Imo. Well, or ill, [Exit Imogen. I am bound to you. Bel. And fhalt be ever. This youth, howe'er diftrefs'd, appears, he hath had Good ancestors. Arv. How angel-like he fings! Guid. But his neat cookery! He cut our roots in characters; And fauc'd our broths, as Juno had been sick, Arv. Nobly he yokes A fmiling with a figh: as if the figh Was that it was, for not being fuch a smile; Guid. I do note, That grief and patience, rooted in him both, Arv. Grow, patience! And let the 'ftinking elder, grief, untwine Enter Cloten. Clot. I cannot find thofe runnagates; that villain Hath mock'd me:-I am faint, + Mingle their fpurs together.] Spurs, an old word for the fibres of a tree. POPE. 5ftinking elder, Shakspeare had only feen English vines which grow against walls, and therefore may be fometimes entangled with the elder. Perhaps we fhould read,―untwine from the vine. JOHNSON. Sir John Hawkins proposes to read entwine. He fays, "Let the ftinking elder [Grief] entwine his root with the vine [Patience] and in the end Patience muft outgrow Grief." STEEVENS. It is great morning.-] A Gallicifm. Grand jour, Sec p. 116, STEEVENs. Bel. Those runagates ! Means he not us? I partly know him; 'tis I know 'tis he:-We are held as outlaws: -Hence. Let me alone with him. [Exeunt Belarius, and Arviragus. Clot. Soft! What are you That fly me thus? fome villain mountaineers? Guid. A thing More flavish did I ne'er, than anfwering Clot. Thou art a robber, A law-breaker, a villain: Yield thee, thief. Guid. To who? to thee? What art thou? Have not I An arm as big as thine? a heart as big? Thy words, I grant, are bigger? for I wear not Clot. Thou villain bafe, Guid. No, nor thy taylor, rafcal, Who is thy grandfather; he made thofe clothes, Clot. Thou precious varlet, My taylor made them not. Guid. Hence then, and thank The man that gave them thee. Thou art fome fool; I'm loth to beat thee. 7 No, nor thy taylor, rafcal, Who is thy grandfather; be made thofe clothes, Which, as it feems, make thee.] See a note on a fimilar paf fage in a former scene: "Whose mother was her painting." STEEVENS. Clot. Clot. Thou injurious thief, Hear but my name, and tremble. Guid. What's thy name? Clot. Cloten, thou villain. Guid. Cloten, thou double villain, be thy name. I cannot tremble at it; were it toad, adder, fpider, 'Twould move me fooner. Clot. To thy further fear, Nay, to thy mere confufion, thou fhalt know. I am fon to the queen. Guid. I am forry for't; not feeming So worthy as thy birth. Clot. Art not afeard? Guid. Thofe that I reverence, thofe I fear; the wife: At fools I laugh, not fear them. Clot. Die the death: When I have flain thee with my proper hand, I'll follow thofe that even now fled hence, Enter Yield, ruftic mountaineer.] I believe, upon examination, the character of Cloten will not prove a very confiftent one. A& I. fcene iv. the lords who are converfing with him on the subject of his rencontre with Pofthumus, reprefent the latter as having neither put forth his ftrength or courage, but ftill advancing forwards to the prince, who retired before him; yet at this his laft appearance, we fee him fighting gallantly, and falling by the hand of Arviragus. The fame perfons afterwards speak of him as of a mere afs or idiot; and yet, Act III. fcene i. he returns one of the nobleft and most reasonable anfwers to the Roman envoy: and the rest of his converfation on the fame occafion, though it may lack form a little, by no means refembles the language of folly. He behaves with proper dignity and civility at parting with Lucius, and yet is ridiculous and brutal in his treatment of Imogen. Belarius defcribes him as not having fenfe enough to know what fear is (which he defines as being fometimes the effect of judgment); and yet he forms very artful schemes for gaining the affection of his mistress, by means of her attendants; to get her perfon into his power afterwards; and feems to be no lefs ac quainted Enter Belarius, and Arviragus. Bel. No company's abroad. Arv. None in the world: You did mistake him, fure. Bel. I cannot tell: Long is it fince I faw him, But time hath nothing blurr'd thofe lines of favour Which then he wore; the fnatches in his voice, And burst of speaking, were as his; I am abfolute, 'Twas very Cloten. Arv. In this place we left them: I wish my brother make good time with him, Bel. Being fcarce made up, I mean, quainted with the character of his father, and the afcendancy the queen maintained over his uxorious weakness. We find Cloten, in fhort, reprefented at once as brave and daftardly, civil and brutal, fagacious and foolish, without that fubtilty of diftinction, and thofe fhades of gradation between sense and folly, virtue and vice, which conftitute the excellence of fuch mixed characters as Polonius in Hamlet, and the Nurfe in Romeo and Juliet. STEEVENS. -the fnatches in his voice, And burst of Speaking,] This is one of our author's ftrokes of obfervation. An abrupt and tumultuous utterance very frequently accompanies a confufed and cloudy understanding. JOHNSON. In the old editions: Being fearce made up, I mean, to man, he had not apprehenfion Of roaring terrors: for defect of judgment Is oft the caufe of fear,] If I underftand this paffage, it is mock reafoning as it ftands, and the text must have been flightly corrupted. Belarius is giving a defcription of what Cloten formerly was; and in aufwer to what Arviragus fays of his being fo fell. "Ay, fays Belarius, he was fo fell; and being fcarce then at man's eftate, he had no apprehenfion of roaring terrors, i. e. of any thing that could check him with fears." But then, how does the inference come in, built upon this? For defect of judgment is oft the cause of fear. I think the poet meant to have faid the mere contrary, Cloten was defective in judgment, and therefore did not fear, Appre I mean, to man, he had not apprehenfion Re-enter Guiderius, with Cloten's head. Guid. This Cloten was a fool; an empty purse, There was no money in't: not Hercules Could have knock'd out his brains, for he had none: Yet I not doing this, the fool had borne My head, as I do his. Bel. What haft thou done? 2 Guid. I am perfect, what: cut off one Cloten's head, Son to the queen, after his own report; Who call'd me traitor, mountaineer; and fwore, Difplace our heads, where, thank the gods, they grow, Apprehenfions of fear grow from a judgment in weighing dangers. And a very easy change, from the traces of the letters, gives us this fenfe, and reconciles the reasoning of the whole paffage: for th' effect of judgment Is oft the cause of fear.. THEOBALD. Hanmer reads, with equal juftnefs of fentiment: -for defect of judgment Is oft the cure of fear. But, I think, the play of effect and caufe more resembling the manner of our author. JOHNSON. If fear, as in other paffages of Shakspeare, be understood in an active fignification for what may caufe fear, it means that Cloten's defect of judgment caufed him to commit actions to the terror of others, without due confideration of his own danger therein. Thus in K. Henry IV. part 2. -all these bold fears, Thou fee'ft with peril I have answered. TOLLET. 2 I am perfect, what-] I am well informed, what. So in this play: 3 I'm perfect, the Pannonians are in arms. JOHNSON. -take us in,] To take in means, to conquer, to fubdue. So in Antony and Cleopatra: -cut the Ionian feas, And |