ACT IV.

SCENE I. The rebel Camp near Shrewsbury.

Enter HOTSPUR, WORCESTER, and DOUGLAS.
Hot. Well said, my noble Scot. If speaking truth,
In this fine age, were not thought flattery,

Such attribution should the Douglas have,
As not a soldier of this season's stamp
Should go so general current through the world.
By Heaven, I cannot flatter; I defy1

The tongues of soothers; but a braver place
In my heart's love hath no man than yourself.
Nay, task me to the word; approve me, lord.
Doug. Thou art the king of honor.

No man so potent breathes upon the ground,
But I will beard him.

Hot.

Do so, and 'tis well.

Enter a Messenger, with letters.

What letters hast thou there?-I can but thank you.
Mess. These letters come from your father,-
Hot. Letters from him! Why comes he not himself?
Mess. He cannot come, my lord; he's grievous sick.
Hot. 'Zounds! how has he the leisure to be sick,
In such a justling time? Who leads his power?
Under whose government come they along?

Mess. His letters bear his mind, not I, my lord.2 Wor. I pr'ythee, tell me, doth he keep his bed? Mess. He did, my lord, four days ere I set forth; And at the time of my departure thence,

He was much feared by his physician.

Wor. I would the state of time had first been whole,

1 Disdain.

2 The folio reads, "not I his mind;" the quarto, 1598, "not I my mind." The emendation is Capell's.

Ere he by sickness had been visited.

His health was never better worth than now.
Hot. Sick now! droop now!

infect

This sickness doth

The very life-blood of our enterprise ;
'Tis catching hither, even to our camp.
He writes me here,-that inward sickness-
And that his friends by deputation could not
So soon be drawn; nor did he think it meet
To lay so dangerous and dear a trust
On any soul removed,' but on his own.
Yet doth he give us bold advertisement,—
That with our small conjunction, we should on,
To see how fortune is disposed to us.
For, as he writes, there is no quailing now;
Because the king is certainly possessed
Of all our purposes. What say you to it?

Wor. Your father's sickness is a maim to us.
Hot. A perilous gash, a very limb lopped off;-
And yet, in faith, 'tis not; his present want
Seems more than we shall find it.—Were it good
To set the exact wealth of all our states
All at one cast? to set so rich a main
On the nice hazard of one doubtful hour?
It were not good; for therein should we read
The very bottom and the soul of hope;
The very list, the very utmost bound
Of all our fortunes.

Doug.

2

'Faith, and so we should;

Where now remains a sweet reversion;
We may boldly spend upon the hope of what
Is to come in.

A comfort of retirement lives in this.

Hot. A rendezvous, a home to fly unto, If that the devil and mischance look big

Upon the maidenhead of our affairs.

Wor. But yet, I would your father had been here.

1 That is, on any less near to himself, or whose interest is remote.

2 Where, for whereas.

3 i. e. "a support to which we may have recourse."

The quality and hair' of our attempt
Brooks no division. It will be thought
By some, that know not why he is away,
That wisdom, loyalty, and mere dislike
Of our proceedings, kept the earl from hence;
And think, how such an apprehension
May turn the tide of fearful faction,
And breed a kind of question in our cause;
For, well you know, we of the offering side
Must keep aloof from strict arbitrement;
And stop all sight-holes, every loop, from whence
The eye of reason may pry in upon us.

This absence of your father's draws a curtain,
That shows the ignorant a kind of fear

Before not dreamt of.

Hot.

You strain too far.

I, rather, of his absence make this use;-
It lends a lustre, and more great opinion,
A larger dare to our great enterprise,

Than if the earl were here: for men must think,
If we, without his help, can make a head,
To push against the kingdom; with his help,
We shall o'erturn it topsy-turvy down.—

Yet all goes well; yet all our joints are whole.

Doug. As heart can think. There is not such a word

Spoke of in Scotland, as this term3 of fear.

Enter SIR RICHARD VERNON.

Hot. My cousin Vernon! welcome, by my soul. Ver. 'Pray God, my news be worth a welcome, lord The earl of Westmoreland, seven thousand strong, Is marching hitherwards; with him, prince John. Hot. No harm. What more? Ver.

And further, I have learned,

1 Hair was anciently used, metaphorically, for the color, complexion, or

nature of a thing.

2 The assailing side.

3 The folio reads "dream of fear."

The king himself in person is set forth,
Or hitherwards intended speedily,
With strong and mighty preparation.

Hot. He shall be welcome too. Where is his son, The nimble-footed,' mad-cap prince of Wales, And his comrades, that daffed the world aside, And bid it pass?

Ver.

All furnished, all in arms,
All plumed like estridges that with the wind
Bated, like eagles having lately bathed; 2
Glittering in golden coats, like images;
As full of spirit as the month of May,
And gorgeous as the sun at midsummer;
Wanton as youthful goats, wild as young bulls.
I saw young Harry, with his beaver on,
His cuisses on his thighs, gallantly armed,-
Rise from the ground like feathered Mercury,
And vaulted with such ease into his seat,
As if an angel dropped down from the clouds,

1 It is recorded of the prince, that "he was passing swift in running." 2 This is the reading of all the old copies, which Hanmer altered to

“All plumed like estridges, and with the wind
Bating like eagles," &c.

Johnson changed it thus:

"All plumed like estridges, that wing the wind;
Bated like eagles," &c.

This reading had been adopted by Malone and Steevens. But if a clear sense can be deduced from the passage as it stands, no conjectural alteration of the text should be admitted. The meaning may be this:-"The prince and his comrades were all furnished, all in arms, all plumed: like estridges (ostriches) that bated (i. e. flutter or beat) the wind with their wings; like eagles having lately bathed." Bating, or to bate, in falconry, is the unquiet fluttering of a hawk-to beat the wing (batter l'ale, Ital.. All birds bate, i. e. flutter, beat, or flap their wings to dry their feathers after bathing; and the mode in which the ostrich uses its wings, to assist itself in running with the wind, is of this character; it is a fluttering or a flapping, not a flight. Bated refers both to the flapping of the plumes, and of the wings of the ostrich; the plumage of that bird is displayed to more advantage when its wings are in motion, than when at rest; and hence the propriety of representing the feathers of the helmets flouting the air to the plumage of the ostrich when its wings were in motion, or when it "bated the air, like eagles lately bathed."

3 The beaver of a helmet was a movable piece, which lifted up or down to enable the wearer to drink or take breath more freely. It is frequently, though improperly, used to express the helmet itself.

VOL. III.

67

To turn and wind a fiery Pegasus,

And witch the world with noble horsemanship.

Hot. No more, no more; worse than the sun in

March,

This praise doth nourish agues. Let them come;
They come like sacrifices in their trim,
And to the fire-eyed maid of smoky war,
All hot, and bleeding, will we offer them.
The mailed Mars shall on his altar sit,
Up to the ears in blood. I am on fire,
To hear this rich reprisal is so nigh,

1

And yet not ours.-Come, let me take my horse,
Who is to bear me, like a thunderbolt,

Against the bosom of the prince of Wales.
Harry to Harry shall, hot horse to horse,

Meet, and ne'er part, till one drop down a corse.
O that Glendower were come!

Ver.

There is more news.

I learned in Worcester, as I rode along,

He cannot draw his power this fourteen days.

Doug. That's the worst tidings that I hear of yet. Wor. Ay, by my faith, that bears a frosty sound. Hot. What may the king's whole battle reach unto ? Ver. To thirty thousand.

Hot.

Forty let it be; My father and Glendower being both away, The powers of us may serve so great a day. Come, let us make a muster speedily; Doomsday is near; die all, die merrily.

Doug. Talk not of dying; I am out of fear Of death, or death's hand, for this one half year.

1 The quartos of 1598 and 1599 read taste.

[Exeunt.