Hath, by inftinct, knowledge from others' eyes, That what he fear'd is chanced. Yet fpeak, Morton; Tell thou thy earl, his divination lies;

And I will take it as a sweet difgrace,

And make thee rich for doing me fuch wrong.
Mort. You are too great to be by me gainfaid:
3 Your spirit is too true, your fears too certain.
North. Yet, for all this, fay not that Percy's dead.
I fee a strange confeffion in thine eye:

Thou fhak'ft thy head; and 'hold'ft it fear, or fin,
To speak a truth. If he be flain, say so:
The tongue offends not, that reports his death:
And he doth fin, that doth belie the dead;

3 Your Spirit-] The impreffion upon your mind, by which you conceive the death of your fon. JOHNSON.

+ Yet, for all this, fay not &c.] The contradiction in the first part of this fpcech might be imputed to the distraction of Northumberland's mind; but the calmnefs of the reflection, contained in the last lines, feems not much to countenance fuch a fuppofition. I will venture to distribute this paffage in a manner which will, I hope, feem more commodious; but do not wish the reader to forget, that the most commodious is not always the true reading:

Bard. Yet for all this, fay not that Percy's dea
North. Ifee a frange confeffion in thine ey
Thou Shak'
ft thy head, and hold'ft it fear, or fin,
To fpeak a truth. If he be flain, Say jo.
The tongue offends not, that reports his death;
And he doth fin, that doth belie the dead,

Not he that faith the dead is not alive.

Morton. Yet the firft bringer of unwelcome news

Hath but d lofing office, and his tongue

Sounds ever after as a fullen bell,

Remember'd knolling a departing friend.

Here is a natural interpofition of Bardolph at the beginning,

who is not pleased to hear his news confuted, and a proper preparation of Morton for the tale which he is unwilling to tell.

JOHNSON.

WARBURTON.

If he be flain, fay fo:] The words fay fo are in the first folio, but not in the quarto: they are neceffary to the verse, but the fenfe proceeds as well without them. JOHNSON.

Not

Not he, which says the dead is not alive.
Yet the first bringer of unwelcome news
Hath but a lofing office; and his tongue
Sounds ever after as a fullen bell,
Remember'd knolling a departing friend.

Bard. I cannot think, my lord, your fon is dead.
Mort. I am forry, I fhould force you to believe
That, which I would to heaven I had not feen:
But these mine eyes faw him in bloody state,
Rend'ring faint quittance 7, wearied and out-breath'd,
To Harry Monmouth; whose swift wrath beat down
The never-daunted Percy to the earth,

From whence with life he never more fprung up.
In few, his death (whofe fpirit lent a fire
Even to the dulleft peafant in his camp)
Being bruited once, took fire and heat away
From the best temper'd courage in his troops:
For from his metal was his party steel'd;

7

Which

-faint quittance, -] Quittance is return. By faint quittance is meant a faint return of blows. So, in another play: "We fhall forget the office of our hand

8

"Sooner than quittance of defert and merit." STEEVENS. For from his metal was his party feel'd;

Which once in him abated,

-]

The word metal is one of thofe hacknied metaphorical terms, which refumes fo much of a literal fenfe as not to need the idea (from whence the figure is taken) to be kept up. So that it may with elegance enough be faid, his metal was abated, as well as his courage was abated. See what is faid on this fubject in Love's Labour's Loft, act V. But when the writer fhews, as here, both before and after:

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his party feel'd

"Turn'd on themselves like dull and heavy lead," that his intention was not to drop the idea from whence he took his metaphor, then he cannot fay with propriety and elegance, his metal was abated; because what he predicates of metal, must be then conveyed in a term conformable to the metaphor. Hence I conclude that Shakespeare wrote:

Which once in him rebated.

i. e. blunted.

WARBURTON.

Here is a great effort to produce little effect. The comme 1

tator

Which once in him abated, all the reft
Turn'd on themselves, like dull and heavy lead.
And as the thing that's heavy in itself,
Upon enforcement, flies with greatest speed;
So did our men, heavy in Hotspur's lofs,
Lend to this weight fuch lightness with their fear,
That arrows fled not swifter toward their aim,
Than did our foldiers, aiming at their fafety,
Fly from the field: Then was that noble Worcester
Too foon ta'en prisoner: and that furious Scot,
The bloody Douglas, whofe well-labouring fword
Had three times flain the appearance of the king,
'Gan vail his ftomach, and did grace the fhame
Of those that turn'd their backs; and, in his flight,
Stumbling in fear, was took. The fum of all
Is, that the king hath won; and hath sent out
A fpeedy power, to encounter you, my lord,
Under the conduct of young Lancaster,
And Weftmoreland: this is the news at full.

North. For this I fhall have time enough to mourn.
In poison there is phyfick; and these news
Having been well, that would have made me fick,
Being fick, have in fome measure made me well:
And as the wretch, whofe fever-weaken'd joints,

tator does not feem fully to understand the word abated, which is not here put for the general idea of diminished, nor for the notion of blunted, as applied to a fingle edge. Abated means reduced to a lower temper, or, as the workmen call it, let down. JOHNSON.

'Gan vail his fiomach,] Began to fall his courage, to let his fpirits fink under his fortune. JOHNSON.

Thus, to vail the bonnet is to pull it off. So, in the Pinner of Wakefield, 1599:

"And make the king vail bonnet to us both."

To vail a staff is to let it fall in token of refpect. Thus, in the fame

play:

"And for the ancient cuftom of vail-fiaff,

"Keep it ftill; claim privilege from me:

"If any afk a reafon, why? or how?

"Say English Edward vail'd his ftaff to you."

STEEVENS.

Like ftrengthlefs hinges, buckle under life,
Impatient of his fit, breaks like a fire

Out of his keeper's arms; even fo my limbs,
Weaken'd with grief, being now enrag'd with grief,
Are thrice themselves: hence therefore, thou nice
crutch;

A fcaly gauntlet now, with joints of steel,

Muft glove this hand: and hence, thou fickly quoif;
Thou art a guard too wanton for the head,

Which princes, flefh'd with conqueft, aim to hit.
Now bind my brows with iron; And approach.
* The rugged'ft hour that time and spight dare bring,
To frown upon the enrag'd Northumberland!
Let heaven kifs earth! Now let not nature's hand
Keep the wild flood confin'd! let order die!
And let this world no longer be a stage,
To feed contention in a lingering act;
But let one spirit of the first-born Cain
Reign in all bofoms, that, each heart being set
On bloody courfes, the rude fcene may end,
And darkness be the burier of the dead!

4

Bard. This ftrained paffion doth you wrong, my

lord:

Sweet

-buckle Bend; yield to preffure. JOHNSON. 2 The rugged'ft hour &c.] The old edition:

The ragged'it hour that time and spight dare bring

To frown &c.

There is no confonance of metaphors betwixt ragged and frown; nor, indeed, any dignity in the image. On both accounts, therefore, I fufpect our author wrote, as I have reformed the text:

The rugged'ft hour &c. THEOBALD.

3 And darkness &c.] The conclufion of this noble speech is extremely ftriking.There is no need to fuppofe it exactly philofophical; darknefs, in poetry, may be abfence of eyes, as well as privation of light. Yet we may remark, that by an ancient opinion it has been held, that if the human race, .for whom the world was made, were extirpated, the whole fyftem of fublunary nature would ceafe. JOHNSON.

* This firained paffion &c.] This line is only in the first edition, VOL. V. where

G

Gg

Sweet earl, divorce not wisdom from your honour.
Mort. The lives of all your loving complices
Lean on your health; the which, if you give o'er
To ftormy paffion, muft perforce decay.

5 You caft the event of war, my noble lord,
And fumm'd the account of chance, before you faid,-
Let us make head. It was your presurmise,
That, in the dole of blows your fon might drop:
You knew, he walk'd o'er perils, on an edge
More likely to fall in, than to get o'er :
You were advis'd, his flesh was capable

Of wounds, and scars; and that his forward fpirit
Would lift him where moft trade of danger rang'd;
Yet did you fay,-Go forth; and none of this,
Though ftrongly apprehended, could restrain
The ftiff-borne action: What hath then befallen,
Or what hath this bold enterprize brought forth,

where it is spoken by Umfrevile, who speaks no where else. It feems neceffary to the connection. POPE.

Umfrevile is spoken of in this very scene as abfent; the line was therefore properly allotted to Bardolph, or perhaps might yet more properly be given to Travers, who is prefent, and yet is made to fay nothing on this very interefting occafion. STEEVENS.

5 You caft the event of war, &c.] The fourteen lines from hence to Bardolph's next fpeech, are not to be found in the first editions till that in folio of 1623. A very great number of other lines in this play are inferted after the first edition in like manner, but of fuch fpirit and maftery generally, that the insertions are plainly by Shakespeare himself. POPE.

To this note I have nothing to add, but that the editor speaks of more editions than I believe him to have feen, there having been but one edition yet discovered by me that precedes the firft folio. JOHNSON.

6 in the dale of blows ] The dole of blows is the diftribution of blows. Dole originally fignified the portion of alins (confifting either of meat or money) that was given away at the door of a nobleman. So, in the old metrical romance of Syr Ifenbras, bl. 1. no date :

"Every day fhe made a dole

" Of many florences gold and hole."

Again, in the and Princess by B. and Fletcher:

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dealing large doles of death." STEEVENS.

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