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VII
Since the evidence, then, points clearly to the use of Q as copy or basis for F, is there anything to determine what procedure was followed? Was the copy simply consulted, or was it physically amended, or was it transcribed, or was there a blend of more than one of these methods?
The use of two quartos seems to indicate amendment or correction, and the facility of using both recto and verso of a quarto leaf when difficulty was encountered. Marginal (including possibly interlinear) correction there certainly seems to have been. This was on the whole feasible. Many quarto pages could have been collated with an authoritative manuscript and corrected without much trouble, and would provide copy no worse than an ordinary corrected proof; for example, of the first two quarto signatures—14 pages of text—only two, B1v and B4v, would be rather crowded after correction. The main difficulty would arise from Q omissions, passages to be inserted in the Q copy. Here it is worth noting that, in general, there was more blank space on the Q page than is usually realized. As the photographs reproduced below will confirm, there was often room for ten or a dozen lines to be inserted, not to mention minor corrections. No doubt some of the smaller insertions would be made on the Q page; the longer or more involved could be written on slips of paper and attached to the page, or included as separate leaves; or they might even be set from the manuscript itself—though this might raise other difficulties. The top half of E1r (of Q2), given below (plate VI), is an example of the lighter type of correction; the lower half illustrates some of the relatively few more difficult stretches.
It is by such a process of correction that many F errors, the existence of which has already been recognized on literary grounds (in, e. g. H. T. Price, The Text of Henry V, 1920), may, and, in some cases, must, have originated. The test is to edit the quarto as the F printers may be presumed to have done, and watch the errors arising in the process. Sample pages are given below. As far as possible, illustrations are drawn from the Q2 copy, since its use, and the evidence for its use, are scarcer (because of its greater conformity with Q1) than for Q3, and Q3 has been amply illustrated above.
(a) Excessive deletion:
-
Q3
Bar.
Good morrow ancient Pistoll. heere comes ancient Pistoll, I prethee Nim be quiet.
Nim.
How do you my host?
-
F
Bar.
Heere comes Ancient Pistoll and his wife: good Corporall be patient heere. How now mine Hoaste Pistoll?
II.i.26-27
That the corrector sometimes drew an arrow or equivalent pointer from a marginal addition to its position in the text of Q, and seemed (to the compositor) to delete in the process the words printed in its path, is suggested by the proximity of some F omissions to passages where an insertion was necessary. For example:-
- Q3
Well France farewell, newes haue I certainly
That Doll is sicke. One malady of France
- F
Newes haue I that my Doll is dead i'th Spittle of
a malady of France
V.i.75-76
(b) Inadequate deletion:
On a theory of marginal correction, it seems clear that the last two words in the F passage given below are to be explained as superfluous, and their presence due to an oversight after the insertion made at the correct point earlier in the line.
- Q
Pist.
What, dost thou push, thou prickeard cur of Iseland
- F
Pist.
Pish for thee, Island dogge: thou prickeard cur of Island.
II.i.39-40
Another probable example of the same kind, where the Q "and" is superfluous in F, and should have been deleted, is II.ii.13-14:
- Q
My Lord of Cambridge, and my Lord-of
Massham,
And you my gentle Knight, giue me your thoughts,
- F
My Lord of Cambridge, and my kinde Lord of
Masham,
And you my gentle Knight, giue me your thoughts:
Similarly, deletion applied to the wrong one of two identical phrases in two successive lines, and applied, or interpreted, inadequately, seems to be what is needed to explain and smooth out the F tangle:-
-
As many Arrowes loosed seuerall wayes
-
Come to one marke: as many wayes meet in one towne,
I.ii.207-8
-
As many arrowes losed seuerall wayes, fly to one
marke:
-
As many seuerall wayes meete in one Towne:
-
As many arrows, loosed, come to one mark;
-
As many several ways meet in one town;
(c) Errors arising out of transposition:
The corrector seems also to have used single or double arrows or a similar device to indicate transfer or transposition, and sometimes in such a way as to leave the process incomplete or liable to be misinterpreted. At two important points, for example, where editors adopt the Q arrangement, or Q lines omitted by F, a method of inadequate transfer seems to furnish the probable explanation of the F error.
-
Q2
Cla.
Farewell kind Lord, fight valiantly to day,
And yet in truth I do thee wrong,
For thou art made on the true sparkes of honour.
-
F
Bedf.
Farwell good Salisbury, & good luck go with thee:
And yet I doe thee wrong, to mind thee of it,
For thou art fram'd of the firme truth of valour.
Exe.
Farwell kind Lord: fight valiantly to day.
Bedf.
He is as full of Valour as of Kindnesse,
Princely in both.
IV.iii.11-16
-
And say, these wounds I had on Crispins day.
IV.iii.48: The F omission of the Q line
- F line
-
And say, to morrow is S. Crispins day:
46 - [12 lines] 51-63
-
Then shal he strip his sleeues, & shew his scars,
47 -
And say, these wounds I had on Crispins day.
48 -
And Gentlemen in England now a bed,
64
(d) Erroneous incorporation from marginal corrections:
There are two outstanding examples of this:-
[See Plate I]
The resulting F version of this passage reads:-
. . . a Villaine . . . ha's strooke the Gloue which your Maiestie is take out of the Helmet of Alanson.
Will.
My Liege, this was my Gloue, here is the fellow of it: and he that I gaue it to in change, promis'd to weare it in his Cappe: I promis'd to strike him, if he did: I met this man with my Gloue in his Cappe, and I haue been as good as my word.
Flu.
Your Maiestie heare now, sauing your Maiesties Manhood, what an arrant rascally, beggerly, lowsie Knaue it is: I hope your Maiestie is peare me testimonie and witnesse, and will auouchment, that this is the Gloue of Alanson, that your Maiestie is giue me, in your Conscience now.
That this is the gloue.
Soul.
And it please your maiesty,
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