upon the exploit themselves: which they fhall have no fooner atchieved, but we'll fet upon them.

P. Henry. Ay, but, 'tis like, that they will know us, by our horfes, by our habits, and by every other appointment, to be ourselves.

Poins. Tut! our horfes they fhall not fee, I'll tie them in the wood; our vifors we will change, after we leave them; and, firrah, I have cafes of buckram * for the nonce, to immask our noted outward gar

ments.

us.

P. Henry. But, I doubt, they will be too hard for

Poins. Well, for two of them, I know them to be as true-bred cowards as ever turn'd back; and for the third, if he fight longer than he fees reafon, I'll forfwear arms. The virtue of this jeft will be, the incomprehenfible lies that this fame fat rogue will tell us, when we meet at fupper: how thirty, at least, he fought with; what wards, what blows, what extremities he endured; and, in the 3 reproof of this, lies the jeft.

P. Henry. Well, I'll go with thee; provide us all things neceffary, and meet me to-morrow night + in Eaft-cheap, there I'll fup. Farewel.

2

Poins. Farewel, my lord.

[Exit Poins.

-for the nonce, -] That is, as I conceive, for the occafion. This phrafe, which was very frequently, though not always very precifely, ufed by our old writers, I fuppofe to have been originally a corruption of corrupt Latin. From pro-nunc, I fuppofe, came for the nunc, and fo for the nonce; just as from adnunc came a-non. The Spanish entonces has been formed in the fame manner from in-tunc. TYRWHITT.

3

4

--to

-reproof] Reproof is confutation. JOHNSON. to-morrow night. ] I think we fhould read: night. The difguifes were to be provided for the purpose of the robbery which was to be committed at four in the morning; and they would come too late if the prince was not to receive them 'till the night after the day of the exploit. This is a fecond instance to prove that Shakespeare could forget in the end of a scene what he had faid in the beginning. STEEVENS.

P. Henry

P. Henry. I know you all, and will a while uphold
The unyok'd humour of your idleness:
Yet herein will I imitate the fun;

Who doth permit the base contagious clouds.
To fmother up his beauty from the world,
That, when he please again to be himself,
Being wanted, he may be more wonder'd at,
By breaking through the foul and ugly mists
Of vapours, that did seem to strangle him.
If all the year were playing holidays,
To fport would be as tedious as to work;

But, when they feldom come, they wifh'd-for come,
And nothing pleaseth but rare accidents.
So, when this loose behaviour I throw off,
And pay the debt I never promifed,
By how much better than my word I am,
By fo much' fhall I falfify men's hopes;
And, like bright metal on a fullen ground,
My reformation, glittering o'er my fault,

5-fall I falfify mens' hopes ;] Juft the contrary. We should read fears. WARBURTON.

To falfify hope is to exceed hope, to give much where men hoped for little.

This speech is very artfully introduced to keep the prince from appearing vile in the opinion of the audience; it prepares them for his future reformation; and, what is yet more valuable, exhibits a natural picture of a great mind offering excufes to itself, and palliating those follies which it can neither justify nor forfake. JOHNSON.

Hopes is ufed fimply for expectations, as fuccefs is for the event, whether good or bad. This is ftill common in the midland coun ties. "Such manner of uncouth speech," fays Puttenham, “did the tanner of Tamworth use to king Edward IV. which tanner having a great while mistaken him, and used very broad talk, at length perceiving by his train that it was the king, was afraid he fhould be punished for it, and faid thus, with a certaine rude repentance, "I hope I fhall be hanged to-morrow, for I fear me I fhall be hanged;" whereat the king laughed a-good; not only to fee the tanner's vain feare, but alfo to hear his mishapen terme : and gave him for recompence of his good sport, the inheritance of Plumpton Parke. FARMER.

VOL. V.

T

Shall

Shall fhew more goodly, and attract more eyes,
Than that which hath no foil to fet it off.
I'll fo offend, to make offence a skill;
Redeeming time, when men think leaft I will. [Exit.

Enter King Henry,, Northumberland, Worcester, Hotspur, Sir Walter Blunt, and others.

K. Henry. My blood hath been too cold and temperate,

Unapt to ftir at thefe indignities,

And you have found me; for, accordingly,
You tread upon my patience: but, be sure,
I will from henceforth rather be myself,

I will from henceforth rather be myself,

Mighty, and to be fear'd, than my condition ;]

i. e. I will from henceforth rather put on the character that becomes me, and exert the refentment of an injured king, than ftill continue in the inactivity and mildnefs of my natural difpofition. And this fentiment he has well expreffed, fave that by his ufual licence, he puts the word condition for difpofition; which use of terms difpleafing our Oxford editor, as it frequently does, he, in a lofs for the meaning, fubftitutes in for than:

Mighty and to be fear'd in my condition.

So that by condition, in this reading, muft bé meant ftation, office. But it cannot be predicated of station and office," that it is smooth as oil, foft as young down;" which fhews that condition muff needs be licentiously ufed for difpofition, as we faid before.

WARBURTON.

The commentator has well explained the fenfe which was not very difficult, but is mistaken in fuppofing the use of condition licentious. Shakespeare uses it very frequently for temper of mind, and in this fenfe the vulgar still fay a good or ill-conditioned man. JOHNSON.

So, in K. Hen. V. a&t V: "Our tongue is rough, coz, and my condition is not fmooth." Ben Jonfon ufes it in the same sense, in The New Inn, act I. fc. vi:

"You cannot think me of that coarfe condition,
"To envy you any thing." STEEVENS.

Mighty,

Mighty, and to be fear'd, than my condition ; Which hath been fmooth as oil, foft as young down, And therefore loft that title of refpe&t,

Which the proud foul ne'er pays, but to the proud.
Wor. Our house, my fovereign liege, little deferves
The fcourge of greatnefs to be used on it;

And that fame greatnefs too which our own hands
Have holp to make fo portly.

North. My lord,

K. Henry. Worcester, get thee gone, for I do fee Danger and difobedience in thine eye:

O, fir, your presence is too bold and peremptory, And majefty might never yet endure

7 The moody frontier of a fervant brow.

You have good leave to leave us; when we need
Your ufe and counfel, we fhall fend for you.-

You were about to speak.

North. Yea, my good lord.

[Exit Worcester.

[To Northumberland.

Thofe prifoners in your highnefs' name demanded,
Which Harry Percy here at Holmedon took,
Were, as he fays, not with fuch ftrength deny'd
As is deliver'd to your majefty:

Either envy, therefore, or mifprifion
Is guilty of this fault, and not my fon..
Hot. My liege, I did deny no prifoners.
But, I remember, when the fight was done,
When I was dry with rage, and extreme toil,
Breathless and faint, leaning upon my fword,
Came there a certain lord, neat, and trimly drefs'd,
Fresh as a bridegroom; and his chin, new reap'd,

7 The moody frontier] This is nonfenfe. We fhould read frontlet, i. e. forehead. WARBURTON.

Frontlet does not fignify forehead, but a bandage round the head. Frontier was anciently used for forehead. So Stubbs, in his Anatomy of Abuses, 1595: "Then on the edges of their bol. fter'd hair, which ftandeth crested round their frontiers, and hanging over their faces, &c." STEEVENS.

8

Shew'd like a stubble land at harveft-home:
He was perfumed like a milliner;

And 'twixt his finger and his thumb he held
9 A pouncet-box, which ever and anon
He gave his nofe, and took't away again;-
Who, therewith angry, when it next came there,

Took it in fnuff:-and ftill he fmil'd, and talk'd;

And, as the foldiers bore dead bodies by,

He call'd them-untaught knaves, unmannerly,
To bring a flovenly unhandfome corfe
Betwixt the wind and his nobility.
With many holiday and lady terms 2

He

3at harveft-home:] That is, at a time of feftivity. JOHNSON. If we understand harveft-home in the general fenfe of a time of feftivity, we fhall lose the most pointed circumftance of the comparifon. A chin new fhaven is compared to a fubble-land at barveft-home, not on account of the festivity of that season, as I apprehend, but because at that time, when the corn has been but juft carried in, the stubble appears more even and upright, than at other. TYRWHITT. A pouncet-box, -] A fmall box for mufk or other perfumes then in fashion: the lid of which, being cut with open work, gave it its name; from poinfoner, to prick, pierce, or engrave. WARBURTON. Dr. Warburton's explanation is juft. At the chriftening of Q. Elizabeth, the marchionefs of Dorfet gave, according to Holinfhed, "three gilt bowls pounced, with a cover." STEEVENS.

any

Took it in fnuff:] Snuff is equivocally ufed for anger, and a powder taken up the nofe.

So, in The Fleire, à comedy by E. Sharpham, 1610: "Nay be not angry, I do not touch thy nose, to the end it should take any thing in Snuff."

Again, in our author's Love's Labour's Loft:

You marr the light, by taking it in Snuff." Again, in Decker's Satiromaftix:

66

'tis enough,

"Having fo much fool, to take him in fnuff;"

and here they are talking about tobacco. Again, in Hinde's Eliofte Libidinofo, 1606: "The good wife glad that he took the matter fo in fnuff &c." STEEVENS.

With many holiday and lady terms] So, in a Looking Glass for

London