King JOHN: PERSONS REPRESENTED. Prince HENRY, his son; afterwards king Henry III. ARTHUR, duke of Bretagne, son of Geffrey, late duke of Bretagne, the elder brother of king John. WILLIAM MARESHALL, earl of Pembroke. GEFFREY FITZ-PETER, earl of Essex, chief justiciary of England. WILLIAM LONGSWORD, earl of Salisbury. ROBERT BIGOT, earl of Norfolk. HUBERT DE BURGH, chamberlain to the king. ROBERT FAULCONBRIDGE, son of Sir Robert Faulconbridge: PHILIP FAULCONBRIDGE, his half-brother, bastard son to king Richard the first. JAMES GURNEY, servant to Lady Faulconbridge. PETER of Pomfret, a prophet. PHILIP, king of France. LEWIS, the dauphin. Arch-duke of Austria. Cardinal PANDULPH, the pope's legate. MELUN, a French lord. CHATILLON, ambassador from France to king John. ELINOR, the widow of king Henry II. and mother of king John. CONSTANCE, mother to Arthur. BLANCH, daughter to Alphonso, king of Castile, and niece to king John. Lady FAULCONBRIDGE, mother to the bastard, and Robert Faulconbridge. Lords, Ladies, Citizens of Angiers, Sheriff, Heralds, Officers, Soldiers, Messengers, and other Attendants. SCENE sometimes in England and sometimes in France. KING JOHN. ACT I. SCENE I.-Northampton. A Room of State in the Palace. Enter King JOHN, Queen ELINOR, PEMBROKE, Essex, SALISBURY, and others, with CHATILLON. King John. Now, say, Chatillon, what would France with us? Chat. Thus, after greeting, speaks the king of France, In my behaviour,' to the majesty, The borrow'd majesty of England here. Eli. A strange beginning ;-borrow'd majesty! Arthur Plantagenet, lays most lawful claim To Ireland, Poictiers, Anjou, Touraine, Maine : K. John. What follows, if we disallow of this? K. John. Here have we war for war, and blood for blood, Controlment for controlment: so answer France. Chat. Then take my king's defiance from my mouth, The furthest limit of my embassy. K. John. Bear mine to him, and so depart in peace : [1] The word behaviour seems here to have a signification that I have never found in any other author. The king of France, says the envoy, thus speaks in my behaviour to the majesty of England; that is, the king of France speaks in the cha racter which I here assume. JOHNSON. [2] Opposition from controller. JOHNSON. Be thou as lightning in the eyes of France; [Exeunt CHAT. and PEM. Eli. What now, my son ? have I not ever said, This might have been prevented, and made whole, Which now the manage of two kingdoms must K. John. Our strong possession, and our right, for us. Eli. Your strong possession, much more than your right Or else it must go wrong with you, and me: So much my conscience whispers in your ear; Enter the Sheriff of Northamptonshire, who whispers ESSEX [Exit Sheriff. That e'er I heard: Shall I produce the men? 3 Re-enter Sheriff, with ROBERT FAULCONBRIDGE, and PHILIP, his bastard brother. This expedition's charge.-What men are you? [3] This simile does not suit well: the lightning indeed appears before the thunder is heard, but the lightning is destructive, and the thunder innocent. JOHNSON. The allusion may, notwithstanding, be very proper, so far as Shakespeare had applied it, i. e. merely to the swiftness of the lightning and its preceding and foretelling the thunder. But there is some reason to believe that thunder was not thought to be innocent in our author's time, as we elsewhere learn from himself. See King Lear, Act III. sc. ii. Antony and Cleopatra, Act II. sc. v. Julius Casar, Act I. sc. iii. and still more decisively in Measure for Measure, Act II. sc. ii. This old superstition is still prevalent in many parts of the country. RITSON. K. John. What art thou? Rob. The son and heir to that same Faulconbridge. Bast. Most certain of one mother, mighty king, Eli. Out on thee, rude man! thou dost shame thy mother, And wound her honour with this diffidence. Bast. I, madam? no, I have no reason for it; K. John. A good blunt fellow :-Why, being younger born, Doth he lay claim to thine inheritance ? Bast. I know not why, except to get the land. But whe'r I be as true begot, or no,* And were our father, and this son like him ;--- I give heaven thanks, I was not like to thee. K. John. Why, what a madcap hath heaven lent us here! The accent of his tongue affecteth him : K. John. Mine eye hath well examined his parts, Whe'r for whether. STEEVENS. The trick or tricking, is the same as the tracing of a drawing, meaning that peculiarity of face which may be sufficiently shown by the slightest outline, STEEVEŃS With that half face would he have all my land: Bast. Well, sir, by this you cannot get my land; K John. Sirrah, your brother is legitimate; To dispossess that child which is not his ? [6] The poet sneers at the meagre sharp visage of the younger brother, by com paring him to a silver groat, that bore the king's face in profile to shew but half the face. THEOBALD. [7] This is a decisive argument. As your father, if he liked him, could not have been forced to resign him, so not liking him, he is not at liberty to reject him. JOHNSON. |