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The tragedy of King John, though not written with the utmo power of Shakespeare, is varied with a very pleafing interchange of incidents and characters. The lady's grief is very affecting; and the character of the bastard contains that mixture of greatness and levity which this author delighted to exhibit. JOHNSON.

There is extant another play of King John, publifhed in 1611. Shakespeare has preserved the greatest part of the conduct of it, as well as fome of the lines. A few of these I have pointed out in the notes, and others I have omitted as undeferving notice. What moft inclines me to believe it was the work of fome contemporary writer, is the number of quotations from Horace, and fimilar fcraps of learning fcattered over it. There is likewife a quantity of rhiming Latin, and ballad-metre, in a scene where the Baftard is reprefented as plundering a monastery; and fome ftrokes of humour, which feem, from their particular turn, to have been most evidently produced by another hand than that of Shakespeare.

Of this historical drama there is faid to have been an edition in 1591 for Sampfon Clarke, but I have never feen it; and the copy in 1611, which is the oldeft I could find, was printed for John Helme, whofe name appears before no other of the pieces of Shakespeare. I admitted this play fome years ago as our author's own, among the twenty which I published from the old editions; but a more careful perufal of it, and a further conviction of his custom of borrowing plots, fentiments, &c. difpofes me to recede from that opinion. STEEVENS.

1

KING

KING RICHARD II.

VOL. V.

K

Perfons

King Richard the Second.

Edmund of Langley, duke of York, uncles to the kingJohn of Gaunt, duke of Lancaster,

Henry, furnamed Bolingbroke, duke of Hereford, afterwards king Henry the Fourth, fon to John of

Gaunt:

Duke of Aumerle, fon to the duke of York.
Mowbray, duke of Norfolk.

Duke of Surrey.

Earl of Salisbury.

Earl Berkley 2.

Bushy,

Bagot,
Green,

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Earl of Northumberland.

Percy, fon to Northumberland.

Lord Rofs 3.

Lord Willoughby.

Lord Fitzwater.

Bishop of Carlifle.

Sir Stephen Scroop.

Lord Marshal; and another lord

Abbot of Westminster.

Sir Pierce of Exton.

Captain of a band of Welchmen.

Queen to king Richard.
Dutchefs of Glofter.

Dutchefs of York.

Ladies, attending on the Queen.

Heralds, two gardiners, keeper, messenger, groom, and

other attendants.

SCENE, difperfedly, in England and Wales.

Duke of Aumerle,- -] Aumerle, or Aumale, is the French for what we now call Albemarle, which is a town in Normandy. The old hiftorians generally ufe the French title. STEEVENS. Earl Berkley.]. It ought to be Lord Berkley. There was no Earl Berkley 'till fome ages after. STEEVENS.

3 Lord Rofs.] Now fpelt Roos, one of the duke of Rutland's titles, STEEVENS..

THE LIFE AND DEATH OF

KING RICHARD II.

ACT I SCENE I.

The court.

Enter king Richard, John of Gaunt, with other nobles and

attendants.

K. Rich. Old John of Gaunt, time-honour'd Lan

cafter,

Haft

• The Life and Death of King Richard II.] But this hiftory. comprises little more than the two laft years of this prince. The action of the drama begins with Bolingbroke's appealing the duke of Norfolk, on an accufation of high treason, which fell out in the year 1398; and it clofes with the murder of king Richard at Pomfret-caftle towards the end of the year 1400, or the beginning of the enfuing year. THEOBALD.

It is evident from a paflage in Camden's Annals, that there was an old play on the subject of Richard the Second; but I know not in what language. Sir Gelley Merrick, who was concerned in the hare-brained bufinefs of the earl of Effex, and was hanged for it, with the ingenious Cuffe, in 1601, is accufed, amongst other things, "quod exoletam tragoediam de tragicâ abdicatione regis Ricardi Secundi in publico theatro coram conjuratis datâ pecuniâ agi curaffet."

"The

I have fince met with a paffage in my lord Bacon, which proves this play to have been in English. It is in the arraignments of Cuffe and Merick, vol. IV. p. 412. of Mallet's edition; afternoon before the rebellion, Merick, with a great company of others, that afterwards were all in the action, had procured to be played before them the play of depofing king Richard the Se

K 2

cond;

Haft thou, according to thy oath and band, Brought hither Henry Hereford thy bold fon; Here to make good the boisterous late appeal, Which then our leifure would not let us hear, Against the duke of Norfolk, Thomas Mowbray ? Gaunt. I have, my liege.

K. Rich. Tell me moreover, haft thou founded him, If he appeal the duke on ancient malice;

Or worthily, as a good subject should,

On fome known ground of treachery in him?
Gaunt. As near as I could fift him on that

ment,

On fome apparent danger feen in him,
Aim'd at your highness, no inveterate malice.

argu

K. Rich. Then call them to our prefence; face to

face,

And frowning brow to brow, ourselves will hear
The accufer, and the accufed, freely speak :-
High-ftomach'd are they both, and full of ire,
rage deaf as the fea, hafty as fire.

In

cond; -when it was told him by one of the players, that the play was old, and they should have lefs in playing it, because few would come to it, there was forty fhillings extraordinary given to play, and fo thereupon played it was.'

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It may be worth enquiry, whether fome of the rhyming parts of the prefent play, which Mr. Pope thought of a different hand, might not be borrowed from the old one. Certainly however, the general tendency of it must have been very different; fince, as Dr. Johnfon obferves, there are some expreffions in this of Shakefpeare, which strongly inculcate the doctrine of indefeasible right. FARMER.

This play of Shakespeare was first entered at Stationers' Hall by Andrew Wife, Aug. 29, 1597. STEEVENS.

5thy oath and band,] When thefe public challenges were accepted, each combatant found a pledge for his appearance at the time and place appointed. So, in Spenfer's Faery Queen, b. iv. c. 3. ft. 3

The day was fet, that all might understand, "And pledges pawn'd the fame to keep aright." The old copies read band instead of bond. The former is right,

So, in the Comedy of Errors:

66 My master is arrested on a band." STEEVENS.

Enter

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