Chapter 19

V.i.100 (314,3) to play at loggats with 'em?] A play, in which pins are set up to be beaten down with a bowl.

V.i.149 (316,5) by the card] The _card_ is the paper on which the different points of the compass were described. _To do any thing by the card_, is, _to do it with nice observation_.

V.i.151 (316,6) the age is grown so picked] So _smart_, so _sharp_, says HANMER, very properly; but there was, I think, about that time, a _picked_ shoe, that is, _a shoe with a long pointed toe_, in fashion, to which the allusion seems likewise to be made. _Every man now is smart; and every man now is a man of fashion_.

V.i.239 (319,7) winter's flaw!] Winter's _blast_.

V.i.242 (319,8) maimed rites!] Imperfect obsequies.

V.i.244 (319,9) some estate] Some person of high rank.

V.i.255 (319,2) Yet here she is allow'd her virgin crants] I have been informed by an anonymous correspondent, that _crants_ is the German word for _garlands_, and I suppose it was retained by us from the Saxons. To carry _garlands_ before the bier of a maiden, and to hang them over her grave, is still the practice in rural parishes.

_Crants_ therefore was the original word, which the author, discovering it to be provincial, and perhaps not understood, changed to a term more intelligible, but less proper. _Maiden rites_ give no certain or definite image. He might have put _maiden wreaths_, or _maiden garlands_, but he perhaps bestowed no thought upon it, and neither genius nor practice will always supply a hasty writer with the most proper diction.

V.i.310 (323,6) When that her golden couplets] [W: E'er that] Perhaps it should be,

_Ere yet_--

_Yet_ and _that_ are easily confounded.

V.ii.6 (324,7) mutinies in the bilboes] _Mutinies_, the French word for seditious or disobedient fellows in the army or fleet. _Bilboes_, the _ship's prison_.

V.ii.6 (324,8) Rashly,/And prais'd be rashness for it--Let us know] Both my copies read,

--Rashly, _And prais'd be rashness for it_, let _us know_.

Hamlet, delivering an account of his escape, begins with saying, that he _rashly_--and then is carried into a reflection upon the weakness of human wisdom. I rashly--praised be rashness for it--_Let us_ not think these events casual, but _let us know_, that is, _take notice and remember_, that we sometimes succeed by _indiscretion_, when we _fail_ by _deep plots_, and infer the perpetual superintendance and _agency_ of the _Divinity_. The observation is just, and will be allowed by every human being who shall reflect on the course of his own life.

V.ii.22 (325,9) With, ho! such bugs and goblins in my life] With _such causes of terror_, arising from my character and designs.

V.ii.29 (325,2) Being thus benetted round with villainies,/ Ere I could make a prologue to my brains] [W: mark the prologue ... bane] In my opinion no alteration is necessary. Hamlet is telling how luckily every thing fell out; he groped out their commission in the dark without waking them; he found himself doomed to immediate destruction. Something was to be done for his preservation. An expedient occurred, not produced by the comparison of one method with another, or by a regular deduction of consequences, but before he _could make a prologue to his brains, they had begun the play_. Before he could summon his faculties, and propose to himself what should be done, a complete scheme of action presented itself to him. His mind operated before he had excited it. This appears to me to be the meaning.

V.ii.41 (326,5) As peace should still her wheaten garland wear,/ And stand a comma 'tween their amities] HANMER reads,

_And stand a_ cement--

I am again inclined to vindicate the old reading.

The expression of our author is, like many of his phrases, sufficiently constrained and affected, but it is not incapable of explanation. The _comma_ is the note of _connection_ and continuity of sentences; the _period_ is the note of _abruption_ and disjunction. Shakespeare had it perhaps in his mind to write, That unless England complied with the mandate, _war should put a_ period _to their amity_; he altered his mode of diction, and thought that, in an opposite sense, he might put, that _Peace should stand a_ comma between their amities_. This is not an easy stile; but is it not the stile of Shakespeare?

V.ii.43 (327,6) as's of great charge] _Asses_ heavily _loaded_. A quibble is intended between _as_ the conditional particle, and _ass_ the beast of burthen. That _charg'd_ anciently signified _leaded_, may be proved from the following passage in _The Widow's Tears_, by Chapman, 1612.

"Thou must be the _ass charg'd with crowns_ to make way." (see 1765, VIII, 294, 2)

V.ii.53 (327,7) The changeling never known] A _changeling_ is a _child_ which the fairies are supposed to leave in the room of that which they steal.

V.ii.68 (328,1) To quit him] To requite him; to pay him his due.

V.ii.84 (329,2) Dost know this water-fly] A _water-fly_, skips up and down upon the surface of the water, without any apparent purpose or reason, and is thence the proper emblem of a busy trifler.

V.ii.89 (329,3) It is a chough] A kind of jackdaw.

V.ii.112 (330,5) full of most excellent differences] Full of _distinguishing_ excellencies.

V.ii.114 (330,6) the card or calendar of gentry] The general preceptor of elegance; the _card_ by which a gentleman is to direct his course; the _calendar_ by which he is to choose his time, that what he does may be both excellent and seasonable.

V.ii.115 (330,7) for you shall find in him the continent of what part a gentleman would see] _You shall find him containing_ and comprising every _quality_ which a _gentleman_ would desire to _contemplate_ for imitation. I know not but it should be read, _You shall find him the continent_

V.ii.119 (330,9) and yet but raw neither in respect of his quick sail] [W: but slow] I believe _raw_ to be the right word; it is a word of great latitude; _raw_ signifies _unripe, immature_, thence _unformed, imperfect, unskilful_. The best account of him would be _imperfect_, in respect of his quick sail. The phrase _quick sail_ was, I suppose, a proverbial term for _activity of mind_.

V.ii.122 (330,1) a soul of great article] This is obscure. I once thought it might have been, _a soul of great altitude_; but, I suppose, _a soul of great article_, means _a soul of_ large comprehension, of many contents; the particulars of an inventory are called _articles_.

V.ii.122 (331,2) his infusion of such dearth and rareness] _Dearth_ is _dearness_, value, price. And his internal qualities of such value and rarity.

V.ii.131 (331,3) Is't not possible to understand in another tongue? you will do't, Sir, really] Of this interrogatory remark the sense ie very obscure. The question may mean, _Might not all this be understood in plainer language_. But then, _you will do it, Sir, really_, seems to have no use, for who could doubt but plain language would be intelligible? I would therefore read, _Is't possible_ not to be understood in a mother _tongue_. You will do it, Sir, really.

V.ii.140 (331,4) if you did, it would not much approve me] If you knew I was not ignorant, your esteem would not nuch advance my reputation. To _approve_, is to _recommend to approbation_.

V.ii.145 (331,5) I dare not confess that, lest I should compare with him in excellence] I dare not pretend to know him, lest I should pretend to an equality: no man can completely know another, but by knowing himself, which is the utmost extent of human wisdom.

V.ii.149 (332,6) in his meed] In his excellence.

V.ii.156 (332,7) impon'd] Perhaps it should be, _depon'd_. So Hudibras,

"I would upon this cause _depone_, "As much as any I have known."

But perhaps _imponed_ is pledged, _impawned_, so spelt to ridicule the affectation of uttering English words with French pronunciation.

V.ii.165 (332,9) more germane.] More_a-kin_.

V.ii.172 (333,1) The king, Sir, hath laid, that in a dozen passes between yourself and him, he shall not exceed you three hits; he hath laid on twelve for nine] This wager I do not understand. In a dozen passes one must exceed the other more or less than three hits. Nor can I comprehend, how, in a dozen, there can be twelve to nine. The passage is of no importance; it is sufficient that there was a wager. The quarto has the passage as it stands. The folio, _He hath one twelve for mine_.

V.ii.193 (333,2) This lapwing runs away with the shell on his head] I see no particular propriety in the image of the lapwing. Osrick did not run till he had done his business. We may read, _This lapwing_ ran _away_--That is, _this fellow was full of unimportant bustle from his birth_.

V.ii.199 (334,4) a kind of yesty collection, which carries them through and through the most fond and winnowed opinions] [W: most fann'd] This is a very happy emendation; but I know not why the critic should suppose that _fond_ was printed for _fann'd_ in consequence of any reason or reflection. Such errors, to which there is no temptation but idleness, and of which there was no cause but ignorance, are in every page of the old editions. This passage in the quarto stands thus: "They have got out of the habit of encounter, a kind of misty collection, which carries them through and through the most profane and renowned opinions." If this printer preserved any traces of the original, our author wrote, "the most fane and renowned opinions," which is better than fann'd and winnow'd.

The meaning is, "these men have got the cant of the day, a superficial readiness of slight and cursory conversation, a kind of frothy collection of fashionable prattle, which yet carried them through the most select and approved judgment. This airy facility of talk sometimes imposes upon wise men."

Who has not seen this observation verified?

V.ii.201 (335,6) and do but blow them to their trials, the bubbles are out] These men of show, without solidity, are like bubbles raised from soap and water, which dance, and glitter, and please the eye, but if you extend them, by blowing hard, separate into a mist; so if you oblige these specious talkers to extend their compass of conversation, they at once discover the tenuity of their intellects.

V.ii.216 (335,7) gentle entertainment] Mild and temperate conversation.

V.ii.234 (336,1) Since no man knows aught of what he leaves, what is't to leave betimes?] The reading of the quarto was right, but in some other copy the harshness of the transposition was softened, and the passage stood thus: _Since no man knows aught of what he leaves_. For _knows_ was printed in the later copies _has_, by a slight blunder in such typographers.

I do not think Dr. Warburton's interpretation of the passage the best that it will admit. The meaning may be this, Since _no man knows aught of_ the state of life which _he leaves_, since he cannot judge what others years may produce, why should he be afraid of _leaving_ life betimes? Why should he dread an early death, of which he cannot tell whether it is an exclusion of happiness, or an interception of calamity. I despise the superstition of augury and omens, which has no ground in reason or piety; my comfort is, that I cannot fall but by the direction of Providence.

Hanmer has, _Since no man_ owes _aught_, a conjecture not very reprehensible. Since _no man can call any possession certain_, what is it to leave?

V.ii.237 (337,2) Give me your pardon, Sir] I wish Hamlet had made some other defence; it is unsuitable to the character of a good or a brave man, to shelter himself in falsehood.

V.ii.272 (338,5) Your grace hath laid upon the weaker side] Thus Hanmer. All the others read,

_Your grace hath laid the odds o' the weaker side._

When the odds were on the side of Laertes, who was to hit Hamlet twelve times to nine, it was perhaps the author's slip.

V.ii.310 (340,7) you make a wanton of me] A _wanton_ was, a man feeble and effeminate. In _Cymbeline_, Imogen says,

"I am not so citizen a _wanton_, To die, ere I be sick."

V.ii.346 (342,8) That are but mutes or audience to this act] That are either mere _auditors_ of this _catastrophe_, or at most only _mute performers_, that fill the stage without any part in the action.

V.ii.375 (344,2) This quarry cries, on havock!] Hanmer reads,

--_cries_ out, _havock!_

To _cry on_, was to _exclaim against_. I suppose, when unfair sportsmen destroyed more _quarry_ or _game_ than was reasonable, the censure was to cry, _Havock_.

(346) General Observation. If the dramas of Shakespeare were to be characterised, each by the particular excellence which distinguishes it from the rest, we must allow to the tragedy of Hamlet the praise of variety. The incidents are so numerous, that the argument of the play would make a long tale. The scenes are interchangeably diversified with merriment and solemnity; with merriment that includes judicious and instructive observations, and solemnity, not strained by poetical violence above the natural sentiments of man. New characters appear from time to time in continual succession, exhibiting various forms of life and particular modes of conversation. The pretended madness of Hamlet causes much mirth, the mournful distraction of Ophelia fills the heart with tenderness, and every personage produces the effect intended, from the apparition that in the first act chills the blood with horror, to the fop in the last, that exposes affectation to just contempt. The conduct is perhaps not wholly secure against objections. The action is indeed for the most part in continual progression, but there are some scenes which neither forward nor retard it. Of the feigned madness of Hamlet there appears no adequate cause, for he does nothing which he might not have done with the reputation of sanity. He plays the madman most, when he treats Ophelia with so much rudeness, which seems to be useless and wanton cruelty.

Hamlet is, through the whole play, rather an instrument than an agent. After he has, by the stratagem of the play, convicted the king, he makes no attempt to punish him, and his death is at last effected by an incident which Hamlet had no part in producing.

The catastrophe is not very happily produced; the exchange of weapons is rather an expedient of necessity, than a stroke of art. A scheme might easily have been formed to kill Hamlet with the dagger, and Laertes with the bowl.

The poet is accused of having shewn little regard to poetical justice, and may be charged with equal neglect of poetical probability. The apparition left the regions of the dead to little purpose; the revenge which he demands is not obtained, but by the death of him that was required to take it; and the gratification which would arise from the destruction of an usurper and a murderer, is abated by the untimely death of Ophelia, the young, the beautiful, the harmless, and the pious.

OTHELLO

I.i.20 (358,4)

One Michael Cassio, a Florentine, A fellow almost damn'd in a fair wife]

This is one of the passages which must for the present be resigned to corruption and obscurity. I have nothing that I can, with any approach to confidence, propose. I cannot think it very plain from Act 3. Scene 1. that Cassio was or was not a Florentine.

I.i.30 (361,6) must be belee'd and calm'd] [--_must be_ LED _and calm'd_. So the old quarto. The first folio reads _belee'd_: but that spoils the measure. I read LET, hindered. WARBURTON.] _Belee'd_ suits to _calm'd_, and the measure is not less perfect than in many other places.

I.i.36 (361,7) Preferment goes by letter] By _recommendation_ from powerful friends.

I.i.37 (361,8) And not by old gradation] [W: Not (as of old)] _Old gradation_, is _gradation_ established by_ancient_ practice. Where is the difficulty?

I.i.39 (361,9) If I in any just term am affin'd] _Affine_ is the reading of the third quarto and the first folio. The second quarto and all the modern editions have _assign'd_. The meaning is, _Do I stand_ within _any such_ terms _of propinquit_ or _relation to the Moor, as that it is my duty to love him_?

I.i.49 (362,1) honest knaves] _Knave_ is here for _servant_, but with a mixture of sly contempt.

I.i.63 (362,2) In compliment extern] In that which I do only for an outward shew of civility.

I.i.76 (363,3) As when, by night and negligence, the fire/Is spied in populous cities] [Warburton, objecting to "by": Is spred] The particle is used equivocally; the same liberty is taken by writers more correct.

_The wonderful creature! a woman of reason! Never grave_ out of _pride, never gay_ out of _season_.

I.i.115 (364,4) What profane wretch art thou?] That is, _what wretch of gross and licentious language?_ In that sense Shakespeare often uses the word _profane_.

I.i.124 (365,6) this odd even] The _even_ of _night_ is _midnight_, the time when night is divided into _even_ parts.

I.i.149 (366,7) some check] Some rebuke.

I.i.150 (366,8) cast him] That is, _dismiss_ him; _reject_ him. We still say, a _cast_ coat, and a _cast_ serving-man.

I.i.162 (366,9) And what's to come of my despised time] [W: despited] _Despised time_, is _time of no value_; time in which

"There's nothing serious in mortality, The wine of life is drawn, and the mere dregs Are left, this vault to brag of." _Macbeth_.

I.i.173 (367,2) By which the property of youth and maidhood/May be abus'd?] By which the faculties of a young virgin may be infatuated, and made subject to illusions and to false imagination.

"Wicked dreams _abuse_ The curtain'd sleep." _Macbeth._

I.ii.2 (368,3) stuff o' the conscience] This expression to common readers appears harsh. _Stuff_ of the _conscience_ is, _substance_, or _essence_ of the conscience. _Stuff_ is a word of great force in the Teutonic languages. The elements are called in Dutch, _Hoefd stoffen_, or _head stuffs_.

I.ii.13 (368,4) And hath, in his effect, a voice potential/As double as the duke's] [Warburton had given a source in Dioscorides and Theocritus for "double"] This note has been much censured by Mr. Upton, who denies, that the quotation is in Dioscorides, and disputes, not without reason, the interpretation of Theocritus.

All this learning, if it had even been what it endeavours to be thought, is, in this place, superfluous. There is no ground of supposing, that our author copied or knew the Greek phrase; nor does it follow, that, because a word has two senses in one language, the word which in another answers to one sense, should answer to both. _Manus_, in Latin, signifies both a _hand_ and _troop of soldiers_, but we cannot say, that _the captain marched at the_ head _of his_ hand; or, that _he laid his_ troop _upon his sword_. It is not always in books that the meaning is to be sought of this writer, who was much more acquainted with naked reason and with living manners.

_Double_ has here its natural sense. The president of every deliberative assembly has a _double voice_. In our courts, the chief justice and one of the inferior judges prevail over the other two, because the chief justice has a _double_ voice.

Brabantio had, _in his effect_, though not by law, yet by _weight_ and _influence_, a voice not _actual_ and formal, but _potential_ and operative, as _double_, that is, a voice that when a question was suspended, would turn the balance as effectually _as the duke's_. _Potential_ is used in the sense of science; a _caustic_ is called _potential_ fire.

I.ii.23 (370,7) speak, unbonnetted] [Pope: unbonnetting] I do not see the propriety of Mr. Pope's emendation, though adopted by Dr. Warburton. _Unbonnetting_ may as well be, _not putting on_, as _not putting off_, the bonnet. Hamner reads _e'en_ bonnetted.

I.ii.26 (370,8) unhoused] Free from _domestic_ cares. A thought natural to an adventurer.

I.ii.28 (370,9) For the sea's worth] I would not marry her, though she were as rich as the Adriatic, which the Doge annually marries.

I.ii.30 (371,2) a land-carrack] A _carrack_ is a ship of great bulk, and commonly of great value; perhaps what we now call a _galleon_.

I.ii.55 (372,3) be advis'd] That is, be _cool_; be _cautious_; be _discreet_.

I.ii.68 (372,4) The wealthy curled darlings of our nation] _Curled_ is _elegantly and ostentatiously dressed_. He had not the hair particularly in his thoughts.

I.ii.74 (373,6) Abused her delicate youth with drugs, or minerals,/ That weaken notion] [T: notion] Hanmer reads with equal probability, _That_ waken motion. [Originally _motion_].

I.iii.6 (375,9) As in these cases where they aim reports] [W: the aim] The folio has,

--_the_ aim reports.

But, _they aim reports_, has a sense sufficiently easy and commodious. There men _report_ not by certain knowledge, but by _aim _and conjecture.

I.ii.18 (375,1) By no assay of reason] Bring it to the _test_, examine it by reason as we examine metals by the _assay_, it will be found counterfeit by all trials.

I.iii.23 (376,2) facile question] _Question_ is for the _act of seeking_. With more _easy endeavour_.

I.iii.24 (376,4) warlike brace] State of defence. To arm was called to _brace on_ the armour.

I.iii.42 (376,5) And prays you to believe him] The late learned and ingenious Mr. Thomas Clark, of Lincoln's Inn, read the passage thus:

_And prays you to_ relieve _him_.

But the present reading may stand. _He intreats you not to doubt the truth of this intelligence_.

I.iii.54 (377,6) Hath rais'd me from my bed; nor doth the general care] The word _care_, which encumbers the verse, was probably added by the players. Shakespeare uses _the general_ as a substantive, though, I think, not in this sense.

I.iii.69 (373,8) though our proper son/Stood in your action] Were the man exposed to your _charge_ or _accusation_.

I.iii.80 (378,9) The very head and front of my offending] The _main_, the _whole_, unextenuated.

I.iii.85 (379,2) Their dearest action] That is _dear_, for which much is paid, whether money or labour; _dear action_, is action performed at great expence, either of ease or safety.

I.iii.107 (380,4) overt test] Open proofs, external evidence.

I.iii.108 (380,5) thin habits and poor likelihoods/Of modern seeming] Weak shew of slight appearance.

I.iii.139 (381,6) And portance in my travel's history] [I have restored,

_And with it all my travel's history_:

From the old edition. It is in the rest,

_And portance in my travel's history_.

Rymer, in his criticism on this play, has changed it to _portents_, instead of _portance_. POPE.] Mr. Pope has restored a line, to which there is little objection, but which has no force. I believe _portance_ was the author's word in some revised copy. I read thus,

_Of being----sold To slavery, of my redemption, thence, And portance in't; my travel's history._ My redemption from slavery, and behaviour in it.

I.iii.140-170 (381,7) Wherein of antres vast, and desarts idle] Whoever ridicules this account of the progress of love, shows his ignorance, not only of history, but of nature and manners. It is no wonder that, in any age, or in any nation, a lady, recluse, timorous, and delicate, should desire to hear of events and scenes which she could never see, and should admire the man who had endured dangers and performed actions, which, however great, were yet magnified by her timidity. [Pope: deserts wild] Every mind is liable to absence and inadvertency, else Pope could never have rejected a word so poetically beautiful. Idle is an epithet used to express the infertility of the chaotic state, in the Saxon translation of the Pentateuch. (1773)

I.iii.140 (382,8) antres] [French grottos. POPE.] Rather _caves_ and _dens_.

I.iii.142 (382,9) It was my hint to speak] [W: hent] _Hent_ is not used in Shakespeare, nor, I believe, in any other author; _hint_, or _cue_, is comnonly used for occasion of speech, which is explained by, _such was the process_, that is, the course of the tale required it. If _hent_ be restored, it may be explained by _handle_. I had a _handle_, or _opportunity_, to speak of cannibals.