And this is Geffrey's. In the name of God
How comes it, then, that thou art call'd a king,
When living blood doth in these temples beat,
Which owe the crown that thou o'ermasterest?
K. JOHN. From whom hast thou this great
commission, France,

To draw my answer from thy articles?

K, PHI. From that supernal Judge that stirs good thoughts

In any breast of strong authority,

To look into the blots and stains of right.
That Judge hath made me guardian to this boy:
Under whose warrant, Impeach thy wrong,
And by whose help, I mean to chastise it.

K. JOHN. Alack, thou dost usurp authority.
K. PHI. Excuse-it is to beat usurping down.
ELI. Who is it, thou dost call usurper, France?
CONST. Let me make answer;-thy usurping

BAST.

AUST.

Hear the crier.

What the devil art thou? BAST. One that will play the devil, sir, with you, An 'a may catch your hide and you alone. You are the hare of whom the proverb goes,d Whose valour plucks dead lions by the beard. I'll smoke your skin-coat, an I catch you right: Sirrah, look to't; i' faith, I will, i' faith.

BLANCH. O, well did he become that lion's robe, That did disrobe the lion of that robe!

BAST. It lies as sightly on the back of him, As great Alcides' shows upon an ass:— —(2)

a In any breast-] The first folio has beast; corrected in the edition of 1632.

b That thou mayst be a queen, and check the world!] It has been doubted whether Shakespeare, who appears to have had cognizance of nearly every sport and pastime of his age, was acquainted with the ancient game of chess; we believe the present passage may be taken to settle the question decisively. The allusion is obviously to the Queen of the chess-board, which, in this country, was invested with those remarkable powers that render her by far the most powerful piece in the game, somewhere about the second decade of the 16th century.

c One that will play the devil, sir, with you, An 'a may catch your hide and you alone.]

The circumstance which more particularly awakens the wrath of Faulconbridge against Austria, namely, that after having caused the death of King Richard Coeur-de-lion, he now wore the

King John, this is the very sum of all,—
England and Ireland, Anjou, Touraine, Maine,
In right of Arthur do I claim of thee:
Wilt thou resign them, and lay down thy arms?
K. JOHN. My life as soon!-I do defy thee,
France.

Arthur of Bretagne, yield thee to my hand,
And, out of my dear love, I'll give thee more
Than e'er the coward hand of France can win:
Submit thee, boy.

ELI. Come to thy grandame, child. CONST. Do, child, go to it (3) grandame, child; Give grandame kingdom, and it grandame will Give it a plum, a cherry, and a fig: There's a good grandame.

ARTH.

Good my mother, peace! I would that I were low laid in my grave; I am not worth this coil that's made for me. ELI. His mother shames him so, poor boy, he

Infortunate in nothing but in thee;
Thy sins are visited in this poor child;
The canon of the law is laid on him,
Being but the second generation
Removed from thy sin-conceiving womb.
K. JOHN. Bedlam, have done.
CONST.

I have but this to say,-
That he's not only plagued for her sin,"
But God hath made her sin and her the plague
On this removed issue;-plagued for her,
And with her plagued; her sin, his injury
Her injury, the beadle to her sin;
All punish'd in the person of this child,
And all for her. A plague upon her!

ELI. Thou unadvised scold, I can produce A will, that bars the title of thy son.

CONST. Ay, who doubts that? a will! a wicked will,

A woman's will, a canker'd grandame's will! K. PHI. Peace, lady; pause, or be more temperate:

a That he's not only plagued for her sin, &c.] The only departure from the old text in this obscure passage is in the punctuation, and in the addition of a d in the sentence of the second clause

"And with her plagued —"

which was first suggested by Mr. Roderick.

In the original, where it runs as follows, the whole passage is pointed with a ruthless disregard of meaning:

The cannons have their bowels full of wrath, And ready mounted are they, to spit forth Their iron indignation 'gainst your walls: All preparation for a bloody siege,

a

And merciless proceeding, by these French,
Confronts your city's eyes, your winking gates;
And but for our approach, those sleeping stones,
That as a waist do girdle you about,
By the compulsion of their ordinance,
By this time from their fixed beds of lime
Had been dishabited, and wide havoc made
For bloody power to rush upon your peace.
But, on the sight of us, your lawful king,
Who painfully, with much expedient march,
Have brought a countercheck before your gates,
To save unscratch'd your city's threaten'd cheeks,—
Behold, the French, amaz'd, vouchsafe a parle;
And now, instead of bullets wrapp'd in fire,
To make a shaking fever in your walls,
They shoot but calm words, folded up in smoke,
To make a faithless error in your ears:
Which trust accordingly, kind citizens,
And let us in. Your king, whose labour'd spirits,
Forwearied in this action of swift speed,
Craves harbourage within your city walls.

K. PHI. When I have said, make answer to us
both..

Lo, in this right hand, whose protection
Is most divinely vow'd upon the right
Of him it holds, stands young Plantagenet,
Son to the elder brother of this man,

And king o'er him, and all that he enjoys:
For this down-trodden equity, we tread

In warlike march these greens before your town;
Being no further enemy to you,
Than the constraint of hospitable zeal,
In the relief of this oppressed child,
Religiously provokes. Be pleased then
Το pay that duty, which you truly owe,

To him that owes (4) it,-namely, this young

prince:

And then our arms, like to a muzzled bear,
Save in aspéct, have all offence seal'd up;
Our cannons' malice vainly shall be spent
Against the invulnerable clouds of heaven;
And, with a blessed and unvex'd retire,
With unhack'd swords, and helmets all unbruis'd,
We will bear home that lusty blood again,
Which here we came to spout against your town,
And leave your children, wives, and you, in

peace.

But if you fondly pass our proffer'd offer,

"Tis not the roundure of your old-fac'd walls
Can hide you from our messengers of war,
Though all these English, and their discipline,
Were harbour'd in their rude circumference.
Then, tell us, shall your city call us lord,
In that behalf which we have challeng'd it?
Or shall we give the signal to our rage,
And stalk in blood to our possession?

CIT. In brief, we are the king of England's
subjects;

For him, and in his right, we hold this town. K. JOHN. Acknowledge then the king, and let me in.

CIT. That can we not: but he that proves the
king,

To him will we prove loyal; till that time,
Have we ramm'd up our gates against the world.
K. JOHN. Doth not the crown of England prove
the king?

And if not that, I bring you witnesses,
Twice fifteen thousand hearts of England's

a Confronts your city's eyes,-] The original has comfort, which was altered by Rowe to confront. Mr. Collier's MS. annotator reads, Come 'fore your city's eyes.

b Ordinance,-] The old spelling of this word should be retained here for the measure's sake.

c The roundure-] Roundure, or, as the old copies spell it, rounder, means circle, from the French, rondeur.

d St. George, &c.] In the old text this passage runs thus,"St. George that swindg'd the dragon,

And ere since sits on 's horseback at mine hostess door," &c.

ACT II.]

your

Alarums and Excursions; then a Retreat. Enter
a French Herald, with Trumpets, to the gates.
FR. HER. You men of Angiers, open wide
gates,
And let young Arthur, duke of Bretagne, in;
Who, by the hand of France, this day hath made
Much work for tears in many an English mother,
Whose sons lie scatter'd on the bleeding ground;
Many a widow's husband grovelling lies,
Coldly embracing the discolour'd earth;
And victory, with little loss, doth play
Upon the dancing banners of the French,
Who are at hand, triumphantly display'd,
To enter conquerors, and to proclaim

Arthur of Bretagne, England's king, and yours!

of blood

In this hot trial, more than we of France;
Rather, lost more. And by this hand I swear,
That sways the earth this climate overlooks,
Before we will lay down our just-borne arms,
We'll put thee down, 'gainst whom these arms
we bear,

Or add a royal number to the dead;
Gracing the scroll, that tells of this war's loss,
With slaughter coupled to the name of kings.

d

BAST. Ha, majesty! how high thy glory towers, When the rich blood of kings is set on fire! O, now doth death line his dead chaps with steel, The swords of soldiers are his teeth, his fangs; And now he feasts, mousing the flesh of men, In undetermin'd differences of kings. Why stand these royal fronts amazed thus? Cry, havoc, kings! back to the stained field, You equal-potents, fiery-kindled spirits! Then let confusion of one part confirm

The other's peace; till then, blows, blood, and death!

K. JOHN. Whose party do the townsmen yet admit?

the custom of the actor who personated the character of Hubert to "double" with it that of the Angiers' spokesman.

c Say, shall the current of our right run on,-] So the second folio; the first has rome, a likely misprint of ronne.

d Mousing the flesh of men,-] For mousing Pope substituted a less expressive term, mouthing, which Malone very properly rejected, and restored the old word. Mousing meant gorging, devouring. Thus, in Decker's "Wonderful Year," 1603,

"Whilst Troy was swilling sack and sugar, and mousing fat venison," &c.

K. PHI. Speak, citizens, for England; who's your king?

HUBERT. The king of England, when we know the king.

K. PHI. Know him in us, that here hold up his right.

K. JOHN. In us, that are our own great deputy, And bear possession of our person here; Lord of our presence, Angiers, and of you.

HUBERT. A greater power than we denies all this;

And, till it be undoubted, we do lock
Our former scruple in our strong-barr'd gates,
Kings, of our fear; until our fears, resolv'd,
Be by some certain king purg'd and depos'd.

BAST. By heaven, these scroyles" of Angiers flout you, kings,

And stand securely on their battlements,
As in a theatre, whence they gape and point
At your industrious scenes and acts of death.
Your royal presences be rul'd by me;
Do like the mutines of Jerusalem, (5)
Be friends a while, and both conjointly bend
Your sharpest deeds of malice on this town:
By east and west let France and England mount
Their battering cannon charged to the mouths,
Till their soul-fearing clamours have brawl'd down
The flinty ribs of this contemptuous city:-
I'd play incessantly upon these jades,
Even till unfenced desolation
Leave them as naked as the vulgar air.—
That done, dissever your united strengths,
And part your mingled colours once again,
Turn face to face, and bloody point to point:
Then, in a moment, fortune shall cull forth
Out of one side her happy minion ;

To whom in favour she shall give the day,
And kiss him with a glorious victory.
How like you this wild counsel, mighty states?
Smacks it not something of the policy?

K. JOHN. Now, by the sky that hangs above
our heads,

I like it well;-France, shall we knit our powers,
And lay this Angiers even with the ground;
Then, after, fight who shall be king of it?

BAST. An if thou hast the mettle of a king, Being wrong'd, as we are, by this peevish town, Turn thou the mouth of thy artillery,

As we will ours, against these saucy walls:
And when that we have dash'd them to the ground,
Why, then defy each other; and, pell-mell,
Make work upon ourselves, for heaven, or hell.
K. PHI. Let it be so.-Say, where will you
assault?

K. JOHN. We from the west will send destruction

Into this city's bosom.

AUST. I, from the north.

K. PHI.

Our thunder from the south, Shall rain their drift of bullets on this town. BAST. O prudent discipline! From north to south,

Austria and France shoot in each other's mouth : [Aside.

I'll stir them to it :-Come, away, away!
HUBERT. Hear us, great kings: vouchsafe a
while to stay,

And I shall show you peace, and fair-fac'd league;
Win you this city without stroke or wound,
Rescue those breathing lives to die in beds,
That here come sacrifices for the field:
Persèver not, but hear me, mighty kings.

K. JOHN. Speak on, with favour; we are bent
to hear.

HUBERT. That daughter there of Spain, the lady Blanch,

C

Is near to England: look upon the years
Of Lewis the Dauphin, and that lovely maid:
If lusty love should go in quest of beauty,
Where should he find it fairer than in Blanch?
If zealous love should go in search of virtue,
Where should he find it purer than in Blanch?
If love ambitious sought a match of birth,
Whose veins bound richer blood than lady Blanch?
Such as she is, in beauty, virtue, birth,

*

she;

Is the young Dauphin every way complete ;
If not complete, O say, he is not she:
And she again wants nothing, to name want,
If want it be not, that she is not he:
He is the half part of a blessed man,
Left to be finished by such a
And she a fair divided excellence,
Whose fulness of perfection lies in him.
O, two such silver currents, when they join,
Do glorify the banks that bound them in ;
And two such shores to two such streams made one,

(*) Old copies, as.

trust to our strong-barred gates as the protectors, or Kings, of our fear. b These scroyles-] From the French escrouelles, scabby rogues.

The lady Blanch,-] This lady was daughter to Alphonso the Ninth, King of Castile, and was niece to King John, by his sister Eleanor.

d If not complete, O say,-] The old copy reads:"If not complete of, say,-" Hanmer first suggested the alteration.