive, he might say to Mr. Malone (in the words of Orlando to Jaques), "I pray you mar no more of my verses with reading them ill-favouredly."

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splendid furniture at Hampton, he replied, "Ah! David, these are the things that make a death"bed terrible.'

P. 575.-388.-397.

K. Hen. Men for their sons, wives for their husband's fate,
And orphans for their parents' timeless death,

Shall rue the hour that ever thou wast born.

I highly approve of Mr. Steevens's restoring the word and, which Mr. Malone (with his usual rage against the corrections of the second folio) had ejected.

KING RICHARD THE THIRD.

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Glo. Now are our brows bound with victoriouss wreaths;
Our bruised arms hung up for monuments;

Our stern alarums chang'd to merry meetings,
Our dreadful marches to delightful measures.
Grim-visag'd war hath smooth'd his wrinkled front;
And now, instead of mounting barbed steeds,
To fright the souls of fearful adversaries,
He capers nimbly in a lady's chamber,
To the lascivious pleasing of a lute.

"The cities of Italy resounded with the noise "of drinking and dancing; the spoils of victory were wasted in sensual pleasures; and nothing (says Agathias) remain'd unless to exchange "their shields and helmets for the soft lute and " the capacious hogshead.-Ελιπετο γαρ οιμαι, αυτοίς σε ύπο αβελτερίας τας ασπίδας τυχον και τα κρανη αμφορέως "One Hai BaρCITY arodora. (Agathias, L. II. p. 48.) "In the first scene of Richard the Third our "English poet has beautifully enlarged on this "idea; for which, however, he was not indebt"ed to the Byzantine historian.'

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Gibbon's History of the Decline and Fall of the Rom. Emp. c. 43. Vol. IV. p. 312. 4to edition 1788.

P. 6.-455.-462.

I, that am curtail'd of this fair proportion,
Cheated of feature by dissembling nature,
Deform'd, unfinish'd, &c.

I cannot help thinking Dr. Johnson's interpretation the true one. The lines in the Old King John do not appear to me prove the contrary.

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Clar. We know thy charge, Brakenbury, and will obey.
Glo. We are the queen's abjects, and must obey.

Dr. Johnson has mistaken the meaning of abjects, which is rightly explained by Mr. M. Mason.

P. 10.-459-468.

Glo. Brother, farewell: I will unto the king;
And whatsoe'er you will employ me in,
Were it, to call king Edward's widow-sister,
I will perform it, to enfranchise you.

Mr. Steevens is certainly right. There clearly is no such meaning as Dr. Johnson supposes.

P. 15.-464.-475.

Anne. Vouchsafe, diffus'd infection of a man,
For these known evils, but to give me leave,
By circumstance to curse thy cursed self.

I doubt whether the instances produced prove that diffused means irregular.

P. 61.-509.-538.

Glo. I hope the king made peace with all of us;

And the compact is firm, and true, in me.

Ric. And so in me; and so, I think, in all.

I agree with Mr. Malone that this speech does not belong to Rivers.

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