The rich advantage of good exercise 9 ? To your direction. Hubert, what news with you? The image of a wicked heinous fault What we fo fear'd he had a charge to do. Sal. The colour of the king doth come and go, good exercife? In the middle ages the whole edu cation of princes and noble youths confifted in martial exercifes, &c. Thefe could not be easily had in a prifon, where mental improvements might have been afforded as well as any where else; but this fort of education never entered into the thoughts of our active, warlike, but illiterate nobility. PERCY. Between his purpose and his confcience,] Between his conscious nefs of guilt, and his defign to conceal it by fair profeffions. JOHNSON. 2 Like heralds 'twixt two dreadful battles fet:] But heralds are not planted, I prefume, in the midft betwixt two lines of battle; though they, and trumpets, are often fent over from party to party, to propofe terms, demand a parley, &c. I have therefore ventured to read, fent. THEOBALD. This Dr. Warburton has followed without much advantage; fet is not fixed, but only placed; heralds must be fer between battles in order to be sent between them. JOHNSON. Pemb. Pemb. And when it breaks 3, I fear, will iffue thence The foul corruption of a fweet child's death. K. John. We cannot hold mortality's strong hand:Good lords, although my will to give is living, The fuit which you demand is gone, and dead. He tells us, Arthur is deceas'd to-night. Sal. Indeed, we fear'd his fickness was paft cure. Pemb. Indeed, we heard how near his death he was, Before the child himself felt he was fick. This must be anfwer'd, either here, or hence. K. John. Why do you bend fuch folemn brows on me? Think you, I bear the shears of destiny? Have I commandment on the pulse of life? That blood, which ow'd the breadth of all this ifle, Enter a messenger. A fearful eye thou haft: where is that blood, So foul a fky clears not without a storm: 3 And when it breaks,] This is but an indelicate metaphor, taken from an impoftumated tumour. JOHNSON. Mef. 1 Mef. From France to England 4. Never fuch a power For any foreign preparation, Was levy'd in the body of a land. The copy of your speed is learn'd by them: prepare, K. John. O, where hath our intelligence been drunk? Mef. My liege, her ear Is ftopt with duft: the firft of April dy'd Three days before: but this from rumour's tongue K. John. With-hold thy speed, dreadful occafion! K. John. Thou haft made me giddy Enter Faulconbridge and Peter of Pomfret. To your proceedings? Do not feek to stuff Faul. But, if you be afraid to hear the worst, 4 From France to England.-] The king afks how all goes in France, the meffenger catches the word goes, and anfwers, that whatever is in France goes now into England. JOHNSON. Aloft Aloft the flood; and can give audience K. John. Thou idle dreamer, wherefore did'ft thou fay fo? Peter. Fore-knowing, that the truth will fall out fo. K. John. Hubert, away with him; imprison him; And on that day at noon, whereon he fays I fhall yield up my crown, let him be hang'd. For I must use thee. O gentle cousin, [Exit Hubert, with Peter. Hear'ft thou the news abroad, who are arriv'd? Faulc. The French, my lord; men's mouths are full of it: Befides, I met lord Bigot and lord Salisbury, K. John. Gentle kinfman, go And thrust thyself into their companies: 'Deliver him to safety,cuftody. JOHNSON. VOL. V. -] That is, Give bim into fafe F Faulc. Faulc. I will feck them out. K. John. Nay, but make hafte: the better foot before. O, let me have no fubject enemies, Some meffenger betwixt me and the peers; Mef. With all my heart, my lege.. K. John. My mother dead! Enter Hubert. [Exit. Hub. My lord, they fay, 2 five moons were seen tonight: Four fixed; and the fifth did whirl about The other four, in wond'rous motion. K. John. Five moons? Hub. Old men and beldams, in the streets, Do prophefy upon it dangerously: Young Arthur's death is common in their mouths: And, when they talk of him, they shake their heads,. And he, that fpeaks, doth gripe the hearer's wrift; With wrinkled brows, with nods, with rolling eyes.. 2 fee moons as were feen to-night, &c.] This incident is méntioned by few of our hiftorians: I have met with it no where, but in Matthew of Wiminfler and Polydore Virgil, with a fmall alteration. Theie kind of appearances were more comimen about that time, than either before or fince. Dr. GRAY.. This incident is likewife mentioned in the old copy of the play. STEEVENS. The |