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Dead march. Corpfe of King Henry the Fifth dif covered, lying in ftate; attended on by the Dukes of BEDFORD, GLOSTER, and EXETER; the earl of WARWICK; the Bishop of Winchester, Heralds, &c.

3

BED. Hung be the heavens with black, yield
day to night!

Comets, importing change of times and ftates,
Brandish your crystal treffes in the fky;

earl of Warwick; ] The Earl of Warwick who makes his appearance in the firft fcene of this play is Richard Beauchamp, who is a character in King Henry V. The Earl who appears in the fubfequent part of it, is Richard Nevil, fon to the Earl of Salisbury, who became poffeffed of the title in right of his wife, Anne, fifter of Henry Beauchamp Duke of Warwick, on the death of Anne his only child in 1449. Richard, the father of this Henry, was appointed governor to the king, on the demife of Tomas Beaufort, Duke of Exeter, and died in 1439. There is no reason to think that the author meant to confound the two chara&ers. RITSON.

3 Hung be the heavens with black,] Alluding to our ancient ftage-practice when a tragedy was to be expected. So, in Sidney's Arcadia, Book II: " There arofe, even with the funne, a vaile of darke cloudes before his face, which shortly had blacked over all the face of heaven, preparing (as it were) a mournfull ftage for a tragedie to be played on.' See alfo Mr. Malone's Hiftorical Account of the English Stage. STEEVENS.

Brandish your cryftal treffes] Crystal is an epithet repeatedly beftowed on comets by our ancient writers. So, in a Sonnet by Lord Sterline, 1604:

"When as thofe chryflal comets whiles appear."

And with them fcourge the bad revolting flars,
That have confented unto Henry's death!

Spenfer, in his Faery Queen, Book I. c. x. applies it to a lady's face: Like funny beams threw from her chryftal face."

Again, in an ancient fong entitled The falling out of Lovers is the renewing of Love:"

"You chryftal planets shine all clear

"And light a lover's way.'

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"There is alfo a white comet with filver haires," fays Pliny, as tranflated by P. Holland, 1601. STEEVENS.

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5 That have confented-] If this expreffion means no more than that the ftars gave a bare confent, or agreed to let King Henry die, it does no great honour to its author. I believe to confent; in this inftance, means to a& in concert. Concentus, Lat. Thus Erate the mufe applauding the fong of Apollo. in Lyly's Midas, 1592, cries out: "Ofweet confent!" i. e. fweet union of founds. Again, in Spenfer's Faery Queen, B. IV. c. ii:

"Such mufick his wife words with time confented."

Again, in his translation of Virgil's Culex:

"Chanted their fundry notes with fweet concent."

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and in many other places. Confented, or as it should be fpelt, concented, means, have thrown themselves into a malignant configura tion, to promote the death of Henry. Spenfer, in more than one inftance, fpells this word as it appears in the text of Shakspeare ; as does Ben Jonson, in his Epithalamion on Mr. Wefton. The following lines.

fhall we curse the planets of mishap, "That plotted thus," &c.

feem to countenance my explanation; and Falftaff fays of Shallow's fervants, that " they flock together in confent, like fo many wild geefe." See alfo Tully de Natura Deorum, Lib. II. ch. xlvi: Nolo in ftellarum ratione multus vobis videri, maximéque earum quæ errare dicuntur. Quarum tantus eft concentus ex diffimilibus motibus, &c.

Milton uses the word, and with the fame meaning, in his Penferofo:

Whofe power hath a true confent

"With planet, or with element." STEEVens.

Steevens is right in his explanation of the word confented. So, in The Knight of The Burning Pefle, the Merchant fays to Merrythought:

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too late, I well perceive,

"Thou art confenting to my daughter's lofs."

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Henry the fifth, too famous to live long!'
England ne'er loft a king of fo much worth.

GLO. England ne'er had a king, until his time. Virtue he had, deferving to command:

His brandifh'd fword did blind men with his beams;
His arms spread wider than a dragon's wings;*
His fparkling eyes replete with wrathful fire,
More dazzled and drove back his enemies,
Than mid-day fun, fierce bent against their faces.
What should I fay? his deeds exceed all fpeech:
He ne'er lift up his hand, but conquered.

.EXE. We mourn in black; Why mourn we not in blood?

and in The Chances, Antonio, fpeaking of the wench who robbed him, fays:

And alfo the fiddler who was confenting with her." meaning the fiddler that was her accomplice.

The word appears to be ufed in the fame fenfe in the fifth fcene of this ac, where Talbot fays to his troops:

"You all confented unto Salisbury's death,

For none would ftrike a ftroke in his revenge."

M. MASON.

Confent, in all the books of the age of Elizabeth, and long afterwards, is the ufual spelling of the word concent. See Vol. XI. p. 85, n. 3; and Vol. XIII. p. 211, n. 2. In other places I have adopted the modern and more proper spelling; but, in the present inftance, I apprehend, the word was used in its ordinary sense. In the second act, Talbot, reproaching the foldiery, ufes the fame expreffion, certainly without any idea of a malignant configura

tion:

"You all confented unto Salisbury's death." MALONE.

6 Henry the fifth, Old copy, redundantly,-King Henry &c. STEEVENS.

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too famous to live long!] So, in King Richard 111: "So wife so young, they fay, do ne'er live long."

STEEVENS.

• His arms fpread wider than a dragon's wings; ] So, in Trailus and Creffida:

"The dragon wing of night o'erfpeads the earth."

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Henry is dead, and never fhall revive:
Upon a wooden coffin we attend;
And death's difhonourable victory
We with our flately prefence glorify,
Like captives bound to a triumphant car.
What? fhall we curfe the planets of mishap,
That plotted thus our glory's overthrow?
Or fhall we think the fubtle-witted French 6
Conjurers and forcerers, that, afraid of him,
By magick verfes have contriv'd his end?

WIN. He was a king blefs'd of the King of kings.
Unto the French the dreadful judgement day
So dreadful will not be, as was his fight.
The battles of the Lord of hofts he fought:
The church's prayers made him fo profperous.
GLO. The church! where is it? Had not church-
men pray'd,

His thread of life had not fo foon decay'd:
None do you like but an effeminate prince.
Whom, like a fchoolboy, you may over-awe.

WIN. Glofter, whate'er we like, thou art protector; And lookeft to command the prince, and realm. Thy wife is proud; fhe holdeth thee in awe, More than God, or religious churchmen, may..

GLO. Name not religion, for thou lov'ft the flesh; And ne'er throughout the year to church thou go'ft, Except it be to pray against thy foes.

the fubtle-willed French &c.] There was a notion prevalent a long time, that life might be taken away by metrical charms. As fuperftition grew weaker, these charms were imagined only to have power on irrational animals. In our author's time it was fuppofed that the Irish could kill rats by a fong.

JOHNSON.

So, in Reginald Scot's Difcoverie of Witchcraft, 1584: 1. The Irishmen addict themselves, &c. yea they will not flicke to affirme that they can rims either man or beaft to death." STEEVENS.

BED. Cease, cease these jars, and reft

in peace!

your

Let's to the altar:-Heralds, wait on us:-
Inftead of gold, we'll offer up our arms;

minds

Since arms avail not, now that Henry's dead.-
Pofterity, await for wretched years.

When at their mothers' moift eyes' babes fhall fuck;
Our ifle be made a nourifh of falt tears,

And none but women left to wail the dead.—
Henry the fifth! thy ghoft I invocate;

71

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moift eyes Thus the fecond folio. dundantly,-moiften'd. STEEVENS.

The firft, re

Our ifle be made a nourish of falt tears,] Mr. Pope-marish. All the old copies read, a nourish and confidering it is faid in the line immediately preceding, that babes fhall fuck at their mothers moift eyes, it seems very probable that our author wrote, a nourice, i. e. that the whole ifle fhould be one common nurse, or nourisher, of tears and these be the nourishment of its miferable iffue.

THEOBALD.

Was there ever fuch nonfenfe! But he did not know that marish is an old word for marth or fen; and therefore very judiciously thus corrected by Mr. Pope. WARBURTON.

We should certainly read-marish. So, in The Spanish Tragedy: "Made mountains marsh, with fpring-tides of my tears.'

RITSON.

I have been informed, that what we call at prefent a few, in which fish are preferved alive, was anciently called a nourish. Nourice, however, Fr. a nurse, was anciently spelt many different ways, among which nourish was one. So, in Syr Eglamour of Artois, bl. 1. no date:

"Of that chylde fhe was' blyth,

"After noryfhes fhe fent belive."

A nourish therefore in this paffage of our author may fignify a nurse, as it apparently does in the Tragedies of John Bochas, by Lydgate, B. I. c. xii:

"Athenes whan it was in his floures

"Was called nourish of philosophers wise.”

Juba tellus generat, leonum

Arida nutrix.

STEEVENS.

Spenfer, in his Ruins of Time, ules nourice as an English word: Chaucer, the nourice of antiquity." MALONE.

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