Ros. My phyfick fays, I." BIRON. Will you prick't with your eye? [Retiring. DUM. Sir, I pray you, a word: What lady is that fame ?9 BOYET. The heir of Alençon, Rofaline her name. DUM. A gallant lady! Monfieur, fare you well. [Exit. LONG. I beseech you a word; What is she in the white? BOYET. A woman fometimes, an you saw her in the light. 7 My phyfick fays, I.] She means to fay, ay. The old fpelling of the affirmative particle has been retained here for the fake of the rhyme. MALONE. *No poynt,] So, in The Shoemaker's Holliday, 1600: tell me where he is. 66 "No point. Shall I betray my brother?" STEEVENS. No point was a negation borrowed from the French. See the note on the same words, Act V. sc. ii. MALONE. • What lady is that fame ?] It is odd that Shakspeare should make Dumain enquire after Rofaline, who was the mistress of Biron, and neglect Katharine, who was his own. Biron behaves in the fame manner. No advantage would be gained by an exchange of names, because the last speech is determined to Biron by Maria, who gives a character of him after he has made his exit. Perhaps all the ladies wore masks but the princess. STEEVENS. They certainly did. See p. 42, where Biron fays to Rofaline "Now fair befal your mask!" Malonz. LONG. Perchance, light in the light: I defire her name. BOYET. She hath but one for herself; to defire that, were a fhame. LONG. Pray you, fir, whose daughter? BOYET. Her mother's, I have heard. BOYET. Not unlike, fir; that may be. [Exit LONG. BIRON. What's her name, in the cap? BOYET. Katharine, by good hap. BIRON. Is the wedded, or no? BOYET. To her will, fir, or fo. BIRON. You are welcome, fir; adieu! BOYET. Farewell to me, fir, and welcome to you. [Exit BIRON.-Ladies unmask. MAR. That laft is Biron, the merry mad-cap lord Not a word with him but a jest. I BOYET. And every jeft but a word. PRIN. It was well done of you to take him at his word. BOYET. I was as willing to grapple, as he was to board. God's bleffing on your beard!] That is, may'ft thou have fense and seriousness more proportionate to thy beard, the length of which fuits ill with fuch idle catches of wit. JOHNSON. I doubt whether so much meaning was intended to be conveyed by these words. MALONE. MAR. Two hot fheeps, marry! BOYET. And wherefore not ships? No sheep, fweet lamb, unless we feed on your lips.* MAR. You sheep, and I pasture; Shall that finish the jeft? BOYET. So you grant pasture for me. MAR. [Offering to kifs her. Not fo, gentle beaft; My lips are no common, though several they be.3 2 unless we feed on your lips.] Our author has the fame expreffion in his Venus and Adonis : "Feed where thou wilt, on mountain or in dale; My lips are no common, though feveral they be.] Several is an inclosed field of a private proprietor; fo Maria fays, her lips are private property. Of a Lord that was newly married, one obferved that he grew fat; "Yes," faid Sir Walter Raleigh, any beaft will grow fat, if you take him from the common and graze him in the feveral." JOHNSON. So, in The Rival Friends, 1632: "my fheep have quite difgreft "Their bounds, and leap'd into the feveral." Again, in Green's Difputation, &c. 1592: "rather would have mewed me up as a henne, to have kept that severall to himself by force," &c. Again, in Sir John Oldcastle, 1600: "Of late he broke into a severall "That does belong to me." Again, in Fenton's Tragical Difcourfes, 4to. bl. 1. 1597"he entered commons in the place which the olde John thought to be referved severall to himself," p. 64. b. Again, in Holinfhed's Hiftory of England, B. VI. p. 150:-" not to take and pale in the commons, to enlarge their fever alles." STEEVENS. My lips are no common, though feveral they be.] In Dr. Johnfon's note upon this paffage, it is faid that SEVERAL is an inclosed field of a private proprietor. Dr. Johnson has totally mistaken this word. In the first place it fhould be fpelled feverell. This does not fignify an inclosed field or private property, but is rather the property of every landholder in the parish. In the uninclofed parishes in Warwickshire, BOYET. Belonging to whom? MAR. To my fortunes and me. PRIN. Good wits will be jangling: but, gentles, agree: and other counties, their method of tillage is thus. The land is divided into three fields, one of which is every year fallow. This the farmers plough and manure, and prepare for bearing wheat. Betwixt the lands, and at the end of them, fome little grafs land is interspersed, and there are here and there fome little patches of green fwerd. The next year this ploughed field bears wheat, and the grafs land is preferved for hay; and the year following the proprietors fow it with beans, oats, or barley, at their discretion; and the next year it lies fallow again; fo that each field in its turn is fallow every third year; and the field thus fallowed is called the common field, on which the cows and sheep graze, and have herdsmen and shepherds to attend them, in order to prevent them from going into the two other fields which bear corn and grafs. These last are called the severell, which is not separated from the common by any fence whatever; but the care of preventing the cattle from going into the feverell, is left to the herdsmen and shepherds; but the herdsmen have no authority over a town bull, who is permitted to go where he pleases in the feverell. DR. JAMES. Holinfhed's Defcription of Britain, p. 33, and Leigh's Accedence of Armourie, 1597, p. 52, fpell this word like Shakspeare. Leigh alfo mentions the town bull, and fays: "all feverells to him are common." TOLLet. My lips are no common, though feveral they be.] A play on the word feveral, which, befides its ordinary fignification of Separate, diftinct, likewife fignifies in uninclofed lands, a certain portion of ground appropriated to either corn or meadow, adjoining the common field. In Minfheu's Dictionary, 1617, is the following article: "TO SEVER from others. Hinc nos pafcua et campos feorfim ab aliis feparatos Severels dicimus." In the margin he fpells the word as Shakspeare does-feverels.-Our author is feldom careful that his comparifons fhould answer on both fides. If Several be understood in its ruftick sense, the adverfative particle ftands but aukwardly. To fay, that though land is feveral, it is not a common, feems as unjuftifiable as to affert, that though a houfe is a cottage, it is not a palace. MALONE. The civil war of wits were much better used lies,) By the heart's still rhetorick, disclosed with eyes,4 Deceive me not now, Navarre is infected. PRIN. With what? BOYET. With that which we lovers entitle, affected. PRIN. Your reason? BOYET. Why, all his behaviours did make their retire To the court of his eye, peeping thorough defire: eye, 4 By the heart's ftill rhetorick, difclofed with eyes,] So, in Daniel's Complaint of Rofalind, 1594: "Sweet filent rhetorick of perfuading eyes; His tongue, all impatient to speak and not fee,] That is, his tongue being impatiently defrous to fee as well as speak. JOHNSON. Although the expreffion in the text is extremely odd, I take the sense of it to be that his tongue envied the quickness of his eyes, and ftrove to be as rapid in its utterance, as they in their perception.-Edinburgh Magazine, Nov. 1786. STEEVENS. • To feel only looking-] Perhaps we may better read: "To feed only by looking-." JOHNSON. |