Gregory, o' my word, we'll not carry coals."-Act I., Scene 1. This phrase was used proverbially for submitting to insult. Its origin is thus explained by Mr. Gifford :-"In all great houses, but particularly in the royal residences, there were a number of mean and dirty dependents, whose office it was to attend the wood-yard, sculleries, &c. Of these (for in the lowest deep there was a lower still), the most forlorn wretches seem to have been selected to carry coals to the kitchens, halls, &c. To this smutty regiment, who attended the progresses, and rode in the carts with the pots and kettles, which, with every other article of furnitnre, were then moved from palace to palace, the people in derision, gave the name of black-guards; a term since become sufficiently familiar, and never properly explained."

"Here comes two of the house of the Montagues."

Act I., Scene 1.

The partisans of the Montague family wore a token in their hats, in order to distinguish them from their enemies, the Capulets. Hence, throughout the play they are known at a distance. The circumstance is mentioned by Gascoigne, in "A DEVISE OF A MASQUE," written for Lord Mountacute (1575):

"And for a further proof, he shewed in his hat

This token, which the Mountacutes did bear always, for that
They covet to be known from Capels, where they pass,
For ancient grudge which long ago 'tween these two houses
was."

"

"So far from sounding and discovery,

As is the bud bit with an envious worm, Ere he can spread his sweet leaves to the air, Or dedicate his beauty to the sun."-Act I., Scene 1. The old copies here, instead of "to the sun," read "to the same." This prosaic termination of so beautiful a passage was altered at the suggestion of Theobald, to whom the received text is, in many instances, indebted, It is highly probable that "same" is a typographical mistake for "sunne," which was often the old orthography of the latter word. Daniel, in one of his sonnets (1594), has a passage somewhat similar:

"And while thou spread'st unto the rising sun
The fairest flower that ever saw the light,
Now 'joy thy time, before thy sweet be done."

"For beauty, starved with her severity,

Cuts beauty off from all posterity."-Act I., Scene 1. A similar thought to this is found in Shakspere's third Sonnet:

"Or who is he so fond will be the tomb
Of his self-love to stop posterity?"

And in his "VENUS AND ADONIS:"-
"What is thy body but a swallowing grave,
Seeming to bury that posterity

Which, by the rights of time, thou needs must have?"

"I remember it well,

'Tis since the earthquake now eleven years."
Act I, Scene 3.

How comes the Nurse to talk of an earthquake upon this occasion? There is no such circumstance, I believe, mentioned in any of the novels from which Shakspere may be supposed to have drawn his story; and therefore it seems probable that he had in view the earthquake which had really been felt in many parts of England in his own time, viz., on the 6th of April, 1580 (See Stowe's "CHRONICLE," &c.). If so, one may be permitted to conjecture that "ROMEO AND JULIET" was written in 1591.-TYRWHITT.

"Enter ROMEO, MERCUTIO, &c."-Act I., Scene 4.

In Arthur Brooke's heavy rhyming poem of "ROMEUS AND JULIET" (which will be subsequently spoken of), there is the following mention of Mercutio:

"At th' one side of her chair her lover Romeo,
And on the other side there sat one called Mercutio;-
A courtier that eachwhere was highly had in price,
For he was courteous of his speech and pleasant of device:
Even as a lion would among the lambs be bold,
Such was, among the bashful maids, Mercutio to behold.
With friendly gripe he seized fair Juliet's snowish hand:
A gift he had that nature gave him in his swathing band,-
That frozen mountain ice was never half so cold

As were his hands, though ne'er so near the fire he did them hold."

On this slight hint, Shakspere founded the admirable character bearing the same name.

"Give me a torch: I am not for this ambling."-Act I., Scene 4. A torchbearer seems to have been a constant attendant In "WESTWARD HOE," by on every troop of maskers. Decker and Webster, we find, "He is just like a torchbearer to maskers; he wears good clothes, and is ranked in good company, but he doth nothing."

Henry VIII., when he went masked to visit Wolsey at Whitehall, had sixteen torchbearers. The gentlemen-pensioners of Queen Elizabeth held torches while a play was acted before her, in the chapel of King's College, Cambridge.

"ROм. The game was ne'er so fair, and I am done. MER. Tut! dun's the mouse,' the constable's own word.' Act I., Scene 4.

"Dun's the mouse" is a proverbial expression that often occurs in the old comedies; its origin is uncertain: some

allusion to the colour of the animal was probably intended, but it was also occasionally used, as in the text, merely to found a quibble on the word "done." Malone observes that the phrase "seems to have meant 'peace, be still:' and hence it is said to be the constable's own word;' who may be supposed to be employed in apprehending an offender, and afraid of alarming him by any noise."-The constable may, with at least equal probability, be thought to have appropriated the word or term, from his habit of enjoining silence to others.

"If thou art dun, we'll draw thee from the mire, &c." Act I., Scene 4. In this line, the word "dun" is used to signify a dun horse. Mr. Gifford, in a note to Ben Jonson's "MASQUE OF CHRISTMAS," has thus described the rustic sport called "Dun is in the Mire:"-" A log of wood is brought into the room: this is Dun (the cart-horse), and a cry is raised that he is stuck in the mire. Two of the company advance, either with or without ropes, to draw him out. After repeated attempts, they find themselves unable to do it, and call for more assistance. The game continues till all the company take part in it, when "dun" is extricated of course; and the merriment arises from the awkward and affected efforts of the rustics to lift the log, and from sundry arch contrivances to let the ends of it fall on one another's toes."

"Of healths five fathom deep."-Act I., Scene 4.

A passage from "WESTWARD HOE" will best explain the practice here alluded to:-" Troth, sir, my master and Sir Goslin are guzzling: they are dabbling together fathom deep. The knight has drunk so much health to the gentleman, yonder, on his knees, that he hath almost lost the use of his legs."

"This is that very Mab

That plats the manes of horses in the night."

Act I., Scene 4. This line alludes to a very singular superstition, not yet forgotten in some parts of the country. It was believed that certain malignant spirits, whose delight was to wander in groves and pleasant places, assumed occasionally the likenesses of women clothed in white; that in this character they sometimes haunted stables in the night-time, carrying in their hands tapers of wax, which they dropped on the horses' manes, thereby platting them in inextricable knots, to the great annoyance of the poor animals and the vexation of their masters. These hags are mentioned in the works of William Auvergne, Bishop of Paris, in the thirteenth century.

There is a very uncommon old print by Hans Burgmair, relating to this subject. A witch enters the stable with a lighted torch; and previously to the operation of entangling the horse's mane, practises her enchantments on the groom, who is lying asleep on his back, and apparently influenced by the nightmare.-Douce.

"Nay, sit, nay, sit, good cousin Capulet."-Act I., Scene 5.

The "cousin Capulet" of this scene is doubtless the "uncle Capulet" mentioned in the paper of invitations. Shakspere and his cotemporaries used the word cousin to denote any collateral relation of whatever degree, and sometimes even to denote those of lineal descent. The King calls Hamlet his cousin, although his nephew and step-son; the old Duchess of York, in Richard III., calls her grandson cousin; and in a subsequent scene of this play, Lady Capulet exclaims, "Tybalt, my cousin; O, my brother's child!"

"Her beauty hangs upon the cheek of night

Like a rich jewel in an Ethiop's ear.-Act I., Scene 5. There is an illustration similar to this in Shakspere's twenty-seventh Sonnet :

"Which, like a jewel hung in ghastly night,

Makes black night beauteous, and her old face new."

In the passage quoted from the text, all the quartos and the first folio read, "It seems she hangs," instead of the more spirited expression, "Her beauty hangs." The present phraseology is from the second folio, and is now so consecrated by general use and approval, that it would be both useless and ungracious to attempt to supersede it.

We may here take the opportunity of remarking, that the most rigid sticklers for the authority of the first folio have found it necessary in very many cases (as well in this play as in others) to prefer the readings of the earlier quartos, and in some comparatively few instances, those of the second folio. The reason is this:-we know, unfortunately, as far as the matter is susceptible of proof, that none of Shakspere's plays were published under his own superintendence: we know also, in reference to all the earlier copies, that typographical errors, stage omissions or interpolations, the want of regalar editing, and other causes, have contributed to obscure, and, not unfrequently, to destroy the Poet's meaning: it is, therefore, in no irreverent spirit (as is too often inculcated), but rather from a feeling of duty and gratitude, that even the most cautious commentators have felt themselves compelled to depart from the principle of taking any one edition as an invariable guide.

From two or three instances selected in the present play from numerous others, merely as illustrations of the general fact, it will be seen that the reviser who should in every case adopt the readings of the first folio, would bring upon his devoted head the merited anathema of every Shaksperian reader. We have not, however, presumed to vary from its text without anxious consideration, and constant reference to thse commentators who have shewn the least disposition to innovate either as to words or versification.

"O, mickle is the powerful grace that lies

In herbs, plants, stones, and their true qualities."

Act II., Scene 3.

This eulogium on the hidden powers of nature affords a natural introduction to the Friar's furnishing Juliet with the sleeping potion in Act IV. Here is one of the many instances in which the train of thought was suggested by Brooke's poem :

"But not in vain, my child, hath all my wandering been:What force the stones, the plants, and metals, have to work, And divers other things that in the bowels of earth do lurk, With care I have sought out; with pain I did them prove."

"BEN. Why, what is Tybalt?

MER. More than Prince of Cats."-Act II., Scene 4. This is an allusion to the story-book of "REYNARD THE Fox," in which Tybert is the name given to the Cat. A similar phrase occurs in many old works.

"These fashion-mongers, these pardonnez-mois, who stand so much on the new form that they cannot sit at ease on the old bench."-Act II., Scene 4.

It is said that during the ridiculous fashion which prevailed of great "boulstered breeches," it was necessary to cut away hollow places in the benches of the House of Commons, to make room for those monstrous protuberances, without which those "who stood on the new form could not sit at ease on the old bench."-SINGER.

"Thisbé, a grey eye or so."-Act II, Scene 4. Mercutio means to allow that Thisbé had a very fine eye; for, from various passages, it appears that a grey eye was in our author's time thought eminently beautiful. This may seem strange to those who are not conversant with ancient phraseology; but a grey eye undoubtedly meant what we now denominate a blue eye.-MALONE.

"ROM. What counterfeit did I give you?

MER. The slip, sir, the slip."—Act II., Scene 4.

This allusion is to the old counterfeit money called a slip, which is frequently mentioned in writings of the period. Greene, in his “THIEVES FALLING OUT," &c., particularly describes it:-" And therefore he went and got him certain slips, which are counterfeit pieces of money, being brass, and covered over with silver, which the common people call slips."

"Why, then is my pump well-flowered."-Act II., Scene 4.

Here is a vein of wit too thin to be easily found. The fundamental idea is, that Romeo wore pinked pumps; that is, punched with holes in figures."-JOHNSON.

It was the custom to wear ribbands in the shoes, formed into the shape of roses, or of any other flowers. So in the "MASQUE OF GRAY'S INN" (1614):-"Every masker's pump was fastened with a flower suitable to his cap."-STEEVENS.

poses the poet to have meant by "runaway," the night; and by its eyes, the stars. It has been proposed to substitute "unawares, eyes may wink," for "runaway's eyes may wink." But this alteration would give a prosaic flatness to the phrase, which—to say nothing of other objections-would alone convince us that it is not the true reading.

'Give me my Romeo: and, when he shall die,
Take him and cut him out in little stars.”

Act III., Scene 2. This emendation is drawn from the undated quarto. The quartos of 1599, 1609, and the folio, read, "When I shall die."

"Hath Romeo slain himself? Say thou but Ay,' And that bare vowel I' shall poison more Than the death-darting eye of cockatrice."

Act III., Scene 2.

In Shakspere's time, the affirmative particle "ay" was usually written "I," and in the above passage the editors have thought it necessary to retain the old spelling. We have, however, ventured to deviate from this unsightly prac. tice, conceiving that there is sufficient similarity between the sounds of "ay" and "I" to point out the intended quibble. This is one of the trivial passages which we easily persuade ourselves have, by some accident or impertinence, been foisted into the genuine text.

"Wert thou as young as I, Juliet thy love."—Act III., Scene 3. Thus the original copy; for which in the folio we have"Wert thou as young as Juliet my love."

I only mention this to shew the very high value of the early quarto editions.-MALONE.

"Some say the lark and loathed toad change eyes;
O, now I would they had changed voices too!
Since arm from arm that voice doth us affray,
Hunting thee hence with hunts-up to the day."
Act III., Scene 5.

The toad having very fine eyes, and the lark very ugly ones, was the occasion of a saying that the lark and toad had changed eyes. This tradition Dr. Johnson states himself to have heard in a rustic rhyme:

"To heaven I'd fly,

But that the toad beguiled me of mine eye."

Juliet means that the croak of the toad would have been no indication of the appearance of day, and consequently no signal for her lover's departure.

The "hunts-up" was the name of the tune anciently played to wake the hunters, and collect them together.

"Ere this hand, by thee to Romeo sealed, Shall be the label to another deed."-Act IV., Scene 1. The seals of deeds were formerly not impressed on the parchment itself, but were appended on distinct slips or labels affixed to it. Hence in "KING RICHARD II.," the Duke of York discovers, by the depending seal, a covenant which his son, the Duke of Aumerle, had entered into:"What seal is that which hangs without thy bosom?"

"Then (as the manner of our country is),
In thy best robes, uncovered on the bier."
Act IV., Scene 1.

The Italian custom here alluded to is still continued. Mr. Rogers, in his poem on Italy, describes a scene of the kind:

"But now by fits

A dull and dismal noise assailed the ear,
A wail, a chant, louder and louder yet:
And now a strange fantastic troop appeared!

Thronging they came, as from the shades below;
All of a ghostly white!-'O say (I cried),
Do not the living here bury the dead?

Do spirits come and fetch them? What are these
That seem not of this world, and mock the day;
Each with a burning taper in his hand?'-
'It is an ancient brotherhood thou seest.
Such their apparel. Through the long, long line,
Look where thou wilt, no likeness of a man:
The living masked, the dead alone uncovered.
But mark!'-And, lying on her funeral couch,
Like one asleep, her eyelids closed, her hands
Folded together on her modest breast,

As 't were her nightly posture, through the crowd
She came at last,-and richly, gaily clad,
As for a birth-day feast!"

My bosom's lord sits lightly on his throne; And, all this day, an unaccustomed spirit Lifts me above the ground with cheerful thoughts." Act V., Scene 1. These three lines are very gay and pleasing. But why does Shakspere give Romeo this involuntary cheerfulness just before the extremity of unhappiness? Perhaps to shew the vanity of trusting to those uncertain and casual exaltations or depressions which many consider as certain foretokens of good and evil.-JOHNSON.

"Going to find a barefoot brother out,

One of our order, to associate me."-Act V., Scene 2. It was customary for friars to travel in pairs, in order that each might be a check upon the behaviour of the other.

The original relater of the story on which this play is formed, was Luigi da Porto, a gentleman of Vicenza, who died in 1529. His novel did not appear till some years after his death; being first printed at Venice, in 1535, under the title of "LA GIULIETTA."

In 1554, Bandello published at Lucca a novel on the same subject (tom. ii., nov. 9); and shortly afterwards Boisteau exhibited one in French, founded on the Italian narratives, but varying from them in many particulars.

From Boisteau's novel the same story was, in 1562, formed into an English poem, with considerable alterations and large additions, by Mr. Arthur Brooke.

Painter, in the second volume of his "PALACE OF PLEASURE" (1567), published a prose translation from the French of Boisteau, which he entitled "RHOMEO AND JULIETTA." Shakspere had probably read Painter's novel, having taken one circumstance from it or from some other prose translation of Boisteau; but his play was undoubtedly formed on the poem of Arthur Brooke.

This is proved decisively by the following circumstances: -1. In the poems, the Prince of Verona is called Escalus: so also in the play. In Painter's translation from Boisteau he is named Signor Escala, and sometimes Lord Bartholomew of Escala.-2. In Painter's novel, the family of Romeo are called the Montesches: in the poem and in the play, the Montagues.-3. The messenger employed by Friar Law

rence to carry a letter to Romeo, to inform him when Juliet would awake from her trance, is in Painter's translation called Anselme: in the poem and in the play, Friar John is employed in this business -4. The circumstance of Capulet's writing down the names of the guests whom he invites to supper, is found in the poem and in the play, but is not mentioned by Painter, nor is it found in the original Italian novel.-5. The residence of the Capulets, in the original and in Painter, is called Villa Franca: in the poem and in the play, Freetown.-6. Several passages of Romeo and Juliet appear to have been formed on hints furnished by the poem, of which no traces are found either in Painter's novel, or in Boisteau, or the original.—MALONE.

Romeo and Juliet is a picture of love and its pitiable fate, in a world whose atmosphere is too rough for this tenderest blossom of human life. Two beings, created for each other, feel mutual love at first glance; every consideration disappears before the invisible influence of living in one another: they join themselves secretly, under circumstances in the highest degree hostile to the union, relying merely on the protection of an irresistible power. By unfriendly events following blow upon blow, their heroic constancy is exposed to all manner of trials, till, forcibly separated from each other, they are united in the grave to meet again in another world.

All this is to be found in the beautiful story which Shakspere has not invented; and which, however simply told, will always excite a tender sympathy: but it was reserved for Shakspere to unite purity of heart and the glow of ima gination, sweetness and dignity of manners and passionate violence, in one ideal picture. By the manner in which he has handled it, it has become a glorious song of praise on that inexpressible feeling which ennobles the soul, and gives to it its highest sublimity, and which elevates even the senses themselves into soul; and at the same time is a melancholy elegy on its frailty, from its own nature and external circumstances: at once the deification and the burial of love. It appears here like a heavenly spark that, descending to the earth, is converted into a flash of lightning, by which mortal creatures are almost in the same moment set on fire and consumed.

Whatever is most intoxicating in the odour of a southern spring, languishing in the song of the nightingale, or voluptuous in the first opening of the rose, is to be found in this poem. But, even more rapidly than the first blossoms of youth and beauty decay, it hurries on from the first timidlybold declaration of love and modest return, to the most unlimited passion, to an irrevocable union: then, amidst alternating storms of rapture and despair, to the death of the two lovers, who still appear enviable as their love survives them, and as by their death they have obtained a triumph over every separating power.

The sweetest and the bitterest love and hatred, festivity and dark forebodings, tender embraces and sepulchres, the fulness of life and self-annihilation, are all here brought close to each other: and all these contrasts are so blended, in the harmonious and wonderful work, into a unity of impression, that the echo which the whole leaves behind in the mind resembles a single but endless sigh.-SCHLEGEL.