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BAWD. Thou say'st true: 'tis not the bringing up of poor bastards, as I think, I have brought up some eleven

BOULT. Ay, to eleven, and brought them down again. But shall I search the market?

BAWD. What else, man? The stuff we have, a strong wind will blow it to pieces, they are so pitifully sodden.

PAND. Thou say'st true; they're too unwholesome o' conscience'. The poor Transilvanian is dead, that lay with the little baggage.

7 Therefore let's have fresh ones, whate'er we pay for them. If there be not a conscience to be used in every trade, we shall never prosper.] The sentiments incident to vicious professions suffer little change within a century and a half.-This speech is much the same as that of Mother Cole, in The Minor: Tip him an old trader! Mercy on us, where do you expect to go when you die, Mr. Loader?" STEEVENS.

8 Thou say'st true: 'tis not the bringing up of poor bastards,] There seems to be something wanting. Perhaps" that will do-" or some such words. The author, however, might have intended an imperfect sentence. MALONE.

9 AY, TO eleven, and brought them down again.] I have brought up (i. e. educated) says the Bawd, some eleven. Yes, (answers Boult) to eleven (i. e. as far as eleven years of age) and then brought them down again. The latter clause of the sentence requires no explanation.

Thus, in The Play of The Wether, by John Heywood, 4to. bl. 1. Mery Report says:

"Oft tyme is sene both in court and towne,

"Longe be women a bryngynge up, and sone brought downe." STEEVENS.

The modern copies read-I too eleven. The true reading, which is found in the quarto 1609, was pointed out by Mr. Steevens. MALONE.

Thou say'st true; THEY'RE TOo unwholesome o' conscience.] The old copies read-there's two unwholesome o' conscience. The preceding dialogue shows that they are erroneous. The complaint had not been made of two, but of all the stuff they had. According to the present regulation, the pandar merely assents to what his wife had said. The words two and too are perpetually confounded in the old copies. MALONE.

BOULT. Ay, she quickly pooped him2; she made him roast-meat for worms:-but I'll go search the market. [Exit BoULT. PAND. Three or four thousand chequins were as pretty a proportion to live quietly, and so give

over.

BAWD. Why, to give over, I pray you? is it a shame to get when we are old?

PAND. O, our credit comes not in like the commodity nor the commodity wages not with the danger; therefore, if in our youths we could pick up some pretty estate, 'twere not amiss to keep our door hatched. Besides, the sore terms we stand upon with the gods, will be strong with us for giving

over.

2 Ay, she quickly POOPED him :] The following passage in The Devil's Charter, a tragedy, 1607, will sufficiently explain this singular term :

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foul Amazonian trulls,

"Whose lanterns are still lighted in their poops."

MALONE.

This phrase (whatever be its meaning) occurs in Have With You to Saffron Walden, or Gabriel Harvey's Hunt is Up, &c. 1596: "But we shall l'envoy him, and trumpe and poope him well enough."

The same word is used by Dryden, in his Wild Gallant:

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He's poopt too." STEEVENS.

3 the commodity WAGES not with the danger;] i. e. is not equal to it. Several examples of this expression are given in former notes on our author. So, in Antony and Cleopatra:

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his taints and honours

Wag'd equal with him." STEEVENS.

Again, more appositely in Othello :

4

"To wake and wage a danger profitless." MALONE.

to keep our door HATCHED.] The doors or hatches of brothels, in the time of our author, seem to have had some distinguishing mark. So, in Cupid's Whirligig, 1607: "Set some picks upon your hatch, and, I pray, profess to keep a bawdy-house."

Prefixed to an old pamphlet entitled Holland's Leaguer, 4to. 1632, is a representation of a celebrated brothel on the Bank-side near the Globe playhouse, from which the annexed cut has been made. We have here the hatch exactly delineated. The man with the pole-ax was called the Ruffian. MALONE.

[graphic]

Vnto this Island and great Plutoes Court, none are deny'd that willingly resort, Charon or'e Phlegeton will set on shoare, and Cerberus will guard you to the doore: Where dainty Deuils drest in humane shape, vpon your senses soone will make a rape. They that come freely to this house of sinne, in Hell as freely may have entrance in.

The precept from Cupid's Whirligig, and the passage in Peri

BAWD. Come, other sorts offend as well as we ". PAND. As well as we! ay, and better too; we cles to which it refers, were originally applied by me to the illustration of the term Pict-hatch in The Merry Wives of Windsor.

A hatch is a half-door, usually placed within a street-door, admitting people into the entry of a house, but preventing their access to its lower apartments, or its stair-case. Thus, says the Syracusan Dromio in The Comedy of Errors, to the Dromio of Ephesus: Either get thee from the door, or sit down at the hatch."

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When the top of a hatch was guarded by a row of pointed iron spikes, no person could reach over, and undo its fastening, which was always within-side, and near its bottom.

This domestick portcullis perhaps was necessary to our ancient brothels. Secured within such a barrier, Mrs. Overdone could parley with her customers; refuse admittance to the shabby visitor, bargain with the rich gallant, defy the beadle, or keep the constable at bay.

From having been therefore her usual defence, the hatch at last became an unequivocal denotement of her trade; for though the hatch with a flat top was a constant attendant on butteries in great families, colleges, &c. the hatch with spikes on it was peculiar to our early houses of amorous entertainment.-Nay, as am assured by Mr. Walsh, (a native of Ireland, and one of the compositors engaged on the present edition of Shakspeare,) [Mr. Steevens's,] the entries to the Royal, Halifax, and Dublin bagnios in the city of Dublin, still derive convenience or security from hatches, the spikes of which are insurmountable.

This long explanation (to many readers unnecessary) is imputable to the preceding wooden cut, from the repetition of which I might have excused myself. As it is possible, however, that I may stand in the predicament of poor Sancho, who could not discern the enchanted castles that were so distinctly visible to his master's opticks, I have left our picture of an ancient brothel where I found it. It certainly exhibits a house, a lofty door, a wicket with a grate in it, a row of garden-rails, and a drawbridge. As for hatch-let my readers try if they can find one.

I must suppose, that my ingenious fellow-labourer, on future consideration, will class his hatch with the air-drawn dagger, and join with me in Macbeth's exclamation-" There's no such thing.'

Let me add, that if the Ruffian (as here represented) was an ostensible appendage to brothels, they must have been regulated on very uncommon principles; for instead of holding out allurements, they must have exhibited terrors. Surely, the Ruffian could never have appeared nisi dignus vindice nodus inciderat, till his presence became necessary to extort the wages of prostitution, or secure some other advantage to his employer.

offend worse. Neither is our profession any trade; it's no calling-but here comes Boult.

Enter the Pirates, and BoULT, dragging in MARINA.

BOULT. Come your ways. [To MARINA.]-My masters, you say she's a virgin?

1 PIRATE. O, sir, we doubt it not.

6

BOULT. Master, I have gone thorough for this piece, you see: if you like her, so; if not, I have lost my earnest.

BAWD. Boult, has she any qualities?

BOULT. She has a good face, speaks well, and has excellent good clothes; there's no further necessity of qualities can make her be refused.

BAWD. What's her price, Boult ?

BOULT. I cannot be bated one doit of a thousand pieces 7.

The representation prefixed to Holland's Leaguer, has, therefore, in my opinion, no more authenticity to boast of, than the contemporary wooden cuts illustrative of the Siege of Troy.

STEEVENS.

A hatch is defined by Johnson, a half-door, a door with an opening over it; and such certainly appears in the frontispiece to the old pamphlet. The halfpenny hatch in Southwark, and many other places, which prevents you from going over a private road without payment, is certainly not within a strait door. The subject is not worthy of much further enquiry, or it might be shown, by extracts from Holland's Leaguer, that the wooden cut was designed as a genuine representation. BosWELL.

Come, other SORTS offend as well as we.] From her husband's answer, I suspect the poet wrote-other trades, &c.

MALONE.

Malone suspects that we should read-"other trades," but that is unnecessary; the word sorts has the same sense, and means professions or conditions of life. So, Macbeth says:

6

66 I have won

"Golden opinion of all sorts of people." M. MASON. - I have gone THOROUGH ] i. e. I have bid a high price for her, gone far in my attempt to purchase her. STEEVENS. 7 I cannot be bated one doit of a thousand pieces.] This speech should seem to suit the Pirate. However, it may belong to Boult. I cannot get them to bate me one doit of a thousand pieces. MALone.

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