CRES. Nay, I'll watch you for that; and that's one of the chiefeft of them too: if I cannot ward what I would not have hit, I can watch you for telling how I took the blow; unless it well past hiding, and then it is paft watching.

PAN. You are fuch another!

Enter TROILUS' Boy.

Bor. Sir, my lord would instantly speak with you PAN. Where?

Box. At your own house; there he unarms him.9 PAN. Good boy, tell him I come: [Exit Boy.] I doubt, he be hurt.-Fare ye well, good niece. CRES. Adieu, uncle.

PAN. I'll be with you, niece, by and by.
CRES. To bring, uncle,-

PAN. Ay, a token from Troilus.

CRES. By the fame token-you are a bawd.—

[Exit PANDARUS.

Words, vows, griefs, tears, and love's full facrifice,
He offers in another's enterprize :

But more in Troilus thousand fold I fee
Than in the glass of Pandar's praise may be ;
Yet hold I off. Women are angels, wooing:
Things won are done, joy's foul lies in the doing:

I

9 At your own house; there he unarms him.] Thefe neceffary words are added from the quarto edition. POPEe.

The words added are only-there he unarms him. JOHNSON.

I

joy's foul lies in the doing:] So read both the old editions, for which the later editions have poorly given : The foul's joy lies in doing. JOHNSON.

That the belov'd knows nought, that knows not this,

Men prize the thing ungain'd more than it is :
That the was never yet, that ever knew
Love got fo fweet, as when defire did fue:
Therefore this maxim out of love I teach,-

Achievement is command; ungain'd, befeech: 3

4

Then though my heart's content 5 firm love doth

bear,

Nothing of that fhall from mine eyes appear.

It is the reading of the second folio. RITSON.
Yet hold I off. Women are angels, wooing:

[Exit.

Things won are done, joy's foul lies in the doing:] This is the reading of all the editions; yet it must be erroneous; for the laft fix words of the paffage are totally inconfiftent with the reft of Creffida's speech, and the very reverse of the doctrine the profeffes to teach. I have, therefore, no doubt that we ought to read :

—joy's foul dies in the doing:

which means, that the fire of paffion is extinguished by enjoy

ment.

The following fix lines fufficiently confirm the propriety of this amendment, which is obtained by the change of a fingle letter:

That the belov'd &c. &c. M. MASON.

2 That She-] Means, that woman. JOHNSON.

3 Achievement is command; ungain'd, befeech :] The meaning of this obfcure line feems to be-" Men, after poffeffion, become our commanders; before it, they are our fuppliants." STEEVENS.

4 Then though-] The quarto reads-Then; the folio and the other modern editions read improperly-That. JOHNSON. my heart's content-] Content, for capacity.

WARBURTON. Ön confidering the context, it appears to me that we ought to read" my heart's confent," not content. M. MASON.

・my heart's content] Perhaps means, my heart's fatisfaction or joy; my well pleased heart. So, in our author's De

SCENE III.

The Grecian Camp. Before Agamemnon's Tent.

Trumpets. Enter AGAMEMNON, NESTOR,
ULYSSES, MENELAUS, and Others.

AGAM. Princes,

What grief hath fet the jaundice on your cheeks? The ample propofition, that hope makes

In all defigns begun on earth below,

Fails in the promis'd largeness: checks and difafters
Grow in the veins of actions highest rear'd;
As knots, by the conflúx of meeting fap,
Infect the found pine, and divert his grain
Tortive and errant from his courfe of growth.
Nor, princes, is it matter new to us,
That we come fhort of our suppose so far,

That, after feven years' fiege, yet Troy walls ftand;
Sith every action that hath gone before,
Whereof we have record, trial did draw
Bias and thwart, not anfwering the aim,
And that unbodied figure of the thought

That gav't furmifed fhape. Why then, you princes,
Do you with cheeks abafh'd behold our works;
And think them shames, which are, indeed, nought

dication of his Venus and Adonis to Lord Southampton : "I leave it to your honourable furvey, and your honour to your heart's content." This is the reading of the quarto. The folio has contents. MALONE.

My heart's content, I believe, fignifies the acquiefcence of my heart. STEEVENS.

To find perfiftive conftancy in men?

The fineness of which metal is not found

:

In fortune's love for then, the bold and coward,
The wife and fool, the artift and unread,

The hard and soft, seem all affin'd' and kin :
But, in the wind and tempest of her frown,
Diftinction, with a broad and powerful fan,
Puffing at all, winnows the light away;
And what hath mafs, or matter, by itself
Lies, rich in virtue, and unmingled.

NEST. With due obfervance of thy godlike feat,
Great Agamemnon, Neftor shall apply
Thy latest words. In the reproof of chance

affin'd-] i. e. joined by affinity. The fame adjective occurs in Othello:

7

8

"If partially affin'd, or leagu'd in office." STEEVENS. broad--] So the quarto. The folio reads―loud.

JOHNSON.

With due obfervance of thy godlike feat,] Goodly [the reading of the folio] is an epithet that carries no very great compliment with it; and Neftor seems here to be paying deference to Agamemnon's ftate and pre-eminence. The old books [the quartos] have it-to thy godly feat: godlike, as I have reformed the text, seems to me the epithet defigned; and is very conformable to what Æneas afterwards fays of Agamemnon:

"Which is that god in office, guiding men?" So godlike feat is here, ftate fupreme, above all other commanders. THEOBALD.

This emendation Theobald might have found in the quarto, which has the godlike feat. JOHNSON.

thy godlike feat,] The throne in which thou fittest, "like a defcended god." MALONE.

୨

9- Neftor Shall apply

Thy latest words.] Neftor applies the words to another

inftance. JOHNSON.

Perhaps Neftor means, that he will attend particularly to, and confider, Agamemnon's latest words. So, in an ancient interlude, entitled, The Nice Wanton, 1560:

Lies the true proof of men: The fea being smooth,
How many fhallow bauble boats dare fail

Upon her patient breaft,' making their way
With thofe of nobler bulk ?2

But let the ruffian Boreas once enrage

The gentle Thetis,3 and, anon, behold

The ftrong-ribb'd bark through liquid mountains cut,

Bounding between the two moift elements,
Like Perfeus' horfe : 4 Where's then the faucy boat,

"O ye children, let your time be well spent ;

6.6

Applye your learning, and your elders obey."

See alfo Vol. IX. p. 40, n. 3. MALONE.

I

breaft.

patient breaft,] The quarto, not fo well-ancient JOHNSON.

2 With thofe of nobler bulk?] Statius has the fame thought, though more diffufively expreffed:

"Sic ubi magna novum Phario de littore puppis

"Solvit iter, jamque innumeros utrinque rudentes
"Lataque veliferi porrexit brachia mali,

"Invafitque vias; it eodem angufta phafelus

Equore, et immenfi partem fibi vendicat auftri.” Again, in The Sylva of the fame author, Lib. I. iv. 120: immenfæ veluti connexa carin

66

Cymba minor, cum fævit hyems

et eodem volvitur auftro."

Mr. Pope has imitated the passage. STEEVENS.

3 But let the ruffian Boreas once enrage

The gentle Thetis,] So, in Lord Cromwell, 1602: "When I have feen Boreas begin to play the ruffian with us, then would I down on my knees.' MALONE.

4 Bounding between the two moist elements,

Like Perfeus' horfe:] Mercury, according to the fable, prefented Perfeus with talaria, but we no where hear of his horse. The only flying horfe of antiquity was Pegafus; and he was the property, not of Perfeus, but Bellerophon. But our poet followed a more modern fabulift, the author of The Deftruction of Troy, a book which furnished him with fome other circumftances of this play. Of the horse alluded to in the text he found in that book the following account: