Anon, from thy infulting tyranny,
Coupled in bonds of perpetuity,

Two Talbots, winged through the lither sky,"
In thy despite, fhall 'fcape mortality.-

O thou whose wounds become hard-favour'd death,
Speak to thy father, ere thou yield thy breath:
Brave death by speaking, whether he will, or no;
Imagine him a Frenchman, and thy foe.-
Poor boy he fimiles, methinks; as who fhould
fay-

Had death been French, then death had died to

day.

Keeps death his court: and there the antick fits
Scoffing his ftate, and grinning at his pomp."

STEEVENS.

It is not improbable that Shakspeare borrowed this idea from one of the cuts to that most exquifite work called Imagines Mortis, commonly afcribed to the pencil of Holbein, but without any authority. See the 7th print. DOUCE.

6 winged through the lither sky,] Lither is flexible or yielding. In much the fame fenfe Milton says: He with broad fails

"Winnow'd the buxom air."

That is, the obfequious air. JOHNSON.

Lither is the comparative of the adjective lithe. So, in Lyly's Endymion, 1591:

66

to breed numbnefs or litherness." Litherness is limberness, or yielding weakness. Again, in Look about you, 1600:

"I'll bring his lither legs in better frame."

Milton might have borrowed the expreffion from Spenfer or Gower, who uses it in the Prologue to his Confeffio Amantis: "That unto him whiche the head is,

"The membres buxom thall bowe."

In the old fervice of matrimony, the wife was enjoined to be buxom both at bed and board. Buxom, therefore, anciently fignified obedient or yielding. Stubbs, in his Anatomie of Abuses, 1595, ufes the word in the fame fenfe: " -are fo buxome to their fhameless defires," &c. STEEVENS.

Come, come, and lay him in his father's arms;
My spirit can no longer bear these harms.
Soldiers, adieu! I have what I would have,
Now my old arms are young John Talbot's grave.
[Dies.

Alarums. Exeunt Soldiers and Servant, leaving the two Bodies. Enter CHARLES, ALENÇON, BURGUNDY, Baftard, LA PUCELLE, and Forces.

CHAR. Had York and Somerset brought rescue in,

We should have found a bloody day of this.

BAST. How the young whelp of Talbot's, ragingwood,"

Did flesh his puny fword in Frenchmen's blood !8
Puc. Once I encounter'd him, and thus I said,
Thou maiden youth be vanquish'd by a maid:
But-with a proud, majeftical high scorn,-
He answer'd thus; Young Talbot was not born
To be the pillage of a giglot wench :9

So, rufhing in the bowels of the French,'

7 raging-wood,] That is, raging mad. So, in Heywood's Dialogues, containing a Number of effectual Proverbs, 1562:

"She was, as they fay, horn-wood."

Again, in The longer thou liveft the more Fool thou art, 1570: "He will fight as he were wood." STEEVENS.

8 in Frenchmen's blood!] The return of rhyme where young Talbot is again mentioned, and in no other place, ftrengthens the suspicion that these verses were originally part of some other work, and were copied here only to fave the trouble of compofing new. JOHNSON.

9

—of a giglot wench :] Giglot is a wanton, or a strumpet.

JOHNSON.

The word is used by Gafcoigne and other authors, though now quite obsolete.

He left me proudly, as unworthy fight.

BUR. Doubtlefs, he would have made a noble

knight:

See, where he lies inherfed in the arms

Of the most bloody nurser of his harms.

BAST. Hew them to pieces, hack their bones afunder;

Whofe life was England's glory, Gallia's wonder. CHAR. O, no; forbear: for that which we have fled

During the life, let us not wrong it dead.

Enter Sir WILLIAM LUCY; attended; a French Herald preceding.

Lucr. Herald,

Conduct me to the Dauphin's tent; to know
Who hath obtain'd the glory of the day.

CHAR. On what fubmiffive meffage art thou fent?
Lucr. Submiffion, Dauphin? 'tis a mere French

word;

We English warriors wot not what it means.

So, in the play of Orlando Furiofo, 1594:

"Whofe choice is like that Greekish giglot's love,
"That left her lord, prince Menelaus."

See Vol. VI. p. 404, n. 7. STEEVENS.

I

in the bowels of the French,] So, in the firft part of Jeronimo, 1605 :

Meet, Don Andrea! yes, in the battle's bowels."

Herald,

STEEVENS.

Conduct me to the Dauphin's tent; to know Who hath obtain'd-] Lucy's meffage implied that he knew who had obtained the victory: therefore Sir T. Hanmer reads: Herald, conduct me to the Dauphin's tent. JOHNSON.

I come to know what prisoners thou haft ta'en,
And to furvey the bodies of the dead.

CHAR. For prifoners afk'ft thou? hell our prifon

is.

But tell me whom thou feek'st.

Lucy. Where is the great Alcides 3 of the field, Valiant lord Talbot, earl of Shrewsbury? Created, for his rare fuccefs in arms,

Great earl of Wafhford,4 Waterford, and Valence; Lord Talbot of Goodrig and Urchinfield,

Lord Strange of Blackmere, lord Verdun of Alton, Lord Cromwell of Wingfield, lord Furnival of Shef

field,

The thrice victorious lord of Falconbridge;
Knight of the noble order of Saint George,
Worthy Saint Michael, and the golden fleece;
Great mareshal to Henry the fixth,

Of all his wars within the realm of France ?

3 Where is the great Alcides—] Old copy-But where's. Corrected by Mr. Rowe. The compofitor probably caught the word But from the preceding line. MALONE.

4 Great earl of Wafhford,] It appears from Camden's Britannia and Holinfhed's Chronicle of Ireland, that Wexford was anciently called Weysford. In Crompton's Manfion of Magnanimitie it is written as here, Washford. This long lift of titles is taken from the epitaph formerly fixed on Lord Talbot's tomb in Rouen in Normandy. Where this author found it, I have not been able to ascertain, for it is not in the common hiftorians. The oldest book in which I have met with it is the tract above mentioned, which was printed in 1599, pofterior to the date of this play. Numerous as this lift is, the epitaph has one more, which, I suppose, was only rejected because it would not eafily fall into the verse," Lord Lovetoft of Worfop." It concludes as here," Lord Falconbridge, Knight of the noble order of St. George, St. Michael, and the golden fleece, Great Marfhall to King Henry VI. of his realm in France, who died in the battle of Bourdeaux, 1453." MALONE.

Puc. Here is a filly ftately ftyle indeed!
The Turk, that two and fifty kingdoms hath,5
Writes not fo tedious a ftyle as this.-

Him, that thou magnifieft with all these titles,
Stinking, and fly-blown, lies here at our feet.

Lucr. Is Talbot flain; the Frenchmen's only fcourge,

Your kingdom's terrour and black Nemesis?
O, were mine eye-balls into bullets turn'd,
That I, in rage, might shoot them at your faces!
O, that I could but call these dead to life!
It were enough to fright the realm of France:
Were but his picture left among you here,
It would amaze the proudeft of you all.

6

Give me their bodies; that I may bear them hence, And give them burial as befeems their worth.

Puc, I think, this upftart is old Talbot's ghost, He speaks with fuch a proud commanding fpirit. For God's fake, let him have 'em ;7 to keep them

here,

They would but stink, and putrefy the air.

CHAR. Go, take their bodies hence.

LUCY.

I'll bear them hence :

The Turk, &c.] Alluding probably to the oftentatious letter of Sultan Solyman the Magnificent, to the Emperor Ferdinand, 1562; in which all the Grand Seignor's titles are enumerated. See Knolles's Hiftory of the Turks, 5th edit. p. 789. GREY.

— amaze —] i. e. (as in other inftances) confound, throw into confternation. So, in Cymbeline: "I am amaz'd with matter

7

STEEVENS.

let him have 'em ;] Old copy-have him. So, a little lower,-do with him. The first emendation was made by Mr. Theobald; the other by the editor of the fecond folio. MALONE.