Marshal, command 5 our officers at arms
Be ready to direct these home-alarms.

SCENE II.

[Exeunt.

The fame. A Room in the Duke of Lancaster's Palace.

Enter GAUNT, and Duchefs of Glofter."

GAUNT. Alas! the part I had in Glofter's blood Doth more folicit me, than your exclaims, To ftir against the butchers of his life. But fince correction lieth in those hands, Which made the fault that we cannot correct, Put we our quarrel to the will of heaven; Who when he fees the hours ripe on earth, Will rain hot vengeance on offenders' heads.

"Juftice decide," but without neceffity. Defigno, Lat. fignifies to mark out, to point out: "Notat defignatque oculis ad cædem unumquemque noftrûm." Cicero in Catilinam. STEEVENS.

To defign in our author's time fignified to mark out. See Mintheu's DICT. in v: "To defigne or fhew by a token. Ital. Denotare. Lat. Defignare." At the end of the article the reader is referred to the words " to marke, note, demonftrate or fhew." -The word is still used with this fignification in Scotland.

MALONE.

• Marshal, command &c.] The old copies-Lord Marshall; but (as Mr. Ritfon obferves,) the metre requires the omiffion I have made. It is alfo juftified by his Majefty's repeated address to the fame officer, in fcene iii. STEEVENS.

6 duchefs of Glofter.] The Duchefs of Glofter was Eleanor Bohun, widow of Duke Thomas, fon of Edward III.

WALPOLE.

7 the part I had-] That is, my relation of confanguinity to Glofter. HANMER.

Who when he fees-] The old copies erroneously read:
Who when they see———.

DUCH. Finds brotherhood in thee no fharper fpur?
Hath love in thy old blood no living fire?
Edward's feven fons, whereof thyself art one,
Were as feven phials of his facred blood,
Or feven fair branches fpringing from one root:
Some of those feven are dried by nature's course,
Some of those branches by the deftinies cut:
But Thomas, my dear lord, my life, my Glofter,-
One phial full of Edward's facred blood,

One flourishing branch of his most royal root,—
Is crack'd, and all the precious liquor fpilt;
Is hack'd down, and his fummer leaves all faded,9
By envy's hand, and murder's bloody axe.

Ah, Gaunt! his blood was thine; that bed, that

womb,

That mettle, that felf-mould, that fashion'd thee, Made him a man; and though thou liv'ft, and

breath'ft,

Yet art thou flain in him: thou doft confent'
In fome large measure to thy father's death,
In that thou feeft thy wretched brother die,

I have reformed the text by example of a fubfequent paffage, p. 17:

heaven's fubftitute,

"His deputy, anointed in his fight," &c. STEEVENS. 9 One phial &c.] Though all the old copies concur in the prefent regulation of the following lines, I would rather read: One phial full of Edward's facred blood

Is crack'd, and all the precious liquor Spill'd;
One flourishing branch of his most royal root

Is hack'd down, and his fummer leaves all faded. Some of the old copies in this inftance, as in many others, read vaded, a mode of spelling practised by several of our ancient writers. After all, I believe the transposition to be needless.

I

STEEVENS.

thou doft confent &c.] i:e. affent. So, in St. Luke's Gospel, xxiii. 51: "The fame had not-confented to the counfel and deed of them." STEEVENS.

Who was the model of thy father's life.
Call it not patience, Gaunt, it is despair:
In fuffering thus thy brother to be slaughter'd,
Thou show'ft the naked pathway to thy life,
Teaching stern murder how to butcher thee:
That which in mean men we entitle-patience,
Is pale cold cowardice in noble breafts.
What shall I say? to fafeguard thine own life,
The best way is to 'venge my Glofter's death.
is-to

GAUNT. Heaven's is the quarrel; for heaven's fubftitute,

His deputy anointed in his fight,

Hath caus'd his death: the which if wrongfully,
Let heaven revenge; for I may never lift
An angry arm against his minifter.

DUCH. Where then, alas! may I complain myself?2 GAUNT. To heaven, the widow's champion and defence.

DỤCH. Why then, I will. Farewell, old Gaunt.3

2 may I complain myself?] To complain is commonly a verb neuter, but it is here ufed as a verb active. So, in a very scarce book entitled A courtlie Controverfie of Cupid's Cautels, &c. Tranflated from the French, &c. by H. W. [Henry Wotton] Gentleman, 4to. 1578: "I coulde finde no companion, eyther to comforte me, or helpe to complaine my great forrowe." Again, p. 58: "wyth greate griefe he complained the calamitie of his countrey."

Again, in The Queenes Majefties Entertainment in Suffolke and Norfolke, by Thomas Churchyard: "-Cupid encountring the Queene, beganne to complayne hys ftate and his mothers," &c. Dryden alfo employs the word in the fame fenfe in his Fables: Gaufride, who couldft fo well in rhyme complain "The death of Richard with an arrow flain." Complain myself (as Mr. M. Mafon obferves,) is a literal tranflation of the French phrafe, me plaindre. STEEVENS.

66

3 Why then, I will. Farewell, old Gaunt.] The measure of this line being clearly defective, why may we not read?

Thou go'ft to Coventry, there to behold
Our coufin Hereford and fell Mowbray fight:
O, fit my husband's wrongs on Hereford's fpear,
That it may enter butcher Mowbray's breaft!
Or, if misfortune mifs the first career,
Be Mowbray's fins fo heavy in his bofom,
That they may break his foaming courfer's back,
And throw the rider headlong in the lifts,
A caitiff recreant 4 to my coufin Hereford!
Farewell, old Gaunt; thy fometimes brother's wife,
With her companion grief muft end her life.

GAUNT. Sifter, farewell: I must to Coventry : As much good stay with thee, as go with me! DUCH. Yet one word more ;-Grief boundeth where it falls,

Not with the empty hollowness, but weight:
I take my leave before I have begun;

For forrow ends not when it seemeth done.

Why then I will.

Now fare thee well, old Gaunt.

Or thus:

Farewell old John of Gaunt.

Why then I will.

There can be nothing ludicrous in a title by which the King has already addreffed him. RITSON.

Sir T. Hanmer completes the measure, by repeating the word -farewell, at the end of the line. STEEVENS.

• A caitiff recreant-] Caitiff originally fignified a prifoner; next a flave, from the condition of prifoners; then a fcoundrel, from the qualities of a flave:

Ήμισυ τῆς ἀρετῆς αποαίνυται δέλιον ἦμαρ.”

In this paffage it partakes of all thefe fignifications. JOHNSON. This juft fentiment is in Homer; but the learned commentator quoting, I fuppofe from memory, has compressed a couplet into a fingle line:

Ημισυ γαρ Τ αρετης αποαίνυται ευρύοπα Ζευς
νερος, ευτ' αν μιν κατα δουλιον ημαρ έλησιν."

Ody. Lib. XVII. v. 322. HOLT WHITE. I do not believe that caitiff in our language ever fignified a prifoner. I take it to be derived, not from captiff, but from chetif, Fr. poor, miferable. TYRWHITT.

Commend me to my brother, Edmund York.
Lo, this is all :-Nay, yet depart not so;
Though this be all, do not fo quickly go;
I fhall remember more. Bid him-O, what?—
With all good speed at Plashy vifit me.

Alack, and what shall good old York there fee,
But empty lodgings and unfurnish'd walls,5
Unpeopled offices, untrodden stones ?

And what cheer there" for welcome, but my groans?
Therefore commend me; let him not come there,
To feek out forrow that dwells every where :7
Defolate, defolate, will I hence, and die;
The laft leave of thee takes my weeping eye.

[Exeunt.

5 unfurnish'd walls,] In our ancient caftles the naked ftone walls were only covered with tapestry, or arras, hung upon tenter hooks, from which it was eafily taken down on every removal of the family. See the preface to The Household Book of the Fifth Earl of Northumberland, begun in 1512. STEEVENS.

6 And what cheer there &c.] I had followed the reading of the folio, [hear] but now rather incline to that of the first quarto.And what cheer, there, &c. In the quarto of 1608, chear was changed to hear, and the editor of the folio followed the latter copy. MALONE.

To feek out forrow that dwells every where:] Perhaps the pointing may be reformed without injury to the sense:

let him not come there

To feek out forrow

that dwells every where.

WHALLEY,