THE FIRST PART OF

KING HENRY IV

ACT FIRST

SCENE I

London. The palace.

Enter King Henry, Lord John of Lancaster, the Earl of Westmoreland, Sir Walter Blunt, and others.

King. So shaken as we are, so wan with care,
Find we a time for frighted peace to pant,
And breathe short-winded accents of new broils
To be commenced in stronds afar remote.
No more the thirsty entrance of this soil
Shall daub her lips with her own children's
blood;

No more shall trenching war channel her fields,
Nor bruise her flowerets with the armed hoofs

5. "No more the thirsty entrance of this soil," etc.; Folio 4, “entrails" for "entrance"; Steevens, "entrants"; Mason "Erinnys"; Malone compares Genesis iv. 11: "And now art thou cursed from the earth, which hath opened her mouth to receive thy brother's blood from thy hand”; “entrance" probably="the mouth of the earth or soil."-I. G.

I

Of hostile paces: those opposed eyes,

Which, like the meteors of a troubled heaven, 10
All of one nature, of one substance bred,
Did lately meet in the intestine shock
And furious close of civil butchery,
Shall now, in mutual well-beseeming ranks,
March all one way, and be no more opposed
Against acquaintance, kindred and allies:
The edge of war, like an ill-sheathed knife,
No more shall cut his master. Therefore,
friends,

As far as to the sepulcher of Christ,

21

Whose soldier now, under whose blessed cross
We are impressed and engaged to fight,
Forthwith a power of English shall we levy;
Whose arms were moulded in their mothers'
womb

To chase these pagans in those holy fields
Over whose acres walk'd those blessed feet,
Which fourteen hundred years ago were nail'd
For our advantage on the bitter cross.

But this our purpose now is twelve month old,
And bootless 'tis to tell you we will go:

9. "those opposed eyes"; the eyes of contending armies; the intent gaze of two forces as they rush together being vividly put for the forces themselves.-C. H. H.

22. "levy"; Steevens assures us that to levy a power to a place “is an expression quite unexampled, if not corrupt"; and he proposes lead instead of levy: which Gifford has effectually upset by the following from Gosson's School of Abuse, 1587: "Scipio, before he levied his forces to the walles of Carthage, gave his soldiers the print of the citie in a cake, to be devoured."-H. N. H.

28. "now is twelve month old," so Qq. 1, 2; Ff., "is a twelve-month old"; Qq. 7, 8, "is but twelve months old."-I. G.

I

Therefore we meet not now.

hear

Then let me

30

Of you, my gentle cousin Westmoreland, What yesternight our council did decree In forwarding this dear expedience. West. My liege, this haste was hot in question, And many limits of the charge set down But yesternight: when all athwart there came A post from Wales loaden with heavy news; Whose worst was, that the noble Mortimer, Leading the men of Herefordshire to fight Against the irregular and wild Glendower, 40 30. "therefore we meet not now"; that is, we meet not now on that question; the question whether we will go.-H. N. H.

33. "this dear expedience"; this momentous enterprise.-C. H. H. 35. "limits of the charge"; express and definite instructions.— C. H. H.

38. "the noble Mortimer"; two historical Edmund Mortimers were confused by Holinshed, and hence by Shakespeare. The following table shows their relationship to one another and to Lady Percy:— Edmund Mortimer, 3rd Earl of March.

Elizabeth, Roger Mortimer, 4th Earl

m. H. Percy

(Hotspur).

Anne,

of March.

m. Richard, Earl of Cambridge (Hen. V, ii. 2. 11).

Sir Edmund Mortimer (1376-1409)

(def. by Glendower).

Edmund Mortimer,

5th Earl of March (1391-1425), (direct heir to the throne after death of Richard II). 1 Hen. VI, ii. 5.

In the play the Mortimer who had a title to the crown is identified with Glendower's captive; he is inconsistently spoken of as brother to Hotspur and his wife (1 i. 3. 142, ii. 3. 78), and as their. nephew (1 iii. 1. 196). In i. 3. these two Mortimers are further identified with Roger Mortimer, fourth Earl, who was proclaimed by Richard II his heir in 1385.

I

Was by the rude hands of that Welshman

taken,

A thousand of his people butchered;

Upon whose dead corpse there was such misuse, Such beastly shameless transformation, By those Welshwomen done, as may not be Without much shame retold or spoken of. King. It seems then that the tidings of this broil Brake off our business for the Holy Land. West. This match'd with other did, my gracious lord;

For more uneven and unwelcome news

50

Came from the north and thus it did import:
On Holy-rood day, the gallant Hotspur there,
Young Harry Percy, and brave Archibald,
That ever-valiant and approved Scot,

At Homildon met,

Where they did spend a sad and bloody hour;

42. So in all the quartos: the folio has "And a thousand." We prefer the former, not only as having better authority, but because it makes the connection plainer between a thousand people and whose dead corpse. Of course being is understood before butchered, and corpse is used as a collective noun.-The matter of the passage is thus related by Holinshed: "Owen Glendower, according to his accustomed manner, robbing and spoiling within the English borders, caused all the forces of the shire of Hereford to assemble togither against him, under the conduct of Edmund Mortimer, earle of March. But comming to trie the matter by battell, whether by treason or otherwise, so it fortuned, that the English power was discomfitted, the earle taken prisoner, and above a thousand of his people slaine in the place. The shamefull villanie used by the Welshwomen towards the dead carcasses was such as honest eares would be ashamed to heare, and continent toongs to speake thereof. The dead bodies might not be buried, without great summes of monie given for libertie to conveie them awaie."-H. N. H.

53. "Archibald"; fourth Earl of Douglas.-C. H. H.

I

As by discharge of their artillery,

And shape of likelihood, the news was told;
For he that brought them, in the very heat
And pride of their contention did take horse, 60
Uncertain of the issue any way.

King. Here is a dear, a true industrious friend,
Sir Walter Blunt, new lighted from his horse,
Stain'd with the variation of each soil

Betwixt that Homildon and this seat of ours;
And he hath brought us smooth and welcom

news.

The Earl of Douglas is discomfited:

Ten thousand bold Scots, two and twenty knights,

Balk'd in their own blood did Sir Walter see
On Homildon's plains. Of prisoners, Hot-
spur took

Mordake the Earl of Fife, and eldest son
To beaten Douglas; and the Earl of Athol,
Of Murray, Angus, and Menteith:

70

57. "their artillery"; Holinshed says that "with violence of the English shot [the Scotch] were quite vanquished and put to flight." Holinshed means arrows, and Mr. Wright suggests that Shakespeare "may have misunderstood" the ambiguous word "shot." In another account of the battle, however (Hist. of Scotland, ii. 254, quot. Stone, p. 132), Holinshed speaks expressly of the "incessant shot of arrows." It is probable that Shakespeare understood perfectly that Holinshed meant arrows, and chose himself to mean the more impressive discharge of cannon.-C. H. H.

64. No circumstance could have been better chosen to mark the expedition of Sir Walter. It is used by Falstaff in a similar manner, "to stand stained with travel."-H. N. H.

71. "Mordake the Earl of Fife"; this was "Murdach Stewart, not the son of Douglas, but the eldest son of Robert, Duke of Albany, Regent of Scotland, third son of King Robert II" ("the" first supplied by Pope).-I. G.