2 Out of my grief and my impatience, He should, or he fhould not; for he made me mad, To fee him fhine fo brifk, and fmell fo fweet, And talk fo like a waiting-gentlewoman, Of guns, and drums, and wounds, (God fave the mark!) 3 And telling me, the fovereign'st thing on earth That villainous falt-petre fhould be digg'd 4 Again, in Nash's Lenten Stuff, &c. 1599: " the parrot the popinjay, Philip-fparrow, and the cuckow. In the ancient poem called The Parliament of Birds, bl. 1. this bird is called jay of paradyfe.' STEEVENS. "the popynge It appears from Minfheu that Dr. Johnfon is right. See his Dia, 1617, in v. Parret. MALONE. The old reading may be supported by the following paffage in Barnes's Hiftory of Edward III. p. 786: "The efquire fought fill, until the wounds began with lofs of blood to cool and fmart. TOLLET. So, in Mortimeriados, by Michael Drayton, 4to. 1596: "As when the blood is cold, we feel the wound MALONE. grief-] i. e. pain. In our ancient tranflations of phyfical treatifes, dolor ventris is commonly called belly-grief. 3 STEEVENS. Spermaceti, for an inward bruife; ] So, in Sir T. Overbury's Characters, 1616: [An ordinary Fencer. ] "His wounds are feldom skin-deepe; for an inward bruife lambftones and sweetebreads are his only spermaceti. BOWLE. 4 but for thefe vile guns, &c.] A fimilar thought occurs in Questions of profitable and plenfant Concernings, &c. 1504, p. 11: "I confeffe thofe gunnes are diuellifh things, and make many men runne away that other wayes would not turne their heads. STEEVENS, He would himself have been a foldier. This bald unjointed chat of his, my lord, And, I beseech you, let not his report Come current for an accufation, Betwixt my love and your high majefly. BLUNT. The circumftance confider'd, good my lord, Whatever Harry Percy then had said, To do him wrong, or any way impeach; K. HEN. Why, yet he doth deny his prisoners; But with provifo, and exception, That we, at our own charge, fhall ransom straight His brother-in-law, the foolish Mortimer; 5 Let what he then said now. JOHNSON. Shakspeare has fallen Lord Mortimer. Before play, he is repeatedly In A& II. Lady Percy And yet when he enters aunt, which in fact he 4 To do him wrong, or any way impeach; What then he faid, fo he unfay it now. ] never rife to impeach him, fo he unfay it 5 His brother-in-law, the foolish Mortimer; into fome contradictions with regard to this he makes his perfonal appearance in the fpoken of as Hotfpur's brother in- law. exprefsly calls him her brother Mortimer. in the third act, he calls Lady Percy his was, and not his fifter. This inconfiftence may be accounted for as follows. It appears both from Dugdale's and Sandford's account of the Mortimer family, that there were two of them taken prifoners at different times by Glendower, each of them bearing the name of Edmund; one being Edmund earl of March, nephew to Lady Percy, and the proper Mortimer of this play; the other, Sir Edmund Mortimer, uncle to the former, and brother to Lady Percy. Shakspeare confounds the two perfons. STEEVENS. Another caufe alfo may be affigned for this confufion. Henry Percy, according to the accounts of our old hiftorians, married Eleanor, the fifter of Roger Earl of March, who was the father of the Edmund Earl of March that appears in the prefent play. But Who, on my foul, hath wilfully betray'd Shakspeare this Edmund had a fifter likewife named Eleanor. might therefore have at different times confounded these two Eleanors. In fact, however, the fifter of Roger Earl of March,' whom young Percy married, was called Elizabeth. MALONE. See my note on Ad II. fc. iii. where this Lady is called-Kate. STEEVENS. 6 and indent with fears,] The reason why he fays, bargain and article with fears, meaning with Mortimer, is, because he fuppofed Mortimer had wilfully betrayed his own force to Glendower out of fear, as appears from his next speech. WARBURTON. The difficulty feems to me to arife from this, that the king is not defired to article or contract with Mortimer, but with another for Mortimer. Perhaps we may read: Shall we buy treafon? and indent with peers Shall we purchase back a trailor? Shall we defcend to a compofition with Worcester, Northumberland, and young Percy, who by disobedience have loft and forfeited their honours and themselves? JOHNSON. Shall we buy treason? and indent with fears,] This verb is used by Harrington in his tranflation of Ariofto. Book XVI. ft. 35: "And with the Irith bands he firft indents, Again, in The Cruel Brother, by Sir W. D'Avenant, 1630: "With my acceptance, make choice of fervices?" Fears may be used in the active fenfe for terrors. So, in the fecond part of this play: all thofe bold fears "Thou seeft with peril I have answered." Thefe lords, however, had, as yet, neither forfeited or loft any thing, fo that Dr. Johnfon's conjecture is inadmiffible. After all, I am inclined to regard Mortimer (though the King affects to speak of him in the plural number) as the Fear, or timid obje&, which had loft or forfeited itfelf. Henry afterwards says: be durft as well have met the devil alone. "As Owen Glendower for an enemy." แ When they have loft and forfeited themselves ; HOT. Revolted Mortimer! He never did fall off, my fovereign liege, Indent with fears, may therefore mean, fign an indenture or compact with daftards. Fears may be fubftituted for fearful people, as wrongs has been used for wrongers in K. Richard II: "He fhould have found his uncle Gaunt a father, "To roufe his wrongs, and chase them to a bay.' "Near Cæfar's angel (fays the Soothsayer to Antony) thy own becomes a fear," i. e. a fpirit of cowardice, and Sir Richard Vernon, in the play before us, uses an expreffion that nearly refembles indenting with fears: "I hold as little counfel with weak fear, The King, by buying treason, and indenting with fears, may therefore covertly repeat both his pretended charges against Mortimer; first, that he had treasonably betrayed his party to Glendower; and, fecondly, that he would have been afraid to encounter with fo brave an adverfary. STEEVENS. He never did fall off, my fovereign liege, But by the chance of war;] The meaning is, he came not into the enemy's power but by the chance of war. The King charged Mortimer, that he wilfully betrayed his army, and, as he was then with the enemy, calls him revolted Mortimer. Hotspur replies, that he never fell off, that is, fell into Glendower's hands, but by the chance of war. I should not have explained thus tediously a paffage fo hard to be mistaken, but that two editors have already miftaken it. JOHNSON. 7 11 To prove that true, Needs no more but one tongue for all thofe wounds, &c.] Hotfpur calls Mortimer's wounds mouthed, from their gaping like a mouth; and fays, that to prove his loyalty, but one tongue was neceffary for all thefe mouths. This may be harih; but the fame idea occurs in Coriolanus, where one of the populace fays: "For if he thows When on the gentle Severn's fedgy bank, He did confound the best part of an hour 8 In changing hardiment with great Glendower: Three times they breath'd, and three times did they drink,9 Upon agreement, of fwift Severn's flood; Who then, affrighted with their bloody looks, us his wounds, we are to put our tongues into these wounds, fpeak for them." And again, in Julius Cæfar, Antony fays: 8 there were an Antony, "Would ruffle up your fpirits, and put a tongue In every wound of Cæfar, that should move," &c. and M. MASON. hardiment-] An obfolete word, fignifying hardiness, bravery, ftoutnefs. Spenfer is frequent in his use of it. STEEVENS. 9 three times did they drink,] It is the property of wounds to excite the moft impatient thirst. The poet therefore hath with exquifite propriety introduced this circumftance, which may ferve to place in its proper light the dying kindness of Sir Philip Sydney; who, though fuffering the extremity of thirft from the agony of his own wounds, yet, notwithstanding, gave up his own draught of water to a wounded foldier. HENLEY. Who then, affrighted &c.] This paffage has been cenfured as founding nonfenfe, which represents a ftream of water as capable of fear. It is misunderstood. Severn is here not the flood, but the tutelary power of the flood, who was affrighted, and hid his head in the hollow bank. JOHNSON. 3 his crifp head Crifp is curled. So, Beaumont and Fletcher, in The Maid of the Mill: "As he fteals by, curls up his head to view you." Again, in Kyd's Cornelia, 1595: "O beauteous Tiber, with thine eafy ftreams, |