Of murd❜rous Subornation? fhall it be,
That you a world of curfes undergo,
Being the agents or bafe fecond means,
The cords, the ladder, or the hangman rather?
(O pardon me, that I defcend fo low,
To fhew the line and the predicament
Wherein you range under this fubtle King)
Shall it for fhame be spoken in these days,
Or fill up Chronicles in time to come,
That men of your Nobility and Power
Did gage them Both in an unjust behalf,
As Both of you, God pardon it! have done,
Το put down Richard, that fweet lovely Rofe,
And plant this Thorn, this Canker Bolingbroke?
And hall it in more fhame be further spoken,
That you are fool'd, difcarded, and shook off
By him, for whom these shames ye underwent ?
No; yet time ferves, wherein you may redeem
Your banish'd honours, and reftore yourselves
Into the good thoughts of the world again.
Revenge the jeering, and difdain'd contempt
Of this proud King, who ftudies day and night
To anfwer all the debt he owes unto you,
Ev'n with the bloody payments of your deaths:
Therefore, I fay-

Wor. Peace, Coufin, fay no more.
And now I will unclafp a fecret book,
And to your quick-conceiving difcontents
I'll read you matter deep and dangerous;
As full of peril and advent'rous fpirit,
As to o'er-walk a current, roaring loud,
4 On the unfteadfaft footing of a spear.

Hot. If he fall in, good night, or fink or fwim-
Send Danger from the eaft unto the west,
So Honour cross it from the north to fouth,

* D fda n'd for d'fdainful.

a fpear. ] i. e. of a fpear laid

4 On the unfteadfast footing of across.

WARBURTON.

And

-O! the blood more ftirs

And let them grapple.
To rouze a Lion, than to start a Hare.
North. Imagination of fome great exploit
Drives him beyond the bounds of patience.
Hot. By heav'n, methinks, it were an easy leap,

By beav'n, methink, &c.] Gildon, a critic of the fize of Dennis, &c. calls this fpeech, Without any ceremony, a ridiculas rant and abfolute madness. Mr. Theobald talks in the fame ftrain. The French critics had taught these people juft enough to understand where Shakespear had tranfgreffed the rules of the Greek tragic writers; and, on thofe occafions, they are full of the poor frigid cant, of fable, Jent ment, diction, unities, &c. But it is another thing to get to Shakespear's fenfe: to do this required a little of their own. For want of which, they could not fee that the poet here ufes an allegorical covering to exprefs a noble and very natural thought. -Hot-fpur, all on fire, exclaims against bu klering and bartering for honour, and dividing it into fhares. O fays he, could I be fure that when I had purchased honour I should wear her dignities without a Rival-what then? why then,

By beav'n, methinks, it were an eafy lap,

To pull bright honour from the pale far'd Moon: .e. tho' fome great and fhining character in the mott elevated orb, was already in poffeffion of her, yet it would, methinks, be eafy by greater acts, to eclipfe bis glory, and pluck all his honours from him;

Το

Or dive into the bottom of the deep,

And pluck up drowned honour by the locks:

So

i. e. or what is ftill more difficult, tho' there were in the world no great examples to incite and fire my emulation, but that honour was quite funk and buried in oblivion, yet would I bring it back into vogue, and render it more illuftrious than ever. that we fee, tho' the expreffion be fublime and daring, yet the thought is the natural movement of an heroic mind. Euripides at leaft thought fo, when he put the very fame fentiment, in the fame words, into the mouth of Eteocles-Iwill not, madam, dif guife my thoughts; I could fcale beaven, I could defcend to the very entrails of the earth, if fo be that by that price I could obtain a kingdom. WARBURTON.

Though I am very far from condemning this fpeech with Gildon and heald as abfolute madnefs, yet I cannot find in it that profundity of reflection and beauty of allegory which the learned commentator has endeavoured to difplay. This fally of Hot-fur may be, I think, foberly and rationally vindicated as the violent eruption of a mind inflated with ambition and fired with refentment; as the boaftful clamour of a man able to do much, and eager to do more; as the haity K 3

motion

To pluck bright honour from the pale-fac'd Moon;
Or dive into the bottom of the Deep,

Where fathom-line could never touch the ground,
And pluck up drowned Honour by the locks;
So he, that doth redeem her thence, might wear
Without Corrival all her Dignities.

6

But out upon this half-fac'd fellowship!

Wor. He apprehends * a world of figures here,
But not the form of what he should attend.

-Good Coufin, give me audience for a while.
Hot. I cry you mercy.

Wor. Thofe fame noble Scots,

That are your prifoners

Hot. I'll keep them all;

By heav'n, he fhall not have a Scot of them;
No, if a Scot would fave his foul, he fhall not;
I'll keep them, by this hand.

Wor. You ftart away,

And lend no ear unto my purposes;
Those prisoners you shall keep.
Hot. I will; that's flat.-

He faid, he would not ranfom Mortimer,
Forbad my tongue to speak of Mortimer;
But I will find him when he lies afleep,
And in his ear I'll holla, Mortimer!

motion of turbulent defire; as
the dark expreffion of indeter-
mined thoughts. The paffage
from Euripides is furely not alle-
gorical, yet it is produced, and
properly, as parallel.

6 But out upon this half-fac'd fellowship!] I think this finely expreffed. The image is taken from one who turns from another, fo as to ftand before him with a fide face; which implied neither a full conforting, nor a feparation. WARB.

I cannot think this word rightly explained. It alludes rather

to drefs. A coat is faid to be faced when part of it, as the fleeves or bofom, is covered with fomething finer and more fplen did than the main fubflance. The mautua makers ftill use the word. Half-fac'd fello xhip is then partnerhip but half ado ned, partnerfhip whib yet wants baf the fhew of dignities and honours.

-a world of figures here, &c.] Figure is ufed here equivocally. As it is applied to Hotfur's fpeech it is a rhetorical mode; as oppofed to form, it means appearance or shipe.

Nay

Nay, I will have a Starling taught to speak
Nothing but Mortimer, and give it him,
To keep his anger ftill in motion.

Wor. Hear you, coufin, a word.
Hot. All Studies here I folemnly defy,
Save how to gall and pinch this Bolingbroke.

"And that fame fword-and-buckler Prince of Wales,
But that, I think, his father loves him not,
And would be glad he met with fome mifchance,
I'd have him poifon'd with a pot of ale.

Wor. Farewel, my kinfman! I will talk to you,
When you are better temper'd to attend.

North. Why, what a wafp-tongu'd and impatient fool Art thou, to break into this woman's mood, Tying thine ear to no tongue but thine own?

Hot. Why, look you, I am whipt and fcourg'd with rods,

Nettled, and ftung with pifmires, when I hear
Of this vile politician Bolingbroke.

In Richard's time-what do ye call the place?
A plague upon't!-it is in Glo'fterbire

--

'Twas where the mad-cap Duke his uncle keptHis uncle York-where I first bow'd my knee Unto this King of Smiles, this Bolingbroke,

When

you and he came back from Ravenfpurg. North. At Berkley castle.

Hot. You fay true:

Why, what a deal of candy'd Courtesy
This fawning greyhound then did proffer me!
Look, when his infant fortune came to age,
And gentle Harry Percy-and kind coufin-
The Devil take fuch cozeners-God forgive me
Good uncle, tell your tale, for I have done.

And that fame fword-and- called a fv:afb-buckler. In this buckler Prince of Wales.] fenfe fword-and-buckler is ufed A Royfter, or turbulent fellow, here. that fought in the taverns, or Alluding to what paffed in failed diforders in the ftreets, was King Richard, Act II. Sc. IX. K 4

Wor.

Wer. Nay, if you have not, to't again; We'l flay your leifure.

Ilot. I have done, i'faith.

Wor. Then once more to your Scottish prisoners.

[To Hot-fpur. Deliver them without their ranfom ftraight, And make the Dowglas' Son your only mean For Pow'rs in Scotland; which, for divers reasons Which I fhall fend you written, be affur'd,

Will eafily be granted.-You, my lord, [To North. Your Son in Scotland being thus employ'd,

Shall fecretly into the bofom creep

Of that fame noble Prelate, well belov'd,
Th' Archbishop.

Hot. York, is't not?

Wor. True, who bears hard

His brother's death at Bristol, the lord Sercop.
I fpeak not this in estimation,

As what, I think, might be, but what, I know,
Is ruminated, plotted and fet down;

And only stays but to behold the face

Of that occafion, that fhall bring it on.

Hot. I fmell it. On my life, it will do well.
North. Before the game's a-foot, thou still lett❜st * slip.

& I (peak not this in eftimation.]
Elimation for conje ture. But
between this and the foregoing
verfe it appears there were fome
lines which are now loft. For,
confider the fenfe. What was it
that was ruminated, plotted, and
fet down? Why, as the text
ftands at prefent, that the Arch-
bishop boe his brother's death
bard. It is plain then that they
Itis
were fome conferuences of that
refentment which the speaker in
formed Hot-fur of, and to which
his conclufion of, I speak not this
by conjecture but on good proof,
must be referred. But fome

player, I fuppofe, thinking the fpeech too long, ftruck them out.

WARBURTON.

If the Editor had, before he wrote his note, read ten lines forward, he would have seen that nothing is omitted. Worcefier gives a dark hint of a confpiracy. Hot-fpur fmelis it, that is, guefes it. Northumberland reproves him for not fuffering Worcejier to tell his defign Hot-Spur, according to the vehemence of his temper, ftill follows his own conjecture.

To let p is, to loose the greyhound.

Hot.