In this fair rescue thou hast brought to me.

P. HEN. O heaven! they did me too much injury,
That ever said, I hearken'd for your death.
If it were so, I might have let alone

The insulting hand of Douglas over you;
Which would have been as speedy in your end,
As all the poisonous potions in the world,
And sav'd the treacherous labour of your son.
K. HEN. Make up to Clifton, I'll to sir Nicholas
Gawsey.
[Exit King HENRY.

Enter Hotspur.

Hor. If I mistake not, thou art Harry Monmouth.

PHEN. Thou speak'st as if I would deny my

name.

Hor. My name is Harry Percy.

P. HEN.

A very valiant rebel of the name.

Why, then I see

I am the prince of Wales; and think not, Percy,
To share with me in glory any more:
Two stars keep not their motion in one sphere;
Nor can one England brook a double reign,
Of Harry Percy, and the prince of Wales.

HOT. Nor shall it, Harry, for the hour is come
To end the one of us; And 'would to God,
Thy name in arms were now as great as mine!
P. HEN. I'll make it greater, ere I part from thee.
And all the budding honours on thy crest
I'll crop, to make a garland for my head.
Hor. I can no longer brook thy vanities.

Enter FALStaff.

[They fight.

FAL. Well said, Hal! to it, Hal!-Nay, you shall find no boy's play here, I can tell you.

Enter DOUGLAS; he fights with FALSTAFF, who falls down as if he were dead, and exit DOUGLAS. HOTSPUR is wounded, and falls.

Hor. O, Harry, thou hast robb'd me of my youth',

I better brook the loss of brittle life,

Than those proud titles thou hast won of me; They wound my thoughts, worse than thy sword my flesh :

But thought's the slave of life 2, and life time's fool;

And time, that takes survey of all the world,
Must have a stop 3. O, I could prophecy,

:

1 O, Harry, thou hast robb'd me of my youth:] Shakspeare has chosen to make Hotspur fall by the hand of the Prince of Wales but there is, I believe, no authority for the fact. Holinshed says, "The king slew that day with his own hand six and thirty persons of his enemies. The other [i. e. troops] of his party, encouraged by his doings, fought valiantly, and slew the Lord Percy, called Henry Hotspur." Speed says Percy was killed by an unknown hand. MALONE.

2 BUT thought's the slave of life,] So, in Hamlet:

3

"Purpose is but the slave to memory." STEEVENS.
those proud titles thou hast won of me;

They wound my thoughts,

But thought's the slave of life, and life time's fool;
And time,-

Must have a stop.] Hotspur in his last moments endeavours to console himself. The glory of the prince wounds his thoughts; but thought, being dependent on life, must cease with it, and will soon be at at end. Life, on which thought depends, is itself of no great value, being the fool and sport of time; of time, which with all its dominion over sublunary things, must itself at last be stopped. JOHNSON.

Hotspur alludes to the Fool in our ancient farces, or the representations commonly called Death's Dance, &c. The same allusion occurs in Measure for Measure, and Love's Labour's Lost.

STEEVENS.

Mr. Steevens could not very easily have supported his opinion, that the allusion here is to the fool in the ancient farces, or in the

But that the earthy and cold hand of death
Lies on my tongue :-No, Percy, thou art dust,
And food for--

[Dies,

P. HEN. For worms, brave Percy,: Fare thee
well, great heart!-

Ill-weav'd ambition, how much art thou shrunk1!
When that this body did contain a spirit,
A kingdom for it was too small a bound;
But now, two paces of the vilest earth

Is room enough':-This earth that bears thee
dead,

Bears not alive so stout a gentleman.

If thou wert sensible of courtesy,

I should not make so dear a show" of zeal :-
But let my favours hide thy mangled face®;

representations called the Dance of Death; a character which has
been altogether misconceived in the course of the annotations on
Shakspeare. Dr. Johnson's interpretation is much more natural
and intelligible, and the allusion is certainly to the common or do-
mestic fool, who was retained for the express purpose of affording
sport to his still more foolish employers. In this sense our author
uses death's fool, fortune's fool, and fate's fool. DOUCE.
The same expression is to be found in our author's 106th
Sonnet :

"Love's not Time's fool." MALone.

4 Ill-weav'd ambition, &c.] A metaphor taken from cloth, which shrinks when it is ill-weaved, when its texture is loose.

JOHNSON.

5 A kingdom for it was too small a bound; &c.]
Carminibus confide bonis-jacet ecce Tibullus;
Vix manet è toto parva quod urna capit. Ovid.

JOHNSON.

6 that bears THEE dead,] The most authentick copy, the quarto of 1598, and the folio, have-" the dead." The true reading is found in a quarto of no authority or value, 1639; but it is here clearly right. MALONE.

7 SO DEAR a show-] Thus the first and best quarto. All the subsequent copies have-" so great," &c. MALONE.

8 But let my FAVOURS hide thy mangled face ;] We should read-favour, face, or countenance. He is stooping down here to kiss Hotspur. WARBURTON.

And, even in thy behalf, I'll thank myself
For doing these fair rites of tenderness.

Adieu, and take thy praise with thee to heaven!
Thy ignomy sleep with thee in the grave,
But not remember'd in thy epitaph!-

[He sees FALSTAFF on the ground.
What! old acquaintance! could not all this flesh
Keep in a little life? Poor Jack, farewell!
I could have better spar'd a better man.
O, I should have a heavy miss of thee,
If I were much in love with vanity.
Death hath not struck so fat a deer' to-day,
Though many dearer, in this bloody fray :-
* So folio: quartos, ignominy.

He rather covers his face with a scarf, to hide the ghastliness of death. JOHNSON.

ignomy-] So the word ignominy was formerly written.

Thus, in Troilus and Cressida, Act V. Sc. III. :

"Hence broker lacquey! ignomy and shame," &c.

Again, in Lord Cromwell, 1602:

REED.

"With scandalous ignomy and slanderous speeches."

MALONE.

I SO FAT a deer-] There is in these lines a very natural mixture of the serious and ludicrous, produced by the view of Percy and Falstaff. I wish all play on words had been forborn.

JOHNSON.

I find the same quibble in The Two Angry Women of Abington, 1599:

"Life is as dear in deer, as 'tis in men." Again, in A Maidenhead Well Lost, 1632, a comedy, by Heywood:

"There's no deer so dear to him, but he will kill it.”

STEEVENS.

Fat is the reading of the first quarto, 1598, the most authentick impression of this play, and of the folio. The other quartos have fair. MALONF.

So fat a deer seems to be the better reading, for Turbervile, in The Terms of the Ages of all Beasts of Venerie and Chase, observes: "You shall say by anie deare, a great deare, and not a fayre deare, unless it be a rowe, which in the fifth year is called a fayre rowe-bucke." TOLLET.

- many dearer,] Many of greater value. JOHNSON.

Embowell'd will I see thee by and by3;
Till then, in blood by noble Percy lie.

66

[Exit.

3 EMBOWELL'D will I see thee by and by.] An ingenious commentator on Mr. Mason's supplement to Dr. Johnson's Dictionary, (see the Monthly Magazine, vol. xii. p. 299,) has disputed the usual sense of embowel'd in this speech, on the ground that the prince would not be guilty of such brutality as to see Falstaff eviscerated; and he therefore contends that the meaning is, put into the bowels of the earth. But surely the prince designs no more than that Falstaff's body shall be embalmed in the usual manner. When the knight rises, he exclaims, if thou embowel me to day, I'll give you leave to powder me, and eat me to morrow," evidently alluding to the practice of evisceration and subsequent treatment of a dead body by strewing aromatics over it for preservation. If the body were to be put into the bowels of the earth, as the commentator contends, Falstaff's "eat me to-morrow would manifestly be an absurd expression. That the present writer may not be suspected of plagiarism on this occasion, he feels himself obliged to lay claim to the above opinion in answer to the commentator, as it appeared in the before-mentioned periodical publication.

*

But the following curious extract from the arraignment of Hugh Le Despenser the favourite of Edward II. will set the question at rest for ever: << Hugh contraytour este trove, par quoy vous agardent touz lez bonez gentz de realme, meyndrez et greyndres, ryches et povrez par comun assent, que vous come larone estes trove, par quey vous serrez pendue. Et contreytour estez trove, par quey vous serrez treynez et quarterecez, et envoye parmy le realme. Et pur ceo que vous fuistez utlage par nostre seignour le roy et par commune assent, et estez revenue en courte sanz garrant, vous serrez decollez. Et pur ceo que vous abbestatez et procurastez discorde entre nostre seignour le roy et la royne et lez altrez del realme, si serret enbouelleez, et puis ils serront ars. Retrayez vous traytour, tyrant reneyee, si alez vostre juyse prendre. Traytour malveys et attaynte." In English: Hugh Le Despencer, you have been found an arch-traitor, for which cause all good people of the realm, great and small, rich and poor, by common consent, award you a convicted felon; therefore you shall be hanged. And forasmuch as you have been found a traitor, you shall be drawn and quartered, and [your limbs] dis

66

This word may serve to correct a mistake in a note in King Richard III. Act V. Sc. II. by Dr. Johnson, who had supposed that drawn was the same as exenterated.