66

a

SON.

" With what encounter so uncurrent I

How he glisters
Have strain'd, t' appear thus," etc.

THOROUGH my rust!" This passage is difficult, and Johnson confessed that The first folio has, “through my rust," and the he could not understand it: he proposed to read, “With second folio, “ through my dark rnst;" but the addition what encounter so uncurrent-Have I been strained to to the old text is needless, if we only read through appear thus."

Stevens considers it a metaphor from • thorough." running at tilt; but Mr. Amoyt has given the following

" – and how his piety explanation of the sentence:-“ Hermione intends to say, ' Beloved as I was by you before Polixenes arrived,

Does my deeds make the blacker!" and deservedly so, I appeal to your conscience how it

“ This vehement retraction of Leontes, accompanied has happened that I have had to struggle against so un

with the confession of more crimes than he was sustoward a current as to appear thus before you in the

pected of, is agreeable to our daily experience of the character of a criminal.''

vicissitudes of violent tempers, and the eruptions of Strain is often used, in old poetry, for going awry,

minds oppressed with guilt.”—Johnson. as Drayton describes a river-"wantonly she strains in

"That did but show thee of a FOOL”—Theobald her lascivious course." The sense may then be, “In what unusual interview have I so erred as to expose

would read soul for “ fool;" and Warburton, that did myself to the appearance of guilt ?”

but show thee off a fool.” I agree, with Coleridge, that

“ fool is Shakespeare's word,” for the reasons he assigns. "That any of these bolder vices WANTED

"1. My ear feels it to be Shakespearian; 2. The inLess impudence to gainsay what they did," etc. volved grammar is Shakespearian—show thee, being a “It is apparent that according to the proper, at least

fool naturally, to have improved thy folly by incon. according to the present use of words, less' should be stancy;' 3. The alteration is most flat, and un-Shake more, or wanted' should be had. But Shakespeare is

spearian. As to the grossness of the abuse, she calls very uncertain in his use of negatives. It may be

him “gross and foolish' a few lines below." This modo necessary once to observe, that, in our language, two

of speech was anciently quite common. negatives did not originally affirm, but strengthen the

1-a deril negation. This mode of speech was in time changed, Would have shed water out of fire, ere done 't." but, as the change was made in opposition to long cus

That is, a devil wonld have shed tears of pity, ere he tom, it proceeded gradually, and uniformity was not ob

would have committed such an action. tained but through an intermediate confusion."-John

" — for one so TENDER"-i. e. Tender in years. “My life stands IN THE LEVEL of your dreams"-A

“An faults I make, when I shall come to know them, metaphor from gunnery: to stand in the level means to

I do repent." be the object at which direct aim is taken.

“ This is another instance of the sudden changes inci “ I have got STRENGTH of LIMIT"-"I know not dent to vehement and ungovernable minds.''- Johnson well how “strength' of limit' can mean strength to pass

" — so long as nature the limits of the child-hed chamber; which yet it must

Will bear up with this exercise," etc. mean in this place, unless we read, in more easy phrase-strength of limh. And now,'”etc.-Johnson.

Mr. Knight was the first to restore the original metre, “ Mr. M. Mason judicionsly conceives strength of

which, in the numerous editions of the last century, and limit to mean, the limited degree of strength which it is

the first thirty years of the present, were thus printed, customary for women to acquire, before they are suf- without any reason assigned for it:fered to go abroad, after child-bearing."-STEVENS.

Shall be my recreation : so long as

Nature will hear up with this exercise, " — FLATNESS of my misery”—“That is, how low,

So long I daily vow to use it. Come

And lead me to these sorrows. how flat, I am laid by my calamity."-Johnson. So, Milton, in “ Paradise Lost," book ii. :

Knight justly remarks:-“ If the freedom and variety thus repuls'd, our final hope

of his versification were offensive to those who had been Is flat despair.

trained in the school of Pope, let it be remembered that - if that which is lost be not found”—This oracle,

we have now come back to the proper estimation of a with the change of names, is from Greene's “ Pandosto."

nobler rhythm; and that Shakespeare, of all the great * Suspition is no proofe; jealonsie is an unequall judge; dramatists, appears to have held the true mean, between Bellaria is chast; Egistus blamelesse; Tranion a true

a syllabic monotony on the one hand, and a license runsubject; Pandosto treacherous; his babe an innocent; ning into prose on the other." the king shall die without an heire, if that which is lost be not founde.”—(Shakespeare's Library, part i. p. 21.)

SCENE III. The editions of “ Pandosto," subsequent to that of 1588, read, “his bahe innocent,” and “the king shall live

“ Enter ANTIGONUS, with the Babe"-So in the old without an heire,” etc. Therefore, Shakespeare em

copies, which there is no reason for changing into child, ploved one of the later impressions; probably that of

as in most modern editions. 1609, the year before we suppose him to have com- " – and there thy CHARACTER"-By “character” is menced this play.

meant the writing afterwards discovered with Perdita. “ Of the queen's SPEED”—“Of the event of the queen's A LULLABY too rough"-So in “ Pandosto:"_“Shalt trial: so we still say, he sped well, or ill.”—Johnson. thou have the whistling windes for thy lullabie, and the “ Which you knew great, and to the hazard—This

salt sea fome instede of sweete milke?''-(Shakespeare's line, in the folio of 1623, is deficient two syllables of

Library, part i. p. 18.)— These verbal resemblances the regular metre, and the editor of the folio of 1632

show that Shakespeare wrote, not only with Greene's supplied them by reading "certain bazard.” Malone

novel in his memory, but before him. pronounces certain of all words the “most objection

" — A savage clamour?able," and supposes the lost word “to be either double Well may I get aboard !—This is the chasc." ful or fearful;" while Stevens urges that it is “quite

This “clamour" was the cry of the dogs and hunters ; 'in Shakespeare's manner.” We leave the line as it

then, seeing the hear, Antigonus exclaims, “ This is the stands in the oldest and most authentic copy, and as, in

chase," or the animal pursued. all probability, Shakespeare wrote it, metrical enough to the ear for dramatic dialogue, though not conforming " — a rery pretty BARN”_" Barn” is still a Northto the regular blank-verse standard.

of England word for child, as bairn is in Scotland.

44

e

“ — A BOY, or a child”—Stevens says that he is imitation represent an action that happened years after told, that, “in some of the inland counties of England, the first, if it be so connected with it that nothing but a female infant, in contradistinction to a male one, is time can be supposed to intervene ? Time is, of all still termed, among the peasantry, a child." » This modes of existence, most obsequious to the imaginause of the word was clearly the ineaning of Shake- tion: a lapse of years is as easily conceived as a passpeare; but in none of the provincial glossaries can sage of hours. In contemplation, we easily contract we find an authority for such an application. On the the time of real actions; and, therefore, willingly percontrary, in all the ancient writers, childe means a mit it to be contracted when we only see their imitaboy, a young man, and generally in some association tion.” with chivalry. Byron, in his preface to “ Childe

" — and leave the GROWTH untried Harold,” says :-" It is almost superfluous to mention Of that wide gap," etc. that the appellation Childe,' as “Childe Waters,'

“Our author attends more to his ideas than to his Childe Childers,' etc., is used as more consonant with the old structure of versification, which I have adopted.” irregular; but he means, the growth,' or progression,

words. The 'growth of the 'wide gap' is somewhat Nares observes upon the passage before us, that the of the time which filled up the .gap' of the story beexpression “6 child' may perhaps be rather referred to

tween Perdita's birth and her sixteenth year. To leare the simplicity of the shepherd, reversing the common

this growth untried, is to leave the passages of the inpractice, than taken as an authority for it.”

termediate years unnoted and unexamined. Untried' is " - how the sea FLAP-DRAGONED it"- The meaning not, perhaps, the word which he would have chosen, is, that the sea swallowed the ship as drinkers swallowed but which his rhyme required."-Johnson. flap-dragons, which were almonds, or other inflammable

imagine me”-i. e. Imagine with me. It is a substances set on fire, set afloat, and gulped down while French idiom, which Shakespeare has played upon in blazing. Thus Falstaff says of the Prince, “ He driuks the Taming OF THE SHREW. And Falstaff, speaking candles' ends for flap-dragons."

of sack, in King HENRY IV., says :“ – a BEARING-CLOTH”—Percy explains this as “the

It ascends me into the brain, dries me there, etc. fine mantle, or cloth, with which a child is usually covered when it is carried to the church to be baptized.”

SCENE I. “ - this is some chaNGELING"-Some child changed “ — I have missingly noted”-Stevens explains thisby the fairies. “Changeling" was oftentimes used sy

“I have observed him at intervals." Bui, is it not nonymously with idiot, because the fairies were sup- rather--Missing him, I have noted of late he is much posed to leave idiots instead of the children they took

retired from court ? away.

Scene II. " -- they are never CURST, but when they are hungry”

Curst" signifies ill-tempered. Thus the adage: "- the red blood reigns in the winter's PALE"Curst cows have short horns."

“ That is, the red, the spring blood, now reigns over the

parts lately under the dominion of winter. The ACT IV.-CHORUS.

English pale,' and the Irish pale,' were frequent ex

pressions in Shakespeare's time; and the words 'red' 6 — Impute it not a crime

and “pale' are used for the sake of the antithesis.”_ To me, or my swift passage, that I slide

FARMER.
O'er sixteen years,” etc.

In this sense we still retain the phrase, “ the pale “This trespass, in respect of dramatic unity, will ap- of the church,” “ the pale of fashion." The Poet means pear venial to those who have read the once famous to retain that sense, with a remote allusion to winter's Lily's Endymion,' (or, as he himself calls it in the pale colours.

“ Doth set my PUGGING tooth on edge”-“Pugging." piece comprise the space of forty years; Endymion ly

and pug gard, seem to have been cant words, of nearly ing down to sleep at the end of the second, and waking

the same meaning with the modern slang-phrase of in the first scene of the fifth, after a nap of that un

prigging-i. e. thieving, or cheating. conscionable length. Lily has, likewise, been guilty of much greater absurdity than Shakespeare committed ;

“With heigh! wiTH HEIGH"-The first folio has only for he supposes that Endymion's hair, features, and

“ with heigh!" the repetition, necessary for the metre,

is from the second folio. person, were changed by age during his sleep, while all the other personages of the drama remained without “— in my time, wore THREE-PILE"—i. e. Three-pile alteration."-STEVENS.

velvet-velvet of the richest kind. Malone states that, in the comedy of “ Patient

" — when the kite builds, look to LESSER LINEN"Grissel,” (by Decker, Chettle, and Haughton,) Grissel

* Autolycus means, that his practice was to steal skeets, is in the first act married, and soon afterwards brought

and large pieces of linen,' leaving the smaller pieces to bed of twins, a son and a daughter; and the daugh

for the kites' to build with."-M. Masox. ter, in the fifth act, is produced on the scene as a woman old enough to be married.

- for the life to come, I sleep out the thougkt of Dr. Johnson has thus commented on the dramatic it_" Fine as this is, and delicately characteristic of unity of time:

one who had lived and been reared in the best society, “ By supposition, as place is introduced, time may be and had been precipitated from it by dice and drabbing, extended. The time required by the fable elapses, for

yet still it strikes against my feelings as a note out of the most part, between the acts; for, of so much of the

tune, and as not coalescing with that pastoral tint which

It is too Macbeth-like action as is represented, the real and poetical duration gives such a charm to this act. is the same. If, in the first act, preparations for war

in the ‘snapper-up of unconsidered trifles,'”—COLE

RIDGE. against Mithridates are represented to be made in Rome, the event of the war may, without absurdity, Every 'leren wether tops; every tod yields---pound be represented in the catastrophe as happening in Pon- and odd shilling,” etc.—To tod is used as a verb by tus. We know that there is neither war nor prepara- dealers in wool. Thus, they say, “ Twenty sheep onght tion for war; we know that we are neither in Rome to tod fifty pounds of wool," etc. The meaning, nor Pontus—that neither Mithridates nor Lucullus is therefore, of the Clown's words is, “Every eleven before us. The drama exhibits successive imitations wethers tods-i. e. will produce a tod, or twenty-eight of successive actions; and why may not the second pounds of wool-every tod yields a pound and odd

prologue, his · Man in the Moon.') Two acts of this

e.

66

;

4

shilling: what then will the wool of fitteen hundred that's for remembrance. There's rue for you; we may yield ?”

call it herb of grace.” The qualities of retaining “Shakespeare has here brought his agricultural know- “ seeming and savour” appear to form the reason why ledge to bear. We have every reasou to believe that these plants were considered emblematical of “grace he was a practical farmer; for, after he had bought his and remembrance." estate in Stratford-Fields, in 1602, we find him suing one Philip Rogers, for a debt of thirty-five shillings and

" — and streak'd GILLYFLOWERS"-Gillyvors, in the teu pence, for corn delivered. And, in 1605, he pur

folios, both here, when the word is spoken by Perdita, chased a moiety of the tithes of Stratforul, which he

and afterwards by Polixenes. Dyce insists that the old probably had to collect in kind. When he puts this spelling should be retuined, as “ an old form of the speech, therefore, in the mouth of the Clown, we may

word." reasonably conclude that he knew, of his own expe

“In the folio edition it is spelled Gillyvors. Gelofer, rience, that the average produce of eleven wethers was or gillofer, was the old name for the whole class of a tod of wool; and that the value of a tod was a 'pound

carnations, pinks, and sweet-williams; from the French and odd shilling.' Ritson says, 'It appears from Staf- girofle. There were also stock-gelofers, and wall-geloford's . Breefe Conceipte of English Pollicye,' 1581, that fers. The variegated gillyflowers, or carnations, being the price of a tod of wool was, at that period, twenty or

considered as a produce of art, were properly called two-and-twenty shillings; so that the medium price was

nature's bastards, and being streaked white and red, exactly · pound and odd shilling.'"-KNIGHT.

Perdita considers them a proper emblem of a painted The researches into the curious and important ques

or immodest woman; and therefore declines to meddle tion of money prices, have shown that this was about with them. She connects the gardener's art of varying the average price of the times. Wool, according to

the colours of these flowers, with the art of painting the our mode of estimation, was then worth eight pence

face-a fashion very prevalent in Shakespeare's time."sterling the pound.

Douce.

“I'll not put “ - THREE-MAN Song-men all"—i. e. Singers of songs in three parts, or for three men.

The diblle in earth to set one slip of them," etc.

“ It has been well remarked of this passage, that Per" - MEANs and bases"_" Means" are tenours-inter

dita does not attempt to answer the reasoning of Pomediate voices, between the treble and bass.

lixenes: she gives up the argument, but, woman-like, “- he sings PSALMS to HORNPIPES"_" In the early

retains her own opinion, or, rather, her sense of right, days of psalmody, it was not unusual to adapt the pop

unshaken by his sophistry. She goes on in a strain of ular secular tunes to the versions of psalms, the rage

poetry, which comes over the soul like music and frafor which originated in France."-Warron's “ Hislory

grance mingled: we seem to inhale the blended odours of Poetry.”

of a thousand flowers, till the sense faints with their

sweetness; and she concludes with a touch of passion“ – to colour the WARDEN pies”—“Wardens' are a ate sentiment, which melts into the very heart." —Mrs. large sort of pear, called in French poires de garde, | JAMESON. because, being a late hard pear, they may be kept very long. It is said that their name is derived from the

“ From Dis's waggon! daffodils”—“An epithet is Anglo-Saxon wearden, (to preserve.) They are now

wanted here, not merely or chiefly for the metre, but called baking-pears.”—NARFS.

for the balance, for the westhetic logic. Perhaps golden

was the word, which would set off the “violets dim.'”. “A fellow sir, that I have known to go about with COLERIDGE. TROL-MY-DAMES”—Probably a corruption of the French

violets dim, term, trou madame. The game much resembles that called bagatelle. The Old-English title of this sport

But sweeter than the lids of Juno's eyes,” etc. was pigeon-holes, as the arches in the machine, through

“ Johnson had not sufficient imagination to comprewhich the balls are rolled, resembles the cavities inade

hend this exquisite passage: he thought that the Poet for pigeons in a dove-house.

had mistaken Juno for Pallas, and says, that sweeter

than an eyelid is an odd image!' But the eyes of Juno " - it will no more but ABIDE"-i. e. It will do no were as remarkable as those of Pallas, and more than remain there for a time.

- of a beauty never yet

Equalled in height of tincture, “ – a motion of the prodigal son"-A “motion"

The beauties of Greece and other Asiatic nations tinged was technical for a puppet-show, of which the history their eyelids of an obscure violet colour, by means of of the prodigal son was here the subject.

some ignent, which was doubtless perfumed like “: — merrily hent the stilc-a"—i. e. Take hold of.

those for the hair, etc., mentioned by Athenæus. Hence

Hesiod's phrase, in a passage which has been renSCENE III.

dered

Her Nowing bair and suble cyclicks -goddess-like PRANK'd up”-i. e. Dressed splen

Breathed enamouring odour, like the breath didly, decorated.

Of balmy Venus.

Shakespeare may not have known this; yet of the beauty - I should blush

and propriety of the epithet violets dim, and the To see you so attired, sworn, I think,

transition at once to the lids of Juno's eyes, and CytheTo show myself a glass.”

rea's breath, no reader of taste and feeling need be rePerdita probably means, that the prince, by the rus- minded."-SINGER. tic habit he wears, seems as if he had sworn to show her as, in a glass, how she ought to be dressed, instead

makes her blood look out”—The old and possiof being “so goddess-like pranked up;” and were it bly the true reading is look on 't, which Collier retains, not for the license and folly which custom had made

as meaning that Camillo observes that Florizel tells familiar at such feasts as that of sheep-shearing, when

Perdita something that makes her blood come into her

cheeks “to look on it." mimetic sports were allowable, she should blush to see him so attired.

“To have a WORTHY FEEDING"-A “worthy feeding" “ For you there's rosemary, and rue; these keep

seems to mean a tract of pasturage, not inconsiderable, Seeming and savour all the winter long,” etc. which the old shepherd considers not unworthy of his Ophelia distributes the same plants, and accompanies

supposed daughter's fortune. them with similar expressions :—“ There's rosemary ; " — FADINGS”—The “fadings" was a dance. Ma

a

a

a

lone quotes a song from “Sportive Wit,” (1666,) which in the form of a woman, from her waist upward, seene implies that it was a rustic dance:

in the sea.” To this Malone supposes that ShakeThe courtiers scorn us country clowns,

speare alludes. In Sir Henry Herbert's office-book, We country clowns do scorn the court;

which contains a register of all the shows of London, We can be as merry upon the downs As you at midnight with all your sport,

from 1623 to 1642, is entered, “a license to Francis With a fading, with a fading.

Sherret, to show a strange fish for one year, from the It appears, from a letter in Boswell's edition of “Ma- 10th of March, 1635.” lone,'' that it was an Irish dance, and that it was prac- " — they call themselves SALTIERS”-i. e. Satyrs, tised, upon rejoicing occasions, as recently as 1803, the

says Malone: men covered with hairy skins, to give date of the letter:

them the appearance of satyrs; but possibly the true The dance is called Rinca Fada, and means, lite

explanation is saultiers-i. e. vaulters. The servant rally, the long dance.' Though faed is a reed, the says afterwards, that the worst of one of the threes name of the dance is not borrowed from it; “fada is the "jumps twelve foot and a half by the squire." The adjective, long, and rinca the substantive, dance. In

stage-direction in the old copies, after they enter, is, Irish the adjective follows the substantive, differing from “Here a dance of twelve satyrs,” and perhaps “saltiers" the English construction : hence, rinca fada. Faeden is only the servant's blunder. is the diminutive, and means little reed'; faeden is the first person of the verb to whistle, either with the lips,

" — by the squire"-i. e. By the fool-rule-Fr. or with a reed-i. e. I whistle.

esquierre. “ This dance is still practised, on rejoicing occasions, “ – that's BOLTED"—i. e. Sifted by the northern in many parts of Ireland. A king and queen are chosen blasts. from among the young persons who are the best danc

" — thou no more shalt never see this knack"-Steers; the queen carries a garland, composed of two

vens omits never, as “ hoops, placed at right angles, and fastened to a handle;

absurd redundancy;" but the re

duplication of negatives was a common mode of writing the hoops are covered with flowers and ribands: you have seen it, I dare say, with the May-maids. Fre

at the time, and the word is found in all the old copies. quently, in the course of the dance, the king and queen " — I was not much afeard”—“ The character of lift up their joined hands as high as they can, she still Perdita is here finely sustained. To have made her holding the garland in the other. The most remote quite astonished at the king's discovery of himself, had couple from the king and queen first pass under; all the not become her birth ; and to have given her presence rest of the line, linked together, follow in succession. of mind to have made this reply to the king, had not When the last has passed, the king and queen suddenly become her education.”- WARBURTON. face about, and front their companions. This is often repeated during the dance, and ihe curious undulations

Will’t please you, sir, be gone"-"O how mor are pretty enongh, resembling the movements of a ser

than exquisite is this whole speech!—and that profound pent. The daucers, on the first of May, visit such

nature of noble pride and grief, venting themselves in newly-wedded pairs, of a certain rank, as have been

a momentary peevishness of resentment towards Flo

rizel :married since last May-day, in the neiglabourhood; who

- Will’t please you, sir, be gone!"_COLERIDGE. commonly bestow on them a stuffed ball, richly decked with gold and silver lace, and accompanied with a “Where no priest shovels in dust”—Before the reform present in money, to regale themselves after the dance. of the burial-service, in the time of Edward VI., it was This dance is practised when the bonfires are lighted the custom for the priest to throw earth on the body, up, the queen hailing the return of summer in a popular in the form of a cross, and then sprinkle it with holyIrish song, beginning

water. Thuga mair sein lu soure ving.

“ — by my FANCY"-i. e. By my lore : the nse of the We lead on summer-see! she follows in our train."

word "fancy" in this sense is perpetual in Shakespeare "— fadings,' “jump her and thump her?”– The and authors of his age. (See MERCHANT OF VENICE.) burdens of old songs and ballads, mentioned in writers

6 — at every sitting”-“ Every sitting" means, at of the time.

every audience you shall have of the king and council : he so chants to the SLEEVE-HAND, and the work the council-days being formerly called, in common about the SQUARE on'l”—The “sleeve-hand” was the speech, the sitting. Howell, in one of his letters, cuff, or wristband; the “square” signified the work says :-“My lord president hopes to be at the next sitabout the bosom.

ting in York.” “ – POKING-STIcks of steel'—" Poking-sticks" were “ But not TAKE IN the mind” –To “take in" anheated in the fire, and made use of to set the plaits of ciently meant to conquer, to get the better of. As, in ruffs. Stowe informs us, that “about the sixteenth | ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA :yeare of the queene [Elizabeth] began the making of

He could so quickly cut the Ionian seas, steele poking-sticks, and untill that time all lawndresses

And take in Toryne. used setting stickes made of wood or bone."

“ She is i' the rear of our birth”—The original reads“ – Clamour your tongues"_" An expression taken

She is i' th' reere ' our birth. from bell-ringing; now contracted to clam. The bells The apostrophes indicate the sense—her being, in are said to be clammed, when, after a course of rounds birth, inferior. Many editions substitute, “rear of or changes, they are all pulled off at once, and give a birth." general clash, or clam, by which the peal is concluded.

POMANDER"-A pomander was a ball of per. As this clam is succeeded by a silence, it exactly suits the sense of the passage." "--NARES.

fumes, and worn in the pocket, or about the neck. Mr. Gifford thinks, with Malone, that it is a misprint " — with a whoo-BUB"—So spelled in the original, sap for charm.

porting the etymology of whoop-up, given by some lexi

cographers. The meaning, of course, is what we now "— a Tawdry lace”—It was sometimes only called

call a hubbub; and in this form we meet with it in a tawdry, and it was not used for lacing, but worn as

several writers of the time of Shakespeare. au ornament for the head or neck.

“(For I do fear eyes EvER,)"— The old reading is, “ – a fish, that appeared upon the coast”—In 1604, “ For I do fear eyes over," which, since Rowe's edition, was entered on the books of the Stationers' Company, has been changed to “I do fear eyes orer you." An “ A strange reporte of a monstrous fish, that appeared old MS. correction suggested to Collier the reading of

the text, which merely requires the change of o to e, in

- and on this stage an obvious misprint.

(Where we offenders now appear) soul-ver'd,

And begin, why to me? "— I would not do't"—Hanmer proposed, and Ste- This is evidently erroneous; but the true reading is very vens adopted a transposition of this, which is the origi- doubtful. We have given that of Stevens, followed by nal text, so as to read, “If I thought it were not a piece Collier and others, which makes no change but the of honesty, etc., I would do it." Yet, as part of the transposition of and. Knight changes the parenthesis knave's reasoning with himself, and stating his own thus: "(Where we offenders now) appear.” 2. Jackprinciple of action, the old text, which is also that of son ingeniously reads, “(Where we offended) now apthe three last editions, may well stand.

pear”—Theobald, “(Where we offend her now.)" 6 — pedler's EXCREMENT"—i. e. His beard. In

“And why to me?” means, " And why such treatment Love's LABOUR Lost, Armado calls his beard - excre

to me, who deserved so much better, than one worse

and better used ?" ment."

Also, in the COMEDY OF ERRORS. The word is used as we now might use excrescence.

“ AFFRONT his eye”-i. e. Meet his eye, or encounter “ — with the manner"-i. e. In the fact-a term

it. (Affrontare, Ital.) Shakespeare uses this word familiar to the law ; being, originally, “taken with the

with the same meaning again in HAMLET, (act iii. mainour," and applied to the thief taken with the

scene 1:)thing stolen about him.

That he, as 'twere by accident, may here

Afroni Ophelia. - TOUZE from thee thy business"-Minshew (Dic- And in CYMBELINE :—“Your preparation can affront tionary), says “touze" is to pull, or tug, and in this no less than what you hear of.” The word is used in sense it is used in MEASURE FOR MEASURE:

the same sense by Ben Jonson, and even by Dryden. We'll touze you joint by joint, etc.

Lodge, in the preface to his “ Translation of Seneca, 66 — court-word for a pheasant-A“pheasant” was

says, “ No soldier is counted valiant that affronteth not

his enemie." a very common present from country tenants to great people.

“ Good madam,--I have done"-Stevens and Malone “ — by the picking on's teeth” –To “pick the teeth” transfer “ I have done” to Paulina, who is going vehewas, at this time, a mark of pretension to fashion, or mently on. Cleomenes endeavours to interpose, but he elegance. Faulconbridge, speaking of the traveller,

gives over the attempt, with “I have done;" and then

Paulina continues. says:

With Knight and Collier, we follow He and his toothpick at my worship's mess.

the old text. In Sir Thomas Overbury's “Characters,” we find—“If

“ — 80 must thy GRACE"—The old editions read, “thy you find not a courtier here, you shall in Paul's, with

grave," which editors generally have agreed with Eda toothpick in his hat, a cape-cloak, and a long stock

wards in interpreting, “Thy grave here means thy ing."

beauties, which are buried in the grave: the continent « — the hottest day prognostication proclaims”—That

for the contents."

Among the other very ingenious is, the hottest day foretold in the almanack. Alma

MS. corrections of the first folio, (cited by Collier as nacks were, in Shakespeare's time, published under such Lord F. Egerton's folio,) is this of grace, which the title :- :-"An Almanack and Prognostication made for context shows, to my judgment, to be right. the year of our Lord God, 1595.”

"- that a king, as friend”—The old folios read,“ at - being somelhing gently considered”—Autolycus

friend”—a phrase, of which the most industrious stumeans, “I, having a gentlemanlike consideration given

dents of Old-English say they find no example else

where. me, (i. e. a bribe,) will bring you,” etc.

As it is probably a misprint, “and friend" and

“a friend" have been conjectured. “As friend" is the ACT V.-SCENE I.

simple conjecture of the MS. corrector above cited. “ Bred his hopes out of: TRUE"-The text is here

SCENE II. much indebted to Mr. Collier for having restored the reading of all the old editions. Leontes, in grief and

“ – if the IMPORTANCE were joy, or sorrow"-Malone remorse, states a fact. and adds, mournfully, “ true;" to

says that importance” here means only import; but which Paulina naturally adds that it is “ too true.” The

the word is rather to be taken in its etymological sense, modern editors, from the time of Theobald, have made

from the French emporter. Spenser uses important in

a kindred manner :-
Paulina say, " True, too true, my lord," without neces-
sity or authority; and, I think, injuriously to the feeling

he fiercely at him flew,
And with important outrage him assail'd.

“ The meaning of the text seems to be, that a beholder “Of his most sovereign NAME"—Most of the modern could not say if they were carried away by joy or soreditions, in opposition to all the old copies, have dame row.”—COLLIER. instead of “name;" as if the reference were to Hermione, and not the preservation of the name of Leontes,

- not by FAVOUR"-i. e. Countenance-often em

ployed in this sense. by marrying again. and having issue to succeed to the throne. In the folios "name" is printed with a capital “— with CLIPPING her"-i. e. Embracing her-a letter, which makes the error more improbable.

word of constant use formerly. Thus, in King JOHN :

Neptune's arms, who clippeth thee about.” « — the former queen is WELL”-i. e. At rest, dead. In ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA, the phrase is said to be

«- like a WEATHER-BITTEN CONDUIT"-Conduits, peculiarly applicable to the dead :

representing the human form, were formerly common.

The same image is found in ROMEO AND JULIET:-
Mess. First, madam, he is well.
Cleo. Why, there's more gold; but, sirrah, mark :

How now? a conduit, girl? what, still in tears?
We use to say, 'The dead are well;' bring it to that,

Evermore streaming? The gold I give thee will I melt, and pour

“Weather-bitten” was, in the third folio, changed to Down thy ill-uttering throat.

weather-beaten; but there is no necessity for the change. So, in ROMEO AND JULIET, Balthazar, speaking of Ju

Hamlet says, “The air bites shrewdly;" and the Duke, liet, whom he imagined to be dead, says:

in As You LIKE IT, speaking of the wind, says :Then she is well, and nothing can be ill.

“When it bites and blows upon my body.” 6 Weather “Begin, “And why to me?'”—The old copies gave this bitten,” therefore, means, corroded by the weather-as passage thus:

we still say, frost-bilten.

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of the passage.

a

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