SCENE III. The Same. Alarums; Excursions; Retreat. Enter King JOHN, ELINOR, ARTHUR, the Bastard, HUBERT, and Lords. K. John. So shall it be; your grace shall stay behind, So strongly guarded. - Cousin, look not sad: Thy grandam loves thee, and thy uncle will [To ELINOR. [To ARTHUR. Arth. O! this will make my mother die with grief. K. John. Cousin, [To the Bastard.] away for England: haste before; And ere our coming, see thou shake the bags Of hoarding abbots; their imprisoned angels1 Set at liberty: the fat ribs of peace Must by the hungry now be fed upon : Use our commission in his utmost force. Bast. Bell, book, and candle shall not drive me back, When gold and silver becks me to come on. I leave your highness. - Grandam, I will pray (If ever I remember to be holy) For your fair safety: so I kiss your hand. Eli. Farewell, gentle cousin. K. John. Coz, farewell. [Exit Bastard. Eli. Come hither, little kinsman; hark, a word. [She takes ARTHUR aside. K. John. Come hither, Hubert. O! my gentle Hubert, We owe thee much: within this wall of flesh There is a soul counts thee her creditor, And with advantage means to pay thy love: And, my good friend, thy voluntary oath Give me thy hand. I had a thing to say, 1 THEIR imprisoned ANGELS] Of course referring to the coin so called, upon the name of which most writers have played. "Their" is from the corr. fo. 1632, and is necessary for the metre, as well as otherwise. But I will fit it with some better time2. - Hub. I am much bounden to your majesty. K. John. Good friend, thou hast no cause to say so yet; But thou shalt have: and creep time ne'er so slow, I had a thing to say, -but let it go. Or if that thou couldst see me without eyes, 2 But I will fit it with some better TIME.] The old copies have tune for "time:" Pope made the correction, also found in the corr. fo. 1632. * Sound on into the drowsy EAR of night:] Many of the commentators would read one instead of "on," which is contradicted by the "midnight bell" in a line just preceding. "Eare of night" for "race of night" is the emendation in the corr. fo. 1632, and is in all probability Shakespeare's word: we have therefore placed it in the text. The "midnight bell," with its twelve times repeated strokes, is very poetically said to "sound on into the drowsy ear of night;" one sound produced by the "iron tongue" driving the other "on," or forward, until the whole number is complete, and the prolonged vibration of the last blow on the bell only left to fill the empty space of darkness. It is almost droll to find the Rev. Mr. Dyce (who approves of "ear" and objects to "on") contending that "the midnight bell" means the bell at one in the morning, and calling three witnesses to the fact, who none of them support him by their evidence: when Defoe, for instance, speaks of "one o'clock in the night," he is not so simple as to call it midnight, but merely "night," as in truth it was. 4 (Which, else, runs tickling up and down the veins,] We let "tickling" stand, as very likely the poet's word, but it is tingling in the corr. fo. 1632. 5 Then in despite of BROAD-EYED watchful day,] We cannot resist Pope's I would into thy bosom pour my thoughts.- Hub. So well, that what you bid me undertake, By heaven, I would do it. K. John. Do not I know, thou wouldst? Good Hubert! Hubert-Hubert, throw thine eye On yond' young boy: I'll tell thee what, my friend, He is a very serpent in my way; And wheresoe'er this foot of mine doth tread, He lies before me. Dost thou understand me? Enough! I could be merry now. Hubert, I love thee; Well, I'll not say what I intend for thee: Remember.-Madam, fare you well: I'll send those powers o'er to your majesty. Eli. My blessing go with thee! For England, cousin: go. Hubert shall be your man, attend on you With all true duty. On toward Calais, ho! [Exeunt. SCENE IV. The Same. The French King's Tent. Enter King PHILIP, LEWIS, PANDULPH, and Attendants. K. Phi. So, by a roaring tempest on the flood, A whole armado of convented sail alteration of brooded, of the folios, to "broad-eyed "-the epithet is so happy and so like Shakespeare. The old corrector of the folio, 1632, saw that brooded must be wrong, and perhaps gives us the custom in his day, converting brooded into the broad. Brooded has surely nothing to do with brooding chickens. 6 A whole armado of CONVENTED sail] It is "convicted sail" in all the folios. "I read (says Mr. Singer) convented," but he omits to add that he took this ex Is scatter'd, and disjoin'd from fellowship. Pand. Courage and comfort! all shall yet go well. Are we not beaten? Is not Angiers lost ? Lew. What he hath won, that hath he fortified: K. Phi. Well could I bear that England had this praise, So we could find some pattern of our shame. Enter CONSTANCE. Look, who comes here? a grave unto a soul; Const. Lo now, now see the issue of your peace! Come, grin on me; and I will think thou smil'st, O, fair affliction, peace! K. Phi. cellent emendation from the corr. fo. 1632. It will be found on p. 206 of "Notes and Emendations." Neither does he pretend to say that the change is proposed in his corrected copy of the folio, 1632, which often so singularly and usefully confirms the changes contained in my corrected folio, 1632. "Convented," of course, means convened or assembled: the armado had been collected. 7 No, I DEFY all counsel.] One of the old senses of "defy" was refuse. Const. No, no, I will not, having breath to cry.- Pand. Lady, you utter madness, and not sorrow. K. Phi. Bind up those tresses. O! what love I note Const. To England, if you will. 8 Which scorns a widow's invocation.] In the folios it is "a modern invocation," which can only mean a common invocation, just such an invocation as Constance would not use. She has already spoken of herself as a "widow," and here again she refers to her condition and its helplessness. We owe this emendation to the corr. fo. 1632, and as modern cannot be the true word, we willingly accept this highly probable and natural substitution. 9 Thou art NOT holy, &c.] The negative having dropped out in the first folio, the deficiency was not supplied in print until the publication of the fourth folio in 1685. We however find "not" written in the margin of the corr. fo. 1632. 1 ten thousand wiry FRIENDS] In the old copies, from first to last, "friends" is misprinted fiends: there can be no doubt that it is an error of the press, as is shown by the insertion of the letter r in the corr. fo. 1632. In the next line but one r again made its escape in "lovers," but is restored on the same authority. |