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In likeness of a new uptrimmed bride *.

Blanch. The lady Constance speaks not from her faith,

But from her need.

Const.
O! if thou grant my need,
Which only lives but by the death of faith,
That need must needs infer this principle,
That faith would live again by death of need:
O! then, tread down my need, and faith mounts up;
Keep my need up, and faith is trodden down.

K. John. The king is mov'd, and answers not to this.
Const. O! be remov'd from him, and answer well.
Aust. Do so, king Philip: hang no more in doubt.
Bast. Hang nothing but a calf's-skin, most sweet lout.
K. Phi. I am perplex'd, and know not what to say.
Pand. What canst thou say, but will perplex thee more,
If thou stand excommunicate, and curs'd?

K. Phi. Good reverend father, make my person your's, And tell me how you would bestow yourself. This royal hand and mine are newly knit, And the conjunction of our inward souls Married in league, coupled and link'd together With all religious strength of sacred vows. The latest breath that gave the sound of words, Was deep-sworn faith, peace, amity, true love, Between our kingdoms, and our royal selves; And even before this truce, but new before, No longer than we well could wash our hands, To clap this royal bargain up of peace, Heaven knows, they were besmear'd and overstain'd With slaughter's pencil; where revenge did paint The fearful difference of incensed kings: And shall these hands, so lately purg'd of blood, So newly join'd in love, so strong in both, Unyoke this seizure, and this kind regreet ? Play fast and loose with faith? so jest with heaven, Make such unconstant children of ourselves,

4 In likeness of a new UPTRIMMED bride.] "Untrimmed bride" say the folios, and Theobald altered untrimmed to and trimmed; but the proper change is made in the corr. fo. 1632, viz. "uptrimmed." The conjecture of the Rev. Mr. Dyce was thus long anticipated, and there could be no reasonable doubt about it. Mr. Dyce himself, as late as 1844, contended, with considerable emphasis, that untrimmed was equivalent to virgin (Remarks, 91), but he changed his opinion afterwards. We never said more than that untrimmed was probably a misprint; and so it turns out to be, viz. untrimmed for "uptrimmed."

As now again to snatch our palm from palm;
Unswear faith sworn; and on the marriage bed
Of smiling peace to march a bloody host,
And make a riot on the gentle brow
Of true sincerity? O! holy sir,
My reverend father, let it not be so:
Out of your grace, devise, ordain, impose
Some gentle order, and then we shall be bless'd
To do your pleasure, and continue friends.

Pand. All form is formless, order orderless,
Save what is opposite to England's love.
Therefore, to arms! be champion of our church,
Or let the church, our mother, breathe her curse,
A mother's curse, on her revolting son.
France, thou may'st hold a serpent by the tongue,
A caged lion by the mortal paw,
A fasting tiger safer by the tooth,

Than keep in peace that hand which thou dost hold.
K. Phi. I may disjoin my hand, but not my faith.
Pand. So mak'st thou faith an enemy to faith;
And, like a civil war, set'st oath to oath,
Thy tongue against thy tongue. O! let thy vow
First made to heaven, first be to heaven perform'd;
That is, to be the champion of our church.
What since thou swor'st is sworn against thyself,
And may not be performed by thyself:
For that, which thou hast sworn to do amiss,
Is but amiss when it is truly done;

* A CAGED lion] It is "cased lion" in the original editions, and obviously a misprint for "caged," the compositor having mistaken the g for a long s. The Rev. Mr. Dyce says peremptorily that "the right reading is undoubtedly chaf'd." He must at all events mean chafed, for chaf'd would ruin the verse; but people were accustomed to see "caged lions," and Shakespeare used an epithet which all his auditors could appreciate. Moreover, chafed could not be misprinted cased without a double blunder, whereas "caged" might easily be misread cased. We do not think that any future editor of Shakespeare is likely to adopt chafed-not even Mr. Dyce himself, unless in a struggle to maintain the consistency of opinions too strongly expressed.

6 IS BUT amiss when it is truly done ;) Here a great difficulty is entirely swept away by the simple change of not to "but," as we find it in the corr. fo. 1632 : what a person swears to do amiss "is but amiss," or is still amiss "when it is truly done." Nothing more can be required to clear the whole passage, and it would be mere waste of time and space to advert to what has been written by all editors on the original and absurd line

"Is not amiss when it is truly done."

The whole passage is struck out in the corr. fo. 1632, but the emendation of

VOL. III.

M

And being not done, where doing tends to ill,
The truth is then most done not doing it.
The better act of purposes mistook

Is to mistake again: though indirect,
Yet indirection thereby grows direct,
And falsehood falsehood cures; as fire cools fire
Within the scorched veins of one new burn'd.

It is religion that doth make vows kept,
But thou hast sworn against religion,

By what thou swear'st, against the thing thou swear'st,
And mak'st an oath the surety for thy truth
Against an oath: the truth, thou art unsure
To swear, swears only not to be forsworn';
Else, what a mockery should it be to swear?
But thou dost swear only to be forsworn;
And most forsworn, to keep what thou dost swear.
Therefore, thy later vows, against thy first,
Is in thyself rebellion to thyself;
And better conquest never canst thou make,
Than arm thy constant and thy nobler parts
Against these giddy loose suggestions:
Upon which better part our prayers come in,
If thou vouchsafe them; but, if not, then know,
The peril of our curses light on thee,

So heavy, as thou shalt not shake them off,
But in despair die under their black weight.

Aust. Rebellion, flat rebellion!
Bast.

Will't not be?

Will not a calf's-skin stop that mouth of thine?

Lew. Father, to arms!

Blanch.

Upon thy wedding day?

Against the blood that thou hast married?
What! shall our feast be kept with slaughter'd men?

Shall braying trumpets, and loud churlish drums,

"but" for not is nevertheless inserted in the margin. No misprint could well be more common, and we have already had several instances of it.

7

swears only not to be forsworn ;) We leave the words of this much vexed passage precisely as they stand in the folio, 1623, no alteration having been made in the folios of 1632, 1664, or 1685. The same remark will apply to the corr. fo. 1632; and sure we are, that the original text is quite as intelligible as any of the changes that have been made or recommended in it. It was certainly intended as an exhibition of refined and jesuitical subtlety, and that it was not understood by the copyist or by the printer we may well believe. As we have before stated, the whole is erased by the old annotator.

Clamours of hell, be measures to our pomp?
O husband, hear me!-ah, alack! how new

Is husband in my mouth!-even for that name,
Which till this time my tongue did ne'er pronounce,

Upon my knee I beg, go not to arms

Against mine uncle.

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Made hard with kneeling, I do pray to thee,
Thou virtuous Dauphin, alter not the doom
Fore-thought by heaven.

Blanch. Now shall I see thy love. What motive may
Be stronger with thee than the name of wife?

Const. That which upholdeth him that thee upholds,
His honour. O! thine honour, Lewis, thine honour.
Lew. I muse, your majesty doth seem so cold,
When such profound respects do pull you on.
Pand. I will denounce a curse upon his head.

K. Phi. Thou shalt not need. -England, I'll fall from thee.

Const. O, fair return of banish'd majesty!

Eli. O, foul revolt of French inconstancy!

K. John. France, thou shalt rue this hour within this

hour.

Bast. Old Time the clock-setter, that bald sexton Time, Is it as he will? well then, France shall rue.

Blanch. The sun's o'ercast with blood: fair day, adieu!
Which is the side that I must go withal?
I am with both: each army hath a hand,
And in their rage, I having hold of both,
They whirl asunder, and dismember me.
Husband, I cannot pray that thou may'st win;
Uncle, I needs must pray that thou may'st lose ;
Father, I may not wish the fortune thine;
Grandam, I will not wish thy wishes thrive:
Whoever wins, on that side shall I lose;
Assured loss, before the match be play'd.

Lew. Lady, with me; with me thy fortune lies.
Blanch. There where my fortune lives, there my life dies.
K. John. Cousin, go draw our puissance together.-

France, I am burn'd up with inflaming wrath;
A rage, whose heat hath this condition,
That nothing can allay, nothing but blood,

[Exit Bastard, The blood, and dearest-valued blood of France.

K. Phi. Thy rage shall burn thee up, and thou shalt turn

To ashes, ere our blood shall quench that fire.

Look to thyself: thou art in jeopardy.

K. John. No more than he that threats. - To arms let's hie!

[Exeunt.

SCENE II.

The Same.

Plains near Angiers.

Alarums, Excursions. Enter the Bastard with AUSTRIA'S

Head.

8

Bast. Now, by my life, this day grows wondrous hot;
Some fiery devil hovers in the sky *,
And pours down mischief. Austria's head, lie there,
While Philip breatheso.

Enter King JOHN, ARTHUR, and HUBERT.

K. John. Hubert, keep this boy.-Philip, make up: My mother is assailed in our tent,

And ta'en, I fear.

Bast.

My lord, I rescued her;

Her highness is in safety, fear you not:
But on, my liege; for very little pains

Will bring this labour to an happy end.

[Exeunt.

8 Some FIERY devil hovers in the sky,] And made the "day grow wondrous hot." It stands "airy devil" in the old copies, but naturally and properly amended to "fiery devil" in the corr. fo. 1632. An airy devil" was not likely to be the Bastard's word, in the midst of the heat and fury of the conflict.

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While Philip breathes.) The old "King John," 1591, partakes more of the barbarism of the time when it was written, and Philip, as he still calls himself, spurns and tramples on Austria's head :

"Lie there, a prey to every ravening fowl,
And as my father triumph'd in thy spoils,
And trod thine ensigns underneath his feet,

So do I tread upon thy cursed self."

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