But you are more inhuman, more inexorable,
Oh ten times more, than tygrs of Hyrcania.
See, ruthless queen, a hapless father's tears :
This cloth thou dipp'dít in blood of my

sweet boy,
And I with tears do wash the blood away.
Keep thou the napkin, and go boast of this:
And if thou tell’It the heavy story right,
Upon my soul, the hearers will sed tears,
Yea, even my foes will shed fast falling tears,
And say, “ alas, it was a piteous deed!”

ACT II. SCENE I.

The Duke of York in Battle.
Methought, he bore him in the thickest troop,
(3) As doth a lion in a herd of neat;
Or as a bear encompass'd round with dogs,
Who having pinch'd a few, and made them cry,
The rest stand all aloof and bark at him,

-Wou'd not have touch'd,

Wou'd not have stain'd the roses just with blood. Which Mr. Theobald, for the sake of an alteration of his own, prefers to this, for which we have so good authority. He reads,

Wou'd not have fain'd the roses juic'd with blood; Sir T. Hanmer, not pleased with this criticism, tries another cast, and gives us

The roses jufi in dud. (3) As, &c.] The poets abound with numberless fimiles of this kind ; particularly Homer and Virgil: but none perhaps is finer than the following from that book, where every page abounds with beauties, and true fublimity. Isaiah xxxi. 4. 66 Like as the lion, and the young lion roaring on his prey ; when a multitude of thepherds is called forth against him, he will not be afraid of their voice Áor abase himself for the noise of them."

The Morning.
See how the morning opes her golden gates,
And takes her farewel of the glorious fun!
(4) How well resembles it the prime of youth,
Trimm'd like a younker prancing to his love !

SCENE VI. The Morning's Dawn.
(5) This battle fares like to the morning's war,
When dying clouds contend with growing light;
What time the shepherd, blowing of his

nails,
Can neither call it perfect day or night.

The Blessings of a Shepherd's Life.
(6) O God! methinks, it were a happy life
To be no better than a homely swain ;

Το

(4) How, &c.] There is something very peculiar in this passage, “ The prime of youth and like a younker, seeming nearly the same thing ; but it is extremely beautiful, the author personifies the prime of youth, and describes him as an allegorical person, trimm'd like a younker, which with us fignifies a brisk, lively young man ; but more properly perhaps from its original, a nobleman, or young lord. See Skinner. The plain manner of understanding it is difficult, and the construction very involv’d, however it seems no more than this,“ how well resembles it, a younker trimm'd out in the prime of youth, prancing to his love.

(5) This, &c.] The expression of blowing his nails is peculiarly natural and beautiful; the reader may remember that Shakespear uses it in the pretty song at the end of Love's Labour Loll

.

And Dick the shepherd blows his nail. (6) O God, &c.] There is something very pleasing and natural in this passage; it is a good deal in the manner of Virgil, who speaks highly of a rural life in his second Georgic, which the reader will be much delighted with, if he compares it with our author, and no less with Horace's fecond Epode expressly on this subject! these are in almost every body's hands ; less flock;

To fit upon a hill, as I do now,
To carve out dials quaintly, point by point,
Thereby to see the minutes how they run:
How
many

make the hour full compleat,
How many hours bring about the day,
How many days will finish up the year,
How

many years a mortal man may live : When this is known, then to divide the time; So many hours must I tend

my So many hours must I take my reit; So many hours must I contemplate; So many

hours must I sport myself; So many days, my ewes have been with young; So many weeks, ere the poor

fools will

yean; So many months, ere I shall sheer the fleece ; So minutes, hours, days, weeks, months and years, Past over, to the end they were created, Would bring white hairs unto a quiet grave. Oh! what a life were this ! how sweet! how lovely! Gives not the hawthorn bush a sweeter shade

'To

known are the following lines from Seneca's IIcrcules Oeticus on the subject, and perhaps they may therefore be more agree

able :

Stretch'd on the turf in fylvan fhades;
No fear the peasant's reft invadles,
While gilded roofs, and beds of state,
Perplex the slumbers of the great.

Secure he rears the beachen bowl,
With steady hand and fearless soul :
Pleas'd with his plain and homely meats,
No swords surround him as he eats.

His modest wife of virtue try'd
Knows not th' expensive arts of pride ;
Her easy with, the home-spun fleece
Plain in its native hue can please,
And happy in her nuptial bed,
No jealous doubts disturb her liead;
Unlike the dame whose day of birth
Is folemniz'd thro' half the earth.

WAR.

To shepherds looking on their filly sheep,
(7) Than doth a rich embroider'd canopy

To

(7) Than, &c.] The miseries of royalty (as have been before observed, 2 Henry IV. A. 4. S. 10.) is a very general topic with the poets ; on which, as indeed on most others, they muft yield the superiority to Shakespear ; Monsieur Racine in his celebrated tragedy of Esther, fpeaks thus on the subject.

A prince encompass'd with a busy crowd
Is ever call'd away by some new object,
The present strikes, futurity difturbs,
But swift as lightning still the past escapes ;
Of all who hourly court our royal favour,
And wou'd commend their loyalty and zeal,
Not one is found so just and truly faithful
To give us notice of neglected merit,

But all with one confent promote our vengeance. In another part of this performance, the author sets in contrast the pleasures and pains of vicious greatness; thus the wicked man's alluring pomp is described,

His days appear a constant scene of joy ;
Gold glitters in his precious robes,
His pride's as boundless as his wealth ;
He never wounds the air with mournful fighs ;
The voice of harmony falutes his ear,
When he lies down to Neep, and when he wakes;
Triumphant plenty with a chearful grace,
Balks in his eyes, and sparkles in his face.

Again,

To crown his tow'ring and ambitious hopes,
A laughing train of children at his boards
Seem to quaffjoy with him in copious bowls.

Now see the reverse.

With plenty crown'd, his conscious heart repines,
And gall is mingled with his sweetest wines.
On the rough waves of paffions toft,

He still unnumber'd pleasures tries :
But finds his expectations croft,

And happiness his fond embraces fies.'
For virtue is the only base
of happiness and lasting peace.

The

To kings that fear their subjects treachery?
O, yes, it doth, a thousand fold it doth.
And to conclude, the shepherd's homely curds
His cold thin drink out of his leathern bottle,
His wonted sleep under a fresh tree's shade,
All which secure and sweetly he enjoys,
Is far beyond a prince's delicates,
His viands sparkling in a golden cup,
His body couched in a curious bed,
When cares, mistrust, and treason, wait on him.

Look, as I blow this feather from my face,
And as the air blows it to me again,
Obeying with my wind, when I do blow,
And yielding to another when it blows,
Commanded always by the greater gust;
Such is the lightness of you common men.

SCENE III. A Simile on ambitious Thoughts

Why, then I do but dream on fov'reignty,
Like one that stands upon a promontory,
And spies a far-off shore where he would tread,
Wishing his foot were equal with his

eye,
And chides the sea that lunders him from thence
Saying, he'll lade it dry, to have his way.

Gloucester's

The Reader with me, is indebted to my worthy friend Mr. Duncombe for the translation of these passages from the French, who hath finished the whole of this tragedy, and some years Since published a tranflation of our author's other most famous performance, Athaliah.