So full replete with choice of all delights, K. Hen. And otherwise will Henry ne'er sume. Therefore, my lord protector, give consent, That Margaret may be England's royal queen. Glo. So should I give consent to flatter sin. You know, my lord, your highness is betroth'd Unto another lady of esteem; How shall we then dispense with that contrast, And not deface your honour with reproach? Suff. As doth a ruler with unlawful oaths; A poor earl's daughter is unequal odds: pre Glo. Why, what, I pray, is Margaret more than that? Her father is no better than an earl, Suff. Yes, my good lord, her father is a king, Glo. And so the earl of Armagnac may do, Exe. Beside, his wealth doth warrant liberal dower; While Reignier sooner will receive than give. Suff. A dower, my lords! disgrace not so king, That he should be so abject, base, and poor, And not to seek a queen to make him rich : And therefore, lords, since he affects her most, age your My tender youth was neve, yet attaint With any passion of inflaming love, I cannot telì; but this I am assur'd, I feel such sharp dissension in my breast, As did the youthful Paris once to Greece [Exit. Of this play there is no copy earlier than that of the folio in 1623, though the two succeeding parts are ex tant in two editions in quarto. That the second and third parts were published without the first, may be admitted as no weak proof that the copies were surrep titiously obtained, and that the printers of that time gave the public those plays, not such as the author designed, but such as they could get them. That this play was written before the two others is indubitably collected from the series of events; that it was written and played before Henry the Fifth is apparent, because in the epi logue there is mention made of this play, and not of the other parts:— 'Henry the Sixth in swaddling bands crown'd king; Whose state so many had the managing, That they lost France, and made his England bleed. Which oft our stage hath shown.' France is lost in this play. The two following contain, as the old title imports, the contention of the houses of York and Lancaster. The Second and Third Parts of Henry VI. were printed in 1600. When Henry V. was written, we know Whom should we match with Henry, being a king, not, but it was printed likewise in 1600, and therefore But Margaret, that is daughter to a king? My noble lord of Suffolk; or for that 1 A triumph then signified a public exhibition; such as a tournament, mask, or revel. 2 By the intervention of another man's choice; or the discretional agency of another. The phrase occurs twice in King Richard III. : 'Be the attorney of my love to her.' Again : before the publication of the first and second parts. The First Part of Henry VI. had been often shown on the stage, and would certainly have appeared in its place, had the anthor been the publisher. JOHNSON THAT the second and third parts, as they are now called, were printed without the first, is a proof, in my apprehension, that they were not written by the same author: and the title of The Contention of the Houses of York and Lancaster, being affixed to the two pieces which were printed in quarto, is a proof that they were a distinct work, commencing where the other ended, but not written at the same time; and that this play was never known by the title of The First Part of King in their volume, to distinguish it from the two subseHenry VI. till Heminge and Condell gave it that name quent plays; which being altered by Shakspeare, assumed the new titles of the Second and Third Parts of King Henry VI. that they might not be confounded with the original pieces on which they were formed. The first part was originally called The Historical P'ay of King Henry VI. MALONE. 3 To censure is here simply to judge. If in judging me you consider the past frailties of your own youth.' 4 Grief, in the first line, stands for pain, uneasiness in the second, especially for sorrow SECOND PART OF KING HENRY THE SIXTH. RELIMINARY REMARKS. THI HIS and the Third Part of King Henry VI. contain | wrote new beginnings to the Acts; he new versified ne that troublesone period of this prince's reign, which new modelled, he transposed many of the parts; and took in the whole contention between the houses of York greatly amplified and improved the whole. and Lancaster: and under that title were these two lines, however, and whole speeches, which he thought Several plays first acted and published. The present play sufficiently polished, he accepted, and introduced, withopens with King Henry's marriage, which was in the out any, or very slight, alterations. twenty-third year of his reign [A. D. 1445], and closes with the first battle fought at St. Albans, and won by the York faction, in the thirty-third year of his reign [A. D. 1455]: so that it comprises the history and transactions of ten years. Malone adopted the following expedient to mark these alterations and adoptions, which has been followed in the present edition:-All those lines which the poet adopted without any alteration, are printed in the usual manner; those speeches which he altered or expanded The Contention of the Two Famous Houses of York are distinguished by inverted commas; and to all lines and Lancaster was published in quarto; the first part in entirely composed by himself asterisks are prefixed. 1594; the secom, or True Tragedy of Richard Duke of The internal evidences upon which Malone relies to York, in 1595, and both were reprinted in 1600. In a establish his position are, 1. The variations between the dissertation annexed to these plays, Mr. Malone has old plays in quarto, and the corresponding pieces in the endeavoured to establish the fact that these two dramas folio edition of Shakspeare's dramatic works, which were not originally written by Shakspeare, but by some are of so peculiar a nature as to mark two distinct preceding author or authors before the year 1590; and hands. Some circumstances are mentioned in the old that upon them Shakspeare formed this and the follow-quario plays, of which there is not the least trace in the ing drama, altering, retrenching, or amplifying as he folio; and many minute variations occur that prove the thought proper. I will endeavour to give a brief ab-pieces in the quarto to have been original and distinct stract of the principal arguments. 1. The entry on the compositions. No copyist or shorthand writer would Stationers' books, in 1594, does not mention the name invent circumstances totally different from those which of Shakspeare; nor are the plays printed with his name appear in Shakspeare's new-modelled draughts, as exIn the early editions; but, after the poet's death, an edi-hibited in the first folio; or insert whole speeches, of tion was printed by one Pavier without date, but really, which scarcely a trace is found in that edition. In some in 1619, with the name of Shakspeare on the title-page. places a speech in one of these quartos_consists of ten This he has shown to be à common fraudulent prac- or twelve lines: in Shakspeare's folio the same speech tice of the booksellers of that period. When Pavier re- consists perhaps of only half the number. A copy ist by published The Contention of the Two Houses, &c. in the ear, or an unskilful shorthand writer. Inight mutilate 1619, he omitted the words as it was acted by the earl and exhibit a poet's thoughts or expressions imperfectly; of Pembrooke his servantes,' which appeared on the but he would not dilate and amplify them, or introduce original title-page,-just as on the republication of the totally new matter. old play of King John, in two parts, in 1611, the words Malone then exhibits a sufficient number of instances 'as.it was acted in the honourable city of London,' were to prove, beyond the possibility of doubt, his position: omitted because the omitted words in both cases mark- so that (as he observes) we are compelled to admit, ed the respective pieces not to be the production of either that Shakspeare wrote two sets of plays on the Shakspeare. And, as in King John, the letters W. Sh. story which forms his Second and Third Parts of King were added, in 1611, to deceive the purchaser; so in Henry VI.. hasty sketches, and entirely distinct and the republication of The whole Contention, &c. Pavier, more finished performances; or else we must acknowhaving dismissed the words above-mentioned, inserted ledge that he formed his pieces on a foundation laid by. these Newly corrected and enlarged by William another writer or writers; that is upon the two parts of Shakspere: knowing that these pieces had been made The Contention of the Two Houses of York, &c. It is the groundwork of two other plays: that they had in a striking circumstance that almost all the passages in fact been corrected and enlarged, (though not in his co- the Second and Third Parts of King Henry VI. which py, which was a mere reprint from the edition of 1600,) resemble others in Shakspeare's undisputed plays, are and exhibited under the titles of the Second and Third not found in the original pieces in quarto, but in his ri Parts of King Henry VI.; and hoping that this new edi-faccimento in folio. As these resemblances to his other tion of the original plays would pass for those altered plays, and a peculiar Shakspearian phraseology, ascerand augmented by Shakspeare, which were then un-tain a considerable portion of these disputed dramas to published. be the production of that poet; so, on the other hand, A passage from Greene's Groatsworth of Wit, ad-other passages, discordant, in matters of fact, from his duced by Mr. Tyrwhitt, first suggested and strongly other plays, are proved by this discordancy not to have supports Malone's hypothesis. The writer, Robert been composed by him: and these discordant passages, Greene, is supposed to address himself to his poetical being found in the original quarto plays, prove that friend, George Peele, in these words:- Yes, trust them those pieces were composed by another writer. not [alluding to the players], for there is an upstart It is observable that several portions of English his crowe beautified with our feathers, that with history had been dramatised before the time of Shakspeare tygre's heart wrapped in a player's hide, supposes hee is well able to bombaste out a blank verse as the best of you; and, being an absolute Joannes factotum, is, in his own conceit, the only Shakescene in a country. 'O tyger's heart wrapped in a woman's hide!' is a line in the old quarto play entitled The First Part of the Contention, &c. There seems to be no doubt that the allusion is to Shakspeare, that the old plays may have been the production of Greene, Peele, and Marlowe, or some of them; and that Greene could not conceal his mortification, at the fame of himself and his associates, old and established playwrights, being eclipsed by a new upstart writer, (for so he calls the poet,) who had then perhaps first attracted the notice of the public by exhibiting two plays formed upon old dramas written by them, considerably enlarged and improved. The very term that Greene uses, 'to bombaste out a blank verse,' exactly corresponds with what has been now suggested. This new poet, says he, knows as well as any man how to amplify and swell out a blank verse. Thus we have King John, in two parts, by an anony mous writer; Edward I. by George Peele; Edward II by Christopher Marlowe; Edward III. anonymous; Henry IV. containing the deposition of Richard II. and the accession of Henry to the crown, anonymous; Henry V. and Richard III. both by anonymous authors. It is therefore highly probable that the whole of the story of Henry VI. had been brought on the scene, and that the first of the plays here printed, formerly called The Historical Play of King Henry VÍ. and now named The First Part of King Henry VI. as well as the Twc Parts of the Contention of the Houses of York and Lancaster, were the compositions of some of the authors who had produced the historical dramas above enume rated. Mr. Boswell, speaking of the originals of the second and third of these plays, says, "That Marlowe may have had some share in these compositions, I am not disposed to deny; but I cannot persuade myself that they entirely proceeded from his pen. Some passages are possessed of so much merit, that they can scarcely be ascribed to any one except the most distinguished of Shakspeare's predecessors; but the tameness of the ge- | produced previous to 1592, but were not printed until neral style is very different from the peculiar characte- they appeared in the folio of 1623. ristics of that poet's mighty line, which are great energy To Johnson's high panegyric of that impressive scene both of thought and language, degenerating too fre- in this play, the death of Cardinal Beaufort, we may quently into tumour and extravagance. The versifica- add that Schlegel says, 'It is sublime beyond all praise. tion appears to me to be of a different colour.-That Can any other poet be named who has drawn aside the Marlowe, Peele, and Greene, may all of them have had curtain of eternity at the close of this life in such an a share in these dramas, is consonant to the frequent overpowering and awful manner? And yet it is not practice of the age; of which ample proofs may be mere horror with which we are filled, but solemn emofound in the extracts from Henslowe's MS. printed by tion; we have an exemplification of a blessing and a Mr. Malone." curse in close proximity; the pious king is an image of the heavenly mercy, which, even in his last moinents, labours to enter into the soul of the sinner.' From the passage alluding to these plays, in Greene's Groatsworth of Wit, it seems probable that they were PERSONS REPRESENTED A Herald. VAUX. HUME and SOUTHWELL, two Priests. GEORGE, JOHN, DICK, SMITH the Weaver, Mi- MARGERY JOURDAIN, a Witch. Wife to Simpcox. SCENE, dispersedly in various parts of England. Lend me a heart replete with thankfulness! Q. Mar. Great king of England, and my gra cious lord; The mutual conference that my mind hath had3By day, by night; waking, and in my dreams; In courtly company, or at my beads,• With you mine alder-liefest sovereign, 'Makes me the bolder to salute my king 'With ruder terms; such as my wit affords, 'And over-joy of heart doth minister. 'K. Hen. Her sight did ravish: but her grace in speech, 'Her words y-clad with wisdom's majesty, [Flourish. Q. Mar. We thank you all. Glo. [Reads.] Imprimis, It is agreed between the 3 I am the bolder to address you, having already fa miliarized you to my imagination. 4 i. e. most beloved of all: from alder, of all; for merly used in composition with adjectives of the super lative degree: and liefest, dearest, or most loved. 5 This weeping joy, of which there is no trace in th original play, Shakspeare frequently uses. It is intro duced in Much Ado about Nothing, King Richard I Macbeth, and King Lear. K. Hen. Uncle, how now? Glo. Pardon me, gracious lord; Some sudden qualm hath struck me at the heart, And dimm'd mine eyes, that I can read no further. K. Hen. Uncle of Winchester, I pray, read on. Win. Item,-It is further agreed between them,--| that the duchies of Anjou and Maine shall be released and delivered over to the king her father; and she sent over of the king of England's own proper cost and charges, without having dowry. K. Hen. They please us well.-Lord marquess, We here create thee the first duke of Suffolk, Cousin of York, we here discharge your grace Somerset, Salisbury, and Warwick; We thank you all for this great favour done, and [Exeunt King, Queen, and Suffolk. Glo. Brave peers of England, pillars of the state, To you Duke Humphrey must unload his grief, 'Your grief, the common grief of all the land. 'What! did my brother Henry spend his youth, His valour, coin, and people, in the wars? Did he so often lodge in open field, 'In winter's cold, and summer's parching heat, To conquer France, his true inheritance? And did my brother Bedford toil his wits, To keep by policy what Henry got? Have you yourselves, Somerset, Buckingham, 'Brave York, Salisbury, and victorious Warwick, 'How France and Frenchmen might be kept in awe? * Car. Nephew, what means this passionate dis- * This peroration with such circumstance?1 * Sal. Now, by the death of him that died for all, * These counties were the keys of Normandy :· But wherefore weeps Warwick, my valiant son? War. For grief, that they are past recovery: tears. Anjou and Maine! myself did win them both; This speech crowded with so many circumstances 3 The indignation of Warwick is natural, but might þave been better expressed: there is a kind of jingl | * York. For Suffolk's duke-may he be suffocate, That dims the honour of this warlike isle ! *France should have torn and rent my very heart, * Before I would have yielded to this league. 'I never read but England's kings have had Large sums of gold, and dowries, with their wives : And our King Henry gives away his own, • To match with her that brings no vantages. * Glo. A proper jest, and never heard before *That Suffolk should demand a whole fifteenth, *For costs and charges in transporting her! * She should have staid in France, and starv'd in France, *Before * Car. My lord of Gloster, now you grow too hot; *It was the pleasure of my lord the king. * Glo. My lord of Winchester, I know your mind 'Tis not my speeches that you do mislike, But 'tis my presence that doth trouble you. 'Rancour will out: Proud prelate, in thy face 'I see thy fury: if I longer stay, I 'We shall begin our ancient bickerings. Nay, more, an enemy unto you all; * And no great friend, I fear me, to the king, 'With-God preserve the good duke Humphrey ! *He being of age to govern of himself, And all together-with the duke of Suffolk, [Exit. Som. Cousin of Buckingham, though Humphrey's pride, And greatness of his place be grief to us, 'Yet let us watch the haughty cardinal; • His insolence is more intolerable * ; 'Than all the princes in the land beside ! 4 Richard Plantagenet, duke of York, marrieò Cicely, the daughter of Ralf Neville, earl of Westmoreland, by Joan, daughter to John of Gaunt, duke of Lancaster, by his third wife, dame Catharine Swinford. Richard Ne ville e 'of Salisbury, was son to the earl of Westmore 'In bringing them to civil discipline;1 'Thy late exploits, done in the heart of France, When thou wert regent for our sovereign, Have made thee fear'd, and honour'd, of the people : Join we together, for the public good; In what we can to bridle and suppress The pride of Suffolk, and the cardinal, 'With Somerset's and Buckingham's ambition; 'And, as we may, cherish Duke Humphrey's deeds, 'While they do tend the profit of the land. * War. So God help Warwick, as he loves the land, * And common profit of his country! * York. And so says York, for he hath greatest cause. Sal. Then let's make haste away, and look unto the main. War. Unto the main! O father, Maine is lost; That Maine, which by main force Warwick did win, * And would have kept, so long as breath did last: Main chance, father, you meant; but I meant Maine ; Which I will win from France, or else be slain. [Exeunt WARWICK and SALISBURY. York. Anjou and Maine are given to the French; * Paris is lost; the state of Normandy * Stands on a tickle2 point, now they are gone : * Suffolk concluded on the articles; *The peers agreed; and Henry was well pleas'd, *To change two dukedoms for a duke's fair daughter. * I cannot blame them all; What is't to them? * "Tis thine they give away, and not their own. * Pirates may make cheap pennyworths of their pillage, * And purchase friends, and give to courtesans, *Still revelling, like lords, till all be gone: *While-as the silly owner of the goods *Weeps over them, and wrings his hapless hands, *And shakes his head, and trembling stands aloof, * While all is shar'd, and all is borne away; *Ready to starve, and dare not touch his own. * So York must sit, and fret, and bite his tongue, * While his own lands are bargain'd for, and sold. * Methinks, the realms of England, France, and Ireland, * Bear that proportion to my flesh and blood, * Unto the prince's heart of Calydon.3 A day will come, when York shall claim his own; Whose church-like humours fit not for a crown. Till Henry, surfeiting in joys of love, Duch. Why droops my lord, like over-ripen'd corn, Hanging the head at Ceres' plenteous load? *Why doth the great Duke Humphrey knit his brows, *As frowning at the favours of the world? * Why are thine eyes fix'd to the sullen earth, * Gazing on that which seems to dim thy sight! 'What seest thou there? King Henry's diadem, * Enchas'd with all the honours of the world? * If so, gaze on, and grovel on thy face, * Until thy head be circled with the same. 'Put forth thy hand, reach at the glorious gold: 'What, is't too short? I'll lengthen it with mine: * And having both together heav'd it up, * We'll both together lift our heads to heaven; * And never more abase our sight so low, As to vouchsafe one glance unto the ground. 'Glo. O Nell, sweet Nell, if thou dost love tny lord, 'Banish the canker of ambitious thoughts: And may that thought, when I imagine ill Against my king and nephew, virtuous Henry * Be my last breathing in this mortal world! 'My troublous dream this night doth make me sad. Duch. What dream'd my lord? tell me, and I'll requite it With sweet rehearsal of my morning's dream. 'Glo Methought, this staff, mine office-badge in court, Was broke in twain, by whom, I have forgot, 'But, as I think, it was by the cardinal And on the pieces of the broken wand 'Were plac'd the heads of Edmond duke of Somerset, And William de la Poole, first duke of Suffolk. This was my dream; what doth it bole, God knows. Duch. Tut, this was nothing but an argument, That he that breaks a stick of Gloster's grove, • Shall lose his head for his presumption. But list to me, my Humphrey, my sweet duke : Methought I sat in seat of majesty, In the cathedral church of Westminster, And in that chair where kings and queens are crown'd; 'Where Henry, and dame Margaret, kneel'd to me, 'And on my head did set the diadem. Glo. Nay, Eleanor, then must I chide outright: *Presumptuous dame, ill nurtur'd4 Eleanor' Art thou not second woman in the realm And the protector's wife, belov'd of him?' *Hast thou not worldly pleasure at command, * Above the reach or compass of thy thought? And wilt thou still be hammering treachery, * To tumble down thy husband, and thyself, *From top of honour to disgrace's feet? Away from me, and let me hear no more. 'Duch. What, what, my lord! are you so cho leric 'With Eleanor, for telling but her dream? 'Next time I'll keep my dreams unto myself, With his new bride, and England's dear-bought. And not be check'd. queen, And Humphrey with the peers be fall'n at jars ; land by a second wife. He married Alice, only daughter of Thomas Montacute, earl of Salisbury, who was killed at the siege of Orleans (see Part I. of this play, Act. i. Sc. 3.), and in consequence of that alliance obtained the title of Salisbury in 1428. His eldest son, Richard, having married the sister and heir of Henry Beauchamp, earl of Warwick, was created earl of Warwick, 1449 1 This is an anachronism. The present scene is in • Glo. Nay, be not angry, I am pleas'd again. Enter a Messenger. 'Mess. My lord protector, 'tis his highness' pleasure. You do prepare to ride into Saint Albans, 'Whereas the king and queen do mean to hawk. Glo. I go.-Come, Nell, thou wilt ride with us? 1445; but Richard, Duke of York, was not viceroy of Ireland till 1449. 2 Tickle is frequently used for ticklish by ancient writers. 3 Meleager; whose life was to continue only so long as a certain firebrand should last. His mother Althea having thrown it into the fire, he expired in torment. 4 Ill nurtur'd is ill educated. 5 Whereas for where; a common substitution in old language, as where is often used for rhereas. |