KING HENRY THE EIGHTH. ACT I. SCENE I.-London. An Antechamber in the Enter the DUKE OF NORFOLK, at one door; at the other, the DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM, and the LORD ABERGAVENNY. Buck. Good morrow, and well met.' done,2 Since last we saw in France? a Nor. How have you I thank your grace: Healthful; and ever since a fresh admirer 3 • That is, since last we saw each other; so in Cymbeline, Act I., Imogen, taking leave of Posthumus, says, 'When shall we see again?' For accounts of Norfolk and Buckingham, see Life of Wolsey, notes B and F. I have been an unfailing admirer; my admiration has been as lively as when freshly excited. 1 The expressions 'good morrow' and 'well met' are here used in the manner of interjections; they are, however, abbreviations of 'I bid (or wish) you good morrow,' and 'you are well met.' 2 Modern usage does not recognise this preterite form; the idiom now occurs only in the present tense, 'how do you do?' 3 'Healthful; and ever since a fresh admirer:' these words are not, grammatically, a direct answer to the inquiry, 'How have you done?' but have their construction completed by supplying the words, 'I have been.' Sometimes, however, the verb do seems grammatically implied in such answers; as, in Act IV., when to Katharine's inquiry, 'How does his highness?' Capucius answers, 'Madam, in good health;' and she then says, 'So may he ever do.' Stayed1 me a prisoner in my chamber, when Nor. 'Twixt Guynes and Arde: a I was then present; saw them salute on horseback; Beheld them, when they lighted, how they clung In their embracement, as they grew together;b Which had they 2, what four throned ones could have weighed Such a compounded one? © Buck. All the whole & time 3 I was my chamber's prisoner. • Guisnes and Ardres, two towns of Picardy. The valley between them was the scene of the famous 'Field of the Cloth of Gold,' in June, 1520. (See Life of Wolsey, sec. 9.) As if they constituted one person. This use of as=as if, or as though, is common in our older writers. с What four other monarchs combined could have: matched this combination of two? a 'All the whole time:' the redundancy here is for the sake of emphasis. Buckingham, however, was present at the interview; for Hall, in his Chronicle, represents the French king as being, on two occasions during the festivity, 'conducted forth' in the valley of Andren by Cardinal Wolsey and the Duke of Buckingham. The absence of Buckingham, therefore, was probably feigned by the dramatist, to make an opportunity for Norfolk's animated description 1 Stayed is the past form of stay, as a verb transitive or passive; staid that of stay, as a verb intransitive. • Which had they=which if they had. The pronominal import of the relative which is to represent the expression grown together, understood; the sense being, and if they had grown together.' Which is an objective case governed by had. (See Hunter's 'TextBook of English Grammar,' p. 105, sec. 1.) s Time, objective to through, understood. (See Gram., 114, 8.) Nor. Then you lost The view of earthly glory: Men might say, Till this time pomp was single, but now married Became the next day's master, till the last b Made former wonders its1: To-day, the French,c of the grand display; that description being derived from the minute account given by Hall, who was himself an eye-witness. a Pomp was, until this time, what may now be called simplicity; but, through the ardent emulation of the French and English, it has been raised far above its former self. Each day successively became a prompter (suggested some new splendours) to the next, till the last day presented a full display of the wondrous glories thus accumulated. The festivity lasted a fortnight. • The continuation of Norfolk's animated description may be interpreted as follows:-One day the French, all glittering with ornament, all covered with gold, like heathen gods [rather than human beings], outshone the English; and the next day the English made Britain, in their persons, display the gorgeousness of India; every man as he stood looked like a mine of treasure. Their dwarfish pages were gilded all over, like figures of cherubim. The fine ladies too, not used to toil, almost sweated under the weight of dress and ornament that was upon them; so that the heat they had to endure gave a rosy colour to their cheeks. The masquerade of one night was extolled as a thing not to be equalled, yet that of the next made it comparatively insignificant and poor. The two kings, though equal in lustre, were called one superior, the other inferior, according as one chanced to present himself alone, the one in sight 1 Its. Shakspeare usually employed the old neuter possessive his; as for instance, a little farther on, where Buckingham says, 'the office did distinctly his full function.' Its does not once occur in our English Bible. (See Gram. 46, note; see also Trench's 'English, Past and Present,' index word its; and Craik's 'English of Shakspeare,' p. 91.) Its is here used as a possessive pronoun, governed in the objective by made. (See Gram. 110, 3.) All clinquant, all in gold, like heathen gods, Beyond thought's compass; that former fabulous story, being always the one most admired; and when both were seen together, it was said the spectators saw only one, and no person attempting to distinguish them could venture a comparison. When these suns, as they were styled, had issued, by means of their heralds, the challenge to fight with any noble spirit who would come forward, they performed feats beyond what could have been imagined, so that the fabled exploits of ancient times, being now seen to be possible enough, gained credit-so that even the romantic story of Sir Bevis was believed. 1 Painting, noun nominative, = a means of painting. 2 Now now, used instead of now- - then; so we frequently find oror for either — -or. 3 Him is used here as a more emphatic form of the pronoun, instead of the nominative absolute he:- he who was in eye being still he who was in praise. ♦ Both, a pronominal expression, nominative absolute. Being now seen possible enough, got credit,— Buck. O, you go far. Nor. As I belong to worship, and affect b In honour honesty, the tract of everything Would by a good discourser lose some life, Which action's self was tongue to. Buck.c All was royal; To the disposing of it nought rebelled; a Sir Bevis of Southampton was a prodigy of strength and valour, who lived about the time of the Norman Conquest. His famous exploit of subduing the giant Ascapard, whom he afterwards took into his service, is referred to in 2 Henry VI., Act. II. Sc. 3, where Horner exclaims:-'Peter, have at thee with a downright blow, as Bevis of Southampton fell upon Ascapart.' Another of this hero's feats was the destruction of the fire-drake, or fiery dragon, that infested the neighbourhood of Cologne. Camden, in his 'Britannia,' says, 'while the monks endeavoured to extol Bevis by legendary tales, they have obscured and drowned his truly noble exploits.' In the romance of Sir Bevis, the hero, mounted on his famous steed Arundel, and armed with his wonderful sword Morglay, is represented as uniformly victorious in the most formidable contests. (See 'Sir Bevis of Hamtoun, A Metrical Romance, Printed at Edinburgh, 1838, for the Maitland Club;' or 'Ellis's Specimens of Early English Metrical Romances,' Bohn's edition, 1848.) As I belong to the rank of honour, and in honour desire to be honest, every part of the procedure would lose, even in the language of an eloquent narrator, some of that spirit which the reality itself expressed. • Theobald, Warburton, and some other critics, imagined that the first half of the passage here assigned to Buckingham must have been intended by the poet to belong to the preceding speaker. Theobald says, 'Buckingham could not with any propriety say this, for he wanted information as to the magnificence, having kept his chamber with an ague during the solemnity.' The old copies of Shakspeare, however, divide the text as we have here presented it, and we venture to suppose that Buckingham is trying to explain |