FIRST PART OF

KING HENRY VI.

ACT I. SCENE I.

Weftminster Abbey.

Dead march. Corpfe of King Henry the Fifth dif covered, lying in ftate; attended on by the Dukes of BEDFORD, GLOSTER, and EXETER; the Earl of WARWICK,' the Bishop of Winchester, Heralds, &c.

BED. Hung be the heavens with black,2 yield day to night!

Comets, importing change of times and states,

I

earl of Warwick ;] The Earl of Warwick who makes his appearance in the first scene of this play is Richard Beauchamp, who is a character in King Henry V. The Earl who appears in the fubfequent part of it, is Richard Nevil, fon to the Earl of Salisbury, who became poffeffed of the title in right of his wife, Anne, fifter of Henry Beauchamp, Duke of Warwick, on the death of Anne his only child in 1449. Richard, the father of this Henry, was appointed governor to the king, on the demife of Thomas Beaufort, Duke of Exeter, and died in 1439. There is no reason to think that the author meant to confound the two characters. RITSON.

2

Hung be the heavens with black,] Alluding to our ancient ftage-practice when a tragedy was to be expected. So, in Sid

Brandifh your crystal treffes 3 in the sky;
And with them fcourge the bad revolting stars,
That have confented unto Henry's death!

ney's Arcadia, Book II: "There arose, even with the funne, a vaile of darke cloudes before his face, which fhortly had blacked over all the face of heaven, preparing (as it were) a mournfull ftage for a tragedie to be played on." See alfo Mr. Malone's

Hifiorical Account of the English Stage. STEEVENS.

3 Brandish your crystal treffes-] Crystal is an epithet repeatedly bestowed on comets by our ancient writers. So, in a Sonnet, by Lord Sterline, 1604 :

"When as thofe chrystal comets whiles appear." Spenfer, in his Fairy Queen, Book I. c. x. applies it to a lady's face:

"Like funny beams threw from her chrystal face." Again, in an ancient fong entitled The falling out of Lovers is the renewing of Love:

"You chryftal planets fhine all clear

"And light a lover's way."

"There is also a white comet with filver haires," says Pliny, as tranflated by P. Holland, 1601. STEEVENS.

• That have confented-] If this expreffion means no more than that the stars gave a bare confent, or agreed to let King Henry die, it does no great honour to its author. I believe to confent, in this inftance, means to act in concert. Concentus, Lat. Thus Erato the mufe, applauding the fong of Apollo, in Lyly's Midas, 1592, cries out: "O fweet confent!" i. e. sweet union of founds. Again, in Spenfer's Fairy Queen, B. IV. c. il : "Such mufick his wife words with time confented."

Again, in his tranflation of Virgil's Culex :

"Chaunted their fundry notes with fweet concent." Again, in Chapman's verfion of the 24th Book of Homer's Ody ffey:

- all the facred nine

"Of deathlefs mufes, paid thee dues divine:

By varied turns their heavenly voices venting; All in deep paffion for thy death consenting. Confented, or as it fhould be fpelt, concented, means, have thrown themselves into a malignant configuration, to promote the death of Henry. Spenfer, in more than one inftance, spells this word as it appears in the text of Shakspeare, as does Ben Jonfon, in his Epithalamion on Mr. Wefton. The following lines,

Henry the fifth, too famous to live long !6
England ne'er loft a king of fo much worth.

"fhall we curfe the planets of mishap,
"That plotted thus," &c.

feem to countenance my explanation; and Falstaff says of Shallow's fervants, that " they flock together in confent, like fo many wild geefe." See alfo Tully de Natura Deorum, Lib. II. ch. xlvi: "Nolo in ftellarum ratione multus vobis videri, maxi méque earum quæ errare dicuntur. Quarum tantus eft concentus ex diffimilibus motibus," &c.

Milton uses the word, and with the fame meaning, in his Penferofo:

"Whofe power hath a true confent

"With planet, or with element." STEEVENS.

Steevens is right in his explanation of the word confented. So, in The Knight of the burning Peftle, the Merchant says to Merrythought:

66

too late, I well perceive,

"Thou art confenting to my daughter's lofs."

and in The Chances, Antonio, fpeaking of the wench who robbed him, fays:

"And also the fiddler who was confenting with her." meaning the fiddler that was her accomplice.

The word appears to be used in the fame fenfe in the fifth scene of this Act, where Talbot fays to his troops:

"You all confented unto Salisbury's death,

"For none would strike a stroke in his revenge."

M. MASON.

Confent, in all the books of the age of Elizabeth, and long afterwards, is the ufual spelling of the word concent. See Vol. X. p. 96, n. 3; and K. Henry IV. P. II. A&t V. fc. i. In other places I have adopted the modern and more proper fpelling; but, in the present inftance, I apprehend, the word was used in its ordinary fenfe. In the fecond Act, Talbot, reproaching the foldiery, uses the fame expreffion, certainly without any idea of a malignant configuration:

"You all confented unto Salisbury's death." MALONE. 5 Henry the fifth,] Old copy, redundantly,-King Henry &c. STEEVENS.

too famous to live long !] So, in King Richard III : "So wife so young, they fay, do ne'er live long."

STEEVENS.

BA

GLO. England ne'er had a king, until his time. Virtue he had, deferving to command:

His brandifh'd sword did blind men with his beams;
His arms fpread wider than a dragon's wings;"
His fparkling eyes replete with wrathful fire,
More dazzled and drove back his enemies,
Than mid-day fun, fierce bent against their faces.
What should I fay? his deeds exceed all speech:
He ne'er lift up his hand, but conquered.

EXE. We mourn in black; Why mourn we not in blood?

Henry is dead, and never fhall revive:
Upon a wooden coffin we attend ;
And death's dishonourable victory
We with our stately prefence glorify,
Like captives bound to a triumphant car.
What? fhall we curfe the planets of mishap,
That plotted thus our glory's overthrow?
Or fhall we think the fubtle-witted French 8
Conjurers and forcerers, that, afraid of him,
By magick verfes have contriv'd his end?

WIN. He was a king blefs'd of the King of kings. Unto the French the dreadful judgment day

7 His arms fpread wider than a dragon's wings;] So, in Troilus and Creffida:

"The dragon wing of night o'erspreads the earth.” STEEVENS.

the fubtle-witted French &c.] There was a notion prevalent a long time, that life might be taken away by metrical charms. As fuperftition grew weaker, these charms were imagined only to have power on irrational animals. In our author's time it was supposed that the Irish could kill rats by a fong.

JOHNSON.

So, in Reginald Scot's Difcoverie of Witchcraft, 1584: "The Irishmen addict themselves, &c. yea they will not fticke to affirme that they can rime either man or beaft to death."

STEEVENS.

So dreadful will not be as was his fight.
The battles of the Lord of hofts he fought :
The church's prayers made him fo profperous.

GLO. The church! where is it? Had not churchmen pray'd,

His thread of life had not fo foon decay'd:
None do you like but an effeminate prince,
Whom, like a school-boy, you may over-awe.
WIN. Glofter, whate'er we like, thou art pro-
tector;

And lookeft to command the prince, and realm.
Thy wife is proud; the holdeth thee in awe,
More than God, or religious churchmen, may.

GLO. Name not religion, for thou lov'ft the flesh; And ne'er throughout the year to church thou go'st, Except it be to pray against thy foes.

BED. Ceafe, cease these jars, and rest

in peace!

your minds

Let's to the altar:-Heralds, wait on us:-
Inftead of gold, we'll offer up our arms;

Since arms avail not, now that Henry's dead.-
Pofterity, await for wretched years,

When at their mothers' moift eyes babes fhall fuck;
Our ifle be made a nourish of falt tears,'

moift eyes-] Thus the fecond folio. The firft, redundantly,-moiften'd. STEEVENS.

1 Our ifle be made a nourish of falt tears,] Mr. Pope-marish. All the old copies read, a nourish and confidering it is faid in the line immediately preceding, that babes fhall fuck at their mothers' moift eyes, it seems very probable that our author wrote, a nourice, i. e. that the whole ifle fhould be one common nurfe, or nourisher, of tears: and those be the nourishment of its miferable iffue. THEOBALD.

Was there ever such nonsense! But he did not know that marish is an old word for marth or fen; and therefore very judicioufly thus corrected by Mr. Pope. WARBURTon.