And never noted in him any study,
Any retirement, any sequestration
From open haunts and popularity.1

Ely. The strawberry grows underneath the nettle;2 And wholesome berries thrive and ripen best, Neighbour'd by fruit of baser quality:

And so the prince obscur'd his contemplation
Under the veil of wildness; which, no doubt,
Grew like the summer grass, fastest by night,
Unseen, yet crescive in his faculty.3

Cant. It must be so: for miracles are ceas'd;
And therefore we must needs admit the means,
How things are perfected.

Ely.

But, my good lord,

How now for mitigation of this bill
Urg'd by the commons? Doth his majesty
Incline to it, or no?

4

Cant.
He seems indifferent;
Or, rather, swaying more upon our part,
Than cherishing the exhibiters against us:
For I have made an offer to his majesty,-
Upon our spiritual convocation;

And in regard of causes now in hand,

1 popularity.] i. e. plebeian intercourse; an unusual sense of the word: though perhaps the same idea was meant to be communicated by it in King Henry IV, Part I, where King Richard II, is represented as having

"Enfeoff'd himself to popularity." Steevens.

2 The strawberry &c.] i. e. the wild fruit so called, that grows in the woods. Steevens.

3

crescive in his faculty.] Increasing in its proper power.

Grew like the summer grass, fastest by night,

Unseen, yet crescive in his faculty.]

"Crescit occulto velut arbor ævo

"Fama Marcelli."

Johnson.

Crescive is a word used by Drant, in his translation of Horace's Art of Poetry, 1567:

4

"As lusty youths of crescive age doe flourishe freshe and grow." Steevens.

swaying more upon our part,] Swaying is inclining. So,

in King Henry VI, Part III:

"Now sways it this way, like a mighty sea,

"Now sways it that way." Malone.

Which I have open'd to his grace at large,
As touching France,-to give a greater sum
Than ever at one time the clergy yet
Did to his predecessors part withal.

Ely. How did this offer seem receiv'd, my lord?
Cant. With good acceptance of his majesty;
Save, that there was not time enough to hear
(As, I perceiv'd, his grace would fain have done,)
The severals, and unhidden passages,5

Of his true titles to some certain dukedoms;
And, generally, to the crown and seat of France,
Deriv'd from Edward, his great grandfather.

Ely. What was the impediment that broke this off?
Cant. The French ambassador, upon that instant,
Crav'd audience: and the hour, I think, is come,
To give him hearing: Is it four o'clock?

Ely.
It is.
Cant. Then go we in, to know his embassy;
Which I could, with a ready guess, declare,
Before the Frenchman speaks a word of it.
Ely. I'll wait upon you; and I long to hear it.

SCENE II.

[Exeunt.

The same. A Room of State in the same.

Enter King HENRY, GLOSTER, BEDFORD, EXETER, WARWICK, WESTMORELAND, and Attendants.

K. Hen. Where is my gracious lord of Canterbury? Exe. Not here in presence.

K. Hen. Send for him, good uncle."

5 The severals, and unhidden passages,] This line I suspect of corruption, though it may be fairly enough explained: the passages of his titles are the lines of succession by which his claims descend. Unhidden is open, clear. Johnson.

I believe we should read several, instead of severals.
M. Mason.

6 Send for him, good uncle.] The person here addressed was Thomas Beaufort, Earl of Dorset, who was half-brother to King Henry IV, being one of the sons of John of Gaunt, by Katharine Swynford. Shakspeare is a little too early in giving him the title of Duke of Exeter; for when Harfleur was taken, and he

West. Shall we call in the ambassador, my liege?? K. Hen. Not yet, my cousin; we would be resolv'd, Before we hear him, of some things of weight, That task our thoughts, concerning us and France. Enter the Archbishop of Canterbury, and Bishop of Ely. Cant. God, and his angels, guard your sacred throne, And make you long become it!

K. Hen. Sure, we thank you. My learned lord, we pray you to proceed;

And justly and religiously unfold,

Why the law Salique, that they have in France,
Or should, or should not, bar us in our claim.
And God forbid, my dear and faithful lord,

That you should fashion, wrest, or bow your reading,
Or nicely charge your understanding soul'
With opening titles miscreate,1 whose right
Suits not in native colours with the truth;
For God doth know, how many, now in health,
Shall drop their blood in approbation2

was appointed governor of the town, he was only Earl of Dorset. He was not made Duke of Exeter till the year after the battle of Agincourt, Nov. 14, 1416. Malone.

Perhaps Shakspeare confounded this character with that of John Holland, Duke of Exeter, who was married to Elizabeth, the king's aunt. He was executed at Plashey in 1400: but with this circumstance our author might have been unacquainted. See Remarks &c. on the last edition of Shakspeare, [i. e. that of 1778] p. 239. Steevens.

7 Shall we call in &c.] Here began the old play. Pope.

8 task-] Keep busied with scruples and laborious disquisitions. Johnson.

9 Or nicely charge your understanding soul-] Take heed, lest by nice and subtle sophistry you burthen your knowing soul, or knowingly burthen your soul, with the guilt of advancing a false title, or of maintaining, by specious fallacies, a claim which, if shown in its native and true colours, would appear to be false. Johnson. miscreate,] Ill-begotten, illegitimate, spurious. Johnson. in approbation—] i. e. in proving and supporting that title which shall be now set up. So, in Braithwaite's Survey of Histories, 1614: " Composing what he wrote, not by report of others, but by the approbation of his own eyes."

1

2

Again, in The Winter's Tale:

"That lack'd sight only;-nought for approbation,
"But only seeing." Malone.

Of what your reverence shall incite us to:
Therefore take heed how you impawn our person,3
How you awake the sleeping sword of war;
We charge you in the name of God, take heed:
For never two such kingdoms did contend,
Without much fall of blood; whose guiltless drops
Are every one a woe, a sore complaint,

'Gainst him, whose wrongs give edge unto the swords That make such waste in brief mortality.4

Under this conjuration, speak, my lord:

And we will hear, note, and believe in heart,
That what you speak is in your conscience wash'd
As pure as sin with baptism.

Cant. Then hear me, gracious sovereign, and you

peers,

That owe your lives, your faith, and services,
To this imperial throne;-There is no bar

3 take heed how you impawn our person,] The whole drift of the king is to impress upon the archbishop a due sense of the caution with which he is to speak. He tells him that the crime of unjust war, if the war be unjust, shall rest upon him:

Therefore take heed how you impawn your person. So, I think, it should be read, Take heed how you pledge yourself, your honour, your happiness, in support of bad advice.

Dr. Warburton explains impawn by engage, and so escapes the difficulty. Johnson.

The allusion here is to the game of chess, and the disposition of the pawns with respect to the King, at the commencement of this mimetick contest. Henley.

To engage and to pawn were, in our author's time, synonymous. See Minshieu's Dictionary, in v. engage. But the word pawn had not, I believe, at that time, its present signification. To impawn seems here to have the same meaning as the French phrase Malone.

se commettre.

4

brief mortality.]

"Nulla brevem dominum sequetur." Horace. Steevens. 5 - There is no bar &c.] This whole speech is copied (in a manner verbatim) from Hall's Chronicle, Henry V, year the second, folio iv, xx, xxx, xl, &c. In the first edition it is very imperfect, and the whole history and names of the princes are confounded; but this was afterwards set right, and corrected from the original, Hall's Chronicle. Pope.

This speech (together with the Latin passage in it) may as well be said to be taken from Holinshed as from Hall. Steevens.

See a subsequent note, in which it is proved that Holinshed, and not Hall, was our author's historian. The same facts, in

To make against your highness' claim to France,
But this, which they produce from Pharamond,
In terram Salicam mulieres nè succedant,

No woman shall succeed in Salique land:

Which Salique land the French unjustly gloze,"
To be the realm of France, and Pharamond
The founder of this law and female bar.
Yet their own authors faithfully affirm,
That the land Salique lies in Germany,
Between the floods of Sala and of Elbe:

Where Charles the great, having subdued the Saxons,
There left behind and settled certain French;
Who, holding in disdain the German women,
For some dishonest manners of their life,
Establish'd there this law,-to wit, no female
Should be inheritrix in Salique land;

Which Salique, as I said, 'twixt Elbe and Sala,
Is at this day in Germany call'd-Meisen.
Thus doth it well appear, the Salique law
Was not devised for the realm of France:
Nor did the French possess the Salique land
Until four hundred one and twenty years
After defunction of king Pharamond,
Idly suppos'd the founder of this law;
Who died within the year of our redemption
Four hundred twenty-six; and Charles the great
Subdued the Saxons, and did seat the French
Beyond the river Sala, in the year

Eight hundred five. Besides, their writers say,
King Pepin, which deposed Childerick,
Did, as heir general, being descended

Of Blithild, which was daughter to king Clothair,
Make claim and title to the crown of France.
Hugh Capet also,—that usurp'd the crown

deed, are told in both, Holinshed being a servile copyist of Hall; but Holinshed's book was that which Shakspeare read; and therefore I always quote it in preference to the elder chronicle, contrary to the rule that ought in general to be observed. Malone. -gloze,] Expound, explain, and sometimes comment up; So, in Troilus and Cressida:

on.

6

66

you have said well;

"And on the cause and question now in hand,
"Have gloz'd but superficially." Reed.