Imatges de pàgina
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The word is still used in that sense by legal conveyancers. MALONE,

P. 205, 1. 18-21. On that advantage, &c.] This passage seems to lie obscure and disjointed. Neither the grammar is to be justified; nor is the sentiment better. I have ventur'd at a slight alteration, which departs so little from the reading which has obtain'd, but so much raises the sense, as well as takes away the obscurity, that I am willing to think it restores the author's meaning: Out on that vantage, THEOBALD. Sir T. Hanmer reads:

what advantage,

which I have followed, though Mr. Theobald's conjecture may be well enough admitted. JOHNSON.

I have no doubt but the old reading is right, and the amendment unnecery; the passage being better as it stood originally, if pointed thus: On that advantage bought with such a shame, (To save a paltry life, and slay bright fame,) Before young Talbot from old Talbot fy, $ The coward horse, that bears me, fall and die! The dividing the sentence into two distinct parts, occasioned the obscurity of it, which this method. of printing removes. M. MASON.

The sense is Before young Talbot fly from his father, (in order to save his life while he destroys his character,) on, or for the sake of, the advantages you mention, namely, preserving our household's name, &c. may my coward horse drop down dead! MALONE.

P. 203, 1. 22. To like one to the peasants is, / to compare, to level by comparison; the line is therefore intelligible enough by itself, but in this sense it wants connection. Sir T. Hanmer Teads, And leave me, which makes a clear

sense and just consequence. But as change is not to be allowed without necessity, I have suffered like to stand, because I suppose the author meant the same as make like, or reduce to a level with. JOHNSON.

P. 204, 1. g. Triumphant death, smear'd with captivity! That is, death stained and dishonoured with captivity. JOHNSON. Death stained by my being made a captive and dying in captivity. The author when he first addresses death, and uses the epithet triumphant, considers him as a person who had triumphed over him by plunging his dart in his breast. In the latter part of the line, if Dr. Johnson has rightly explained it, death must have its ordinary signification. "I think light of my death, though rendered disgraceful by captivity," &c. Perhaps however the construction intended by the poet was -Young Talbot's valour makes me, smeared with captivity, smile, &c. If so, there should be a comina after captivity. MALONE.

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P. 204, 1. 16. Tendring my ruin,] Watching me with tenderness in my fall. JOHNSON.

P. 204, 1. 24. JOHN TALBOT.] This John Talbot was the eldest son of the first Earl by his sècond wife, and was Viscount Lisle, when he was killed with his father, in endeavouring to relieve Chatillon, after the battle of Bourdeaux, in the year 1453. He was created Viscount Lisle in 1451. John, the Earl's eldest son by his first wife, was slain at the battle of Northampton in 1460. MALONE.

P. 204, 1. 27. Thou antick death,] The fool, or antick of the play, made sport by mocking the graver personages. JOHNSON.

It is not improbable that Shakspeare borrowed this idea from one of the cuts to that most exqui

site work called Imagines Mortis, commonly ascribed to the pencil of Holbein, but without any authority. See the 7th print. Douce.

P. 205, first 1. winged through the lither sky,] Lither is flexible or yielding. In much the 'same sense Milton says:

- He with broad sails

"Winnow'd the buxom air."

That is, the obsequious air. JOHNSON.

Lither is the comparative of the adjective lithe. So, in Lyly's Endymion, 1591:

66 -to breed numbness or litherness." Litherness is limberness, or yielding weakness. STEEVENS.

P. 205, 1. 23. raging - wood,] That is, raging mad. STEEVENS.

P. 205, 1. 23-25. The return of rhyme where young Talbot is again mentioned, and in no other place, strengthens the suspicion that these verses were originally part of some other work, and were copied here only to save the trouble 'of composing new. JOHNSON.

P. 205, 1. 31. Giglot is a wanton, or a strumpet. JOHNSON.

-P. 205, 1.32. in the bowels of the French, So, in the first part of Jeronimo, 1605:

"Meet, Don Andrea! yes, in the battle's bowels. STEEVENS.

P. 206, 1. 29. and fol. Great Earl of Washford, &c.] It appears from Camden's Britannia and Holinshed's Chronicle of Ireland, that Wexford was anciently called Weysford. In Crompton's Mansion of Magnanimitie it is written as here, Washford. This long list of titles is taken from the epitaph formerly fixed on Lord Talbot's tomb in Rouen

in Normandy. Where this author found it, I have not been able to ascertain, for it is not in the common historians. The oldest book in which I have met with it is the tract above mentioned, which was printed in 1599, posterior to the date of this play. Numerous as this list is, the epitaph has one more, which, I suppose, was only rejected because it would not easily fall into the verse, "Lord Lovetoft of Worsop." It concludes as here, "Lord Falconbridge, Knight of the noble order of St. George, St. Michael, and the golden fleece, Great Marshall to King Henry VI. of his realm in France, who died in the battle of Bourdeaux, 1453." MALONE.

P. 207, 1. 9. The Turk, that two and fifty kingdoms hath,] Allud

ing probably to the ostentatious letter of Suita Solyman the Magnificent, to

Emperor FerGrand Signior's titles are enumerated. See Knolles's History of the Turks, 5th edit. p. 789. GREY.

dinand, 1562; in which all the

P. 207, 1. 21. a amaze i. e. (as in other instances) confound, throw into consternation. STEEVENS.

P. 208, 1. 5. In the original copy, the transcriber or printer forgot to mark the commencement of the fifth Act; and has by mistake called this scene, Seene II. The editor of the second folio made a very absurd regulation by making the act begin in the middle of the preceding scene, (where the Dauphin, &c. enter, and take notice of the dead bodies of Talbot and his son,) which was inadvertently followed in subsequent editions. MAL. P. 208, 1. 25. immanity i. e. barbarity, savageness. STEEVENS.

P. 209, 1. 5.-my years are young,] His Majesty, however, was twenty-four years old. MALONE.

P. 209.

P. 209, 1. 14-16. Exe. What! is my Lord of Winchester install'd,

And call'd unto a Cardinal's degree!] This (as Mr. Edwards has observed in his MS. notes) argues a great forgetfulness in the poet. In the first act Gloster says:

"I'll canvass thee in thy broad cardinal's hat:" and it is strange that the Duke of Exeter should not know of his advancement. STEEVENS.

It should seem from the stage-direction prefixed to this scene, and from the conversation between the Legate and Wincheser, that the auther meant it to be understood that the Bishop had obtained his cardinal's hat only just before his present entry. The inaccuracy therefore was in making Gloster address him by that title in the beginning of the play. He in fact obtained it in the fifth year of Henry's reign. MALONE.

P. 210, 1. 21. 22. That, neither in birth, or for authority.

The Bishop will be overborne by thee:] I would read for birth. That is, thou shalt not rule me, though thy birth is legitimate, and thy authority supreme. JOHNSON.

P. 212, first 1. Now help, ye charming spelle and periapts;] Charms sow'd up. Ezek. xiii. 18: "Woe to them that sow pillows to all arm-holes, to hunt souls.", POPE.

Periapts were worn about the neck as preservatives from disease or danger. Of these, the first chapter of St. John's Gospel was deemed the most efficacious.

Whoever is desirous to know more about them, may consult Reginald'Scott's Discovery of Witchcraft, 1584, p. 230, &c. STEEVENS.

The following story, which is related in Wits, Fits, and Fancies, 1595, proves what Mr. Steevens VOL. X.

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