Whose edge is sharper than the sword; whose tongue All corners of the world: kings, queens, and states, To lie in watch there, and to think on him?7 To weep 'twixt clock and clock? if sleep charge nature, And cry myself awake? that's false to his bed? Pis. Alas, good lady! Imo. I false? Thy conscience witness:-Iachimo, Thou didst accuse him of incontinency; 8 Thou then look'dst like a villain; now, methinks, Thy favour's good enough.-Some jay of Italy, Whose mother was her painting,9 hath betray'd him: 3 What shall I need to draw my sword? the paper "Struck dead at first, what needs a second striking?" 4 Outvenoms all the worms of Nile; &c.] So, in Churchyard's Discourse of Rebellion &c. 1570: "Hit venom castes as far as Nilus flood, [brood] "Hit poysoneth all it toucheth any wheare." Serpents and dragons by the old writers were called worms. Of this, several instances are given in the last Act of Antony and Cleopatra. Steevens. 5 Rides on the posting winds,] So, in King Henry V: 6 7 66 making the wind my post-horse." Malone. states,] Persons of high rank. Johnson. What is it to be false? To lie in watch there, and to think on him?] This passage should be pointed thus: 8 - What! is it to be false, To lie in watch there, and to think on him? M. Mason. Some jay of Italy,] There is a prettiness in this expression; pulta, in Italian, signifying both a jay and a whore: I suppose from the gay feathers of that bird. Warburton. So, in The Merry Wives of Windsor: "Teach him to know turtles from jays." Steevens. 9 Whose mother was her painting,] Some jay of Italy, made by art; the creature, not of nature, but of painting. In this sense painting may be not improperly termed her mother. Johnson. 1 Poor I am stale, a garment out of fashion ;1 Put on for villainy; not born, where 't grows; Pis. Good madam, hear me. I met with a similar expression in one of the old comedies, but forgot to note the date or name of the piece: " -a parcel of conceited feather-caps, whose fathers were their garments." In All's Well that Ends Well, we have 66 whose judgments are "Mere fathers of their garments." Malone. Whose mother was her painting,] i. e. her likeness. Steevens Harris. 1 Poor I am stale, a garment out of fashion;] This image occurs in Westward for Smelts, 1620, immediately at the conclusion of the tale on which our play is founded: "But (said the Brainford fish-wife) I like her as a garment out of fashion." Steevens. 2 And, for I am richer than to hang by the walls, I must be ripp'd:] To hang by the walls, does not mean, to be converted into hangings for a room, but to be hung up, as useless, among the neglected contents of a wardrobe. So, in Measure for Measure: "That have, like unscour'd armour, hung by the wall." When a boy, at an ancient mansion-house in Suffolk, I saw one of these repositories, which (thanks to a succession of old maids!) had been preserved, with superstitious reverence, for almost a century and a half. Clothes were not formerly, as at present, made of slight materials, were not kept in drawers, or given away as soon as lapse of time or change of fashion had impaired their value. On the contrary, they were hung on wooden pegs in a room appropriated to the purpose of receiving them; and though such cast-off things as were composed of rich substances, were occasionally ripped for domestick uses, (viz. mantles for infants, vests for children, and counterpanes for beds,) articles of inferior quailty were suffered to hang by the walls, till age and moths had destroyed what pride would not permit to be worn by servants or poor relations. "Comitem horridulum tritâ donare lacerna," seems not to have been customary among our ancestors.-When Queen Elizabeth died, she was found to have left above three thousand dresses behind her; and there is yet in the wardrobe of Covent-Garden Theatre, a rich suit of clothes that once belonged to King James I. When I saw it last, it was on the back of Justice Greedy, a character in Massinger's New Way to pay Old Debts. Steewens. Imo. True honest men being heard, like false Æneas, Were, in his time, thought false: and Sinon's weeping Did scandal many a holy tear; took pity From most true wretchedness: So, thou, Posthúmus, Goodly, and gallant, shall be false, and perjur'd, I draw the sword myself: take it; and hit And if I do not by thy hand, thou art No servant of thy master's: Against self-slaughter♦ That cravens my weak hand. Come, here's my heart; The scriptures" of the loyal Leonatus, 3 Wilt lay the leaven on all proper men; &c.]i. e. says Mr. Upton, "wilt infect and corrupt their good name, (like sour dough that leaveneth the whole mass) and wilt render them suspected." In the line below he would read-fall, instead of fail. So, in King Henry V: "And thus thy fall hath left a kind of blot "To mark the full-fraught man, and best-indued, I think the text is right. Malone. 4 Against self-slaughter &c.] So again, in Hamlet: the Everlasting fix'd "His canon 'gainst self-slaughter." Steevens. 5 That cravens my weak hand.] i. e. makes me a coward. Pope. That makes me afraid to put an end to my own life. See Vol. VI, p. 68, n. 7. Malone. 6 Something's afore 't:] The old copy reads-Something 's a-foot. Johnson. The correction was made by Mr. Rowe. Malone. All turn'd to heresy? Away, away, Be stomachers to my heart! Thus may poor fools Believe false teachers: Though those that are betray'd Do feel the treason sharply, yet the traitor Stands in worse case of woe. And thou, Posthumus, thou that did'st set up Will then be pang'd by me.-Pr'ythee, despatch: When I desire it too. Pis. O gracious lady, Since I receiv'd command to do this business, Imo. Do 't, and to bed then. Pis. I'll wake mine eye-balls blind first.2 7 The scriptures -] So, Ben Jonson, in The Sad Shepherd: "The lover's scriptures, Heliodore's, or Tatius'." Shakspeare, however, means in this place, an opposition between scripture, in its common signification, and heresy. Steevens. 8 thou that-] The second thou, which is not in the old copies, has been added for the sake of recovering metre. Steevens. 9 disedg'd] So, in Hamlet: "It would cost you a groang, to take off mine edge." Steevens. 1 That now thou tir❜st on,] A hawk is said to tire upon that which she pecks; from tirer, French. Johnson. See Vol. VI, p. 214, n. 3. Steevens. 2 I'll wake mine eye-balls blind first.] [In the old copies, the word-blind is wanting ] The modern editions for wake read break, and supply the deficient syllable by—Ah wherefore. I read—I'll wake mine eye-balls out first, or, blind first. Johnson. Sir T. Hanmer had made the same emendation. Malone. Dr. Johnson's conjecture (which I have inserted in the text) may receive support from the following passage in The Bugbears, a MS. comedy more ancient than the play before us: I doubte "Least for lacke of my slepe I shall watche my eyes oute." Steevens. Imo. Wherefore then Didst undertake it? Why hast thou abus'd Pis. But to win time Imo. Pis. I thought you would not back again. Imo. Bringing me here to kill me. Pis. Then, madam, Most like; Not so, neither But if I were as wise as honest, then My purpose would prove well. It cannot be, Some villain, ay, and singular in his art, Imo. Some Roman courtezan. Pis. No, on my life. I'll give but notice you are dead, and send him Imo. 3 To be unbent,] To have thy bow unbent, alluding to an hunter. Johnson. when thou hast ta'en thy stand, The elected deer before thee?] So, in one of our author's poems, Passionate Pilgrim, 1599: "When as thine eye hath chose the dame, "And stall'd the deer that thou should'st strike." Malone. |