Fal. No, I think thou art not; I think, thou art quit for that. Marry, there is another indictment upon thee, for suffering flesh to be eaten in thy house, contrary to the law; for the which, I think, thou wilt howl.

Host. All victuallers do so: what's a joint of mutton or two in a whole Lent?

P. Hen. You, gentlewoman,

Dol. What says your grace?

Fal. His grace says that which his flesh rebels against.

[Knocking heard.

Host. Who knocks so loud at door? look to the door there,

Francis.

Enter PETO.

P. Hen. Peto, how now! what news?

Peto. The king your father is at Westminster,
And there are twenty weak and wearied posts
Come from the north; and as I came along
I met, and overtook, a dozen captains,
Bare-headed, sweating, knocking at the taverns,
And asking every one for sir John Falstaff.

P. Hen. By heaven, Poins, I feel me much to blame
So idly to profane the precious time,
When tempest of commotion, like the south
Borne with black vapour, doth begin to melt,
And drop upon our bare unarmed heads.

Give me my sword, and cloak.-Falstaff, good night.

[Exeunt Prince HENRY, POINS, PETO, and

BARDOLPH.

Fal. Now comes in the sweetest morsel of the night, and we must hence, and leave it unpicked. [Knocking heard.] More knocking at the door?

Re-enter BARDOLPH.

How now? what's the matter?

Bard. You must away to court, sir, presently;

A dozen captains stay at door for you.

Fal. Pay the musicians, sirrah. [To the Page.]-Farewell, hostess;-farewell, Doll. You see, my good wenches, how men of merit are sought after: the undeserver may sleep, when the man of action is called on. Farewell, good wenches. If I be not sent away post, I will see you again ere I go.

Dol. I cannot speak ;-if my heart be not ready to burst. -Well, sweet Jack, have a care of thyself.

Fal. Farewell, farewell.

[Exeunt FALSTAFF and BARDOLPH.

Host. Well, fare thee well: I have known thee these twentynine years, come peascod-time; but an honester, and truerhearted man,- Well, fare thee well.

Bard. [Within.] Mistress Tear-sheet!

Host. What's the matter?

Bard. [Within.] Bid mistress Tear-sheet come to my

master.

Host. O! run, Doll, run; run, good Doll. Come. She [Exeunt.

comes blubbered. - Yea-will you come, Doll1?

Enter King HENRY in his nightgown, with a Page.

K. Hen. Go, call the earls of Surrey and of Warwick; But, ere they come, bid them o'er-read these letters, And well consider of them. Make good speed. - [Exit Page. How many thousand of my poorest subjects Are at this hour asleep! - O sleep! O gentle sleep! Nature's soft nurse, how have I frighted thee,

That thou no more wilt weigh my eyelids down,
And steep my senses in forgetfulness?

Why rather, sleep, liest thou in smoky cribs,

Upon uneasy pallets stretching thee,

And hush'd with buzzing night-flies to thy slumber,
Than in the perfum'd chambers of the great,
Under high canopies of costly state',
And lull'd with sound of sweetest melody ?
O, thou dull god! why liest thou with the vile,
In loathsome beds, and leav'st the kingly couch,
A watch-case, or a common 'larum bell?
Wilt thou upon the high and giddy mast
Seal up the ship-boy's eyes, and rock his brains
In cradle of the rude imperious surge,
And in the visitation of the winds,
Who take the ruffian billows by the top,
Curling their monstrous heads, and hanging them
With deaf'ning clamours in the slippery clouds ',
That with the hurly death itself awakes?
Canst thou, O partial sleep! give thy repose
To the wet sea-boy' in an hour so rude,
And in the calmest and most stillest night,
With all appliances and means to boot,
Deny it to a king? Then, happy low, lie down"!
Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.

3 Under HIGH canopies of costly state,] "High" is an emendation in the corr. fo. 1632: the poor text in the early impressions is,

"Under the canopies of costly state,"

and it may at first appear strange how "high" became misprinted the. The difficulty vanishes when it is recollected that "high," of old, was usually spelt hie, which the compositor read the. We have no hesitation in introducing this change - so small yet so much for the better. The same blunder is committed in "The Merry Devil of Edmonton" (Dodsley's Old Plays, v. 271, last edit.), where Sir Arthur Clare remarks,

"Well, 'tis in vain to cross the Providence."

Here the ought to be "high," as indisputably as in Shakespeare.

4

in the slippery CLOUDS,) Although the corr. fo. 1632 here alters "clouds" to shrowds we are willing, under the difficulty of the case, to leave the old word of the 4to. and folios unchanged. It is at the reader's option to prefer one word or the other; but we were formerly disposed to think that the substitution of shrowds for "clouds" in the corr. fo. 1632 ought to be decisive. Prof. Mommsen renders " in the slippery clouds" ins glatte Tauwerk, preferring therefore the new reading. give THY repose

5

Enter WARWICK and SURREY".

War. Many good morrows to your majesty!

K. Hen. Is it good morrow, lords?

War. 'Tis one o'clock, and past.

K. Hen. Why then, good morrow to you all, my lords.

Have you read o'er the letters that I sent you?

War. We have, my liege.

K. Hen. Then you perceive, the body of our kingdom How foul it is; what rank diseases grow, And with what danger, near the heart of it.

War. It is but as a body, yet, distemper'd, Which to his former strength may be restor'd, With good advice, and little medicine.

My lord Northumberland will soon be cool'd.

K. Hen. O God! that one might read the book of fate, And see the revolution of the times

Make mountains level, and the continent,

Weary of solid firmness, melt itself
Into the sea: and, other times, to see

The beachy girdle of the ocean

Too wide for Neptune's hips; how chances mock,
And changes fill the cup of alteration

With divers liquors! O, if this were seen,
The happiest youth, viewing his progress through,
What perils past, what crosses to ensue,

Would shut the book, and sit him down and die *.
'Tis not ten years gone,

Since Richard, and Northumberland, great friends,
Did feast together, and in two years after
Were they at wars: it is but eight years, since
This Percy was the man nearest my soul;
Who like a brother toil'd in my affairs,

[TO WARWICK.

And laid his love and life under my foot;
Yea, for my sake, even to the eyes of Richard,
Gave him defiance. But which of you was by,
(You, cousin Nevil, as I may remember)
When Richard, with his eye brimfull of tears,
Then check'd and rated by Northumberland,
Did speak these words, now prov'd a prophecy?
"Northumberland, thou ladder, by the which
My cousin Bolingbroke ascends my throne';”—
Though then, God knows, I had no such intent,
But that necessity so bow'd the state,
That I and greatness were compell'd to kiss :
"The time shall come," thus did he follow it,
"The time will come, that foul sin, gathering head,
Shall break into corruption1":"-so went on,
Foretelling this same time's condition,
And the division of our amity.

War. There is a history in all men's lives,
Figuring the nature of the times deceas'd;
The which observ'd, a man may prophesy,
With a near aim, of the main chance of things
As yet not come to life, which in their seeds,
And weak beginnings, lie intreasured.
Such things become the hatch and brood of time;
And, by the necessary form of this,
King Richard might create a perfect guess,
That great Northumberland, then false to him,
Would, of that seed, grow to a greater falseness,
Which should not find a ground to root upon,
Unless on you.

K. Hen.

Are these things, then, necessities?

Then let us meet them like necessities;

And that same word even now cries out on us.

They say, the bishop and Northumberland

Are fifty thousand strong.

9

War.

It cannot be, my lord.

ascends my throne;) Shakespeare did not mean to quote his own lines