not that so, mafter Page? He hath wrong'd me;indeed, he hath;-at a word, he hath;-believe me;-Robert Shallow, Efquire, faith, he is wrong'd. PAGE. Here comes fir John.

Enter Sir John FALSTAFF, BARDOLPH, NYM, and

PISTOL.

FAL. Now, mafter Shallow; you'll complain of me to the king?

SHAL. Knight, you have beaten my men, kill'd my deer, and broke open my lodge."

FAL. But not kifs'd your keeper's daughter?
SHAL. Tut, a pin! this fhall be anfwer'd.

FAL. I will anfwer it ftraight;--I have done all this: That is now anfwer'd.

SHAL. The Council fhall know this.

FAL. 'Twere better for you, if it were known in counfel: you'll be laugh'd at.

9 and broke open my lodge.] This probably alludes to fome real incident, at that time well known. JOHNSON.

So probably Falstaff's answer. FARMER.

2 'Twere better for you, if it were known in counsel:] The old copies read-Twere better for you, if 'twere known in council. Perhaps it is an abrupt fpeech, and must be read thus:-'Twere better for youiftwere known in council, you'll be laugh'd at. 'Twere better for you, is, I believe, a menace. JOHNSON.

Some of the modern editors arbitrarily read-if 'twere not known in council:--but I believe Falstaff quibbles between council and counfel. The latter fignifies fecrecy, So, in Hamlet:

The players cannot keep counfel, they'll tell all." Falftaff's meaning feems to be-'twere better for you if it were known only in fecrecy, i. e. among your friends. A more publick complaint would fubject you to ridicule.

Thus, in Chaucer's Prologue to the Squires Tale, v. 10305, Mr, Tyrwhitt's edit:

"But were ye what? in confeil be it feyde,
Me reweth fore I am unto hire teyde."

EVA. Pauca verba, fir John; good worts.

FAL. Good worts! good cabbage.3-Slender, I broke your head; What matter have you against me?

+

SLEN. Marry, fir, I have matter in my head against you; and against your coney-catching rafcals, Bardolph, Nym, and Pistol. They carried me to the tavern, and made me drunk, and afterwards pick'd my pocket.

Again, in Gammer Gurton's Needle, laft edit. p. 29:

But firft for you in council, I have a word or twaine."

STEEVENS.

Mr. Ritfon fuppofes the prefent reading to be juft, and quite in Falstaff's infolent fneering manner. It would be much better, indeed, to have it known in the council, where you would only be laughed at."

REED.

The fpelling of the old quarto (counfel,)as well as the general purport of the paffage, fully confirms Mr. Steevens's interpretation. "Shal. Well, the Council fhall know it. Fal. 'Twere better for you 'twere known in counfell.. You'll be laugh't at."

In an office-book of Sir Heneage Finch, Treafurer of the Chambers to Queen Elizabeth, (a Mf. in the British Museum,) I obferve that whenever the Privy Councel is mentioned, the word is always fpelt Counsel; fo that the equivoque was lefs ftrained then than it appears now.

Mum is Counfell, viz. filence," is among Howel's Proverbial Sentences. See his DICT. folio, 1660. MALONE.

66

3 Good worts! good cabbage.] Worts was the ancient name of all the cabbage kind. So, in Beaumont and Fletcher's Valentinian: Planting of worts and onions, any thing." STEEVENS. 4 coney-catching rafcals,] A coney-catcher was, in the time of Elizabeth, a common name for a cheat or fharper. Green, one of the first among us who made a trade of writing pamphlets, publifhed A Detection of the Frauds and Tricks of Coney-catchers and Couzeners. JOHNSON.

So, in Decker's Satiromastix:

Thou shalt not coney-catch me for five pounds."

STEEVENS.

5 They carried me, &c.] Thefe words, which are neceffary to introduce what Falstaff fays afterwards, ["Piftol, did you pick mafter Slender's purfe?] I have restored from the early quarto.

BAR. You Banbury cheese!"
SLEN. Ay, it is no matter.

7

! PIST. How now, Mephoftophilus ?? SLEN. Ay, it is no matter.

8

NYM. Slice, I fay! pauca, pauca; flice! that's my humour..

Of this circumftance, as the play is exhibited in the folio, Sir John could have no knowledge. MALONE.

We might fuppofe that Falstaff was already acquainted with this robbery, and had received his fhare of it, as in the case of the handle of miftrefs Bridget's fan, A& II. fc. ii. His queftion, therefore, may be faid to arife at once from confcious guilt and pretended ignorance. I have, however, adopted Mr. Malone's reftoration. STEEVENS.

6 You Banbury cheese!] This is faid in allufion to the thin carcafe of Slender. The fame thought occurs in Jack Drum's Entertainment, 1601:- "Put off your cloaths, and you are like a nothing but paring." So Heywood, in his

Banbury cheese,

collection of epigrams:

"I never faw Banbury cheese thick enough,

"But I have oft feen Effex cheefe quick enough."

66

STEEVENS.

7 How now, Mephoftophilus?] This is the name of a spirit or familiar, in the old flory book of Sir John Fauftus, or John Fauft: to whom our author afterwards alludes, A&II. fc. ii. That it was a cant phrafe of abuse, appears from the old comedy cited above, called A pleafant Comedy of the Gentle Craft, Signat. H 3. Away you Iflington whitepot; hence you hopper-arfe, you barley-pudding full of maggots, you broiled carbonado: avaunt, avaunt, Mephoftophilus." In the same vein, Bardolph here also calls Slender, “ You Banbury cheese." T. WARTON.

Pistol means to call Slender a very ugly fellow. So, in Nofcete, (Humors) by Richard Turner, 1607:

"O face, no face hath our Theophilus,

"But the right forme of Mephotophilus.

"I know 'twould ferve, and yet I am no wizard,

To playe the Devil i'the vault without a vizard." Again, in The Mufes Looking Glafs, 1638: “We want not you to play Mephotophilus. A pretty natural vizard!" STEEVENS.

s Slice, I fay! pauca, pauca;] Dr. Farmer (fee a former note, p. 10, n. 8.) would transfer the Latin words to Evans.

But the

SLEN. Where's Simple, my man?—can you tell, coufin?

EVA. Peace: I pray you! Now let us underftand: There is three umpires in this matter, as I underftand: that is-mafter Page, fidelicet, mafter Page; and there is myself, fidelicet, myfelf; and the three party is, laftly and finally, mine host of the Garter.

PAGE. We three, to hear it, and end it between them.

EVA. Fery good: I will make a prief of it in, my note-book; and we will afterwards 'ork upon the caufe, with as great difcreetly as we can.

FAL. Pistol,———————

PIST. He hears with ears.

EVA. The tevil and his tam! what phrafe is this,* He hears with ear? Why, it is affectations.

FAL. Pistol, did you pick master Slender's purfe? SLEN. Ay, by thefe gloves, did he, (or I would I might never come in mine own great chamber again else,) of seven groats in mill-fixpences,' and

old copy, I think, is right. Piftol, in K. Henry V. ufes the fame language:

I will hold the quondam. Quickly

"For the only fhe; and pauca, there's enough." In the fame fcene Nym twice ufes the word folus.

MALONI.

--that's my humour.] So, in an ancient Mf. play, entitled

The Second Maiden's Tragedy:

"I love not to difquiet ghofts, fir,

"Of any people living; that's my humour, fir.".

See a following note, A& II. fc. i, STEEVENS.

2

what phrafe is this, &c.] Sir Hugh is juftified in his cenfure of this paffage by Pecham, who in his Garden of Eloquence, 1577, places this very mode of expreffion under the article Piconafmus.

HENDERSON,

3 -mill-fixpences,] It appears from a paffage in Sir William

two Edward fhovel-boards, that coft me two fhilling and two pence a-piece of Yead Miller, by thefe gloves.

Davenant's Newes from Plimouth, that these mill'd-fixpences were ufed by way of counters to caft up money:

"A few mill'd fixpences, with which

"My purfer cafts accompt." STEEVENS.

4 Edward fhovel-boards,] One of thefe pieces of metal is mentioned in Middleton's comedy of The Roaring Girl, 1611:

away flid I my man, like a fhovel-board fhilling," &c.

STEEVENS.

"Edward Shovel-boards," were the broad fhillings of Edw. VI. Taylor, the water-poet, in his Travel of Twelve-pence, makes him complain:

the unthrift every day

With my face downwards do at hoave-board play; "That had I had a beard, you may suppose,

"They had worne it And in a note he tells us:

off, as they have done my nofc."
"Edw. fhillings for the most part are

ufed at hoave-board." FARMER.

In the Second Part of K. Henry IV. Falstaff says, "Quoit him down, Bardolph, like a fhove-groat fhilling." This confirms Dr. Farmer's opinion, that pieces of coin were used for that purpose. M. MASON.

text.

The following extract, for the notice of which I am indebted to Dr. Farmer, will afcertain the fpecies of coin mentioned in the "I muft here take notice before I entirely quit the fubjed of thefe laft-mentioned fhillings, that I have alfo feen fome other pieces of good filver, greatly refembling the fame, and of the fame date 1547, that have been fo much thicker as to weigh about half an ounce, together with fome others that have weighed an ounce. Folkes's, Table of English filver Coins, p. 32. The former of these were probably what coft Maiter Slender two fhillings and two-pence a-piece. REED.

It appears, that the game of Shovel-board was played with the fhillings of Edward VI. in Shadwell's time; for in his Mifer, A& II. fc. i. Cheatly fays, "She perfuaded him to play with hazard at backgammon, and he has already loft his Edward Jhillings that he kept for Shovel-board, and was pulling out broad pieces (that have not feen the fun these many years) when I came away.'

In Shadwell's Lancashire Witches, Vol. III. p. 232. the game is called Shuffle-board. It is fill played; and I lately heard a man afk another to go into an alehoufe in the Broad San&uary, Weftminier, to play at it. DOUCE.