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K. Hen. I would have her learn, my fair coufin, how perfectly I love her; and that is good English.

Bur. Is the not apt ?

K. Hen. Our tongue is rough, coz ; and my condition is not smooth fo that, having neither the voice nor the heart of flattery about me, I cannot fo conjure up the fpirit of love in her, that he will appear in his true likeness.

Bur. Pardon the franknefs of my mirth,2 if I answer you for that. If you would conjure in her you muft make a circle: if conjure up love in her in his true likeness, he must appear naked, and blind: Can you blame her then, being a maid yet rofed over with the virgin crimson of modefty, if fhe deny the appearance of a naked blind boy in her naked feeing felf? It were, my lord, a hard condition for a maid to confign to.

K. Hen. Yet they do wink, and yield; as love is blind, and enforces.

Bur. They are then excused, my lord, when they fee not what they do.

K. Hen. Then, good my lord, teach your coufin to confent to winking.

Bur. I will wink on her to confent, my lord, if you wilk teach her to know my meaning: for maids, well fummer'd and warm kept, are like flies at Bartholomew-tide, blind, though they have their eyes; and then they will endure handling, which before would not abide looking on.

K. Hen. This moral 3 ties me over to time, and a hot fum-mer; and fo I fhall catch the fly, your coufin, in the latter end, and the must be blind too.

Bur. As love is, my lord, before it loves..

K. Hen. It is fo: and you may, fome of you, thank love for my blindness; who cannot fee many a fair French city, for one fair French maid that ftands in my way.

Fr. King. Yes, my lord, you fee them perfpectively, the cities turned into a maid; for they are all girdled with maiden walls, that war hath never enter'd. K. Hen.

9 Condition is temper. STEEVENS.

2 We have here but a mean dialogue for princes; the merriment is very grofs, and the fentiments are very worthlefs. JOHNSON.

3 That is, the application of this fable. The moral being the applica on of a fable, our author calls any application a moral. JOHNSON.

VOL. IV.

G

g

K. Hen. Shall Kate be my wife ?

Fr. King. So please you.

K. Hen. I am content; fo the maiden cities you may wait on her: fo the maid, that stood in the way with, fhall fhow me the way to my will.

talk of, for my

Fr. King. We have confented to all terms of reafon.
K. Heu. Is't fo, my lords of England?

Weft. The king hath granted every article:-
His daughter, first; and then, in sequel, all,
According to their firm propofed natures.

Exe. Only, he hath not yet fubfcribed this :-Where your majefty demands,-That the king of France, having any occafion to write for matter of grant, fhall name your highnefs in this form, and with this addition, in French,Notre tres cher filz Henry roy d' Angleterre, beretier de France; and thus in Latin,-Præclariffimus filius nofter Henricus, rex Anglia, & hæres Francia.

Fr. King. Nor this I have not, brother, fo deny'd, But your requeft fhall make me let it pafs.

K. Hen. I pray you then, in love and dear alliance, Let that one article rank with the reft:

And, thereupon, give me your daughter.

Fr. King. Take her, fair fon; and from her blood raife up

Iffue to me: that the contending kingdoms

Of France and England, whofe very thores look pale
With envy of each other's happiness,

May ceafe their hatred; and this dear conjunction
Plant neighbourhood and chriftian-like accord
In their fweet bofoms, and never war advance
His bleeding fword 'twixt England and fair France.
All. Amen!

K. Hen. Now welcome, Kate:-and bear me witness all, That here I kifs her as my fovereign queen.

[Flourish. 2. Ifa.

4 What, is tres cher, in French, Præclariffimus in Latin? We should read, præcariffimus. WARBURTON.

"This is exceeding true," fays Dr. Farmer, but how came the blunder? It is a typographical one in Holinfhed, which Shak fpeare copied; but muft indifputably have been corrected, had he been acquain ted with the languages." STEEVENS.

2. Ifa. God, the best maker of all marriages,
Combine your hearts in one, your realms in one!
As man and wife, being two, are one in love,
So be there 'twixt your kingdoms fuch a fpoufal,
That never may ill office, or fell jealousy,
Which troubles oft the bed of bleffed marriage,
Thruft in between the paction of thefe kingdoms,
To make divorce of their incorporate league;
That English may as French, French Englishmen,
Receive each other!-God fpeak this Amen!

All. Amen!

K. Hen. Prepare we for our marriage: :-on which day,
My lord of Burgundy, we'll take your oath,
And all the peers', for furety of our leagues.-
Then fhall I fwear to Kate,-and you to me;
And may our oaths well kept and profperous be!
Enter CHORUS.

Thus far, with rough, and all unable pen,
Our bending authors hath purfu'd the ftory;
In little room confining mighty men,

6

Mangling by ftarts the full courfe of their glory.
Small time, but, in that small, moft greatly liv'd
This ftar of England: fortune made his fword;
By which the world's best garden 7 he achiev'd,
And of it left his fon imperial lord.

Henry the fixth, in infant bands crown'd king
Of France and England, did this king fucceed;
Whofe ftate fo many had the maraging,

[Exeunt.

That they loft France, and made his England bleed: Which oft our ftage hath shown; and, for their fake, your fair minds let this acceptance take.8

In

[Exeunt.

5 By bending, our author meant unequal to the weight of bis fubject, and bending beneath it; or he may mean, as in Hamlet: "Here stooping to your clemency." STEEVENS.

By touching only on felect parts. JOHNSON.

7 i. e. France. A fimilar diftinction is bestowed, in The Taming of the Sbrew, on Lombardy:

"The pleasant garden of great Italy." STEEVENS.

8 This play has many fcenes of high dignity, and many of eafy

merriment.

merriment. The character of the king is well fupported, except in his courtship, where he has neither the vivacity of Hal, nor the grandeur of Henry. The humour of Pistol is very happily continued: his character has perhaps been the model of all the bullies that have yet appeared on the English ftage.

The lines given to the Chorus have many admirers; but the truth is, that in them a little may be praifed, and much must be forgiven; nor can it be easily discovered why the intelligence given by the Chorus is more neceffary in this play than in many others where it is omitted. The great defect of this play is the emptinefs and narrowness of the last act, which a very little diligence might have easily avoided. JOHNSON

END OF THE FOURTH VOLUME

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