Page images
PDF
EPUB

A play called The Funeral of Richard Cordelion, was written by Robert Wilson, Henry Chettle, Anthony Mundy, and Michael Drayton, and first exhibited in the year 1598. See The Historical Account of The English Stage, vol. iii. MALONE.

KING JOHN.

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 1.
ROBERT BIGOT, Earl of Norfolk.

HUBERT DE BURGH, Chamberlain to the King.
ROBERT FAULCONBRIDGE, Son of Sir Robert Faul-

conbridge.

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.

I-Salisbury.] Son to King Henry II. by Rosamond Clifford.

STEEVENS.

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. K. 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! K. JOHN. Silence, good mother; hear the embassy.

CHAT. Philip of France, in right and true behalf Of thy deceased brother Geffrey's son,

Arthur Plantagenet, lays most lawful claim

2 In my behaviour,] 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 character which I here assume. I once thought that these two lines, "in my behaviour," &c. had been uttered by the ambassador, as part of his master's message, and that behaviour had meant the conduct of the King of France towards the King of England; but the ambassador's speech, as continued after the interruption, will not admit this meaning. JOHNSON.

"In my

behaviour means, I think, in the words and action that I am now going to use. So, in the fifth Act of this play, the Bastard says to the French king

[ocr errors]

Now hear our English king,

"For thus his royalty doth speak in me.” MALONE.

To this fair island, and the territories;

To Ireland, Poictiers, Anjou, Touraine, Maine :
Desiring thee to lay aside the sword,

Which sways usurpingly these several titles ;
And put the same into young Arthur's hand,
Thy nephew, and right royal sovereign.

K. JOHN. What follows, if we disallow of this?
CHAT. The proud control of fierce and bloody

war,

2

To enforce these rights so forcily withheld.

K. JOHN. Here have we war for war, and blood for blood,

Controlment for controlment: so answer France 3.

2-control-] Opposition, from controller. JOHNSON.

I think it rather means constraint or compulsion. So, in the second Act of King Henry V. when Exeter demands of the King of France the surrender of his crown, and the King answers"Or else what follows?' Exeter replies:

66

Bloody constraint; for if you hide the crown, "Even in your hearts, there will he rake for it."

The passages are exactly similar. M. MASON.

3. Here have we war for war, and blood for blood,

Controlment for controlment, &c.] King John's reception of Chatillon not a little resembles that which Andrea meets with from the King of Portugal, in the first part of Jeronimo, &c. 1605 :

"And. Thou shalt pay tribute, Portugal, with blood.— "Bal. Tribute for tribute then; and foes for foes.

I bid you sudden wars."

STEEVENS.

"And. Jeronimo was exhibited on the stage before the year 1590.

MALONE.

From the following passage in Barnabie Googe's Cupido conquered, (dedicated with his other poems, in May, 1562, and printed in 1563,) Jeronymo appears to have been written earlier than the earliest of these dates:

"Mark hym that showes ye Tragedies,

66

Thyne owne famylyar frende,

"By whom y Spaniard's hawty style

"In Englysh verse is pende."

B. Googe had already founded the praises of Phaer and Gascoigne, and is here descanting on the merits of Kyd.

It is not impossible (though Ferrex and Porrex was acted in

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 :

4

Be thou as lightning in the eyes of France;

1561) that Hieronymo might have been the first regular tragedy that appeared in an English dress.

It may also be remarked, that B. Googe, in the foregoing lines, seems to speak of a tragedy "in English verse" as a novelty. STEEVENS.

The foregoing note is entirely founded on a mistake. Googe's verses relate, not to Kyd's Tragedy, but to Alexander Neville's translation of the Spaniard Seneca's Tragedy of dipus, printed

in 1560.

A. Neville was Googe's particular friend; in the verses quoted, Mercury is the speaker, and he is addressing Googe the author:

"Marke him that thundred out the deeds

"of olde Anchises sun

"Whose English verse gyves Maroes grace,
"in all that he hath done;

"Whose death the Muses sorrow much

"that lack of aged dayes

"Amongst the comen Brytons old

"should hynder Virgils prayse.

"Mark him that hath wel framde a glasse
"for states to looke upon,

"Whose labour shews the ends of the

"that lyved long agone.

"Marke hym yt showes ye tragedyes,

"thyne owne famylyar frende,
"By whom ye Spaniard's hawty style

"in Englysh verse is pende."

The first person here alluded to, is Thomas Phayer, who had published a translation of the first seven books of the Æneid, and was prevented by death from finishing the work. The second is Higgins, the author of the Mirrour of Magistrates.

The third, Alexander Neville, the familiar friend of Googe, who has a copy of encomiastic verses on Googe prefixed to the very book here quoted. Several of Googe's poems in that work are addressed to Neville, and his answers are subjoined.

MALONE.

4 Be thou as LIGHTNING] The simile does not suit well:

« PreviousContinue »