P. 675, c. 1, 7. 1. all in post,-] So, in Painter's novel: "Let us take our horse to prove which of oure wives doth surmount. Whereuppon they roode to Rome in post." MALONE.

Id. l. 13. Where mortal stars,] i. e. eyes. Our author has the same allusion in A MidsummerNight's Dream:

who more engilds the night

Than all yon fiery o's and eyes of light."
Again, in Romeo and Juliet:

"At my poor house look to behold this night Earth-treading-stars, that make dark heaven light." MALONE. P. 676, c. 1, l. 5.. which in his liver glows.] Thus the quarto 1594. Some of the modern editions have grows.-The liver was formerly supposed to be the seat of love. MALONE. Id. 1. 7. Thy hasty spring still blasts, and ne'er grows old!] Like a too early spring, which is frequently checked by blights, and never produces any ripened or wholesome fruit; the irregular forwardness of an unlawful passion never gives any solid or permanent satisfaction. So, in a subsequent stanza :

"Unruly blasts wait on the tender spring." Again, in Hamlet:

'For Hamlet, and the trifling of his favour,
Hold it a fashion and a toy of blood;
A violet in the youth of primy nature,
Forward, not permanent; sweet, not
lasting;

The perfume and suppliance of a minute:
No more."

Again, in King Richard III. :

"Short summers lightly have a forward spring"

Blasts is here a neutral verb; it is used by Sir W. Raleigh in the same manner, in his poem entitled the Farewell:

"Tell age it daily wasteth;

Tell honour, how it alters;

Tell beauty, how it blasteth," &c.

In Venus and Adonis we find nearly the same sentiment:

"Love's gentle spring doth alway fresh

o'er (as it is printed in the text), the word over, when contracted, having been formerly written ore. But in this way the passage is not reducible to grammar. Virtue would stain that, i. e. blushes, o'er with silver white.The word intended was, perhaps, or, i. e. gold, to which the poet compares the deep colour of a blush. Thus in Hamlet we find ore used by our author manifestly in the sense of or or gold:

"O'er whom his very madness,like some ore Among a mineral of metals base,

Shows itself pure."

The terms of heraldry in the next stanza seem to favour this supposition: and the opposition between or and the silver white of virtue is entirely in Shakspeare's manner. So, afterwards:

"Which virtue gave the golden age, to gild Their silver cheeks." MALONE. Shakspeare delights in opposing the colours of gold and silver to each other. So, in Macbeth:

"His silver skin lac'd with his golden blood." We meet with a description, allied to the present one, in Much Ado About Nothing: I have mark'd

66

A thousand blushing apparitions

To start into her face; a thousand innocent shames

In angel whiteness bear away those blushes." STEEVENS.

Id. 1. 15. -in that white intituled,] I suppose he means, "that consists in that whiteness, or takes its title from it." STEEVENS.

Our author has the same phrase in his 37th Sonnet:

66 -For whether all or more,

Intitled in their parts do crowned sit-" MALONE.

Id. 1.40 Therefore that praise which Collatine doth owe,] Praise here signifies the object of praise, i. e. Lucretia. To owe in old language means to possess. MALONE.

Id. l. 62. Nor could she moralize his wanton sight,] To moralize here signifies to interpret, to investigate the latent meaning of his looks. So, in Much Ado About Nothing; "you have some moral in this Benedictus." Again in The Taming of the Shrew:-"and has left me here to expound the meaning or moral of his signs and tokens." MALONE.

Id. c. 2, 1. 9. Intending weariness with heavy spright;]

Intending is pretending. MALONE.

XX

P. 676, c. 2, l. 36. So that in vent'ring ill,] Thus the old copy. The modern editions read: So that in vent'ring all. But there is no need of change. "In venturing ill," means, from an evil spirit of adventure, which prompts us to covet what we are not possessed of. MALONE. Id. l. 48. himself confounds,] i. e. destroys. MALONE.

P. 677, c. 1, l. 18. — soft fancy's slave!] Fancy, for love or affection. So, in A MidsummerNight's Dream:

Wishes and tears poor fancy's followers." MALONE. Id. 1. 20. Then my digression-] My deviation from virtue. So, in Love's Labour's Lost: "I will have that subject newly writ o'er, that I may example my digression by some mighty precedent." MALONE.

Again, in Romeo and Juliet:

"Thy noble shape is but a form in wax, Digressing from the valour of a man." STEEVENS.

Id. l. 22.

a

the scandal will survive,

And be an eye-sore in my golden coat ; Some loathsome dash the herald will contrive;]

In the books of heraldry a particular mark of disgrace is mentioned, by which the escutcheons of those persons were anciently distinguished, who "discourteously used a widow, maid, or wife, against her will." There were likewise formerly marks of disgrace for him that "revoked a challenge, or went from his word; for him who fled from his colours," &c. In the present instance our author seems to allude to the mark first mentioned. MALONE. "Some loathsome dash the herald will contrive." So, in King John:

"To look into the blots and stains of right." Again, in Drayton's Epistle from Queen Isabel to King Richard II.:

"No bastard's mark doth blot my conquering shield."

This distinction, whatever it was, was called in ancient heraldry a blot or difference. STEE

VENS.

Id. l. 62. Who fears a sentence or an old man's

saw,

Shall by a painted cloth be kept in awe.] In the old tapestries or painted cloths many moral sentences were wrought. So, in If This Be not a Good Play the Devil is in't, by Decker, 1612:

"What'says the prodigal child in the painted cloth?" MALONE.

Id. c. 2, l. 54. To have him heard;] That is, to discover him to proclaim his approach. MALONE.

Id. l. 66. He takes it from the rushes where it lies;]

The apartments in England being strewed with rushes in our author's time, he has given Lucretia's chamber the same covering. The contemporary poets, however were equally inattentive to propriety. Thus, Marlowe in his Hero and Leander :

"She fearing on the rushes to be flung,
Striv'd with redoubled strength."

MALONE.

P. 678, c. 1, l. 10. To add a more rejoicing to the prime,]

That is, a greater rejoicing. So, in King
Richard II. :

"To make a more requital of your loves."
The prime is the spring. MALONE.)

Id. c. 2, l. 18. And him by oath they truly honoured] Alluding to the ancient practice of swearing domestics into service. So, in Cymbeline:

Id.

Id.

Id.

"Her servants are all sworn and honourable." STEEVENS.

The matrimonial oath was, I believe, alone in our author's thoughts. MALONE.

1. 25. And in his will his wilful eye he tired.] This may mean-He glutted his lustful eye in the imagination of what he had resolved to do.' To tire is a term in falconry. So, in Heywood's Rape of Lucrece :

"Must with keen fang tire upon thy flesh." Perhaps we should read-And on his will, &c. STEEVENS.

c. 2, 1.2. Tender my suit:] Cherish, regard my suit. So, in Hamlet:

"Tender yourself more dearly." MALONE. 1. 5. Worse than a slavish wipe,] More disgraceful than the brand with which slaves were marked. MALONE.

Id. l. 5. -or birth-hour's blot:] So, in King

John:

Again, in A Midsummer-Night's Dream :
"And the blots of Nature's hand,
Shall not in their issue stand;
Never mole, hair-lip, nor scar,
Nor mark prodigious-."

It appears that in Shakspeare's time the arms of bastards were distinguished by some kind of blot. Thus in the play above quoted:

"To look into the blots and stains of right.

But in the passage now before us, those corporal blemishes with which children are sometimes born, seem alone to have been in our author's contemplation. MALONE.

Id. l. 11. Like a white hind under the grype's sharp claws,] So, in King Richard III. : "Ah me! I see the ruin of my house;

The tiger now hath seiz'd the gentle hind."? All the modern editions read:

Or cruell gripe to gnaw my growing harte." FERREX AND PORREX.

It was also a term in the hermetic art. Thus, in Ben Jonson's Alchemist:

66

- let the water in glass E be flitter'd, And put into the gripe's egg.”

As griffe is the French word for a claw, perhaps anciently those birds which are remarkable for griping their prey in their talons, were occasionally called gripes. STEEVENS. Id. 1. 24. his vulture folly,] Folly is used here as it is in the sacred writings, for depravity of mind. So also, in Othello:

"She turn'd to folly and she was a whore." MALONE.

Id. l. 44. – pretended;] i. e. proposed to thyself. So, in Macbeth:

-alas the day!

What good could they pretend? STEEVENS, Id. 1. 63. Soft pity enters at an iron gate.] Meaning, I suppose, the gates of a prison. STEE

VENS.

P. 682, c. 1, 1.68. To dry the old oak's sap, and cherish springs;] The last two words, if they make any sense, it is such as is directly contrary to the sentiment here advanced; which is concerning the decays and not the repairs of time. The poet certainly wrote:

"To dry the old oak's sap, and tarish springs;"

i. e. to dry up springs, from the French tarir, or tarissement, exarefacere, exsiccatio: these words being peculiarly applied to springs or rivers. WARBURTON.

Dr Johnson thinks Shakspeare wrote:

66

and perish springs;"

and Dr Farmer has produced from the Maid's Tragedy a passage in which the word perish is used in an active sense. If change were necessary, that word might perhaps have as good a claim to admission as any other; but I know not why the text has been suspected of corruption. The operations of Time, here described, are not all uniform; nor has the poet confined himself solely to its destructive qualities. In some of the instances mentioned, its progress only is adverted to. Thus we are told, his glory is

"To wake the morn and sentinel the nightAnd turn the giddy round of fortune's wheel."

In others, its salutary effects are pointed out: "To cheer the ploughman with uncreasful

crops,

To unmask falsehood and bring truth to light,

To wrong the wronger till he render right." Where then is the difficulty of the present line, even supposing that we understand the word springs in its common acceptation? It is the office of Time (says Lucretia) to dry up the sap of the oak, and to furnish springs with a perpetual supply; to deprive the one of that moisture which she liberally bestows upon the other. In the next stanza the employment of Time is equally various and discordant:

"To make the child a man, the man a child." To advance the infant to the maturity of man, and to reduce the aged to the imbecility of childhood. By springs however may be understood (as has been observed by Mr Tollet) the shoots or buds of young trees; and then the meaning will be,-It is the office of Time, on the one hand, to destroy the ancient oak, by drying up its sap; on the other, to cherish young plants, and to bring them to maturity. So, in our author's 15th Sonnet:

"When I perceive that men, as plants in

crease,

"Cheer'd and check'd even by the self-same sky-"

I believe this to be the true sense of the passage. Springs has this signification in many ancient English books; and the word is again used in the same sense in The Comedy of Errors:

"Even in the spring of love thy love-springs | rot."

Again, in Venus and Adonis :

"This canker that eats up love's tender spring." MALONE.

In Holinshed's Description of England, both the contested words in the latter part of the verse occur." We have manie woods, forests, and parks, which cherish trees abundantlie, beside infinit numbers of hedge-rowes, groves,

MALONE.

Id.c. 2,1. 49. As slanderous death's-man, &c.] i. e. executioner. So, in one of our author's plays: he's dead; I am only sorry

He had no other death's-man."
STEEVENS.

Id. l. 64. Out, idle words,] Thus the quarto. The octavo 1607, has our idle words,-which has been followed by that of 1616. Dr Sewel reads without authority: 0 idle words. Out is an exclamation of horror or contempt yet used in the north.

Id.

P.

Id.

Id.

Id.

1. 69. For me, I force not argument a straw,] I do not value or esteem argument. So, in The Tragicall Hystory of Romeus and Juliet, 1562:

"But when he, many monthes, hopeless of

his recure,

Had served her, who forced not what paynes he did endure-." Again, in Love's Labour's Lost:

"Your oath broke once, you force not to forswear." MALONE.

683. c. 1, 1. 32. A badge of fame to slander's livery; In our author's time the servants of the nobility all wore silver badges on their liveries, on which the arms of their masters were engraved. MALONE.

c. 2, l. 42. While thou on Tereus descant'st, better skill.] Philomel, the daughter of Pandion, king of Athens, was ravished by Tereus, the husband of her sister Progne. According to the fable, she was turned into a nightingale, Tereus into a lapwing, and Progne into a swallow. There seems to be something wanting to complete the sense-with better skill, but this will not suit the metre. In a preceding line, however, the preposition, with, though equally wanting to complete the sense, is omitted, as here:

"For day hath nought to do what's done by night."

All the copies have:

"While thou on Tereus descants better skill."

This kind of error (descants for descant'st) occurs in almost every page of our author's plays.-MALONE.

Perhaps the author wrote (I say perhaps, for in Shakspeare's licentious grammar nothing is very certain):

66

I'll hum on Tarquin's ill,

While thou on Tereus descant'st better still." STEEVENS.

1. 47. who if it wink,) Shakspeare seldom attends to the last antecedent. The construction is:- which heart, if the eye wink, shall fall, &c. MALONE.

l. 63. When life is sham'd, and death re proaches debtor. Reproaches is here, I think, the Saxon genitive case:-when death is the debtor of reproach. So, in A MidsummerNight's Dream:

"I do wander everywhere

Swifter than the moones sphere."

She debates whether she should not rather destroy herself than live; life being disgraceful in consequence of her violation, and her death