EPILOGUE. SPOKEN BY A DANCER. First, my fear; then, my court'sy: last, my speech. My fear is, your displeasure; my court'sy, my duty; and my speech, to beg your pardons. If you look for a good speech now, you undo me: for what I have to say, is of mine own making ; and what, indeed, I should say, will, I doubt, prove mine own marring. But to the purpose, and so to the venture.—Be it known to you, (as it is very well,) I was lately here in the end of a displeasing play, to pray your patience for it, and to promise you a better. I did mean, indeed, to pay you with this; which, if, like an ill venture, it come unluckily home, I break, and you, my gentle creditors, lose. Here, I promised you, I would be, and here I commit my body to your mercies: bate me some, and I will pay you some, and, as most debtors do, promise you infinitely. If my tongue cannot entreat you to acquit me, will you command me to use my legs? and yet that were but light payment,—to dance out of your debt. But a good conscience will make any possible satisfaction, and so will I. All the gentlewomen here have forgiven me ;* if the gentlemen will not, then the gentlemen do not agree with the gentlewomen, which was never seen before in such an assembly. One word more, I beseech you. If you be not too much cloyed with fat meat, our humble author will continue the story with Sir John in it, and make you merry with fair Katharine of France: where for any thing I know, Falstaff shall die of a sweat, unless already he be killed with your hard opinions: for Oldcastle died a martyr, and this is not the man.' iThis epilogue was merely occasional, and alludes to some theatrical transaction-JOHNSON. All the gentlewomen, &c.] The trick of influencing one part of the audience by the favour of the other, has been played already in the epilogue to As you like it.-JOHNSON. for Oldcastle died a martyr, and this is not the man.] The ridiculous representations of Sir John Oldcastle, lord Cobham, on the stage were undoubtedly produced by papists, and probably often exhibited in inferior theatres to crowded audiences, between the years 1580 and 1590. Shakspeare had given this name originally to Falstaff, but as the cause of the reformation became more generally popular, he found it necessary to change the appellation of his character. Mr. Malone has written several pages to disprove this traditional anecdote; but his arguments are not likely to produce much conviction. My tongue is weary; when my legs are too, I will bid you good night: and so kneel down before you ;—but, indeed, to pray for the queen.TM m to pray for the queen.] It was the custom of the old players at the end of the performance, to pray for their patrons. Almost all the ancient interludes I have met with conclude with some solemn prayer for the king or queen, house of commons, &c. Hence, perhaps, the Vivant Rex et Regina, at the bottom of our modern play-bills.-STEEVENS. KING HENRY V. THIS play was entered on the Stationers' books, August 14, 1600, and printed in the same year. It was written after the Second Part of King Henry IV. being promised in the epilogue to that play; and while the earl of Essex was in Ireland, as we learn from the chorus to the fifth act. Lord Essex went to Ireland April 15, 1599, and returned to London on the 28th of September in the same year. So that this play must have been produced between April and September, 1599. The transactions comprised in this Historical Play commence about the latter end of the first, and terminate in the eighth, year of this king's reign: when he married Katharine princess of France, and closed up the differences betwixt England and that crown.-MALONE and THEOBALD. PERSONS REPRESENTED. King HENRY the Fifth. Duke of GLOSTER, brothers to the king. Duke of EXETER, uncle to the king. Duke of YORK, cousin to the king. Earls of SALISBURY, WESTMORELAND, and WARWICK. Archbishop of CANTERBURY. Bishop of ELY. Earl of CAMBRIDGE, Lord SCROOP, Sir THOMAS GREY, conspirators against the king. Sir THOMAS ERPINGHAM, GOWER, FLUELLEN, MACMORRIS, JAMY, officers in King Henry's army. BATES, COURT, WILLIAMS, soldiers in the same. NYM, BARDOLPH, PISTOL, formerly servants to Falstaff, now soldiers in the same. Boy, servant to them. A Herald. Chorus. CHARLES the Sixth, king of France. LEWIS, the Dauphin. Dukes of BURGUNDY, ORLEANS, and BOURBON. The Constable of France. RAMBURES, and GRANDPREE, French lords. Governor of Harfleur. MONTJOY, a French herald. Ambassadors to the king of England. ISABEL, queen of France. KATHARINE, daughter of Charles and Isabel. ALICE, a lady attending on the Princess Katharine. QUICKLY, Pistol's Wife, an Hostess. Lords, Ladies, Officers, French and English Soldiers, Messengers, and Attendants. The SCENE, at the beginning of the Play, lies in England, but afterwards wholly in France. CHORUS. Enter CHORUS. O, for a muse of fire, that would ascend The brightest heaven of invention! b A kingdom for a stage, princes to act, And make imaginary puissance :d a this wooden O,] Alluding to the sign of Shakspeare's theatre, which was that of the Globe. It was also probably circular within. The outside appears from Mr. Henley's drawing to have been octagonal. b the very casques,] This does not mean the identical casques, or helmets, but the casques only, the casques alone.-M. MASON. c imaginary forces,-] Imaginary for imaginative, or your powers of fancy. Active and passive words are by this author frequently confounded. JOHNSON. d This chorus shows that Shakspeare was fully sensible of the absurdity of showing battles on the theatre, which, indeed, is never done, but tragedy becomes farce. Nothing can be represented to the eye, but by something like it, and |