who wrote in the time of Edward IV., says, "Here is to be noted that the King Henry V. was a noble prince after he was king and crowned; howbeit before in his youth he had been wild, reckless, and spared nothing of his lusts nor desires, but accomplished them after his liking." Fabyan is even more severe :"This man before the death of his father applied himself to all vice and insolency." The story of Henry insulting the Lord Chief Justice, and being by him committed to prison, was first told by Sir Thomas Elyot, in 1534, in his book entitled "The Governor:' and he sets out by saying, "The most renowned prince King Henry V., late King of England, during the life of his father was noted to be fierce and of wanton courage." His servant, according to this story, was arraigned for felony, and the prince, "incensed by light persons about him, in furious rage came hastily to the bar." According to Sir Thomas Elyot, the prince did not strike the judge; but, being "set all in a fury, all chafed, in a terrible manner came up to the place of judgment, men thinking that he would have slain the judge." Holinshed makes the blow to have been inflicted. Stow, whose Chronicle was published in 1580, gives us a much more natural version of the prince's robberies than that of the old play :-he makes them to have been wanton frolics, followed by restitution. Lastly, Hall collects and repeats all the charges against Henry of the earlier historians. In a word, there is not one solitary writer up to the time of Shakspere that entertained any doubt that "His addiction was to courses vain; His companies unletter'd, rude, and shallow; His hours fill'd up with riots, banquets, sports." This passage in 'Henry V.,' which is introduced by the archbishop to heighten his praises of the king by contrast with his former state, is the severest passage which Shakspere has against the early character of the prince. It is stronger than his father's reproof, in the third act of the First Part. But where is the "insolency" of Holinshed -the "all vices" of Hardyng-the "spared nothing of his lusts and desires" of Caxton? Let it be observed, too, how careful Shakspere has been to make the common tradition of Henry's almost miraculous conversion rest only upon the opinion of others. The archbishop indeed says,— 66 never Hydra-headed wilfulness which he appears, thus apostrophizes his But the prince, in the very first scene in companions, "I know you all, and will awhile uphold The unyoked humour of your idleness." Even in the 'Richard II.,' when Henry IV. speaks of his "unthrifty son," we are prepared, not for the coarse profligate of the old play, but for a high-couraged and reckless boy, offending in the very wantonness of his hot blood, which despises conventional forms and opinions: "As dissolute as desperate; yet, through both, I see some sparkles of a better hope." But it is not from the representations of others that we must form our opinion of the character of the Prince of Shakspere. He is, indeed, the "madcap prince of Wales," "that daff'd the world aside," but he is not the "sword and buckler prince of Wales," that Hotspur would have "poisoned with a pot of ale." He is a gentleman; a companion, indeed, of loose revellers, but one who infinitely prefers the excitement of their wit to their dissipation. How graceful too, and how utterly devoid of meanness and hypocrisy, is his apology to his father for his faults! How gallantly he passes from the revels at the Boar's Head to the preparations for the battle-field! How just are his praises of Hotspur! How modest his challenge!— "I have a truant been to chivalry." What a key to his real kindness of heart and good nature is his apostrophe to Falstaff: "Poor Jack, farewell! I could have better spared a better man!" How magnanimous is his pleading for the life of the Douglas! Never throughout the two plays is there a single expression of un 66 filial feeling towards his father. "My heart | Tyler has printed a letter of Prince Henry bleeds inwardly," says the Prince of Shakspere, to the council, written in 1401, and describing "that my father is so sick." The low profli- his proceedings in Wales against Owen Glengate of the old play says, "I stand upon thorns dower. It contains the following passages: till the crown be on my head." The king's "So we caused the whole place to be set description of his son in Shakspere is truly on fire, and many other houses around it, bein accordance with the poet's delineation of longing to his tenants. And then we went his character:straight to his other place "He hath a tear for pity, and a hand Open as day for melting charity; * * * * * there we burnt a fine lodge in his park, and the whole country around. * * * * * Yet notwithstanding, being incensed, he's flint; And certain of our people sallied forth, and took As humorous as winter." And yet, according to Mr. Tyler, Shakspere has done injustice to Henry of Monmouth. When in Richard II.' Bolingbroke speaks of his "unthrifty son," Mr. Tyler informs us that the boy was only twelve years and a half old. "At the very time," says Mr. Tyler, "when, according to the poet's representation, Henry IV. uttered this lamentation (Part I., Act I. Scene 1), expressive of deep present sorrow at the reckless misdoings of his son, and of anticipations of worse, that very son was doing his duty valiantly and mercifully in Wales." Again, according to Mr. Tyler, the noble scene between Henry and his father in the third act of the First Part was not the real truth-Henry was not then in London ;and from a letter of Henry to his council we find that the king had received "most satisfactory accounts of his very dear and wellbeloved son the prince, which gave him very great pleasure." Mr. Tyler remarks upon this letter, "It is as though history were designed on set purpose, and by especial commission, to counteract the bewitching fictions of the poet." For our own parts, we have a love of Henry as Shakspere evidently himself had; but we have derived that love more from "the bewitching fictions" of the poet, than from what we learn from history apart from the poet. With every respect for Mr. Tyler's excellent intentions, we are inclined to think that Shakspere has elevated the character of Henry, not only far above the calumnies of the old Chroniclers, which, we believe, were gross exaggerations, but has painted him much more amiable, and just, and merciful than we find him in the original documents which Mr. Tyler has rendered popular. Mr. * * * * * a gentleman of high degree he was put to death; and several of his companions, who were taken the same day, met with the same fate. We then proceeded to the commote of Edionyon, in Merionethshire, and there laid waste a fine and populous country." Our tastes may be wrong; but we would rather hold in our affections "the madcap prince of Wales" at the Boar's Head, "of all humours, that have showed themselves humours, since the old days of goodman Adam," than adulterate the poetical idea with the documentary history of a precocious boy, burning, wasting, and slaying; or, as Mr. Tyler says, "doing his duty valiantly.” There is sometimes a higher truth even than documentary truth. The burnings and slayings of Henry of Monmouth must be judged of according to the spirit of his age. Had the great dramatist represented these things, he would, indeed, have done injustice to Henry in his individual character. We believe that he most wisely vindicated his hero from the written and traditionary calumnies that had gathered round his name, not by showing him, as he did Prince John of Lancaster, a "sober-blooded boy," but by divesting his dissipation of the grossness which up to his time had surrounded it; and by exhibiting the misdirected energy of an acute and active mind, instead of the violent excesses and the fierce passions that had anciently been attributed to him. The praiseworthy attempt of Mr. Tyler to prove that there was no solid historical ground for Henry's early profligacy is founded upon a very ingenious treatise, full of antiquarian research, by Mr. Alexander Luders. That gentleman, as it appears to *An Essay on the Character of Henry V. when Prince of Wales.' 1813. us, has left the question pretty much where and 'Richard II.'). It is only an historical he found it. He has, however, taken a right | picture, the various circumstances of which view of what our poet did for the character have no relation amongst themselves. There of Henry: "Shakspere seemed to struggle is no personage who predominates over the against believing the current stories of mis- others, so as to fix the attention of the audiconduct as much as he could, that he might ence. It is the anarchy of the Scene. What, not let the prince down to their level." however, renders it worthy an attentive examination is its division into a tragic and a comic portion. The two species are here very distinct. The tragic portion is cold, disjointed, undecided; but the comic, although absolutely foreign to the shadow of the action which makes the subject of the piece, merits sometimes to be placed by the side of the better passages of the Regnards, and even of the Molières." This is pretty decided for a blockhead; and, indeed, the decision with which he speaks could only proceed from a blockhead par excellence. Had this Frenchman not been supremely dull and conceited, he would have had some glimmerings of the truth, though he might not have 66 "In the Shaksperean drama there is a vitality which grows and evolves itself from within-a key-note which guides and controls the harmonies throughout."* It is under the direction of a deep and absolute conviction of the truth of this principlenot only as applied to the masterpieces of Shakspere, the Lear,' the Macbeth,' the 'Othello,' but to all his works without exception-that we can alone presume to understand any single drama of this poet-much less to attempt to lead the judgment of others. Until by long and patient thought we believe that we have traced the roots, and seen the branches and buddings, of that “vitality”until by frequent listening to those harmonies" we hear, or fancy we hear, that "key-note"—we hold ourselves to be utterly unfitted even to call attention to a solitary poetical beauty, or to develope the peculiarities of a single character. Shakspere is not to be taken up like an ordinary writer of fiction, whose excellence may be tested by a brilliant dialogue here, or a striking situation there. The proper object of criticism upon Shakspere is to show the dependence of the parts upon the whole; for by that principle alone can we come to a due appreciation even of the separate parts. Dull critics, and brilliant critics, equally blunder about Shakspere, when they reject this safe guide to the comprehension of his works. We have a Frenchman before us-M. Paul Duport-who gives us an 'Analyse Raisonnée' of our poet, which is perfectly guiltless of any imaginative power to hide or adorn the dry bones of the Analysist. Mark the confidence with which this gentleman speaks of the two plays before us! Of the first part he says, "This piece has still less of action and interest than those which preceded it—(‘John,' *Coleridge's Literary Remains,' vol. i. p. 104. Essais Littéraires sur Shakspeare,' 2 tom. Paris, 1828. | seen the whole truth. Our own Johnson had too strong a sympathy with the marvellous talent which runs through the scenes of the Henry IV.' not to speak of these plays with more than common enthusiasm. The great | events, he says, are interesting; the slighter occurrences diverting; the characters diversified with the profoundest skill; Falstaff is the unimitated, unimitable. But now comes the qualification-the result of Johnson looking at the parts instead of the whole:-“I fancy every reader, when he ends this play, cries out with Desdemona, 'O most lame and impotent conclusion!' As this play was not, to our knowledge, divided into acts by the author, I could be content to conclude it with the death of Henry the Fourth." Let us endeavour, in going through the scenes of these plays, with the help of the great guiding principle that Shakspere "worked in the spirit of nature by evolving the germ from within, by the imaginative power according to an idea;"-let us endeavour to prove-not, indeed, that these plays do not want action and interest, and that the tragic parts are not cold, disjointed, and undecided —but that all the circumstances have relation amongst themselves, and that the comic Coleridge's Literary Remains,' vol. i. p. 104. "Can no man tell of my unthrifty son?"— to "the most lame and impotent conclusion" which Johnson would suppress, nothing can be spared-nothing can be altered;-that Dame Quickly and Justice Silence are as essential to the progress of the action as Hotspur and the King;-that the Prince could not advance without Falstaff, nor Falstaff without the Prince;-that the poetry and the wit are co-dependent and inseparable;—and, above all, that the minute shades of character generally, and especially the extraordinary fusion of many contrary qualities in the character of Falstaff, are to be completely explained and reconciled only by reference to their connexion with the dramatic action-"the key-note which guides and controls the harmonies throughout." Some seventy lines from the commencement of this play (we shall find it convenient to speak of the two parts as forming one drama), the "key-note" is struck. The King communicates to his friends "the smooth and welcome news" of the battle of Holmedon. His exultation is unbounded: "And is not this an honourable prize? A gallant prize? ha, cousin, is it not?" But when the King is told "It is a conquest for a prince to boast of," the one circumstance—the "One fatal remembrance, one sorrow that throws Who is sweet Fortune's minion, and her pride: That some night-tripping fairy had exchanged The King forces his "young Harry" from his thoughts, and talks of "young Percy's pride." But the real action of the drama has commenced, in this irrepressible disclosure of the King's habitual feelings. It is for the poet to carry on the exhibition of the "riot and dishonour,"-their course, their ebbings and flowings,-the circumstances which control, and modify, and subdue them. The events which determine the career of the Prince finally conquer the habits by which he was originally surrounded; and it is in the entire disclosure of these habits-as not incompatible with their growing modification and ultimate overthrow by those events which constitute what is called the tragic action of the drama-that every incident and every character becomes an integral part of the whole-a branch, or a leaf, or a bud, or a flower, of the one "vitality." We have seen in what spirit the Prince of the old play which preceded Shakspere was conceived. We have seen, also, the character of the associates by whom he was surrounded. We feel that the whole of such a representation must be untrue. The depraved and unfeeling blackguard of that play could never have become the hero of Agincourt. There was no unity of character between the Prince of the beginning and of the end of that Its deep shade alike o'er his joys and his play; and therefore there could have been woes," no unity of action. Perhaps no mind but Shakspere's could have reconciled the apparent contradiction which appears to lie upon the surface both of the events by which the Prince was moulded, and the characters by which he was surrounded. It was for him alone to exhibit a species of profligacy not only capable of being conquered by the higher energy which made the Prince chivalrously brave and daring, but absolutely akin to that higher energy. This was to be effected, not only by the peculiar qualities of the Prince's own mind, but by the still more peculiar qualities of his associates. As the Prince of Shakspere, while he "Daff'd the world aside, and let it pass," never ceased to feel, in the depths of his nobler nature, "thus we play the fools with the time; and the spirits of the wise sit in the clouds and mock us,"- —so he never could have been surrounded by the "Ned" and "Tom" of the old play, who must have extinguished all thoughts of "the wise," and have produced irredeemable "dishonour." Falstaff, the "unimitated, unimitable Falstaff," was the poetical creation that was absolutely necessary to the conduct of the great dramatic action,-the natural transformation of "the madcap Prince of Wales" into King Henry V. So, indeed, were all the satellites which revolve round Falstaff, sharing and reflecting his light. It is the perfect characterization of this drama which makes the incidents consistent: the characters cannot live apart from the incident; the incidents cannot move on without the characters. If we attempt to unravel the characters, and the complicated character of Falstaff especially, without reference to the incidents, we are speedily in a labyrinth. The vulgar notion of Falstaff, for example, is the stage notion. Mrs. Inchbald truly remarks, "To many spectators, all Falstaff's humour is comprised in his unwieldy person." But the same lady adopts an equally vulgar stage generalization, and calls him the "cowardly Falstaff." The "wit" of Falstaff, though slightly received into the stage conception of the character, is a very vague notion compared with the bulk and the cowardice of Falstaff. Mrs. Inchbald (we are quoting from her prefaces to the acted plays) says, "The reader who is too refined to laugh at the wit of Sir John must yet enjoy Hotspur's picture of a coxcomb." The refinement of the players is even more sensitive; for they altogether leave out in the representation the scene where Falstaff and the Prince alternately stand for the King and Harry-a scene to which nothing of comic that ever was written, except, perhaps, a passage or two in Cervantes, can at all approach. The players, however, are consistent. Their intolerance of poetry and of wit are equal. Not a line do they keep of the matchless first scene of the third act, than which Shakspere never wrote anything more spirited, more individualised, more harmonious. But we are digressing. Falstaff, then, we see, in the rude general conception of his character, is fat, cowardly, and somewhat witty. The players always double and quadruple the author's notion of his fat and his cowardice; and they kindly allow us a modicum of his wit. To be fat and to be cowardly, and even to have some wit, would go far to make an excellent butt for a wild young prince; but they would not make a Falstaff. These qualities would be, to such a prince as Shakspere has conceived, little better than Bardolph's nose, or the Drawer's "Anon, anon, sir." To understand Falstaff, however, we must take him scene by scene, and incident by incident; we must study his character in its development by the incidents. "Thou art so fatwitted, with drinking of old sack, and unbuttoning thee, after supper, and sleeping upon benches after noon." Here is the sensualist introduced to us. We have here a vista of "the halfpennyworth of bread to the intole rable deal of sack." But, if we look closely, we shall see that the Prince is exaggerating; and that Falstaff humours the exaggeration. It is Falstaff's cue to heighten all his own infirmities and frailties. "Men of all sorts," he says, “take a pride to gird at me." But he has himself a pride in the pride which they take:-"The brain of this foolish-compounded clay, man, is not able to invent anything that tends to laughter, more than I invent, or is invented on me: I am not only witty in myself, but the cause that wit is in other men.' How immediately Falstaff turns the prince from bantering to a position in which he has to deal with an antagonist. The thrusts of wit are exchanged like the bouts of a fencing-match. The sensualist, we see, has a prodigious activity of intellect; and he at once passes out of the slough of vulgar sensuality. But the man of wit is also a man of action. He is ready for "purse |