Hoft. What's the matter?

Bard. Bid Mistress Tear-Sheet come to my master.
Hoft. O run, Dol, run; run, good Dol. [Exeunt.

ACT III.

SCENE

I. 2

The Palace in LONDON.

Enter King Henry in his Night-Gown, with a Page.

K. HENRY.

(0, call the Earls of Surrey and of Warwick; But, ere they come, bid them o'er-read thefe

G

letters,

And well confider of them.

Make good speed.

[Exit Page.
How many thousands of my poorest Subjects
Are at this hour afleep! O gentle fleep,
Nature's foft Nurfe, how have I frighted thee,
That thou no more wilt weigh my eye-lids down,
And steep my fenfes in forgetfulnefs?

Why rather, Sleep, ly'ft thou in fmoaky cribs,
Upon uneafy pallets ftretching thee,

And hufht with buzzing night-flies to thy flumber;
Than in the perfum'd chambers of the Great,
Under the Canopies of coftly State,

And lull'd with founds of fweeteft melody?
O thou dull God, why ly'st thou with the vile
In loathfom beds, and leav'ft the kingly couch
A watch-cafe, or a common larum bell?

7 This firft fcene is not in my copy of the first edition.

A watch-cafe, &c] This alludes to the watchmen fet in garrifon-towns upon fome emi

Wilt

nence attending upon an alarumbell, which he was to ring out in cafe of fire, or any approaching danger. He had a cafe or box to fhelter him from the weather,

bur

Wilt thou, upon the high and giddy mast,
Seal up the fhip-boy's eyes, and rock his brains,
In cradle of the rude imperious Surge;
And in the Vifitation of the winds,

Who take the ruffian billows by the top,
Curling their monftrous heads, and hanging them
With deaf'ning clamours in the flip'ry shrouds,
That, with the hurley, death itself awakes?
Can't thou, O partial Sleep, give thy repose
To the wet fea-boy in an hour fo rude?
And, in the calmeft and the stillest night,
With all appliances and means to boot,
Deny it to a King? then, happy lowly clown,
Uneafy lyes the head, that wears a Crown.

Enter Warwick and Surrey.

War. Many good morrows to your Majesty!
K. Henry. Is it good morrow, lords?

War. 'Tis one o'clock, and paft.

I

K. Henry. Why, then, good morrow to you. Well,

Have you read o'er the letters I fent you?
War. We have, my Liege.

K.Henry. Then you perceive the body of our Kingdom,
How foul it is; what rank difeafes grow,
And with what danger, near the heart of it.
Wor. It is but as a body yet diftemper'd,
Which to its former strength may be restor'd,
With good advice and little medicine;

3 My lord Northumberland will foon be cool'd. K. Henry. Oh heav'n, that one might read the book of fate,

And fee the revolution of the times

Make Mountains level, and the Continent,

Weary of folid firmness, melt itself

Into the Sea; and, other times, to fee

The beachy girdle of the Ocean.

Too wide for Neptune's hips; how Chances mock,
And Changes fill the cup of alteration

With divers liquors! 40, if this were seen,
The happieft youth viewing his progrefs through,
What perils paft, what croffes to enfue,

All, to two Peers. THEOBALD.
Sir T. Hanmer and Dr. War-
burton have received this emen-
dation, and read well for all. The
reading either way is of no im-

portance.

It is but as a body YET diftemper'd,] What would he have more? We should read, It is but as a body SLIGHT df temper'd. WARBURTON. The prefent reading is right. Difemper, that is, according to the old phyfick, a disproportionate mixture of humours, or inequality of innate heat and radidical humidity, is less than actual deafe, being only the ftate which foreruns or produces difcafes. The difference between difemper and d feofe, feems to be VOL. IV.

much the fame as between dif pofition and habit.

3 My lord Northumberland will foon be cooL'D.] I believe Shakespear wrote SCHOOL'D; tutord, and brought to fubmiffion. WARBURTON. Cool'd is certainly right. 40, if this were seen, &c.] Thefe four lines are supplied from the Edition of 1600. WARB.

My copy wants the whole fcene, and therefore these lines. There is fome difficulty in the line,

What perils poft, what croffes to er fue, because it seems to make paft perils equally terrible with ensuing crofes.

Wou'd fhut the book, and fit him down and die.
'Tis not ten Years gone,

Since Richard and Northumberland, great Friends,
Did feast together; and in two years after
Were they at wars.
It is but eight years fince,
This Percy was the man nearest my foul;
Who, like a brother, toil'd in my affairs,
And laid his love and life under my foot;
Yea, for my fake, ev'n to the eyes of Richard
Gave him defiance. But which of you was by?
(You, cousin Nevil, as I may remember) [To War.
When Richard, with his eye brim-full of tears, 5
Then check'd and rated by Northumberland,
Did fpeak these words, now prov'd a prophecy.
• Northumberland, thou ladder by the which
• My coufin Bolingbroke afcends my Throne :'
Though then, Heav'n knows, I had no fuch intent;
But that Neceffity fo bow'd the State,

That I and Greatnefs were compell'd to kifs:
• The time will come, thus did he follow it,
• The time will come, that foul fin, gathering bead,
• Shall break into corruption: so went on,
Foretelling this fame time's condition,
And the divifion of our amity.

War. There is a hiftory in all men's lives,
Figuring the Nature of the times deceas'd;
The which obferv'd, a man may prophefy,
With a near aim, of the main chance of things
As yet not come to life, which in their feeds
And weak beginnings lie intreasured.

6

Such things become the hatch and brood of time;
And by the neceffary form of this,
King Richard might create a perfect guess,

5 He refers to King Richard, act 5. fcene 2. But whether the King's or the authour's memory fails him, fo it was, that War. quick was not prefent at that converfation.

6 And by the nece Tary form of this, I think we might

better read,

The neceffary form of things. The word this has no very evident antecedent.

That

That great Northumberland, then falfe to him,
Would of that feed grow to a greater falseness,
Which should not find a ground to root upon,
Unless on You.

K. Henry. Are these things then neceffities? *
Then let us meet them like neceffities;

And that fame word even now cries out on us.
They fay, the Bishop and Northumberland
Are fifty thousand strong.

War. It cannot be:

Rumour doth double, like the voice and echo,
The numbers of the fear'd. Please it your Grace
To go to bed. Upon my life, my lord,
The Pow'rs, that you already have sent forth,
Shall bring this prize in very easily.

To comfort you the more, I have receiv'd
A certain inftance that Glendower is dead.
Your Majefty hath been this fortnight ill,
And thefe unfeafon'd hours perforce must add
Unto
your fickness.

K. Henry. I will take your counfel;

And were these inward wars once out of hand,

We would, dear lords, unto the Holy Land. ' [Exeunt.

through the first edition, and there is therefore no evidence that the divifion of the acts was made by the authour. Since then every editor has the fame right to mark the intervals of action as the players, who made the prefent diftribution, I fhould propose that this fcene may be added to the foregoing act, and the remove from London to Gloucesterfhire be made in the intermediate time, but that it would fhorten the next act too much, which has not even now its due proportion to the reft.