Enter EXTON and Servants.

K. RICHARD.

How now? what means Death in this rude Affault?

Wretch, thine own Hand yields thy Death's

Inftrument;

[Snatching a Sword. Go thou, and fill another Room in Hell.

[Kills another. Exton ftrikes him down. That Hand fhall burn in never-quenching Fire, That faggers thus my Perfon! Thy Pierce Hand

Hath with the Kings Blood, ftain'd the Kings own Land!

Mount, mount my Soul, thy Seat is up on high;

Whilft my grofs Flesh finks downward, here

to die!

EXTON.

As full of Valour, as of Royal Blood;
Both have I fpilt:

[Dies.

Oh would the Deed were

good! For now the Devil, that told me, I did well, Says, that this Deed is chronicled in Hell. This dead King to the living King I'll bear; Take hence the reft, and give them Burial here.

The Hiftory goes on to relate, that King Richard's Body was carried through the City to St. Paul's Cathedral with the Face uncovered and lay in that Manner three Days, expofed to the View of the People.

Shake

Shakespear makes Exton bring the Corps in a Coffin to the Court, prefent it to the King, in the Prefence of feveral of his Nobility, and tell him that his Commands had been obeyed.

This abfurdity is followed by the King's confeffing that he had given fuch Orders, but that he now repented of them, and after driving the Murderer from his Prefence, he weeps over the dead King, and pacifies his Confcience with a Vow to make a Voyage to the Holy Land to expiate his Guilt.

Vol. III.

G

PLAN

PLAN

Of the FIRST PART of

Henry the Fourth.

N this Play Shakespear takes up the Hiftory exactly where he left it in Richard the Second. Bolingbroke, now King Henry the Fourth, is prevented from making a Voyage to the Holy Land, which he had vowed, by a Confpiracy formed against him by fome of thofe Lords, whofe Affiftance had enabled him to ufurp the Throne.

The brave Piercy furnamed Hotspur, having refused to surrender his Scotch Prisoners, taken in the Battle of Holmedon, to the King, who also in return denies to ransom his Brother in Law, Mortimer, from the Welsh Rebel Owen Glendower, a Quarrel enfues; Piercy and the other discontented Noblemen join with the G 2 Scots

Scots and Glendower; they raife an Army and march to meet the King at Shrewsbury.

The King fends to treat with the Rebels; Piercy, being disposed to listen to an Accommodation, Commiffions his Uncle, the Earl of Worcester, to propofe Terms to the King.

Worcester, out of an Opinion that Henry could never be thoroughly reconciled to them, and would take an other Opportunity to be revenged, treacherously conceals the King's favourable Offers, and tells Piercy that he is refolved to fight.

Then follows the Battle, in which, the brave Piercy is flain by the wild Prince of Wales; The King's Party is victorious; the treacherous Worcester being made Prifoner, is condemned to die, and the King, dividing his Forces, fends one. Part, under the Command of his fecond Son, to meet the Earl of Northumberland at York; and himself and the Prince of Wales march against the Rebel Glendower and the Earl of March.

The Tranfactions contained in this Hiftorical Drama, are comprized in the Space of ten Months, The Action of it commences with the News of Hotspur's having defeated the Scots, under Archibald Earl of Douglas, at Holmedon; which Battle was fought on Holy-rood-Day, the 14th of September 1402; and is clofed with the Defeat and Death of Hotspur at Shrewsbury;