sense seems to be "have perjured themselves;" and Rolfe's explanation that "the metaphor seems to be taken from the act of tearing a legal document" seems a very probable one. Lorn, the past participle of the verb "to lose," is used by Chaucer and Spenser, but not by Shakespeare. It may be that torn is merely intended to convey here the act of violently tearing up, as it were, their allegiance by the roots; or it may mean tortured, as in the following passage from Beaumont and Fletcher's King and No King, ii. 1: Nay, should I join with you, Should we not both be torn. -Works, vol. i. p. 56. 232 Line 94: The PURPLE testament of bleeding war.Purple here=bloodstained, as in Julius Cæsar (iii. 1. 158): Now, whilst your purpled hands do reek and, smoke. 233. Line 109: the BURIED hand of WARLIKE Gaunt.-Warburton wanted to read: "the warlike hand of buried Gaunt," which is undoubtedly the sense. But Ritson, in his note (Var. Ed. vol. xvi. p. 110), has collected so many instances of a similar misplacement of epithets in Shakespeare that we cannot hold any alteration of the text necessary. Take, as one instance, II. Henry VI. (iv. 7. 108): These hands are free from guiltless bloodshedding, instead of: These guiltless hands are free from bloodshedding. 234 Lines 112-114.-The value to be placed on Bolingbroke's oaths may be estimated from what he did, better than from what he said. Richard promptly granted these demands; but that did not prevent the truthful and honourable Harry Bolingbroke from proceeding to do what he probably intended to do from the first, viz. to imprison Richard, and to seize the crown himself. Northumberland, who was destined to give the successful usurper a great deal of trouble, probably knew from the first what Bolingbroke's intentions were. 235. Line 149: My GAY APPAREL for an almsman's gown.-Richard's extravagance in dress, not only in his own person, but in the liveries of his courtiers and attendants of all kinds, is frequently alluded to in the Egerton MS. play, and is thus noticed by Holinshed: "And in gorgious and costlie apparell they exceeded all measure, not one of them that kept within the bounds of his degree. Yeomen and groomes were clothed in silkes, with cloth of graine and skarlet, ouer sumptuous ye may be sure for their estates. And this vanitie was not onelie vsed in the court in those daies, but also other people abroad in the towns and countries, had their garments cut far otherwise than had beene accustomed before his daies, with imbroderies, rich furres, and goldsmiths worke, and euerie daie there was deuising of new fashions, to the great hinderance and decaie of the commonwelth" (vol. ii. p. 868). 236. Line 162: Our sighs and they shall LODGE the summer corn.-Compare II. Henry VI. iii. 2. 176: Like to the summer's corn by tempest lodg'd. 237. Line 176: in the BASE COURT.-Derived from French, basse cour, the outer court of the castle, surrounded by stables and servants' offices; generally on a lower level than the inner court, which was surrounded by the dwell ing-rooms, chapel, &c. Steeven's quotes Greene's Farewell to Follie (1617): "--began, at the entrance into the base court, to use these words." 238. Lines 194, 195: yourt heart is up, I know, Thus high at least [Touching his own head]. This is always a great point with the actor of Richard II. Charles Kean, copying his father, produced much effect in this speech. The meaning is, of course, that Bolingbroke is aiming at the crown. 239. Lines 204, 205: Cousin, I am too YOUNG to be your FATHER, Bolingbroke and Richard were both born in the year 1366; they were now both thirty-three years old. 240. Line 209: Then I must not say no.-Stowe gives the following account of their setting out from Flint: "The duke with a high sharpe voyce bade bring forth the kings horses, and then two little nagges, not worth forty franks, were brought forth; the king was set on the one, and the earle of Salisburie on the other: and thus the duke brought the king from Chester, where he was delivered to the duke of Glocesters sonne and to the earle of Arundel's sonne, (that loved him but little, for he had put their fathers to death,) who led him straight to the castle" (see Var. Ed. vol. xvi. p. 115). ACT III. SCENE 4. 241. Line 1.-The scene is laid at Langley (now called King's Langley), the Duke of York's palace, near St. Alban's. In ii. 2. 116, York says to the queen: "Come, cousin, I'll dispose of you;" see also iii. 1. 36. According to the French (anonymous) chronicler, who wrote an account of "The Betrayal and Death of Richard II. King of England," the queen, after Richard's departure, retired to Wallingford. Lingard says that "The Earl of Wiltshire, with Bussy and Greene, members of the committee of parliament, had been appointed to wait on the young queen at Wallingford; but they suddenly abandoned their charge, and fled with precipitation to Bristol" (vol. iii. p. 384). This scene, in Charles Kean's arrangement of this play, is the first scene of act iv. 242. Line 4: the world is full of RUBS.-At the game of bowls a rub means when a bowl is stopped in its course by some inequality of the ground. Richardson (sub voce) quotes from Wood's Athenæ Oxon. vol. i. the following passage: "He (Elmer) used for recreation to bowl in a garden, and Martin Marprelate thence took this taunting scoff, that the Bishop would cry Rub, rub, rub, to his bowl, and, when twas gone too far, say, the devil go with it, and then, quoth he the bishop would follow." 243. Line 19: Madam, I'll SING-It was probably this line which suggested the introduction of the song in the revival of this play at Drury Lane in 1815, in which Edmund Kean appeared. (See our Introduction, p. 335.) 244. Lines 22, 23: And I could WEEP, would weeping do me good, Qq. and Ff. read, "And I could sing," which Pope altered to weep, an emendation fully justified by line 23. We have followed the Variorum, Dyce, and Singer in adopting it. 245. Line 32: Give some SUPPORTANCE.-Used by Shakespeare only in this passage, and in Twelfth Night (iii. 4. 329): "for the supportance of his vow." 246. Line 46: Her KNOTS disorder'd.-Compare Love's Labour's Lost (i. 1. 249): "thy curious-knotted garden." See note 16 of that play in our edition. 247. Line 57: WE at time of year.-We is omitted in Qq. and Ff. it was first supplied by Capell. Both sense and metre absolutely require it. 248. Line 72: 0, I am PRESS'D TO DEATH.-This alludes to the old punishment of peine forte et dure, inflicted on those who declined to plead to the indictment against them; it consisted in piling weights on the wretched victim's chest. Compare Much Ado (iii. 1. 76): "press me to death with wit." 249. Lines 73, 74: THOU, [She pauses, as if half-choked by her emotion] Old Adam's likeness, set to dress this garden, HOW DARES Thy harsh rude tongue sound this unpleasing news? Printed as two lines only in Qq. and Ff.: Thou, old Adam's likeness, set to dress this garden How dares thy harsh rude tongue sound this unpleasing news? F. 2, Q. 5, F. 3, F. 4 omit rude in second line. Pope omits old in first line, and harsh, rude in second line; but this is rather an arbitrary proceeding. It is evident that the lines as arranged in the old copies are anything but rhythmical. We have arranged them as above, believing that the detached syllables Thou, and How dares, express the violent agitation of the queen's feelings, and were not intended to form part of either line. 250. Line 105: I'll set a bank of RUE, sour HERB OF GRACE. This plant (Ruta graveolens) was once much cultivated in English gardens for its medicinal qualities. Rue is, of course, an English form of the Latin name; but as to rue means "to be sorry," and so "to repent," and as repentance is the chief sign of grace, it came to be called "Herb of Grace." Loudon, writing in 1838, said “it is to this day called Ave Grace in Sussex.” Its specific Latin name graveolens is derived from its strong aromatic smell; it has a very bitter taste, and was used extensively in old prescriptions. To its supposed quality as an eyesalve Milton alludes in Paradise Lost: then purg'd with euphrasy and rue The visual nerve, for he had much to see. -Book xi. lines 414. 415. Dr. Daubeny says of it, "it is a powerful stimulant and narcotic, but not much used in modern practice" (see Ellacombe's Plant Lore of Shakespeare, p. 205). Rue is frequently mentioned in Shakespeare. Compare Hamlet (iv. 5. 181, 182): "there's rue for you; and here's some for me: we may call it herb-grace o' Sundays." ACT IV. SCENE 1. 251. Line 1.-Westminster Hall had been rebuilt by Richard; the work was commenced in 1397, and completed in 1399. The first Parliament held in the new building, was summoned for the purpose of dethroning Richard. Shakespeare has, in this scene, mixed up the proceedings of two Parliaments, that which met on September 30th, 1399, the writs for which were issued in King Richard's name; and that which met on October 6th, having been summoned by Henry immediately on his assuming the crown. It was in the latter Parliament, on October 19th, that the accusations against the Duke of Aumerle (Albemarle) were made. 252. Line 10: In that DEAD time.-It is doubtful whether dead here means "dark and dreary" as the Clarendon Press Edd. explain it, or "deadly" as Schmidt explains it. In Hamlet (i. 1. 65) we have "jump at this dead hour," i.e. midnight, the hour when nearly all life is apparently dead (in sleep). In Mids. Night's Dream (iii. 2. 57): So should a murderer look, so dead, so grim. The word, certainly, seems to mean "deadly;" unless it means, as we say now, "so deadly pale." 253. Line 12: the RESTFUL English court, probably means "quiet," "peaceful." Compare Sonn. lxvi. 1: Tir'd with all these, for restful death I cry. Some explain it as "stationary;" while the Clarendon Press Edd. give the sense as "quiet, reposing; because it had no need to act, but only to give orders." The simplest meaning, ie. "peaceful," is most likely to be the right one here; as England was, at the time alluded to, at peace with all foreign powers. 254. Line 21: Shall I so much dishonour MY FAIR STARS. -This, undoubtedly, means "Shall I dishonour my birth?" and refers to the common belief that the stars influenced the circumstances of one's birth. In Holland's Translation of Pliny's Natural History (bk. ii. chap, viii.) we find: "The Starres which we said were fixed in the heaven, are not (as the common sort thinketh) assigned to every one of us; and appointed to men respectively: namely, the bright and faire for the rich; the lesse for the poore: the dimme for the weak, the aged and feeble; neither shine they out more or lesse, according to the lot and fortune of every one, nor arise they each one together with that person unto whom they are appropriate; and die likewise with the same: ne yet as they set and fall, do they signifie that any bodie is dead." Compare All's Well (i. 1. 196, 197): we the poorer born Whose baser stars do shut us up in wishes. 255. Line 29: To STAIN the TEMPER of my knightly SWORD.-Compare I. Henry IV. (v. 2. 94): A sword, whose temper I intend to stain With the best blood that I can meet withal. The Clarendon Press Edd. say: "The harder the steel the brighter polish would it take, hence the polish may be taken as a measure of the temper.” 256. Line 38: If thou DENI'ST it twenty times, thou liest. -Printed deniest in F. 1. The elision of the e is not attended to so carefully, in the first Folio, with regard to those words ending in iest, ied, as with regard to others in which such elision is necessary for the metre. The reader who has a sensitive ear will notice that this line is singularly cacophonous, owing to the letter t occurring so often in close succession. 257. Line 52: I task THEE to the like. This is Capell's reading. Q. 1 reads "I taske the earth to the like:" Q. 2, Q. 3, Q. 4" take the earth." 258. Line 55: From SUN to SUN-i.e. from sunrise to sunset. Compare Cymbeline (iii. 2. 69-71): How many score of miles may we well ride 'Twixt hour and hour? Pis One score 'twixt sun and sun, It may mean from sunrise on one day to sunrise on the 259. Line 65: Dishonourable BOY!-Fitzwater was, at this time, thirty-one years old; so that the word boy is applied contemptuously. Compare Coriolanus (v. 6. 101): Name not the god, thou boy of tears! and subsequent lines 104, 113, 117, where Coriolanus resents the term boy with the greatest indignation. 260. Line 67: VENGEANCE and REVENGE.-This tautology was not unusual where it was sought to express intensity. Instances of it occur frequently in the Liturgy of the Church of England. 261. Line 74: I dare meet Surrey in a WILDERNESS.Johnson thus explains this line: "I dare meet him where no help can be had by me against him." Compare Beaumont and Fletcher, Lover's Progress (v. 2): Maintain thy treason with thy sword? With what I durst encounter it. 262. Lines 97, 98: -Works, vol. ii. p. 658. and there at Venice gave His body to that pleasant country's earth. Holinshed says: "The Duke of Norfolke departed sorrowfullie out of the realme into Almanie, and at the last came to Venice, where he for thought and melancholie deceassed" (vol. ii. p. 848). Holinshed subsequently alludes to his death (vol. iii. p. 9) as taking place some time in this year (1399). According to Lingard: "Norfolk, after a short residence in Germany, visited Jerusalem, and in his return died of a broken heart at Venice" (vol. iii. p. 379). He gives the date in the margin, apparently on the authority of Rymer, as September 29th, 1399. Richard's deposition took place on September 30th, and therefore Norfolk's death could not then have been known in England. 263. Lines 103, 104: Sweet peace conduct his sweet soul to the BOSOM Compare Richard III. (iv. 3. 38): The sons of Edward sleep in Abraham's bosom. 264. Line 112: of that name the fourth.-So Ff.: Qq. read fourth of that name. 265. Line 116: Yet best BESEEMING ME to speak the truth -i.e. "Yet I speak as best befitting me (being a bishop) to speak the truth." Johnson suggests: Yet best beseems it me to speak the truth. But the construction is not more lax than many which occur in Shakespeare. 266. Line 141.-Shall KIN with KIN and KIND with KIND confound.-Kin refers to blood-relationship; kind to our common human nature. Compare Hamlet (i. 2. 65): A little more than kin, and less than kind. 267. Line 149: Lest CHILD, CHILD'S children.-So all the old copies. Pope, quite unnecessarily, reads "children's children," which Dyce and other editors adopt. 268. Lines 155-318.-These lines (165 in all) are not found in Q. 1, Q. 2; but Q. 3, Q. 4 both give them, though not so carefully printed as in F. 1. Whether the lines were added by Shakespeare after 1598 (the date of Q. 2), or whether they formed part of the original play, but were omitted out of respect for the susceptibility of Queen Elizabeth, is not certain. Looking at them from a dramatist's point of view, as they do not in the least advance the action of the piece, they bear the appearance of having been inserted in order "to write up" the part of Richard, for the sake of the actor. 269. Lines 183-187.-With these lines compare the following passage in Day's Ile of Gulls (ii. 3): "I can compare my lord and his friend to nothing in the world so fitly as to a couple of water-buckets; for whilst hope winds the one rp dispaire plunges the other downe" [Works, p. 40 (of play)]. 270. Lines 196, 197: My CARE is loss of CARE, by old CARE done; Your CARE is gain of CARE, by new CARE won. The meaning of this tiresome jingle is: "My sorrow is loss of the care attending the office of king, by the cessation of that office; your trouble is the gain of care by having won that office with all the anxieties attending on it." 271. Line 210: all DUTY'S RITES.-Q. 3, Q. 4 have duties rites: Ff. Q. 5 (substantially) duteous oaths. The reading in our text seems the preferable one, the meaning being "the ceremonial observances due from subjects to their sovereign." 272. Line 215: God keep all vows unbroke ARE MADE to thee! So Ff. Q. 5; it is a common elliptical construction "(that) are made." Q. 3, Q. 4 read that swear to thee, a reading which seems to be little better than nonsense; but some editors prefer it. I do not understand why the Camb. Edd., after saying in their preface that F. 1 is our highest authority for this scene, deliberately adopt the faulty reading of Q. 3, Q. 4. 273. Line 225: Against the STATE AND PROFIT of this land.-Hunter explains these words "the constitution and prosperity," which is probably the right explanation. 274. Line 232: To read a LECTURE of them-i.e. to read them aloud. Compare As You Like It (iii. 2. 365): "I have heard him read many lectures against it." Lecture properly means nothing more than " the act of reading." 275. Lines 255-257: I have no name, no title,- It may be asked how could Richard's baptismal name be said to be usurp'd? The general explanation given is that, in resigning his crown, he had resigned all the privileges of his birth. But may not Richard allude to the accusation of bastardy, brought against him by some of the people, when he was being sent from Westminster to the Tower (on August 31st, 1399), "The king . . . as he went along, was greeted with curses, and the appellation of 'the bastard,' a word of ominous import, and prophetic of his approaching degradation." "This alluded" (adds Lingard in a note) "to a report which had been spread that he was not the son of the Black Prince, but of a canon of Bordeaux" (see Lingard, vol. iii. p. 392). Prince. Is it upon record, or else reported Successively from age to age, he built it? Buck. Upon record, my gracious lord. In that passage Shakespeare gives what is, probably, the May tear a passage through the flinty ribs 281. Lines 11, 12: Ah, thou, the MODEL where old Troy did stand, Thou Thou MAP of honour, thou King Richard's tomb. Malone says: "Model, it has already been observed, is used by our author, for a thing made after a pattern. He is, I believe, singular in this use of the word. ruined majesty, says the queen, that resemblest the desolated waste where Troy once stood" (Var. Ed. vol. xvi. p. 140). The Clarendon Press Edd. explain it thus: "the groundplan of the ruined city, to be traced only by the foundations of the walls. So Richard is only the ruin of his former self." Map of honour seems to mean not the mere outline, but the lifeless picture of honour. In II. Henry VI. (iii. 1. 202, 203) we have the same expression in a different Alluding to the fratres jurati, or sworn brothers, who, in the age of chivalry, swore to share their fortunes together. Compare Much Ado (i. 1. 72, 73): "He hath every month a new sworn brother." 284. Line 23: And cloister thee in some RELIGIOUS HOUSE. A religious house is, of course, a monastery. Compare As You Like It (v. 4. 187): The duke hath put on a religious life. 285. Line 25: Which our profane hours here have STRICKEN down. -As referring to the child-queen Isabel, this line is nonsense; and Richard's first queen was without a stain of scandal. She was always called "The good Queen Anne." Stricken is used in Julius Cæsar (ii. 1. 192): "The clock hath stricken three." 286. Line 34: WHICH art a lion and a king of beasts.For this use of the neuter relative for the masculine, compare the Anglican version of the Lord's Prayer: "Our Father which art in heaven." The Roman Catholic version has who. 287. Lines 46, 47: the senseless brands will SYMPATHIZE The heavy accent of thy moving tongue. Compare, for the transitive use of sympathize, Love's Labour's Lost (iii. i. 52, 53): “A message well sympathized; a horse to be ambassador for an ass.' 288. Lines 55-68.-The prophecy contained in this speech was fulfilled; Northumberland proving afterwards to Henry IV. one of the most troublesome of his rebellious subjects. See above, note 13. 289. Lines 74, 75: Let me UNKISS the oath 'twixt thee and me; This refers to the kiss of betrothal See Two Gentlemen of Verona, note 39; Taming of the Shrew, note 120. 290. Line 80: Sent back like HALLOWMAS or SHORT'st of DAY.-Hallowmas was All Souls Day, the 2nd of November, not the 1st, which is All Saints, the eve of All Souls (see Two Gentlemen of Verona, note 34). It certainly was not the shortest day, even in Shakespeare's time, when it was ten days nearer the winter solstice; nor do I believe the proper sense of the passage requires us to take Hallowmas and the short'st of day to be identical. Richard says his wife set forth in pomp," and "came adorned hither like sweet May;" now she is sent back like the sad season, when the souls of the dead are prayed for, and all the world recalls its losses by death, or the shortest day, when there is little or no sunshine as there is in May. For the expression short'st of day = shortest day, compare Macbeth (iii. 1. 118): "my near'st of life"="my_nearest life." palace at Langley, for Holinshed says: "this earle of Rutland departing before from Westminster to see his father the duke of Yorke," &c. (vol. iii. p. 10), which makes it clear the Duke of York was not then in London. Langley, or King's Langley, is nearer Windsor (where the king now was) than London is. 293. Lines 15-17: and that all the walls With painted imagery had said at once "Jesu preserve thee! welcome, Bolingbroke!" Shakespeare does not say that the walls "were hung" with painted imagery, but that "you would have thought they were.' ." No doubt, as Malone suggests, he was thinking of the painted cloths "that were hung in the streets, in the pageants that were exhibited in his own time; in which the figures sometimes had labels issuing from their mouths containing sentences of gratulation" (Var. Ed. vol. xvi. p. 147). 294. Line 28: Did scowl on Richard; no man cried "God save him!”—Qq. print "gentle Richard:" Ff. omit gentle. As the epithet gentle occurs below (line 31), we have followed the Ff. in omitting it here, the omission being a great improvement to the metre. 295. Line 37.-The beautiful description comprised in lines 7-36 was, as far as we know, derived from no historical or traditionary source. No one can fail to notice the sudden descent into bald commonplace which characterizes lines 37-45. The contrast is so great, that it is impossible not to suspect that Shakespeare had an older and inferior play before him when he was at work on this tragedy. 296. Lines 42, 43: But that is lost for being Richard's friend, And, madam, you must call him RUTLAND now. Holinshed says, speaking of the transactions of the first parliament of Henry IV.: "Finallie, to auoid further inconuenience, and to qualifie the minds of the enuious, it was finallie enacted, that such as were appellants in the last parlement against the duke of Glocester and other, should in this wise following be ordred. The dukes of Aumarle, Surrie, and Excester there present, were judged to loose their names of dukes, togither with the honors, titles and dignities therevnto belonging" (vol. iii. p. 7). 297. Lines 46, 47: Welcome, my son: who are the VIOLETS now That strew the GREEN LAP of the new-come SPRING? The spring is the reign of Bolingbroke; the violets, his earliest courtiers. Compare Milton, Song on May Morning, lines 3, 4: The flowery May, who from her green lap throws 298. Line 52: What news from Oxford? hold those justs and triumphs? - Holinshed thus describes the plan of the conspirators: "at length by the aduise of the earle of Huntington it was deuised, that they should take vpon them a solemne iusts to be enterprised betweene him and 20 on his part, and the earle of Salisburie and 20 with him at Oxford, to the which triumph k. Henrie should be |