Duchess of York, with whom it is much more in character. The Poet seems to have intended that we should understand that the boy had on some occasion overheard his mother say what he repeats concerning his uncle Gloster, and she is disturbed to find that what she had said thus finds its way to the Duchess, as it might seriously affect herself. She excuses herself by saying that it was not intended to be heard, at least not by her son, quoting a very common proverb, Little pitchers have long ears.

If for "this" we read his, we should have all the effect of Warburton's admirable suggestion, with less disturbance of the text, grossness being taken as equivalent to greatness in its comparative sense, when used as equivalent to size or

extent.

III. 1. GLOSTER.

Thus, like the formal vice, Iniquity,
I moralize two meanings in one word.

I should print it thus:

Thus, like the formal vice, Iniquity,

I moralize-two meanings in one word.

III. 3. RIVERS.

And, for more slander to thy dismal seat,
We give thee up our guiltless blood to drink.

The modern editors have shewn an unreasonable preference for the quartos, whose reading this is. The folios have it more effectively and more euphonously—

We give to thee our guiltless blood to drink.

It is clear that in printing this play the editors would have

done well to have taken the text of the folio as the basis, introducing a better reading from the quartos when they could find one.

III. 4. GLOster.

Lovel and Catesby, look that it be done.

In the older copies Lovel and Ratcliffe. Ratcliffe has been made to give way to Catesby, because Ratcliffe is represented as having been at Pontefract at the execution of Rivers, Grey, and Vaughan, which took place on the same day with the execution of Hastings at London. It is sufficiently evident that Ratcliffe could not have been at Pontefract and in London on the same day; but then it is equally manifest that the Poet might use a poet's license, and represent Ratcliffe as having fulfilled the tyrant's intention at Pontefract, and then a few days after have re-appeared in London to assist at the death of Hastings.

An editor is not justified in such alterations in a poet's text. It would have been a not improper subject for a note that there was here a slight variation from the truth of history, much slighter, however, than many others in these Histories. But then, when something else is substituted which the Poet did not write, care should be taken that the substituted word is consistent with the other part of the play, which in this instance is not the case. That consistency requires that Catesby should enter in the fifth scene with Lovel, bringing the head of Hastings, whereas he is sent to fetch the Lord Mayor. Moreover, the modern editors have retained the Ratcliffe of the old copies in the scene in which the head of Hastings is brought in, which was on the very day of his execution. In fact, it is hazardous to begin to tamper with the text of any great writer.

III. 7. BUCKINGHAM.

Being the right idea of your father.

Such slight changes as this are perhaps unavoidable when writings two hundred and fifty years old come to be delivered from a modern press; but surely something must be allowed to be lost when we see how the line stands in the original copies.

Being the right Idea of your Father.

The word "idea" appears to have been not fully naturalized. It is here equivalent to image.

IV. 2. KING RICHARD.

Hath he so long held out with me untir'd,

And stops he now for breath?

Here the play begins to be grandly instructive. What a lesson to the young not to lend themselves to any purposes of evil in any wily companion, when we see Buckingham shrinking from the temptation presented to him to commit the most odious of all crimes, and immediately falling under the suspicion of him whom he had served, and about to be cast off and lose rank, fortune, life, everything! It is a lesson also to be careful of incurring the inferior risk of evil by a too close union with a party, religious or political, whose extravagancies and follies must be adopted by the simple and the honest-minded, or he must be content to share in an inferior degree the fate of Buckingham.

We see also a few lines farther the dreadful state into which the chief actor had also brought himself—

Uncertain way of gain! But I am in

So far in blood, that sin will pluck on sin :

and we see him on the facilis descensus, till it ends with "Despair and die."

Whatever evils may attend the theatres, and they are

many, it cannot in justice be denied or doubted, that exhibitions such as these, of the dreadful consequences which attend deviations from the right path, have in some instances occurred at the proper moment, and have saved some mind hesitating between two courses; and that generally, without the effects being obvious, they have aided in saving society from much that would have been evil.

IV. 3. K. RICHARD.

His daughter meanly have I match'd in marriage.

That is Clarence's daughter to Sir Richard Pole; but it should be observed that the marriage was not so mean as the words would lead us to suppose, and as is I believe generally supposed by many persons who do not take their ideas of history from Shakespeare only. The mother of Sir Richard Pole was half-sister to Margaret, Countess of Richmond, mother of King Henry the Seventh, namely one of the Saint Johns, and her mother a Beauchamp. It has not been sufficiently adverted to how both King Henry the Seventh and King Henry the Eighth advanced those who were related to them on the Lancastrian side. Many of the dignities created in those reigns were in favour of persons who stood in various degrees of demi-sang consanguinity to the king. I do not know whether Shakespeare is right in representing the marriage of the daughter and heir of Clarence with Sir Richard Pole as having taken place during the reign of Richard; but it was in fact a union of the houses of York and Lancaster, similar to that in the marriage of Richmond and the lady Elizabeth, and of Lord Welles, a near kinsman of Richmond, with another daughter of King Edward the Fourth; and, if brought about in the reign of Henry the Seventh, probably a stroke of the same policy which gave to the new Lancastrian sovereign the heiress of the rival house. The putting this

lady to death in her old age is the foulest of the many foul stains on the latter years of the reign of Henry the Eighth.

Shakespeare's lines are remembered; and this line has I have no doubt contributed much to keep out of sight the real quality and condition of the father of Cardinal Pole, whose reputation was European, and who was one of the most illustrious characters of the age, splendid in birth and personal accomplishments, as he was eminent for virtue, wisdom, and learning.

IV. 4. Q. Margaret.

Here in these confines slily have I lurked,
To watch the waning of mine enemies.

There is, I believe, no historical evidence, and the taste might be questioned which led to the introduction of Queen Margaret in this play. Yet there is something striking in a scene in which three illustrious ladies meet together, each of whom has such a tale to tell of husbands, children, brothers, killed in York and Lancaster's long jars. In the hands of very skilful actors the scene might be made effective. We have no direction for "old Queen Margaret," as she is styled in the old copies, speaking "aside,” but it is plain that her three first speeches are uttered aside, nor does she join the others till they sit upon the ground. Shakespeare was aware of the effect of this. Constance assumes this attitude; and in King Richard the Second we have

For heaven's sake let us sit upon the ground.

I know not what could induce the modern editors to substitute "match" for "match't" the reading of the old copies, in the following lines, and to punctuate them as they have done.

Thy Edward he is dead, that killed my Edward;

Thy other Edward dead, to quit my Edward;