on the stage; and have his bones new embalmed with the teares of ten thousand spectators at least, (at several times,) who in the tragedian that represents his person behold him fresh bleeding.”—Pierce Penniless, his Supplication to the Devil, 1592. That this passage related to the old play of King Henry VI., or, as it is now called, the First Part of King Henry VI., can hardly be doubted. Talbot appears in the First Part, and not in the Second or Third Part, and is expressly spoken of in the play, as well as in Hall's Chronicle, as "the terror of the French." Holinshed, who was Shakspeare's guide, omits the passage in Hall, in which Talbot is thus described; and this is an additional proof that this play was not the production of our great Poet. There are other internal proofs of this: 1. The author does not seem to have known precisely how old Henry VI. was at the time of his father's death. He supposed him to have passed the state of infancy before he lost his father, and even to have remembered some of his sayings. In the Fourth Act, Sc. 4, speaking of the famous Talbot, he says,— "When I was young, (as yet I am not old,) A stouter champion never handled sword." But Shakspeare knew that Henry VI. could not possibly remember any thing of his father: "No sooner was 1 crept out of my cradle, But I was made a king at nine months old." King Henry VI., Part II. Act iv. Sc. 9. "When I was crowned I was but nine months old." King Henry VI, Part III. Act i. Sc. 1. The first of these passages is among the additions made by Shakspeare to the old play, according to Mr. Malone's hypothesis. The other passage does occur in the True Tragedie of Richard Duke of York; and therefore it is natural to conclude that neither Shakspeare nor the author of that piece could have written the First Part of King Henry VI. 2. In Act ii. Sc. 5, of this play, it is said that the earl of Cambridge raised an army against his sovereign. But Shakspeare, in his play of King Henry V., has represented the matter truly as it was; the earl being, in that piece, Act ii., condemned at Southampton for conspiring to assassinate Henry. 3. The author of this play knew the true pronunciation of the word Hecate, as it is used by the Roman writers:— "I speak not to that railing Hecaté." But Shakspeare, in Macbeth, always uses Hecate as a dissyllable. The second speech in this play ascertains the author to have been very familiar with Hall's Chronicle: "What should I say? his deeds exceed all speech." This phrase is introduced upon almost every occasion by Hall when he means to be eloquent. Holinshed, not Hall, was Shakspeare's historian. Here, then, is an additional minute proof that this play was not Shakspeare's. This is the sum of Malone's argument, which Steevens has combated in notes appended to it. Malone conjectured that this piece, which we now call the First Part of King Henry VI., was, when first performed, called The Play of King Henry VI.; and he afterwards found his conjecture confirmed by an entry in the accounts of Henslowe, the proprietor of the Rose Theatre on the Bank Side. It must have been very popular, having been played no less than thirteen times in one season. The first entry of its performance by the lord Strange's company, at the Rose, is dated March 3, 1591. It is worthy of remark, that Shakspeare does not appear at any time to have had the smallest connection with that theatre, or the companies playing there; which affords additional argument in favor of Malone's position, that the play could not be his. "By whom it was written, (says Malone,) it is now, I fear, difficult to ascertain. It was not entered on the Stationers' books, nor printed till the year 1623; when it was registered with Shakspeare's undisputed plays by the editors of the first folio, and improperly entitled the Third Part of King Henry VI. In one sense it might be called so; for two plays on the subject of that reign had been printed before. But, considering the history of that king, and the period of time which the piece comprehends, it ought to have been called, what in fact it is, the First Part of King Henry VI. At this distance of time, it is impossible to ascertain on what principle it was that Heminge and Condell admitted it into their volume; but I suspect that they gave it a place as a necessary introduction to the two other parts; and because Shakspeare had made some slight alterations, and written a few lines in it.t Mr. Malone's arguments have made many converts to his opinion; and perhaps Mr. Morgann, in his elegant Essay on the Dramatic Character of Falstaff, led the way, when he pronounced it "that-drum-and-trumpet thing,-written, doubtless, or rather exhibited, long before Shakspeare was born, though afterwards repaired and furbished up by him with here and there a little sentiment and diction." This applies only to the title in the Register of the Stationers' Company: in the first folio, it was called the First Part of King Henry VI. Malone's Life of Shakspeare, p. 310, ed. 1821. First published in 1777. PERSONS REPRESENTED. KING HENRY THE SIXTH. Duke of Gloster, Uncle to the King, and Protector. Duke of Bedford, Uncle to the King, and Regent of France. THOMAS BEAUFORT, Duke of Exeter, great Uncle to the King. HENRY BEAUFORT, great Uncle to the King, Bishop of Winchester, and afterwards Cardinal. JOHN BEAUFORT, Earl of Somerset; afterwards Duke. Earl of Warwick. Earl of Salisbury. Earl of Suffolk. JOHN TALBOT, his Son. EDMUND MORTIMER, Earl of March. Mortimer's Keeper, and a Lawyer. SIR JOHN FASTOLFE. SIR WILLIAM LUCY. SIR WILLIAM GLANSDALE. SIR THOMAS Gargrave. Mayor of London. WOODVILLE, Lieutenant of the Tower. VERNON, of the White Rose, or York Faction. BASSET, of the Red Rose, or Lancaster Faction. CHARLES, Dauphin, and afterwards King of France. Governor of Paris. Bastard of Orleans. An old Shepherd, Father to Joan la Pucelle. MARGARET, Daughter to Reignier; afterwards married to King Henry. Countess of Auvergne. JOAN LA PUCELLE, commonly called Joan of Arc. Fiends appearing to La Pucelle, Lords, Warders of the Tower, Heralds, Officers, Soldiers, Messengers, and several Attendants both on the English and French. SCENE, partly in England, and partly in France. FIRST PART OF KING HENRY THE SIXTH. ACT I. Dead March. SCENE I. Westminster Abbey. Bedford. HUNG be the heavens with black, yield day to night! Comets, importing change of times and states, 3 Glo. England ne'er had a king, until his time. Virtue he had, deserving to command; His brandished sword did blind men with his beams; His arms spread wider than a dragon's wings; 1 Richard Beauchamp, earl of Warwick, who is a character in King Henry V. The earl of Warwick, who appears in a subsequent part of this drama, is Richard Nevill, son to the earl of Salisbury, who came to the title in right of his wife, Anne, sister of Henry Beauchamp, duke of Warwick. Richard, the father of this Henry, was appointed governor to the king on the demise of Thomas Beaufort, duke of Exeter, and died in 1439. There is no reason to think the author meant to confound the two characters. 2 Crystal is an epithet repeatedly bestowed on comets by our ancieat writers. 3 Our ancestors had but one word to express consent, and concent, which meant accord and agreement, whether of persons or things. His sparkling eyes, replete with wrathful fire, Exe. We mourn in black; why mourn we not in Henry is dead, and never shall revive. 1 Win. He was a king blessed of the King of kings. Unto the French the dreadful judgment day So dreadful will not be, as was his sight. The battles of the Lord of Hosts he fought; The church's prayers made him so prosperous. Glo. The church! where is it? Had not churchmen prayed, His thread of life had not so soon decayed. Win. Gloster, whate'er we like, thou art protector; Bed. Cease, cease these jars, and rest your minds in peace! Let's to the altar;-heralds, wait on us : 1 There was a notion long prevalent that life might be taken away by metrical charms. |