SCENE III.

"―seldom comes the better"-An ancient proverbial saying, noticed in the " English Courtier and Country Gentleman," (1586:)—" As the proverbe sayth seldome come the better. Val. That proverb indeed is auncient, and for the most part true."

SCENE IV.

"Last night, I heard, they lay at Stony-Stratford, And at Northampton they do rest to-night." This is the reading of the folio: the quarto

Last night, I hear, they lay at Northampton; At Stony-Stratford will they be to-night. Stevens and Malone have a controversy as to the value of the respective readings.

"A PARLOUS boy"-" Parlous" means perilous, from which (as Ritson says) it was probably corrupted; but it sometimes seems to be used in the sense of satirically talkative, (as in CORIOLANUS.) The word occurs again in act iii. scene 1, of this play; and there it is spelled perilous, in all the old copies.

"to look on DEATH no more"-The folio has on earth for " on death," which is the reading of every old quarto; and is so clearly in the Poet's manner, and in unison with the context, as to allow no doubt that earth was a misprint. The Duchess refers to the scenes of slaughter to which her eyes had been witness.

"Come, come, my boy; we will to sanctuary." The wretched state of the Queen at this juncture is thus described by one of the chroniclers :-" Whereupon the Bishop called up all his servants, and took with him the great seal, and came before day to the Queen, about whom he found much heaviness, rumble, haste, business, conveyance, and carriage of her stuff into sanctuary. Every man was busy to carry, bear, and convey stuff, chests, and fardells: no man was unoccupied; and some carried more than they were commanded to another place. The Queen sat alone, below on the rushes, all desolate and dismayed, whom the Archbishop comforted in the best manner that he could."

ACT III.-SCENE I.

"Welcome, sweet prince, to London, to your CHAMBER." London was anciently called Camera Regis, (the King's Chamber,") which title, we learn from Lord Coke, it began to have immediately after the Norman Conquest. London is called the "King's special chamber," in the Duke of Buckingham's oration to the citizens, as given by Sir T. More, whence Shakespeare drew other phrases.

"Weigh it but with the grossness of this age," etc. That is, Examine it with the plainness and simplicity of our times,-not ceremoniously and traditionally, with reference to strict religious usages, and old customs.

"Oft have I heard of sanctuary men, But sanctuary children ne'er till now." This argument is from More's “ History," as printed in the chronicles, where it is very much enlarged upon. "Verelye I have often heard of saintuarye men, but I never heard erste of saintuarye chyldren.

*

*

*

But he can be no saintuarye manne, that neither hath wisedome to desire it, nor malice to deserve it, whose

"Thus like the formal Vice, Iniquity," etc. "In a note on HENRY IV., (Part II. act iii.,) we have given a brief notice of the Vice of the old drama. Gifford has thus described him, with his usual good sense; and his description may spare our readers the trouble of wading through the elaborate dissertations which generally accompany the passage before us:'He appears to have been a perfect counterpart of the Harlequin of the modern stage, and had a two-fold office; to instigate the hero of the piece to wickedness, and, at the same time, to protect him from the devil, whom he was permitted to buffet and baffle with his wooden sword, till the process of the story required that both the protector and the protected should be carried off by the fiend; or the latter driven roaring from the stage by some miraculous interposition in favour of the repentant offender.' This note is appended to a passage in the first scene of Ben Jonson's The Devil is an Ass.' We learn from this scene that there were Vices of various ranks, which had their proper appellations:

We have here then the very personage to which Richard refers; and Jonson brings him upon the scene to proclaim his own excellencies, in a style of which the following is a specimen :

What is he calls upon me, and would seem to lack a Vice? Ere his words be half spoken, I am with him in a trice: Here, there, and everywhere, as the cat is with the mice: True Vetas Iniquitas. Lack'st thou cards, friend, or dice? I will teach thee to cheat, child, to cog, lie, and swagger, And ever and anon to be drawing forth thy dagger: To swear by Gogs-nowns, like a lusty Juventus, In a cloak to thy heel, and a hat like a pent-house. Satan, however, will have nothing to do with Iniquity, whom he holds to be obsolete:

They are other things

That are received now upon earth, for Vices; Stranger and newer; and changed every hour. "Iniquity was, no doubt, a character whose attributes were always essentially the same; who was dressed always according to one fashion; who constantly went through the same round of action; who had his own peculiar cant words;-something, in fact, very similar to that most interesting relic of antiquity, Punch, who, in spite of meddling legislation, still beats his wife and still defies the devil. It is to this fixed character of the Vice Iniquity' that we think Shakespeare alludes, when he calls him the formal Vice,'-the Vice who conducts himself according to a set form. It was his custom, no doubt, to

-moralize two meanings in one word.

"He dreamt the boar had rased off his helm," etc. This is the reading of the folio; that of the quartos is— And then he sends you word

He dreamt to-night the boar had rased his helm. The ordinary reading is neither that of the folio, nor of the quartos, but a compound of each.

"without INSTANCE"-The word "instance" signifies here, as in other passages of Shakespeare, example, fact in proof, corroboration. So in the MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR " My desires had instance and argument to commend themselves." "Instance" is used with great latitude of meaning by Shakespeare and his contemporaries. Its primitive sense is "any thing standing nigh;" and it is taken sometimes for an example, a proof, sometimes for request, and sometimes for a motive, or

cause.

"I wonder he's so SIMPLE"-"I wonder he is so fond," in the quartos: the old meaning of the word fond was what it is represented to be in the text of the folio; and the alteration, like others in the folio, seems to have been made to conform to the change of language.

"My lord, I hold my life as dear as yours;

And never, in my DAYS, I do protest," etc. That is, "As dear as you do yours," which in fact is the reading of the quarto editions. In the next line, the quartos have life for "days," which Kuight notices as one of the numerous instances of the minute accuracy with which the text of the folio had been revised. "Days" is evidently substituted for life, to avoid the repetition of that word, which occurs in the preceding line; and yet life is retained in modern editions.

SCENE III.

· conducting Rivers, Grey, and Vaughan, to execution"-" Queen Elizabeth Grey is deservedly pitied for the loss of her two sons; but the royalty of their birth has so engrossed the attention of historians, that they never reckon into the number of her misfortunes the murder of this her second son, Sir Richard Grey. It is remarkable how slightly the death of Earl Rivers is always mentioned, though a man invested with such high offices of trust and dignity; and how much we dwell on the execution of the lord chamberlain Hastings, a man in every light his inferior. In truth, the generality draw their ideas of English story from the tragic rather than the historic authors."-WALPOLE.

"For truth, for duty, and for loyalty." In the quartos this scene opens with Ratcliff exclaiming "Come, bring forth the prisoners." The stage-direction of the folio is, "Enter Sir Richard Ratcliff, with halberds, carrying the nobles to death at Pomfret." The line is therefore clearly unnecessary.

- the hour of death is EXPIATE"-This word does not occur in the quartos. The second folio reads, “the hour of death is now expired." However forced the meaning of "expiate" may be, Shakespeare has used it in his Twenty-second Sonnet, in a similar manner :My glass shall not persuade me I am old, So long as youth and thou are of one date, But when in thee time's furrows I behold,

Then look I death my days should expiate. Though, on this authority, "expiate" is retained in the text, yet I incline to agree with Stevens that, in both places, it is an error of the press for expirate, which accords with Shakespeare's phraseology elsewhere; as in ROMEO AND JULIET-" and expire the term of a despised life."

SCENE IV.

"INWARD with the noble duke"-i. e. Intimate; in confidence.

"Had you not come upon your CUE"-This expression is taken from the theatre. The "cue," queue, or tail of a speech, consists of the last words, which are the signal for the entrance, or reply. Gloster enters at the right moment.

I saw good strawberries in your garden there," etc. "This circumstance of asking the bishop for some of his strawberries, seems to have been mentioned by the old historians merely to show the unusual affability and good humour which the dissembling Gloster affected, at the very time he had determined on the death of Hastings. It originates with Sir Thomas More, who mentions the protector's entrance to the council fyrste aboute ix of the clocke, saluting them curtesly, and excusing himself that he had been from thein so long, saieng merily that he had been a slepe that day. And after a little talking with them he said unto the bishop of Elye, my lord, you have very good strawberries at your gar dayne in Holberne, I require you let us have a messe of them.' It is remarkable that this bishop (Morton) is supposed to have furnished Sir Thomas More with the materials of his history, if he was not the original author of it." (See Preface to More's "Life of Richard III.") The author of the manuscript Latin play, quoted by Stevens, also thought the circumstance worth using, and makes the Protector say

Eliensis antistes venis?

ferunt hertum tuum

Decora fraga, plurimum producere, etc.

"By any LIVELIHOOD"-So the folio. The meaning is perfectly clear, the word being used in the same sense as in ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL, (act i. scene 1:)" The tyranny of her sorrows takes all livelihood from her cheek." Stanley asks how they interpret Gloster's 66 livelihood" liveliness, cheerfulness. Both Knight and Collier restore the word, which has been changed by other modern editors for the reading of the quartos, likelihood, which they interpret as appearance, and thus perpetuate what was no doubt a typographical

error.

"Lovel, and Ratcliff, look that it be done." "Instead of this line of the folio text, we have in the quartos, some see it doue.' The stage-direction of the quartos is, Manet Ca. with Hast., and Catesby subsequently speaks the two lines which in the folio are given to Ratcliff. The line which Lovel speaks is not found in the quartos. In all modern editions Catesby is substituted for Ratcliff, and we read—

Lovel and Catesby, look that it be done. This change is made to avoid the apparent impossibility

of Ratcliff, who in the preceding scene is attending the execution at Pomfret, being on the same day in London. But in making this change the editors can only prescribe a half-remedy, for in the next scene they are constrained to keep Ratcliff on the London scene, bringing in Hastings' head. In that scene Gloster says in the foliowhich line is retained in the modern text,

Be patient, they are friends; Ratcliff and Lovel. We must either, it appears to us, take the text of the quarto altogether, in which neither Ratcliff nor Lovel appear, or adopt the apparent absurdity of the folio. But in truth, this is one of those positions in which the Poet has trusted to the imagination of his audience, rather than to their topographical knowledge; and by a bold anticipation of a rate of travelling which is now a reality, Ratcliff is without offence at Pomfret and London on the same day. In the rapid course of the dramatic action this is easily overlooked. We have little doubt that Ratcliff and Lovel are thus brought upon the scene together, in the folio copy, in association with the history how Collingbourne was cruelly executed for making a rhyme'—

The Cat, the Rat, and Lovel our dog,

Rule all England under a hog.

The audience were familiar with this story; and it was natural that Shakespeare should show Richard (the hog) in association with Catesby, (the cat,) Ratcliff, (the rat.) and Lovel, the three most confidential ministers of his usurpation. In the third scene of act i., Margaret calls Richard rooting hog.'"-KNIGHT.

"my FOOT-CLOTH horse"-For "foot-cloth," see HENRY VI., (Part II., act iv. scene 7.) A "foot-cloth horse" was a palfrey covered with such housings, used for state; and was the usual mode of conveyance for the rich, at a period when carriages were unknown.

This is from Hollingshed, who copies Sir Thomas More:-" In riding toward the Tower the same morning in which he [Hastings] was beheaded, his horse twice or thrice stumbled with him, almost to the falling; which thing, albeit each man wot well daily happeneth to them to whome no such mischance is toward: yet hath it beene of an old rite and custome observed as a token oftentimes notablie foregoing some great misfortune." Hall also relates the incident, in much the same way.

"Come, come, despatch"-So the folio, unceremoniously and characteristically; and it seems to be an intentional correction, with that object, of the prior editions, which make Catesby (to whom the speech is there assigned) give Hastings his rank:-" Despatch, my lord."

SCENE V.

"in ROTTEN armour"-We retain the quaint stagedirection of the folio, which the modern editors, except Knight, change to "in rusty armour." Hollingshed tells us that "the Protector immediately after dinner, intending to set some colour on the matter, sent in all haste for many substantial men out of the citie unto the Tower; and at their coming, himselfe, with the duke of Buckingham, stood harnessed in old ill-faring briganders, such as no man should weene that they would vouchsafe to have put upon their backes, except that some sudden necessitie had constrained them." Shakespeare has closely followed Hollingshed.

"INTENDING deep suspicion"-To "intend" was often, of old, used for to pretend. So in the TAMING OF THE SHREW, (act iv. scene 1:)-"I intend that all this is done in reverend care of her." So, in the seventh scene of this act, Buckingham tells Gloster to "intend some fear."

"I never look'd for better at his hands," etc. This and the following line, in the folio, form the commencement of Buckingham's speech, and such, no doubt, is the correct distribution of the dialogue. Modern editors have taken it from him without assigning any The only excuse is, that, in the quartos, the

reason.

two lines are made the conclusion of the speech of the Lord Mayor.

"-bring them to Baynard's castle"-" Baynard's Castle, which stood on the bank of the river in Thamesstreet, has been swept away by the commercial necessities of London. The dingy barge is moored in the place of the splendid galley; and porters and carmen squabble on the spot where princes held their state."KNIGHT.

"Go thou [To CAT.] to friar Penker"-Dr. Shaw, and Penker, (or Pinker,) were popular preachers of the time; and Speed informs us that the latter was Provincial of the Augustine friars. Dr. Shaw was brother to the Lord Mayor.

66

-no manner person"-" This is the reading of the folio, and is a common idiom of our old language. The quartos, however, have no manner of person.' Both forms were indifferently used. In the same chapter (Lev. vii.) of our common translation of the Bible, we find-no manner fat, and no manner of blood. "No manner person" is probably the more ancient form, and these minute archaisms should be preserved in SHAKESPEARE, wherever we have authority for them."KNIGHT.

SCENE VI.

"seen in THOUGHT"-i. e. Seen in silence.

SCENE VII.

"How now, how now"-The earlier editions all have "How now, my Lord?" The change in the folio is clearly the author's, to express the eager impatience of the inquiry.

"—with his contract with Lady Lucy"-" This objection to King Edward's marriage with Lady Grey is said to have been started by the mother of Edward IV., previous to that alliance taking place. But Elizabeth Lucy, (whose father's name was Wyat, and who had acquired the name of Lucy by marriage,) being sworn to speak the truth, declared that the King had not been affianced to her, although she owned an intimacy had existed between them."

"-like dumb STATUES, or breathing stones"-Here we have an instance, as in HENRY VI., (Part II., act iii. scene 2,) of" statue" having been pronounced as a trisyllable. Other proofs of the same kind are pointed out in JULIUS CESAR, (act iii. scene 2, etc.) Rowe, not attending to this, and mistaking the Poet's meaning, read unbreathing for "breathing." Stevens and other editors have printed "statue" statua, but without warrant from any old copies.

"were not Us'D"-So the folios: the quartos wont.

"on that ground I'll MAKE a holy descant"-Collier here suggests, that "ground" and "descant" are both terms of art in music. The quartors read build for "make," a verb which is inconsistent with the figure employed by Buckingham.

“He is not LULLING"-So all the ancient copies; most modern editions change it to lolling.

"―on a lewd LOVE-bed"-So in the folio: the quartos day-bed, which is the old English name for a couch, or sofa. The change seems to be the author's own corection.

11

66

-loath'd BIGAMY"-Not the having two wives at once, but the word is used in its old canonical and statutory sense; for, as Blackstone states, Bigamy, by a canon of the council of Lyons, (A. D., 1274, adopted by a statute in 4 Edw. I.,) was made unlawful and infamous. It differed from Polygamy, or having two wives at once; as it consisted in either marrying two virgins successively, or once marrying a widow." The phrase is from Sir T. More, as copied by Hall and Hollingshed; where, as in this speech, "the widowhood of Lady Grey" is insisted on as making the king "to be defouled with bigamie in his first marriage."

“Come, citizens, we will entreat no more."

The quartos add, very characteristically, what was afterwards omitted, probably in consequence of the statute against profane words, (3 Jac. I. c. 21.) Buckingham says, according to the quartos

Come, citizens: zounds! I'll entreat no more;

for the old quartos inform us, in a direction, after Richard has come upon the stage, "Here he ascendeth the throne."

"I play the TOUCH"-i. e. I act as a touchstone. "Touch" is thus used by Spenser and by Drayton.

"The king is angry: see, he gnaws his lip." Several of the old English historians observe that this was an accustomed action of Richard when angry.

“I will converse with iron-witted fools," etc. After this line, all the modern editions add a stagedirection, ("Descends from his Throne,") which is not in any of the old copies, so that the author, as the text is there printed, left the dialogue to be carried on from the throne or otherwise, as might be thought most effective.

"-WITTY Buckingham"-"Witty" was not, at this time, employed to signify a man of fancy, but was used for sagacity, wisdom, or judgment; or, as Baret defines it," having the senses sharp, perceiving or foreseeing quicklie." It is here used sneeringly.

"The boy is FOOLISH"-" Shakespeare has here per

O! do not swear, my lord of Buckingham.

There can be little doubt that this came from Shakespeare's pen, on whatever account the text might afterwards be altered.

66

If you deny them, all the land will rue it."

The quartos, with some immaterial literal variation from the folio, attribute this line to " Another" attendant on Gloster, and the line before it only to Catesby. The multiplication of characters was necessarily avoided on the old stage. The various reading is here worth preserving, if not restoring.

"our holy WORK again"-" Our holy task again" in the quartos. Collier reminds us that, according to the old arrangement of this scene, Gloster, with the two bishops, stood in the balcony at the back of the stage, while he was addressed by Buckingham, etc., from the boards.

ACT IV.-SCENE I.

"-a week of TEEN"-i. e. A week of sorrow-a favourite word with Shakespeare. He has it in Love's LABOUR'S LOST, (act iv. scene 3;) in ROMEO AND JULIET, (act i. scene 3;) and in the TEMPEST, (act i. scene 2.) It is found in many old writers, and is used by Chaucer both as a verb and substantive. It is derived, according to Todd, from the Saxon teonan, (injuries.) It is still in use in the north-east of England. (See Holloway's "Dictionary of Provincialisms.")

"Rude ragged nurse, old sullen play-fellow For tender princes, use my babies well!" This speech is not in the quartos. Knight justly remarks that it bears the mark of Shakespeare's later years, in its bold imagery.

Rude ragged nurse, old sullen play-fellow, possesses all the highest attribute of poetry,-that of suggesting a long train of thought by some short and powerful allusion, far more effective than the most skilful elaboration.

this time, I believe, about ten years old, and we are not told by any historian that he had then exhibited any symptoms of folly. Being confined by Henry VII. immediately after the battle of Bosworth, and his education being entirely neglected, he is described by Polydore Virgil, at the time of his death, in 1499, as an idiot; and his account, which is copied by Hollingshed, was certainly a sufficient authority for Shakespeare's repre

sentation."-MALONE.

"— and prefer thee FOR IT"-Here the quartos add— Tyr. 'Tis done, my gracious lord.

K. Rich. Shall we hear from thee, ere we sleep?

Tyr. Ye shall, my lord.

The same question had been put to Catesby by Richard, at the end of the first scene of the third act. It was therefore, though very characteristic, omitted here in the folio.

"BUCK. My lord"-From this speech down to the line, "I am not in the giving vein to-day," is not in the folio, but the quarto impressions all contain it. It is difficult to account for the omission of a portion of the play so spirited and characteristic. There is only one similar omission in the later edition, while the added passages, not found in the quartos, are numerous.

"Because that, like a Jack, thou keep'st the stroke Betwixt thy begging and my meditation."

This passage alludes to the "Jack of the Clockhouse," mentioned before in RICHARD II. It was a figure made in public clocks to strike the bell on the outside, of the same kind as those preserved till a recent period in the old church of St. Dunstan's, in Fleet-street, (London.) Richard compares Buckingham to one of these automatons, and bids him not to suspend the stroke on the clock-bell, but strike, that the noise may be past, and himself at liberty to pursue his meditations.

SCENE IV.

"a dire INDUCTION"-Preface, introduction. Thus, we have the "Induction" in the TAMING OF THE SHREW.

"Withdraw thee, wretched Margaret"-In this scene we take leave of Margaret of Anjou, that "she-wolf of France," who has been almost as much the presiding evil genius of the last two parts of HENRY VI. as Richard is of this. Mrs. Jameson, who was led to a partial adoption of Malone's opinion on the three parts of HENRY VI., not so much from his argument as from their appearing to her to " have less of poetry and passion, and more of unnecessary verbiage and inflated language, than the rest of Shakespeare's plays," finds an additional and original argument in the character of Queen Margaret. Her criticism on the style is just, but she would hardly have drawn her inference from it, if she had been aware that the evidence shows these to be the productions of the immature and unpractised Shakespeare, beginning to form for himself and his country the historic drama. Her other argument, which she considers "the most conclusive of all to those who have studied Shakespeare in his own spirit,” is thus stated :—“ Margaret, as exhibited in these tragedies, is a dramatic portrait of considerable truth, and vigour, and consistency-but she is not one of Shakespeare's women. He who knew so well in what true greatness of spirit consisted-who could excite our respect and sympathy, even for a Lady Macbeth, would never have given us a heroine without a touch of heroism; he would not have portrayed a highhearted woman struggling unsubdued against the strangest vicissitudes of fortune; meeting reverses and disasters, such as would have broken the most masculine spirit, with unbroken constancy,-yet left her without a single personal quality which would excite our interest in her bravely endured misfortunes;-and this in the very face of history. He would not have given us, in lieu of the magnanimous queen, a mere Amazonian trull,' with every coarser feature of depravity and ferocity: he would have redeemed her from unmingled detestation; he would have breathed into her some of his own sweet spirit-he would have given the woman a soul."-(MRS. JAMESON's Characteristics of Women.)

Now, as we here find that, in RICHARD III., all these characteristics of Margaret are adopted and recapitulated, it is clear that this argument against the character being Shakespeare's, destroys itself, by proving too much; for it would prove that this play too is by some other hand than his, which no one can assert, in the wildest mood of critical conjecture. Shakespeare might certainly have given a higher and more heroic cast to Margaret of Anjou; but the truth evidently is, that having, partly from the intimation of the chroniclers, very probably (as Courtenay suggests) from uncontradicted and universally believed tradition, adopted, in spite of his imputed Lancasterian prejudices, this view of Margaret's ferocity, cruelty, and conjugal infidelity, he must have seen that he could not breathe into such a personage "his own sweet spirit," any more than into Goneril, Regan, or the Queen of CYMBELINE, and therefore placed her in bold and unmitigated contrast to the mild virtues of the "holy Henry." The comparison of Margaret with Lady Macbeth suggests a deep moral truth, which must have been in the Poet's mind, though he has not embodied it in formal moral declamation. Our interest in Lady Macbeth is kept up in spite of her crimes, by her unflagging and devoted attachment to her husband, and their mutual and touching confidence and solace in each other, even in guilt as well as in sorrow. Margaret has no communion with Henry's heart: she scorus him, and her affections roam elsewhere. That last redeeming virtue of woman being lost, Margaret has nothing left but her talent and courage; and those qualities alone cannot impart the respect and sympathy which we continue to feel for the guilty but nobler wife of Macbeth.

say, that right for right"-In the third scene of the first act, Margaret was reproached with the murder

of young Rutland, and the death of her husband and son were imputed to divine vengeance roused by that wicked act. "So just is God to right the innocent." Margaret now means to say, "The right of me, an injured mother, whose son was slain at Tewkesbury, has now operated as powerfully as that right which the death of Rutland gave you to divine justice, and has destroyed your children in their turn."

"WHEN didst thou sleep"-So every old edition until the folio, (1632,) which needlessly substituted why for "when." 66 When didst thou sleep, when such a deed was done?" means, When before this time didst thou sleep, etc. Queen Margaret's reply makes it clear that such is the sense of the line.

"makes her PEW-FELLOW"-i. e. Partaker of, or participator in, the grief of others. The word appears to have been used metaphorically for an equal, a companion, or old and intimate acquaintance; as Stevens shows, in several quotations. The familiar use of this phrase indicates an earlier use of pews in churches, in England, than is commonly assigned.

"he is but BOOT"-i. e. Something thrown in; given to boot.

"INDEX of a direful pageant"-Thus in HAMLET, (act iii. scene 4:)—

what act

That roars so loud and thunders in the inder.

Mr. Nares suggests that the "index" of a pageant was probably a painted cloth hung up before a booth where a pageant was to be exhibited.

66- thy babes were FAIRER"-The folio has sweeter, which does not support the antithesis of "fouler" in the next line. We, therefore, adopt the word of all the quartos.

The trumpet sounds"-In the quarto, "I hear his drum." The mode of introducing Richard had been varied in the interval between 1597 and 1623.

"—a touch of your CONDITION"-i. e. A little of your own disposition, or temper. "Condition" had of old frequently this sense.

"-none, but HUMPHREY HOUR"--Stevens supposes that this is an allusion to some affair of gallantry of which the Duchess had been suspected. There is no mention of any thing of the kind, in the chronicles. Malone conjectures that "Humphrey Hour" is merely used as a ludicrous periphrasis for hour, like Tom Troth for truth, in Gabriel Harvey's Letter to Spenser. There can hardly be any allusion, as has been suggested, to the phrase of "dining with Duke Humphrey," used to express those who dined upon air, or passed their hour in admiring his monument, in old St. Paul's Cathedral.

"All UNAVOIDED is the doom"-" Unavoided" is used here for unavoidable, say the annotators; but the words rather express "always unavoided," as a general truth.

"FROM thy soul"-" From" is taken in a different sense, by Richard and by Elizabeth-he using it as "proceeding from;" she taking it as " away from."

"Even so: how think you of it"-Thus the folio: the quartos read, "I, even I: what think you of it, madam ?" I note the difference as showing a correction, giving more cool superiority to the speaker than the more earnest words of the early copies.

"Endur'd of her, for whom you BID like sorrow." That is, Endur'd by her, for whom you did abide like "Bid" (Johnson observes) is the past tense

sorrow. from bide.