King. Here is a dear, a true industrious friend,
Sir Walter Blunt, new lighted from his horse,
Stain'd with the variation of each soil

Betwixt that Holmedon and this seat of ours;
And he hath brought us smooth and welcome news.
The Earl of Douglas is discomfited:

Ten thousand bold Scots, two and twenty knights,
Balk'd in their own blood did Sir Walter see

65

On Holmedon's plains. Of prisoners, Hotspur took 70
Mordake the Earl of Fife, and eldest son

62. a dear, a true] Qq 3, 4; deere, a true Qq 1, 2; a deare and true Qq 5-8, Ff. 64. Stain'd] Strain'd F, Dering MS. 69. blood did] bloud. Did Qq 70. Holmedon's plains] Holmedon plaine Qq 6-8. 71. the] Pope; omitted Qq, Ff.

I-4.

63. Sir Walter Blunt] Wright observes that the news of the battle of Humbleton Hill was brought to the king not by Sir Walter Blunt but by Nicholas Merbury, who received as his reward a pension of £40 a year. Rymer's Foedera, ix. 25.

63. new lighted] newly alighted. So in Massinger, The Roman Actor, v. ii:"There is a post, new lighted,

That brings assured intelligence." Cf. Richard II. I. i. 82, and Hamlet, III. iv. 59.

66. smooth and welcome] Epithets antithetical to " uneven and "unwelcome" in line 50. For "smooth " cf. 2 Henry IV. Induction, lines 39,

40:

"from Rumour's tongues They bring smooth comforts false." 68. two and twenty] Theobald, following Holinshed (see Introd. P. xxxvi), read three and twenty.

69. Balk'd... blood] lying in balks or ridges which formed furrows drenched with blood. A similar figure occurs in Milton, History of Britain (Bohn, v. 211): "The Romans slew all; men, women, and the very drawing horses lay heaped along the field in a gory mixture of slaughter." Tollet quotes from Pope's Iliad :

"On heaps the Greeks, on heaps
the Trojans bled,

And thick'ning round them rise
the hills of dead."

A balk signified a ridge between two

furrows (Cath. Angl., 1483, and Sherwood, Eng. French Dict.). O.E. balc, a ridge between two furrows, and balca, a heap. Of conjectural emendations the most interesting are Baked (Grey), cf. Hamlet, II. ii. 481; Bath'd (Heath); Bark'd (Grant White, comparing Hamlet, 1. v. 71).

71. The scansion may be, "Mór | dake Earl of Fife | etc." Pope read the Earl, and is followed by many edd. Malone, omitting the article, says "the word earl is here used as a dissyllable."

71. Mordake] Murdach Stewart, eldest son of Robert Duke of Albany, Regent of Scotland.

Douglas]

71, 72. and eldest Mordake was the eldest son of Robert Duke of Albany, and Shakespeare has here (and in I. iii. 261) been misled by a printer's error in Holinshed's Chronicles (ed. 1808), iii. 21: “and of prisoners among other were these, Mordacke earle of Fife, son to the gouernour Archembald earle Dowglas, etc.,' where a comma should follow " gouernour.' On the following page of Holinshed we find "Mordake earle of Fife, the duke of Albanies sonne." Theobald, supposing that a line was lost after "eldest son," read, in line 72, The beaten Douglas. Rann reads the regent's son, The beaten Douglas. Mordake is called "eldest son," Boswell Stone infers that Shakespeare must have consulted Holinshed's Historie of Scotland, where we read "Murdocke Steward, eldest sonne to duke Robert the gouernour."

As

To beaten Douglas; and the Earl of Athol,
Of Murray, Angus, and Menteith:
And is not this an honourable spoil?
A gallant prize? ha, cousin, is it not?
West. In faith,

It is a conquest for a prince to boast of

King. Yea, there thou makest me sad and makest me sin

In envy that my Lord Northumberland
Should be the father to so blest a son,

A son who is the theme of honour's tongue;
Amongst a grove, the very straightest plant;
Who is sweet Fortune's minion and her pride:
Whilst I, by looking on the praise of him,
See riot and dishonour stain the brow.
Of my young Harry. O that it could be proved
That some night-tripping fairy had exchanged
In cradle-clothes our children where they lay,
And call'd mine Percy, his Plantagenet!

73.

72. Earl Earle Qq, Ff 1-3. A gallant. of.] See note infra.

...

Murray] Murrey Qq; Murry F.
80. to] of Qq 5-8, Ff.

72. the Earl of Athol] French, Shakespeareana Genealogica: "At the date of the battle of Holmedon there was virtually no 'Earl of Athol,' that dignity having been resigned to the crown in 1341, and it was not revived until 1408, in the person of Walter Stewart, second son of King Robert II. There is, however, in Rymer's Foedera, a safe-conduct dated June 8, 1404, granted to Walter Stewart, Earl of Athol and Caithness, to enable him to visit the shrine of Thomas à Becket."

73. Murray] Thomas Dunbar, second Earl of Moray.

73. Angus] George Douglas, only son of William, first Earl of Douglas. His mother, Margaret Stewart, was Countess of Angus in her own right (French, Shak. Gen.).

73. Menteith] This was one of the titles of Murdach Earl of Fife, whose mother, Margaret Graham, was Countess of Menteith in her own right. In making two persons of Fife and Menteith Shakespeare follows Holinshed, Chronicles (ed. 1808), iii. 21: "Mordacke earle of Fife, . . . Robert earle of Angus, and (as some writers haue) the earles of Atholl & Menteith."

75-77. A gallant . . . boast of.] The

...

75

80

85

75-77.

West. In faith, a conquest for a
Prince to boast of."

83. minion] favourite, as in King John, II. i. 392.

85, 86. riot Harry] See Introd. pp. xvi-xviii and xxvii.

87, 88. That some lay] An allusion to the popular belief that the fairies will steal a beautiful child at its birth, leaving in exchange an ugly elf or changeling. See Midsummer-Night's Dream, 11. i. 23; and Marlowe, The Massacre at Paris (Dyce, p. 243): “My son! thou art a changeling, not my son. Cf. also Norton and Sackville, Gorboduc, IV. i; Spenser, Faerie Queene, 1. x. 35; Nashe, Foure Letters Confuted (Grosart, ii. 265); Romeo and Juliet, 1. iv. 54 (in this edition, Dowden's note); Gay, Fables, Pt. I. iii.

90

Then would I have his Harry, and he mine.
But let him from my thoughts. What think you, coz,
Of this young Percy's pride? the prisoners,
Which he in this adventure hath surprised,

To his own use he keeps; and sends me word,
I shall have none but Mordake Earl of Fife.
West. This is his uncle's teaching: this is Worcester,
Malevolent to you in all aspects;

Which makes him prune himself, and bristle up
The crest of youth against your dignity.
King. But I have sent for him to answer this;
And for this cause a while we must neglect
Our holy purpose to Jerusalem.

Cousin, on Wednesday next our council we
Will hold at Windsor; so inform the lords:
But come yourself with speed to us again;

IOI. a while] a-while F. 104. so] and so F.

95

100

105

103, 104. Cousin, lords :] See note infra.

91. let him from] The omission of the verb, when of motion, is com

mon.

92-95. the prisoners. Fife] Tollet and Steevens assert that by the law of arms Hotspur had an exclusive right to the prisoners, excepting only the Earl of Fife, to whom, as a prince of the blood royal, Henry was entitled by his acknowledged military prerogative. Sir J. Turner, Pallas Armata (pr. 1683), p. 341: "The Ransome of a Prisoner belongs to him who took him, unless he be a person of very eminent quality, and then the Prince, the State, or their General seizeth on him, giving some gratuity to those who took him."

93. surprised] captured, as in 2 Henry VI. IV. ix. 8, and King Edward III. v. i.

97. Malevolent aspects] Worcester is likened to some "ill planet' which exerts an evil influence "in all aspects." Aspect " is an astrological term strictly denoting the relative positions of the heavenly bodies at a given time, but loosely used with reference to the way in which they look upon the earth at a particular moment. Cf. Troilus and Cressida, 1. iii. 92; Winter's Tale, II. i. 107; and Chaucer, Canterbury Tales, A. 1087. For " malevolent" in its astrological use cf. "malevolent

star" in Massinger, Duke of Milan, 1. iii. See Introd. p. xxxvii.

98. prune himself] "To prune" is a technical term in falconry used of a hawk that trims or dresses her feathers in preparation for action. The Boke of St. Albans, 1486: "She proynith when she fetcheth oyle with hir beke over hir tayle and anoynteth hir fete and hir federis. And. that

tyme that she proynyth she is lykyng and lusty, and whanne she hathe doone she will rowse hire myghtyly." Cf. Cymbeline, v. iv. 118.

98, 99. bristle . . . crest] Cf. King John, IV. iii. 149: "Now ... Doth dogged war bristle his angry crest."

100. I have . . . this] This is not according to Holinshed. See Introd. p. xxxvii.

103, 104. Pope's arrangement of the lines. Line 103 ends at "hold" in Qq and Ff. It has not been suggested to put cousin in a separate line and then to divide as in Qq and Ff.

106, 107. more is to be .] we must speak and act, not in anger, but advisedly. For "out of anger cf. 1. iii. 51 and IV. iii. 7. post: "You speak it out of fear and cold heart." Johnson paraphrases: "more is to be said than anger will suffer me to say: more than can issue from a mind disturbed like mine."

For more is to be said and to be done

Than out of anger can be uttered.

West. I will, my liege.

SCENE II.-London.

[Exeunt.

An Apartment of the Prince's.

Enter the PRINCE OF WALES and FALSTAFF.

Fal. Now, Hal, what time of day is it, lad?

Prince. Thou art so fat-witted, with drinking of old sack and unbuttoning thee after supper and sleeping upon benches after noon, that thou hast forgotten to demand that truly which thou wouldst truly know. What a devil hast thou to do with the time of the day? Unless hours were cups of sack, and minutes capons, and clocks the tongues of bawds, and dials the signs of leaping-houses, and the blessed sun himself a fair hot wench in flame-coloured taffeta, I see no reason

London. Prince's.] Theobald. Falstaffe, and Pointz. Ff (substantially).

108. West....] Seymour would omit this line. If we adopt this proposal and that anonymously made (Cambridge Shakespeare) to transpose said and done in line 106, the scene will conclude with the conventional rhyming couplet,

London

SCENE II.

Prince's] Tradition says that the Prince had a residence called Cold Harbour in the neighbourhood of Eastcheap, and Holinshed (see Introd. p. xxxix) speaks of "the princes house" in London. There is nothing in the text to support Staunton's view that the scene is laid in a tavern, while it is intrinsically improbable that the Prince's associates met in a room in the palace as suggested by Capell.

2. fat-witted] thick-witted, dull; cf. Love's Labour's Lost, v. ii. 268: "Wellliking wits they have; gross, gross; fat, fat."

4, 5. thou hast know] Falstaff had asked a question the answer to which could not concern a man of his habits, tastes and way of life. Why should a man of pleasure ask aught so superfluous as the time of day, when he might have asked of sack, capons, etc.? The point is not, as Johnson sup

Enter Falstaff.] Enter .

5

IO

4. after noon] in the afternoone Ff. posed, that Falstaff had asked in the night what was the time of the day. The Prince, Moorman thinks, contends that Falstaff's concern is with the night and not with the day. There is no reason to suppose with Steevens that the scene takes place at night, and that this circumstance was forgotten by Shakespeare when in line 112 the Prince wishes Poins a good morrow.

6. What a devil] A-form and y taken from the French (12th century) "comment diables!"; "diables" being in the nominative (= vocative). In M.E. the expression is found as "what devil," but in the sixteenth century the form "what a devil" is found. Cf. Puttenham, English Poesie (Arber), III. xxiii. 274 [New Eng. Dict.].

9. leaping-houses] brothels. Cf. vb. "to leap" in Beaumont and Fletcher, Cupid's Revenge, v; and "vaultinghouses" in Middleton, Father Hubburd's Tales (Bullen, viii. 79).

10. flame-coloured] bright red. So in Middleton, Your Five Gallants, 1. 1; and in Beaumont and Fletcher, The Masque of the Inner Temple and Gray's Inn: "Enter four Cupids attired in flame-coloured taffeta." Cotgrave: "Haulte couleur. A fierie red, or flame colour."

why thou shouldst be so superfluous to demand the
time of the day.

Fal. Indeed, you come near me now, Hal; for we that
take purses go by the moon and the seven stars, and
not by Phœbus, he, that wandering knight so fair.
And, I prithee, sweet wag, when thou art king, as,
God save thy grace,-majesty I should say, for grace
thou wilt have none,—

Fal. No, by my troth, not so much as will serve to be 20 prologue to an egg and butter.

Prince. Well, how then? come, roundly, roundly.

14. the seven] Qq 1-4; seven Qq 5-8, Ff,

king] a king Q I. 18. none,-] Cambridge; none. Rowe (ed. 2); none Qq, Ff. 20. by my troth] omitted Ff. 22. come, roundly] Theobald; come roundly Qq, Ff.