Her husband's to Aleppo gone, mafter o'the Tyger: But in a fieve I'll thither fail, I And, like a rat without a tail, I'll do, I'll do, and I'll do. 2 Witch. I'll give thee a wind". 1 Witch. as not being able to procure better provifion than offals, which are confidered as the refuse of the tables of others. COLEPEPER. So, in Ben Jonfon's Staple of Nerus, old Penny-boy fays to the Cook : "And then remember meat for my two dogs; "Fat flaps of mutton, kidneys, rumps, &e." Again, in Wit at feveral Weapons, by B. and Fletcher: "A niggard to your commons, that you're fain "To fize your belly out with shoulder fees, "With kidneys, rumps, and cues of fingle beer." In the Book of Haukynge, &c, (commonly called the Book of St. Albans) bl. 1. no date, among the proper terms used in kepyng of haukes, it is faid: "The hauke tyreth upon rumps." 8 -ronyon cries.] STEEVENS. į. e. fcabby or mangy woman. Fr. rogneux, royne, fcurf. Thus Chaucer, in the Romaunt of the Rofe, p. 551: "Withouten bleine, or scabbe, or roine." Shakespeare ufes the word again in The Merry Wives of Windfor. STEEVENS. 9 in a fieve I'll thither fail,] Reginald Scott, in his Difcovery of Witchcraft, 1584, fays it was believed that witches "could fail in an egg fhell, a cockle or muscle shell, through and under the tempeftuous feas." Again, fir W. Davenant, in his Albovine, 1629: "He fits like a witch failing in a fieve." STEEVENS. It fhould be remembered (as it was the belief of the times) that though a witch could affume the form of any animal fhe pleased, the tail would ftill be wanting. . The reafon given by fome of the old writers, for fuch a deficiency, is, that though the hands and feet, by an eafy change, might be converted into the four paws of a beaft, there was still no part about a woman which corresponded with the length of tail common to almost all four-footed creatures, STEEVENS. 2 I'll give thee a wind.] This free gift of a wind is to be confidered as an act of fifterly friendship, for witches were fuppofed to fell them. So, in Summer's last Will and Teftament, 1600: Gg 4 (6 -in I Witch. Thou art kind. 3 Witch. And I another. 1 Witch. I myself have all the other; 3 And the very points they blow, All the quarters that they know I will drain him dry as hay 5: -in Ireland and in Denmark both, Witches for gold will fell a man a wind, "Which in the corner of a napkin wrap'd, "Shall blow him fafe unto what coaft he will." Drayton, in his Moon-calf, fays the fame. STEEVENS. 3 And the very points they blow;] Weary As the word very is here of no other ufe than to fill up the verse, it is likely that Shakespeare wrote various, which might be eafily mistaken for very, being either negligently read, haftily pronounced, or imperfectly heard. JOHNSON. The very points are the true exact points. Very is ufed here (as in a thousand inftances which might be brought) to exprefs the declaration more emphatically. Inftead of points, however, the ancient copy reads ports. But this cannot be right; for though the witch, from her power over the winds, might juftly enough fay that she had all the points and quarters from whence they blow, fhe could not with any degree of propriety declare that he had the ports to which they were directed, STEEVENS. 4 the fhipman's card.] The card is the paper on which the winds are marked under the pilot's needle. So, in the Loyal Subject, by B. and Fletcher: "The card of goodnels in your minds, that fhews you "When you fail falfe." STEEVENS. 5 -dry as bay :] So, Spenfer, in his Faery Queen, b. iii. c. 9; "But he is old and withered as hay.' " STEEVENS, i. e. as one under a curfe, an interdiction. So, afterwards in this play: By his own interdiction ftands accurs'd." So among the Romans, an outlaw's fentence was, Aqua & Ignis interdictio; i. e. he was forbid the ufe of water and fire, which imply'd the neceffity of banishment. THEOBALD, Mr. Weary feven-nights, nine times nine, 2 Witch. Shew me, fhew me, 1 Witch. Here I have a pilot's thumb, Wreck'd, as homeward he did come. [Drum within, 3 Witch. A drum, a drum; Macbeth doth come. 8 All. The weird fifters, hand in hand, Pofters of the fea and land, Thus Mr. Theobald has very justly explained forbid by accurfed, but without giving any reafon of his interpretation. To bid is origi nally to pray, as in this Saxon fragment: He ir pir biz bore, &c. He is wife that prays and makes amends. As to forbid therefore implies to prohibit, in oppofition to the word bid in its prefent fenfe, it fignifies by the fame kind of op pofition to curfe, when it is derived from the fame word in its primitive meaning, JOHNSON. 7 Shall be dwindle, &c.] This mischief was fuppofed to be put in execution by means of a waxen figure, which reprefented the perfon who was to be confumed by flow degrees. So, in Webster's Dutchefs of Malfy, 1623: it waftes me more "Than were't my picture fafhion'd out of wax, So, Holinfhed, fpeaking of the witchcraft practifed to destroy king Duffe: 66 -found one of the witches roafting upon a wooden broch an image of wax at the fire, refembling in each feature the king's perfon, &c." for as the image did wafte afore the fire, fo did the bodie of the king break forth in fweat. And as for the words of the inchantment, they ferved to keep him ftill waking from sleepe, &c." This may ferve to explain the foregoing paffage: Sleep fhall neither night nor day, Hang upon his penthoufe lid. STEEVENS. 8 The weyward fifters, hand in hand,] The witches are here fpeaking of themfelyes; and it is worth an enquiry 'Thus do go about, about; Thrice to thine, and thrice to mine, up: Enter enquiry why they fhould ftile themfelves the aweyward, or wayward fifters. This word, in its general acceptation, fignifies, perverfe, froward, moody, obftinate, untractable, &c. and is every where fo ufed by our Shakespeare. To content ourselves with two or three instances: "Fy, fy, how wayward is this foolish love, Two Gentlemen of Verona. It is improbable the witches would adopt this epithet to themfelves, in any of these fenfes, and therefore we are to look a little farther for the poet's word and meaning. When I had the first fufpicion of our author being corrupt in this place, it brought to my mind the following paffage in Chaucer's Troilus and Cresseide, lib. iii. v. 618: "But O fortune, executrice of wierdes." Which word the Gloffaries expound to us by fates, or deftinies. I was foon confirmed in my fufpicion, upon happening to dip into Heylin's Cofmography, where he makes a fhort recital of the story of Macbeth and Banquo. "Thefe two," fays he, travelling together through a forest, were met by three fairies, witches, wierds. The Scots call them, &c." I presently recollected, that this ftory must be recorded at more length by Holinfhed, with whom, I thought, it was very probable, that our author had traded for the materials of his tragedy, and therefore confirmation was to be fetched from this fountain. Accordingly, looking into the Hiftory of Scotland, I found the writer very prolix and exprefs, from Hector Boethius, in his remarkable ftory; and, p. 170, speaking of these witches, he uses this expreffion : "But afterwards the common opinion was, that these women were either the weird fifters; that is, as ye would say, the Goddeffes of Destiny, &c.". Again, a little lower: "The words of the three weird fifters alfo (of whom before ye have heard) greatly encouraged him thereunto." And in feveral other paragraphs there this word is repeated. I be Enter Macbeth and Banquo. Mac. So foul and fair a day I have not feen. Ban. believe, by this time, it is plain, beyond a doubt, that the word wayward has obtained in Macbeth, where the witches are spoken of, from the ignorance of the copyifts, who are not acquainted with the Scotch term; and that in every paffage, where there is any relation to these witches or wizards, my emendation must be embraced, and we must read weird. THEOBALD. The weyward fifters, hand in hand,] Mr. Theobald had found out who thefe weyward fifters were; but obferved they were called, in his authentic Holinfhed, weird ffters; and fo would needs have weyward a corruption of the text, because it fignifies perverfe, froward, &c. and it is improbable (he fays) that the witches should adopt this epithet to themfelves. It was hard that, when he knew fo much, he should not know a little more; that weyward had anciently the very fame fenfe, as weird; and was, indeed, the very fame word differently fpelt; having acquired its later fignification from the quality and temper of thefe imaginary witches. But this is being a critic like him who had discovered that there were two Hercules's; and yet did not know that he had two next-door neighbours of one and the fame name. As to thefe weyward fifters, they were the Fates of the northern nations; the three hand-maids of Odin. Hæ nominantur Valkyria, quas quodvis ad prælium Odinus mittit. Ha viros morti deftinant, & victoriam gubernant. Gunna, & Rota, & parcarum minima Skullda: per aëra & maria equitant femper ad morituros eligendos; cædes in poteftate habent. Bartholinus de Caufis contemptæ à Danis adhuc Gentilibus mortis. It is for this reafon that Shakespeare makes them three; and calls them, Pofters of the fea and land; and intent only upon death and mifchief. However, to give this part of his work the more dignity, he intermixes, with this northern, the Greek and Roman fuperftitions; and puts Hecate at the head of their enchantments. And to make it ftill more familiar to the common audience (which was always his point) he adds, for another ingredient, a fufficient quantity of our own country. fuperftitions concerning witches; their beards, their cats, and their broomsticks. So that his witch-fcenes are like the charm they prepare in one of them; where the ingredients are gathered from every thing hocking in the natural world, as here, from every thing abfurd in the moral. But as extravagant as all this is, the play has had the power to charm and bewitch every audience from that time to this. WARBURTON. Wierd comes from the Anglo-Saxon rind, and is used as a fub ftantive |