"I was not ignoble of descent."—Act IV. Sc. 1.

Lady Elizabeth, Edward IV.'s queen, was the daughter of Sir Richard Widville, afterwards earl of Rivers; her mother was Jaqueline, duchess dowager of Bedford, who was daughter to Peter of Luxemburgh, earl of St. Paul, and widow of John, duke of Bedford, the brother of Henry V. MALONE.

"This pretty lad will prove our country's bliss.”—Act IV. Sc. 6. When Richmond, whose future grandeur is here prophesied, became king, his gratitude to Henry VI. for his early presage in his favour, made him solicit Pope Julius to canonize him as a saint; but either Henry VII. would not pay the money demanded, or, as Bacon supposes, the pope refused, lest "as Henry was reputed in the world abroad but as a simple man, the estimation of that kind of honour might be diminished, if there were not a distance kept between innocents and saints."-MALONE.

During the contest between the houses of York and Lancaster, sixteen battles were fought, and upwards of ninety thousand persons were slain. This carnage, though considerable, sinks into insignificance when we remember the battles of Moskwa, Leipsic, and Waterloo.

KING RICHARD III.

"He hearkens after prophecies and dreams.”—Act I. Sc. 1. "Some have reported, that the cause of this nobleman's death (the duke of Clarence) rose of a foolish prophecie, which was, that after King Edward should raigne one whose first letter of his name should be a G; wherewith the king and the queen were sore troubled, and began to conceive a grievous grudge against this duke, and could not be quiet till they had brought him to his end."-HOLINSHED.

Some historians say, that when Clarence endeavoured to obtain in marriage Mary, the daughter and heiress of the duke of Burgundy, his brother, King Edward, was displeased, because he wished to unite that lady with Rivers, the queen's brother; and in this way the breach between the brothers has been explained.-- MALONE.

Open their congeal'd mouths, and bleed afresh."—Act I. Sc. 2.

It is a tradition very generally received, that the murdered body bleeds on the touch of the murderer. This was so much believed by Sir Kenelm Digby, that he has endeavoured to explain the cause.—JOHNSON.

“Pattern of thy butcheries.”—Act I. Sc. 2.

"The dead corps, on the Ascension even, was conveied with bills and glaives, pompouslie (if you will call that a funeral pompe) from the Tower to the church of Saint Paule, and there laid on a beire or coffin bare faced; the same in the presence of the beholders, did bleed, where it rested the space of one whole daie. From thence he was carried to the Blackfriars, and bled there likewise."-HOLINSHED.

Crosby-place is now Crosby-square, in Bishopsgate-street; part of the house is yet remaining, and is a meeting-place for a presbyterian congre gation. This magnificent mansion was built in the year 1466, by Sir John Crosby, grocer and woolman. Sir J. Crosby's tomb is in the neighbouring church of St. Helen the Great.-STEEVENS.

"The Countess Richmond."-Act I. Sc. 3.

Margaret, daughter to John Beaufort, first duke of Somerset, after the death of her first husband, Edmund Tudor, earl of Richmond, half-brother to King Henry VI., by whom she had only one son, afterwards King Henry VII.; she married next Sir Henry Stafford, uncle to Humphrey, duke of Buckingham.-MALONE.

"Wert thou not banished on pain of death ?”—Act I. Sc. 3.

Margaret fled into France after the battle of Hexham, in 1464, and Edward thereupon issued a proclamation, prohibiting any of his subjects from aiding her to return, or harbouring her, should she revisit England. On the 14th of April, 1471, she landed at Weymouth. After the battle of Tewksbury, in the same year, she was confined in the Tower, where she continued till 1475, when she was ransomed by her father, Regnier, and removed to France, where she died in 1482. The present scene is in 1477, so that her appearance here is a mere poetical fiction.—Malone.

"Your brother Gloster hates you."-Act I. Sc. 4.

Gloster hated Clarence, because he would not share with him that moiety of the estate of the great earl of Warwick, to which Gloster was entitled on his marriage with the younger sister of the duchess of Clarence, Lady Ann Nevill, who had been betrothed to Edward, prince of Wales. This seems proved by a letter from Sir John Paston to his brother, dated Feb. 14, 1471:-" Yesterday, the king, the queene, my lords of Clarence and Gloster, went to Shene to pardon; men say, not all in charity. The king entreateth my lord of Clarence for my lord of Gloster; and as it is said, he answereth, that he may well have my lady his sisterin-law, but they shall part no livelihood, as he saith; so what will fall can I not say." "-MALONE.

"Welcome, sweet prince, to London, to your chamber."-Act III. Sc. 1. London was anciently called Camera Regis. So, in Heywood's If you know not Me, you know Nobody, 1633:-" This city, our great chamber." POPE.

"Enter Buckingham."—Act III. Sc. 2.

The jesting remarks here given to Buckingham were really made by Sir Thomas Howard, afterwards introduced in this play as earl of Surry. "The same morning ere he (Hastings) were up from his bed, where Shore's wife lay with him all night, there came to him Sir Thomas Haward [Howard], sonne to the Lord Howard, as it were of courtesie, to accompaignie him to the counsaill; but forasmuche as he the Lord Hastings was not readie, he tarried awhile for him, and hasted him away. This Sir Thomas, while the Lord Hastings stayed awhile communyng with a priest whom he met in the Tower strete, broke the lord's tale, saying to him merrily, What, my lord, I pray you come on, wherefore talke you so long with the priest? you have no nede of a priest yet;' and laughed upon him, as though he would saye, you shall have nede of one soone."-Continuation of HARDING'S CHRONICLE.

Dr. John Morton, elected bishop of Ely in 1478, advanced to the see of Canterbury in 14-6, appointed lord-chancellor in 1487, died in 1500. He deserves the gratitude of posterity as having first suggested a marriage between Henry VII. and Elizabeth, the eldest daughter of Edward IV., which union terminated the long and bloody contest between the houses of York and Lancaster.-MALONE.

"Put to death a citizen."-Act III. Sc. 5.

This person was one Walker, a substantial citizen and grocer, at the Crown, in Cheapside.-GREY.

"Baynard's castle."-Act III. Sc. 5.

It was originally built by Baynard, a nobleman, who, according to Stowe, came in with the Conqueror. This edifice, which stood in Thamesstreet, has long been pulled down, though part of its strong foundations are still visible at low water. The site of it is now a timber-yard.

"Doctor Shaw."—Act III. Sc. 5.

STEEVENS.

Shaw and Penker were two popular preachers. Instead of a pamphlet being published to furnish the advocates of the administration with plausible arguments on great political measures, it was formerly usual to publish the court-creed from the pulpit at Saint Paul's cross. As Richard now employed Doctor Shaw to support his claim to the crown; so, about fifteen years before, the great earl of Warwick employed his chaplain, Doctor Goddard, to convince the people that Henry VI. ought to be restored, and that Edward IV. was an usurper.-MALONE.

"The brats of Clarence."-Act III. Sc. 5.

Edward, earl of Warwick, who, after the battle of Bosworth, was sent, by Richmond, to the Tower, without even the shadow of an allegation against him, and executed, with equal injustice, on Tower-hill, Nov 21, 1499; and Margaret, afterwards married to Sir Richard Pole, the last princess of the house of Lancaster, who was restored to her honours in the fifth year of Henry VIII. and in the thirty-first year of his reign (1540), at the age of 70, was put to death by that sanguinary tyrant. The immediate cause of Warwick's being put to death was, that the king of Spain would not marry his daughter Katherine to Arthur, prince of Wales, during his life-time. This murder (for it deserves no other name) made such an impression on Katherine, that when she was informed of Henry's intention to repudiate her, she exclaimed, "I have not offended, but it is a just judgment of God, for my first marriage was made in blood." MALONE.

"With his contract with Lady Lucy."-Act III. Sc. 7.

The king had been familiar with this lady before his marriage, to ob struct which, his mother alleged a precontract between them:-"Whereupon dame Elizabeth Lucy was sent for, and albeit she was by the kyng his mother, and many other, put in goode comfort to affirme that she was assured to the kynge, yet when she was solemnly sworn to saye the truth, she confessed she was never ensured. Howbeit, she sayd his grace spake such lovyinge wordes to her, that she verily hoped he woulde have married her, that yf suche kinde wordes had not bene, she would never have shewed such kindnesse to hym to let hym so kyndely gette her with chylde."-HALL'S CHRONICLE.

"O would to God, that the inclusive verge

Of golden metal, that must round my brow,

Were red-hot steel, to sear me to the brain."-Act IV. Sc. 1.

An allusion to the ancient mode of punishing a regicide, or any othe egregious criminal, by placing a crown of iron, heated red-hot, upon his head.-MALONE.

"The earldom of Hereford."-Act IV. Sc. 2.

Shakspeare makes Richard refuse to grant the Hereford estate to Buckingham, and their quarrel is the consequence in the tragedy. This is contrary to the truth of history. Buckingham actually obtained from Richard III., when he usurped the throne, the earldom of Hereford, and the office of constable of England, which had long been annexed by inheritance to that earldom.-MALONE.

"Lest, being seen, thy brother, tender George,

Be executed."-Act V. Sc. 3.

"The Lord Stanley lodged in the same town (Stafford), and hearing that the earle of Richmond was marching thitherward, gave to him place, dislodging him and his to avoide all suspicion, being afraide least being seen openly to be a factor or ayder to the earle, his son-in-law, before the day of battyle, that King Richard, which yet not utterly put him in diffidence and mistrust, would put to some evil death his son and heir-apparent."- HOLINSHED.

KING HENRY VIII.

"Butcher's cur."-Act I. Sc. 1.

When the duke of Buckingham's death was reported to the Emperor Charles V., he said, "The first buck of England was worried to death by a butcher's dog."-STEEVENS.

"The duke being at the rose."-Act I. Sc. 2.

This house was purchased about the year 1561, by Richard Hill, sometime master of the Merchant-Tailors' Company, and is now the Merchant-Tailors' School, in Suffolk-lane.-WHALLEY.

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Leave these remnants

Of fool, and feather."-Act I. Sc. 3.

"At that time (in the court of Henry VIII.) I was no common squire, no under-trodden torch-bearer; I had my feather in my cap as big as a flag in the foretop, my French doublet gelt in the belly, as though (like a pig readie to be spitted) all my guts had been plucked out; a paire of side-paned hose that hung down like two scales filled with Holland cheeses; my long stock that sate close to my dock, my rapier pendent like a round sticke, &c.; my blacke cloake of black cloth, ouerspreading my backe, lyke a thornbacke on an elephant's eare; and in consummatior of my curiositie, my handes without gloves, all a more French.”

NASHE'S LIFE OF JACKE WITTON, 1594

"Enter the King, and twelve others, as maskers."-Act I. Sc. 4. "Before the king began to dance, they requested leave to accompany the ladies at mumchance. Leave being granted, then went the masquers and first saluted all the dates, and then returned to the most worthiest, and then opened the great cup of gold, filled with crownes and other pieces, to cast at. Thus perusing all the gentlewomen, of some they wonne, and to some they lost. And having viewed all the ladies, they returned to the cardinal with great reverence, pouring downe all their gold, which was above two hundred crowns. At all, quoth the cardinal, and casting the die, he won it; whereat was made great joy." CAVENDISH'S LIFE OF WOLSEY.

"I were unmannerly to take you out,
And not to kiss you."-Act I. Sc. 4.

A kiss was anciently the established fee of a lady's partner. So, in A Dialogue between Custom and Veritie, on the Use and Abuse of Dauncing and Minstrelsie, no date, "Imprinted at London, at the long shop, adjoining unto Saint Mildred's church in the Pultrie, by John Allde," we find the following stanza :

"But some reply, what foole would daunce,

If that when daunce is doon,

He may not have at ladyes lippes
That which in daunce he woon?"

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Your grace,

STEEVENS.

I fear, with dancing is a little heated."-Act I. Sc. 4.

The king, on being discovered, and desired by Wolsey to take his place, said that he would "first go and shift him; and, thereupon, went into the cardinal's bed-chamber, where was a great fire prepared for him, and there he new appareled himself with riche and princelie garments. And in the king's absence the dishes of the banquet were cleane taken away, and the tables covered with new and perfumed clothes. Then the king took his seat under the cloath of estate, commanding every person to sit still as before; and then came in a new banquet before his majestie of two hundred dishes, and so they passed the night in banqueting and dancing till morning."-CAVENDISH'S LIFE OF WOLSEY.

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Norfolk opens a folding door; the king is discovered sitting, and reading pensively."-Act II. Sc. 2..

"Exit lord

The stage direction in the old copy is a singular one. chamberlain, and the King draws the curtain, and sits reading pensively;" and it will enable us to ascertain precisely the state of the theatre in Shakspeare's time. When a person was to be discovered in a different apartment from that in which the original speakers in the scene are exhibited, the method was to place such person in the back part of the stage, behind the curtains which were, occasionally, suspended across it. These the person who was to be discovered (as Henry, in the present case) drew back just at the fit moment. Rowe, looking no further than the modern stage, changed the direction thus:- The scene opens and discovers the king," &c., but besides the folly of introducing scenes when there were none, such an exhibition would be improper, for Norfolk has just said, "Let's in," and, therefore, should himself do some act in order to visit the king. This, indeed, in the simple state of the old stage, was not attended to; the king, very civilly, discovering himself.”—MALONE.

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