The better to beguile. This is for all, Mr. Theobald, remarks, Though all the editors have swallowed this reading implicitly, it is certainly corrupt; and I have been furprized how men of genius and learning could let it pass without fome fufpicin. What idea can we frame to ourselves of a breathing bond, or of its being fanctified and pious, &c. But he was too hafty in framing ideas before he understood thofe already framed by the poet, and expreffed in very plain words. Do not believe (fays Polonius to his daughter) Hamlet's amorous vows made to you; which pretend religion in them (the better to beguile) like those fanctified and pious vows [or bonds] made to heaven. And why fhould not this pafs without fufpicion? WARBURTON. Theobald for bends fubftitutes barwds. JOHNSON. Notwithflanding Warburton's elaborate explanation of this paffage, I have not the leaft doubt but Theobald is right, and that we ought to read bawds instead of bonds. Indeed the present reading is little better than nonsense. Polonius had called Hamlet's vows, brokers, but two lines before, a fynonymous word to barwds, and the very title that Shakspeare gives to Pandarus, in his Troilus and Creffida. The words implorators of unholy fuits, are an exact defcription of a bawd; and all fuch of them as are crafty in their trade, put on the appearance of fanctity, and are not of that die which their investments fhew." M. MASON. 66 The old reading is undoubtedly the true one. Do not, fays Polonius, believe his vows, for they are merely uttered for the purpose of perfuading you to yield to a criminal paffion, though they appear only the genuine effufions of a pure and lawful affection, and affume the femblance of thofe facred engagements entered into at the altar of wedlock. The bonds here in our poet's thoughts were bonds of love. So, in his 142d Sonnet: thofe lips of thine, "That have profan'd their scarlet ornaments, "And feal'd false bonds of love, as oft as mine." Again, in The Merchant of Venice: "O, ten times fafter Venus pigeons fly, "To feal love's bonds new made, than they are wont "Sanctified and pious bonds," are the true bonds of love, or, as our poet has elsewhere expressed it, "A contract and eternal bond of love." Dr. Warburton certainly misunderstood this paffage; and when he triumphantly afks" may not this pafs without fufpicion?" if he means his own comment, the answer is, because it is not perfectly accurate. MALONE, I would not, in plain terms, from this time forth, [Exeunt. SCENE IV. The Platform. Enter HAMLET, HORATIO, and MARCELLUS. HAM. The air bites fhrewdly; it is very cold. HOR. It is a nipping and an eager air.1 HAM. What hour now? HOR. MAR. No, it is struck. I think, it lacks of twelve. HOR. Indeed? I heard it not; it then draws near the season, Wherein the spirit held his wont to walk. [A flourish of trumpets, and ordnance shot off, within. What does this mean, my lord? HAM. The king doth wake to-night, and takes his roufe,' • I would not, in plain terms, from this time forth, Have you fo flander any moment's leifure,] Polonius fays, in plain terms, that is, not in language lefs elevated or embellished than before, but in terms that cannot be misunderstood: I would not have you fo difgrace your moft idle moments, as not to find better employment for them than lord Hamlet's converfation. JOHNSON. 2—an eager air.] That is, a fharp air, aigre, Fr. So, in a fubfequent fcene: And curd, like eager droppings into milk." MALONE. takes his roufe,] A roufe is a large dofe of liquor, a debauch. So, in Othello: “ they have given me a rouse already." 3 Keeps waffel, and the fwaggering up-fpring' reels; And, as he drains his draughts of Rhenifh down, The kettle-drum and trumpet thus bray out The triumph of his pledge. HOR. HAM. Ay, marry, is't: Is it a custom? But to my mind, though I am native here, More honour'd in the breach, than the obfervance. It should seem from the following paffage in Decker's Gul's Hornbook, 1609, that the word roufe was of Danish extraction: "Teach me, thou foveraigne fkinker, how to take the German's uply freeze, the Danish roufa, the Switzer's ftoop of rhenish," &c. STEEVENS. 4 Keeps waffel,] See Vol. VII. p. 396, n. 4. Again, in The Hog bath loft his Pearl, 1614: "By Croefus name and by his castle, i. e. devotes his nights to jollity. STEEVENS. the fawaggering up-fpring-] The bluftering upftart. JOHNSON. It appears from the following paffage in Alphonfus Emperor of Germany, by Chapman, that the up-spring was a German dance: "We Germans have no changes in our dances; "An almain and an up-spring, that is all." Spring was anciently the name of a tune, fo in Beaumont and Fletcher's Prophetess: "And ftrike him fuch new Springs-." This word is used by G. Douglas in his tranflation of Virgil, and, I think, by Chaucer. Again, in an old Scots proverb: "Another would play a spring, ere you tune your pipes." STEEVENS. 6 This heavy-headed revel, east and weft,] This heavy-headed revel makes us traduced eaft and weft, and taxed of other nations. JOHNSON. By eaft and weft, as Mr. Edwards has obferved, is meant, throughout the world; from one end of it to the other. This and the fol lowing twenty-one lines have been restored from the quarto. MALONE. Makes us traduc'd, and tax'd of other nations: They clepe us, drunkards,' and with swinish phrase Soil our addition; and, indeed it takes From our achievements, though perform'd at height, The pith and marrow of our attribute. That, for fome vicious mole of nature in them, They clepe us, drunkards,] And well our Englishmen might; for in Q. Elizabeth's time there was a Dane in London, of whom the following mention is made in a collection of characters entitled Looke to it, for Ile ftab ye, no date: "You that will drinke Keynaldo unto deth, "The Dane that would carowse out of his boote." Mr. M. Mason adds, that "it appears from one of Howell's letters, dated at Hamburgh in the year 1632, that the then King of Denmark had not degenerated from his jovial predeceffor.-In his account of an entertainment given by his majefty to the Earl of Leicester, he tells us, that the king, after beginning thirty-five toafts, was carried away in his chair, and that all the officers of the court were drunk." STEEVENS. See alfo the Nuga Antiquæ, Vol. II. p. 133, for the scene of drunkenness introduced into the court of James I. by the King of Denmark, in 1606. REED. 8 The pith and marrow of our attribute.] The best and most valuable part of the praise that would be otherwise attributed to us. JOHNSON. • That, for fome vicious mole of nature in them, As, in their birth, (wherein they are not guilty, Since nature cannot choose his origin,] We have the fame senti ment in The Rape of Lucrece : "For marks defcried in men's nativity "Are nature's fault, not their own infamy." Mr. Theobald, without neceflity, altered mole to mould. The reading of the old copies is fully fupported by a paffage in King Jahn: "Patch'd with foul moles, and eye-offending marks." MALONE. By the o'er-growth of fome complexion,* 2 complexion,] i. e. humour; as fanguine, melancholy, phlegmatick, &c. WARBURTON. The quarto, 1604, for the has their; as a few lines lower it has bis virtues, instead of their virtues. The correction was made by Mr. Theobald. MALONE. The form of plaufive manners;] That intermingles too much with their manners; infects and corrupts them. See Vol. XIII. p. 123, n. 9. Plaufive in our poet's age fignified gracious, pleasing, popular. So, in All's well that ends well: 66 his plaufive words "He scatter'd not in ears, but grafted them, 66 Plaufible, in which fenfe plaufive is here ufed, is defined by Cawdrey in his Alphabetical Table, &c. 1604, “ Pleasing, or received joyfully and willingly." MALONE. 4-fortune's ftar,] The word far in the text fignifies a car of that appearance. It is a term of farriery: the white star or mark fo common on the forehead of a dark coloured horfe, is ufually produced by making a fear on the place. RITSON. - fortune's ftar,] Some accidental blemish, the confequence of the overgrowth of fome complexion or humour allotted to us by fortune at our birth, or fome vicious habit accidentally acquired afterwards. Theobald, plaufibly enough, would read-fortune's fear. The emendation may be fupported by a paffage in Antony and Cleopatra: "The Scars upon your honour therefore he "Does pity as conftrained blemishes, "Not as deferv'd." MALONE. 5 As infinite as man may undergo,)] As large as can be accumulated upon man. JOHNSON. So, in Measure for Measure: "To undergo fuch ample grace and honour,-." STEEVENS. |