pale beggar face. The expression is poor and feeble. From the epithet pale, it is highly probable that fear is the Poet's word, as found in the folio and older quarto. Beggar fear,' however, is unmeaning. It should surely be bug-bear fear. I read : "And with pale bug-bear fear impeach, &c.". In this there is force: indeed the crest fallen' of the immediately preceding line points out such reading as right. B. Dutch. One phial full of Edward's sacred blood, One flourishing branch of his most royal root,Is crack'd, and all the precious liquor spilt; Is hack'd down, and his summer leaves all faded, By envy's hand, and murder's bloody axe. One phial, &c. Some of the old copies in this instance, as in many others, read vaded, a mode of spelling practised by several of our ancient writers. STEEV. his summer leaves all faded.' Vaded, is something more than faded. It means, Vanished, gone, a latiu sense. B. Mar. Speak truly, on thy knighthood, and thy oath, And so defend thee heaven, and thy valour! And so- -] The old copies read: As so-―STEEV. And so is certainly wrong, because it is not sufficiently expressive of doubt in relation to Mowbray. As so' should therefore be restored to the text as used conditionally. As so thou speakest' may Heaven defend thee." B. "if thou sayst truly, then Boling. And with thy blessings steel my lance's point, That it may enter Mowbray's waxen coat, And furbish new the name of John of Gaunt. -waxen coat,] Waxen may mean either soft, and consequently 'penetrable, or flexible. The brigandines or coats of mail, then in use, were composed of small pieces of steel quilted over one another, and yet so flexible as to accommodate the dress they form, to every motion of the body. Of these many are to be seen in the Tower of London. STEEV. A "waxen coat" is not a coat made of wax, nor even a oft coat. The speech is figurative, Waxen is employed as a participle present, and means growing.-Coat is used for consequence, importance, in allusion to ensigns armorial. Boling broke's meaning is,-that he hopes to overturn, or put down, the growing greatness of Mowbray, and to raise up the name of Gaunt. Waxen' should be printed waxin, as with the old writers "Now all thing ginneth waxin gay." Thorn out of the rose. B. K. Rich. And for we think, the eagle-winged prid Of sky aspiring and ambitious thoughts, With rival-hating envy, set you on To wake our peace, which in our country's cradle To wake our peace, which in our country's cradle Draws the sweet infant breath of gentle sleep, as pretty as it is in the image, is absurd in the sense for peace awake is still peace, as well as when asleep. The difference is, that peace asleep gives one the notion of a happy people sunk in sloth and Juxury, which is not the idea the speaker would raise, and from which state the sooner it was awaked the better. WARB. Perhaps, "wake our ease," i. e. disturb our tranquillity, may be the true reading. Ease and peace being nearly alike in sound, the transcriber might be deceived by it. B. K. Rich. Norfolk, for thee remains a heavier doom Which I with some unwillingness pronounce : The fly-slow hours shall not determinate The dateless limit of thy dear exile; The fly slow hours- -] The old copies read: The sly slow hours. Mr. Pope made the change; whether it was necessary or not, let the poetical reader determine. STEEV. "Sly-slow" might certainly remain in the text as meaninghours which are gliding, (iusidiously, as it may perhaps be called) away. Pope's reading, however, must be preferred, as presenting an image highly beautiful and just; (flying, as is generally understood by it, being here supposed to be expressive of rapidity) 'fly-slow,' i. e. "quick-slow." Hours which fly, but whose flight, however rapid, is imperceptible, and therefore may be termed slow. "Dear exile," should be "dere exile," the old word for painful. B. Mowb. A dearer merit, not so deep a maim As to be cast forth in the common air, Have I deserved at your highness' hand. A dearer merit, not so deep a maim Have I deserved -] To deserve a merit is a phrase of which I know not any example. I wish some copy would exhibit: A dearer mede, and not so deep a maim. To deserve a mede or reward, is regular and easy. JOHN. "A dearer merit." He seems to have used merit in the seuse of regard, consequence. B. Green. Now for the rebels, which stand out in Ire land; Expedient manage must be made, my liege; Expedient manage,'—"fit, proper proceedings"-" such as the time requires." B. Gaunt. This fortress, built by nature for herself, Against infection and the hand of war; Against infection, I once suspected that for infection we might read invasion; but the copies all agree, and I suppose Shakspeare meant to say, that is nders are secured by their situation both from war and pestilence. JouN. "Against infection."—A fortress thrown up against infection is an expression not very likely to fall from the pen of Shakspeare. He may have used infraction, by poetical license, for assault, breaking in upon. The passage is then sufficiently correct. B. Gaunt. England, bound in with the triumphant sea, Whose rocky shore beats back the envious siege Of watry Neptune, is now bound in with shame, With inky blots, and rotten parchment bonds; With inky blots,] I suspect that our author wrote-inky bolts. How can blots bind in any thing? and do not bolts correspond better with bonds? STEEV. "Inky blots;" i. e. the wording of the rotten parchment What are inky bolts? or what have inky bolts to do with re ment bonds? B. K. Rich. Wert thou not brother to great Edward's son, This tongue, that runs so roundly in thy head, Should run thy head from thy unreverend shoulders. "Thy, unreverend shoulders." Unreverend' should be unre verent. B. Gaunt. Join with the present sickness that I have; And thy unkindness be like crooked age, To crop at once a too-long wither'd flower. To crop at once a too-long wither'd flower. Thus stands these lines in all the copies, but I think there is an error. Why should Gaunt, already old, call on any thing like age to end him? How can age be said to crop at once? How is the idea of crookedness connected with that of cropping? I suppose the poct dictated thus: And thy unkindness be time's crooked edge To crop at once▬▬▬▬ That is, let thy unkindness be time's scythe to crop. Edge was easily confounded by the car with age, and one mistake once admitted made way for another. JOHN. "Be like crooked age,"&c. The difficulty will be removed by a transposition of some of the lines and the objections raised by Johnson entirely done away.-As thus: : "Join with the present sickness that I have, The third line, according to the present change, is merely ejaculatory: a wish suddenly thrown out by Gaunt that the King's unkindness may do the work of "crooked" i. e. extreme old age, and end him. B. Queen. Yet, again, methinks, Some unborn sorrow, ripe in fortune's womb, With nothing trembles; yet at something grieves,] The following line requires that this should be read just the contrary way: With something trembles, yet at nothing grieves. WARB. All the old editions read: -my inward soul With nothing trembles; at something it grieves. The reading, which Dr. Warburton corrects, is itself an innova、 tion. His conjectures give indeed a better sense than that of any copy, but copies must not be needlessly forsaken. JOHN. "With nothing trembles, yet at something grieves." Dr. Warburton has mistaken the meaning: and Johnson, though he rejects the Prelate's reading as being an innovation, is wrong in saying that "it gives a better sense than that of any copy." The commentators have supposed that the queen is affected principally by the absence of the king, but the very reverse is intended to be shewn. She is grieved indeed at parting with Richard, but still more grieved by an unborn something." This she calls nothing' by reason that she has merely a presentiment of ill. Something and nothing- it has existence in the mind, and it is something: it has none in reality, and it is 'nothing. The speech of Bushy which immediately follows will serve as a comment, as an ilustration of the passage. B. Queen. Conceit is still deriv'd But what it is, that is not yet known; what For nothing hath begot my something grief; Or something hath, the nothing that I grieve :] With these lines I know not well what can be done. The queen's reasoning, as it now stands, is this; my trouble is not conceit, for conceit is still derived from some antecedent cause, some fore-father grief; but with me the case is, that either my real grief hath no real cause, or some real cause has produced a fancied grief. That is, my grief is not conceit, because it either has not a cause like conceit, or it has a cause like conceit. This can hardly stand. Let us try again, and read thus: For nothing hath begot my something grief; Not something hath the nothing which I grieve: That is; my grief is not conceit; conceit is an imaginary uneasiness from some past occurrence. But, on the contrary, here is real grief without a real cause; not a real cause with a fanciful sorrow. This, I think, must be the meaning; harsh at the best, yet better than contradiction or absurdity. JOHN. "For nothing hath begot," &c. These lines appear obscure to Dr. Johnson, because he considers' or' as an English particle, |