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Upon his Irish expedition;

From whence he, intercepted, did return.
To be depos'd, and, fhortly, murdered.

WOR. And for whofe death, we in the world's wide mouth

Live scandaliz'd, and foully spoken of.

Hor. But, foft, I pray you; Did king Richard
then

Proclaim my brother Edmund Mortimer
Heir to the crown? 7

chil

7 Heir to the crown?] Edmund Mortimer, earl of March, was the undoubted heir to the crown after the death of Richard, as appears from the following table; in which the three younger dren of King Edward III. are not included, as being immaterial to the fubject before us:

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Sandford in his Genealogical Hiftory fays, that the laft mentioned
Edmund, earl of March, (the Mortimer of this play,) was mar-
ried to Anne Stafford, daughter of Edmund, earl of Stafford,
VOL. VIII.
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NORTH.

He did; myself did hear it.

Hor. Nay, then I cannot blame his coufin king, That wish'd him on the barren mountains starv'd. But fhall it be, that you,-that fet the crown Upon the head of this forgetful man; And, for his fake, wear the detefted blot Of murd❜rous fubornation,-shall it be, That you a world of curfes undergo; Being the agents, or Lule fecond means, The cords, the ladder, or the hangman rather?— O, pardon me, that I defcend fo low, To fhow the line, and the predicament, Wherein you range under this fubtle king.Shall it, for fhame, be fpoken in these days, Or fill up chronicles in time to come, That men of your nobility and power, Did 'gage them both in an unjust behalf,— As both of you, God pardon it! have done,Το put down Richard, that sweet lovely rose,

Thomas Walfingham afferts that he married a daughter of Owen Glendower; and the fubfequent hiftorians copied him; but this is a very doubtful point, for the Welsh writers make no mention of it. Sandford fays that this earl of March was confined by the jealous Henry in the castle of Trim in Ireland, and that he died there, after an imprisonment of twenty years, on the 19th of January, 1424. But this is a mistake. There is no proof that he was confined a ftate-prifoner by King Henry the Fourth, and he was em ployed in many military fervices by his fon Henry the Fifth. He, died in his own caftle at Trim in Ireland, at the time mentioned by Sandford, but not in a state of imprisonment. See note on King Henry VI. P. II. Act II. fc. ii. Vol. X.

Since the original note was written, I have learned that Owen Glendower's daughter was married to his antagonist Lord Gray of Ruthven. Holinfhed led Shakspeare into the error of fuppofing her the wife of Edmund Mortimer, earl of March. This nobleman, who is the Mortimer of the prefent play, was born in November, 1392, and confequently at the time when this play commences, was little more than ten years old. The Prince of Wales was not fifteen. MALONE.

And plant this thorn, this canker, Bolingbroke?*
And shall it, in more shame, be further spoken,
That you are fool'd, difcarded, and fhook off
By him, for whom these shames ye underwent ?
No; yet time ferves, wherein you may redeem
Your banish'd honours, and reftore yourselves
Into the good thoughts of the world again:
Revenge the jeering, and difdain'd' contempt,
Of this proud king; who ftudies, day and night,
To answer all the debt he owes to you,

Even with the bloody payment of your deaths.
Therefore, I fay,-

WOR.
Peace, coufin, say no more:
And now I will unclasp a secret book,
And to your quick-conceiving discontents
I'll read you matter deep and dangerous;
As full of peril, and advent'rous fpirit,
As to o'er-walk a current, roaring loud,
On the unsteadfast footing of a spear.*

Hor. If he fall in, good night:-or fink or
fwim: 3-

Send danger from the east unto the west,
So honour cross it from the north to fouth,

8 this canker, Bolingbroke?] The canker-rofe is the dogrofe, the flower of the Cynofbaton. So, in Much ado about Nothing: "I had rather be a canker in a hedge, than a rose in his grace." STEEVENS.

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On the unfteadfast footing of a spear.] That is, of a fpear laid

acrofs.

WARBURTON.

3 fink or fwim:] This is a very ancient proverbial expreffion. So, in The Knight's Tale of Chaucer, Mr. Tyrwhitt's edit. v. 2399:

Ne recceth never, whether I fink or flete."

Again, in The longer thou liveft the more Fool thou art, 1570:
"He careth not who doth fink or fwimme." STEEVENS.

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And let them grapple;-O! the blood more ftirs, To rouse a lion, than to start a hare.3

NORTH. Imagination of fome great exploit Drives him beyond the bounds of patience.

Hor. By heaven, methinks, it were an eafy leap, To pluck bright honour from the pale-fac'd moon;*

3

the blood more firs,

To roufe a lion, than to fart a bare.] This paffage will remind the claffical reader of young Afcanius's heroic feelings in the fourth Æneid:

- pecora inter inertia votis

Optat aprum, aut fulvum defcendere monte leonem. STEEVENS. 4 By heaven, methinks, it were an eafy leap,

To pluck bright honour from the pale-fac'd moon;] Though I am very far from condemning this fpeech with Gildon and Theobald, as abfolute madness, yet I cannot find in it that profundity of reflection, and beauty of allegory which Dr. Warburton has endeavoured to difplay. This fally of Hotfpur, may be, I think, foberly and rationally vindicated as the violent eruption of a mind inflated with ambition and fired with refentment; as the boafted clamour of a man able to do much, and eager to do more; as the hafty motion of turbulent defire; as the dark expreffion of indetermined thoughts. The paffage from Euripides is furely not allegorical, yet it is produced, and properly, as parallel. JOHNSON.

Euripides has put the very fame fentiment into the mouth of Eteocles: "I will not, madam, difguife my thoughts; I would fcale heaven, I would defcend to the very entrails of the earth, if fo be that by that price I could obtain a kingdom.

WARBURTON.

This is probably a paffage from fome bombaft play, and afterwards used as a common burlefque phrafe for attempting impoffibilities. At leaft, that it was the laft, might be concluded from its ufe in Cartwright's poem On Mr. Stokes his Book on the Art of Vaulting, edit. 1651, p. 212:

"Then go thy ways, brave Will, for one;

By Jove 'tis thou must leap, or none, "To pull bright honour from the moon.'

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Unless Cartwright intended to ridicule this paffage in Shakspeare, which I partly fufpect. Stokes's book, a noble object for the wits, was printed at London, in the year 1641. T. WARTON.

A paffage fomewhat refembling this, occurs in Archbishop Parker's Addrefs to the Reader, prefixed to his Tract entitled. A Brief Ex

Or dive into the bottom of the deep,

Where fathom-line could never touch the ground,'
And pluck up drowned honour by the locks;
So he, that doth redeem her thence, might wear,
Without corrival, all her dignities:

But out upon this half-fac'd fellowship!"

amination for the Tyme, &c.-" But trueth is to hye fet, for you to pluck her out of heaven, to manifeftlye knowen to be by your papers obfcured, and furely ftablished, to drowne her in the myrie lakes of your fophifticall writinges."

In The Knight of the burning Peftle, Beaumont and Fletcher have put the foregoing rant of Hotfpur into the mouth of Ralph the apprentice, who, like Bottom, appears to have been fond of acting parts to tear a cat in. I fuppofe a ridicule on Shakspeare was defigned. STEEVENS.

Where fathom-line could never touch the ground,] So, in The Tempest:

"I'll feek him deeper than e'er plummet founded."

STEEVENS.

The

6 But out upon this half-fac'd fellowship!] A coat is faid to be faced, when part of it, as the fleeves or bofom, is covered with fomething finer or more fplendid than the main fubftance. mantua-makers ftill ufe the word. Half-fac'd fellowship is then partnership but half-adorned, partnership which yet wants half the fhow of dignities and honours." JOHNSON.

So, in The Portraiture of Hypocrifie, &c. bl. 1. 1589: "A gentleman should have a gowne for the night, two for the daie, &c. one all furred, another half-faced."

Mr. M. Mafon, however, obferves, that the allufion may be to the half-faces on medals, where two perfons are represented. "The coins of Philip and Mary (fays he) rendered this image fufficiently familiar to Shakspeare." STEEVENS.

I doubt whether the allufion was to drefs. Half-fac'd feems to have meant paltry. The expreffion, which appears to have been a contemptuous one, I believe, had its rife from the meaner denominations of coin, on which, formerly, only a profile of the reigning prince was exhibited; whereas on the more valuable pieces a full face was reprefented. So, in King John:

"With that half-face would he have all my land,-
"A half-fac'd groat, five hundred pound a year!"

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