6

Your aiery buildeth in our aiery's neft :-
O God, that fee'ft it, do not suffer it;
As it was won with blood, loft be it fo!

Buck. Peace, peace, for fhame, if not for charity. 2. Mar. Urge neither charity nor fhame to me; Uncharitably with me have you dealt,

And fhamefully by you my hopes are butcher'd.
My charity is outrage, life my fhame,-

And in my fhame ftill live my forrow's rage!
Buck. Have done, have done.

2. Mar. O princely Buckingham, I'll kifs thy hand,
In fign of league and amity with thee:
Now fair befal thee, and thy noble house!
Thy garments are not fpotted with our blood,
Nor thou within the compafs of my curse.
Buck. Nor no one here; for curfes never pafs
The lips of those that breathe them in the air.
2. Mar. I'll not believe but they afcend the fky,
And there awake God's gentle-fleeping peace.
O Buckingham, beware of yonder dog;
Look, when he fawns, he bites; and, when he bites,
His venom tooth will rankle to the death:
Have not to do with him, beware of him;
Sin, death, and hell, have set their marks upon
And all their minifters attend on him.

him;

Glo. What doth she say, my lord of Buckingham ? Buck. Nothing that I refpect, my gracious lord. 2. Mar. What, doft thou fcorn me for my gentle counfel?

And footh the devil that I warn thee from?

• Your aiery buildeth in our aiery's neft:-] An aiery is a hawk's or an eagle's neft. So, in Green's Card of Fancy, 1608:

It is a fubtle bird that breeds among the aiery of hawks.” Again, in Heywood's Rape of Lucrece, 1630:

"His high-built aiery fhall be drown'd in blood."

Again, in Maffinger's Maid of Honour :

"One aiery, with proportion, ne'er discloses

"The eagle and the wren." STEEVENS.

O, but remember this another day,

When he shall split thy very heart with forrow;
And fay, poor Margaret was a prophetefs.-
Live each of you the fubjects to his hate,
And he to yours, and all of you to God's?! [Exit.
Buck. My hair doth stand on end to hear her curfes.
Riv. And fo doth mine; I wonder, fhe's at liberty.
Glo. I cannot blame her, by God's holy mother;
She hath had too much wrong, and I repent
My part thereof, that I have done to her.

Queen. I never did her any, to my knowledge.
Glo. Yet you have all the vantage of her wrong.
I was too hot to do fome body good,
That is too cold in thinking of it now.
Marry, as for Clarence, he is well repay'd;
'He is frank'd up to fatting for his pains ;-
God pardon them that are the cause thereof!
Riv. A virtuous and a christian-like conclufion,

7 Live each of you the fubjects to his hate,

And he to yours, and all of you to God's !]

It is evident from the conduct of Shakespeare, that the house of Tudor retained all their Lancastrian prejudices, even in the reign of queen Elizabeth. In this play of Richard the Third, he feems to reduce the woes of the houfe of York from the curfes which queen Margaret had vented against them; and he could not give that weight to her curfes, without fuppofing a right in her to utter them. WALPOLE.

8

reads:

I wonder he's at liberty.] Thus the quarto. The folio

-I mufe, why fhe's at liberty. STEEVENS. 9 He is frank'd up to fatting for his pains ;-] A frank is an old English word for a bog-fty. 'Tis poffible he ufes this metaphor to Clarence, in allufion to the creft of the family of York, which was a boar. Whereto relate thofe famous old verfes on Richard III :

The cat, the rat, and Lovel the dog,
Rule all England under a hog.

He uses the fame metaphor in the last scene of act IV. POPE.
A frank was not a common hog-ftye, but the pen in which those
hogs were confined of whom brawn was to be made.

STEEVENS.

To

To pray for them that have done fcathe to us'.
Glo. So do I ever, being well advis'd;
For had I curs'd now, I had curs'd myself.

Enter Catefey.

[Afide.

Catef. Madam, his majesty doth call for you,And for your grace,-and you, my noble lords. Queen. Catesby, I come :-Lords, will you go with me?

Riv. Madam, we will attend your grace.

[Exeunt all but Glofter. Glo. I do the wrong, and first begin to brawl. The fecret mifchiefs that I fet abroach,

I lay unto the grievous charge of others.

Clarence,-whom I, indeed, have laid in darkness,-
I do beweep to many fimple gulls;

Namely, to Stanley, Haftings, Buckingham;
And tell them-'tis the queen and her allies,
That stir the king against the duke my brother.
Now they believe it; and withal whet me
To be reveng'd on Rivers, Vaughan, Grey:
But then I figh, and, with a piece of fcripture,
Tell them that God bids us do good for evil :
And thus I clothe my naked villainy

With old odd ends, ftol'n forth of holy writ;
And feem a faint, when moft I play the devil,

Enter two Murderers.

But foft, here come my executioners.-
How now, my hardy, ftout, resolved mates?
Are you now going to dispatch this thing?

I

-done fcathe to us.] Scathe is harm, mischief. So, in Soliman and Perfeda: "Whom now that paltry ifland keeps from feath." Again :

Millions of men opprest with ruin and feath."

D 3

STEEVENS,

1 Mir

1 Mur. We are, my lord; and come to have the

warrant,

That we may be admitted where he is,

Glo. Well thought upon, I have it here about me When you have done, repair to Crofby-place. But, firs, be fudden in the execution, Withal obdurate, do not hear him plead; For Clarence is well fpoken, and, perhaps, May move your hearts to pity, if you mark him. 1 Mur. Tut, tut, my lord, we will not ftand to prate,

Talkers are no good doers; be affur'd,

We go to use our hands, and not our tongues.
Glo. Your eyes drop mill-ftones, when fools' eyes
drop tears 2:

I like you, lads;-about your business straight;
Go, go, dispatch.

I

Mur. We will, my noble lord.

SCENE IV,

An apartment in the Tower.

Enter Clarence, and Brakenbury.

[Exeunt,

Brak, Why looks your grace fo heavily to-day?
Clar. O, I have paft a miferable night,
So full of fearful dreams, of ugly fights,
That, as I am a chriftian faithful man,
I would not spend another fuch a night,
Though 'twere to buy a world of happy days;
So full of difmal terror was the time.

2 Your eyes drop mill-ftones, when fools' eyes drop tears;] This, I believe, is a proverbial expreffion. It is used again in the tragedy of Cafar and Pompey, 1607:

"Men's eyes must mill-flones drop, when fools fhed tears."

STEEVENS.

Brak.

-faithful man,] Not an infidel. JOHNSON.

Brak. What was your dream, my lord? I pray you, tell me.

Clar. Methought, that I had broken from the
Tower,

And was embark'd to crofs to Burgundy;
And, in my company, my brother Glofter:
Who from my cabin tempted me to walk
Upon the hatches; thence we look'd towards Eng-
land,

And cited up a thoufand heavy times,
During the wars of York and Lancafter
That had befall'n us. As we pac'd along
Upon the giddy footing of the hatches,
Methought, that Glofter ftumbled; and, in falling,
Struck me, that thought to stay him, over-board,
Into the tumbling billows of the main.

O Lord! methought, what pain it was to drown!
What dreadful noife of water in mine ears!
What fights of ugly death within mine eyes!
Methought, I faw a thoufand fearful wrecks;
A thousand men, that fifhes gnaw'd upon;
Wedges of gold, great anchors, heaps of pearl,
Ineftimable ftones, unvalued jewels 4,

All scatter'd in the bottom of the sea.

Some lay in dead men's skulls; and, in thofe holes,
Where eyes did once inhabit, there were crept,
(As 'twere in fcorn of eyes) reflecting gems,
That woo'd the flimy bottom of the deep,
And mock'd the dead bones that lay fcatter'd by.

4 Ineftimable ftones, unvalued jewels,] Unvalu'd is here used for invaluable. So, in Lovelace's Pofthumous Poems, 1659:

Again:

66

the unvalew'd robe she wore "Made infinite lay lovers to adore."

"And what fubftantial riches I poffefs,

"I must to these unvalew'd dreams confefs." MALONE. 5 That woo'd the flimy bottom- ] By feeming to gaze

upon it; or, as we now fay, to ogle it. JOHNSON.

D 4

Brak.