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ACT IV.

WHO meets us here ?--my niece Plantagenet,

Led in the hand of her kind aunt of Gloster?] Here is a manifest intimation that the dutchess of Gloster leads in somebody in her hand; but there is no direction marked in any of the copies, from which we can learn who it is. I have ventured to guess it must be Clarence's young daughter. The old dutchess of York calls her niece, i. e. grand-daughter; as grand-children are frequently called nephews.

THEOBALD.

28. I may not leave it so;] That is, I may not so resign my office, which you offer to take on you at your peril. JOHNSON.

62. Were red-hot steel, to seer me to the brain!] Shẹ seems to allude to the ancient mode of punishing a regicide, viz. by placing a crown of iron heated redhot, upon his head. In the Tragedy of Hoffman, 1631, this punishment is introduced;

"Fix on thy master's head my burning crown. Again:

“And wear his crown made hot with flaming fire.

"Bring forth the burning crown there."

"To have his head sear'd with a burning crown.”

In some of the monkish accounts of a place of future torment, a burning crown is appropriated to those who deprived any lawful monarch of his kingdom.

STEEVENS. 84. For never yet one hour in his bed] Hour is here, as in many other places, used by Shakspere as a dissyllable. MALONE.

86. But with his timorous dreams- -] It is recorded by Polydore Virgil, that Richard was frequently disturbed by terrible dreams: this is therefore no fiction. JOHNSON.

98.

Romeo and Juliet:

of teen.] Teen is sorrow.

"And yet to my teen be it spoken," &c. Again, in the Return from Parnassus, 1606:

So, in

"Flies have their spleen, each silly ant his teens." STEEVENS.

103. Rude ragged nurse! old sullen play-fellow] To call the Tower nurse and play-fellow is very harsh : perhaps part of this speech is addressed to the Tower, and part to the lieutenant. JOHNSON.

105. So foolish sorrow bids your stones farewel.] Hither the third act should be extended, and here it very properly ends with a pause of action.

JOHNSON. 113. Ah, Buckingham, now do I play the touch,] To play the touch, is to represent the touchstone.

So, in the 16th Song of Drayton's Polyolbion: "With alabaster, tuch, and porphyry adorn'd."

Again, in the epistle of Mary the French Queen to Charles Brandon, by Drayton :

"Before mine eye, like touch, thy shape did prove."

Again, in Spenser's Faery Queen, B. I. c. iii: "Though true as touch, though daughter of a king."

STEEVENS.

133. -see, he gnaws his lip.] Several of our ancient historians observe, that this was an accustomed action of Richard, whether he was pensive or angry. STEEVENS.

135. And unrespective boys:] Unrespective is inattentive, taking no notice, inconsiderate. So, in Daniel's Cleopatra, 1599:

"When dissolute impiety possess'd

"The unrespective minds of prince and people."

141.

STEEVENS,

close exploit-] Is secret act.

JOHNSON. 149. witty-] In this place signifies judicious or cunning. A wit was not at this time employed to signify a man of fancy, but was used for wisdom or judgment. So, in Daniel's Cleopatra, 1599:

"Although unwise to live, had wit to die.”

Again:

"And at her feet do witty serpents move."

170.

So far in blood, that sin will pluck on sin.]

The

The same reflections occur in Macbeth:

"I am in blood

"Step'd in so far, that should I wade no more,
"Returning were as tedious," &c.

Again:

"Things bad begun make strong themselves by ill." STEEVENS.

173. Is thy name— -Tyrrel?] It seems, that a late editor (who boasts much of his fidelity in "marking the places of action, both general and particular, and supplying scenical directions”), throughout this scene, has left king Richard on his throne; whereas he might have learnt, from the following passage in Sir John Harrington's Metamorphosis of Ajax, 1596, that the monarch appeared, during the present interview with Tyrrel, on an elevation of much less dignity. "The best part (says Sir John) of our chronicles, in all men's opinions, is that of Richard the third, written as I have heard by Moorton, but as most suppose, by that worthy and incorrupt magistrate Sir Thomas More, sometime lord chancellor of England, where it is said, how the king was devising with Teril to have his nephews privily murdred ;. and it is added, he was then sitting on a draught; a fit carpet for such a counsel." See likewise Holinshed, Vol. II. p. 735. STEEVENS.

205. A king!-perhaps-] From hence to the words, Thou troublest me, I am not in the vein-have been left out ever since the first editions, but I like them well enough to replace them,

POPE.
The

The allusions to the plays of Henry VI. are no weak proofs of the authenticity of these disputed pieces. JOHNSON.

223. Because that, like a Jack, &c.] An image, like those at Dunstan's church in Fleet-street, and at the market-houses at several towns in this kingdom, was usually called a Jack of the clock-house. See Cowley's Discourse on the Government of Oliver Cromwell. Richard resembles Buckingham to one of those automatons, and bids him not suspend the stroke on the clock-bell, but strike, that the hour may be past, and himself be at liberty to pursue his meditations.

Sir J. HAWKINS.

1610" their still in labour."

So, in The Fleire, a comedy, tongues are, like a Jack o' the clock, Again, in The Coxcomb, by Beaumont and Fletcher: -Is this your Jack o' the clock-house?

"Will you strike, sir?"

Again, in a pamphlet by Deckar, called the Gul's Horn-booke, 1609: 66 -but howsoever, if Powles Jacks be once up with their elbowes, and quarrelling to strike eleven, as soon as ever the clock has parted them, and ended the fray with his hammer, let not the duke's gallery conteyne you any longer."

In Lantern and Candle-light, or the Belman's Second Night-Walk, &c. by Decker, is a passage "of a new and cunning drawing of money from gentlemen," which may tend to a somewhat different explanation. "There is another fraternitie of wandring pilgrims, who merrily call themselves Jackes of the Clock-house.

The