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one in Peele's Edward I. (p. 392) where the Queen "longs to give your Grace a boxe on the ear," and does it. It may have been introduced by him into the play, but there is little evidence of any hand other than Shakespeare's in either play in this scene, but much of his. The improvements are very considerable, and the eliminations are noticeable, as "Somerset . . . Regent over the French" twice in four lines (Q) at the end of scene. There is revising and inserting in these first three scenes showing the Cardinal's implacable hate for Gloucester (Humphrey) which does not appear in Contention. This is what would be natural in Shakespeare, whether author of Contention or not, who had constructed 1 Henry VI. A later play than Contention.

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I. iv. 22, 23. It thunders and lightens . . . spirit. Adsum." Peele has similar arranging in The Old Wives' Tale where Sacrapant is the magician: "Re-enter Sacrapant: it lightens and thunders: the second Brother falls down [Jourdain grovels on the earth here]. . . . Sacrapant . . . Adeste, dæmons! Enter two Furies (p. 450, b). . . . 'It thunders and lightens.' Again at p. 454, b. But Marlowe was familiar with all such machinery, and to him the passages in Q (that are completely altered) are due, Peele's modelling remaining and being even extended in the present play. See under "Marlowe " in this Introduction.

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1. iv. 16. silent of the night. See above at 1. ii. 82-86. This speech is Shakespeare's, the variation of the good expression of Peele's is quaint, but both hands are at work. Not in Q.

I. iv. 17. The time of night when Troy was set on fire. Compare Peele, Tale of Troy (p. 557, b): "It was the time when midnight's sleep and rest With quiet pause the town of Troy possess'd. . . . Now Troy as was foretold began to burn.” Not in Q.

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See above at Jack Straw (p. 395).

1. iv. 38. I hardly can endure. Similarly a spirit (angel of providence) says to Neronis in Peele's Sir Clyomon (p. 521, a): “Let desperation die in thee-I may not here remain. [Ascends.]" In Q:"I must hence again."

1. iv. 75. A sorry breakfast for my Lord Protector. Peele, Edward I. (p. 398, a): "By Gis, fair lords, ere many days be past England shall give this Robin Hood his breakfast"; and (p. 407, a): "Ah, gentle Richard, many a hot breakfast haue we been at together!" Not in Q.

With regard to these "blind prophecies," and their frequent use by Peele, see note at I. iv. 62. And also above at Jack Straw "(when Adam delved)." This repetition here in identical words side by side is not so inartistic in Q on account of the interposition there of the next scene (II. i.).

ACT II.

II. i. 24.

Tantane animis cœlestibus ira? Peele might have suggested this quotation; he used it in Speeches to the Queen at Theobalds (1591). It was used also in Speeches to the Queen at Sudely (1592). Nichols, III. 137.

I attribute this scene in both plays wholly to Shakespeare under Peele's guidance with regard to stage-directions. A few touches of his hand (perhaps) appear in illustrations from him, but none of weight. Note sing-song end-paused lines at the end of the scene.

Henry's holiness begins to be attended to here, as compared with Q. See also in last Act at 1. iii. 54-59. And in this at 11. i. 66. And so throughout. See . ii. 232, IV. iv. 35, etc.

11. ii. Chiefly genealogical. Shakespeare had a bias for royal pedigree-work, and down to Warwick's last speech in Q 1, the readings are almost identical with some corrections of genealogy in Folio (see note at 1. 4). This part also connects us with 1 Henry VI. (11. iv. and iv. v.). Warwick's speech of ten lines (53-62) becomes two lines in 2 Henry VI., and is replaced by one to Buckingham by Shakespeare. This is the sort of place the scent gets warm. It is a bit of rant by Peele that is expunged, at least most likely by Peele, but certainly not by Shakespeare. See note at II. ii. 78. Shakespeare closes the scene. II. iii. Down to the entrance of the Armourer, it is Peele's in Q, re-written very carefully by Shakespeare in 2 Henry VI., and extended from forty to sixty lines. One of the rejected lines "For sorrowes teares hath gript my aged heart" (an allusion to "blood-drinking sighs," etc.) is recalled in 3 Henry VI. 1. iv. 171. Peele uses the noun similarly "Winding about his heart with mortal gripes" (David and Bethsabe, (p. 475, a) and elsewhere. "Fountains of mine eyes" is not again in Shakespeare, and is properly Peele's unless it belongs earlier to Kyd. "O eyes no eyes but fountains of my tears" (Spanish Tragedy). But I am wholly unable to separate Peele from some of Kyd's accepted work (i.e. Soliman and Perseda). See again David and Bethsabe (p. 475, a): "David's soul dissolves, Lading the fountains of his drowned eyes.” We then have depart twice in four lines (" depart away" occurs in Romeo and Juliet). Humphrey's succeeding speech is altogether in Peele's manner of harping on a string or two, as willing. . . thine, as erst . . . mine, and even as willing. leave it, as others . . . receive it." This is left standing.

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We are surely indebted to Peele also for the interesting stage instructions prefixed to the trial by combat. In this scene the Queen's “manliness" is developed (1. 28). In the next her hatred of Gloucester (iv. 52) receives attention as compared with Q.

II. iv. I. II. iv. 6. "Ten is the houre," etc. Hard at hand, with reference to time, occurs here in Q. It is a favourite expression (referring to place) with Peele, and occurs in Marlowe's Tamburlaine (Dyce, p. 15, b). But the Shakespearian use in Othello, III. i. 267. The opening words, the note of the scene, are added by Shakespeare in 2 Henry VI. On the whole evidence the opening of the scene is Shakespeare's in Q, and is Shakespeare's improved in 2 Henry VI. But there is no need to dwell upon other writers in this pathetic scene, which is wholly Shakespeare's in both plays. Plenty of Shakespearian touches occur. Eleanor's speeches after Gloucester leaves (in Q) are much improved in the revision, and

See note at "mourning cloaks" (stage-direction).

as usual commonplace writing has been deleted, whether bits of Peele's work or his own.

ACT III.

In this Act one of the noticeable results in the reformation of the old play is the production of harmony by the alteration, often, of a single word or so, from lines that won't scan to lines that will, or from lines that will to others that will more musically. One of the broadest Shakespearian results. Take 111. ii. 275: "But all the honour Salisbury hath got," and sound it with "But all the honour Salisbury hath won." This is an extreme example in delicacy. Shakespeare put out this use of got elsewhere, in "get the day."

III. i.

There are a few expressions of Peele's in the revised play, as, "heart unspotted " (III. i. 100); the metaphor of "choking weeds" (111. i. 31), etc. But none of any consequence. "Thrice-noble " is here the property of 2 Henry VI., not of Q. "It skills not," noted on at Jack Straw above, is also inserted, and not in Q. "Now or never” (111. i. 331), and "make commotion" (III. i. 358) are also used earlier by Peele (the latter in Jack Straw, see note). All of these, I believe, belong only to 2 Henry VI. (not Q). The whole scene is Shakespeare's written lightly for a shorter play and expanded fully by the same writer. At II. 154-160 certain changes of epithets to Beaufort and Suffolk, seem to be merely capricious.

III. ii. Note the careful stage-instructions in Q, at the opening. The same conclusion as in the last scene, holds good of authorship in this, but there are even fewer signs of Peele in either play. See note at "The commons like an angry hive of bees" (125) with parallel from Jack Straw, and at "breathless corpse" (132); "three days space" (295); "chalky cliffs" (101); "grove of cypress trees" (323); "serpent's hiss" (326). All from the finished play. Shakespeare develops greatly in this scene. He has made Warwick and Margaret all his own no matter who started them. None of the suspected ones could have approached the varied and powerful language in Margaret's and Suffolk's dialogue; both of which abound in unmistakable Shakespearianisms (as my notes amply demonstrate), not a few of which are also in the earlier Quarto form. The Quarto affords another "thrice" adjective, "thrice-famous" altered to "thrice-famed" (157). There is hardly a line in it to challenge, and hardly a line not accepted for the final play. Scene iii. is all Shakespeare's. The alterations from one text to the other are unimportant in any respect other than that of gracing the old and careless text, which contains some sad corruptions, if metre was considered. There are signs of Peele in the short original. See note at "gripe" replaced by "grin" (24); "Forbear to" (31); and the last line "see his funerals be performde" is illustrated by the last line in Peele's Battle of Alcazar : "So to perform the prince's funerals." We may allot this part of Act III., and only this part (in Q), to Peele. As the play progresses so does Peele stand aside in important situations. Note in Scene iii., the excision of a patch of Oh's from the final play.

C

A like experience occurred

in Love's Labour's Lost. Note corrupt readings in Q (as at III. ii. 197). Shakespeare's own work, corrected by Shakespeare.

ACT IV.

Iv. i. Opened by Shakespeare, and the opening seven lines awkwardly tacked on to Peele's opening, for I think he wrote this scene down to Suffolk's exit in Q. The stage direction here is both explicit and important since it gives us Walter (Water) Whitmore's name. Note too the prophecies and the quibbling on "Pole" (70) as in Jack Straw (see note). But the revision is Shakespeare's work, although a few touches or rememberings of Peele occur, as in “gaudy day” (1); "name and port of” (19); "senseless winds" (77). He is probably, the borrower (in Q) of Greene's Abradas, altered to Bargulus by Shakespeare. See an odd note at the end of iv. i. on the Quarto expression "Come let's go." The omission of the ship passage (Q) “like as it were a fight at sea from the final play is interesting. Possibly it was found too difficult of stage management. In this scene The Contention supplies the Folio with a missing line (48). The same thing happens a couple of times in Part III.

Iv. ii. 8. 'twas never merry world . . . since gentlemen came up. Peele, Jack Straw (Hazlitt's Dodsley, v. 382). "But merrily with the world it went, When men ate berries of the hawthorn tree." From Grafton (see note at 1. 68).

IV. ii. 18. labouring men. you in, you labouring slaves."

Peele, Old Wives' Tale (p. 453, b) “Go get

IV. ii. 61. his coat is of proof. Peele, David and Bethsabe (p. 465, a) : "He puts on armour of his honour's proof."

IV. ii. 133. Adam was a gardener. Peele, Jack Straw (p. 381): “When Adam delved and Eve span."

IV. ii. 145. His son am I, deny it if you can.

Peele, Old Wives' Tale (p. 455, b): "are not you the man, sir, deny it if you can, sir," etc.

In Q. IV. ii. 151. That speaks he knows not what. Peele, Edward I. (p. 413, a): "Bereav'd her sense and memory at once, so that she spoke she knew nor how nor what." Not in Q.

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IV. ii. 182. 'tis for liberty. Peele, Jack Straw (p. 399): we will have wealth and liberty." [Cry all: Wealth and Liberty !] King. "It is enough. . . You shall have liberty."

The parallelism with Peele's work here lies more in the assumption that Jack Straw was written by Peele, connected with the fact that Shakespeare makes use of Jack Straw's rebellion from the chroniclers, as shown in my notes. Two passages in this scene in Q, here (47-52 and 77-82) are transferred to Scene vii. in the final play (6-11, 8, 9). But there is little omitted or altered from one scene to the other: the difference lies mainly in extension. There is, however, one suggestive

X

little point. In Q Dick Butcher is knighted before Stafford's entry, by Cade at the same time as he knights himself, to encourage him to the fight, and the result is satisfactory. This little structural detail need not have been rejected. It is quite in Peele's way since he celebrates knighthood and knights and orders in and out of season. Peele's sympathy is much more with the people (as in Jack Straw); he does not address them as "filth and scum of Kent, marked for the gallows."

IV. iii. 7, 8. a hundred lacking one. Peele, Old Wives' Tale (p. 451, b). In Q.

See note at passage, from

IV. iii. 16. break open the gaols and let out the prisoners. Peele, Jack Straw (396): "they have . . . let out all the prisoners, broke up the Marshalsea and the King's Bench." Not in Q.

This scene is reduced to five lines in Q, that is to say to Cade's single speech (11. 3-8). The development as well as the original may be by Peele. But the belief grows that they worked out Cade together in both plays.

IV. iv. 10-12. I myself. . . will parley with Jack Cade. In Peele's Jack Straw (391). Richard II. says: "Tell them that we ourselves will come to them" by Sir John Morton's advice: "Thus would I deal with these rebellious men: I would find time to parley with some of them." It appears from New Eng. Dict. the verb was not common before 1600. In Q Shakespeare opened this scene with ten added lines, calculated to make Margaret's character more objectionable, not to say abominable.

IV. iv. 40.

"Ah, were the Duke of Suffolk now alive" is found lower down in Scene ix. (Q). Unaccountable change.

IV. V. 10. gather head. Peele, Battle of Alcazar (p. 432, a): “The
Spaniard ready to embark himself, Here gathers to a head." The
expression has occurred already in Q. See note.
In Q.

IV. vii. 1, 2. pull down the Savoy; others to the Inns of Court: down with them. This from the 1381 rebellion. The Inns of Court are referred to in Jack Straw: "We'll not leave a man of law, Nor a paper worth a haw," etc. (394). In Q.

IV. vii. 9-11. John's and Smith's asides should have remained where they were in Scene ii. in Q. They belong there from 6 to 12. See note. IV. vii. 14. burn all the records of the realm. See extract from Fabyan at IV. vii. 1. Peele, Jack Straw (401); "Enter Tom Miller to burn papers. I have made a bonfire here Of a great many bonds and indentures, And obligations: faith I have been amongst The ends of the Court, and among the records . . . in the Guildhall." In Q.

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IV. vii. 18, 19. all things shall be in common. And above at ii. 68, All the realm shall be common. Peele, Jack Straw (382): “it were better to have this community, Than to have this difference in degree." In Q (in first quotation). This scene.

IV. vii. 120-122. tribute. . . maidenhead. Peele, Jack Straw (beginning). See note at passage in text.

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