P. HEN. Sup any women with him?

PAGE. None, my lord, but old mistress Quickly, and miftrefs Doll Tear-fheet."

P. HEN. What pagan may that be?

8

PAGE. A proper gentlewoman, fir, and a kinfwoman of my master's.

P. HEN. Even fuch kin, as the parish heifers are to the town bull.-Shall we fteal upon them, Ned, at fupper?

POINS. I am your fhadow, my lord; I'll follow you.

P. HEN. Sirrah, you boy,-and Bardolph;-no word to your master, that I am yet come to town: There's for your filence.

BARD. I have no tongue, fir.

PAGE. And for mine, fir,-I will govern it.

P. HEN. Fare ye well; go. [Exeunt BARDOLPH and Page.]-This Doll Tear-fheet should be fome road.

POINS. I warrant you, as common as the way between faint Alban's and London.

1 - Doll Tear-fheet.] Shakspeare might have taken the hint for this name from the following paffage in The Playe of Robyn Hoode, very proper to be played in Maye games, bl. 1. no date:

"She is a trul of trust, to serve a frier at his luft,
"A prycker, a prauncer, a terer of hetes," &c.

STEEVENS.

What pagan may that be?] Pagan feems to have been a cant term, implying irregularity either of birth or manners.

So, in The Captain, a comedy by Beaumont and Fletcher: "Three little children, one of them was mine;

Upon my confcience the other two were pagans." In the City Madam of Maffinger it is used (as here) for a prosti

in all thefe places

"I've had my feveral Pagans billeted." STEEVENS.

P. HEN. How might we fee Falstaff bestow himself to-night in his true colours, and not ourselves be feen?

POINS. Put on two leather jerkins," and aprons, and wait upon him at his table as drawers.

P. HEN. From a god to a bull? a heavy descenfion! it was Jove's cafe. From a prince to a prentice? a low transformation! that fhall be mine: for, in every thing, the purpose must weigh with the folly. Follow me, Ned. [Exeunt.

9 Put on two leather jerkins,] This was a plot very unlikely to fucceed where the prince and the drawers were all known; but it produces merriment, which our author found more useful than probability. JOHNSON.

Johnfon forgets that all the family were in the fecret, except Falstaff; and that the Prince and Poins were difguifed.

M. MASON.

But how does this circumftance meet with Dr. Johnson's objection? The improbability arifes from Falftaff's being perfectly well acquainted with all the waiters in the house; and however difguifed the Prince and Poins might be, or whatever aid they might derive from the landlord and his fervants, they could not in fact pafs for the old attendants, with whofe perfon, voice, and manner, Falstaff was well acquainted. Accordingly he difcovers the Prince as foon as ever he speaks. However, Shakspeare's chief object was to gain an opportunity for Falstaff to abuse the Prince and Poins, while they remain at the back part of the stage in their difguifes: a jeu de theatre which he practifed in other plays, and which always gains applaufe. MALONE.

edition.

beavy defcenfion!] Defcenfion is the reading of the first

Mr. Upton proposes that we should read thus by transpofition: From a god to a bull? a low transformation!—from a prince to a prentice? a heavy declenfion! This reading is elegant, and perhaps right. JOHNSON.

The folio reads-declenfion. MALONE.

SCENE III.

Warkworth. Before the Castle.

Enter NORTHUMBERLAND, Lady NORTHUMBERLAND, and Lady PERCY.

NORTH. I pray thee, loving wife, and gentle daughter,

Give even way unto my rough affairs:
Put not you on the visage of the times,
And be, like them, to Percy troublesome.

LADY N. I have given over, I will speak no

more:

Do what you will; your wifdom be your guide. NORTH. Alas, fweet wife, my honour is at pawn; And, but my going, nothing can redeem it.

LADY P. O, yet, for God's fake, go not to these wars!

The time was, father, that you broke your word, When you were more endear'd to it than now; When your own Percy, when my heart's dear Harry, Threw many a northward look, to see his father Bring up his powers; but he did long in vain." Who then perfuaded you to stay at home?

4 Threw many a northward look, to fee his father

Bring up his powers; but he did long in vain.] Mr. Theobald very elegantly conjectures that the poet wrote,

but he did look in vain.

Statius, in the tenth Book of his Thebaid, has the fame thought: fruftra de colle Lycai

66

"Anxia profpectas, fi quis per nubila longe

"Aut fonus, aut noftro fublatus ab agmine pulvis."

STEEVENS.

There were two honours loft; yours, and your

fon's.

For yours, may heavenly glory brighten it!
For his, it stuck upon him, as the fun

In the grey vault of heaven: and, by his light,
Did all the chivalry of England move

To do brave acts; he was, indeed, the glass
Wherein the noble youth did dress themselves.
He had no legs," that practis'd not his gait:
And speaking thick, which nature made his ble-
mish,

Became the accents of the valiant;"

For those that could fpeak low, and tardily,
Would turn their own perfection to abuse,
To feem like him: So that, in fpeech, in gait,
In diet, in affections of delight,

In military rules, humours of blood,

5 In the grey vault of heaven:] So, in one of our author's to his mistress:

"And truly, not the morning fun of heaven
"Better becomes the grey cheeks of the east," &c.

poems

STEEVENS.

6 He had no legs, &c.] The twenty-two following lines are of those added by Shakspeare after his first edition. POPE. They were firft printed in the folio, 1623. MALONE. And speaking thick, which nature made his blemish, Became the accents of the valiant;] Speaking thick is, Speaking faft, crowding one word on another. So, in Cymbeline:

fay, and peak thick,

66

"

"Love's counsellor fhould fill the bores of hearing"Became the accents of the valiant" is, came to be affected by them," a sense which (as Mr. M. Mason obferves) is confirmed by the lines immediately fucceeding;

For thofe that could fpeak low, and tardily, "Would turn their own perfection to abuse, "To feem like him:

The oppofition defigned by the adverb tardily, alfo ferves to fupport my explanation of the epithet thick. STEEVENS,

He was the mark and glass, copy and book,
That fashion'd others. And him,-O wondrous

him!

O miracle of men!-him did you leave,
(Second to none, unfeconded by you̟,)
To look upon the hideous god of war
In disadvantage; to abide a field,

Where nothing but the found of Hotspur's name
Did feem defenfible: -so you left him:
Never, O never, do his ghost the wrong,
To hold your honour more precife and nice
With others, than with him; let them alone;
The marshal, and the archbishop, are ftrong:
Had my sweet Harry had but half their numbers,
To-day might I, hanging on Hotspur's neck,
Have talk'd of Monmouth's grave.

NORTH.

Befhrew your heart, Fair daughter! you do draw my spirits from me, With new lamenting ancient overfights.

But I must go, and meet with danger there;
Or it will feek me in another place,

And find me worse provided.

LADY. N.

O, fly to Scotland,

Till that the nobles, and the armed commons,
Have of their puiffance made a little taste.

LADY P. If they get ground and vantage of the
king,

Then join you with them, like a rib of steel,

8 He was the mark and glafs, copy and book,

That fashion'd others.] So, in our author's Rape of Lucrece,

1594:

"For princes are the glass, the school, the book,
"Where subjects' eyes do learn, do read, do look."

MALONE.

9 Did feem defenfible:] Defenfible does not in this place mean capable of defence, but bearing ftrength, furnishing the means of defence; the paffive for the active participle. MALONE.