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Again, in Orlando Furioso, 1599:

"I am the man that did the slave to death.”

STEEVENS.

113. And very well, &c.] This line I have restored from the old quartos. STEEVENS.

130. like the night-owl's lazy flight,] Warwick compares the languid blows of his soldiers, to the lazy strokes which the wings of the owl give to the air in its flight, which is remarkably slow.

143. Edw. to England?

War.

MONCK MASON.

-when came George from Burgundy

-he was lately sent

From your kind aunt, dutchess of Burgundy, With aid of Soldiers to this needful war.] This circumstance is not warranted by history. Clarence and Gloucester (as they were afterwards created) were sent into Flanders immediately after the battle of Wakefield, and did not return until their brother Edward got possession of the crown. Besides, Clarence was not now more than twelve years old.

Isabel, dutchess of Burgundy, whom Shakspere calls the duke's aunt, was daughter of John I. king of Portugal, by Philippa of Lancaster, eldest daughter of John of Gaunt. They were, therefore, no more than third cousins. REMARKS.

169. haught Northumberland,] So Grafton in his Chronicle says, p. 417: 66 the lord Henry

Percy, whom the Scottes for his haut and valiant

courage called Sir Henry Hotspurre."

Bij

PERCY.

The

The word is common to many writers. So, in Marlow's K. Edward II. 1622:

"This haught resolve becomes your majesty.” Again, in Kyd's Cornelia, 1595:

"Pompey, that second Mars, whose haught renown," &c.

Again, in Lilly's Woman in the Moon, 1597:

"Thymind as haught as Jupiter's high thoughts."

171.

STEEVENS. -the easy melting king like wax] So,

again in this play of the Lady Gray:

"As red as fire; nay, then her wax must melt.”

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257. Whose father, &c.] Alluding to a common proverb:

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Happy the child whose father went to the devil."

JOHNSON. 262. Than in possession any jot of pleasure.-] Thus the folio. The quarto thus:

Than may the present profit countervaile. STEEVENS. 277. -thirty thousand- -] The quarto reads fifty thousand.

STEEVENS.

281. Darraign] That is, Range your host, put your host in order.

JOHNSON,

Chaucer

Chaucer, Skelton, and Spenser, use this word. So, in Guy Earl of Warwick, a Tragical History, 1661: "Darraign our battles, and begin the fight." The quartos read-Prepare your battles, &c.

STEEVENS.

282. I would, your highness would depart the field; The queen, &c.] This superstitious belief, relative to the fortunes of our unhappy prince, is yet more circumstantially introduced by Drayton in The Miseries of Queen Margaret:

"Some think that Warwick had not lost the
day,

"But that the king into the field he brought;
"For with the worse that side went still away
"Which had king Henry with them when they
fought;

"Upon his birth so sad a curse they lay,

"As that he never prospered in aught.

"The queen wan two, among the loss of

many,

"Her husband absent; present never any."

STEEVENS.

298. Since when, &c.] The quartos give the remainder of this speech to Clarence, and read:

To blot our brother out, &c.

STEEVENS.

313. Your legs did better service than your hands.]

An allusion to the proverb,

"One pair of heels is worth two pair of hands."

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333. -I am resolv'd.] It is my firm persuasion;

I am no longer in doubt.

345.

JOHNSON.

-mis-shapen, stigmatick,] "A stigma.

tick, says J. Bullokar in his English Expositor, 1616, " is a notorious lewd fellow, which hath been burnt with a hot iron, or beareth other marks about him as a token of his punishment."

The word is likewise used in Drayton's epistle from Q. Margaret, to W. de la Poole:

“That foul, ill favour'd, crook-back'd stigmamatic."

Again, in Drayton's epistle from K. John to Matilda: "These for the crook'd, the halt, the stigmaSTEEVENS.

tic."

347. —-lizards' dreadful stings.] Thus the folio. The quartos have this variation:

-or lizards' fainting looks.

This is the second time that Shakspere has armed the lizard (which in reality has no such defence) with a sting; but great powers seem to have been imputed to its looks. So, in Noah's Flood, by Drayton : "The lizard shuts up his sharp-sighted eyes, Amongst the serpents, and there sadly lies." STEEVENS.

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348. gold.

gilt,] Gilt is a superficial covering of STELVENS.

352. To let thy tongue detect] To shew thy meanness of birth by the indecency of language with

which thou railest at my deformity.

JOHNSON.

352. To let thy tongue detect thy base-born heart?] So the folio. The quartos:

To parley thus with England's lawful heirs.

STEEVENS.

353. A wisp of straw- -] I believe that a wisp signified some instrument of correction used in the time of Shakspere. The following instance seems to favour the supposition. See a Woman never Vexed, a comedy, by Rowley, 1632:

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"Nay worse;—I'll stain thy ruff; nay, worse

than that,

"I'll do thus

[Holds up a wisp.

-dost wisp me, thou tatterdemallion ?"

Again in Marston's Dutch Courtezan, 1604:

"Thou little more than a dwarf, and something less than a woman!

"Cris. A wispe! a wispe! a wispe!”

Barrett in his Alveari, or Quadruple Dictionary, 1580, interprets the word wispe by peniculus or Toyos, which signify any thing to wipe or cleanse with; a cook's linen apron, &c. Pewter is still scoured by a wispe of straw, or hay. Perhaps Edward means one of these wisps, as the denotement of a menial servant. Barrett adds, that like a wase it signifies " a wreath to be laied under the vessel that is borne upon the head, as women use.". If this be its true sense, the prince may think that such a wisp would better become the head of Margaret, than a crown.

It appears, however, from the following passage in Thomas Drant's translation of the seventh satire of

Horace,

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