Line 275.

ACT V. SCENE II.

draw the curtain close;] i. e. the curtain of the

balcony, or upper stage, where the king now is.

MALONE.

Of our flesh, few are angels: &c.] If this passage means any thing, it may mean, few are perfect, while they remain in their mortal capacity.

Line 323.

or guile.

⚫ Line 360.

STEEVENS.

a single heart,] i. e. a heart void of duplicity

MALONE. -your painted gloss &c.] Those that understand you, under this painted gloss, this fair outside, discover your empty talk and your false reasoning.

JOHNSON.

Line 444. Than but once think his place becomes thee not.] Who dares to suppose that the place or situation in which he is, is not suitable to thee also? who supposes that thou art not as fit for the office of a privy counsellor as he is? MALONE.

Line 481. —you'd spare your spoons;] It appears by this and another passage in the next scene, that the gossips gave spoons.

JOHNSON.

It was the custom, long before the time of Shakspeare, for the sponsors at christenings to offer gilt spoons as a present to the child. These spoons were called apostle spoons, because the figures of the apostles were carved on the tops of the handles. Such as were at once opulent and generous, gave the whole twelve; those who were either more moderately rich or liberal, escaped at the expence of the four evangelists; or even sometimes contented themselves with presenting one spoon only, which exhibited the figure of any saint, in honour of whom the child received its name. STEEVENS.

Line 502.

503.

ACT V. SCENE III

-Paris-Garden?] The bear-garden of that time.

-gaping.] i. e. bawling, shouting.

JOHNSON.

·524.sir Guy, nor Colbrand,] Of Guy of Warwick every one has heard. Colbrand was the Danish giant, whom Guy subdued at Winchester. Their combat is very elaborately described by Drayton in his Polyolbion.

JOHNSON.

Line 535.

Moorfields to muster in?] The train-bands of

the city were exercised in Moorfields.

JOHNSON.

Line 543. he should be a brazier by his face,] A brazier signifies a man that manufactures brass, and a mass of metal occasionally heated to convey warmth. Both these senses are here understood. JOHNSON.

Line 547.

-That fire-drake-] A fire-drake is a fiery

serpent; a fire-work, an ignis fatuus.

Line 551. till her pink'd porringer fell off her head,] Her pink'd porringer is her pink'd cap, which looked as if it had been moulded on a porringer.

MALONE.

Line 553. —the meteor-] The fire-drake, the brazier.

560.

JOHNSON. -loose shot,] i. e. loose or random shooters.

MALONE.

566. -the Tribulation of Tower-hill, or the limbs of Limehouse,] I suspect the Tribulation to have been a puritanical meeting-house. The limbs of Limehouse, I do not understand.

Line 570.

whipping. Line 589.

JOHNSON.

-running banquet of two beadles,] A publick

JOHNSON.

here ye lie baiting of bumbards,] A bumbard is an ale-barrel; to bait bumbards is to tipple, to lie at the spigot.

Line 598.

pitch.

JOHNSON. -I'll pick you o'er the pales else.] To pick is to

MALONE.

ACT

ACT V. SCENE IV.

Line 647. [Now shall this peace sleep with her: &c.] These lines, to the interruption by the king, seem to have been inserted at some revisal of the play, after the accession of king James. If the passage, included in crotchets, be left out, the speech of Cranmer proceeds in a regular tenour of prediction and continuity of sentiments; but by the interposition of the new lines, he first celebrates Elizabeth's successor, and then wishes he did not know that she was to die; first rejoices at the consequence, and then laments the cause. Our author was at once politick and idle; he resolved to flatter James, but neglected to reduce the whole speech to pro

priety, or perhaps intended that the lines inserted should be spoken in the action, and omitted in the publication, if any pub lication ever was in his thoughts. Mr. Theobald has made the same observation. JOHNSON.

Line 660. His honour and the greatness of his name

Shall be, and make new nations:] On a picture of this contemptible king, which formerly belonged to the great Bacon, and is now in the possession of lord Grimston, he is styled imperii Atlantici conditor. The year before the revival of this play (1612) there was a lottery for the plantation of Virginia. These lines probably allude to the settlement of that colony. MALONE.

EPILOGUE.

Line 11. such a one we show'd them;] In the character of Katharine. JOHNSON. Line 12. If they smile, &c.] This thought is too much hacknied. It has been used already in the Epilogues to As you like it and The Second Part of King Henry IV. STEEVENS.

. Though it is very difficult to decide whether short pieces be genuine or spurious, yet I cannot restrain myself from expressing my suspicion that neither the Prologue nor Epilogue to this play is the work of Shakspeare; non vultus, non color. It appears to me very likely that they were supplied by the friendship or officiousness of Jonson, whose manner they will be perhaps found exactly to resemble. There is yet another supposition possible: the Prologue and Epilogue may have been written after Shakspeare's departure from the stage, upon some accidental revival of the play, and there will then be reason for imagining that the writer, whoever he was, intended no great kindness to him, this play being recommended by a subtle and covert censure of his other works. There is, in Shakspeare, so much of fool and fight;

-the fellow,

"In a long motley coat, guarded with yellow," appears so often in his drama, that I think it not very likely that he would have animadverted so severely on himself. All this, however, must be received as very dubious, since we know not the exact date of this or the other plays, and cannot tell how our author might have changed his practice or opinions, JOHNS.

Dr. Johnson's conjecture, thus cautiously stated, has been since strongly confirmed by Mr. Tyrwhitt; who states that this play was revived in 1613, at which time, without doubt, the Prologue and Epilogue were added by Ben Jonson, or some other person. On the subject of every one of our author's historical pieces, except this, I believe a play had been written, before he commenced a dramatick poet. MALONE.

I entirely agree in opinion with Dr. Johnson, that Ben Jonson wrote the Prologue and Epilogue to this play. Shakspeare had, a little before, assisted him in his Sejanus; and Ben was too proud to receive assistance without returning it. It is probable, that he drew up the directions for the parade at the christening, &c. which his employment at court would teach him, and Shakspeare must be ignorant of. I think, I now and then perceive his hand in the dialogue.

It appears from Stowe, that Robert Greene wrote somewhat on this subject. FARMER.

END OF THE ANNOTATIONS ON KING HENRY VIII.

VOL. X.

КК