In the prior post on English histories, we noted that the gardener’s comparison of commonwealth to gardens in Richard II derives from two passages of two different works of North: Plutarch’s Lives and The Dial of Princes: Notice that in the above exchange, North’s fatness … of the soil refers to its fertility—and, as withContinue reading “Henry IV Worries that Prince Hal Has Vices Like the “Fattest Soil” Has Weeds”