And leave him all; life leaving, all is death's. Par. Have I thought long to see this morning's face,' And doth it give me such a sight as this? La. Cap. Accurs'd, unhappy, wretched, hateful day! Most miserable hour, that e'er time saw In lasting labour of his pilgrimage! But one, poor one, one poor and loving child, And cruel death hath catch'd it from my sight. That ever, ever, I did yet behold! O day! O day! O day! O hateful day! Never was seen so black a day as this: woful day, O woful day! Par. Beguil'd, divorced, wronged, spited, slain! Most détestable day, by thee beguil'd, By cruel cruel thee quite overthrown! O love! O life!-not life, but love in death! Cap. Despis'd, distressed, hated, martyr'd, kill'd!- O child! O child!-my soul, and not my child!- 6 life leaving, all is death's.] The old copies read-life living. The emendation was made by Mr. Steevens. Malone. — morning's face,] The quarto, 1597, continues the speech. of Paris thus: 7 "And doth it now present such prodigies? "Distrest, remediless, unfortunate. "O heavens! Oh nature! wherefore did you make me 80 woe! O woful, &c.] This speech of exclamations is not in the edition above-cited. [that of 1597] Several other parts unnecessary or tautology, are not to be found in the said edition; which occasions the variation in this from the common books. Pope. In the text the enlarged copy of 1599 is here followed. Malone.. 9 Dead art thou, dead! &c.] From the defect of the metre it is probable that Shakspeare wrote: Dead, dead, art thou! &c.. And, with my child, my joys are buried! Fri. Peace, ho, for shame! confusion's cure1 lives not In these confusions. Heaven and yourself Had part in this fair maid; now heaven hath all, And all the better is it for the maid: Your part in her you could not keep from death; Cap. All things, that we ordained festival, Fri. Sir, go you in-and, madam, go with him ;- When the same word is repeated, the compositor often is guilty of omission. Malone. I have repeated the word-dead, though in another part of the line. Steevens. 11 confusion's cure ] Old copies-care. Corrected by Mr. Theobald. These violent and confused exclamations, says the Friar, will by no means alleviate that sorrow which at present overwhelms and disturbs your minds. Malone. 2 All things, &c.] Instead of this and the following speeches, the eldest quarto has only a couplet: 3 66 Cap. Let it be so: come woeful sorrow-mates, Steevens To follow this fair corse unto her grave: [Exeunt CAP. Lady CAP. PAR. and Friar. 1 Mus 'Faith, we may put up our pipes, and be gone. Nurse. Honest good fellows, ah, put up, put up; For, well you know, this is a pitiful case. [Exit Nurse. 1 Mus. Ay, by my troth, the case may be amended. Enter PETER. Pet. Musicians, O, musicians, Heart's ease, heart's case; O, an you will have me live, play—heart's ease. 1 Mus. Why heart's ease? Pet. O, musicians, because my heart itself playsMy heart is full of woe: O, play me some merry dump, to comfort me.5 4a pitiful case.] If this speech was designed to be metrical, we should read-piteous. Steevens. 50, play me some merry dump, to comfort me.] A dump anciently signified some kind of dance, as well as sorrow. So, in Humour out of Breath, a comedy, by John Day, 1607: "He loves nothing but an Italian dump, "Or a French brawl." But on this occasion it means a mournful song. So, in The Arraignment of Paris, 1584, after the shepherds have sung an elegiac hymn over the hearse of Colin, Venus says to Paris: "How cheers my lovely boy after this dump of woe? dumps to prove. Steevens. Dumps were heavy mournful tunes; possibly indeed any sort of movements were once so called, as we sometimes meet with a merry dump. Hence doleful dumps, deep sorrow, or grievous afflic tion, as in the next page but one, and in the less ancient ballad of Chevy Chase. It is still said of a person uncommonly sad, that he is in the dumps. In a MS. of Henry the Eighth's time, now among the King's Collection in the Museum, is a tune for the cittern, or guitar, entitled, "My lady Careys dompe;" there is also "The Duke of Somersettes dompe;" as we now say, "Lady Coventry's minuet," &c. "If thou wert not some blockish and senseless dolt, thou wouldest never laugh when I sung a heavy mixt-Lydian tune, or a note to a dumpe or dolefull dittie." Plutarch's Morals, by Holland, 1602, p. 61. Ritson. At the end of The Secretaries Studie, by Thomas Gainsford, Esq. 4to. 1616, is a long poem of forty-seven stanzas, and called A Dumpe or Passion. It begins in this manner: 2 Mus. Not a dump we; 'tis no time to play now. Pet. You will not then? Mus. No. Pet. I will then give it you soundly. 1 Mus. What will you give us? Pet. No money, on my faith; but the gleek:6 I will give you the minstrel." 6 1 Mus. Then will I give you the serving-creature. Pet. Then will I lay the serving-creature's dagger on "I cannot sing; for neither have I voyce, "I write and credit that I see and knowe, "And mean plain troth; would every one did so." the gleek:] So, in A Midsummer Night's Dream: Reed. To gleek is to scoff. The term is taken from an ancient game at cards called gleek. So, in Turberville's translation of Ovid's Epistle from Dido to Eneas: "By manly mart to purchase prayse, "And give his foes the gleeke دو Again, in the argument to the same translator's version of Hermione to Orestes: "Orestes gave Achylles' sonne the gleeke." Steevens. The use of this cant term is no where explained; and in all probability cannot, at this distance of time, be recovered. To gleek however signified to put a joke or trick upon a person, perhaps to jest according to the coarse humour of that age. See 4 Midsummer Night's Dream, above quoted. Ritson. 7 No money, on my faith; but the gleek; I will give you the minstrel.] Shakspeare's pun has here remained unnoticed. A Gleekman or Gligman, as Dr. Percy has shown, signified a minstrel. See his Essay on the ancient English Minstrels, p. 55. The word gleek here signifies scorn, as Mr Steevens has already observed: and is as he says, borrowed from the old game so called, the method of playing which may be seen in Skinner's Etymologicon, in voce, and also in The Compleat Gamester, 2d edit. 1676, p. 90. Douce. - the minstrel.] From the following entry on the books of the Stationers' Company, in the year 1560, it appears that the hire of a parson was cheaper than that of a minstrel or a cook. "Item, payd to the preacher vi s. iid. Item, payd to the minstrell xii s. 66 Item, payd to the coke XV 6," Steevens. your pate. I will carry no crotchets: I'll re you, I 'll fa you; Do you note me? 1 Mus. An you re us, and fɑ us, you note us. 2 Mus. Pray you, put up your dagger, and put out your wit. Pet. Then have at you with my wit; I will dry-beat you with an iron wit, and put up my iron dagger :-Answer me like men: When griping grief the heart doth wound, And doleful dumps the mind oppress,9* 8 When griping grief &c.] The epithet griping was by no means likely to excite laughter at the time it was written. Lord Surrey, in his translation of the second Book of Virgil's Æneid, makes the hero say: "New gripes of dred then pearse our trembling brestes.” Dr. Percy thinks that the questions of Peter are designed as a ridicule on the forced and unnatural explanations too often given by us painful editors of ancient authors. Steevens. IN COMMENDATION OF MUSICKE. "Where griping grief ye hart would woūd, (& dolful domps ye mind oppresse, "There musick with her silver sound, is wont with spede to geue redresse; "Of troubled minds for every sore, swete musick hath a salue in store: "In ioy it maks our mirth abound, in grief it chers our heauy sprights, "The carefull head releef hath found, by musicks pleasant swete delights: "Our senses, what should I saie more, are subject unto musicks lore. "The Gods by musick hath their pray, the soul therein doth ioye, "For as the Romaine poets saie, in seas whom pirats would destroye, "A Dolphin sau'd from death most sharpe, Arion playing on his harp "Oh heauenly gift that turnes the minde, (like as the sterne doth rule the ship) "Of Musick, whom ye Gods assignde to comfort man, whom cares would nip, "Sith thou both man, & beast doest moue, what wisemā the will thee reprove? From the Paradise of Daintie Deiuses, fol. 31, b. Richard Edwards." Of Richard Edwards and William Hunnis, the authors of sundry poems in this collection, see an account in Wood's Athene Oxon. and also in Tanner's Bibliotheca. Sir John Hawkins. |