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ssage quoted by Theobald from the _Knight of the Burning Pestle_ is an imitation. If it be chargeable with any fault, it is with plagiarism, not with sarcasm. "Henry V." Act i. sc. 2. Westmoreland's speech:-- "They know your _grace_ hath cause, and means, and might; So hath your _highness_; never King of England Had nobles richer," &c. Does "grace" mean the king's own peculiar domains and legal revenue, and "highness" his feudal rights in the military service of his nobles?--I have sometimes thought it possible that the words "grace" and "cause" may have been transposed in the copying or printing;-- "They know your cause hath grace," &c. What Theobald meant, I cannot guess. To me his pointing makes the passage still more obscure. Perhaps the lines ought to be recited dramatically thus:-- "They know your Grace hath cause, and means, and might:-- So _hath_ your Highness--never King of England _Had_ nobles richer," &c. He breaks off from the grammar and natural order from earnestness, and in order to give the meaning more passionately. _Ib._ Exeter's speech:-- "Yet that is but a _crush'd_ necessity." Perhaps it may be "crash" for "crass" from _crassus_, clumsy; or it may be "curt," defective, imperfect: anything would be better than Warburton's "'scus'd," which honest Theobald, of course, adopts. By the by, it seems clear to me that this speech of Exeter's properly belongs to Canterbury, and was altered by the actors for convenience. Act iv. sc. 3. King Henry's speech:-- "We would not _die_ in that man's company That fears his fellowship to die with us." Should it not be "live" in the first line? _Ib._ sc. 5.-- "_Const._ _O diable!_ _Orl._ _O seigneur! le jour est perdu, tout est perdu!_ _Dan._ _Mort de ma vie!_ all is confounded, all! Reproach and everlasting shame Sit mocking in our plumes!--_O meschante fortune!_ Do not run away!" Ludicrous as these introductory scraps of French appear, so instantly followed by good, nervous mother-English, yet they are judicious, and produce the impression which Shakespeare intended,--a sudden feeling struck at once on the ears, as well as the eyes, of the audience, that "here come the French, the baffled French braggards!"--And this will appear still more judicious, when we reflect on the scanty apparatus of distinguishing dresses in Shakespeare's tyring-room. "Henry VI.--Part I." Act i. sc. 1. Bedford's speech:--
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