walking, eating, and speaking, all under the influence of the most popular leader of fashion." 69. Line 64: I'll FEE thee to stand up.-Fee is Theobald's correction for see of the Folios. Staunton (comparing Richard II. v. 3. 129, 130: Beling. Good aunt, stand up. I do not sue to stand; reads sue. "The afflicted king mindful of his own debility remarks, Instead of your begging permission of me to rise I'll sue thee for the same grace.' 70. Line 70: Good faith, across; i.e. "I would you had broken it across;" for in tilting it was thought awkward and disgraceful to break the spear across the body of the adversary, instead of by a direct thrust. Staunton thinks the allusion is "to some game where certain successes entitle the achiever to mark a cross." 71. Line 75: I've seen a MEDICINE.-For medicine in this sense (French, médecin), compare: 74. Lines 87, 88: hath amaz'd me more Than I dare blame my weakness. i.e. more than I like to confess, the confession involving a confession of weakness. 75. Line 138: Since you set up your rest 'gainst remedy. --In the game of primero "to set up one's rest" was to stand upon the cards you have in your hand in the hope that they may prove better than those of your adversary; hence its very common figurative use, "to take a resolution." Compare Romeo and Juliet, note 18. 76. Line 147: despair most FITS.-Fits, according to Dyce, who quotes Nichols's Illustrations, &c., vol. ii. p. 343, is Theobald's correction for shifts of the Folios. Theobald, however, printed sits, which is Pope's emendation. 77. Lines 158, 159: I am not an impostor, that proclaim I am not an impostor, pretending to have another object in view from that which I am really aiming at. 78. Lines 164, 165: Ere twice the horses of the sun shall bring "Ere they shall conduct him round his daily orbit." The pilot's glass in line 168 must be a two-hour glass. VOL. V. Seard otherwise, ne worse of worst extended With vildest torture, let my life be ended. Schmidt (Sh. Lex. s. v. extend) attempts to explain this as follows: "nor would that be an increase of ill; it would not be the worst mended by what is still worse." But ne nor occurs nowhere else in any work attributed to Shakespeare except in the doubtful Prologue to Pericles (ii. 36), and none but the most servile worshipper of the Folio will be content with this explanation. The other three Folios alter ne to no(" no worse of worst extended"), which Steevens interprets, "provided nothing worse is offered to me (meaning violation), let my life be ended with the worst of tortures." Of the various emendations suggested, the reading given in the text seems decidedly the best. Malone first suggested nay for ne. 81. Line 184: Youth, beauty, wisdom, courage, all.-To mend the metre Theobald printed: "Youth, beauty, wisdom, courage, virtue, all." But see Abbott, Sh. Gr. § 509: "Lines with four accents are found when a number of short clauses or epithets are connected together in one line, and must be pronounced slowly." 82. Line 195: Ay, by my sceptre and my hopes of HEAVEN. The Folios have "hopes of helpe"--perhaps from the verb occurring twice two lines above. The correction is Thirlby's, and is one required by the rhyme. 83. Line 213: my deed shall match thy DEED.-So the Folios. The Globe reads "my deed shall match thy meed." ACT II. SCENE 2. 84. Line 24: as Tib's rush for Tom's forefinger.-“Tib and Tom," says Douce (Illustrations, p. 196), "were names for any low and vulgar persons, and they are usually mentioned together in the same manner as Jack and Gill.” Rush rings were sometimes used in the marriage ceremony, especially where the parties had cohabited previously. They were also employed as rustic gifts emblematic of marriage. Boswell quotes: O thou greate shepheard, Lobbin, how great is thy griefe! -Spenser, Shepherds Calendar, November. scene consists in the pretensions of Parolles to knowledge and sentiments which he has not," was the first to make any change in the distribution of the dialogue. The Folio distributes it as follows: Line 11: Par. So I say both of Galen and Paracelsus. Ol. Laf. Of all the learned and authenticke fellowes. Line 40: Ol. Laf. In a most weake Par. And debile minister great power, grear transcendence, which should indeede giue vs a further vse to be made, then alone the recou'ry of the king, as to bee Old Laf. Generally thankfull. Enter King, Hellen, and attendants. Par. I would have said it, &c. The rest is as it appears in the text. 86. Line 29: A showing of a heavenly effect in an earthly actor. The title of some pamphlet is here ridiculed.— Warburton. 87. Line 31: Why, your DOLPHIN is not lustier. -Steevens thought the Dauphin was intended; but Malone, followed by Dyce, rightly interpreted it of the dolphin, which is "a sportive lively fish." Compare: his delights Were dolphin-like; they show'd his back above -Ant. & Cleop. v. 2. 88-90. 88. Line 64: marry, to each, but one!-Monck Mason says: "To each, except Bertram, whose mistress she hoped to be herself.' "But it is much more natural to understand it, as Rolfe does, to mean "but one mistress." 89. Line 66: My mouth no more were broken. -A broken mouth is a mouth which has lost part of its teeth.Johnson. 90. Line 67: And WRIT as little beard.-From meaning "to subscribe" ("a gentleman born . . . who writes himself Armigero," Merry Wives, i. 1. 9), to write came to mean "to claim a title," "lay claim to." Compare, "I must tell thee, sirrah, I write man" (line 208 of this scene): "and yet he 'll be crowing as if he had writ man ever since his father was a bachelor" (II. Hen. IV. i. 2. 30). 91. Line 68: a noble father.-The Folio here has the stage-direction: She addresses her to a Lord. 92. Lines 84, 85: I had rather be in this choice than throw AMES-ACE for my life.-It is very difficult to see what Lafen means here. Ames-ace, formed from the old French ambes as, and now called ambs-ace, is the two aces at dice. Now if this were the highest throw, the ace counting highest as in whist, the meaning would be clear; Lafeu would say that he would rather have a good chance of winning such a prize as Helena, than have the best possible luck at gaming. But unfortunately there is no proof forthcoming that ames-ace was ever counted as the highest throw; on the contrary, except in games in which all doublets counted double, and in which ames-ace was still the lowest doublet, as seizes was the highest,--it was always the lowest throw. Even in the expression of Thomas Nashe, "as you love good fellowship and amesace" ("The Induction to the Dapper Mounsier Pages of the Court," prefixed to the Unfortunate Traveller, 1594; Works, ed. Grosart, v. 9), the reference is probably to the custom of throwing for wine, the lowest thrower having to pay for it; and the meaning will be, "as you love good fellowship and would rather throw for wine even if you were the loser, than spoil the sport of the company." The next point to be settled is the meaning of "for my life:" does it mean "in exchange for, as the price of, my life," or "during my whole life?" If the former, we must suppose the preservation of Lafeu's life to depend upon the remote chance of his throwing ames-ace, and the expression will not amount to more than, "I had rather be in this choice than just escape with my life." But if this is so, why should he have mentioned ames-ace rather than any other throw? The latter alternative is the more probable, that is, that the case suggested by Lafeu is his throwing ames-ace, or having bad luck during the remainder of his life. But how is this to the point, and what is the drift of the speech? Dr. Brinsley Nicholson, who was kind enough to send me a very full discussion of ames-ace, answers the question as follows: "The humorous old man [Lafeu] uses a humorous comparison, one not unknown then or now. We may call it, for want of a better term, a comparison by contraries, or if you will, an ironical comparison; but another example will best explain it. One lauding a sweetsonged prima donna says, 'I'd rather hear her than walk an hundred miles with peas in my boots.' Literally taken this is nonsense, but taken in the spirit in which such a saying is uttered, it is seen that the greatness of his desire is to be measured by the difficulty, toil, pain, and resolution required to complete the task with which he associates that desire." And Mr. P. A. Daniel, who accepts Dr. Nicholson's interpretation, gives another known example of this mode of expression; to the effect, "I would rather have it, than a poke in the eye with a birch rod." Rolfe takes the same view: as he concisely puts it, "He ironically contrasts this ill luck [ames-ace for life] with the good luck of having a chance in the present choice." 93. Line 90: No better, if you please; i.e. I wish no better wife than you. 94. Line 105: There's one grape yet, &c.-Old Lafeu, having, upon the supposition that the lady was refused, reproached the young lords as boys of ice, throwing his eyes on Bertram, who remained, cries out, "There is one yet into whom his father put good blood-but I have known thee long enough to know thee for an ass."Johnson. 95. Line 132: From lowest place WHEN virtuous things proceed. When is Thirlby's correction for whence of the Folios. 96. Lines 156, 157: My honour's at the stake; WHICH to DEFEAT Which often stands for which thing (Abbott, Sh. Gr. § 271). So here it is "which danger to defeat." Theobald changed defeat to defend, and so Dyce reads. 97. Line 170: Into the STAGGERS.-Some species of the staggers, or the horse's apoplexy, is a raging impatience, which makes the animal dash himself with a destructive violence against posts or walls. To this the allusion, I suppose, is made.-Johnson. To stop which scruple, let this brief suffice, It is no pamper'd glutton we present, -The History of Sir John Oldcastle, Prologue 5-7. which passages prove that brief need not always imply a written document; it may therefore mean the brief troth plight which has just taken place, and upon which the king says, it is convenient that the marriage ceremony shall forthwith follow. 99. Line 190: else, does err.-The Folio here inserts: Parolles and Lafew stay behind, commenting of this wedding. 100. Line 210: What I dare too well do, I dare not do."I am only too ready to chastise you, but I must not. I am quite man enough to do so, but it is not expedient. You are a lord, and there is no fettering of authority" (see below, line 252). 101. Line 269: METHINKS 'T.-The Folios have meethink'st. 102. Lines 276-279: you are more saucy with lords and honourable personages than the commission of your birth and virtue gives you heraldry; i.e. more than the warrant of your birth and virtue gives you title to be. Hanmer, with some plausibility, altered to "more than the heraldry of your birth and virtue gives you commission." 103 Line 297: That hugs his kicky-wicky here at home. -So F. 1. The later Folios have kicksy-wicksy: probably a colloquial term formed from kick, and implying restiveness; here applied in an intelligible, though not very complimentary sense to a wife. Nares quotes: Perhaps an ignis fatuus now and then Poems subj. to R. Fletcher's Eplg. [1656], p. 168, and one of Taylor the water-poet's books is entitled, A Kicksey-Winsey, or a lerry-come-twang: wherein John Taylor hath satyrically suted 750 bad Debtors, that will not pay him for his Return of his Journey from Scotland. 104 Lines 308, 309: war is no strife To the dark house and the detested wife. The "dark house," says Johnson, "is a house made gloomy by discontent." "Detested" is Rowe's correction for "detected" of the Folios. 105 Line 310: capriccio.-F. 1 has caprichio. This Italian word was adopted as an English one. Cotgrave gives under Caprice, "a humour, caprichio, &c." ACT II. SCENE 4. 106. Line 16: FORTUNES.-Capell's correction for fortune of the Folios. 107. Line 35: The search, sir, was profitable. - Before these words, as at the commencement of the speech, "Did you find me," the Folios have the prefix Clo. Perhaps a short speech of Parolles-for instance, "In myself," as Dr. Brinsley Nicholson suggests (Shakespeariana, vol. i. p. 55)—has fallen out here. 108. Line 44: puts it off to a compell'd restraint.-Defers it by referring to a compulsory abstinence. So: Please it your lordship, he hath put me off [for payment] To the succession of new days this month. -Tim. of Ath. ii. 2. 19, 20. 111. Line 40: like him that leaped into the custard.It was customary at City banquets for the City fool to leap into a large bowl of custard set for the purpose. Theobald quotes: He may perchance, in tail of a sheriff's dinner, Shall make my lady mayoress and her sisters Laugh all their hoods over their shoulders. -Ben Jonson, The Devil is an Ass, i. 1. (p. 97, ed. 1631). 112. Lines 51-53: I have spoken better of you than you have or will to deserve at my hand.-So F. 1. Probably some word has fallen out after have; Malone suggested qualities. F. 2 reads: "than you have or will deserve." 113. Lines 94, 95: Ber. Where are my other men, monsieur?— The Folios assign these words to Helena: Hel. I shall not breake your bidding, good my Lord: Where are my other men? Monsieur, farwell. The change in distribution and punctuation is due to Theobald, who observes that "neither the Clown, nor any of her retinue are now upon the stage: Bertram observing Helen to linger fondly, and wanting to shift her off, puts on a show of haste, asks Parolles for his servants, and then gives his wife an abrupt dismission." ACT III. SCENE 1. 114. (Stage-direction) The two Frenchmen.-These are distinguished in the Folio as "French E" and "French G," and in i. 2 as "1 Lo. G." and "2 Lo. E." I have followed the Globe editors in styling uniformly G First Lord, E Second Lord, except in the last nine lines of iii. 6, where G once is evidently (and so the Globe) Second Lord, and E twice First Lord. The Folio sometimes calls them "Cap. G" and "Cap. E," and in iv. 1 E is "1 Lord E." Capell and Malone suggested that the initials E and G stand for the names of the actors who played the parts, and in the list of actors prefixed to F. 1 we find the names William Ecclestone, Samuel Gilburne, and Robert Goughe. The same actors, as Capell points out, also took the parts of the two Gentlemen in act iii. 2., who are styled in the Folio "French E" and "French G." 115. Lines 11-13: But like a common and an outward man, "I cannot explain state secrets, except as an ordinary outsider who frames for himself a tolerable idea of the nature of a great council, though unable to form any judgment on the weighty points there discussed." This seems to be the general sense of this somewhat obscure passage. A "self unable motion" is a "motion" which is itself unable to do something or other; and here apparently to discharge the functions of a counsellor. For motion in the sense of "mental sight," "intuition," compare this sensible warm motion to become A kneaded clod. -Meas. for Meas. iii. 1. 120, 121. 116. Line 22: When better fall, for your avails they FELL. -The past tense is required by the rhyme; otherwise one would be tempted to read "they fall;" "when better men (i.e. men in higher posts) are slain, you will step into the places they have left vacant." ACT III. SCENE 2. 117. Lines 7, 8: he will look upon his boot, and sing; mend the RUFF, and sing.-The ruff is probably, as most of the commentators take it to be, the top of the boot which turned over with a fringed and scalloped edge and hung loosely over the leg: this was usually called a ruffle: “not having leisure to put off my silver spurs, one of the rowels catch'd hold of the ruffle of my boot, and being Spanish leather, and subject to tear, overthrows me" (Ben Jonson, Every Man out of his Humour, iv. 4, p. 149, ed. 1616). 118. Line 9: SOLD a goodly manor for a song.-So F.3; Ff. 1 and 2 have "hold a goodly," &c. 119. Line 14: our old LING and our Isbels o' the country. -So F. 2; F. 1 has "our old Lings." 120. Line 20: E'EN that.-Theobald's correction for "In that" of the Folios. 121. Line 21.-F. 1 inserts the heading A Letter, and omits Count [reads]. 122. Line 53: Can woman me unto 't.-"Can make me weak enough to give way to it as a woman usually does." 123. Line 68: If thou engrossest all the griefs ARE thine; i.e. all the griefs which are thine, the relative, as often in Shakespeare, being omitted. Rowe altered it to "all the griefs as thine," unnecessarily weakening the passage. 124. Line 71: And thou art ALL my child; i.e. my only child. For all in this sense of alone, only, compare: To this well-painted piece is Lucrece come, To find a face where all distress is stelled. Many she sees where cares have carved some, But none where all distress and dolour dwell'd. -Rape of Lucrece, 1443-46. Why have my sisters husbands, if they say The fellow has a deal of that too much, "He has a deal of that too-much (excess), which considers him to have much," i.e. excess of vanity, which makes him fancy he has many good qualities. Rolfe, whose view of the passage this is, compares: For goodness, growing to a plurisy, 126. Lines 113, 114: -Hamlet, iv. 7. 118, 119. move the still-PIECING air That sings with piercing. F. 1 has "the still-peering aire;” F. 2 the "still piercing.” "Still-piecing air," i.e. the air which closes again immediately, is due to Malone. "Peece" is an Elizabethan spelling of piece ("Now good Cesario, but that peece of song," Tw. Night, ii. 4. 2, F. 1); so that if we accept this reading we have only to alter one letter. 127. Lines 123-125: No, come thou home, Rousillon, "Come home from that place, where all that honour gets from the danger it encounters, if it gets anything, is a scar, while it often loses everything." ACT III. SCENE 4. 128. Lines 24, 25: and yet she writes, Pursuit would be but vain. This must be supposed to be in a part of the letter not read aloud by the steward. ACT III. SCENE 5. 129. Line 21: are not the things they go under. —Are not the things for which their names would make them pass. -Johnson. 130. Line 23: example... cannot for all that dissuade succession, but that they are limed, &c.-All these terrible examples of ruin before their eyes cannot prevent maids from doing as others have done before them. "But that they are limed"="to prevent their being limed." this use of "but," signifying "prevention," compare: Have you no countermand for Claudio yet, But he must die to-morrow? -Meas. for Meas. iv. 2. 95, 96. And see Abbott, Sh. Gr. § 122. For 131. Line 36: To Saint Jaques le Grand.—By St. James the Great, Shakespeare no doubt signified the apostle so called, whose celebrated shrine was at Compostella, in Spain; and Dr. Johnson rightly observes that Florence was somewhat out of the road in going thither from Rousillon. There was, however, subsequently, another James, of La Marca of Ancona, a Franciscan confessor of the highest eminence for sanctity, who died at the convent of the Holy Trinity near Naples, in A.D. 1476. He was not beatified until the seventeenth century, nor canonized until 1726; but it is quite possible that his reputation was very great in connection with Italy, even at the period of this play; and that Shakespeare adopted the name without considering any other distinction.-Staun I WAR'NT, good creature, wheresoe'er she is, For war'nt I am indebted to Mr. B. G. Kinnear (who writes it warnt), Cruces Shakespeariana, 1883, p. 146. In Hamlet, i. 2. 243: Ham. Perchance 't will walk again. Q.2 has "I warn't it will. F. 1 has "I write good creature, wheresoere she is," &c., which Malone and Schmidt defend. F. 2 has "I right good creature;" Rowe, "Ah! right good creature;" Capell," Ay, right:-Good creature!" The Globe, "I warrant, good creature;" Dyce, after Williams, "I wot, good creature.' 134. Line 86: That leads him to these PASSES.-The Folios have places. Theobald conjectured paces; passes, which Dyce prints, was suggested by Mr. W. N. Lettsom (Walker's Crit. Exam. vol. ii. p. 240), who compares: your grace, like power divine, Hath looked upon my passes. -The Folios have "this success," corrected by Rowe. Lump of ore is Theobald's correction for lump of ours of the Folios. But why was so much importance attached to a drum? Fairholt, quoted by Rolfe, informs us that the drums of the regiments in those days were decorated with the colours of the battalion: to lose a drum was therefore to lose the colours of the regiment. 137. Lines 41-43: if you give him not John Drum's entertainment, your inclining cannot be removed.-To give a person John or Tom Drum's entertainment is to turn him forcibly out of your company. The origin of the expression is doubtful. Douce suggested that it was a metaphor borrowed from the beating of a drum, or else alluded to the drumming a man out of a regiment; while Rolfe has "no doubt that originally John Drum was merely a sportive personification of the drum, and that the entertainment was a beating, such as the drum gets;" afterwards "the expression came to mean other kinds of abusive treatment than beating." Theobald quotes Holinshed's Description of Ireland:-"no guest had ever a cold or forbidding look from any part of his [the mayor of Dublin 1551] family: so that his porter, or any other officer, durst not, for both his eares, give the simplest man that resorted to his house, Tom Drum his entertaynement, which is, to hale a man in by the heade, and thrust him out by both the shoulders." 138. Line 107: we have almost EMBOSSED him.-Emboss was a hunting term, old French embosquer, and meant to inclose (game) in a wood. So here the Second Lord means that they have almost got Parolles in their toils. There is another hunting term embossed, meaning "foaming at the mouth from fatigue," with which the above must not be confounded. "When he [the hart] is foaming at the mouth, we saye that he is embost" (Gascoigne, Book of Hunting, 1575, p. 242, quoted in Hazlitt's Dodsley, vol. xi. p. 406). In this sense the word does not come from embosquer, but is merely a technical application of the ordinary verb emboss, "to cover with bosses." Shakespeare twice uses it in this sense: Some of 'em knew me, Els they had cased me like a cony too, As they have done the rest, and I think rosted me, -Beaumont and Fletcher, Love's Pilgrimage, ii. 2 (ed. 1647, p. 9). ACT III. SCENE 7. 140. Line 19: RESOLV'D to carry her. So Dyce and Globe. F. 1 has Resolue. F. 2 and most editors Resolves. 141. Line 21: his IMPORTANT blood.-Compare: Therefore great France My mourning and important tears hath pitied. -Lear, iv. 4. 25. 26. |