Aumerle, thou weep'st; My tender-hearted cou sin! We'll make foul weather with despised tears; Or shall we play the wantons with our woes, Within the earth; and, therein laid,―There lies Two kinsmen, digg'd their graves with weeping eyes? Would not this ill do well ?-Well, well, I see tend 8 To speak with you; may't please you to come down? K. RICH. Down, down, I come; like glistering Phaeton, Wanting the manage of unruly jades. [NORTH. retires to BOLING. 7-Bolingbroke says-ay.] Here is another instance of injury done to the poet's metre by changing his orthography. I, which was Shakspeare's word, rhymed very well with die; but ay has quite a different sound. See a note on The Merry Wives of Windsor, vol. viii. p. 186, n. 7. TYRWHITT. In some counties ay is at this day pronounced with a sound very little differing from that of I. MALONE. 1 - base court-] Bas cour, Fr. So, in Hinde's Eliosto Libidinoso, 1606: “ - they were, for a public observation, brought into the base court of the palace." Again, in Greene's Farewell to Follie, 1617: began, at the entrance into the base court, STEEVENS. to use these words." VOL. XVI. I In the base court? Base court, where kings grow base, To come at traitors' calls, and do them grace. In the base court? Come down? Down, court! down, king! For night-owls shriek, where mounting larks should [Exeunt, from above. sing. BOLING. What says his majesty ? NORTH. Sorrow and grief of heart Makes him speak fondly, like a frantick man : Yet he is come. Enter King RICHARD, and his Attendants, below. BOLING. Stand all apart, And show fair duty to his majesty. My gracious lord,— [Kneeling. K. RICH. Fair cousin, you debase your princely knee, To make the base earth proud with kissing it: BOLING. My gracious lord, I come but for mine own. K. RICH. Your own is yours, and I am yours, and all. BOLING. So far be mine, my most redoubted lord, As my true service shall deserve your love. K. RICH. Well you deserve :-They well deserve to have, That know the strong'st and surest way to get.Uncle, give me your hand: nay, dry your eyes ; Tears show their love, but want their remedies.Cousin, I am too young to be your father, Though you are old enough to be my heir. K. RICH. Then I must not say, no 9. [Flourish. Exeunt. SCENE IV. Langley. The Duke of YORK's Garden. Enter the QUEEN, and two Ladies. QUEEN. What sport shall we devise here in this garden, To drive away the heavy thought of care? 1 LADY. Madam, we'll play at bowls. QUEEN. Twill make me think, the world is full of rubs, And that my fortune runs against the bias. 1 LADY. Madam, we will dance. QUEEN. My legs can keep no measure in delight, When my poor heart no measure keeps in grief: Therefore, no dancing, girl; some other sport. 1 LADY. Madam, we'll tell tales. 9 Then I must not say, no.] "The duke with a high sharpe voyce bade bring forth the kings horses, and then two little nagges, not worth forty franks, were brought forth; the king was set on the one, and the earle of Salisburie on the other: and thus the duke brought the king from Flint to Chester, where he was delivered to the duke of Glocesters sonne and to the earle of Arundels sonne, (that loved him but little, for he had put their fathers to death,) who led him straight to the castle." Stowe, (p. 521, edit. 1605,) from a manuscript account written by a person who was present. MALONE. QUEEN. Of sorrow, or of joy1? 1 LADY. Of either, madam. For if of joy, being altogether wanting, It adds more sorrow to my want of joy : QUEEN. 'Tis well, that thou hast cause; But thou should'st please me better, would'st thou weep. 1 LADY. I could weep, madam, would it do you good. QUEEN. And I could weep, would weeping do me good, And never borrow any tear of thee. But stay, here come the gardeners : Let's step into the shadow of these trees.— Enter a Gardener, and Two Servants. My wretchedness unto a row of pins, [QUEEN and Ladies retire. 1 of sorrow, or of JOY?] All the old copies concur in reading : "Of sorrow, or of grief?" STEEVENS. Mr. Pope made the necessary alteration. 3 And I could WEEP,] The old copies read-" And I could sing." STEEVEns. Mr. Pope made the emendation. MALONE. 4 Against a change: Woe is forerun with woɛ.] The poet, according to the common doctrine of prognostication, supposes dejection to forerun calamity, and a kingdom to be filled with rumours of sorrow when any great disaster is impending. The sense is, that publick evils are always presignified by publick pensiveness, and plaintive conversation. JOHNSON. GARD. Go, bind thou up yon' dangling apricocks, Cut off the heads of too-fast-growing sprays, 1 SERV. Why should we, in the compass of a pale, 5 Keep law, and form, and due proportion, GARD. 5 — OUR firm estate?] How could he say our, when he immediately subjoins, that it was infirm? We should read: The servant says our, meaning the state of the garden in which they are at work. The state of the metaphorical garden was indeed unfirm, and therefore his reasoning is very naturally induced. Why (says he,) should we be careful to preserve order in the narrow cincture of this our state when the great state of the kingdom is in disorder? I have replaced the old reading which Dr. Warburton would have discontinued in favour of his own conjecture. STEEVENS. Her KNOTS disorder'd,] Knots are figures planted in box, the lines of which frequently intersect each other. So, Milton: "Flowers, worthy Paradise, which not nice art "In beds and curious knots, but nature boon "Pour'd forth." STEEVENS. |