Enter another Messenger,

2. MESS. Lords, view these letters, full of bad mifchance,

France is revolted from the English quite;
Except some petty towns of no import:
The Dauphin Charles is crowned king in Rheims:
The bastard of Orleans with him is join'd;
Reignier, duke of Anjou, doth take his part;
The duke of Alençon flieth to his fide.

EXE. The Dauphin crowned king! all fly to him! O, whither shall we fly from this reproach?

GLO. We will not fly, but to our enemies'

throats:

Bedford, if thou be flack, I'll fight it out.

BED Glofter, why doubt'st thou of my forward

nefs?

An army have I muster'd in my thoughts,
Wherewith already France is over-run.

Enter a third Messenger.

3. MESS. My gracious lords, -to add to your la

ments,

Wherewith you now bedew king Henry's hearse, -
I must inform you of a dismal fight,
Betwixt the flout lord Talbot and the French.

WIN. What! wherein Talbot overcame? is't so?
3. MESS. O, no; wherein lord Talbot was o'er-

thrown:

The circumstance I'll tell you more at large.
The tenth of August last, this dreadful lord,

Retiring from the fiege of Orleans,

had only a short intermiffion from Henry the Fifth's death to my coming amongst them. WARBURTON.

1

Having full scarce fix thousand in his troop. 4
By three and twenty thousand of the French
Was round encompaffed and fet upon :
No leifure had he to enrank his men;
He wanted pikes to set before his archers;
Instead whereof, sharp stakes, pluck'd out of hedges,
They pitched in the ground confusedly,
To keep the horsemen off from breaking in.
More than three hours the fight continued;
Where valiant Talbot, above human thought,
Enacted wonders with his fword and lance.
Hundreds he sent to hell, and none durst stand him:
Here, there, and every where, enrag'd he flew:
The French exclaim'd, The devil was in arms;
All the whole army stood agaz'd on him:
His foldiers, spying his undaunted spirit,
A Talbot! a Talbot! cried out amain,
And rush'd into the bowels of the battle.'
Here had the conquest fully been feal'd up,
If fir John Fastolfe had not play'd the coward;

4 Having full scarce &c.] The modern editors read, -Scarce full, but, I think, unneceffarily. So, in The Tempest: Profpero, master of a full poor cell."

5

-

STEEVENS.

1

STEEVENS.

6

he flew:] I suspect, the author wrote-flow.

MALONE.

7 And rush'd into the bowels of the battle.) Again, in the fifth act of this play:

"So, rushing in the bowels of the French."

The same phrafe had occurred in the first part of Jeronimo,

1605:

8

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

STEEVENS.

If fir John Falstolfe &c.] Mr. Pope has taken notice, "That Falstaff is here introduced again, who was dead in Henry V. The

८ 1

He being in the vaward, (plac'd behind,o
With purpose to relieve and follow them,)
Cowardly fled, not having struck one stroke.
Hence grew the general wreck and massacre;

occasion whereof is, that this play was written before King Henry IV. or King Henry V." But it is the hiftorical Sir John Faftolfe (for fo he is called by both our Chroniclers) that is here mentioned; who was a lieutenant general, deputy regent to the duke of Bedford in Normandy, and a knight of the garter; and not the comick character afterwards introduced by our author, and which was a creature merely of his own brain. Nor when he named him Falstaff do I believe he had any intention of throwing a flur on the memory of this renowned old warrior. Theobald.

Mr. Theobald might have seen his notion contradi&ed in the very line he quotes from. Fastolfe, whether truly or not, is faid by Hall and Holinshed to have been degraded for cowardice. Dr. Heylin, in his Saint George for England, tells us, that “ he was afterwards, upon good reason by him alledged in his defence, reftored to his honour," " This Sir John Falstoff," continues he, was without doubt, a valiant and wife captain, notwithstanding the stage hath made merry with him." FARMER.

See Vol. XII. p. 184, n. 4; and Oldys's Life of Sir John Faftolfe in the General Dictionary. MALONE.

In the 18th song of Drayton's Polyolbion is the following character of this Sir John Fastolph:

Strong Faftolph with this man compare we justly may; " By Salsbury who oft being seriously imploy'd " In many a brave attempt the general foe annoy'd; With excellent fucceffe in Main and Anjou fought, " And many a bulwarke there into our keeping brought: " And chosen to go forth with Vadamont in warre, Moft resolutely tooke proud Renate duke of Barre."

STEEVENS.

For an account of this Sir John Faftolfe, see Anstis's Treatise on the Order of the Garter; Parkins's Supplement to Blomfield's Hiftory of Norfolk; Tanner's Bibliotheca Britannica; or Capel's notes, Vol. II. p. 221; and Sir John Feun's Collection of the Paston Letters:

REED.

9 He being in the vaward, (plac'd behind,] Some of the editors seem to have confidered this as a contradiction in terms, and have proposed to read the rearward, but without neceffity. Some part of the van must have been behind the foremost line of it. We often say the back front of a house. STEEVENS.

۱

Enclosed were they with their enemies:
A bafe Walloon, to win the Dauphin's grace,
Thrust Talbot with a spear into the back;
Whom all France, with their chief affembled

strength,

Durst not prefume to look once in the face.
BED. Is Talbot fiain? then I will flay myfelf,
For living idly here, in pomp and ease,
Whilft fuch a worthy leader, wanting aid,
Unto his daftard foe-men is betray'd.

3. MESS. O no, he lives; but is took prisoner, And lord Scales with him, and lord Hungerford: Most of the rest slaughter'd, or took, likewife.

BED. His ransom there is none but I shall pay: I'll hale the Dauphin lieadlong from his throne, His crown shall be the ranfom of my friend; Four of their lords I'll change for one of ours.Farewell, my masters; to my task will I; Bonfires in France forthwith I am to make, To keep our great faint George's feast withal: Ten thousand foldiers with me I will take, Whose bloody deeds shall make all Europe quake.

3. MESS. So you had need; for Orleans is be

fieg'd;

The English army is grown weak and faint:
The earl of Salisbury craveth fupply
And hardly keeps his men from mutiny,

Since they, fo few, watch fuch a multitude.

EXE. Remember, lords, your oaths to Henry

fworn;

Either to quell the 'Dauphin utterly,
Or bring him in obedience to your yoke.

BED. I do remember it; and here take leave,

To go about my preparation.

[Exit.

GLO. I'll to the Tower with all the haste I can,

To view the artillery and munition;
And then I will proclaim young Henry King.

[Exit.

EXE. To Eltham will I, where the young king

is,

Being ordain'd his special governor;

And for his fafety there I'll best devise.

[Exit.

WIN. Each hath his place and function to at

tend:

I am left out; for me nothing remains.
But long I will not be Jack-out-of-office;
The king from Eltham I intend to send,

And fit at chiefest stern of publick weal.

[Exit. Scene closes.

9 The king from Eltham I intend to send, And fit at chiefeft ftern of publick weal.] The king was not at this time so much in the power of the Cardinal, that he could send him where he pleased. I have therefore no doubt but that there is

an error in this passage, and that it should be read thus:

The king from Eltham I intend to fteal

And fit at chiefeft ftern of publick weal.

This flight alteration preserves the sense, and the rhyme also, with which many scenes in this play conclude. The king's perfon, as appears from the speech immediately preceding this of Winchefter, was under the care of the Duke of Exeter, not of the Cardinal:

" Exe. To Eltham will I, where the young king is,
"Being ordain'd his special governor." M. MASON.

The second charge in the Articles of accufation preferred by the Duke of Glofter against the Bishop, (Hall's Chron. Henry VI. f. 12, b.) countenances this conjecture. MALONE.

The disagreeable clash of the words-intend and fend, feems indeed to confirm the propriety of Mr. M. Mason's emendation.

STEEVENS.