Since thou haft far to go, bear not along Mowb. No, Bolingbroke; if ever I were traitor, Hath from the number of his banish'd years K. Rich. Why, uncle? thou haft many years to live all the world's my way.] Perhaps Milton had this in his mind when he wrote thefe lines, The world was all before them, where to chufe JOHNSON. And pluck nights from me, but not lend a morrow.] It is matter of very melancholy confideration, that all human advantages confer more power of doing evil than good. JOHNSON. Thou canst help time to furrow me with age, four. You urg'd me as a judge; but I had rather, To fmooth his fault I would have been more mild: K. Rich. Coufin, farewell; and, uncle, bid him fo: From where you do remain, let paper show. Gaunt. Oh, to what purpose doft thou hoard thy words, That thou return'ft no greeting to thy friends? A partial flander-] That is, the reproach of partiality, This is a juft picture of the ftruggle between principle and af fection. JOHNSON. Gaunt. Gaunt. What is fix winters? they are quickly gone. Boling. To men in joy; but grief makes one hour ten. Gaunt. Call it a travel, that thou tak'ft for pleasure. Boling. My heart will figh, when I mifcall it fo, Which finds it an enforced pilgrimage. Gaunt. The fullen paffage of thy weary steps [7 Boling. Nay, rather, every tedious ftride I make Gaunt. All places that the eye of heaven vifits, Are to a wife man ports and happy havens. Boling. Nay, rather, every tedious firide I make] This, and the fix verses which follow, I have ventured to fupply from the old quarto. The allufion, it is true, to an apprenticeship, and becoming a journeyman, is not in the fublime tafte; nor, as Horace has expreffed it, fpirat tragicum fatis: however, as there is no doubt of the paffage being genuine, the lines are not fo despicable as to deferve being quite loft. THEOBALD. journeyman to grief?] I am afraid our author in this place defigned a very poor quibble, as journey fignifies both travel and a day's work. However, he is not to be cenfured for what he himself rejected. JOHNSON. The quarto, in which thefe lines are found, is faid in its titlepage to have been corrected by the author; and the play is in, deed more accurately printed than most of the other fingle copies. There is now however no method of knowing by whom the alteration was made. STEEVENS. All places that the eye of heaven vifits, &c.] The fourteen verfes that follow are found in the firft edition. PorE, I am inclined to believe, that what Mr. Theobald and Mr. Pope have restored were expunged in the revifion by the author: if the lines inclosed in crotchets are omitted, the fenfe is more coherent. Nothing is more frequent among dramatic writers, than to shorten their dialogues for the stage. JOHNSON. Teach thy neceffity to reason thus :— Think not, the king did banish thee; But thou the king. Woe doth the heavier fit, The grafs whereon thou tread'ft, the presence strow'd; For gnarling forrow hath lefs power to bite way : Had I thy youth, and caufe, I would not stay. There is a paffage refembling this in Tully's Fifth Book of Tufculan Questions. Speaking of Epicurus, he fays" Sed unà fe dicit recordatione acquiefcere præteritarum voluptatum: ut fi quis æftuans, cum vim caloris non facile pa"tiatur recordari velit, fe aliquando in arpinati noftro gelidis "fluminibus circumfufum fuiffe. Non enim video, quomodo "fedare poffint mala præfentia præteritæ voluptates." The Tufculan Questions of Tully had been tranflated early enough for Shakespeare to have feen them. STEEVENS, Boling. Then, England's ground, farewell; fweet foil, adieu; My mother and my nurse, that bears me yet! SCENE IV. The court. [Exeunt. Enter king Richard, and Bagot, &c. at one door, and the lord Aumerle at the other. K. Rich. We did obferve.-Coufin Aumerle, How far brought you high Hereford on his way? Aum. I brought high Hereford, if you call him so, But to the next highway, and there I left him. K. Rich. And, fay, what store of parting tears were fhed? Aum. 'Faith, none by me: except the north-east wind, (Which then blew bitterly against our faces) Awak'd the fleepy rheum; and fo by chance Did grace our hollow parting with a tear. K. Rich. What faid our coufin when you parted with him? Aum. Farewell. And, for my heart difdained that my tongue That words feem buried in my forrow's grave. -yet a true-born Englishman.] Here the firft act ought to end, that between the first and fecond acts there may be time for John of Gaunt to accompany his fon, return, and fall fick. Then the firft fcene of the second act begins with a natural converfation, interrupted by a meffage from John of Gaunt, by which the king is called to vifit him, which vifit is paid in the following fcene. As the play is now divided, more time paffes between the two laft fcenes of the first act, than between the first aft and the fecond. JOHNSON. Marry, |