ACT III.

SCENE I. Bangor. A Room in the Archdeacon's House.

Enter HOTSPUR, WORCESTER, MORTIMER, and GLENDOWER.

Mort. These promises are fair, the parties sure, And our induction1 full of prosperous hope.

Hot. Lord Mortimer,-and cousin Glendower,Will you sit down?

And, uncle Worcester:-A plague upon it!
I have forgot the map.

Glend.

No, here it is.

Sit, cousin Percy; sit, good cousin Hotspur,
For by that name as oft as Lancaster

Doth speak of you, his cheek looks pale; and, with
A rising sigh, he wisheth you in heaven.

Hot. And you in hell, as often as he hears Owen Glendower spoke of.

Glend. I cannot blame him: at my nativity, The front of heaven was full of fiery shapes, Of burning cressets3; and, at my birth,

1 Induction is used by Shakspeare for commencement, beginning. The introductory part of a play or poem was called the induction, Such is the prelude of the Tinker to the Taming of the Shrew. Sackville's induction to the Mirror for Magistrates is another instance.

2 Shakspeare has amplified the hint of Holinshed, who says, 'Strange wonders happened at the nativity of this man; for the same night that he was born all his father's horses in the stable were found to stand in blood up to their bellies.' The poet had probably also heard that, in 1402, a blazing star appeared, which the Welsh bards represented as portending good fortune to Owen Glendower.

3 Cressets were open lamps, exhibited on a beacon, carried upon a pole or otherwise suspended. Cotgrave thus describes

The frame and huge foundation of the earth,
Shak'd like a coward.

Hot. Why, so it would have done At the same season, if your mother's cat had But kitten'd, though yourself had ne'er been born. Glend. I say, the earth did shake when I was born. Hot. And I say, the earth was not of my mind, If you suppose, as fearing you it shook.

Glend. The heavens were all on fire, the earth did tremble.

Hot. O, then the earth shook to see the heavens on fire,

And not in fear of your nativity.

Diseased nature oftentimes breaks forth
In strange eruptions: oft the teeming earth
Is with a kind of colick pinch'd and vex'd
By the imprisoning of unruly wind

Within her womb; which, for enlargement striving,
Shakes the old beldame earth, and topples" down
Steeples, and moss-grown towers. At your birth,
Our grandam earth, having this distemperature,
In passion shook.

Glend.

Cousin, of many men
I do not bear these crossings. Give me leave
To tell you once again,—that, at my birth,
The front of heaven was full of fiery shapes;

them under the word falot, 'a cresset light (such as they use in playhouses), made of ropes wreathed, pitched, and put into small open cages of iron.' Their form will be best understood by this representation, taken from Mr. Douce's Illustrations of Shakspeare, vol. i. p. 431.

▲ Beldame, and belsire, formerly signified grandmother and grandfather.

5 To topple, in its active sense, is to throw down.

The goats ran from the mountains, and the herds
Were strangely clamorous to the frighted fields.
These signs have mark'd me extraordinary;
And all the courses of my life do show,

I am not in the roll of common men..

Where is he living,-clipp'd in with the sea
That chides the banks of England, Scotland,
Wales,-

Which calls me pupil, or hath read to me?
And bring him out, that is but woman's son,
Can trace me in the tedious ways of art,
And hold me pace in deep experiments.

Hot. I think, there is no man speaks better
Welsh:-

I'll to dinner.

Mort. Peace, cousin Percy; you will make him mad.

Glend. I can call spirits from the vasty deep. Hot. Why, so can I; or so can any man: But will they come, when you do call for them? Glend. Why, I can teach you, cousin, to command The devil.

Hot. And I can teach thee, coz, to shame the

devil,

By telling truth; Tell truth, and shame the devil.If thou have power to raise him, bring him hither, And I'll be sworn, I have power to shame him hence. O, while you live, tell truth, and shame the devil. Mort. Come, come,

No more of this unprofitable chat.

Glend. Three times hath Henry Bolingbroke made head

Against my power: thrice from the banks of Wye, And sandy-bottom'd Severn, have I sent him, Bootless home, and weather-beaten back.

Shakspeare has already, in Act ii. Sc. 1, quibbled upon

boots and boot, profit.

Hot. Home without boots, and in foul weather too! How 'scapes he agues, in the devil's name? Glend. Come, here's the map: Shall we divide our right,

According to our three-fold order ta'en?

Mort. The archdeacon hath divided it
Into three limits, very equally:

England, from Trent and Severn hitherto 7,
By south and east, is to my part assign'd:
All westward, Wales beyond the Severn shore,
And all the fertile land within that bound,
To Owen Glendower: and, dear coz, to you
The remnant northward, lying off from Trent.
And our indentures tripartite are drawn:
Which being sealed interchangeably,
(A business that this night may execute),
To-morrow, cousin Percy, you, and I,
And my good lord of Worcester, will set forth,
To meet your father, and the Scottish power,
As is appointed us at Shrewsbury.

My father Glendower is not ready yet,

Nor shall we need his help these fourteen days :--Within that space [To GLEND.] you may have drawn together

Your tenants, friends, and neighbouring gentlemen. Glend. A shorter time shall send me to you, lords, And in my conduct shall your ladies come:

From whom you now must steal, and take no leave; For there will be a world of water shed,

Upon the parting of your wives and you.

Hot. Methinks, my moiety 8, north from Burton here,

7 i. e. to this spot (pointing to the map).

8 A moiety was frequently used by the writers of Shakspeare's age as a portion of any thing, though not divided into equal parts. Thus Heywood, in his History of Women, 1624:-' I would unwillingly part with the greatest moiety of my own means and fortunes.'

10

out.

In quantity equals not one of yours:
See, how this river comes me cranking 9 in,
And cuts me, from the best of all my land,
A huge half moon, and monstrous cantle
I'll have the current in this place damm'd up;
And here the smug and silver Trent shall run,
In a new channel, fair and evenly:

It shall not wind with such a deep indent,
To rob me of so rich a bottom here.

Glend. Not wind? it shall, it must; you see, it doth.
Mort. Yea,

But mark, how he bears his course, and runs me up
With like advantage on the other side;
Gelding the opposed continent as much,
As on the other side it takes from you.

Wor. Yea, but a little charge will trench him here,
And on this north side win this cape of land;
And then he runs straight and even.

Hot. I'll have it so; a little charge will do it.
Glend. I will not have it alter'd.

Hot.

Glend. No, nor you shall not.

Hot.

Glend. Why, that will I.

Hot.

Speak it in Welsh.

Will not you?

Who shall say me nay?

Let me not understand you then,

Glend. I can speak English, lord, as well as you; For I was train'd up in the English court 11;

9 To crank is to crook, to turn in and out. Crankling is used by Drayton in the same sense: speaking of a river, he says that Meander

'Hath not so many turns and crankling nooks as she.' Shakspeare, in his Venus and Adonis, says of a hare :— 'He cranks and crosses with a thousand doubles.'

10 A cantle is a portion, a part, a corner or fragment of any thing. The French had chanteau and chantel, and the Italians canto and cantone in the same sense.

11 Owen Glendower's real name was Owen ap-Gryffyth Vaughan. He took the name of Glendower from the lordship of which he was