He never did fall off, my sovereign liege,
But by the chance of war: to prove that true,
Needs no more but one tongue for all those wounds,
Those mouthed wounds which valiantly he took,
When on the gentle Severn's sedgy bank."
This "gentle Severn's sedgy bank" is too poetical for Hotspur; but what
shall be said of his description of the river?
"Who then, affrighted with their bloody looks,
Ran fearfully among the trembling reeds,
And hid his crisp head in the hollow bank
Blood-stained with these valiant combatants."
Shakespeare was still too young, too much in love with poetry to confine
himself within the nature of Hotspur. But the character of Hotspur was
so well known that Shakespeare could not long remain outside it. When
the King cuts short the audience with the command to send back the
prisoners, we find the passionate Hotspur again:
"And if the devil come and roar for them,
I will not send them.--I will after straight,
And tell him so: for I will ease my heart,
Although it be with hazard of my head."
The last line strikes a false note; such a reflection throws cold water
on the heat of passion, and that is not intended, for though reproved by
his father Hotspur storms on:
"Speak of Mortimer!
'Zounds! I will speak of him; and let my soul
Want mercy, if I do not join with him...."
The next long speech of Hotspur is mere poetic slush; he begins:
"Nay, then, I cannot blame his cousin king,
That wish'd him on the barren mountains starve...."
and goes on for thirty lines to reprove the conspirators for having put
down "Richard, that sweet lovely rose," and planted "this thorn,
Bolingbroke." This long speech retards the action, obscures the
character of Hotspur, and only shows Shakespeare poetising without a
flash of inspiration. Then comes Hotspur's famous speech about honour:
"By heaven, methinks it were an easy leap,
To pluck bright honour from the pale-faced moon;
Or dive into the bottom of the deep ..."
And immediately afterwards a speech in which his uncontrollable
|