Will raise your highness such a mighty sum,
As never did the clergy at one time

Bring in to any of your ancestors.

K. Hen. We must not only arm to invade the French; But lay down our proportions to defend

Against the Scot, who will make road upon us

With all advantages.

8

Cant. They of those marches, gracious sovereign, Shall be a wall sufficient to defend

Our inland from the pilfering borderers.

K. Hen. We do not mean the coursing snatchers only, But fear the main intendment of the Scot,9

Who hath been still a giddy neighbour1 to us;
For you shall read, that my great grandfather
Never went with his forces into France,2
But that the Scot on his unfurnish'd kingdom

3 They of those marches,] The marches are the borders, the limits, the confines. Hence the Lords Marchers, i. e. the lords presidents of the marches, &c. So, in the first canto of Drayton's Barons' Wars:

"When now the marchers well upon their way," &c.

Steevens.

9 the main intendment of the Scot,] Intendment is here perhaps used for intention, which, in our author's time, signified extreme exertion. The main intendment may, however, mean, the general disposition. Malone.

Main intendment, I believe, signifies-exertion in a body. The king opposes it to the less consequential inroads of detached parties. Steevens.

1 • giddy neighbour -] That is, inconstant, changeable.

Johnson. 2 Never went with his forces into France,] The quartos, 1600 and 1608,read:

"never my great grandfather

"Unmask'd his power for France."

What an opinion the Scots entertained of the defenceless state of England, may be known by the following passage from The Battle of Flodden, an ancient historical poem:

"For England's king, you understand,
"To France is past with all his peers:
"There is none at home left in the land,

"But joult-head monks, and bursten freers.

"Of ragged rusties, without rules,

"Of priests prating for pudding shives;

"Of milners madder than their mules,

"Of wanton clerks, waking their wives." Steevens.

Came pouring, like the tide into a breach,
With ample and brim fulness of his force;
Galling the gleaned land with hot essays;
Girding with grievous siege castles, and towns;
That England, being empty of defence,

Hath shook, and trembled at the ill neighbourhood.3 Cant. She hath been then more fear'd than harm'd, my liege:

For hear her but exampled by herself,-
When all her chivalry hath been in France,
And she a mourning widow of her nobles,
She hath herself not only well defended,
But taken, and impounded as a stray,

The king of Scots; whom she did send to France,
To fill king Edward's fame with prisoner kings;
And make your chronicle as rich with praise,5
As is the ooze and bottom of the sea

With sunken wreck and sumless treasuries.6

West. But there's a saying, very old and true,7

3 at the ill neighbourhood.] The quartos, 1600 and 1608, read:

4

at the bruit thereof.

Steevens.

-fear'd] i. e. frightened. Malone.

5 And make your chronicle as rich with praise, &c.] The similitude between the chronicle and the sea consists only in this, that they are both full, and filled with something valuable. The quarto has your, the folio their chronicle.

Your and their, written by contraction yr, are just alike, and her in the old hands, is not much unlike yr. I believe we should read her chronicle. Johnson.

Your chronicle means, I think, the chronicle of your kingdom, England. Malone.

6

read:

and sumless treasuries.] The quartos, 1600 and 1608,

and shipless treasury. Steevens.

7 West. But there's a saying, &c.] This speech, which is dissuasive of war with France, is absurdly given to one of the churchmen in confederacy to push the king upon it, as appears by the first scene in this act. Besides, the poet had here an eye to Hall, who gives this observation to the Duke of Exeter. But the editors have made Ely and Exeter change sides, and speak one another's speeches: for this, which is given to Ely, is Exeter's; and the following given to Exeter, is Ely's. Warburton.

This speech is given in the folio to the Bishop of Ely. But it appears from Holinshed, (whom our author followed) and from

If that you will France win,

Then with Scotland first begin: 8

For once the eagle England being in prey,
To her unguarded nest the weasel Scot

Comes sneaking, and so sucks her princely eggs;
Playing the mouse, in absence of the cat,

To spoil and havock more than she can eat.

9

Exe. It follows then, the cat must stay at home: Yet that is but a curs'd necessity;1

Hall, that these words were the conclusion of the Earl of Westmoreland's speech; to whom, therefore, I have assigned them. In the quarto Lord only is prefixed to this speech. Dr. Warburton and the subsequent editors attributed it to Exeter, but certainly without propriety; for he, on the other hand, maintained that "he whiche would Scotland winne, with France must first beginne." Malone.

8 If that you will France win, &c.] Hall's Chronicle. Hen. V, year 2, fol. 7, (p. 2) x. Pope.

It is likewise found in Holinshed, and in the old anonymous play of King Henry V.

Steevens.

9 To spoil and havock more than she can eat.] It is not much the quality of the mouse to tear the food it comes at, but to run over it and defile it. The old quarto reads, spoile, and the two first folios, tame: from which last corrupted word, I think, I have retrieved the poet's genuine reading, taint. Theobald.

nent.

1 Yet that is but a curs'd necessity;] So the old quarto [1600]. The folios read crush'd: neither of the words convey any tolerable idea; but give us a counter-reasoning, and not at all pertiWe should read-'scus'd necessity. It is Exeter's business to show there is no real necessity for staying at home: he must therefore mean, that though there be a seeming necessity, yet it is one that may be well excus'd and got over. Warburton.

Neither the old readings nor the emendation seem very satisfactory. A curs'd necessity has no sense; a 'scus'd necessity is so harsh that one would not admit it, if any thing else can be found. A crush'd necessity may mean a necessity which is subdued and overpowered by contrary reasons. We might read-a crude necessity, a necessity not complete, or not well considered and digested; but it is too harsh.

Sir T. Hanmer reads:

Yet that is not o' course a necessity. Johnson.

A curs'd necessity means, I believe, only an unfortunate necessity. Curs'd, in colloquial phrase, signifies any thing unfortunate. So we say, such a one leads a cursed life; another has got into a cursed It may mean, a necessity to be execrated.

scrape.

This vulgarism is often used by Sir Arthur Gorges, in his translation of Lucan, 1614. So, Book VII, p. 293:

Since we have locks to safeguard necessaries,
And pretty traps2 to catch the petty thieves.
While that the armed hand doth fight abroad,
The advised head defends itself at home:
For government, though high, and low, and lower, 3
Put into parts, doth keep in one concent;4
Congruing in a full and natural close,

Like musick.

Cant.

True: therefore doth heaven divide

"His cursed fortune he condemned." Steevens.

Mr. M. Mason justly observes that this interpretation, though perhaps the true one, does not agree with the context; [Yet that is but an unfortunate necessity, since we, &c.] and therefore proposes to read,

Yet that is not a curs'd necessity.

But and not are so often confounded in these plays, that I think his conjecture extremely probable. It is certainly (as Dr. Warburton has observed) the speaker's business to show that there is no real necessity for staying at home. Malone.

2 And pretty traps] Thus the old copy; but I believe we should read petty.

Pretty, however, is a term colloquially employed by our author in Romeo and Juliet:

my daughter 's of a pretty age." Steevens.

3 For government, though high, and low, and lower,] The foundation and expression of this thought seems to be borrowed from Cicero, De Republica, Lib. II: "Sic ex summis, et mediis, et infimis interjectis ordinibus, ut sonis, moderatam ratione civitatem, consensu dissimiliorum concinere; et quæ harmonia à musicis dicitur in cantu, eam esse in civitate concordiam." Theobald.

4 in one concent;] I learn from Dr. Burney, that consent is connected harmony, in general, and not confined to any specific consonance. Thus, (says the same elegant and well-informed writer) concentio and concentus are both used by Cicero for the union of voices or instruments in what we should now call a chorus, or concert.

In the same sense I suppose Ben Jonson to have used the word in his Volpone, Act III, sc. iv:

as Plato holds your music

"(And so does wise Pythagoras, I take it)

"Is your true rapture, when there is consent
"In face, in voice," &c.

Steevens.

5 Congruing] The folio has congreeing. The quarto congrueth. Corrected by Mr. Pope. Malone.

In the old quarto, 1608, the passage stands thus:

"For government, though high or low, being put in parts,

66

Congrueth with a mutuall consent like musicke." Steevens

The state of man in divers functions,
Setting endeavour in continual motion;
To which is fixed, as an aim or butt,
Obedience: for so work the honey bees;
Creatures, that, by a rule in nature, teach
The act of order" to a peopled kingdom.
They have a king, and officers of sorts:"

8

6 Setting endeavour in continual motion; To which is fixed, as an aim or butt,

Obedience:] Neither the sense nor the construction of this passage is very obvious. The construction is, endeavour,—as an aim or butt to which endeavour, obedience is fixed. The sense is, that all endeavour is to terminate in obedience, to be subordinate to the public good and general design of government. Johnson.

7 The act of order -] Act here means law, or statute; as appears from the old quarto, where the words are," Creatures that by awe ordain an act of order to a peopled kingdom."

Mr. Pope changed act to art, and was followed by all the subsequent editors. Malone.

8 -for so work the honey bees;

They have a king, &c.] Our author, in this parallel, had, I have no doubt, the following passage, in Lyly's Euphues and his England, 1581, in view: "In like manner, Euphues, is the government of a monarchie,-that it is neither the wise foxe nor the malicious woolfe, should venture so farre, as to learne whether the lyon sleepe or wake in his denne, whether the prince fast or feast in the court; but this should be their order,-to understand there is a king, but what he doth, is for the gods to examine, whose ordinance he is, not for men whose overseer he is. Then how vain is it,-that the foot should neglect his office, to correct the face; or that subjects should seeke more to know what their princes doe, than what they are; wherein they shew themselves as bad as beasts, and much worse than my bees, who, in my conceit, observe more order than they. If I might crave pardon, I would a little acquaint you with the commonwealth of my bees. I have for the space of these twenty yeeres dwelt in this place, taking no delight in any thing but only keeping my bees, and marking them; and this I find, which had I not seen I should hardly have believed, that they use as great wit by induction, and art by workmanship, as ever man hath or can; using between themselves no lesse justice than wisdome, and yet not so much wisdome as majestie; insomuch as thou wouldest thinke that they were a kind of people, a commonwealth of Plato; where they all labour, all gather hony, flie together in a swarme, eat in a swarme, and sleepe in a swarme. They live under a law, using great reverence to their elder as to the wiser. They choose a king, whose palace they frame, both braver in shew, and stronger in substance.—If their prince die, they know not how to live.