Or turn'd an eye of doubt upon my face,' Deep shame had struck me dumb, made me break off, And didst in signs again parley with sin; The deed, which both our tongues held vile to name.- This kingdom, this confine of blood and breath, Between my conscience, and my cousin's death. Hub. Arm you against your other enemies, The dreadful motion of a murd'rous thought,3 1 Or turn'd an eye of doubt upon my face, As bid me tell my tale in express words;] That is, such an eye of doubt as bid me tell my tale in express words. M. Mason. 2 As bid-] Thus the old copy. Mr. Malone reads-And. Steevens. Mr. Pope reads-Or bid me &c. but As is very unlikely to have been printed for Or. As we have here As printed instead of And, so, vice versâ, in King Henry V, 4to. 1600, we find And misprinted for As: "And in this glorious and well foughten field "We kept together in our chivalry." Malone. As, in ancient language, has sometimes the power of-as for instance. So, in Hamlet: "As, stars with trains of fire," &c. In the present instance it seems to mean, as if. "Had you, (says the King, speaking elliptically) turned an eye of doubt on my face, as if to bid me tell my tale in express words," &c. So, in Spenser's Fairy Queen: "That with the noise it shook as it would fall;" i. e. as if.—I have not therefore disturbed the old reading. Steevens. 3 The dreadful motion of a murd'rous thought,] Nothing can be And you have slander'd nature in my form; Is yet the cover of a fairer mind Than to be butcher of an innocent child. K. John. Doth Arthur live? O, haste thee to the peers, Throw this report on their incensed rage, And make them tame to their obedience! Forgive the comment that my passion made Upon thy feature; for my rage was blind, And foul imaginary eyes of blood Presented thee more hideous than thou art. O, answer not; but to my closet bring The angry lords, with all expedient haste: I conjure thee but slowly; run more fast.* SCENE III. The same. Before the Castle. Enter ARTHUR, on the Walls. [Exeunt. Arth. The wall is high; and yet will I leap down:5Good ground, be pitiful, and hurt me not! falser than what Hubert here says in his own vindication; for we find, from a preceding scene, the motion of a murd'rous thought had entered into him, and that very deeply: and it was with difficulty that the tears, the entreaties, and the innocence of Arthur had diverted and suppressed it. Warburton. 4 The old play is divided into two parts, the first of which concludes with the King's despatch of Hubert on this message; the second begins with "Enter Arthur," &c. as in the following scene. Steevens. 5 The wall is high; and yet will I leap down:] Our author has here followed the old play. In what manner Arthur was deprived of his life is not ascertained. Matthew Paris, relating the event, uses the word evanuit; and, indeed, as King Philip afterwards publickly accused King John of putting his nephew to death, without mentioning either the manner of it; or his accomplices, we may conclude that it was conducted with impenetrable secrecy. The French historians, however, say, that John coming in a boat, during the night-time, to the castle of Rouen, where the young prince was confined, ordered him to be brought forth, and having stabbed him, while supplicating for mercy, the King fastened a stone to the dead body, and threw it into the Seine, in order to give some colour to a report, which he afterwards caused to be spread, that the prince attempting to escape out of a window of the tower of the castle, fell into the river, and was drowned. Malone. There's few, or none, do know me; if they did, If I get down and do not break my limbs, As good to die, and go, as die, and stay. [Leaps down. O me ! my uncle's spirit is in these stones:— Heaven take my soul, and England keep my bones! [Dies. Enter PEMBROKE, SALISBURY, and BIGOT. Sal. Lords, I will meet him at saint Edmund's-Bury; It is our safety, and we must embrace This gentle offer of the perilous time. Pem. Who brought that letter from the cardinal? Sal. The count Melun, a noble lord of France; Whose private with me," of the Dauphin's love, Is much more general than these lines import. Big. To-morrow morning let us meet him then. Sal. Or, rather then set forward: for 'twill be Two long days' journey, lords, or e'er we meet.7 6 Whose private &c.] i. e. whose private account of the Dauphin's affection to our cause is much more ample than the letters. Pope. 7 or e'er we meet.] This phrase, so frequent in our old writers, is not well understood. Or is here the same as ere, i. e. before, and should be written (as it is still pronounced in Shropshire) ore. There the common people use it often. Thus, they say, Ore to-morrow, for ere or before to-morrow. The addition of ever, or e'er, is merely augmentative. That or has the full sense of before, and that e'er, when joined with it, is merely augmentative, is proved from innumerable passages in our ancient writers, wherein or occurs simply without e'er, and must bear that signification, Thus, in the old tragedy of Master Arden of Feversham, 1599, quarto, (attributed by some, though falsely, to Shakspeare) the wife says: "He shall be murdered or the guests come in.” So, in All for Money, an old Morality, 1574: "I could sit in the cold a good while I swear, "Or I would be weary such suitors to hear." Again, in Every Man, another Morality, no date: "As, or we departe, thou shalt know." Again, in the interlude of The Disobedient Child, bl. 1. no date: "To send for victuals or I came away." That or should be written ore I am by no means convinced. The vulgar pronunciation of a particular county ought not to be Enter the Bastard. Bast. Once more to-day well met, distemper'd lords! With our pure honours, nor attend the foot Bast. Whate'er you think, good words, I think, were best. Sal. Our griefs, and not our manners, reason now.9 Bast. But there is little reason in your grief; Therefore, 'twere reason, you had manners now. Pem. Sir, sir, impatience hath his privilege. Bast. 'Tis true; to hurt his master, no man else.1 Sal. This is the prison: What is he lies here? [Seeing ARTH. Pem. O death, made proud with pure and princely beauty! The earth had not a hole to hide this deed. Sal. Murder, as hating what himself hath done, Doth lay it open to urge on revenge. Big. Or, when he doom'd this beauty to a grave, Found it too precious-princely for a grave. Sal. Sir Richard, what think you? Have you beheld, Or have you read, or heard? or could you think?3 received as a general guide. Ere is nearer the Saxon primitive Steevens. xr. 8 distemper'd-] i. e. ruffled, out of humour. Hamlet: 66 So, in in his retirement marvellous distemper'd." Steevens. -reason now.] To reason, in Shakspeare, is not so often to argue, as to talk. Johnson. 9 So, in Coriolanus: 1 66 reason with the fellow "Before you punish him." Steevens. no man else.] Old copy-no man's. Corrected by the editor of the third folio. Malone. 2 Have you beheld,] Old copy-You have &c. Corrected by the editor of the second folio. Malone. 3 Or have you read, or heard? &c.] Similar interrogatories have been already urged by the Dauphin, Act III, sc. iv: Who hath read, or heard, "Of any kindred action like to this?" Steevens. Or do you almost think, although you see, The height, the crest, or crest unto the crest, Pem. All murders past do stand excus'd in this: Shall give a holiness, a purity, To the yet-unbegotten sin of time;5 Bast. It is a damned and a bloody work; Sal. If that it be the work of any hand?— wall-ey'd wrath,] So, in Titus Andronicus, Lucius, addressing himself to Aaron the Moor: 5 "Say, wall-ey'd slave." Steevens. sin of time;] The old copy-of times. I follow Mr. Pope, whose reading is justified by a line in the celebrated soliloquy of Hamlet: "For who would bear the whips and scorns of time?" Again, by another in this play of King John, p. 401: ry V: "I am not glad that such a sore of time-" Steevens. "By custom and the ordinance of times." Again, in The Rape of Lucrece: "For now against himself he sounds his doom, "That through the length of times he stands disgrac❜d." Mr. Pope and the subsequent editors more elegantly read-sins of time; but the peculiarities of Shakspeare's diction ought, in my apprehension, to be faithfully preserved. Malone. |