FAL. Now, the report goes, she has all the rule of her husband's purse; the hath legions of angels.5 PIST. As many devils entertain; and, To her, boy, fay I.

NYM. The humour rifes; it is good: humour me the angels.

FAL. I have writ me here a letter to her: and here another to Page's wife; who even now gave me good eyes too, examin'd my parts with most judicious eyliads: sometimes the beam of her view gilded my foot, sometimes my portly belly.

PIST. Then did the fun on dung-hill shine.
NYM. I thank thee for that humour. I

5-she hath legions of angels.] Thus the old quarto. The folio reads" he hath a legend of angels." STEEVENS.

6 As many devils entertain;] i. e. do you retain in your fervice as many devils as she has angels. So, in The Two Gentlemen of Verona:

"Sweet lady, entertain him for your fervant." This is the reading of the folio. MALONE. The old quarto reads :

7

" As many devils attend her!" &c. STEEVENS. -eyliads: This word is differently spelt in all the

copies. It occurs again, in King Lear, Act IV. fc. v:

"She gave strange œiliads, and most speaking looks, "To noble Edmund."

I suppose we should write oëillades, French. STEEVENS. Sometimes the beam of her view gilded my foot, fometimes my portly belly.] So, in our author's 20th Sonnet : "An eye more bright than their's, less false in rolling, "Gilding the object whereupon it gazeth." MALONE. Then did the fun on dung-hill shine.] So, in Lyly's Euphues,

1581:

I

"The fun shineth upon the dunghill." HOLT WHITE. -that humour.) What diftinguishes the language of Nym from that of the other attendants on Falstaff, is the constant repetition of this phrase. In the time of Shakspeare fuch

FAL. O, she did so course o'er my exteriors with such a greedy intention, that the appetite of her eye did seem to scorch me up like a burning glass! Here's another letter to her: she bears the purse too; she is a region in Guiana, all gold and bounty.3 I will be cheater to them both, and they shall be exchequers to me; they shall be my East and West Indies, and I will trade to them both. Go, bear thou this letter to mistress Page; and thou this to mistress Ford: we will thrive, lads, we will thrive.

an affectation seems to have been fufficient to mark a character. In Sir Giles Goofecap, a play of which I have no earlier edition than that of 1606, the fame peculiarity is mentioned in the hero of the piece: "-his only reason for every thing is, that we are all mortal; then hath he another pretty phrase too, and that is, he will tickle the vanity of every thing." STEEVENS.

2-intention,] i. e. eagerness of defire. So, in Chapman's tranflation of Homer's Address to the Sun:

"

Even to horror bright,

८८ A blaze burns from his golden burgonet;
"Which to behold, exceeds the sharpeft fet
"Of any eye's intention." STEEVENS.

3-she is a region in Guiana, all gold and bounty.] If the tradition be true (as I doubt not but it is) of this play being wrote at Queen Elizabeth's command, this passage, perhaps, may furnish a probable conjecture that it could not appear till after the year 1598. The mention of Guiana, then so lately discovered to the English, was a very happy compliment to Sir Walter Raleigh, who did not begin his expedition for South America till 1595, and returned from it in 1596, with an advantageous account of the great wealth of Guiana. Such an address of the poet was likely, I imagine, to have a proper impression on the people, when the intelligence of fuch a golden country was fresh in their minds, and gave them expectations of immenfe gain. THEOBALD.

4 I will be cheater to them both, and they shall be exchequers to me;] The same joke is intended here, as in The Second Part of Henry the Fourth, Act II:

"- I will bar no honest man my house, nor no cheater."By which is meant Escheatour, an officer in the Exchequer, in no good repute with the common people. WARBURTON.

PIST. Shall I fir Pandarus of Troy become, And by my fide wear steel? then, Lucifer take all!

NYM. I will run no base humour: here, take the humour letter; I will keep the 'haviour of reputation.

FAL. Hold, firrah, [to RoB.] bear you these letters tightly; 5

Sail like my pinnace to these golden shores.Rogues, hence, avaunt! vanish like hail-stones, go; Trudge, plod, away, o' the hoof; seek shelter, pack!

5

-bear you these letters tightly;] i. e. cleverly, adroitly. So, in Antony and Cleopatra, Antony, putting on his armour, fays:

"My queen's a squire

"More tight at this, than thou." MALONE.

No phrase is so common in the eastern counties of this kingdom, and particularly in Suffolk, as good tightly, for briskly and effectually. HENLEY.

It is used in this sense in Don Sebastian, by Dryden, Act II. fc. ii.-" tightly, I fay, go tightly to your business." REED.

6

-my pinnace-] A pinnace seems anciently to have fignified a small vessel, or floop, attending on a larger. So, in Rowley's When you see me you know me, 1613 :

"

- was lately sent

"With threefcore fail of ships and pinnaces."

Again, in Muleasses the Turk, 1610:

"Our life is but a failing to our death

"Through the world's ocean: it makes no matter then,

"Whether we put into the world's vast sea

"Shipp'd in a pinnace, or an argofy."

At present it fignifies only a man of war's boat.

occurs in The

A paffage fimilar to this of Shakspeare Humourous Lieutenant, by Beaumont and Fletcher :

- this small pinnace

"Shall fail for gold." STEEVENS.

A pinnace is a small vessel with a square stern, having fails and oars, and carrying three masts; chiefly used (fays Rolt, in his Dictionary of Commerce,) as a Scout for intelligence, and for landing of men. MALONE.

Falstaff will learn the humour of this age, French thrift, you rogues; myself, and skirted page. [Exeunt FALSTAFF and ROBIN.

PIST. Let vultures gripe thy guts! for gourd, and fullam holds,

And high and low beguile the rich and poor : 9

7

- the humour of this age,]

folio reads the honor of the age.

Thus the 4to. 1619: The

STEEVENS.

* Let vultures gripe thy guts! This hemistich is a burlesque on a passage in Tamburlaine, or The Scythian Shepherd, of which play a more particular account is given in one of the notes to Henry IV. P. II. Act II. sc. iv. STEEVENS.

I suppose the following is the passage intended to be ridiculed:

- and now doth ghaftly death

"With greedy talents [talons] gripe my bleeding heart, " And like a harper [harpy] tyers on my life."

Again, ibid:

"Griping our towels with retorted thoughts." MALONE. 9-for gourd, and fullam holds,

And high and low beguile the rich and poor :) Fullam is a cant term for false dice, high and low. Torriano, in his Italian Dictionary, interprets Pife by false dice, high and low men, high fullams and low fullams. Jonson, in his Every Man out of his Humour, quibbles upon this cant term : "Who, he ferve? He keeps high men and low men, he has a fair living at Fullam."-As for gourd, or rather gord, it was another inftrument of gaming, as appears from Beaumont and Fletcher's Scornful Lady: "And thy dry bones can reach at nothing but GORDS or nine-pins.'

now,

WARBURTON.

In The London Prodigal I find the following enumeration of false dice: "I bequeath two bale of false dice, videlicit, high men and low men, fulloms, stop cater-traies, and other bones of 'function."

Green, in his Art of Juggling, &c. 1612, says, "What should I say more of false dice, of fulloms, high men, lowe men, gourds, and brizled dice, graviers, demies, and contraries?"

Again, in The Bellman of London, by Decker, 5th edit. 1640; among the false dice are enumerated, "a bale of fullams."-" A bale of gordes, with as many high-men as lowmen for passage." STEEVENS.

Gourds were probably dice in which a secret cavity had been

Tester I'll have in pouch, when thou shalt lack,
Base Phrygian Turk !

NYM. I have operations in my head, which be humours of revenge.

PIST. Wilt thou revenge?

NYM. By welkin, and her star !

PIST. With wit, or steel?

NYM. With both the humours, I:

I will discuss the humour of this love to Page.*

PIST. And I to Ford shall eke unfold,

How Falstaff, varlet vile,
His dove will prove, his gold will hold,
And his foft couch defile.

1

made; fullams, those which had been loaded with a small bit of lead. High men and low men, which were likewife cant terms, explain themselves. High numbers on the dice, at hazard, are from five to twelve, inclusive; low, from aces to four. MALONE.

High and low men were false dice, which, being ng chiefly made at Fulham, were thence called "high and low Fulhams." The high Fulhams were the numbers, 4, 5, and 6. See the manner in which these dice were made, in The Complete Gamefter, p. 12, edit. 1676, 12mo. DOUCE.

I

in my head,] These words, which are omitted in the folio, were recovered by Mr. Pope from the early quarto.

reads:

MALONE.

2 I will discuss the humour of this love to Page.] The folio -to Ford;" but the very reverse of this happens, See Act II. where Nym makes the discovery to Page, and not to Ford, as here promised; and Pistol, on the other hand, to Ford, and not to Page. Shakspeare is frequently guilty of these little forgetfulnesses. STEEVENS.

The folio reads to Ford; and in the next line and I to Page, &c. But the reverse of this (as Mr. Steevens has observed) happens in Act II. where Nym makes the difcovery to Page, and Piftol to Ford. I have therefore corrected the text from the old quarto, where Nym declares he will make the ditcovery to Page; and Pistol says, "And I to Ford will likewife tell-." MALONE.