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to his situation in life, a person who runs with eagerness from one situation to another, though he ought not to have any concern in it: one, in short, whom we call a busy body. B.

Peter.

I do perceive,

These poor informal women are no more

But instruments of some more mightier member,

That sets them on.

These poor informal women. Informal signifies out of their senses. In the Comedy of Errors, we meet with these lines:

I will not let him stir,

"Till I have used the approved means I have,

"With wholesome syrups, drugs, and holy prayers,
"To make of him a formal man again."

Formal, in this passage, evidently signifies in his senses. The lines are spoken of Antipholis of Syracuse, who is behaving like a madman. Again, in Antony and Cleopatra:

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Thou shouldst come like a fury crown'd with snakes,

"Not like a formal man." STEEV.

"Informal woman." "Informal" means informing against, accusing. Informal can scarcely have the sense which Mr. Steevens has affixed to it, in either instance. Here it certainly cannot : for Angelo would hardly talk of his patience being touch'd by mad women; or of their being (as such) the instruments employed against him. In the passages from the Comedy of Errors, and Antony and Cleopatra, "formal man" is a proper, perfect man.

B.

Ang. O my dread lord,

I should be guiltier than my guiltiness,

To think I can be undiscernible,

When I perceive, your grace, like power divine,

Hath look'd upon my passes.

STEEV.

My passes.] i. e. what has past in my administration.
"My passes." "Passes " for trespasses, crimes. B.

Duke. Well, Angelo, your evil quits you well:

Look that you love your wife.

Your evil quits you well.] Quits you, recompenses, requites you. JoHN. "Quits you well."Quits' seems here to have its ordinary mean

ing, leaves. Your evil leaves you, and you are unhurt. B.

Duke. Thy slanders I forgive; and therewithal

Remit thy other forteits!

Thy other forfeits.] Thy other punishments. JOHN.

To forfeit anciently signified to commit a carnal offence. So in the History of Helyas Knight of the Swanne, bl. 1. no date" to affirme by an untrue knight, that the noble queen Beatrice had forfayted with a dogge." Again, in the 12th Pageant of the Coventry Collection of Mysteries, the Virgin Mary tells Joseph:

"I dede nevyr forfete with man I wys." MS. Cott. Vesp. D. viii. STEEV.

"Forfeits." Forfeit is the French forfait, which signifies transgression, crime. B.

Much ado about Nothing.

ACT I. SCENE I.

Beat. He set up his bills here in Messina, and challenged Cupid at the flight; and my uncle's fool reading the challenge subscrib'd for Cupid, and challenged him at the bird-bolt.

-challenged Cupid at the flight.] To challenge at the flight, was a challenge to shoot with an arrow. Flight means an arrow, as may be proved from the following lines in Beaumont and Fletcher's Bonduca :

-not the quick rack swifte ;

"The virgin from the hated ravisher

"Not half so fearful: not a flight drawn home,

"A round stone from a sling."

The bird-bolt is a short thick arrow without point, and spreading at the extremity so much, as to leave a flat surface, about the breadth of a shilling. Such are to this day in use to kill rooks with, and are shot from a cross bow. So in Marston's What You Will, 1607;

"

-ignorance should shoot

"His gross-knobb'd hird-bolt."

-STEEV.

Challenged Cupid at the flight,' &c. The Commentators are right in respect to flight and bolt; both which may be understood to be spoken of the arrow. But there is a remote, a latent meaning in the expressions of Beatrice undiscovered by them; together with a kind of quibble on the words in question; and if the whole be not expounded clearly, much of the pleasantry and even force of the passage will be lost for in it flight' is not only an arrow, but a sally of the fancy, and bolt' as it has the signification of flight' in the first instance, so it has likewise something resembling it in the second; since to bolt is to blurt, or send forth any hasty sentiment or opinion. Now for perfectly understanding the whole, we must attend to the character of Benedick, who is represented at the opening of the play as entertaining an indifference, or at least of showing an affected indifference for women. He therefore challenges Cupid, or love,

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armed as he is supposed to be, and with all his power of wit and fancy, to cope or enter the lists with him, "he has wit enough to defend himself." But a further explication of bird-bolt' is yet required: its hidden meaning must be set to view. A bolt,' as I have before observed, is not only an arrow, but any word or expression suddenly thrown out. Hence, "a fool's bolt is soon shot." Meaning that the fool speaks hastily; that he instantly utters whatever is uppermost in his thought, in a word, that his sallies are lively and without premeditation, as is certainly the case.

We see then the reason for which Benedick is made to challenge love. But why, it will be asked, does the fool subscribe for Cupid, and summon Benedick to a trial at the Bird bolt? Bird with the earlier writers is mistress, a woman beloved and courted. The fool who has noticed the character of the champion, is said by Beatrice to challenge this adversary of woman; and in the name of Cupid at the bird-bolt: that is to bring him to the presence of beauty, to an assembly of women on whom he has exercised his wit; and that it may of course be seen whether he can maintain his ground against the force of their charms and pleasantry united, or if he must necessarily succumb to them. That I have rightly interpreted the passage, the very circumstance of challenging Cupid I believe will prove. If this is not admitted the whole will be without a consequence, and that in Shakspeare would be extraordinary indeed. B.

Bene. But speak you this with a sad brow? or do you play the flouting Jack; to tell us Cupid is a good harefinder, and Vulcan a rare carpenter?

-to tell us Cupid is a good hare-finder, &c. I know not whether I conceive the jest here intended. Claudio hints his love of Hero. Benedick asks whether he is serious, or whether he only means to jest, and tell them that Cupid is a good hare-finder, and Vulcan a rare carpenter. A man praising a pretty lady in jest, may show the quick sight of Cupid, but what has it to do with the carpentry of Vulcan? Perhaps the thought lies no deeper than this, Do you mean to tell us as new what we all know already? JOHN.

To tell us Cupid is a good hare-finder, &c.' The meaning, I believe, is this "How am I to understand you? Do you mean to tell us that Cupid is sure to bring trouble and anxiety to his followers?" (To be hare, or haried is, in old language, to be confused, troubled, perplexed.) "And do you further inform us that Vulcan was an excellent [carpenter,] chariot-builder ?" Benedick would have it understood, " both these circumstances are known to me." The poet has called Vulcan a chariot-builder, in mistake, and instead of his monstrous issue Ericthonius, who was actually the inventor of that vehicle (carpentum). The "carpentaria fabrica," has led our Author to use the English substantive in the Latin sense; and not altogether improperly in speaking of the Lemnian god, though, as before remarked, it is to his son, if son he must be called, that it will particularly apply. B.

Claud. If this were so, so were it uttered.

Bene. Like the old tale, my lord: it is not so, nor 'twas not so: but, indeed, God forbid it should be so. Claud. If my passion change not shortly, God forbid it should be otherwise.

Claud. If this were so, so were it uttered. This and the three next speeches I do not well understand; there seems something omitted relating to Hero's consent, or to Claudio's marriage, else I know not what Claudio can wish not to be otherwise. The copies all read alike. Perhaps it may be better thus,

Claud. If this were so, so were it.

Bene. Uttered like the old tale, &c.

Claudio gives a sullen answer, if it is so, so it is. Still there seems something omitted which Claudio and Pedro concur in wishing. JoHN.

If this were so, so were it uttered.' I see no kind of chasm here and the speeches are easily understood. Claudio says: If this' (his love for Hero) were so,' [would] it were so uttered,'i. e. "would it were made known," or-"I would that Leonato were acquainted with that love." Benedick,-and according to his ordinary humor observes, "God forbid it should be so that you should be really in love." To this, his companion replies,If my passion change not shortly"—that is" if some other passion (such perhaps as the greater one of ambition) seize not on me; God forbid it should be otherwise." In a word, his wish (as he would insinuate) is, at present, only for the gaining of Hero. B.

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Conr. What the good-jer, my lord! why are you thus out of measure sad?

What the good-jer, my lord! We should read, goujere. STEEV.

What the good-jer, my lord.' We should not read goujere. Jer' is the same as jere or gere, i. e. jest, joke. The expression is equivalent to—“ In the name of pleasantry, why, &c." B.

Claud.

Beauty is a witch,

Against whose charms faith melteth into blood.

-beauty is a witch,

Against whose charms fuith melteth into blood.

i. e. as wax when opposed to the fire kindled by a witch, no longer preserves the figure of the person whom it was designed to represent, but flows into a shapeless lump; so fidelity, when confronted with beauty, dissolves into our ruling passion, and is lost there like a drop of water in the sea. STEEV.

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Beauty is a witch.' We are here presented with a note, which may be deserving of a place among the Curiosities of Literature. To Mr. D'Israeli I therefore commit it. But whatever may be Mr. Steevens's idea of the power of witchcraft, I am of opinion that wax will melt, when exposed to the action of fire, whether that fire should be kindled by a witch, or even by Mr. S. himself:-who is certainly not to be numbered among the supernaturals,-since his annotations passim, enchanting as they may be in his own conceit,

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