The first scene of the third act is a storehouse of contemporary
commonplace. Nothing fresher than such stale pot-pourri as the following
is to be gathered up in thin sprinklings from off the dry flat soil. A
messenger informs the French king that he has descried off shore
The proud armado (_sic_) of King Edward's ships;
Which at the first, far off when I did ken,
Seemed as it were a grove of withered pines;
But, drawing on, their glorious bright aspect,
Their streaming ensigns wrought of coloured silk,
Like to a meadow full of sundry flowers,
Adorns the naked bosom of the earth;
and so on after the exactest and therefore feeblest fashion of the Pre-
Marlowites; with equal regard, as may be seen, for grammar and for sense
in the construction of his periods. The narrative of a sea-fight ensuing
on this is pitiable beyond pity and contemptibly beneath contempt.
In the next scene we have a flying view of peasants in flight, with a
description of five cities on fire not undeserving of its place in the
play, immediately after the preceding sea-piece: but relieved by such
wealth of pleasantry as marks the following jest, in which the most
purblind eye will be the quickest to discover a touch of the genuine
Shakespearean humour.
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