Towards Ludlow then, for we'll not stay behind. ༄,,,,¥ SCENE III. The Same. A Street. Enter Two Citizens, meeting. [Exeunt. 1 CIT. Good morrow, neighbour: Whither away so fast? 2 CIT. I promise you, I scarcely know myself: Hear you the news abroad? 1 CIT. Yes; that the king is dead'. 2 CIT. Ill news, by'r lady; seldom comes the better2: I fear, I fear, 'twill prove a giddy † world. Enter another Citizen. 3 CIT. Neighbours, God speed! 1 CIT. Give you good morrow, sir. 3 CIT. Doth the news hold of good king Edward's death? * Quarto 1597, Neighbour, well met, whither away so fast! † Quarto 1597, troublous. For these two speeches, the quarto 1597 has only-Good morrow, neighbours. 9 Towards LUDLOW then,] The folio here and a few lines higher, for Ludlow reads-London. Few of our author's plays stand more in need of the assistance furnished by a collation with the quartos, than that before us. MALONE. YES; the king's dead.] Thus the second folio. The first, without regard to measure "Yes, that the king is dead." STEEVENS. The quarto 1597 is equally faulty, according to Mr. Steevens. It reads 2 66 I [ay] that the king is dead." MALONE. 66 - - seldom comes the better:] A proverbial saying, taken notice of in The English Courtier and Country Gentleman, 4to. bl. 1. 1586, sign. B: as the proverbe sayth, seldome come the better. Val. That proverb indeed is auncient, and for the most part true," &c. REED. 2 CIT. Ay, sir, it is too true; God help, the while! 3 CIT. Then, masters, look to see a troublous world. 1 CIT. No, no; by God's good grace, his son shall reign. 3 CIT. Woe to that land, that's govern'd by a child3 ! 2 CIT. In him there is a hope of government; That, in his nonage, council under him, And, in his full and ripen'd years, No doubt, shall then, and till then, govern well. years, himself, 1 CIT. So stood the state, when Henry the sixth Was crown'd in Paris but at nine months old. 3 CIT. Stood the state so? no, no, good friends, God wot; For then this land was famously enrich'd 1 CIT. Why, so hath this, both by his father and mother. 3 CIT. Better it were, they all came by his father. Or, by his father, there were none at all: For emulation now, who shall be nearest, Will touch us all too near, if God prevent not. O, full of danger is the duke of Gloster; And the queen's sons, and brothers, haught and proud *: And were they to be rul'd, and not to rule, * Quarto 1597, And the queen's kindred haughty and proud. The modern editors read-a better. The passage quoted above proves that there is no corruption in the text; and shows how very dangerous it is to disturb our author's phraseology, merely because it is not familiar to our ears at present. MALONE. 3 Woe to that land, that's govern'd by a child !]. "Woe to thee, O land, when thy king is a child.” Ecclesiastes, ch. x. STEEVENS. 4 THAT, in his nonage, council under him,] So the quarto. The folio reads-Which in his nonage.-Which is frequently This sickly land might solace as before. 1 CIT. Come, come, we fear the worst; all will be well. 3 CIT. When clouds are seen, wise men put on When great leaves fall, then winter is at hand; 2 CIT. Truly, the hearts of men are full of fear: You cannot reason almost with a man 5 That looks not heavily, and full of dread. 3 CIT. Before the days of change, still is it so : By a divine instínct, men's minds mistrust Ensuing danger; as, by proof, we see The water swell before a boist'rous storm. 2 CIT. Marry, we were sent for to the justices. [Exeunt. used by our author for who, and is still so used in our Liturgy. But neither reading affords a very clear sense. Dr. Johnson thinks a line lost before this. I suspect that one was rather omitted after it. MALONE. I see no difficulty. We may hope well of his government under all circumstances: we may hope this of his council while he is in his nonage, and of himself in his riper years. BOSWELL. 5 You cannot REASON almost with a man -] To reason, is to converse. So, in The Merchant of Venice, vol. v. p. 65 : "I reasoned with a Frenchman yesterday." So, in King John, vol. xv. p. 232: “Our griefs, and not our manners, reason now." See note on that passage. MALONE. Before the days of change, &c.] This is from Holinshed's Chronicle, vol. iii. p. 721 : Before such great things, men's hearts of a secret instinct of nature misgive them; as the sea without wind swelleth of himself some time before a tempest." TOLLET. L Enter the Archbishop of YORK, the young Duke of YORK, Queen ELIZABETH, and the Duchess of YORK. ARCH. Last night, I hear, they lay at Northamp ton; At Stony-Stratford will they be to-night": 7 Last night, I HEAR, they lay at NORTHAMPTON: AT STONY-STRATFORD WILL THEY BE to-night :] Thus the quarto 1597. The folio reads : "Last night, I heard, they lay at Stony-Stratford, “And at Northampton they do rest to-night." An anonymous remarker, who appears not to have inspected a single quarto copy of any of these plays, is much surprised that editors should presume to make such changes in the text, (without authority, as he intimates,) and assures us the reading of the folio is right, the fact being, that "the prince and his company did in their way to London actually lye at Stony-Stratford one night, and were the next morning taken back by the duke of Glocester to Northampton, where they lay the following night. See Hall, Edw. V. fol. 6.” Shakspeare, it is clear, either forgot this circumstance, or did not think it worth attending to.-According to the reading of the original copy in quarto, at the time the Archbishop is speaking, the King had not reached Stony-Stratford, and consequently his being taken back to Northampton on the morning after he had been at Stratford, could not be in the author's contemplation. Shakspeare well knew that Stony Stratford was nearer to London than Northampton; therefore in the first copy the young King is made to sleep on one night at Northampton, and the Archbishop very naturally supposes that on the next night, that is, on the night of the day on which he is speaking, the King would reach Stony-Stratford. It is highly improbable that the editor of the folio should have been apprized of the historical fact above stated; and much more likely that he made the alteration for the sake of improving the metre, regardless of any other circumstance. How little he attended to topography appears from a preceding scene, in which he makes Gloster, though in London, talk of sending a messenger to that town, instead of Ludlow. See p. 85, n. 9. To-morrow, or next day, they will be here." DUCH. I long with all my heart to see the prince; By neither reading can the truth of history be preserved, and therefore we may be sure that Shakspeare did not mean in this instance to adhere to it. According to the present reading, the scene is on the day on which the King was journeying from Northampton to Stratford; and of course the Messenger's account of the peers being seiz'd, &c. which was on the next day after the King had lain at Stratford, is inaccurate. If the folio reading be adopted, the scene is indeed placed on the day on which the King was seized; but the Archbishop is supposed to be apprized of a fact which before the entry of the Messenger he manifestly does not know, and which Shakspeare did not intend he should appear to know; namely, the Duke of Gloster's coming to StonyStratford the morning after the King had lain there, taking him forcibly back to Northampton, and seizing the Lords Rivers, Grey, &c. The truth is, that the Queen herself, the person most materially interested in the welfare of her son, did not hear of the King's being carried back from Stony-Stratford to Northampton till about midnight of the day on which this violence was offered him by his uncle. See Hall, Edward V. fol. 6. Historical truth being thus deviated from, we have a right to presume that Shakspeare in this instance did not mean to pay any attention to it, and that the reading furnished by the quarto was that which came from his pen: nor is it possible that he could have made the alteration which the folio exhibits, it being utterly inconsistent with the whole tenour and scope of the present scene. If the Archbishop had known that the young King was carried back to Northampton, he must also have known that the lords who accompanied him were sent to prison; and instead of eagerly asking the Messenger, in p. 92, "What news?" might have informed him of the whole transaction. The truth of history is neglected in another instance also. The Messenger says, the Lords Rivers, Grey, &c. had been sent by Gloster to Pomfret, whither they were not sent till some time afterwards, they being sent at first, according to Sir Thomas More, (whose relation Hall and Holinshed transcribed,) "into the North country, into diverse places to prison, and afterwards all to Pontefract." The reading of the text is that of the quarto 1597. The arguments here adduced being, as I conceive, unanswerable, Mr. Steevens has not attempted to discuss them, and, without regard to them, adopts the reading of the folio, forsooth! as the smoother of the two. He asserts, indeed, that sense here cannot claim a preference; but I think I have shown the contrary. MALONE. |