What in the world fhould make me now deceive,

Since I muft lofe the ufe of all deceit?

Why should I then be falfe; fince it is true
That I muft die here, and live hence by truth?
I fay again, if Lewis do win the day,

He is forfworn, if e'er those eyes of yours
Behold another day break in the east:

But even this night,-whose black contagious breath

Already smokes about the burning crest
Of the old, feeble, and day-wearied fun,-
Even this ill night, your breathing shall expire;
Paying the fine of rated treachery,

8

Even with a treacherous fine of all your lives,
If Lewis by your affiftance win the day.
Commend me to one Hubert, with your king;
The love of him,-and this refpect befides,
For that my grandfire was an Englishman,'-
Awakes my confcience to confefs all this.
In lieu whereof, I pray you, bear me hence
From forth the noife and rumour of the field;
Where I may think the remnant of my thoughts
In peace, and part this body and my foul
With contemplation and devout defires.

by little and little confumed, intending thereby in conclufion to wafte and deftroy the king's perfon."

Refolve and diffolve, had anciently the fame meaning. So, in Hamlet:

8

66

O, that this too too solid flesh would melt,

Thaw, and refolve itself into a dew!" STEEVENS.

rated treachery,] It were eafy to change rated to hated for an easier meaning, but rated fuits better with fine. The Dauphin has rated your treachery, and fet upon it a fine which your lives muft pay. JOHNSON.

For that my grandfire was an Englishman,] from the old play, printed in quarto, in 1591.

This line is taken MALONE.

SAL. We do believe thee,-And befhrew my

foul

But I do love the favour and the form
Of this most fair occafion, by the which
We will untread the fteps of damned flight;
And, like a bated and retired flood,
Leaving our rankness and irregular course,
Stoop low within those bounds we have o'erlook'd,
And calmly run on in obedience,

2

Even to our ocean, to our great king John.
My arm fhall give thee help to bear thee hence;
For I do fee the cruel pangs of death

Right in thine eye.'-Away, my friends! New flight;

And happy newness, that intends old right.

[Exeunt, leading off MELUN.

2 Leaving our rankness and irregular courfe,] Rank, as applied to water, here fignifies exuberant, ready to overflow: as applied to the actions of the speaker and his party, it fignifies inordinate. So, in our author's Venus and Adonis:

"Rain added to a river that is rank,

"Perforce will force it overflow the bank." MALONE. 3 Right in thine eye.] This is the old reading. Right fignifies immediate. It is now obfolete. Some commentators would readpight, i. e. pitched as a tent is; others, fight in thine eye.

happy newness, &c.]

STEEVENS.

Happy innovation, that purposed

the restoration of the ancient rightful government. JOHNSON.

SCENE V.

The fame. The French Camp.

Enter LEWIS, and his Train.

LEW. The fun of heaven, methought, was loth to fet;

But stay'd, and made the western welkin blush, When the English meafur'd' backward their own ground,

In faint retire: O, bravely came we off,
When with a volley of our needlefs fhot,
After fuch bloody toil, we bid good night;
And wound our tatter'd colours clearly up,
Laft in the field, and almoft lords of it!-

5 When the English meafur'd-] Old copy-When English mea fure, &c. Corrected by Mr. Pope. MALONE."

6

- tatter'd-] For tatter'd, the folio reads, tottering.

JOHNSON.

It is remarkable through fuch old copies of our author as I have hitherto feen, that wherever the modern editors read tatter'd, the old editions give us totter'd in its room. Perhaps the present broad pronunciation, almoft particular to the Scots, was at that time common to both nations.

So, in Marlowe's K. Edward II. 1598:

Again:

"This tottered enfign of my ancestors."

"As doth this water from my totter'd robes." Again, in The Downfall of Robert Earl of Huntington, 1601: "I will not bid my enfign-bearer wave

66

My totter'd colours in this worthlefs air." STEEVENS. Tattering, which in the fpelling of our author's time was tottering, is ufed for tatter'd. The active and paffive participles are employed by him very indifcriminately. MALONE.

I read tatter'd, an epithet which occurs again in King Lear and Romeo and Juliet. Of tattering (which would obviously mean tearing to tatters) our author's works afford no parallel. STEEVENS.

Enter a Meffenger.

MESS. Where is my prince, the Dauphin?

LEW.

Here:-What news?

MESS. The count Melun is flain; the English

lords,

By his perfuafion, are again fallen off:

And your fupply, which you have wifh'd fo long, Are caft away, and funk, on Goodwin fands.

LEW. Ah, foul fhrewd news!-Befhrew thy very heart!

I did not think to be fo fad to-night,

As this hath made me.-Who was he, that faid,
King John did fly, an hour or two before
The ftumbling night did part our weary powers?
MESS. Whoever spoke it, it is true, my lord.
LEW. Well; keep good quarter," and good care
to-night:

The day fhall not be up fo foon as I,

To try the fair adventure of to-morrow. [Exeunt.

SCENE VI.

An open place in the neighbourhood of SwinfteadAbbey.

7

Enter the Bastard, and HUBERT, meeting.

HUB. Who's there? fpeak, ho! speak quickly, or I fhoot.

BAST. A friend :-What art thou?

keep good quarter,] i. e. keep in your allotted pofts or ftations. So, in Timon of Athens :

HUB.

Of the

BAST. Whither doft thou go?

part of England.

HUB. What's that to thee? Why may not I demand

Of thine affairs, as well as thou of mine?

BAST. Hubert, I think.

HUB.

Thou haft a perfect thought:

I will, upon all hazards, well believe

Thou art my friend, that know'ft my tongue fo well: Who art thou?

BAST.

Who thou wilt: an if thou please, Thou may'ft befriend me fo much, as to think I come one way of the Plantagenets.

HUB. Unkind remembrance! thou, and eyeless night,'

8 perfect thought :] i. e. a well-informed one. Cymbeline:

So, in

"thou, and eyelefs night,] The old copy reads-endless.

STEEVENS.

We fhould read eyelefs. So, Pindar calls the moon, the eye of night. WARBURTON.

This epithet I find in Jarvis Markham's English Arcadia, 1607: "O eyeless night, the portraiture of death!"

Again, in Gower De Confeffione Amantis, Lib. V. fol. 102. b:
"The daie made ende, and lofte his fight,
"And comen was the darke night,
"The whiche all the daies eie blent."

STEEVENS.

The emendation was made by Mr. Theobald. With Pindar our author had certainly no acquaintance; but, I believe, the correction is right. Shakspeare has, however, twice applied the epithet endless to night, in K. Richard II:

Again:

"Then thus I turn me from my country's light,
"To dwell in folemn fhades of endless night.'

"My oil-dry'd lamp

"Shall be extinct with age and endless night."

But in the latter of thefe paffages a natural, and in the former, a kind of civil, death, is alluded to. In the prefent paffage the epithet