P. 95. "I do remain as neuter. So, farewell, Unless you please to enter in the castle, And there repose you for this night." So Pope. The old copies have “So fare you well." Upon which Walker notes, "The extra syllable in the body of the line would be in place in Macbeth or King Henry the VIII., but is strange here." — In the last line, Capell has “And there repose you for this night, or so”; Collier's second folio, "And there, my lords, repose you for this night." Of course these additions were made in order to complete the verse; but this play abounds in octo-syllabic verses. P. 99. ACT III., SCENE I. "Thanks, gentle uncle.- Come, my lords, away, In the first of these lines, the old copies are without my. Inserted by Pope. The second line was thrown out by Theobald as an interpolation; partly because the other two lines rhyme to each other. On the other hand, Ritson and Heath think it genuine. Walker is for retaining the line, but thinks a line ought to be supplied before it, thus: “And lead me forth our well-appointed powers." He adds, "The awkward vicinity of the final words away and holiday to each other perhaps demands this." P. 99. ACT III., SCENE II. "Yea, my good lord. How brooks your Grace the air, After late tossing on the breaking seas?" In the first line, good, wanting in the old copies, was supplied by Pope. In the second, the old copies read After your late tossing"; your having probably been repeated by mistake from the preceding line. P. 100. "The means that Heaven yields must be embraced, And not neglected; else, if Heaven would, And we will not, Heaven's offer we refuse." In the first of these lines, the old copies have heavens yield, and in the second omit if, needful alike to sense and metre. P. 101. "Discomfortable cousin! know'st thou not That when the searching eye of heaven is hid So Hanmer. Instead of and, the old copies have that, which is commonly explained as referring, not to globe, the nearest antecedent, but to eye of heaven. But where is the sense of saying "the eye of heaven, which lights the lower world, is hid behind the globe"? as if the same eye of heaven did not light the upper world also. P. 102. "For all the Welshmen, hearing thou wert dead, Are gone to Bolingbroke, dispersed, or fled." So Collier's second folio. The old copies have and instead of or. P. 103. "Boys, with women's voices, Strive to speak big, and clap their female joints Here Pope substituted clasp for clap, and Collier's second folio changes female to feeble. But clap may well have the same meaning as clasp. The other change is plausible indeed; yet why not "female joints," as well as "women's voices"? And Dyce aptly quotes from Cowley's Garden, P. 105. "The earth itself breathes better perfumes here "How some have been deposed; some slain in war; Some haunted by the ghosts they have deposed." Walker, referring to deposed and deposed, says, "One of these is wrong. Possibly deprived in the latter place." And he rightly adds that the Poet has deprive in the sense of depose in Hamlet, i. 4: "Which might deprive your sovereignty of reason." But, if any change were to be made, I should prefer Pope's "by the ghosts they dispossess'd." P. 106. "Throw away respect, Tradition, form, and ceremonious duty." Instead of Tradition, Roderick proposed Addition; and rightly, I have little doubt. Addition was continually used for title, or mark of honour. See, however, foot-note 20. P. 106. "I live with bread like you, feel want, taste grief, Need friends: subjected thus, How can you say to me, I am a king?”. Upon this, Walker notes, “I feel almost assured that Shakespeare wrote, 'Need friends, fear enemies: - Subjected thus,' &c." I have very little doubt that Walker is right, and find it not easy to refrain from adopting his reading. ACT III., SCENE III. P. 108. "Your Grace mistakes me; only to be brief, Left I his title out." So Rowe. The old copies omit me. P. 109. "I know it, uncle; and I not oppose The old copies read "and oppose not," thus making a bad hitch in the metre. P. 109. "Welcome, Harry: what, will not this castle yield?" There is surely something wrong here: it is hardly credible that Shakespeare could have fallen into so gross a breach of prosody. Hanmer substituted Well for Welcome; but neither does that seem right; though, to be sure, it rectifies the metre. P. 110. "York. See, see, King Richard doth himself appear," &c. The first six lines of this speech are without any prefix in the old copies, and York's speech is there made to begin with "Yet looks he like a king." Most of the modern editions assign them to York; and with good reason, I think, as the four lines which the old copies assign to York are strictly continuous with them. Dyce gives the first six lines to Percy; rather strangely, I think, for they seem little in keeping with the reserved and modest bearing of Percy in this play. P. III. 66 Alack, alack, for woe, That any harm should stain so fair a show." Instead of harm, Collier's and Singer's second folios have storm, which Dyce adopts; much to my surprise, I must confess, for I fail to perceive how any thing is gained by the change. Williams proposed to read shame. P. 112. "The King of Heaven forbid our lord the King Be rush'd upon! No; thy thrice-noble cousin, So Pope. The old editions are without No in the third of these lines, and also without of in the fourth. Walker would read "This thy thrice-noble," &c.; which would rectify the metre indeed, but not so well, I think, as Pope's reading. Several ways have been proposed for rectifying the metre of the last line; but Pope's of is the simplest. P. 113. "We do debase ourself, cousin, do we not? Walker says, "Perhaps, coz." But I suspect cousin was in this instance meant to be pronounced as one syllable, as even, given, heaven, &c., often are. ACT III., SCENE IV. P. 117. "Of sorrow or of joy." The old copies have griefe instead of joy. A palpable misprint, which the context readily corrects. P. 118. "And I could weep, would weeping do me good, And never borrow any tear of thee." So Pope. The old copies read "And I could sing." Some have tried to maintain the old reading, using an over-subtilty of argument that may indeed amuse, but not convince. Dyce aptly quotes from the Poet's Lucrece: — P. 118. "Showing, as in a model, a firm state." So Walker, and with evident propriety. The old text reads "our firme estate." P. 119. "O, what pity is it That he had not so trimm'd and dress'd his land Do wound the bark," &c. The necessary word We is wanting in the old editions. Supplied by Capell. P. 119. "They might have lived to bear, and he to taste Their fruits of duty. All superfluous branches We lop away, that bearing boughs may live." So the second folio. The other old copies omit All. |