Wipe off the dust that hides our sceptre's gilt, This difference between the two plays may be accounted for by the difference of the materials. Nothing is said in the old play of King John, and very little in Holinshed, of the King's offences; whereas those of Richard are repeatedly set forth. Still, I cannot help observing, though I know not how to account for it, that the dramatist here dwells upon popular grievances, which, in the other play he treats with contempt, though history has certainly handed down John as, not less than Richard, the oppressor of his people. It is, however, true that Shakspeare has, even in this play, not only much of high-flown loyalty and assertion of the sacredness of the kingly character, but some expressions disrespectful to the commons; yet these latter are put into the mouths of the king's favourites,* and the ministers of his maladministration, whom the poet apparently represents as not undeservedly punished.t Bushy. The wavering commons; for their love It does not appear in the play, but it is true, *Act ii. Sc. 3. + Act iii. Sc. 1. that the gentleman who thus treats "the hateful commons," was their Speaker.* The Chroniclet is also followed in the march of Bolingbroke from Ravenspurg to Berkeley Castle, and in his interview with the Duke of York, who soon gave up the notion of opposing him. I suspect too, that York, who, according to our authority, must have been in Bristol ¶ when it fell into the hands of Bolingbroke, did, in fact, negociate with the invader, and preserve a neutrality, but not without a struggle, well described by Shakspeare, between his loyalty and his disgust at the king's misgovernment. 'If I know How, or which way, to order these affairs, Is my kinsman, whom the king hath wrong'd, + Hol. 853. I know not on what authority. Lingard says that Sir Peter Courtenay, Governor of Bristol, gave it up to the Duke of York as Regent, but he gives no authority but Walsingham, who does not bear him out; nor do any of the Chronicles which I have searched. That Sir Peter was Governor of Calais appears in Rymer, viii. 83. ¶ Wals. 554. § Act ii. Sc. 2. L This is addressed to the queen; but Isabel was in truth now a child of eight or nine years old.* We are told that York was more of sportsman than a politician. "When all the lords to council and parliament Went, he would to hunting and also to hawking.”† Shakspeare makes York a doubtful adherent of Henry, even at a later period. I do not know whether there is any warrant for this, except in his original hesitation. Johnsong thinks that the next scene, between the Earl of Salisbury|| and "a Captain," is out of its place. The scene has little interest, and the question is unimportant, but the transposition which the Doctor suggests would be more conformable to * Bosw., 53. She is correctly placed with Bushy and Green, but her residence was not in the king's palace, but at Wallingford Castle. Another anachronism consists in mentioning now the death of the widowed Duchess of Gloucester, who died after the accession of Henry. Plashy was Gloucester's seat in Essex. + Hardyng, p. 340. § Bosw. 86. At Flint, in Act iii. Sc. 3. || John de Montacute, third Earl of that family. Collins says, but Sir Egerton Brydges denies, that the present Montagus are descended from his brother. If so, there must be a legal claim to the old earldom; but it was given to the Nevilles, descendants in the female line. Salisbury was certainly an adherent of Richard. Holinshed. The withering of the bay-trees is in Holinshed, as commentators have observed. I should scarcely mention this scene but for a line in it which I remember to have been quoted by Mr. Canning. "Rich men look sad, and ruffians dance and leap,— The one in fear to lose what they enjoy, The other to enjoy by rage and war.” Mr. Canning quoted, in the House of Commons,* the first of these lines, but he gave it thus "Good men look pale, while ruffians dance and leap ;” and, comparing the state of the country at two different periods, he asked,—" was not the ruffian now abashed, and did not the good man feel confident in his security ?" Mr. Canning made his quotation, as he often did, without recollecting where the passage was to be found; and employed me, the next morning, to search it out for him; a frequent and most agreeable diversion from my usual employment, which I remember with great delight. When he found that it was property, and not virtue, which had been put in jeopardy, he rejoiced that no Radical had taken advantage of his misquotation: but Radicals, perhaps, are not readers of Shakspeare. * July 11, 1817. Canning's Speeches, iv. 24. In the condemnation of the king's two favourites, Bushy and Green, the Chronicle* is followed; for if Shakspeare exercises upon them a summary jurisdiction, Holinshed reports that they were arraigned before the constable and marshal; a proceeding, I apprehend, which (even if it implied the exercise of martial law) was equally inconsistent with the ordinary forms of legal judgment.† Shakspeare now introduces Richard at Barkloughly Castle in Wales, accompanied by the Bishop of Carlisle and the Duke of Aumerle:‡ here he is joined by Salisbury, who brings the mournful intelligence that the army which, on landing from Ireland, he had collected in Wales, had dispersed themselves, and some had even joined Bolingbroke, upon a false report of Richard's death. This is all according to Holinshed,§ and it is *Hol., 853. + Walsingham says they were "statim ad clamorem communium decapitati," p. 38. Scroop, Earl of Wiltshire, is mentioned as beheaded with the other two; and Shakspeare afterwards alludes to him, as in the same predicament, though he has omitted him in this place. Eldest son of the Duke of York, Earl of Rutland and Duke of Albemarle. § And see in Arch. xx., 70, the French metrical history of the deposition of Ric. II., written by a contemporary, with the valuable notes of the Rev. John Webb; this may probably be deemed the best authority for the events of this time. |
