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CHOR. Thus with imagin'd wing our swift scene flies, In motion of no lefs celerity

Than that of thought. Suppofe, that you have seen The well-appointed king at Hampton pier Embark his royalty; and his brave fleet

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With filken ftreamers the young Phoebus fanning."
Play with your fancies; and in them behold,
Upon the hempen tackle, fhipboys climbing:
Hear the fhrill whiftle, which doth order give
To founds confus'd; behold the threaden fails,

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well-appointed—] i. e. well furnished with all the neceffaries of war. So, in King Henry VI. Part III:

"And very well appointed, as I thought,
"March'd towards faint Alban's-

6 at Hampton pier

-." STEEVENS.

Embark his royalty ;] All the editions downwards, implicitly, after the firft folio, read-Dover pier. But could the poet poffibly be fo difcordant from himself (and the Chronicles, which he copied,) to make the king here embark at Dover; when he has before told us fo precifely, and that fo often over, that he embarked at Southampton? I dare acquit the poet from fo flagrant a variation. The indolence of a tranfcriber, or a compofitor at prefs, must give rife to fuch an error. They, feeing pier at the end of the verfe, unluckily thought of Dover pier, as the best known to them; and fo unawares corrupted the text. THEOBALD.

Among the records of the town of Southampton, they have a minute and authentick account (drawn up at that time, of the encampment of Henry the Fifth near the town, before this embarkment for France. It is remarkable, that the place where the army was encamped, then a low level plain or a down, is now entirely covered with fea, and called Weltport. T. WARTON. Phebus fanning.] Old copy-fayning. Corrected by Mr. Rowe. MALONE.

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8 Hear the brill whistle, which doth order give

To founds confus'd:] So, in Pericles, Prince of Tyre, 1609: the boatswain whistles, and

"The mafter calls, and trebles the confufion." MALONE.

Borne with the invifible and creeping wind,
Draw the huge bottoms through the furrow'd fea,
Breafting the lofty furge: O, do but think,
You ftand upon the rivage,' and behold
A city on the inconftant billows dancing;
For fo appears this fleet majestical,

Holding due courfe to Harfleur. Follow, follow!
Grapple your minds to fternage of this navy;"
And leave your England, as dead midnight, still,
Guarded with grandfires, babies, and old women,
Either past, or not arriv'd to, pith and puiffance:
For who is he, whose chin is but enrich'd
With one appearing hair, that will not follow
Thefe cull'd and choice-drawn cavaliers to France?
Work, work, your thoughts, and therein fee a
fiege:

Behold the ordnance on their carriages,

With fatal mouths gaping on girded Harfleur. Suppose, the ambaffador from the French comes back;

Tells Harry-that the king doth offer him Katharine his daughter; and with her, to dowry, Some petty and unprofitable dukedoms.

The offer likes not: and the nimble gunner

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:

rivage,] The bank or fhore. JOHNSON.

Rivage French. So, in Spenfer's Fairy Queen, B. IV. c, i : "Pactolus with his waters fhere

"Throws forth upon the rivage round about him nere." Again, in Gower De Confeffione Amantis, Lib. VIII. fol. 186: Upon the ftronde at rivage." STEEVENS.

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to fternage of this navy;] The ftern being the hinder part of the fhip, the meaning is, let your minds follow close after the navy. STEEVENS.

I fufpect the author wrote, fteerage. So, in his Pericles:

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Think his pilot, thought;

"So with his fteerage fhall your thoughts grow on,
"To fetch his daughter home." MALONE.

With linftock" now the devilish cannon touches, [Alarum; and chambers go off.

And down goes all before them.

all before them. Still be kind,

And eke out our performance with your mind.

[Exit.

SCENE I.

The fame. Before Harfleur.

Alarums. Enter King HENRY, EXETER, BEDFORD, GLOSTER, and Soldiers, with fcaling ladders.

K. HEN. Once more unto the breach, dear friends,

once more;

Or close the wall up with our English dead!

linftack,] The ftaff to which the match is fixed when ordnance is fired. JOHNSON.

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So, in Middleton's comedy of Blurt Mafter Constable, 1602: O Cupid, grant that my blushing prove not a linflocke, and give fire too fuddenly," &c.

Again, in The Jew of Malta, by Marlowe, 1633:

"Till fhall hear a culverin difcharg'd

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you

By him that bears the linftock kindled thus."

I learn from Smith's Sea Grammar, 1627, that the "Lint-stock is a handfome carved ftick, more than halfe yard long, with a cocke at the one end, to hold faft his match," &c. STEEVENS.

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chambers-] Small pieces of ordnance, See p. 79, n. 5. STEEVENS.

3 And cke-] This word is in the first folio written-eech; as it was, fometimes at leaft, pronounced.-So, in Pericles, 1609: "And time that is fo briefly spent,

"With your fine fancies quaintly each;

"What's dumb in show I'll plain with speech." MALONE. 4 Or clofe the wall &c.] Here is apparently a chafm. One line at least is loft, which contained the other part of a disjunctive propofition. The king's fpeech is, dear friends, either win the town, r clofe up the wall with dead. The old quarto gives no help.

JOHNSON. I do not perceive the chafm which Dr. Johnfon complains of. What the king means to fay, is,-Re-enter the breach you have made, or

In peace, there's nothing fo becomes a man,
As modeft ftillness, and humility:

But when the blaft of war blows in our ears,
Then imitate the action of the tiger; +
Stiffen the finews, fummon up the blood,'
Difguife fair nature with hard-favour'd rage:
Then lend the eye a terrible afpéct ;

Let it pry through the portage of the head,"
Like the brafs cannon; let the brow o'erwhelm it,
As fearfully, as doth a galled rock

O'erhang and jutty' his confounded base,*

fill it up with your own dead bodies; i. e. Purfue your advantage, or give it up with your lives.-Mount the breach in the wall, or repair it by leaving your own carcafes in lieu of the ftones you have difplaced in fhort-Do one thing or the other. So, in Churchyard's Siege of Edenbrough Caftle:

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we will poffeffe the place,

"Or leaue our bones and bowels in the breatch." This fpeech of king Henry was added after the quartos 1600

and 1608. STEEVENS.

4 - when the blast of war blows in our ears,

Then imitate the action of the tiger;] Sir Thomas Hanmer has obferved on the following paffage in Troilus and Crefssida, that in forms and high vinds the tyger roars and rages moft furiously:

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even fo

"Doth valour's fhow and valour's worth divide

"In ftorms of fortune: for, in her ray and brightness,
"The herd hath more annoyance by the brize

"Than by the tiger: but when splitting winds
"Make flexible the knees of knotted oaks,

"And flies flee under fhade; why then the thing of cou

rage,

"As rouz'd with rage, with rage doth fympathize," &c. STEEVENS.

fummon up the blood,] Old copy-commune, &c. Corrected by Mr. Rowe. MALONE.

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portage of the head,] Portage, open space, from port, a gate. Let the eye appear in the head as cannon through the battlements, or embrafures, of a fortification. JOHNSON.

So we now fay-the port-holes of a fhip. M. MASON. 7-jutty-] The force of the verb to jutty, when applied

Swill'd with the wild and wafteful ocean."
Now fet the teeth, and stretch the noftril wide;
Hold hard the breath, and bend up every fpirit"
To his full height!-On, on, you nobleft English,'

to a rock projecting into the fea, is not felt by those who are unaware that this word antiently fignified a mole raised to withstand the encroachment of the tide. In an act, 1 Edw. VI. c. 14, provifion is made for "the maintenaunce of piers, jutties, walles, and bankes against the rages of the fea." HOLT WHITE.

Jutty-heads, in fea-language, are platforms ftanding on piles, near the docks, and projecting without the wharfs, for the more convenient docking and undocking fhips. See Chambers's Dict.

STEEVENS.

8 his confounded bafe,] His worn or wafted base.

So, in The Tempeft:

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JOHNSON.

-the shore, that o'er his wave-worn basis bow'd, "As ftooping to relieve him." STEEVENS.

One of the fenfes of to confound, in our author's time, was, to deftroy. See Minfheu's DICT. in v.

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let the brow o'erwhelm it,

As fearfully, as doth a galled rock

MALONE.

O'erhang and jutty his confounded base,

Swill'd with the wild and wasteful ocean.] So, in Daniel's Civil Warres, 1595:

"A place there is, where proudly rais'd there ftands
"A huge afpiring rock, neighbouring the skies,

"Whofe furly brow imperiously commands

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"The fea his bounds, that at his proud foot lies;

"And fpurns the waves, that in rebellious bands

"Affault his empire, and againft him rife." MALONE.

bend up every Spirit-] A metaphor from the bow. JOHNSON.

So again, in Hamlet: "they fool me to the top of my bent." Again, in Macbeth:

"I am fettled, and bend up

"Each corporal agent to this terrible feat." MALONE.

3 -you

nobleft English,] Thus the fecond folio. The first has-oblih. Mr. Malone reads-noble; and obferves that this fpeech is not in the

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quartos.

STEEVENS.

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