The emptier ever dancing in the air, You may my glories and my state depose, BOLING. Part of your cares you give me with your crown. K. RICH. Your cares set up, do not pluck my cares down. My care is loss of care, by old care done'; be; Therefore no, no, for I resign to thee. 9 The EMPTIER ever dancing-] This is a comparison not easily accommodated to the subject, nor very naturally introduced. The best part is this line, in which he makes the usurper the empty bucket. JOHNSON. My care is loss of care, by old care done;] Shakspeare often obscures his meaning by playing with sounds. Richard seems to say here, that "his cares are not made less by the increase of Bolingbroke's cares; for this reason, that "his care is the loss of care," his grief is, that his regal cares are at an end, by the cessation of the care to which he had been accustomed. JOHNSON. 2 my balm,] The oil of consecration. He has mentioned it before. JOHNSON. With mine own breath release all duty's rites * : All pomp and majesty I do forswear; My manors, rents, revenues, I forego; My acts, decrees, and statutes, I deny : God save king Henry, unking'd Richard says, NORTH. No more, but that you read [Offering a paper. These accusations, and these grievous crimes, Committed by your person, and your followers, Against the state and profit of this land; That, by confessing them, the souls of men May deem that you are worthily depos'd. K. RICH. Must I do so? and must I ravel out My weav'd up follies? Gentle Northumberland, If thy offences were upon record, Would it not shame thee in so fair a troop, And cracking the strong warrant of an oath,- * So quarto; folio, duteous oaths. So quarto; folio, are made. If thou would'st,] That is, if thou wouldst read over a list of thy own deeds. JOHNSON. 3 4 Nay, ALL of you, that stand and look upon,] So the quarto 1608, except that it omits the word all, which I have restored from the folio. The folio reads-look upon me. To "look upon " is frequently used by our author, for" to be a looker on." MALONE. Though some of you, with Pilate, wash your hands, NORTH. My lord, dispatch; read o'er these articles. 5 K. RICH. Mine eyes are full of tears, I cannot see : And yet salt water blinds them not so much, But they can see a sort of traitors here. Nay, if I turn mine eyes upon myself, I find myself a traitor with the rest: For I have given here my soul's consent, To undeck the pompous body of a king; Make glory base; and sovereignty, a slave; Proud majesty, a subject; state, a peasant. NORTH. My lord, K. RICH. No lord of thine, thou haught, insulting man, Nor no man's lord; I have no name, no title,- That I have worn so many winters out, Good king,-great king,-(and yet not greatly good,) So, in King Richard III. : 6 WARBURTON. "A sort of vagabonds, rascals, and runaways." STEEVENS. haught,] i. e. haughty. So, in King Richard III. : 7 No, not that name was given me at the font,] How that name which was given him at the font could be usurped, I do not understand. Perhaps Shakspeare meant to shew that imagination, dwelling long on its own misfortunes, represents them as greater than they really are. ANONYMOUS. An if my word be sterling yet in England, BOLING. Go some of you and fetch a lookingglass. [Exit an Attendant. NORTH. Read o'er this paper, while the glass doth come. K. RICH. Fiend! thou torment'st me ere I come to hell. BOLING. Urge it no more, my lord Northumber land. NORTH. The commons will not then be satisfied. K. RICH. They shall be satisfied: I'll read enough, When I do see the very book indeed Where all my sins are writ, and that's—myself. Re-enter Attendant with a Glass. Give me the glass, and therein will I read * And made no deeper wounds?-O, flattering glass, Thou dost beguile me! Was this face the face†, That every day under his household roof Did keep ten thousand men1? Was this the face, That, like the sun, did make beholders wink? * Quarto omits, and therein will I read. + Quarto, Was this the face. Quarto omits this line and the four preceding words. 8 of HIS majesty.] i. e. of its majesty. Our poet, and the writers of his time, frequently used the personal for the neutral pronoun. MALONE. the very BOOK indeed WHERE ALL MY sins are wRIT,] This phrase is from the 139th Psalm, v. 15: “ and in thy book were all my members written." STEEVENS. 'Did KEEP ten thousand men ?] Shakspeare is here not quite accurate. Our old chronicles only say "that to his household came every day, to meate, ten thousand men." MALONE. Was this the face, that fac'd so many follies, As brittle as the glory is the face; [Dashes the Glass against the ground. For there it is, crack'd in a hundred shivers.- The shadow of your face. K. RICH. Say that again. The shadow of my sorrow? Ha! let's see:very true, my grief lies all within ; 'Tis And these external manners of lament 2 Are merely shadows to the unseen grief, That swells with silence in the tortur'd soul; There lies the substance *: and I thank thee, king, 2 BOLING. Name it, fair cousin. K. RICH. Fair cousin! I am greater than a king3: * Quarto omits, There lies the substance. + Quarto omits, For thy great bounty. my grief lies all within; And these external manners of lament, &c.] So, in Hamlet: "But I have that within which passeth show; "These but the trappings and the suits of woe." The old copies read laments. MALONE. 3 Fair cousin? I am greater than a king :] So the folio. The quarto 1608, reads: "Fair coose, why? I am greater than a king.” The modern editors: "Fair cousin? Why, I am greater than a king." BOSWELL. |