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No night is now with hymn or carol bleft: -
Therefore the moon, the governefs of floods,
Pale in her anger, wafhes all the air,
That rheumatic difeafes do abound:

and Fay were called Fairies, who foon grew to be a mighty people, and conquered all nations. Their eldeft fon Elfin governed America, and the next to him, named Elfinan, founded the city of Cleopolis, which was enclosed with a golden wall by Elfiuine. Hisfon Elfin overcame the Gobbelines; but of all fairies, Elfant was the most renowned, who built Panthea of chryftal. To thefe fucceeded Elfar, who flew two brethren giants; and to him Elfinor, who built a bridge of glass over the fea, the found of which was like thunder. At length Elficleos ruled the Fairy-land with much wifdom, and highly advanced its power and honour: he left two fons, the eldest of which, fair Elferon, died a premature death, his place being fupplied by the mighty Oberon; a prince, whofe "wide memorial'flill remains; who dying left Tanaquil to fucceed him by will, fhe being alfo called Glorian or Gloriana." I tranfcribe this pedigree, merely to prove that in Shakspeare's time the notion of Fairies dying was generally known. REED.

I once in

7 - their winter here; ] Here, in this country. clined to receive the emendation propofed by Mr. Theobald, and adopted by Sir T. Hanmer, their winter cheer; but perhaps alte ration is unnecessary. "Their winter" may mean those sports with which country people are wont to beguile a winter's evening, at the feafon of Chriftmas, which, it appears from the next line was particularly in our author's contemplation:

The wery winter nights reftore the Christmas games,

"And now the fefon doth invite to banquet townish dames." Romeus and Juliet, 1562. MALONE.

8 No night is now with hymn or carol bleft: -] Since the coming of Christianity, this feafon, [winter, in commemoration of the birth of Chrift, has been particularly devoted to feitivity. And to this cuftom, notwithstanding the impropriety, hymn or carol bleft certainly alludes. WARBURTON.

Hymns and carols, in the time of Shakspeare, during the feason of Christmas, were fung every night about the streets, as a pretext for collecting money from houfe to house. STEEVENS,

9 That rheumatick difeafes do abound: ] Rheumatick difeafes fignified in Shakspeare's time, not what we now call rheumatism, but diftillations from the head, catarrhs, &c. So, in a paper entitled "The State of Sir H. Sydney's bodie, &c. Feb. 1567; " Sydney's Memorials, Vol. I. p. 94: he hath verie much diftempered diverfe parts of his bodie, as namely, his hedde, his ftomach, &c.

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--

2

And, thorough this diflemperature, we fee
The feafons alter: hoary headed frofts

and thereby is always fubje& to coughes, diftillations, and other rumatick difeafes." MALONE.

Therefore the moon, the governess of floods, &c.] The repeated adverb therefore, throughout this fpeech, I fuppofe to have conftant reference to the firft time when it is ufed. All these irregularities of season happened in consequence of the disagreement between the king and queen of the fairies, and not in confequence of each other. Ideas crouded faft on Shakspeare; and as he committed them to paper, he did not attend to the diftance of the leading objec from which they took their rife. Mr. Malone concurs with me on this occafion.

That the feftivity and hospitality attending Christmas, decreased, was the fubje&t of complaint to many of our ludicrous writers. Among the reft to Nafh, whofe comedy called Summer's Laft Will and Teftament, made its firft appearance in the fame year with this play, viz. 1600. There Chriflmas is introduced, and Summer says

to him:

Christmas, how chance thou com'ft not as the reft,
"Accompanied with fome mufic or fome fong?
"A merry carrol would have grac'd thee well,

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Thy ancestors have us'd it heretofore.".

Christmas. "Ay, antiquity was the mother of ignorance," &c. and then proceeds to give reafons for such a decay in mirth and houfe-keeping.

The confufion of feafons here defcribed, is no more than a poetical account of the weather, which happened in England about the time when the Midfummer-Night's Dream was written. For this information I am indebted to chance, which furnished me with a few leaves of an old meteorological history.

The date of the piece, however, may be better determined by a defcription of the fame weather in Churchyard's Charitie, 1595, when, fays he, "a colder feafon, in all forts, was never feene." He then proceeds to fay the fame over again in rhime:

"A colder time in world was neuer feene:

"The fkies do lowre, the fun and moone waxe dim;
"Sommer fcarce knowne but that the leaues are greene.
"The winter's wafte driues water ore the brim;

''

Upon the land, great flotes of wood may swim. "Nature thinks fcorne to do hir dutie right,

"Because we have displeasde the Lord of Light."

Let the reader compare thefe lines with Shakspeare's, and he

Fall in the fresh lap of the crimson rose; 3
And on old Hyems' chin, and icy crown,

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will find that they are both defcriptive of the fame weather and its confequences.

Churchyard is not enumerating, on this occafion, fictitious but real misfortunes. He wrote the prefent Poem to excite Charity on his own behalf; and among his other fufferings very naturally dwelt on the coldness of the feafon, which his poverty had rendered the less supportable.

L'Allegro, and il Penferofo, will naturally impute one incident to different causes. Shakspeare, in prime of life and success, fancifully afcribes this diftemperature of seasons to a quarrel between the playful rulers of the fairy world; while Churchyard, broken down by age and misfortunes, is feriously difpofed to reprefent the fame inclemency of weather, as a judgement from the Almighty ou the offences of mankind. STEEVENS.

Therefore the moon, the governess of floods, &c.] This line has no immediate connection with that preceding it (as Dr. Johnson feems to have thought). It does not refer to the omiffion of hymns or carols, but of the fairy rites, which were disturbed in confequence of Oberon's quarrel with Titania. The moon is with peculiar propriety represented as incensed at the ceffation not of the carols, (as Dr. Warburton thinks,) nor of the heathen rites of adoration, (as Dr. Johnson fuppofes, but of thofe fports, which have been always reputed to be celebrated by her light.

As the whole paffage has been much mifunderfood, it may be proper to obferve that Titania begins with faying,

"And never, fince the middle fummer's fpring,

"Met we on hill, in dale, foreft, or mead,

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"But with thy brawls thou haft difturb'd our sport.

She then particularly enumerates the feveral confequences that have flowed from their contention. The whole is divided into four claufes :

1." Therefore the winds, &c.

"That they have overborne their continents:

2." The Ox hath therefore ftretch'd his yoke in vain;

"The ploughman loft his fweat;

"No night is now with hymn or carol bleft;

3. Therefore the Moon

4.

washes all the air,

"That rheumatick diseases do abound:

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By their increase, now knows not which is which:

An odorous chaplet of fweet fummer buds
Is, as in mockery, fet: The fpring, the fummer,

"And this fame progeny of evil comes

"From our debate, from our diffention."

In all this there is no difficulty. All these calamities are the confequence of the diffention between Oberon and Titania; as feems to be fufficiently pointed out by the word therefore, so often repeated. Thofe lines which have it not, are evidently put in appofition with the preceding line in which that word is found.

2

MALONE.

this diftemperature, ] Is, this perturbation of the elements.

STEEVENS.

By diftemperature, I imagine is meant in this place, the pertur-. bed ftate in which the king and queen had lived for fome time paft. MALONE.

3 Fall in the fresh lap of the crimson rofe;] To have "fnow in the lap of June," is an expreffion ufed in Northward Hoe, 1607, and Shakspeare himself in Coriolanus, talks of the "confecrated fnow that lies on Dian's lap:" and Spenfer in his Faery Queen, B. II. c. ii. has:

"And fills with flow'rs fair Flora's painted lap."

STEEVENS.

This thought is elegantly expreffed by Goldfmith in his Traveller: "And winter lingering chills the lap of May."

M. MASON.

Hyems' chin,] Dr. Grey, not inelegantly, conjectures,

that the poet wrote:

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on old Hyems' chill and icy crown."

It is not indeed cafy to discover how a chaplet can be placed on the chin.

STEEVENS.

I believe this peculiar image of Hyem's chin muft have come from Virgil, (Æneid iv. 253) through the medium of the translation of the day:

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tum flumina mento

Precipitant fenis, & glacie riget horrida barba." S. W. Thus tranflated by Phaer, 1561;

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and from his hoary heard adowne,

"The ftreames of waters fall; with yce and froft his face doth frowne.

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This fingular image was, I believe, fuggefted to our poet by Golding's tranflation of Ovid, Book II:

The childing autumn, angry winter, change
Their wonted liveries; and the 'mazed world,

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By their increase, now knows not which is which: And this fame progeny of evils comes

"Andlaftly, quaking for the colde, flood Winter all forlorne, "With rugged head as white as dove, and garments all to

torne,

"Forladen with the isycles, that dangled up and downe Upon his gray and hoary beard, and fnowie frozen crown."

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MALONE.

It should rather be for thin, i. e. thin-hair'd. TYRWHITT.
So, Cordelia, fpeaking of Lear:

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to watch, poor perdu!

"With this thin helm." STEEVENS.

Thinne is gearer to chinne (the fpelling of the old copies) than thill, and therefore, I think, more likely to have been the author's word. MALONE.

The childing autumn,] Is the pregnant autumn, frugifer autumnus. So, in Heywood's Brazen Age, 1613:

"Fifty in number childed all one night."

Again, in his Golden Age, 1611 :

"I childed in a cave remote and filent."

Again, in his Silver Age, 1613:

"And at one inftant fhe fhall child two iffues."

There is a rofe called the childing rofe. STEEVENS.

Again, in affo's Godfrey of Bulloigne, by Fairfax, B. XVIII, ft. 26:

"An hundreth plants befide (even in his fight)
"Childed an hundreth nymphes fo great, fo dight."

Childing is an old term in botany, when a fmall flower growa out of a large one; the childing autumn," therefore means the autumn which unfeasonably produces flowers on those of summer. Florifts have also a childing daify, and a childing scabious.

HOLT WHITE

6 By their increafe,] That is, By their produce. JOHNSON.

So, in our author's 97th Sonnet :

"The teeming autumn, big with rich increase,

"Bearing the wanton burthen of the prime."

The latter expreffion is fcriptural: "Then shall the earth bring forth her increafe, and God, even our God, fhall give us his blessing.' PSALM lxvii. MALONE.

VOL. VII.

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