Perfons Represented. King Henry the Fourth. Earl of Westmoreland, Sir Walter Blunt. Sons to the king. Friends to the king. Thomas Percy, Earl of Worcester. Scroop, Archbishop of York. Archibald, Earl of Douglas. Owen Glendower. Sir Richard Vernon. Sir John Falstaff. Gadshill. Peto. Lady Percy, wife to Hotspur, and fifter to Mortimer. Lady Mortimer, daughter to Glendower, and wife to Mortimer. Mrs. Quickly, hoftefs of a tavern in Eastcheap. Lords, Officers, Sheriff, vintner, chamberlain, drawers, two carriers, travellers, and attendants, &C. SCENE, England. FIRST PART OF KING HENRY IV'. ACT I. SCENE I. London. A Room in the Palace. Enter King HENRY, WESTMORELAND, Sir Walter K. Hen. So fhaken as we are, fo wan with care, And breathe short-winded accents of new broils The transactions contained in this hiftorical drama are comprifed within the period of about ten months; for the action commences with the news brought of Hotspur having defeated the Scots under Archibald earl Douglas at Holmedon, (or Halidown-hill,) which battle was fought on Holyrood-day (the 14th of September) 1402; and it clofes with the defeat and death of Hotfpur at Shrewsbury; which engagement happened on Saturday the 21ft of July, (the eve of Saint Mary Magdalen) in the year 1403. THEOBALD. This play was first entered at Stationers' Hall, Feb. 25, 1597, by Andrew Wife. Again by M. Woolff, Jan. 9, 1598. For the piece fuppofed to have been its original, fee Six old plays on which Sbakfpeare founded &c. published for S. Leacroft, Charing-Crofs. STEEV. This comedy was written, I believe, in the year 1597. See An Attempt to afcertain the order of Shakspeare's plays, Vol. I. MALONE. Shakspeare has apparently defigned a regular connection of these dramatick hiftories from Richard the Second to Henry the Fifth. King Henry, at the end of Richard the Second, declares his purpose to vific the Holy land, which he refumes in this fpeech. The complaint made by king Henry in the last act of Richard the Second, of the wildness of his fon, prepares the reader for the frolicks which are here to be recounted, and the characters which are now to be exhibited. JOHNSON. 2 Find we a time for frighted peace to pant, And breathe short-winded accents of new broils] That is, let us foften peace to reft awhile without disturbance, that the may recover breath to propose new wars, JoHNSON. No No more the thirsty entrance of this foil Shall daub her lips with her own children's blood 3; 3 No more the thirsty entrance of this foil No Shall daub ber lips with ber own children's blood;] I would read the thirsty entrants of this foil; i. e. those who set foot on this kingdom through the thirst of power or conqueft. Whoever is accustomed to the old copies of this author, will generally find the words confequents, occurrents, ingredients, fpelt confequence, occurrence, ingredience; and thus, perhaps, the French word entrants, anglicized by Shakspeare, might have been corrupted into entranit, which affords no very apparent meaning. STEEVENS. This is an extremely difficult paffage. An anonymous writer feems to think all difficulty to be done away, by understanding "the thirty entrance of this foil" in the sense of the face of the earth parch'd and crack'd, as it is always in a dry fummer." If we take the words in their natural order, the meaning then will be,-No more fhall the thirty crack'd face of this foil daub her lips &c. This furely is a strange kind of phrafeology. If there be no corruption in the text, I believe Shakspeare meant, however licentioufly, to fay, No more fhall this foil have the lips of ber #birfty entrance, or mouth, daubed with the blood of her own children. Mr. Steevens's conjecture formerly appeared to me fo likely to be true, that I had no doubt about the propriety of admitting it into the text. It should be observed, that, supposing these copies to have been made out by the ear, (which there is great reafon to believe was the cafe,) the tranfcriber might eafily have been deceived; for entrance and entrants have nearly the fame found, and he would naturally write a familiar inftead of an unusual word. A fimilar mistake has happened in the first scene of King Henry V. where we have (in the first folio) "With fuch a heady currance fcowring faults-" instead of " With fuch a heady current &c." Again, in Macbeth, p. 135, edit. 1623: "Commends the ingredience of our poison'd chalice Again, in The Winter's Tale, p. 290, edit. 1623:-"three pound of fugar, five pound of currence," &c. I do not know that the word entrant is found elsewhere; but Shak peare has many of a fimilar formation. So, in K. Henry VI. P. 1 : "Here enter'd Pucelle, and her praɛtifants." Again, ibid: But when my angry guardant stood alone-". Again, in K. Lear: "Than twenty filly ducking óbfervants—,” Again, in All's Well that ends Well: The bravest queftant shrinks." Sit No more fhall trenching war channel her fields, Shall now, in mutual, well befeeming ranks, Whole Sir Philip Sidney, in his Defence of Poefie, ufes comedient for a writer of medies. See alfo Shelton's tranflation of DON QUIXOTE, Vol. I. p. 296, edit. 1612: "The audients of her fad ftorie felt, &c." Mr. Mafon's objection however to this reading has, I confefs, fomewhat diminished my confidence in it: "It cannot, (he obferves) be right, because the king does not allude to ravages committed by any foreign invaders, but to the blood fhed by the English themfelves."It is, however, poffible,that in enumerating the bleflings of peace, he might mention a cellation of foreign hoftility as well as of domeftick broils, though the latter was the primary object of confideration. Her lips, in my apprehenfion, refers to foil in the preceding line, and not to peace, as has been fuggefted. Shakspeare feldom attends to the integrity of his metaphors. In the fecond of these lines he confiders the foil or earth of England as a perfon; (So in K. Richard II. Tells them, he does beftride a bleeding land, Gafping for life under great Bolingbroke.) and yet in the first line the foil must be understood in its ordinary material fenfe, as alfo in a fubfequent line in which its fields are faid to be channeled with war. Of this kind of incongruity our author's plays furnish innumerable inftances. Daub, the reading of the earliest copy, is confirmed by a paffage in K. Richard II. where we again meet with the image prefented here: "For that our kingdom's earth fhall not be foil'd "With that dear blood which it hath foftered." The fame kind of imagery is found in K. Henry VI. P. III: "Thy brother's blood the thirfty earth hath drunk." MALONE. As far as to the fepulcher &c. The lawfulness and juftice of the holy wars have been much difputed; but perhaps there is a principle on which the queftion may be eafily determined. If it be part of the religion of the Mahometans to extirpate by the fword all other religions, tis, by the laws of felf-defence, lawful for men of every other religion, and |