*KING HENRY IV. PART I.] The tranfactions contained in this historical drama are comprised within the period of about ten months; for the action commences with the news brought of Hotfpur having defeated the Scots under Archibald earl of Douglas at Holmedon, (or Halidown-hill,) which battle was fought on Holyrood-day, (the 14th of September,) 1402; and it closes with the defeat and death of Hotfpur at Shrewsbury; which engagement happened on Saturday the 21ft of July, (the eve of Saint Mary Magdalen,) in the year 1403. THEOBALD.

This play was first entered at Stationers' Hall, Feb. 25, 1597, by Andrew Wife. Again, by M. Woolff, Jan. 9, 1598. For the piece fuppofed to have been its original, fee Six old Plays on which Shakspeare founded, &c. published for S. Leacroft, Charing-Crofs. STEEVENS.

Shakspeare has apparently defigned a regular connection of these dramatic hiftories from Richard the Second to Henry the Fifth. King Henry, at the end of Richard the Second, declares his purpofe to visit the Holy Land, which he refumes in the first speech of this play. The complaint made by King Henry in the last act of Richard the Second, of the wildnefs of his fon, prepares the reader for the frolicks which are here to be recounted, and the characters which are now to be exhibited. JOHNSON.

This comedy was written, I believe, in the year 1597. See An Attempt to afcertain the Order of Shakspeare's Plays, Vol. I.

MALONE.

King Henry the Fourth.

Henry, Prince of Wales,

2

Prince John of Lancaster, Jons to the King-
Earl of Weftmoreland, friends to the King.
Sir Walter Blunt, •}

Thomas Percy, Earl of Worcester.
Henry Percy, Earl of Northumberland:
Henry Percy, furnamed Hotfpur, his fon.
Edmund Mortimer, Earl of March.
Scroop, Archbishop of York.
Archibald, Earl of Douglas.

Owen Glendower.

Sir Richard Vernon.

Sir John Falstaff.
Poins.

Gadshill.

Peto.
Bardolph.

Lady Percy, wife to Hotfpur, and fifter to Mortimer. Lady Mortimer, daughter to Glendower, and wife to Mortimer.

Mrs. Quickly, hoftefs of a tavern in Eastcheap.

Lords, Officers, Sheriff, Vintner, Chamberlain, Drawers, two Carriers, Travellers, and Attendants.

SCENE, England.

2 Prince John of Lancafter.] The perfons of the drama were originally collected by Mr. Rowe, who has given the title of Duke of Lancafter to Prince John, a mistake which Shakspeare has been no where guilty of in the first part of this play, though in the fecond he has fallen into the fame error. King Henry IV. was himfelf the laft perfon that ever bore the title of Duke of Lancaster. But all his fons (till they had peerages, as Clarence, Bedford, Gloucefter,) were diftinguished by the name of the royal house, as John of Lancaster, Humphrey of Lancafter, &c. and in that proper ftyle, the prefent John (who became afterwards fo illuftrious by the title of Duke of Bedford,) is always mentioned in the play before us. STEEVENS.

FIRST PART OF

KING HENRY

IV.

ACT I. SCENE I.

London. A Room in the Palace.

Enter King HENRY, WESTMORELAND, Sir WALTER BLUNT, and Others.

K. HEN. So fhaken as we are, fo wan with care, Find we a time for frighted peace to pant, And breathe fhort-winded accents of new broils 2 To be commenc'd in ftronds afar remote.

No more the thirsty Erinnys of this foil

Shall daub her lips with her own children's blood;3

2 Find we a time for frighted peace to pant,

And breathe fhort-winded accents of new broils-] That is, let us foften peace to reft a while without disturbance, that she may recover breath to propofe new wars. JOHNSON.

3 No more the thirsty Erinnys of this fail

Shall daub her lips with her own children's blood;] See Mr. M. Mafon's note, p. 359. The old copies read-entrance, Perhaps the following conjecture may be thought very far fetch'd, and yet I am willing to venture it, because it often happens that wrong reading has affinity to the right. We might read:

-the thirty entrants of this foil;

i. e. those who set foot on this kingdom through the thirst of power or conqueft, as the speaker himself had done, on his return to England after banishment.

Whoever is accustomed to the old copies of this author, will ge nerally find the words confequents, occurrents, ingredients, fpelt confequence, occurrence, ingredience; and thus, perhaps, the French word entrants, anglicized by Shakspeare, might have been corrupted into entrance, which affords no very apparent meaning.

No more fhall trenching war channel her fields,

By her lips Shakspeare may mean the lips of peace, who is mentioned in the fecond line; or may use the thirsty entrance of the foil, for the porous furface of the earth, through which all moisture enters, and is thirftily drank, or soaked up.

So, in an Ode inserted by Gascoigne in his and Francis Kinwelmerfh's tranflation of the Phoeniffe of Euripides:

"And make the greedy ground a drinking cup,

"To fup the blood of murdered bodies up." STEEVENS. If there be no corruption in the text, I believe Shakspeare meant, however licentiously, to fay, No more fhall this foil have the lips of her thirsty entrance, or mouth, daubed with the blood of her own children.

Her lips, in my apprehenfion, refers to foil in the preceding line, and not to peace, as has been fuggefted. Shakspeare seldom attends to the integrity of his metaphors. In the fecond of thefe lines he confiders the foil or earth of England as a perfon; (So, in King Richard II:

"Tells them, he does beftride a bleeding land,

"Gafping for life under great Bolingbroke.)"

and yet in the first line the foil must be understood in its ordinary material fenfe, as alfo in a fubfequent line in which its fields are faid to be channelled with war. Of this kind of incongruity our author's plays furnish innumerable inftances.

Daub, the reading of the earlieft copy, is confirmed by a paffage in K. Richard II. where we again meet with the image presented here:

66

"For that our kingdom's earth fhall not be foil'd "With that dear blood which it hath fostered." The fame kind of imagery is found in K. Henry VI. P. III: Thy brother's blood the thirsty earth hath drunk:" In which paffage, as well as in that before us, the poet had perhaps the facred writings in his thoughts: "And now art thou curfed from the earth, which hath opened her mouth to receive thy brother's blood from thy hand." Gen. iv. 2. This laft obfervation has been made by an anonymous writer.

Again, in K. Richard II:

"Reft thy unreft on England's lawful earth,

Unlawfully made drunk with innocent blood."

The earth may with equal propriety be faid to daub her lips with blood, as to be made drunk with blood.

A paffage in the old play of King John, 1591, may throw fome light on that before us:

"Is all the blood y-fpilt on either part,

Clofing the crannies of the thirsty earth,

"Grown to a love-game, and a bridal feast?" MALONE..