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ut an effeminate prince,

Enter a Messenger.

l-boy, you may over-ame

and the prince and real

er we like, thou art protect Mess. My honourable lords, health to you all!

he holdeth thee in awe,
igious churchmen may
or thou lov'st the flesh

he year to church thoug
ainst thy foes.

nd rest your minds in pe

is, wait on us.

* up our arms,

that Henry's dead.

ed years,

Sad tidings bring I to you out of France,
Of loss, of slaughter, and discomfiture:
Guienne, Champaigne, Rheims, Orleans,
Paris, Guysors, Poictiers, all are quite lost.

Bed. What say'st thou, man, before dead Henry's corse?
Speak softly, or the loss of those great towns

Will make him burst his lead and rise from death.

Glou. Is Paris lost? is Roan yielded up?

If Henry were recall'd to life again

These news would cause him once more yield the ghost. Exe. How were they lost? what treachery was us'd?

ist ned eyes babes shall Mess. No treachery, but want of men and money.

of salt tears,
wail the dead.
'invocate:
m civil broils!
n the heavens!
ul will make

nourish] Ff, Cambridge; ht-] or bright Francis ; or bright Berenice J at Alexander Bullock, C

es.

Amongst the soldiers this is muttered,

65. is Roan] F 1; and is Roan Ff 2, 3, 4; Rouen Cambridge.

She no sooner let it flye,
But that a goodly shyning starre it
up a loft did stye

And drew a greate way after it
bryght beames like burning

heare."

The mention of hair shows that the
comet is referred to again. Plutarch
says "there was a great comet which
seven nights together was seen very
bright after Cæsar's death." See note
in Arden edition to Julius Cæsar, II. ii.
31. And see more in Holland's Plinie,
bk. ii. ch. xxv.: "By that starre it was
signified (as the common sort beleeved)
that the soule of Iulius Cæsar was
received among the divine powers of
the immortal gods." That the above
account in Golding of Cæsar's constella-
tion was familiar to Shakespeare is
evident from the account of the "warn-
ings of the Gods" before the murder
(lines 879-95). They supply the
"battles feyghting in the clowdes,"
"the rain of blood," the "gastly
spryghts" of Julius Cæsar, II. ii. 12-25.
56. or bright-] M. Mason says,
"Pope's conjecture is confirmed by this
peculiar circumstance, that two blazing
stars (the Julium Sidus) are part of the
arms of the Drake family.' "And Malone
rightly affirms that this blank arose
from the transcriber or compositor
not being able to make out the name.
The rhyme is the chief argument in
favour of Drake, which is however very
unacceptable of a then-living man.

ghost I invocate invol Compare Richard III. lawful that I invocate: d Locrine, Iv. i: "b thou dost invocate, By: f thy deceased sire." viii. New Eng. Dict glorious star... The See Golding's On: The Epistle, lines 29 to a blazing. ar showes nd immortalitie c ng growes. ines 944-56:nurthred corce of ake eede... Venus

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starre C

house of Rome d,

s bodye tooke spryght.

60

65

70

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64. lead] the lining or inner shell of the wooden coffin. Compare Beaumont and Fletcher's Knight of Malta, Iv. ii. : "[They remove the coffin, lift Oriana out of it, and then put it back into the monument.] . Mir. Softly good friend; take her into your arms. Nor. Put in the crust again." The "crust here is the lapping of lead mentioned in The Passionate Pilgrim, xxi. 391-95. See too Middleton's A Mad World, my Masters, II. ii.: “let him trap me in gold, and I'll lap him in lead." Without a knowledge of this a passage in The Merchant of Venice, II. vii. 49-51 loses its force. Marlowe gives: "Not lapt in lead but in a sheet of gold" (Tamburlaine, pt. ii., end of Act ii.). "Wrapt in lead," meaning dead, occurs twice in Spenser's Shepheards Calendar (June and October), 1579. 67. cause him yield] For "to" omitted after "cause," compare Greene, George-a-Greene (at the end): "Whose fathers he caus'd murthered in those warres."

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70. this is muttered] Grafton has here (i. 562): “the Duke of Bedford openly rebuked the Lordes in generall, because that they in the time of warre, through their privie malice and inwarde grudge, had almost moved the people to warre and commocion, in which time all men should .. serve and dread their soveraigne Lorde King Henry, in performing his conquest in Fraunce, which was in maner brought to conclusion."

18

8

THE FIRST PART O

That here you maintain several factions;
And whilst a field should be dispatch'd a
You are disputing of your generals.
One would have lingering wars with littl
Another would fly swift, but wanteth win
A third thinks, without expense at all,
By guileful fair words peace may be obta
Awake, awake, English nobility!
Let not sloth dim your honours new-beg
Cropp'd are the flower-de-luces in your a
Of England's coat, one half is cut away.
Exe. Were our tears wanting to this funeral

These tidings would call forth her flowing
Bed. Me they concern. Regent I am of Fran
Give me my steeled coat: I'll fight for F
Away with these disgraceful wailing robe
Wounds will I lend the French instead of
To weep their intermissive miseries.

76. A third thinks] F 1, Cambridge; A third man think. etc., Craig; a third thinks that Keightley conj. 78. Aw Awake, away F 2. 80, 81. arms of England's coat,] land's coat Cambridge; arms, Of England's coat Pope. Steevens; their Theobald, Cambridge, Craig.

71. maintain ... factions] back up, uphold factions or parties. New Eng. Dict. quotes Hanmer, Chronicle of Ireland (ante 1604): "His three sonnes formerly went into Ireland to maintaine one of the factions." See note, II. iv. 109 below, on factions.

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72. field... dispatch'd] armed force,
or order of battle made ready and sent
promptly away.
74-76. One
Another
third] Compare Faerie Queene, I. xii. 10.
80. flower-de-luces] The fleur de lis,
or lily of France. A heraldic bearing
and artistic ornament probably repre-
senting the Iris. "Iris, this herbe is
called Floure-delyce" (R. Banckes?
Herball, Sig. D, ii. 30, 1525). As a
part of England's coat, Grafton says:
"Ihon Rastall sayth in his chronicle
that it is not lyke to be true that the
great Hall of Westminster that is now,
was buylded by this king, but rather in
the tyme of King Richarde the Second.
For sayth he, the Armes that are there
both on the timber and on the stone
worke, which is the three Lyons quar-
tered with the flower de luce, and the
white Hart for his badge, were the
armes of King Richard. For there was
never king of England that gave the

flower de luce whi Fraunce before thirde" (i. 176).

81. coat] coat of of England's coat "your English co by a foreign mes uses English no manner. The pun be altered from the

83. her flowing flowing tides (Ma alteration of Theo jected. A similar is in Lyly's Endym

85. steeled coat] again in Shakespea of Greene's in A Arragon (line 155) helmes, clap on y Marlowe has "ste burlaine, pt. II. ii. steeled crest" (Wo Hazlitt's Dodsley, "coats of steel," 31 and note.

87, 88. lend... pare Timon of Athe

88. intermissive] New Eng. Dict. has from Ferne's Blazon

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your steeled coates." teeled crests" (Tam 2); Lodge has" thy ounds of Civil War, , vii. 114). Compare 3 Henry VI. II. i, 160, • eyes to weep] Com ens, v. i. 160. coming at intervals. as an earlier example

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Exe. The Dauphin crowned king! all fly to him!
O! whither shall we fly from this reproach?
Glou. We will not fly, but to our enemies' throats.
Bedford, if thou be slack, I'll fight it out.

Bed. Gloucester, why doubt'st thou of my forwardness?
An army have I muster'd in my thoughts,
Wherewith already France is overrun.

Enter another Messenger.

Mess. My gracious lords, to add to your laments,
Wherewith you now bedew King Henry's hearse,
I must inform you of a dismal fight
Betwixt the stout Lord Talbot and the French.
Win. What! wherein Talbot overcame? is't so?
Mess. O, no! wherein Lord Talbot was o'er-thrown:
The circumstance I'll tell you more at large.
The tenth of August last this dreadful lord,
Retiring from the siege of Orleans,

92, 96. Dauphin] Dolphin Ff.

100

105

IIO

94. Reignier] Rowe, etc.; Reynold Ff. 94. doth take] F 1; doth Ff 2, 3, 4; takes Hanmer. 95. flieth to] Ff 1, 2; flieth on Ff 3, 4. 95. side.] Capell; side. Exit. Ff. 108, 145, 157. Mess.]

3 Mess. Ff.

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on of Gentrie, 1586.

102. Overrun] harried and destroyed by a hostile force. A very old sense but not again in Shakespeare. See below, at "girt," III. i. 171, for Marlowe example.

104. bedew . . . hearse] This expres

sion occurs again in 2 Henry IV. iv. V. 114: "the tears that should bedew my hearse." Spenser has "salt teares bedeawd the hearers cheeks" (Faerie Queene, 1. xii. 16). For "dewed with tears," see 2 Henry VI. III. ii. 340.

105. dismal] savage, ferocious, terrible. Compare Macbeth, 1. ii. 53: 'began a dismal conflict." Greene uses the word in this active fighting sense: "When the wild boare is not chafed thou mayst chasten him with a wand, but being once endamaged with the dogges, he is dismoll" (Philomela (Grosart, xi. 150, (ante 1592). This dismal fight was the Battle of Patay. 109. circumstance] details, particulars.

12

10

THE FIRST PART OF

Having full scarce six thousand in his troo
By three-and-twenty thousand of the Fren
Was round encompassed and set upon.
No leisure had he to enrank his men;
He wanted pikes to set before his archers;
112. full scarce] Ff; scarce full Rowe.

112. full] fully, in full, altogether.
Full is very often "placed emphatic-
ally" (Schmidt) before adjectives and
adverbs by Shakespeare. The sense
varies with the following word. Here
it means "all told." See Iv. i. 20.
Compare "full resolved" in Peele's
Edward I.: "Edward is full resolved of
thy faith" (387, b); an expression oc-
curring in Titus Andronicus and Two
Gentlemen of Verona. And see below,
"full replete " (v. v. 17).

...

stood still, abiding adversaries. .. T the most part of Herynge and Lente men call the unfor Herynges." The with the events bef It was a surprise. with five thousand n Meum. . . . The Eng forwarde perceyued men, and imagining

115. enrank] place in ranks. Not enemies, commande found earlier.

116. He wanted pikes to set before his archers] The archers carried stakes, or the other footmen carried them for them, to set in the ground before the former to keep off the enemy's horse. A few passages from Grafton's Chronicle (1569) of these wars will illustrate this. "The Duke of Bedford, not ignoraunt howe to order his men, made likewise an entier batayle, and suffered no man to be on horseback and set the archers (every one having a sharpe stake) both in the front of the battayle, and on the sides lyke wings, and behinde the battayle were the pages with the chariottes and cariages, and all the horses were tyed together either with the reins of their bridles or by the tayles" (i. 556, reprint, 1809). This was a "pitched field." The chronicler continues: "The French men at the first sight remembering howe often times in pitched fieldes they had bene overcome... began somewhat to feare. The french horsemen that daye did little service: for the archers so galled their horses, that they desyred not muche to approch their presence.' This battle (Patay) was fought the xxvij day of August, 1425, and was a great victory for the English. And again (p. 578): "Wherefore Sir John Fastolfe and his Companions set all their cōpanie in good order of Battaile, and pitched stakes before every Archer to breake the force of the horsemen. At their backes they set all their wagons and cariages... and in this maner they

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environe and enclos with their stakes, horsemen came on archers had no leysu in aray. There wa to fight at adventu continued by the s houres. And altho men were overpresse of their adversaries, back one foote, till Lorde Talbot was so backe, and so was were slayne about tv taken xl. Whereof the Lorde Scales, the and Sir Thomas Ra chiefe. . . . From parted without any s John Fastolfe, the valyauntnesse elected the Garter: For whic of Bedford in a great hym the Image of his Garter: but aft of friends, and appa good excuse by him a stored to the order ag minde of the Lord 582, Grafton). It wil lengthy note supplies Fastolfe "without any the three hours' fi wounded sore in th dealt with, as well break the force of th III. i. 103 for Fas again.

116. pikes] The ex

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g the assault of their This conflict (because of the cariage was en stuffe) the Frenchfortunate battaile of next passage deals efore us in the play. "The lorde Talbote men, was coming to glishe men comming the [French] horse ng to deceyue their

All the whole army stood agazed on him.
His soldiers, spying his undaunted spirit,
A Talbot! a Talbot! cried out amain,
And rush'd into the bowels of the battle.
Here had the conquest fully been seal'd up,

124. slew] Ff; flew Rowe (ed. 2), Cambridge, Craig.

here is needful to explain a line in Greene's Frier Bacon and Frier Bungay (Grosart, xiii. 162) :

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"But then the stormy threats of war shall cease:

The horse shall stampe as carelesse of the pike,

Drums shall be turn'd to timbrels of delight.'

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ded the footemen to se themselues about , but the french so fiercely that the ure to set themselves as no remedie, but ure. This battayle Space of three long ough the Englishe ed with the number Hed yet they never their Captayne the ore wounded at the there s taken... welve hundred, and the Lorde Talbot Lorde Hungerford mpstone were the this battayle de Stroke striken, ST same yere for his into the order of ch cause the Duke anger toke from Saint George, and erward, by meane raunte causes of lleged, he was re ayne, agaynst the Talbot" (page I be seen that this much information. stroke striken, ht, and Talbot e back, are all

130

These pikes ("stakes bound with yron
sharpe at both the ends of the length of
v. or vj. foote, to be pitched before the
Archers . . . so that the footemen
were hedged about ") were first devised
and practised by that wise and politic
prince (Henry the Fifth) at Agincourt
(Grafton, pp. 516-517).

is the stakes to horsemen. See olfe's cowardice

act signification

121. valiant Talbot] Grafton's words on Talbot are (p. 574): "This ioly Capteyn & sonne of the valiant Mars

which Lord Talbot, beyng both of noble birth and haute courage, after his commyng into Fraunce, obteyned so many glorious victories of hys enimies that his only name was, and yet is, dreadfull to the French nacion, and much renoumed amongst all other people." See notes at I. iv. 42 and II. i. 79.

124. Here, there, and every where] Occurs again in Troilus and Cressida, V. v. 26. Also in the Faerie Queene,

III. i. 66:—

"Here, there, and everywhere, about
her sway'd

Her wrathfull steele."
And again, III. xi. 28.

124. slew] The alteration to" flew
"is
unbearable and unwarrantable. "Slay,"

used absolutely, is a fine expression.
Compare Julius Cæsar, III. ii. 209.

126. agazed] astounded, amazed. Probably an old form of aghast. New Eng. Dict. gives examples from Chester Plays (c. 1400), and Surrey's Poems, 1557. Surrey affected Chaucerian language.

127. undaunted spirit] See again for these words, III. ii. 99 and v. v. 70. Marlowe uses this in Edward III. (Dyce, p. 184, b): “Th' undaunted spirit of Percy was appeas'd."

128. A Talbot! a Talbot] The name of the leader, coupled with St. George, was the usual battle-cry. So in Graf

ton:

"And in lyke maner the Duke of Bedford encouraged his people, and foorthwith they gave the onset upon their enimies, crying, Saint George, Bedford" (p. 557). And again (p. 561): "the Englishe men came out

by the gate of the towne, cryeng Saint George, Salisburie: and set on their enimies both before and behinde." And again (p. 575): “About sixe of the clock in the morning they issued out of the Castell, cryeng Saint George, Talbot."

129. bowels of the battle] Compare iv. vii. 42 below, and Coriolanus, IV. v. 136. "Bowels of the earth" (1 Henry IV. 1. iii. 61) occurs in Golding's Ovid, i. 156.

130. seal'd up] brought to a determination, made perfect. Compare Greene, Frier Bacon and Frier Bungay (Grosart, xiii. 41): "Then go to bed and seal up your desires."

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