King Henry VIII
Act I Sc. 1
“Out of his self-drawing web. Oh! gives us note,
The force of his own merit makes his way.”
So the folio reads. Steevens and Malone read ‘he gives us note,’ and Singer ‘Oh, it gives us note.’ Mr. Collier says, very plausibly, that the ‘Oh’ arose from ‘a being written for he. I read “Out of his self-drawing web—Oh, give it note!”
“A gift that Heaven gives for him, which buys.”
Perhaps ‘for’ should be to.
“A new hell in himself now.—Why the Devil.”
“And his own letters,
The honourable board of Council out,
Must fetch in him he papers.”
‘Papers’ is here evidently a verb, as Pope saw, in the sense of ‘puts on paper’; but we have no other instance of it. Mr. Staunton proposes paupers, a verb equally unknown and still more devoid of meaning here. I cannot regard ‘papers’ as right; yet I know not what to propose in its place. Possibly the original may have been puts there.
“A beggar’s book
Outworths a noble’s blood.”
Collier’s folio reads brood for ‘book,’ and a rime may have been intended.
Sc. 2
“To you that chok’d it.”
‘Chok’d’ is a very bold term in this place; perhaps the word was check’d.
“I am solicited, not by a few, to tell you—
And those of true condition—that your subjects
Are in great grievance.”
It is quite evident something has been lost here.
“That tractable Obedience is a slave.”
For ‘That’ the folio has This.
“There is no primer business.”
‘Business’ is the correction of both Southern and Warburton for baseness of the folio, and is deservedly adopted by most editors.
“What we oft do best,
By sick interpreters, once weak ones, is
Not ours, or not allow’d.”
‘By’ would seem to be here the same as apud or bei, Germ., a sense it sometimes bears (see Index s. v.). Steevens gives instances of ‘once’ in the sense of sometimes; but I should incline to read or or and, with those whom he terms “the modern editors.” I suspect that ‘sick’ may have been such.
“State statues only.—Things done well.”
Perhaps my lord or lord cardinal has been effaced at the end.
“Almost with listening ravish’d, could not find.”
The folio has ‘ravish’d listening.’
“This dangerous conception in this point.”
The first ‘This’ should be perhaps His or The.
“By a vain prophecy of Nicholas Hopkins.”
The folio has Henton, the name of his convent, for ‘Hopkins.’
“Whom after under the confession’s seal.”
The folio reads commission’s; the correction is Theobald’s.
“The monk might be deceiv’d, and that ’twas dangerous for him.”
In the folio it is ‘for this’; Rowe corrected it.
“As he made semblance of his duty he would.”
Sc. 3
“The spavin,
A springhalt reign’d among them.”
For ‘A’ Collier’s folio reads Or; I read And. See on Temp. i. 2.
“For I was spoke to, with Sir Henry Guildford...
This night to be comptrollers.”
I think we should punctuate thus to get rid of the grammatical difficulty. We have precisely such another in 3 Hen. VI. i. 2.
Sc. 4
“My lord Sands.—Yes, if I can make my play.”
“Because they speak no English, thus they prayed me.”