Enter KING JOHN, KING PHILIP, LEWIS, BLANCH, ELINOR, Bastard, AUSTRIA, and Attendants. K.Phi.'Tis true,fair daughter; and this blessed day, Ever in France shall be kept festival: To solemnize this day, the glorious sun Stays in his course, and plays the alchemist; Turning, with splendour of his precious eye, The meagre cloddy earth to glittering gold: The yearly course, that brings this day about, Shall never see it but a holyday. Const. A wicked day, and not a holyday! [Rising. What hath this day deserv'd? what hath it done; That it in golden letters should be set, Among the high tides, in the calendar? Nay, rather, turn this day out of the week7; This day of shame, oppression, perjury: Or, if it must stand still, let wives with child Pray, that their burdens may not fall this day, Lest that their hopes prodigiously be cross'd; But on this day, let seamen fear no wreck; 6 Solemn seasons, times to be observed above others. 7 In allusion to Job iii. 3- Let the day perish,' &c.; and v. 6, Let it not be joined to the days of the year, let it not come into the number of the months.' ster. i. e. be disappointed by the production of a prodigy, a monSo in a Midsummer Night's Dream: Nor mark prodigious, such as are 9 But for unless; its exceptive sense of be out. In the ancient almanacks the days supposed to be favourable or unfavourable to bargains are distinguished among a number of particulars of the like importance. This circumstance is alluded to in Webster's Duchess of Malfy, 1623 : By the almanack, I think To choose good days and shun the critical.' So in Macbeth: No bargains break, that are not this day made: K. Phi. By heaven, lady, you shall have no cause To curse the fair proceedings of this day: Have I not pawn'd to you my majesty? Const. You have beguil'd me with a counterfeit 1o, And our oppression hath made up this league:— Wear out the day in peace; but, ere sunset, Aust. Lady Constance, peace. Const. War! war! no peace! peace is to me a war. O Lymoges? O Austria11! thou dost shame That bloody spoil: Thou slave, thou wretch, thou coward; Thou little valiant, great in villany! 10 i. e. a false coin ; a representation of the king being usually impressed on his coin. A counterfeit formerly signified also a portrait. The word seems to be here used equivocally. 11 Shakspeare, in the person of Austria, has conjoined the two well known enemies of Richard Coeur-de-lion. Leopold, duke of Austria, threw him into prison in a former expedition (in 1193); but the castle of Chaluz, before which he fell (in 1199) belonged to Vidomar, Viscount of Limoges. The archer who pierced his shoulder with an arrow (of which wound he died) was Bertrand de Gourdon. Austria in the old play is called Lymoges, the Austrich duke. Holinshed says, 'The same year Philip, bastard sonne to King Richard, to whom his father had given the castell and honour of Coniacke, killed the viscount of Lymoges in revenge of his father's death,' &c. Thou ever strong upon the stronger side! To teach thee safety! thou art perjur'd too, Thou wear a lion's hide! doff it for shame, Bast. And hang a calf's-skin on those recreant limbs. K. John. We like not this; thou dost forget thyself. 12 Sir John Hawkins thought that there was here a sarcastic intention of calling Austria a fool; he says that a calf-skin coat was anciently the dress of a fool. It is more probable, as Ritson observes, that she means to call him a coward; she tells him that a calf's-skin would suit his recreant limbs better than a lion's. A calf-hearted fellow is still used for a dastardly person. 13 Pope inserted the following lines from the old play here, which he thought necessary to explain the ground of the Bastard's quarrel with Austria:' 'Aust. Methinks that Richard's pride, and Richard's fall Should be a precedent to fright you all. Faulc. What words are these? How do my sinews shake! My father's foe clad in my father's spoil! How doth Alecto whisper in my ears, Delay not, Richard, kill the villain straight; Disrobe him of the matchless monument, Thy father's triumph o'er the savages !— Now by his soul I swear, my father's soul, Twice will I not review the morning's rise, Till I have forn that trophy from thy back, And split thy heart for wearing it so long.' Enter PANDULPH. K. Phi. Here comes the holy legate of the pope. Pand. Hail, you anointed deputies of heaven:To thee, King John, my holy errand is. I Pandulph, of fair Milan cardinal, And from Pope Innocent the legate here, Why thou against the church, our holy mother, This, in our 'foresaid holy father's name, K. John. What earthly name to interrogatories 14, To charge me to an answer, as the pope. Tell him this tale; and from the mouth of England, But as we under heaven are supreme head, K. Phi. Brother of England, you blaspheme in this. K. John. Though you, and all the kings of Christendom, 14 What earthly name subjoined to interrogatories, can force a king to speak and answer them? The old copy reads earthy. The emendation was Pope's. It has also tash instead of task in the next line, which was substituted by Theobald. Johnson observes that this must have been a very captivating scene at the time of our struggles with popery. VOL. IV. K K Are led so grossly by this meddling priest, Who, in that sale, sells pardon from himself: Against the pope, and count his friends my foes. Pand. Then, by the lawful power that I have, Thou shalt stand curs'd, and excommunicate: And blessed shall he be, that doth revolt From his allegiance to an heretick; And meritorious shall that hand be call'd, Canonized, and worship'd as a saint, That takes away by any secret course Thy hateful life. O, lawful let it be, Const. To my keen curses; for, without my wrong, There is no tongue hath power to curse him right. Pand. There's law and warrant, lady, for my curse. Const. And for mine too; when law can do no right, Let it be lawful, that law bar no wrong: And raise the power of France upon his head, Eli. Look'st thou pale, France? do not let go thy hand. |