The works of Thomas Middleton, Volume 1 (of 5)
Act ii. last scene.
# 46:
Perhaps 1610 was its earliest season: see Collier’s _New Particulars regarding the Works of Shakespeare_, p. 24.
# 47:
See _Life of Shakespeare_ (1821), p. 420 sqq.
# 48:
“The former [Middleton] was a man of considerable powers, who has lately been the object of much discussion, on account of the liberal use which Shakspeare is ascertained to have made of his recently discovered tragi-comedy, _The Witch_.” Introd. to Massinger’s _Works_, vol. i. p. liv. ed. 1813.
“Yet the spleen of Davies is more tolerable than the tedious absurdity of the other commentators, who labour to justify our great poet’s pronunciation of this word [Hecate] from a mass of contemporary authorities, as if it was not a matter of the utmost indifference, and determined, in every case, by the measure of the verse. Shakspeare gave the word as he found it in Middleton, without caring whether it were a dissyllable or a trisyllable,” &c. Note on B. Jonson’s _Works_, vol. vi. p. 282.
“The production of this Masque [_The Masque of Queens_] has subjected Jonson to a world of unmerited obloquy from the commentators. It was written, it seems, ‘on account of the success of Shakspeare’s Witches, which alarmed the jealousy of a man, who fancied himself his rival, or rather his superior.’ And this is repeated through a thousand mouths. Not to observe, that if Jonson was moved by any such passion, it must be by Middleton’s Witches, not Shakspeare’s (for the latter is but a copyist himself, in this case),” &c. Note on B. Jonson’s _Works_, vol. vii. p. 115. I ought to mention, that when Gifford threw out these remarks, Malone had not declared his ultimate opinion on the subject.
# 49:
Middleton, as I have shewn in my notes on _The Witch_, had carefully consulted the celebrated work of Reginald Scot.
# 50:
See the excellent remarks of Lamb, cited in vol. iii. p. 329.
# 51:
_Retrospective Review_, vol. viii. p. 135.
# 52:
_Lectures on Dram. Literature_, p. 79.
# 53:
Campbell’s _Specimens of the Brit. Poets_, vol. iii. p. 118.
# 54:
Of _The Roaring Girl_ I believe that Middleton wrote by far the greater portion; but of the two other plays which he produced in conjunction with Dekker—_The First and Second Parts of the Honest Whore_—I have no doubt that his share is comparatively small.
# 55:
See _Your Five Gallants_ and _The Family of Love_.
# 56:
_Retrospective Review_, vol. viii. p. 126.
# 57:
_senatus_] Old ed. “senatum.”
# 58:
_He is_] Old ed. “Hees.”
# 59:
_there is_] Old ed. “ther’s.”
# 60:
_Wants some_ two _of threescore_.] “Sim.’s impatience of his mother’s death leads him into an error here: it appears, p. 17, that she wanted _five_ of that number.”—GIFFORD.
# 61:
_have_] Old ed. “hath.”
# 62:
_Dic quibus_, &c.] Virgil, _Ecl._ iii. 104.
# 63:
_nomothetæ_] Old ed. “nomotheta.”
# 64:
_chreokopia_] Old ed. “Crecopedi.”—“Χρεωκοπια signifies the cutting off that part of the debt which arose from the interest of the sum lent.”—M. MASON.
# 65:
_full allow’d_] i. e. fully approved.
# 66:
_seisactheia_] Old ed. “Sisaithie.”—“Σεισαχθεια, i. e. a shaking off a burthen, metaphorically an abolition of debt.”—GIFFORD.
# 67:
_old is_] Old ed. “old’s.”
# 68:
_He is_] Old ed. “Hees.”
# 69:
_passions_] “i. e. pathetic speeches.”—GIFFORD.
# 70:
_allow_] i. e. approve.
# 71:
_both do_] Old ed. “_both do_ both.”
# 72:
_which_] Old ed. “_which_ that.”
# 73: CLEAN. _And so it does; The church-book overthrows it, if you read it well._] “Cleanthes and the lawyer are at cross purposes. The latter observes, that the church-book (by which he means the register of births kept there) overthrows all demur; to which the former replies, that it really does so, taking the holy Scriptures for the church-book.
“To observe upon the utter confusion of all time and place, of all customs and manners, in this drama, would be superfluous; they must be obvious to the most careless observer.”—GIFFORD.
# 74:
_woman_] Old ed. “women.”
# 75:
_law_] Old ed. “lawfull.”
# 76:
_likelihood_] Old ed. “livelihood.”
# 77:
_whose_] Old ed. “which.”
# 78:
_as they may be supposed tedious_] Old ed. “_as_ it _may be supposed_ is _tedious_.”
# 79:
_for the women_] Old ed. “_for_ the which are _the women_.”
# 80:
_past_] Old ed. “to be _past_.”
# 81:
_they_] Old ed. “to.”
# 82:
_and not for a full month_, &c.] “The reader will see the necessity and the motive of this provision in the act towards the conclusion of the play.”—GIFFORD.
# 83:
“Had acts of parliament, in Massinger’s days, been somewhat like what they are in ours, we might not unreasonably have supposed that this was wickedly meant as a ridicule on them; for a more prolix, tautological, confused piece of formality, human wit, or rather human dulness, could not easily have produced. As it stands in the old copy and in Coxeter, it is absolutely incomprehensible.”—_Id._
# 84:
_do it_] Old ed. “doot.”
# 85:
_woman_] Old ed. “women.”
# 86:
_’tis_] Old ed. “his.”
# 87:
_now_] Old ed. “nor.”
# 88:
———— _if this hold, white heads will be cheap, And many watchmen’s places will be vacant_;] “The authors could not forbear, even at this serious moment, to indulge a smile at the venerable guardians of the night, who in their time, as well as in ours, seem to have been very ancient and quiet.”—GIFFORD.
# 89:
_sorrow is_] Old ed. “sorrowes.”
# 90:
_horse_] Old ed. “horseback.”
# 91:
_where is_] Old ed. “wheres.”
# 92:
_In’s secure quiet_, &c.] So Gifford. The old ed. has,
“_In_ his secured _quiet by a villaines hand_ Am _basely lost in_ my _starrs ignorance_.”
# 93:
_sir_] Old ed. “sit.”
# 94:
_weeping_] “This is given by the modern editors as a marginal note; but the old copy makes it, and rightly, a part of the text.”—GIFFORD.
# 95:
_to prevent her_] “i. e. to anticipate the period she had allotted to life.”—_Id._
# 96:
_she will_] Old ed. “sheel.”
# 97:
_there’s_] Old ed. “there is.”
# 98:
_her_] Old ed. “it.”
# 99:
_her_] Old ed. “it.”
# 100:
_thrown_] Old ed. “threw.”
# 101:
_she will_] Old ed. “sheel.”
# 102:
_while_] i. e. until.
# 103:
_Forgetest still_] Old ed. “_Still_ forgets.”
# 104:
_with_] Old ed. “within.”
# 105:
_doubled now_] Old ed. “_now doubled_.”
# 106:
_Cleanthes, never better_] Old ed. “_Never better, Cleanthes._”
# 107:
_strong_] Old ed. “stronger.”
# 108:
_she is ... of’t_] Old ed. “shees ... of it.”
# 109:
_allow_] i. e. approve.
# 110:
_’s_] Old ed. “is.”
# 111:
_Buried my name in Epire_, &c.] “This is obscure. Perhaps Leonides means, that he had so conducted himself in his native country (i. e. so raised his reputation there), that his memory would always live in the recollection of the people, unless he now quitted them for a residence elsewhere. The conclusion of this speech I do not understand.”—GIFFORD.]
# 112:
_on us_] Old ed. “ons.”
# 113:
_with’t_] Old ed. “with it.”
# 114:
_yet_] Old ed. “yes.”
# 115:
_there is_] Old ed. “theres.”
# 116:
_one_] Old ed. “all _one_.”
# 117:
_at night_] Old ed. “_at night_, my lord.”
# 118:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 119:
Old ed. “2.”
# 120:
_act_] Old ed. “_act_, my lord.”
# 121:
_on_] Old ed. “upon.”
# 122:
_where_] i. e. whereas.
# 123:
_Wood_] i. e. mad, raging: so M. Mason reads, for “Would” of the old ed. Gifford gives “Worried,” to perfect, as he says, the metre: but he forgot (what he elsewhere notices) that “aches” was formerly a dissyllable, and pronounced _aitches_.
# 124:
_pan’d hose_] i. e. breeches (generally made full and bombasted) having _panes_ or openings in the cloth, where other colours were inserted in silk, and drawn through.
# 125:
_bravery_] “i. e. ostentatious finery of apparel.”—GIFFORD.
# 126:
_Push_] This exclamation (which Gifford alters to _Pish_) is several times used by Middleton, as well as by other authors of his time: so Chapman;
“And lest some Momus here might now crie _push_, Say our pageant is not worth a rush.” _Gentleman Usher_, 1606, sig. C 4.
# 127:
_And keep a better table than that, I trow._] “This wretched fellow is punning upon the word _table_, which, as applied to his father, meant a large sheet of paper, where precepts for the due regulation of life were set down in distinct lines; and as applied to himself—that he would keep a better house, i. e. live more sumptuously, than his father.”—GIFFORD.
# 128:
_cheese-trenchers_] “Before the general introduction of books, our ancestors were careful to dole out instruction in many ways: hangings, pictures, _trenchers_, knives, wearing apparel, every thing, in a word, that was capable of containing a short sentence, was turned to account.... Saltonstall observes of one of his characters, that ‘for talke hee commonly uses some proverbial verses, gathered perhaps from _cheese-trenchers_.’ _Pictures_, by W. S.”—_Id._ See also my edition of Webster’s _Works_, III. 191, and note there.
# 129:
_Forfeit before_] So Gifford: but I am not quite satisfied with his reading. Old ed. “_Before_ surfet.”
# 130:
_You’ve_] Old ed. “You have.”
# 131:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 132:
_seven-and-fifty_] “See p. 6.”—GIFFORD.
# 133:
_Push_] See note, p. 29.
# 134:
_I’m_] Old ed. “_I_ am.”
# 135:
_Enter_, &c.] The stage-direction in the old ed. is, “_Enter Cleanthes and Hipolita with a hears_.”
# 136:
_this_] Old ed. “in _this_.”
# 137:
_I’ve_] Old ed. “_I_ have.”
# 138:
_condition_] “i. e. on condition.”—GIFFORD.
# 139:
_the duke in sight_] Old ed. “_the_ dim _sight_.”—“The variation in the text is from a conjecture of Mr. M. Mason. I suppose the manuscript had only the initial letter of duke, and the printer not knowing what to make of _d. in_ sight, corrected it into _dim sight_. These abbreviations are the source of innumerable errors.”—_Id._
# 140:
_Him._] Old ed. “He.”
# 141:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 142:
_Bailiff._] Old ed. “Bayly.”
# 143:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 144:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 145:
_doctors a’ the name._ “He alludes to Dr. W. Butler, a very celebrated physician of Elizabeth’s days. The oddity of his manners, the singularity of his practice, and the extraordinary cures which he performed, raised many strange opinions of him. ‘He never’ (says Dr. Wittie) ‘kept any apprentices for his business, nor any maid but a fool, and yet his reputation thirty-five years after his death was still so great, that many empiricks got credit among the vulgar by claiming relation to him, as having served him, and learned much from him.’ He died at an advanced age in 1618.”—GIFFORD.
# 146:
_should_] Old ed. “shall.”
# 147:
_I’ve_] Old ed. “I have.”
# 148:
_to let him live still_] Old. ed. “_still to let him live_.”
# 149:
_have_] So Gifford. Old ed. “am,” which perhaps is right.
# 150:
_perfum’d_] So Gifford. Old ed. “perform’d,” which may be right, in the sense of drest to perfection.
# 151:
_we know ... you young_] Old ed. “you _know_ ... your _young_.”
# 152:
_Simonides._] Old ed. “Mr. _Simonides_.”
# 153:
_We’ve_] Old ed. “we have.”
# 154:
_I am_] Old ed. “I’me.”
# 155:
_botcher_] Old ed. “brother.”
# 156:
_wheezing_] Old ed. “wheening.”
# 157:
_oft_] Old ed. “often.”
# 158:
_quited_] i. e. requited.
# 159:
_For_] Old ed. “After.”
# 160:
_aches_] See note, p. 28.
# 161:
_know_] Old ed. “knowes.”
# 162:
_I’ve_] Old ed. “I have.”
# 163:
_despatch’t_] Old ed. “_dispatch_ him.”
# 164:
_in_] Old ed. “_in_ your.”
# 165:
_it is_] Old ed. “’tis.”
# 166:
_deduct it to days_] “A Latinism, _deducere_, bring it down, or, reduce it to days. This absurdity of consulting the church-book for the age, &c. may be kept in countenance by Beaumont and Fletcher, vol. 6th, p. 248. Indeed there are several passages in this play that resemble some in the _Queen of Corinth_.”—GIFFORD.
# 167:
_sexton_] Old ed. “_sexton_ for that.”
# 168:
_Scirophorion_ ... _Hecatombaion_] Old ed. “Scirophon ... Hecatomcaon.”—“Scirophorion, Hecatombaion, _and, soon after_, December; what a medley! This miserable ostentation of Greek literature is, I believe, from the pen of Middleton, who was ‘a piece’ of a scholar.”—GIFFORD.
# 169:
_Gnotho_] Old ed. “Gnothos.”
# 170:
_here’s a trick_, &c.] “This alludes to those games, in which the low cards were thrown out; _coats_ were what we call court cards. _The end of serving-men_, which occurs in the next speech, is the title of an old ballad.”—GIFFORD.
# 171:
_spoke_] Old ed. “spak.”
# 172:
_Gnotho_] Old ed. “Gnothos.”
# 173:
_if you do_] “i. e. if you _fare well_.”—GIFFORD.
# 174:
_passionately_] “i. e. plaintively, sorrowfully.”—_Id._
# 175:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 176:
_broker_] Old ed. “brother.”
# 177:
_vow’d servants_] Old ed. “_servants vowd._”
# 178:
_Nor_] Old ed. “Nay.”
# 179:
_hour_] Old ed. “_hour_ at least.”
# 180:
_beguile_] Old ed. “beguild.”
# 181:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 182:
_fault_] “i. e. misfortune.”—GIFFORD.
# 183:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 184:
_discover’d_] Old ed. “_discoverd_ gentlemen.”
# 185:
_grinning_] Old ed. “ginny.”
# 186:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 187:
_cannot_] Old ed. “can’t.”
# 188:
_one_] Old ed. “_one_ and.”
# 189:
_horse-trick_] “Some rough curvetting is here meant, but I know not the precise motion. The word occurs in a _Woman killed with Kindness_. ‘Though we be but country fellows, it may be, in the way of dancing, we can do the _horse_-trick as well as the serving-men.’ A. 1.”—GIFFORD.
# 190:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 191:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 192:
_trillibubs._] “This seems to be a cant word for any thing of a trifling nature.”—GIFFORD.
# 193:
FIRST COURTIER _dances a galliard_] The stage- direction in old ed. is “_A Gailliard Laminiard_.”—“A galliard is described by Sir John Davis as a _swift and wandering dance, with lofty turns and capriols in the air_; and so very proper to prove the strength and activity of Lysander. It is still more graphically described, as Mr. Gilchrist observes, in Burton’s _Anat. of Melancholy_: ‘Let them take their pleasures, young men and maides flourishing in their age, fair and lovely to behold, well attired and of comely carriage, dancing _a Greeke Galliarde, and, as their dance required, kept their time, now turning, now tracing, now apart, now altogether, now a curtesie, then a caper, &c._, that it was a pleasant sight.’ Fol. 1632.”—GIFFORD.
# 194:
_go_] Old ed. “ago.”
# 195:
_vennies_] or _venues_, i. e. assaults, bouts, turns.
# 196:
_a flap-dragon_] Was a raisin, plum, &c., and sometimes even a candle’s end, made to float in a shallow dish, or glass, of brandy, or other liquor, from which, when set on fire, it was to be snatched by the mouth and swallowed. Gallants in former days vied with each other in drinking off flap-dragons to the healths of their mistresses.
# 197:
_it is_] Old ed. “’tis.”
# 198:
_you_] Old ed. “with _you_.”
# 199:
_vennies_] See note, p. 66.
# 200:
—— _with a trick_] “Lysander gives them all harsh names—here he bestows one on Simonides, which the delicacy or fear of the old publisher would not permit him to hazard in print: tant mieux.”—GIFFORD.
# 201:
“This stuff is not worth explaining; but the reader, if he has any curiosity on the subject, may amply gratify it by a visit to Pantagruel and his companions on the Isle Ennasin. Below, there is a miserable pun upon _hair_—the _crossing_ of an _hare_ was ominous.”—_Id._
# 202:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 203:
_the scotomy_] Old ed. “scotony.”—“The _scotomy_ (σκοτωμα) is a dizziness or swimming in the head.”—_Id._
# 204:
_venny_] See note, p. 66.]
# 205:
_go_] Old ed. “goes.”
# 206:
_You_] Old ed. “It.”
# 207:
_are_] Old ed. “_are_ all.”
# 208:
_back_] Old ed. “black.”
# 209:
——_for’t had been safer Now to be mad_, &c.] “_Minus est insania turpis._ There are many traits of Massinger in this part of the scene.”—GIFFORD.
# 210:
_has_] i. e. he has—an elliptical expression frequent in our early poets.
# 211:
_thou’rt_] Old ed. “thou art.”
# 212:
See note, p. 72.
# 213:
_consort_] i. e. company of musicians.
# 214:
_Gnotho_] Old ed. “Gnothoes.”
# 215:
_foot_] Old ed. “foole.”
# 216:
_we have Siren here_ ... _’twas Hiren, the fair Greek_] In Shakespeare’s _Henry IV._, Part II. Act ii. Sc. 4., Pistol exclaims, “have we not Hiren here?” and the same (or nearly the same) words occur in several other old plays. They seem to be a quotation from a (now-lost) drama by Peele, called _The Turkish Mahomet and Hiren the Fair Greek_. See the commentators on the passage of Shakespeare just cited, and my Account of Peele, &c. p. xxxv., prefixed to his _Works_, sec. ed.
# 217:
_Gnotho_] Old ed. “Gnothoes.”
# 218:
_She grew longer_, &c.] “This miserable trash, which is quite silly enough to be original, has yet the merit of being copied from Shakspeare.”—GIFFORD.
# 219:
_avoirdupois_] Old ed. “haberdepoyse.”
# 220:
_consort_] i. e. company: see note, p. 75.
# 221:
_wizards_] Old ed. “vizards.”
# 222:
_Gnotho_] Old ed. “Gnothoes.”
# 223:
_No_] Old ed. “She;” but compare p. 76.
# 224:
This stage-direction in old ed. stands thus: “_The Dance of old women maskt, then offer to take the men, they agree all but Gnothoes: he sits with his Wench after they whisper._”
# 225:
_Gnotho_] Old ed. “Gnothoes.”
# 226:
_a mermaid_] “The mermaids of the writer’s time had succeeded to the Syrens of the ancients, and possessed all their musical as well as seductive qualities. Mermaid also was one of the thousand cant terms which served to denote a strumpet; and to this, perhaps, Agatha alludes.”—GIFFORD.
# 227:
_old_] Old ed. “old _old_.”
# 228:
_thine_] Old ed. “nine.”
# 229:
_Gnotho_] Old ed. “Gnothoes.”
# 230:
_Gnotho_] Old ed. “Gnothoes.”
# 231:
_loath to depart_] “There was anciently both a tune and a dance of this name; to the former of which Gnotho alludes.”—GIFFORD.
# 232:
_bawd does_] Old ed. “bawds doe.”—Rings with deaths’ heads on them used to be worn by procuresses, probably from an affectation of piety: see my ed. of Webster’s _Works_, iii. 212. and note there.
# 233:
_And I’ll bury some money before I die_, &c.] “This, as every one knows, was an infallible method of causing the person who did it to walk after death.”—GIFFORD.
# 234:
_Though_, &c.] To this line in the old ed. “_Hip._” is prefixed.
# 235:
_’gainst_] Old ed. “against.”
# 236:
_prove_] Old ed. “proves.”
# 237:
_make_] Old ed. “makes.”
# 238:
_How sweetly_, &c.] In the old ed. this speech, as far as “senses,” is given to Hippolita, and the rest to Cleanthes.
# 239:
_the chiefest_] Old ed. “_the_ first and _chiefest_.”
# 240:
_can’t_] Old ed. “cannot.”
# 241:
_comfort_] “The old copy has _consort_, which induced Coxeter to give the speech to Hippolita. I have little doubt but that the mistake is in this word, which should be _comfort_, as it stands in the text: by this term the fond parent frequently addresses his children. In the mouth of Leonides, too, it forms a natural reply to the question of Cleanthes, who then turns to make the same demand of his wife.”—GIFFORD.
# 242:
_That only_, &c.] This and the next line are transposed in the old ed.
# 243:
_lightness_] Old ed. “lightning.”]
# 244:
_propension_] Old ed. “proportion.”
# 245:
_to afford_] Old ed. “t’afford.”
# 246:
_Has_] i. e. he has. See note, p. 72.
# 247:
_That cries most_, &c.] “Our old poets abound in allusions to this stratagem of the lapwing.”-GIFFORD.
# 248:
_make_] Old ed. “makes.”
# 249:
_me_] Old ed. “a _mee_.”
# 250:
_affliction_] Old ed. “affection.”
# 251:
_his_] Old ed. “this.”
# 252:
_comforts_] Old ed. “consorts:” see p. 84, and note.
# 253:
——_blood_; _The sorrows_, &c.]
Old ed.
——“_blood_, to _The sorrows that he feels, are our heads_.”
# 254:
_thee_] Old ed. “him.”
# 255:
_her_] Old ed. “their.”
# 256:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 257:
_Clean._] Old ed. “Hip.”
# 258:
_eleven_] Old ed. “leaven.”
# 259:
_fellow_] Old ed. “follow.”
# 260:
_sit_] Old ed. “set.”
# 261:
_an_] Old ed. “one.”
# 262:
_vild_] i. e. vile—a form of the word common in our early poetry.
# 263:
_Their fathers_] Old ed. “Her father.”
# 264:
_Widow_] Old ed. “Widdows.”
# 265:
_Sim._] So Gifford. The old ed. gives this to Eugenia.
# 266:
_Ere_] Old ed. “Ever.”
# 267:
_You_] Old ed. “We.”
# 268:
_ne’er touch’d by razor_] Old ed. “new _tucht by_ reason.” The emendation is M. Mason’s.
# 269:
_To call you judges doth not suit your years, Nor heads and beards shew more antiquity_;—] “Mr. M. Mason reads,
_To call you judges doth not suit your years, Nor heads; and brains shew more antiquity._
It is evident that he did not comprehend the sense, which, though ill conceived and harshly expressed, is,—You have not the years of judges, nor do your heads and _beards_ (old copy, _brains_) shew more of age.”—GIFFORD.
# 270:
_beauty serves_] Old ed. “beautifeaus.”
# 271:
_bold_] Old ed. “of old.”
# 272:
—— _turn the soul_] “So the old copy: Coxeter and Mr. M. Mason read, _turn the_ scale, which has neither the spirit nor the sense of the original.”—GIFFORD.
# 273:
_yourselves_] Old ed. “yourselfe.”
# 274:
_forward for thee without fee_] So Gifford. Old ed. has “_forward fee thee_,” and gives “_without fee_” as a stage-direction, in the margin.
# 275:
_Times of amazement_! _what duty, goodness dwell_—] “Mr. M. Mason takes this for a complete sentence, and would read, _Where do you goodness dwell?_ In any case the alteration would be too violent; but none is needed here. Hippolita sees the woman who betrayed her approaching, breaks off her intended speech with an indignant observation, and hastily retires from the court.”—GIFFORD.
# 276:
_My stomach_ strives _to dinner_.] “This is sense, and therefore I have not tampered with it: the author probably wrote, _My stomach_ strikes _to dinner_.”—_Id._
# 277:
_Dutch venny_] Compare p. 66, 67. Gifford gives “_Dutch_ what-you-call;” and perhaps rightly, as the names of the other two “wet vennies” follow.
# 278:
_pepper’d_] Old ed. “prepard.”
# 279:
_A Flourish_, &c.] Old ed.
“Florish. _Duk._ A flemish. _Enter the Duke._”
# 280:
FIRST] Old ed. “2.”
# 281: EVAN. _Nay, back t’ your seats_] “The old copy reads, _Nay_, bathe _your seats_; out of which Mr. M. Mason formed _keep_; Davis, _take_; and every one may make what he can. I believe the young men were pressing forward to receive the duke, and that his exclamation was, as above, _Nay_, back t’ _your seats_.”—GIFFORD. This line is given in the old ed. to “_2 Court_.”
# 282: SECOND COURT. _May’t please_, &c.] Old ed.
“_Duk._ May’t please your highness. _Sim._ ’Tis old Lisander.”
# 283:
_else_] So Gifford. Old ed. “as are.”
# 284: EUG. _Your place above_] Old ed.
“_Hip._ Your place above—Duke—away to death with him. _Cleanthes_ Guard.”
I have followed Gifford in this scene.
# 285:
_car’d_] Old ed. “guard.” What is now given to Lysander forms part of Simonides’s speech in old ed.
# 286: EVAN. _Away_, &c.] See note 284 in this page.
# 287:
_offender_] Old ed. “offenders.”
# 288:
_order_] Old ed. “orders.”
# 289:
_swoon_] Old ed. “stand.”
# 290:
[_spreading_] _palm_] “I have inserted _spreading_, not merely on account of its completing the verse, but because it contrasts well with _contracted_. Whatever the author’s word was, it was shuffled out of its place at the press, and appears as a misprint (_showdu_) in the succeeding line.”—GIFFORD.
# 291:
_of_] Old ed. “to.”
# 292:
_our_] Old ed. “one.”
# 293:
_And much less mean to entreat it_] “For _mean_ the old copy has _shown_, which is pure nonsense: it stands, however, in all the editions. I have, I believe, recovered the genuine text by adopting _mean_, which was superfluously inserted in the line immediately below it.”—GIFFORD.
# 294:
_humour_] Old ed. “honour.”
# 295:
_My lords, it shall_] “i. e. it shall _be briefly questioned_. This would not have deserved a note, had not Mr. M. Mason mistaken the meaning, and corrupted the text to, _My lords_, I _shall_.”—_Id._
# 296:
_you_] Old ed. “them.”
# 297:
_godlike_] Old ed. “_goe like_.”
# 298:
_We’ve_] Old ed. “We have.”
# 299:
_we’re_] Old ed. “wee are.”
# 300:
_It is_] Old ed. “’Tis.”
# 301:
_a_] Old ed. “him.”
# 302:
_bad_] Old ed. “a _bad_.”
# 303:
_you’re_] Old ed. “yeare.”
# 304:
_’gainst_] Old ed. “against.”
# 305:
_judge, I desire, then_] Old ed. “_judge then, I desire_.”
# 306:
_This were_, &c.] “i. e. O, that this were, &c. But, indeed, this speech is so strangely printed in the quarto, that it is almost impossible to guess what the writer really meant. The first three lines stand thus:
CLEAN. _This were the judgment seat, we now The heaviest crimes that ever made up Unnaturalness in humanity._
Whether the genuine, or, indeed, any sense be elicited by the additions which I have been compelled to make, is not mine to say; but certainly some allowance will be made for any temperate endeavour to regulate a text where the words, in too many instances, appear as if they had been shook out of the printer’s boxes by the hand of chance.”—GIFFORD.
# 307:
_like_] Old ed. “lyar.”
# 308:
_they’re_] Old ed. “y’are.”
# 309:
_Here_] Old ed. “Where.”
# 310:
_come you_] Old ed. “_you come_.”
# 311:
_you are_] Old ed. “y’are.”
# 312:
_he’s_] Old ed. “he is.”
# 313: SIM.] Old ed. “_Clean._”
# 314:
_pox_] Old ed. “a _pox_.”
# 315: CLEAN.] Old ed. “_Sim._”
# 316: SIM.] Old ed. “_Clean._”
# 317:
_vild_] See note, p. 94.
# 318:
_may challenge them_] Old ed. “my _challenge_ then.”
# 319: CREON.] Old ed. “_Cle._”
# 320: CREON.] Old ed. “_Cle._”
# 321:
_place_] Old ed. “places.”
# 322:
_mature_] Old ed. “nature.”
# 323: CLEAN.] What is now assigned to Cleanthes is given to First Courtier in the old ed.
# 324:
_shall_] Old ed. “whom it _shall_.”
# 325:
[_shall appear before us_] “Whether the words which I have inserted convey the author’s meaning, or not, may be doubted; but they make some sense of the passage, and this is all to which they pretend.”—GIFFORD.
# 326:
_band_] So Gifford. Old ed. “baud.”—Qy. did the author write “_The old_ bald sires _again_?”
# 327:
_May_] Old ed. “My.”
# 328:
_crowd on_] i. e. fiddle on. A fiddle is still called a _crowd_ in many parts of England.
# 329:
_hat is_] Old ed. “hats.”
# 330:
_as he is my sovereign, I do give him two crowns for it_, &c.] “Here is some poor pun. A sovereign was a gold coin worth _ten_ shillings; or, is the wit in some fancied similarity of sound between _duke_ and _ducat_ (a piece of the same value as the other)?”—GIFFORD.
# 331:
_you will_] Old ed. “you’l.”
# 332:
_goes_] Old ed. “_goes_ out.”
# 333:
_the_] Old ed. “a.”
# 334:
_Crowd on_] See note, p. 110.
# 335:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 336:
_Gnotho_] Old ed. “Gnothoes.”
# 337:
_at_] Old ed. “to.”
# 338:
_Gnotho_] Old ed. “Gnothoes.”
# 339:
_that_] Old ed. “where _that_.”
# 340:
_trumpet_] Old ed. “trumpets.”
# 341:
_hop’d it had_] Old ed. “hope t’ _had_.”
# 342:
_Gnotho_] Old ed. “Gnothoes.”
# 343:
_This passion has given some satisfaction yet_] “i.e. this pathetic exclamation: it is parodied in part from _the Spanish Tragedy_, and is, without all question, by far the stupidest attempt at wit to which that persecuted play ever gave rise. That it afforded _some satisfaction_ to Lysander, ought, in courtesy, to be attributed to his having more good nature than taste.”—GIFFORD.
# 344:
_All hopes_, &c.] Gifford has given the four first lines of this speech as verse, and I follow him. The rhymes seem to have been lost in the wretched corruption of the text.
# 345:
_my_] Old ed. “our.”
# 346:
_but_] Old ed. “fashion, _but_.”
# 347:
_were_] Old ed. “have.”
# 348:
_return_] Old ed. “retaine.”
# 349:
_bind_] Old ed. “bound.”
# 350:
_regent_] Old ed. “regents.”
# 351:
_grow_] Old ed. “grew.”
# 352:
_joy_] Old ed. “joyed.”
# 353:
_Gentlemen, &c._] The publisher’s address to the readers.
# 354:
An allusion to the suppression of the theatres by the Puritans.
# 355:
“Huntingdon, the place where Oliver Cromwell was born, and resided many years of his life. Some allusion here seems to be lost.”—REED.
# 356:
_Raynulph_] “Raynulph Higden was the compiler of the Polychronicon, as far as the year 1357, thirty-first of Edward III. It was translated into English by Trevisa, and completed and printed by Caxton in folio, 1482.”—REED.
# 357:
_agen_] The old spelling of _again_, and necessary here for the sake of the rhyme: compare p. 416.
# 358:
_apaid_] i. e. satisfied, contented.
# 359:
_Before a Monastery_] The place of action is not noted in the old ed., and Middleton seems to have troubled himself little about the matter. After some hesitation, I have marked the present scene “_Before a Monastery_,” on account of what Constantius says at p. 131:
“in mind I will be always _here_; _here_ let me stay.”
That the scene cannot be _within_ the monastery, is shewn by the entrance of the two Graziers.
# 360:
_They’re_] Old ed. “They are.”
# 361:
_I’m_] Old ed. “I am.”
# 362:
_We’re_] Old ed. “we are.”
# 363:
_Who’s_] Old ed. “Who is.”
# 364:
_general peace_] Compare p. 127, l. 12.
# 365:
_acts_] Old ed. “actions:” so afterwards in Act iii. Sc. i. the old ed. has “If I ensnare her in an _action_ of lust.”
# 366:
_requite_] Old ed. “require.”
# 367:
_preas’d_] i. e. pressed. Old ed. “prais’d.” _Prease_ for _press_ is very common in our early poets.
# 368:
_I’ve_] Old ed. “I have.”
# 369:
_e’er_] Old ed. “ever.”
# 370:
_’t_] Old ed. “it.”
# 371:
_remorse_] i. e. pity.
# 372:
_I’m_] Old ed. “I am.”
# 373:
_thy_] Old ed. “the.”
# 374:
_we’d_] Old ed. “wee’ld.”
# 375:
_recover’t_] Old ed. “recovered.”
# 376:
_like_] i. e. please.
# 377:
_you’ve_] Old ed. “You have.”
# 378:
_enter_] Old ed. “enters.”
# 379:
_passion_] i. e. sorrow.
# 380:
_you’re_] Old ed. “you are.”
# 381:
_rushes_] “With which anciently rooms used to be strewed.”—REED.
# 382:
_Byrlady_] i. e. By our lady.
# 383:
_seems by my flesh_] An allusion to a very gross saying, which will be found in Ray’s _Proverbs_, p. 179, ed. 1737.
# 384:
_We’re_] Old ed. “We are.”
# 385:
_nice_] i. e. scrupulous.
# 386:
_I’ve_] Old ed. “I have.”
# 387:
_like_] i. e. please.
# 388:
_You’ve_] Old ed. “You have.”
# 389:
_there is_] Old ed. “there’s.”
# 390:
_That is ... of’t_] Old ed. “that’s ... of it.”
# 391:
_o’er ... ne’er_] Old ed. “over ... never.”
# 392: CAST.] Old ed. “_Const._”
# 393:
_lamp_] Old ed. “lump.”
# 394:
_I’m_] Old ed. “I am.”
# 395:
_I’m_] Old ed. “I am.”
# 396:
_they’d_] Old ed. “they’ld.”
# 397:
_they’re_] Old ed. “they are.”
# 398:
_I’ve_] Old ed. “I have.”
# 399:
_are_] Old ed. “is.”
# 400:
_We’ve_] Old ed. “we have.”
# 401:
_You will_] Old ed. “Will you.”
# 402:
_I’ve_] Old ed. “I have.”
# 403:
_You’d_] Old ed. “Youl’d.”
# 404:
_I’m_] Old ed. “I am.”
# 405:
_of’t_] Old ed. “of it.”
# 406:
_I’m strong_] Old ed. “I am stronger.”
# 407:
_And warranted worth lightens your fair aspècts_] “Alluding to the story of Pope Gregory’s admiring the beauty of the English youths at Rome. Beda, Hist. c. i.”—REED. I believe the author has no such allusion.
# 408:
_Stay_[_s_] Qy. “_stains_;” i. e. brings into disgrace, exceeds?—a common use of the word in our early writers.
# 409:
_They’ve_] Old ed. “they have.”
# 410:
_fame_] Old ed. “same.”
# 411:
_condition_] i. e. disposition, or (as he has just said) humour.
# 412:
_Why_, &c.] Qy. “Why, _will’t_ not keep a hog?”
# 413:
_fruitful ... uberous_] Synonymes.
# 414:
_take you_] Old ed. “you take.”
# 415:
_’bout_] Old ed. “about.”
# 416:
no proof in love to indiscretion] i. e. I suppose,—no trial compared to that which is occasioned by the indiscretion of the object beloved.
# 417:
_imposterous_] i. e. deceitful, cheating. The word occurs in several of our early writers. Dodsley and his editors chose to give the line thus:
“For when th’art known to be a whore, _impostress_.”
# 418:
_I’m_] Old ed. “I am.”
# 419:
_I’ve_] Old ed. “I have.”
# 420:
_I’ve_] Old ed. “I have.”
# 421:
_conceit_] i. e. conception, idea.
# 422:
_love’s_] Old ed. “love is.”
# 423:
_he’s_] Old ed. “he is.”
# 424:
_’Gainst_] Old ed. “Against.”
# 425:
_cast_] i. e. contrived.
# 426:
_The true man_] i. e. the honest man—an expression used in opposition to a thief.
# 427:
_let_] i. e. hinderance.
# 428:
_and_] Old ed. “_and_ thy.”
# 429:
_you’d_] Old ed. “youl’d.”
# 430:
_with’t_] Old ed. “with it.”
# 431:
_practice_] i. e. artifice, insidious design.
# 432:
_act_] Old ed. “action.” See note, p. 129.
# 433: VORT.] This speech in the old ed. is given to Horsus.
# 434:
_ne’er_] Old ed. “never.”
# 435:
_I’ve ... on’t_] Old ed. “I have ... on it.”
# 436:
_practice_] See note, p. 160.
# 437:
_garden-house_] When this play was written, gardens with summer-houses in them were very common in the suburbs of London. These buildings were often used as places of intrigue.
# 438:
_conceit_] i. e. conceive.
# 439:
_bestow’t_] Old ed. “bestow it.”
# 440:
_against the hair_] i. e. against the grain, contrary to nature.
# 441:
_night-rails_] i. e. night-gowns.
# 442:
_rack_] A friend would read “crack”—unnecessarily, I think.
# 443:
_that’s_] Old ed. “that is.”
# 444:
_cruelly_] Old ed. “cruelty.”
# 445:
_I’ve_] Old ed. “I have.”
# 446:
_pluck’t_] Old ed. “_pluck_ it.”
# 447:
_where_] i. e. whereas.
# 448:
_by’t_] Old ed. “by it.”
# 449:
_conceit_] i. e. fancy.
# 450:
_A Chamber in a Castle_ Not in the castle, of which Hengist immediately proceeds to speak. As the Barber presently says of Simon and Oliver, “here they come both in a pelting chafe from the town-house,” the scene must be at or near Queenborough.
# 451:
_ne’er_] Old ed. “never.”
# 452:
_’gainst_] Old ed. “against.”
# 453:
_ascends first_] Old ed. “_first ascends_.”
# 454:
_Here’s no sweet coil._] “It is observed by Dr. Warburton (see note to 1st part _Henry_ 4th, A. 5, S. 3.), that in Shakespeare’s time the negative in common speech was used to design, ironically, the excess of a thing; and this assertion is fully confirmed by the several examples produced by Mr. Steevens in proof of it.” REED.
# 455:
_I’m_] Old ed. “I am.”
# 456:
_I’m_] Old ed. “I am.”
# 457:
_Sir-reverence_] A corruption of _save-reverence_, _salvâ reverentiâ_. See Nares in v.
# 458:
_towards_] i. e. at hand, forthcoming.
# 459:
_scorn’d the motion_] Here S. P., an annotator in Dodsley’s _Old Plays_, wishes unnecessarily to read “mention.” Middleton has the same expression elsewhere; and so in Beaumont and Fletcher’s _Cupid’s Revenge_, act iv. sc. 3.
“_3 Cit._ You had best Go peach; do, peach! _2 Cit._ Peach? _I scorn the motion._”
# 460:
_callymoocher_] A term of reproach, which I cannot explain.
# 461:
_ale-conner_] “Or ale-taster, an officer appointed in every court leet to look to the assize and goodness of bread, ale, and beer.” Kersey’s _Dict._—See also Robinson’s _Hist. of Tottenh._ p. 241, quoted by Nares in v.
# 462:
_spiny baldrib_] i. e. a thin slender fellow, with little flesh on his ribs.
# 463:
_cittern_] “A lute or _cittern_ formerly used to be part of the furniture of a barber’s shop, and, as Sir John Hawkins, in his notes on Walton’s _Complete Angler_, p. 236, observes, answered the end of a newspaper, the now common amusement of waiting customers. In an old book of enigmas, to every one of which the author has prefixed a wooden cut of the subject of the enigma, is a barber, and the cut represents a barber’s shop, in which there is one person sitting in a chair under the barber’s hands, while another, who is waiting for his turn, is playing on the lute; and on the side of the shop hangs another instrument of the lute or _cittern_ kind.”—REED.
# 464:
_throughly_] Modernised unnecessarily by Dodsley into _thoroughly_.
# 465:
_sack-buts_] A play on the meaning of the word—_musical instruments_, and _buts of sack_.
# 466:
_Exeunt_, &c.] Old ed. “_Exit cum suis._”
# 467:
_hear_] Old ed. “_hear_ her.”
# 468:
_They’ve_] Old ed. “They have.”
# 469:
_taken_] Old ed. “ta’ne.”
# 470:
_passion_] i. e. sorrow.
# 471:
_conceitedly_] i. e. fancifully, ingeniously.
# 472:
_minded_] i. e. intended.
# 473:
_Thong-Castle_] “See Lambarde’s Perambulation of Kent, 1596, p. 195. Jeffrey of Monmouth’s British History, B. 6. C. 11.”—REED.
# 474:
_Lo, I_, &c.] In _Wit Restored_, 1658 (_Facetiæ_, &c. vol. i. p. 268. ed. 1817), this speech of Simon is printed, with a few very slight variations, under the title of _A Prologue to the Mayor of Quinborough_.
# 475:
_cannot_] _Wit Rest._ “scorne to;” but compare p. 175, l. 24.
# 476:
_riots_] Old ed. “roots.”
# 477:
_here’s_] Old ed. “there’s.”
# 478:
_I’ve_] Old ed. “I have.”
# 479:
_of’t_] Old ed. “of it.”
# 480:
_byrlady_] See note, p. 135.
# 481:
_give_] Old ed. “gives.”
# 482:
_carp_] Mr. J. P. Collier proposes to read “cup.”
# 483:
_I’m_] Old ed. “I am.”
# 484:
_we’ve_] Old ed. “we have.”
# 485:
_I’ve_] Old ed. “I have.”
# 486:
_I’m_] Old ed. “I am.”
# 487:
_I’m_] Old ed. “I am.”
# 488:
_mother_] i. e. hysterical passion.
# 489:
_I’ve_] Old ed. “I have.”
# 490:
_ne’er_] Old ed. “never.”
# 491:
_niceness_] i. e. scrupulousness.
# 492:
_I’ve_] Old ed. “I have.”
# 493:
_Able to_, &c.] Old ed.
“_Able to_ make _all of our name_ inhumid,”—
and so the line stands in all the eds. of Dodsley’s _Old Plays_.
# 494:
_e’er_] Old ed. “ever.” The line seems corrupted. Qu. “_In this wild tempest_,” &c.?
# 495:
_raught_] i. e. snatched away, ravished.
# 496:
_no_] See note 454, p. 169.
# 497:
_dear_] See notes, vol. iii. p. 307, vol. iv. p. 486: here, perhaps, it is equivalent to—excessive.
# 498:
_to seek in honesty_] i. e. at a loss for, deficient in honesty.
# 499:
_I’d_] Old ed. “I had.”
# 500:
_Though’t_] Old ed. “_Though_ it.”
# 501:
_I’ve_] Old ed. “I have.”
# 502:
_I’m_] Old ed. “I am.”
# 503:
_hight_] i. e. called.
# 504:
_decreen_] i. e. decree. An old form, for the sake of the rhyme.
# 505:
_Is’t_] Old ed. “Is it.”
# 506:
_Nemp your sexes_ “‘The appointment being agreed to on both sides, Hengist, with a new design of villany in his head, ordered his soldiers to carry, every one of them, a long dagger under their garments; and while the conference should be held with the Britons, who would have no suspicion of them, he would give them this word of command, _Nemet oure Saxas_; at which moment they were all to be ready to seize boldly every one his next man, and with his drawn dagger stab him. Accordingly, at the time and place appointed, they all met, and began to treat of peace; and when a fit opportunity for executing his villany served, Hengist cried out, _Nemet oure Saxas_; and the same instant seized Vortegirn, and held him by his cloak.’ Jeffrey of Monmouth’s British History, translated by Aaron Thompson, 1718, 8vo, p. 194.”—REED. _Nemp your sexes_, i. e. Nymeð eouer seaxes,—take your daggers, or short swords.
# 507:
_Lie_] Old ed. “Lies.”
# 508:
_I’ve_] Old ed. “I have.”
# 509:
_I’ve_] Old ed. “I have.”
# 510:
_by’t_] Old ed. “by it.”
# 511:
_Methinks_, &c.] “Shakespeare seems to have imitated this in the Tempest, A. 3. S. 3.
‘Oh, it is monstrous! monstrous! Methought, the billows spoke, and told me of it; The winds did sing it to me; and the thunder, That deep and dreadful organ-pipe, pronounc’d The name of Prosper.’”—REED.
The date of _The Tempest_ must be settled before we can determine whether Shakespeare or Middleton was the imitator.
# 512:
_of’t_] Old ed. “of it.”
# 513:
_Where_] i. e. whereas. Altered by Dodsley and his editors to “When.”
# 514:
_Kirsendom_] A corruption of _Christendom_.
# 515:
_you’re_] Old ed. “you are.”
# 516:
_that’s_—_Kent’s_] Old ed. “_that_ is”—“_Kent_ is.”
# 517:
_Players_] They have, it appears, only “taken the name of country comedians to abuse simple people;” but I follow the old copy in terming them “Players,” to prevent the confusion which would afterwards arise from adopting any other appellation.
# 518:
_The Whirligig_] Not, I apprehend, the comedy called _Cupid’s Whirligig, by E. S._, 1607.
# 519:
_The Wild-goose Chase_] i. e., perhaps, Fletcher’s comedy so called, see p. 122.
# 520:
_Woodcock of our side_] Taylor, the water-poet, in the preface to _Sir Gregory Nonsense_, mentions a book so called; but perhaps he merely invented the title.—This expression was proverbial, and frequently occurs in our early writers: _woodcock_ was a cant term for a simpleton.
# 521:
_O, the clowns_, &c.] Nash tells us that, “amongst other cholericke wise Justices he was one that, hauing a play presented before him and his Township, by Tarlton and the rest of his fellows, her Maiesties seruants, as they were now entring into their first merriment (as they call it), the people began exceedingly to laugh, when Tarlton first peept out his head.”—_Pierce Pennilesse_, sig. D. 2, ed. 1595. And in the Præludium to Goff’s _Careless Shepherdes_, 1656, Thrift says—
“I never saw Rheade peeping through the Curtain, But ravishing joy enter’d into my heart.” p. 5.
# 522:
_Twopence_] Old ed. “2d.” Dodsley and his editors, “second!!”
# 523:
_to_] i. e. comparable to.
# 524:
_on’t; that’s the thing_] Old ed. “_on_ it, _that’s the thing_ indeed.”
# 525:
_Alas_] Old ed. “Las.”
# 526:
_I’m_] Old ed. “I am.”
# 527:
_by Amsterdam_] “The toleration allowed to all religious sects in the United Provinces, on their throwing off the Spanish yoke, occasioned numbers of dissenters from the established religion of their country, to take refuge in different parts of the states of Holland. The chief place appears to have been Amsterdam, which is mentioned as such in several contemporary dramatic writers. See Ben Jonson’s Alchymist, and The Fair Maid of the Inn, by Beaumont and Fletcher.”—REED.
# 528:
_The play begins_] Dodsley and his editors print these words as a stage-direction, though they are not given as such in the old copy. They are evidently the exclamation of Simon on hearing the trumpet.
# 529:
_I’ll stop_, &c.] Old ed. “_I’le hide my ears and stop my eyes._”
# 530:
_golls_] A cant term for hands,—fists, paws.
# 531:
_swound_] i. e. swoon.
# 532:
_aqua-vitæ_] A common name for spirits.
# 533:
_First_] Old ed. “2.”
# 534:
_towards_] i. e. at hand.
# 535:
_cut_] i. e. slashed (see note, vol. i. p. 28), with a play on the word: “_Cutted_, scolding, brawling, quarrelling.” Kersey’s _Dict._
# 536:
_in Kent, or Kirsendom_] I ought to have noticed an earlier allusion (at p. 200) to the proverbial saying, “Neither in Kent nor Christendom,” which has been variously explained; see Ray’s _Proverbs_, p. 245, ed. 1768.
# 537:
_at an exercise_] “Alluding to the week-day sermons used by the puritans, which they called _Exercises_. S. P.”—_Note in Dodsley’s Old Plays._
# 538:
_Here’s no abuse_, &c.] See note 454, p. 169.
# 539:
_fox’d_] i. e. drunk.
# 540:
_sight’s_] Old ed. “sight is.”
# 541:
_till’t_] Old ed. “till it.”
# 542:
_of’t_] Old ed. “of it.”
# 543:
_Resolv’d_] i. e. convinced, informed.
# 544:
_waking_] Old ed. “making.”
# 545:
_where_] i. e. whereas.
# 546:
_practice_] See note, p. 160.
# 547:
_of’t_] Old ed. “of it.”
# 548:
_the prince_] Words which, perhaps, should be thrown out.
# 549:
_I will_] Old ed. “I’le.”
# 550:
_prevented_] i. e. anticipated.
# 551:
_And_] i. e. If.
# 552:
_golls_] See note, p. 206.
# 553:
_Ninevitical motion_] _Motion_ is a puppet-show; and that of _Nineveh_, often mentioned by our old writers, appears to have been very popular. “They say, there’s a new _motion of the city of Nineveh_, with Jonas and the whale, to be seen at Fleet-bridge.”—B. JONSON’s _Every Man out of his Humour_, act ii. sc. 1.
# 554:
_Tamburlain_] A personage whom Marlowe’s tragedy of that name had rendered familiar to the audience.
# 555:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 556:
_sprig of rosemary at his burial, than of a gilded bride-branch at mine own wedding_] Rosemary, as being an emblem of remembrance, was used both at funerals and weddings. Compare _The Pleasant History of John Winchcomb, in his younger yeares called Jacke of Newberie_: “Then was there a faire bride cup of silver and gilt carried before her [the bride], wherein was a goodly _braunch of rosemarie gilded very faire_, hung about with silken ribonds of all colours: next was there a noyse of musitians that played all the way before her: after her came all the chiefest maydens of the countrie, some bearing great bride cakes, and some _garlands of wheate finely gilded_, and so she past unto the church.”—Sig. D 3, ed. 1633.
# 557:
_this in his burgonet_] i. e. this glove in his helmet or hat. See stage-direction at the beginning of this scene.
# 558:
_fled_] Old ed. “flee.”
# 559:
_curb_] A friend would read “curse.”
# 560:
_measure_] i. e. a grave, stately dance, with slow and measured steps.
# 561:
_likes_] i. e. pleases.
# 562:
_Lady, bid him_, &c.] Imitated from Shakespeare:
“Let wantons, light of heart, Tickle the senseless rushes with their heels.” _Romeo and Juliet_, act. i. sc. 4.
It is hardly necessary to remark, that before carpets were used, the floors were strewed with rushes.
# 563:
_I’ve_] Old ed. “I have.”
# 564:
_likes_] i. e. pleases.
# 565:
_Willow, willow, willow_] The burden of the song which Shakespeare has rendered immortal: see _Othello_, act iv. sc. 3.
# 566:
_besides_] i. e. by.
# 567:
_laced mutton_] A prostitute—a cant term very common in our early dramatists.
# 568:
_Cornelius’ dry-fats_, &c.] The sweating-tub of Cornelius, formerly used for the cure of the venereal disease, is often mentioned by our early dramatists: but, in the present passage, I suspect there is an allusion which had better be left unexplained.
# 569:
_chitty_] i. e., perhaps, the Italian _città_: but Lazarillo afterwards affectedly uses “_chick_” and “_chickness_” for _sick_ and _sickness_.
# 570:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 571:
_chitty_] See note, p. 236.
# 572:
_Brown-bill_] A sort of pike with a hooked point, anciently carried by the English foot-soldiers, and afterwards by watchmen.
# 573:
_curtal_] i. e. dog, or horse: here, I suppose, it has the former signification.
# 574:
_find_] i. e. furnish.
# 575:
_my full charge_] The constable of the night used regularly to give a charge to the watchmen: see Shakespeare’s _Much ado about Nothing_, act iii. sc. 3.
# 576:
_Mirror of Magistrates_] An allusion to the once- popular poetical work so entitled.
# 577:
_chitty_] See note, p. 236.
# 578:
_bill-men_] See note, p. 237.
# 579:
_camooch_] In B. Jonson’s _Every Man out of his Humour_, act v. sc. 3, the word _camouccio_ occurs, as a term of vituperation; which, says Gifford, “is perhaps a corruption of _camoscio, a goat or goat’s skin_, and may mean _clown_ or _flat-nose_, or any other apposite term which pleases the reader.” So, too, in Dekker and Webster’s _Sir T. Wyatt_, 1607, (Webster’s _Works_, vol. ii. p. 298), “A Spaniard is a _camocho_, or calamanco,” &c.; and Sir T. Brown observes (_Vulgar Errors_, p. 351, ed. 1669), “Many _Spaniards_ ... which are of the race of Barbary Moors ... have not worn out the _camoys nose_ unto this day.”
# 580:
_unpent-house the roof of my carcass_] i. e., in the language of ordinary mortals,—take off my hat.
# 581:
_chitty_] See note, p. 236.
# 582:
_besonian_] Ital. _besogno_ or _besognoso_—often used as a term of reproach by our early writers,—beggar, scoundrel.
# 583:
_bonds and bills_] A play on words: see note, p. 237.
# 584:
_adelantado_] i. e. the king’s lieutenant of a country, or deputy in any important place of charge. “Don Diego de fisty Cankcemuscod, who was admirall or high _adellantado_ of the whole fleete.”—Taylor the water-poet’s _Navy of Land Ships_, p. 79: _Works_, ed. 1630.
# 585:
_pitch and pay_] i. e. pay down your money at once.
# 586:
_Thamer Cham_] i. e. Timur Khaun.
# 587:
_dried one_] i. e. a dried pilcher, or pilchard.
# 588:
_rivo_] A Bacchanalian interjection, frequently found in our old drama: its etymology has not been discovered.
# 589:
_shift_] viz. trenchers, platters.
# 590:
_Song_] Old ed. “_Sing. Musicke._”
# 591:
_poor-john_] A sort of fish (hake, it is said,) dried and salted.
# 592:
_A Street_] Though the servingmen of Camillo (see p. 247) make their appearance immediately on being called for, this scene, whether I have marked it rightly or not, is evidently intended to lie in the neighbourhood of the house where Violetta dwelt.
# 593:
_Spanish needle_] The best needles were imported from Spain: see Gifford’s note on B. Jonson, _Works_, vol. v. p. 12.
# 594:
_quail-pipe boot_] The following lines from Chaucer’s _Rom. of the Rose_ (v. 7212), though relating to a much earlier period, may be quoted here:
“And high shewis knoppid with dagges, That _frouncin_ [_i. e._ wrinkle] _like a quale-pipe_, Or botis riveling as a gipe.”
# 595:
_points_] i. e. the tagged laces which fastened the _hose_ or breeches to the doublet.
# 596:
_not entered into any band_] A play on words: _band_ and _bond_ were formerly used indiscriminately.
# 597:
_slop_] i. e. breeches.
# 598:
_other-gates_] i. e. other-ways—other-kind.
# 599:
_tasting of the cog_] Another pun—_keg_ and _cog_. To _cog_ is to lie or wheedle.
# 600:
_bawdy_] Another—_body_.
# 601:
_Via_] An exclamation of defiance (from the Italian), frequent in our old dramas.
# 602:
_and if I wist_] i. e. if I supposed.
# 603:
_by the cross of this Dandyprat_] “King Henry the seuenth,” says Camden, “stamped a small coyne called _Dandyprats_.”—_Remaines_, p. 173, ed. 1629. Many coins were marked with a cross on one side.
# 604:
_Gentlemen, to the dresser!_] When dinner was ready, the cook used to knock on the dresser with his knife, as a signal for the servants to carry it into the hall. But the words put into the mouth of the facetious Doyt appear to have been those usually employed by the usher to the attendants on such occasions. In the notes to the _Northumberland Household Book_, p. 423, are extracts from “Lord Fairfax’s Orders for the servants of his household [after the civil wars],” where, among “The Usher’s Words of Directions,” we find,—“Then he must warn to the Dresser, ‘_Gentlemen_ and Yeomen, _to the Dresser_.’” Gifford (Massinger’s _Works_, vol. i. p. 166) has cited from a note of Reed on Dodsley’s _Old Plays_ this passage of Lord Fairfax’s “Orders,” &c., as if it contained the _warning_ of the _cook_; and Nares, in his _Glossary_ (voc. _Dresser_), has made the same mistake.
# 605:
_brown-bill_] See note, p. 237.
# 606:
_broken pate—broker_] A play on the word _broker_, which meant pander.
# 607:
_vail_] i. e. lower.
# 608:
_broking_] i. e. pandering.
# 609:
_dag_] i. e. pistol.
# 610:
_Mephostophilis_] The fiend-attendant in Marlowe’s well-known tragedy of _Faustus_.
# 611:
_crackship_] i. e. boyship—little mastership.
# 612:
_current_] An allusion to the coin called a dandyprat: see note, p. 246.
# 613:
_angel_] i. e. a gold coin, in value about ten shillings.
# 614:
_ventoy_] i. e. fan.
# 615:
_incony_] i. e. fine, delicate, pretty.
# 616:
_Fa, la_, &c.] Here (as appears from what follows) Imperia moves about, or dances, to the music.
# 617:
_ingle_] i. e. wheedle, coax.
# 618:
_&c._] Is sometimes found in passages of our early dramatists, and seems to mean that the players might make use of any suitable expressions which occurred to them.
# 619:
_Song_, &c.] Old ed. “_Reades. Song._”
# 620:
_Were neither_, &c.] Old ed.
“_Were neither lip, nor cheekes currall, nor cherry eyes._”
Some of the lines in this miserable effusion seem intended to be sung only, not read.
# 621:
_And_] i. e. if.
# 622:
_jack_] The figure which struck the bell on the outside of the old clocks was called a _jack_.
# 623:
_these_] Old ed. “this.”
# 624:
_incontinently_] i. e. immediately.
# 625:
_counterfeit_] i. e. portrait.
# 626:
_nail him up_, &c.] As counterfeit money is nailed up.
# 627:
_Wut_] i. e. Wilt.
# 628:
_Much!_] An ironical and contemptuous expression, of frequent occurrence in the old English drama, equivalent, generally, to _little_ or _none_.
# 629:
_good_] Old ed. “God.”
# 630:
_aslopen_] i. e. asleep—for the rhyme.
# 631:
_teston_] Or _tester_ (so called from the head, _teste_, stamped on it),—_i. e._ sixpence: it was originally of higher value.
# 632:
_I’m_] Old ed. “I am.”
# 633:
_my roba_] i. e. my wanton. _Buona-roba_ is an Italian phrase for a courtesan; “as we say, good stuffe,” &c. Florio in v.
# 634:
_marry, muff_] So Taylor the water-poet;
“Here’s a sweet deale of scimble scamble stuffe, To please my Lady Wagtayle, _marry muffe_.” _A Whore_, p. 111—_Workes_, ed. 1630.
# 635:
_I’m_] Old ed. “I am.”
# 636:
_I’m_] Old ed. “I am.”
# 637:
_stock_] i. e. stocking.
# 638:
_hose, pan’d, stuft with hair_] See note, p. 28.
# 639:
_Abram-colour’d_] So in _Soliman and Perseda_, 1599, sig. H 3:
“Where is the eldest sonne of Pryam? That _abraham-couloured_ Troion.”
In Shakespeare’s _Merry Wives of Windsor_, act i. sc. 4, Slender is described as having a “_Cain- coloured_ beard;” and in our author’s _Chaste Maid in Cheapside_, act iii. sc. 2, “_Judas_ with the red beard” is mentioned. Theobald, in a note on the passage of Shakespeare just quoted, thinks that such expressions were suggested by old tapestries and pictures. Steevens, _ibid._, is not certain but that “_Abraham_” may be a corruption of _auburn_; and in _Coriolanus_, act ii. sc. 3, where we now read with the fourth folio, “our heads are some brown, some black, some _auburn_,” the three earlier folios have “_Abram_.”
# 640:
_When Monsieur Motte lay here ambassador_] Though the scene of this play is in Venice, yet “_here_” means in England,—during some of the earlier years of Elizabeth’s reign.
# 641:
_against the hair_] See note, p. 163.
# 642:
_I’m_] Old ed. “I am.”
# 643:
_these_] Old ed. “this.”
# 644:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 645:
_stone_] Old ed. has “no see,” a misprint. I doubt if the word which I have substituted for it be the right one.
# 646:
_I’m_] Old ed. “I am.”
# 647:
_save Hippolito_] Because, probably, Imperia was to be his partner. The lavolta was a dance for two persons, described by Sir J. Davies, in his _Orchestra_, as “a lofty jumping or a leaping round.” See also Douce’s _Illust. of Shakspeare_, vol. i. p. 489.
# 648:
_zanies with torches_] _zanies_ seems here to mean nothing more than attendants. In act iii. sc. 1. of this drama, when Violetta is told that “Imperia the courtesan’s _zany_ hath brought you this letter,” she exclaims, “her _groom_ employ’d by Fontinelle!” and in Florio’s _New World of Words_, ed. 1611, is “_Zane_, the name of John in some parts of Lombardy, but commonly used for a silly John, a simple fellow, _a seruile drudge_ or foolish clowne in any commedy or enterlude play.”—For “_torches_” the old ed. has “coaches.” Torch-bearers were the constant attendants at masques.
# 649:
_suckets_] i. e. sweetmeats.
# 650:
_angels_] See note, p. 250.
# 651:
_bale_] i. e. pair.
# 652:
_I’m_] Old ed. “I am.”
# 653:
_a’ high lone_] So in Shakespeare’s _Romeo and Juliet_, act i. sc. 3, where we now read, “For then she could stand _alone_,” the 4to of 1597 has “stand _high lone_.” Compare too W. Rowley’s _A Shoomaker a Gentleman_, 1638; “The warres has lam’d many of my old customers, they cannot go _a hie lone_.” Sig. B 4.
# 654:
_leesing_] i. e. losing.
# 655:
LAZARILLO _enters_] His entrance is not marked in the old copy, and perhaps the poet intended that he should come in with the masquers.
# 656:
_give fire too suddenly to the Roaring Meg of my desires_] A metaphor drawn from the celebrated gun, which Churchyard thus mentions in his _Siege of Edenbrough Castell_;
“With thondryng noyes was shot of _roeryng Meg_, And throw the thickst she thompt orethawrt the waies,” &c. fol. 94—_Chippes_, ed. 1575.
# 657:
_Don Diego_] Old ed. “Don Dego,”—seems to have been ironically used for _Spaniard_, in consequence of a strange indecency committed by a personage of the name: see note on act iv. sc. 3, where Lazarillo declares that he is “kin to Don Diego.”
# 658:
_Sanguine-cheeked! dost think their faces have been at cutler’s?_] So Beaumont and Fletcher:
“_Piso._ ————————O’ my life, he looks Of a more rusty, swarth complexion Than an old armory doublet. _Lod._ I would send His _face to th’ cutler’s then, and have it sanguin’d_.” _Captain_, act ii. sc. 2.
“_Sanguine._ The bloud-stone wherewith cutlers do sanguine their hilts.”—COTGRAVE’S _Dict._
# 659:
_Exeunt_, &c.] The old ed. has no stage-direction here. The curtains, called _traverses_, sometimes used for scenes (see Malone’s _Hist. Acc. of the English Stage_, p. 88, ed. Boswell), were drawn, I suppose, after this speech of Hippolito.
# 660:
_with smoke_] There is something abrupt and awkward in the conclusion of this scene; and I am inclined to believe that part of it has been lost at the press.
# 661:
_these brims_] Old ed. “this brimmes.”—I suppose Hippolito means to say, do not wear your hat so much over your face.
# 662:
_Brest_] A play on words—_breast_.
# 663:
_bona-roba_] See note, p. 258.
# 664:
_Incestancy_] i. e. incest. I have not met with the word elsewhere.
# 665:
_fond_] i. e. silly.
# 666:
_laugh and lie down_] An allusion to the game at cards called _Laugh and lay down_.
# 667:
——————_the owl, whose voice Shrieks like the belman_] Here, perhaps, Middleton recollected _Macbeth_:
“It was the owl that shriek’d, the fatal belman, Which gives the stern’st good night.”—Act ii. sc. 2.
# 668:
_owes_] i. e. owns.
# 669:
_a’ life_] i. e. as my life, extremely.
# 670:
_zany_] See note, p. 261.
# 671:
_making himself ready_] i. e. dressing himself.
# 672:
_noddy_] A game on the cards often alluded to by our dramatists: how it was played is doubtful.
# 673:
_lie_] Old ed. “lyes.”
# 674:
_At ten a’ clock_] Did the author forget that Violetta, according to appointment, had, in the preceding scene, met Fontinelle _at midnight_?
# 675:
_Amen_] Old ed. “_Amen_, amen, amen.”
# 676:
_I’m_] Old ed. “I am.”
# 677:
_table-books_] i. e. memorandum-books.
# 678:
_these dried stockfishes, that ask so much tawing_] To _taw_ is, properly, to dress leather with allum:
“Yes, if they _taw_ him, as they do whit-leather, Upon an iron, or beat him soft like stockfish.” BEAUMONT _and_ FLETCHER’s _Captain_, act iii. sc. 3.
# 679:
LAZARILLO] Old ed. here (and here only), “Lazarino.”
# 680:
_skreet_] Query for _discreet_?
# 681:
_unclipt angels_] A play on words: see note, p. 250.
# 682:
_chitty-matron_] See note, p. 236.
# 683:
_chitty_] See note, p. 236.
# 684:
_capachity_] i. e. capacity: see note, p. 236.
# 685:
_the a-per-se_] i. e. the chiefest, most excellent: see Nares in _Gloss._, and Todd in Johnson’s _Dict._
# 686:
_ela_] The highest note in the scale of music.
# 687:
_virginals_] An instrument of the spinnet kind: the most correct description of it is in Nares’s _Gloss._
# 688:
_a garden_] As these words are given in italics, they are probably intended as a quotation from the _Economical Cornucopia_.
# 689:
_chitty_] See note, p. 236.
# 690:
_sops-in-wine_] i. e. pinks: see much concerning the name in Nares’s _Gloss._
# 691:
_in print_] i. e. in exact and perfect manner.
# 692:
_poking-sticks_] i. e. irons for setting the plaits of the ruff.
# 693:
_chick_] i. e. sick. See note, p. 236.
# 694:
_where_] i. e. whereas.
# 695:
_chickness_] i. e. sickness: see note, p. 236.
# 696:
_chittizens_] See note, p. 236.
# 697:
_gentlemen_] Old ed. “gentleman.”
# 698:
_lerry_] i. e. learning, lesson.
# 699:
_alablaster_] So the word was formerly written,—even as late as the time of Milton: see the first editions of _Comus_, v. 660, and _Par. Lost_, b. iv. 544.
# 700:
_nock_] i. e. notch—where the string is fastened.
# 701:
_guide’s_] Qy. “girl’s?”
# 702:
_aventure_] i. e. adventure.
# 703:
_wrack_] i. e. wreck.
# 704:
_goldfinch_] i. e. a piece of gold, or purse.
# 705:
_perilous_] i. e. dangerously shrewd: when the word is used in this sense by our early dramatists, it is generally written _parlous_, as at p. 286.
# 706:
_lantern and candle-light_] The old ed. gives these words in italics, with, perhaps, some allusion which I cannot explain. Of Dekker’s tract _O per se O, or a new Crier of Lantern and Candle-light_, no edition is known anterior to the production of the present drama.
# 707:
_O sconce, and O sconce!_] i. e. (I suppose) O my head, and O my lantern!
# 708:
_ban_] i. e. curse.
# 709:
_I’ve_] Old ed. “I have.”
# 710:
_I’m_] Old ed. “I am.”
# 711:
_I’m_] Old ed. here, and in next line (where “_courtier_” is a trisyllable), “I am.”
# 712:
_Marry muff_] See note, p. 258.
# 713:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 714:
_&c._] See note, p. 252.
# 715:
_go by, old Jeronimo_] A quotation from Kyd’s _Spanish Tragedy_, which was written probably about 1590. The words are spoken by Hieronimo to himself:
“_King._ Who is he that interrupts our business? _Hier._ Not I: Hieronimo, beware, go by, go by.”
Dodsley’s _Old Plays_, vol. iii. p. 163. new ed. Though this expression, and other lines of _The Spanish Tragedy_, are so often ridiculed by contemporary writers, the play possesses no ordinary merit. Coleridge (see his _Literary Remains_, vol. ii. p. 129) thought that some passages of it were written by Shakespeare. We know (from Henslowe’s MSS.) that Ben Jonson made “adycions” to it in 1601 and 1602.
# 716:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 717:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 718:
_mum_] Opposite this word the old ed. has a stage- direction “_Clap_”—which perhaps means that she is to _clap to_ the window.
# 719:
_knew_] Old ed. “know.”
# 720:
_parlous_] Old ed. “Paulons:” see note, p. 283.
# 721:
_I’m_] Old ed. “I am.”
# 722:
_pantaples_] or _pantables_—i. e. a kind of slippers.
# 723:
_up and down_] The old ed. adds, “_A song presently within_,”—a direction intended to warn the singers and musicians to be in readiness.
# 724:
_cry_] Old ed. here and in the next line, “cryes.”
# 725:
_curtal_] i. e. horse.
# 726:
_The Spanish pavin_] A grave and stately dance. Sir J. Hawkins says,—“Every _pavan_ had its _galliard_, a lighter kind of air made out of the former:” see Nares’s _Gloss._ in v.
# 727:
_Satan_] Old ed. “Satin,”—a play on the words _Satan_ and _satin_.
# 728:
_Ho_] The word here (as in our very earliest poets) is equivalent to “stop.”
# 729:
_cast_] i. e. vomit.
# 730:
_I’ve_] Old ed. “I have.”
# 731:
_gin_] i. e. snare.
# 732:
_I’m_] Old ed. “I am.”
# 733:
_perilous_] See note, p. 283.
# 734:
_Cast_] i. e. let me consider.
# 735:
_sconce_] i. e. lantern.
# 736:
_bill-men_] See note, p. 237.
# 737:
_My sconce takes this in snuff_] A poor conceit: to _take in snuff_ is, to be angry, to take offence. So Shakespeare:
“You’ll mar the light, by taking it in snuff.” _Love’s Labour’s Lost_, act v. sc. 2.
# 738:
_when?_] An elliptical expression of impatience, very frequent in our old dramatists.
# 739:
_&c._] See note, p. 252.
# 740:
_cony-catching_] i. e. cheating, deceiving: the _cony_, or rabbit, was reckoned a simple animal. The tricks of the _cony-catchers_, or sharpers, with whom London used to abound, were described by R. Greene in several pamphlets: see the full titles of them in my ed. of his _Dram. Works_, vol. i. p. cvi.
# 741:
_Woodcock, how dost thou, Woodcock?_] The old ed. gives these words to Blurt.
# 742:
_Woodcock, you are of our side_] A proverbial expression, which, I suppose, originated in some game: see note, p. 203.
# 743:
_And_] i. e. if.
# 744:
_my lean Pilcher_] i. e. his page, with an allusion to his name: see p. 243 and note.
# 745:
_I have a poor Spanish suit_, &c.] Lazarillo had escaped in his shirt: see p. 286.
# 746:
_And_] i. e. if.
# 747:
_slop_] i. e. breeches.
# 748:
_mandillion_] “Mandiglione, a iacket, a mandillion.” Florio’s _New World of Words_, ed. 1611.—Stubbes (_apud_ Strutt, _Dress and Habits_, vol. ii. p. 267.) says that it covered the whole body down to the thighs; and R. Holmes (_ibid._) describes it as a loose garment having holes to put the arms through.
# 749:
_bill-man_] See note, p. 237.
# 750:
_most thundering_, &c.] This repetition is perhaps an error of the old ed.
# 751:
_Don Diego_] Old ed. here and in the next speech, “_Don_ Dego.”
# 752:
_adelantado_] See note, p. 241.
# 753:
_Don Diego that was smelt out in Paul’s_] So in Heywood’s _Fair Maid of the West_, 1631:
——“now you _Don Diegoes_, _You that made Paules to stinke_.”—Part I. p. 51.
And in Dekker and Webster’s _Sir Thomas Wyatt_, 1607: “There came but one _Dondego_ into England, and _he made all Paul’s stink again_.” Vol. ii. p. 298 of Webster’s _Works_,—where (vol. iv. p. 293.) I have given an explanation of these passages, which I am unwilling to repeat here.
# 754:
_bill-men_] See note, p. 237.
# 755:
_bewrays_] i. e. betrays, discovers.—Lazarillo immediately plays on the word,—_beray_, to foul.
# 756:
_sheaths_] Qy. “sheathed.”
# 757:
_Via_] See note, p. 245.
# 758:
_Catso_] Old ed. “At so.” This word, of obscene meaning, is borrowed from the Italian. So in _The Malcontent_:
“_Pietro._ Vengeance and torture! _Mal._ _Catso!_ _Pietro._ O revenge!” See my ed. of Webster’s _Works_, vol. iv. p. 28.
# 759:
_Mapew_] Qy. the beginning of some French song—_Mais peu_?
# 760:
_She_] Qy. “Yea?”
# 761:
_rushes_] See note, p. 234.
# 762:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 763:
_pickst_] Qy. “prickst?”
# 764:
_owe_] i. e. own.
# 765:
_Did Phœbe here_, &c.] Old ed.
“_Phœbe here one night did lie._”
# 766:
_I’m_] Old ed. “I am.”
# 767:
_put up_] i. e. sheathe your sword.
# 768:
_rushes_] See note, p. 234.
# 769:
_what motion’s this_] See note, p. 229.
# 770:
_ventoy_] i. e. fan.
# 771:
_yellow_] i. e. jealous.
# 772:
_Much husbands here!_] See note, p. 257. So Shakespeare:
“Is it not past two o’clock? and here _much_ Orlando!” _As you like it_, act iv. sc. 3.
# 773:
_gilds_] Old ed. “glides.”
# 774:
_if my man_, &c.] A metaphor drawn from the game of _tables_.
# 775:
_ingle_] i. e. male favourite.
# 776:
_Omnes_] The speeches which in the present scene have this prefix may be assigned to whatever individuals of Camillo’s party the reader pleases to select.
# 777:
_bills_] See note, p. 237.
# 778:
_o’er_] Old ed. “over.”
# 779:
_appose_] i. e. oppose.
# 780:
_brown bill_] See note, p. 237.
# 781:
_I’m_] Old ed. “I am.”
# 782:
_I’m sure you’re lord of this misrule_] Old ed. “I am _sure_ you are _lord of_ all _this misrule_.” In great houses the master of the Christmas sports was called _the Lord of Misrule_.
# 783:
_our_] Old ed. “your.”
# 784:
_her_] i. e. Imperia’s.
# 785:
_Violet_] Old ed. “Violetta.”
# 786:
_lie_] i. e. lay—for the sake of the rhyme.
# 787:
_daw_] i. e. simpleton.
# 788:
_I’m_] Old ed. “I am.”
# 789:
_perilous_] See note, p. 283.
# 790:
_a fume_] i. e. in smoking tobacco.
# 791:
_knight of the post_] i. e. cheat, sharper.—This cant term means, properly, a hireling evidence; or a person hired to give false bail in case of arrest.
# 239.10: --------------
_Note omitted at p. 239, l. 10._
_a precept_ i. e. a justice’s or magistrate’s warrant.
# 792:
On the death of Falso’s brother, Furtivo passes into his service.
# 793:
_begun_] Qy. “began” for the rhyme.
# 794:
_Who_] So ed. 1630. First ed. “Who’s.”
# 795:
_owe_] i. e. own.
# 796:
_prevent_] i. e. anticipate.
# 797:
_a little too wise_, &c.] So Shakespeare:
“So wise so young, they say, do ne’er live long.” _Richard III._, act iii. sc. 1.
# 798:
_sad_] i. e. serious, grave.
# 799:
_a safer stern_] i. e. (I suppose) a safer course to steer. _Stern_ is used by our early writers in the sense of steerage, helm.
# 800:
_curious_] i. e. scrupulous.
# 801:
_Niece_] i. e. the _niece_ of Justice Falso. Her name is not given in any part of the play.
# 802:
_purchase_] i. e. booty. It was, properly, a cant term among thieves for stolen goods.
# 803:
_queasy_] i. e. squeamish.
# 804:
_earing_] So ed. 1630. First ed. “earning.”
# 805:
_Castiza_] Old eds. “_his Lady_.” We learn her name from several subsequent parts of the play.
# 806:
_alas_] Old eds. “’lasse.”
# 807:
_do it_] Old eds. “doo’t.”
# 808:
_Servant_] Old eds. “Seruus.”
# 809:
_It is_] Old eds. “’Tis.”
# 810:
_Take’t of my truth_, &c.] The metre seems to have suffered by corruption of the text.
# 811:
_singly_] Ed. 1630, “simplie.”
# 812:
_an inseparable knave_] i. e., I presume, one whose knavery cannot be separated from himself.
# 813:
_vild_] See note, p. 94.
# 814:
_the forefinger_] i. e. the forefinger pointed at him.
# 815:
_honourably welcome_] What she has just said explains the meaning of these words.
# 816:
_guess_] A familiar corruption of _guests_, which Middleton uses elsewhere. See also Webster’s _Cure for a Cuckold_, and my note there, _Works_, vol. iii. p. 357.
# 817:
_towed_] Old eds. “toward.”
# 818:
_a_] So ed. of 1630.—Not in 1st ed.
# 819:
_I wus_] A vulgar form of _I wis_ (which is the reading of ed. 1630), I think, or rather _i-wis_, certainly, truly.
# 820:
_proper_] i. e. handsome.
# 821:
_sursurrara_] or _sasarara_—a corruption of _certiorari_.
# 822:
_term-trotter_] i. e. a resorter to the capital during term-time.
# 823:
_again_] i. e. against.
# 824:
_wittol_] i. e. tame cuckold.
# 825:
_sacred, pure_] In Campbell’s _Spec. of British Poets_, vol. iii. p. 134, where this passage is quoted, the reading is “wholly _pure_”—an alteration by the editor.
# 826:
_rarely_] i. e. finely, nobly.
# 827:
_gentlemen_] So ed. 1630. First ed. “gentleman.”
# 828:
_I’m_] Old eds. “I am.”
# 829:
_steaks_] Old eds. “steakes.” Some sort of dress ornamented with guards or facings, is meant, I suppose—if the reading be right.
# 830:
_I see not a cross yet_] i. e. I see no money yet: _vide_ note, p. 246.
# 831:
_angels_] See note, p. 250.
# 833:
_have_] Old eds. “has.”
# 834:
_Welcome_, &c.] One of those snatches of blank verse (and printed as such in the old eds.) which sometimes occur in the midst of prose speeches.
# 835:
_Knight_] Old eds. “_Fal._”
# 836:
_a noble touch_] So Shakespeare:
“Come, my sweet wife, my dearest mother, and My friends of _noble touch_:” _Coriol._ act iv. sc. 1.
which Warburton rightly explains,—of true metal unallayed: a metaphor from trying gold on the touchstone.
# 837:
_royals_] Gold pieces current for 15_s._ in Middleton’s time.
# 838:
_It has_] Old eds. “T’as.”
# 839:
_jets_] i. e. struts.
# 840:
_so strangely_] i. e. so coyly—with such an appearance of coldness. In Johnson’s _Dict._ (even in Todd’s ed.), the lines from Shakespeare’s _Two Gent. of Verona_, act i. sc. 2.
“She makes it _strange_; but she would be best pleas’d To be so anger’d with another letter,”—
are absurdly cited for an example of the word _strange_ in the sense of _remote_.
# 841:
_angels_] See note, p. 250.
# 842:
_toward_] i. e. in a state of preparation, at hand.
# 843:
_passion_] i. e. in a sorrowful tone, with emotion.
# 844:
_Reverend and honourable Matrimony_, &c.] In a note on the Aldine edition of Milton, I have pointed out the resemblance between the present passage and that in _Par. Lost_, b. iv. 750;
“Hail, wedded love, mysterious law,” &c.:
and I take this opportunity of observing, that some lines in a play by a dramatist contemporary with Middleton seem to have been in Milton’s memory when he described the fall of Vulcan;
“How high I tumbled, who can gesse aright, _Falling a summers day from morne to night_.” HEYWOOD’s _Brazen Age_, 1613, sig. I.
“_from morn To noon he fell, from noon to dewy eve, A summer’s day_; and with the setting sun,” &c. _Par. Lost_, b. i. 742.
Homer has merely;
πᾶν δ’ ἦμαρ φερόμην, ἅμα δ’ ἠελίῳ καταδύντι, κ. τ. λ. _Il._ I. 592.
# 845:
_Without thee_] The earlier part of this line seems to have dropt out.
# 846:
_That wedlock’s_, &c.] This line is imperfect; and after the next line, something is lost.
# 847:
_a’m_] i. e. _them_: a’ is often used for _he_ in our early dramas.
# 848:
_clip_] i. e. embrace.
# 849:
_Indeed all_, &c.] Probably in this and the next speech of Fidelio, the metre is lost by the corruption of the text.
# 850:
_Discover quickly_] He means—let us discover ourselves quickly.
# 851:
_know_] Old eds. “knowes.”
# 852:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 853:
_I’m_] Old eds. “I am.”
# 854:
_vildly_] i. e. vilely: see note, p. 94.
# 855:
_contain_] i. e. restrain.
# 856:
_who_] So ed. 1630. First ed. “whome.”
# 857:
_ha’_] Old eds. “a _ha_.”
# 858:
_You have_] Old eds. “Y’aue.”
# 859:
_apparance_] i. e. appearance.
# 860:
_Suitor_] This word I have substituted for the “_Whin._” of the 1st ed. and the “_Whi._” of the second.—Perhaps Tangle ought not to enter till Falso says, “What, old signior,” &c.
# 861:
_good_] So ed. 1630. First ed. “gour.”
# 862:
_When_] So ed. 1630. First ed. has “Wheu:” but _when_, as an expression of impatience, occurs often in our early dramatists:
“_When_, Lucius, _when_? Awake, I say: what, Lucius! _Enter_ LUCIUS. LUC. Call’d you, my lord?” SHAKESPEARE’s _Jul. Cæsar_, act ii. sc. 1. See also p. 289 and note.
# 863:
_prevent_] i. e. anticipate.
# 864:
_sidemen_] Or _sidesmen_—i. e. assistants to the churchwarden.
# 865:
_scandala magnatum_] This form seems to have been common; so Taylor, the water-poet;
“From _scandala magnatum_ I am cleare.” _Farewell to the Tower-bottles_, p. 126—_Workes_, ed. 1630.
See also _The Sculler_, p. 29, _ibid._
# 866:
_a writ of execution, Rapier and Dagger_] These words are given to Falso in the old eds.—Ed. 1630 makes sad work in the distribution of the speeches here.
# 867:
_Reinish_] a wretched pun—_Rhenish_.
# 868:
_Non vacat_, &c.] Ovid. _Trist._ ii. 216.
# 869:
_Byrlady_] a corruption of _By our Lady_.
# 870:
_Tan._] So ed. 1630. First ed. “_Fals._”
# 871:
_sursurraras_] See note, p. 330.
# 872:
_Longswords_] So ed. 1630. First ed. “Longsword.”
# 873:
_by th’_] So ed. 1630. First ed. “_by th’_ the.”
# 874:
_he_] So ed. 1630. First ed. “heele.”
# 875:
_Exeunt_] After this word in the old eds. is the following direction, intended for the benefit of the performers, not of the reader: “_Toward the close of the musick_ [played between the acts] _the Justices three men prepare for a robberie_.”
# 876:
_truss me_] To _truss_ means to tie the points or tagged laces by which the hose or breeches was attached to the doublet.
# 877:
_to_] So ed. 1630. Not in First ed.
# 878:
_venery_] i. e. hunting.
# 879:
_Latronello_] Old eds. “_Latronello_, and Fuca.”
# 880:
_under covert barn_] i. e. when he may rob under protection. _Barn_ is a familiar corruption of _baron_. A wife is said in law to be _under covert baron_, as sheltered by marriage under her husband.
# 881:
_slinking_] Ed. 1630, “stinking.”
# 882:
_northern dozens_] In _The Rates of the Custome House_, &c. 1582, among the cloths enumerated we find
“Kerseyes of all sorts _Northen dosens_ Bridge Waters” &c. &c. Sig. G. 2.
Strutt cites the following act: “Every _Northern cloth_ shall be seven quarters of a yard in width, from twenty-three to twenty-five yards in length, and weigh sixty-six pounds each piece; the half piece of each cloth, called _dozens_, shall run from twelve to thirteen yards in length, the breadth being the same, and shall weigh thirty-six pounds.”—_Dress and Habits_, &c. vol. ii. p. 197.
# 883:
_gear_] i. e. matter.
# 884:
_true men_] See note, p. 158.
# 885:
_Was it your loss_, &c.] Old eds.
“O me, I’m dearly sorry for your chance, was it your loss?”
which destroys the metre.
# 886:
_lord_] Ed. 1630, “lady.”
# 887:
_angels_] See note, p. 250.
# 888:
_cast_] i. e. vomit.
# 889:
_Exeunt_] I found it impossible to preserve an equality in the length of the acts in this drama. The stage-direction in the old copies (see p. 367, note), shews plainly that a new act commences with the entrance of “_Falso untrussed_;” and it was necessary to close that act with the present scene, where the Jeweller’s Wife, parting from her paramour at night, desires him to come to her “to-morrow” about the same hour. The morning of that “to-morrow” has arrived, when Phœnix and Proditor enter in the next scene; during which, as the reader will observe, time is supposed to pass away with astonishing rapidity.
# 890:
_Phoenix_] How happens Proditor to address the pretended assassin by his real name, not only here but also at the commencement of act v., where the word, forming part of a line, cannot be thrown out as a printer’s interpolation?
“PROD. Now, _Phœnix_. PHŒ. Now, my lord. PROD. Let princely blood Nourish our hopes,” &c.
That Proditor knew the prince by the name of Phœnix appears from act i. sc. 2, where he says,
“Not many months _Phœnix_ shall keep his life.”
Perhaps Middleton committed this oversight in the haste of composition.
# 891:
_toy_] i. e. whim, fancy, conceit.
# 892:
_most_] Old eds. “more.”
# 893:
_wittol_] See note, p. 331.
# 894:
_horse and foot_] So in _The Famous Historye of Thomas Stukeley_, 1605: “Shee’s mine _horse and foote_.”—Sig. B. 2.
# 895:
_again_] i. e. against.
# 896:
_sursurraras_] See note, p. 330.
# 897:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 898:
_do_] Old eds. “do’s.”
# 899:
_Thou that hast found such sweet pleasure_, &c.] See p. 330.]
# 900:
_hurt_] Old eds. “heart.”
# 901:
_’Tis coming_, &c.] A speech which seems to have been originally all verse.
# 902:
_carpet_] i. e. table-cover.—Gifford (Ben Jonson’s _Works_, vol. v. p. 182) explains it “embroidered rug:” but why “_rug_?” the finest Turkey carpets were formerly used for covering tables, as many old pictures testify.—That _carpet_ also meant sometimes a bed-cover appears from the following passage of Brathwaite:
“Downe goes the silken _carpet_ all the while, Showing those sheets,” &c. _Strappado for the Diuell_, 1615, p. 43.
# 903:
_marmoset_] i. e. little monkey.
# 904:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 905:
_Metreza_] See note, vol. iii. p. 628.
# 906:
_sixpenny ordinary_] There were ordinaries of all prices. Our author notices, in _Father Hubburd’s Tales_, a three-half-penny ordinary; in _No Wit, no Help like a Woman’s_, a twelvepenny ordinary, act ii. sc. 3; in _The Black Book_, an eighteenpenny ordinary; in _A Trick to catch the Old One_, a two-shilling ordinary, act i. sc. 1; Fletcher, in _The Wild-Goose Chase_, a ten-crown ordinary, act i. sc. 1; and our author, in _Father Hubburd’s Tales_, mentions a person who had spent five pounds at a sitting in an ordinary.
# 907:
_overflown_] i. e. drunk.—“The young Gentleman is come in, Madam, and as you foresaw very high _flowne_, but not so drunke as to forget your promise.”—BROME’s _Mad Couple well Match’d_, act iv. sc. 2. _Five New Playes_, 1653.
# 908:
_tread_] A friend would read “thread,”—with an allusion to the sport called Running at the Ring, when the tilter, riding at full speed, endeavoured to thrust the point of his lance through, and to bear away, the ring, which was suspended at a fixed height. But the text is quite right. G. Markham gives particular directions how to make a horse _tread the ring_—i. e. perform various movements in different directions within a ring marked out on a piece of ground: see _Cheape and good Husbandry_, &c., p. 18, sqq. ed. 1631.
# 909:
_approve_] i. e. prove.
# 910:
_revenue_] Phœnix accidentally uses the word by which, as the reader will remember, the Knight is accustomed to address the Jeweller’s Wife.
# 911:
_Adieu, farewell_, &c.] The Knight is supposed to enter from a tavern, and to be taking leave of the companions with whom he had been carousing.
# 912:
_angels_] See note, p. 250.
# 913:
_rouses_] i. e. bumpers: see Gifford’s note on _The Duke of Milan_, Massinger’s _Works_, vol. i. p. 239, sec. ed.
# 914:
_mullwines_] A vulgar corruption of _mulled wines_.
# 915:
_Argo_] Like the _argal_ of the grave-digger in _Hamlet_—a vulgarism for _ergo_.
# 916:
_two most famous universities, Poultry and Wood- street_] i. e. the Counter prisons in the Poultry and Wood-street. The same piece of wit occurs in our author’s _Michaelmas Term_ and in his _Roaring Girl_. So also in Fennor’s _Compter’s Commonwealth_, 1617; “But before I was matriculated in one of these city universities,” &c. p. 4: and in Jordan’s _Walks of Islington and Hogsdon_, &c. 1657, where Wildblood, when brought into Wood-street Counter, says, “I have commenced in this college before now,” act iv. sc. 1.
# 917:
_from the Master’s side down to ... the Hole_] The best _side_ or department in those prisons was called the _Master’s side_; and one of the worst, the _Hole_: see Fennor’s _Compter’s Commonwealth_, pp. 4, 5, 11, 18, 62, 69, 79; and Jordan’s _Walks of Islington and Hogsdon_, &c. act iv.
Gifford (note on B. Jonson’s _Works_, vol. ii. p. 208) mentions the _Knights’ ward_ as if it had been the best department; but, I believe, it was the second best,—after the _Master’s side_.
# 918:
_toys_] i. e. whimsical, odd things: see note, p. 378.
# 919:
_Phœnix_] See note, p. 378.
# 920:
_make a foot-cloth’d posterity_] i. e. make your descendants persons of great consequence, riding with _foot-cloths_ (long housings) on their horses.
# 921:
_keep_] Old eds. “keeps.”
# 922:
-_quicking_] So ed. 1630. First ed. “qucking.”—Query, “quickening.”
# 923:
_At his first rising_, &c.] The words of Proditor to Phœnix, see p. 396.
# 924:
_What’s here_] Old eds. “_Whats heere_ my Lord:” the printer having by mistake inserted the exclamation of Proditor twice.
# 925:
_affirm’t_] Old eds. “affirme it.”
# 926:
_vild_] i. e. vile: see note, p. 94.
# 927:
_what make I here?_] i. e. what business have I here?
# 928:
_contained in_] i. e. restrained in, confined to.
# 929:
_Discovers himself_] This stage-direction, which is not in the 1st ed., is given as part of the dialogue in ed. 1630,—“to approoue it discouers himselfe.”
# 930:
_keeps_] i. e. dwells.
# 931:
_stings_] Old eds. “strings” and “string.”
# 932:
_this diamond_] Which the Jeweller’s Wife had given to Phoenix: see p. 391.
# 933:
_Torment again!_] Ed. 1630 has “Tormentagent:” qy. did the author write “Torment’s agent?” Compare _The Old Law_ (p. 31), where Evander calls the executioner “Agent for death.”
# 934:
_wrack_] i. e. wreck.
# 935:
_mistress_] So ed. 1630. First ed. “Master.”
# 936:
_ne’er_] Old eds. “never.”
# 937:
_those_] So ed. 1630. First ed. “these.”
# 938:
_Turks_] So ed. 1630. First ed. “Turke.”
# 939:
_She never saw the dogs and the bears fight_] At Paris-Garden, in Southwark. Brathwait, (writing several years after this play was produced, though at what particular date is uncertain,) mentions it as one of the chief “sights” in London.
“Seven Hils there were in Rome, and so there be Seven Sights in New-Troy crave our memorie: 1 Tombes, 2 Guild-Hall Giants, 3 Stage-plaies, 4 Bedlam poore, 5 Ostrich, 6 _Beare-garden_, 7 Lyons in the Towre.”
_Barnabees Journall_, sig. L. 3. 1st ed. n. d. (_Sec. Part_, note.)
# 940:
_war’s_] So ed. 1630. First ed. “war.”
# 941:
_least_] So ed. 1630. First ed. “left.”
# 942:
_fathom_] i. e. comprehension,—compass of thought or contrivance.—Old eds. “fadome.”
# 943:
_advance_] Old eds. “aduanceth.”
# 944:
_agen_] So the word is generally written by our early poets; and where the rhyme requires that spelling, it ought not to be modernised.
# 945:
_neasts_] i. e. nests—for the sake of the rhyme. So Brome;
“That the tipling _feast_, With the Doxie in the _neast_,” &c. _A Jovial Crew_, 1652 (acted 1641), sig. F. 4.
# 946:
_The Middle_, &c.] The old eds. do not mark the place of action; but the circumstance of the “bills” (see p. 423) evidently shews that the poet intended this scene to lie in the middle aisle of St. Paul’s. That _bills_ (advertisements) used to be posted up there, and that persons of all descriptions were in the habit of resorting thither, both for business and amusement, might be proved by citations from various writers: it is sufficient to refer the reader to Ben Jonson’s _Every Man out of his Humour_, act i. sc. 1.
# 947:
_You’ve_] Old eds. “_You_ have.”
# 948:
_possess’d_] i. e. persuaded, convinced: so Brome;
“My lord, I do presume I am unwelcome, Because you are _possess’d_ I never lov’d you.” _The Queen and Concubine_, p. 38.—_Five New Playes_, 1659.
# 949:
_vildly_] i. e. vilely: see note, p. 94.
# 950:
_Shortyard_, &c.] Old eds. “with his two spirits, _Shortyard_,” &c.—It should seem that these assistants of Quomodo’s villany were more than mere mortal agents: vide the first speech of Shortyard in the 3d scene of act iii.
# 951:
_look sleek_] So ed. 1630. First ed. “looke, _seeke_.”
# 952:
_Ne_] i. e. Nor—an archaism.
# 953:
_Observe ... gallantry_] Qy. did the author mean this speech to open with two rhyming lines?
# 954:
_angels_] See note, p. 250.
# 955:
_subtilty’s_] Old eds. “subtiltie is.”
# 956:
_bills_] i. e. advertisements: see note, p. 418.
# 957:
_this_] Old eds. “tis.”
# 958:
_Has forgot_, &c.] The next speech of Rearage concludes a couplet, which can only be rendered complete by the following awkward arrangement of the text;
“Has forgot his father’s Name, poor Walter Gruel, that begot him, Fed him, and brought him up.”
But let me observe, that Middleton, when he introduces a couplet, does not always think it necessary that the first line should consist of as many feet as the second: compare the lines at the end of the fourth act of this play;
“Delay not now; you’ve understood my love; I’ve a priest ready; this is the fittest season. No eye offends us: let this kiss Restore thee to more wealth, me to more bliss.”
See also _The Phœnix_, p. 351, where my remark (note ^{845}) about the dropping out of part of the line was inconsiderate.
Nor is this somewhat slovenly style of writing peculiar to our author: in one of Brome’s plays, a speech which consists of regular blank verse concludes with the following couplet;
“So, now dye and sinke Into thy grave, to rid us of thy stinke.” _The Sparagus Garden_, 1640, sig. H. 3. (acted 1635.)
# 959:
_respective_] i. e. respectful.
# 960:
_I’d_] Old eds. “I had.”
# 961:
_I’ve_] Old eds. here and in the next line but three, “I have.”
# 962:
_agen_] See note, p. 416.
# 963:
_pains_] So ed. 1630. First ed. “payne.”
# 964:
_apperil_] i. e. peril: see Gifford’s note—B. Jonson’s _Works_, vol. v. p. 137.
# 965:
_death of sturgeon_] There seems to be some corruption in the text here.
# 966:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 967:
_aloof off_] Lethe again uses this expression, act iii. sc. 1, “since only her consent kept _aloof off_, what might I think,” &c.
# 968:
_Some, poor_, &c.] i. e. Would that some poor, &c.
# 969:
_scurvy murrey kersey_] Equivalent, perhaps, to poor piece of stuff.
# 970:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 971:
_kersened_] A vulgarism for christened.
# 972:
_disguise_] Old eds. “disquire.”
# 973:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 974:
_braver_] i. e. more richly clad.
# 975:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 976:
_Hellgill_] Old eds. “Lethes Pandar:” his name, as we find afterwards, is Dick Hellgill.
# 977:
_thrummed_] Seems here to mean thatched: the father of the Country Wench, speaking of her (act ii. sc. 2), says,
“O, if she knew The dangers that attend on women’s lives, She’d rather lodge under a poor _thatch’d roof_” &c.
_Thrum_ is, properly, the tuft at the end of the warp in weaving.
# 978:
_a loose-bodied gown_] Is frequently mentioned as a common dress of courtesans: so Taylor, the water-poet;
“Her _loose gowne_, for her looser body fit.” _A Whore_, p. 111.—_Workes_, 1630.
# 979:
_bums_] i. e., perhaps, _bum-rolls_: “The ladies also extended their garments from the hips with foxes’ tails and _bum-rolls_ [stuffed cushions],” &c.—Strutt’s _Dress and Habits_, &c. vol. ii. p. 259.
# 980:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 981:
_deny_] i. e. refuse.
# 982:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 983:
_thing_] So ed. 1630. First ed. “things.”
# 984:
_most_] i. e. greatest,—thorough.
# 985:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 986:
_pants_] “Qy. haunts?” says a friend; but I believe the text is right: for the sake of the rhyme, _pants_ is used in the forced sense of—breathes, exists, dwells.
# 987:
_lie_] Old eds. “lyes.”
# 988:
_An Ordinary_] In Middleton’s days (and, I believe, long after,) gambling was carried on at ordinaries. The place of action is not marked in the old eds.
# 989:
_impressure_] Old eds. “impressier.”
# 990:
_skills_] i. e. signifies.
# 991:
_angels_] See note, p. 250.
# 992:
_wears a smock_] Equivalent, I believe, to—is a knave: “the answer of a mad fellowe to his mistresse, who being called knaue by her, replied that it was not possible, for, said he, if you remember yourselfe, good mistresse, this is leape yeare, and then, as you know well, knaues _weare smockes_.”—_Treatise against Jud. Astrol._, &c., by J. Chamber, 1601, p. 113. Compare too vol. iii. p. 81.
# 993:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 994:
_will_] i. e. desire.
# 995:
_knew_] Old eds. “know.”
# 996:
_the Standard_] Of the Standard in Cheapside, which John Wells, mayor in the year 1430, first “caused to be made with a small cistern with fresh water,” &c., an ample account will be found in Stow’s _Survey of London_, b. iii. p. 34, ed. 1720.
# 997:
_Push_] See note, p. 29.
# 998:
_vild_] i. e. vile: see note, p. 94.
# 999:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 1000:
_Push_] See note, p. 29.
# 1001:
_inward_] i. e. intimate.
# 1002:
_beholding_] Is often used for _beholden_ by our early writers.
# 1003:
_slight_] i. e. contrivance, artifice.
# 1004:
_She’d_] Old eds. “She would.”
# 1005:
_keeps_] i. e. dwells.
# 1006:
_fond_] i. e. foolish.
# 1007:
_Thomasine_] Here, and in a subsequent stage- direction, the old eds. designate her “_Quomodoes Wife_,” but in all the other stage-directions, and in all the prefixes to her speeches, “_Thomasine_.”
# 1008:
_look_] Old eds. “lookes.”
# 1009:
_a cast of manchets_] i. e. a couple of small loaves, or rolls, of fine white bread. “A _cast_ of hawks” (a not unfrequent expression) occurs in our author’s _Spanish Gipsy_, act ii., scene 2.
# 1010:
_a custard_] Appears, from several passages in our old writers, to have been a common love-present.
# 1011:
_aunt_] i. e. procuress—in which sense the word often occurs.
# 1012:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 1013:
_sir-reverence_] See note, p. 171.
# 1014:
_my shop is not altogether so dark_, &c.] See note, p. 482.
# 1015:
_cloth_] i. e. hangings.
# 1016:
_virginals_] See note, p. 278.
# 1017:
_Retires_] Old eds. “Exit:” but presently, when called by Quomodo, he replies, “I’m ne’er out a’ the shop, sir.”
# 1018:
_what lack you_] Was the constant address of shopkeepers to customers. In 1628, Alexander Gill was brought before the council for saying, among other things, that the king was only fit to stand in a shop and cry _what do you lack?_
# 1019:
_inward_] i. e. intimate acquaintance.
# 1020:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 1021:
_bedfellow_] It was formerly common for men (even those of the highest rank) to sleep together; and the custom was still prevalent in the time of Cromwell: see the notes of Steevens and Malone on Shakespeare’s _Henry V._ act ii. sc. 2; and Clarendon’s _Hist. of the Rebellion_, vol. vii. p. 34, ed. 1826.
# 1022:
_Gum_] Old eds. here, and afterwards in this scene, “Goome:” but see p. 437.
# 1023:
_walk_] i. e. depart.
# 1024:
_Brainford_] A common corruption of Brentford.
# 1025:
_take up a commodity of cloth_] Many passages in our early writers might be cited to shew how common a custom it was for needy gallants to take up _commodities_, i. e. wares which they were to convert into ready money. Brown paper (which Quomodo presently mentions,) was an article frequently taken up; see Steevens’s note on Shakespeare’s _Measure for Measure_, act iv. sc. 3; and ginger, pins, packthread, &c. &c., are also found in the strange list of _commodities_.
# 1026:
_grow diseased_] i. e. become uneasy.
# 1027:
_i-wis_] i. e. certainly, truly. There can be no doubt that the word is an adverb.
# 1028:
_foot-cloths_] See note, p. 396.
# 1029:
_take me with you_] i. e. understand me fully.
# 1030:
_where_] i. e. whereas.
# 1031:
_brown paper_] See note, p. 450.
# 1032:
_as late our graceless dames_] The allusion here is probably to the execution of Sir Everard Digby, who, for his share in the gunpowder plot, was drawn, hanged, and quartered, at the west end of St. Paul’s Church, 30th January, 1606: see Stow’s _Annales_, p. 882, ed. 1631.
# 1033:
_wale_] i. e. texture; properly, the ridge of threads.
# 1034:
_quo’_] i. e. quoth.
# 1035:
_wold_] Old eds. “wilde.”
# 1036:
_bedfellow’s_] See note, p. 448.
# 1037:
_price_] Qy. “piece:” see p. 452.
# 1038:
_Push_] See note, p. 29.
# 1039:
_logs yet to keep Christmas with_] The bringing in and burning of the log, a huge piece of fire-wood, was (at least in the country) an important ceremony on Christmas eve. It was lighted with a piece of the last year’s brand: see the poem entitled _Ceremonies for Christmasse_ in Herrick’s _Hesperides_, p. 309, ed. 1648.
# 1040:
_Poultry and Wood-street_] See note, p. 392.
# 1041:
_before_] Old eds. “_with the cloath_:” but see his first speech as Idem, p. 460.
# 1042:
_he_] i. e. Quomodo: so ed. 1630. First ed. “we.”
# 1043:
_a proper springall_] i. e. a handsome youth. Old eds. “_a proper_, springfull.”
# 1044:
_What do ye lack_] See note, p. 447.
# 1045:
_he_] i. e. he who.
# 1046:
To her speeches in this scene, and in all the subsequent scenes where she appears, is prefixed “_Curt._” i. e. courtesan; and in the stage-directions after this scene, she is called “_Courtesan_” or “_Harlot_.”
# 1047:
_the tailor points it_] When this play was written, women’s gowns were usually made by men.
# 1048:
_tirewoman_] i. e. cap-maker, milliner.
# 1049:
_Hellgill’s Servant_] Old eds. “One.”
# 1050:
_toy_] See note, p. 378.
# 1051:
_Fath._] Old eds. “Sho.”
# 1052:
_risse_] i. e. risen.—Ed. 1630, “rissen:” but the other form frequently occurs.
# 1053:
_and_] Old eds. “_and_ a.”
# 1054:
_Clubs, clubs_] Was the cry which called forth the London apprentices when any fray arose.
# 1055:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 1056:
_Byrlady_] See note, p. 365.
# 1057:
_mother_] See note, p. 186.
# 1058:
_aloof off_] See note, p. 427.
# 1059:
_merely_] i. e. absolutely.
# 1060:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 1061:
_cast of manchets_, &c.] See notes, p. 444.
# 1062:
_aunt_] See note, p. 444.
# 1063:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 1064:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 1065:
_banes_] i. e. bans.
“Whenere my heart Love’s warmth but entertaines, O Frost! O Snow! O Haile forbid the _Banes_.” HERRICK’s _Hesperides_, p. 42. ed. 1648.
# 1066:
_likes_] i. e. pleases.
# 1067:
_in Paul’s_] See note, p. 418.
# 1068:
_spirits_] See note, p. 421.
# 1069:
_a warning-piece_] So old eds.: but qy. “a warning: peace!”
# 1070:
_know_] So ed. 1630.—First ed. “knew.”
# 1071:
_knew_] Old eds. “know.”
# 1072:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 1073:
_lecher_] Old eds. “leather.”
# 1074:
_a_] So ed. 1630. Not in first ed.
# 1075:
_come_] Old eds. “comes.”
# 1077:
_proceeded in both the counters_] See note, p. 392.
# 1078:
_bachelors_] So ed. 1630.—First ed. “batchler.”
# 1079:
_Much_] See note, p. 257.
# 1080:
_Fal._] Qy. _Easy_?
# 1081:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 1082:
_Easy_] Qy. _Fal._?
# 1083:
_bring_] So ed. 1630.—First ed. “ring.”
# 1084:
_gossip_] i. e. sponsor.
# 1085:
_bands_] Old eds. “bonds:” the words were formerly used indiscriminately: see note, p. 245.
# 1086:
_Byrlady_] See note, p. 365.
# 1087:
_owe_] i. e. own.
# 1088:
_a dark shop’s good for somewhat_] The city tradesmen were frequently twitted about the darkness of their shops. “What should the city do with honesty?... Why are your wares gumm’d; _your shops dark_,” &c.—BROME’s _City Wit_, act i. sc. 1. (_Five New Playes_, 1653.)
# 1089:
_recullisance_] i. e. (I suppose) recognisance: _cullisen_ frequently occurs as a corruption of _cognisance_: see Gifford’s note on B. Jonson’s _Works_, vol. ii. p. 36.
# 1090:
_blue beadles_] The dress formerly worn by beadles was blue: so Taylor, the water-poet;
“The very _blue-coate Beadles_ get their trash By whips and rods, and the fine firking lash.” _Anagrams and Satyrs_, p. 254—_Workes_, 1630.
# 1091:
_as before_] See p. 481.
# 1092:
_bedfellow_] See note, p. 448.
# 1093:
_disguised as before_] See p. 481.—Old eds. “_his disguised spirits_.” see note, p. 421.
# 1094:
_i-wis_] See note, p. 451.
# 1095:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 1096:
_a bow wide_] A term in archery—when the arrow flew a bow-length wide (on one side or other) of the mark.
# 1097:
_let_] i. e. hinderance.
# 1098:
_vild_] See note, p. 94.
# 1099:
_spirits_] See note, p. 421.
# 1100:
_slight_] See note, p. 441.
# 1101:
_I’ll have ’emlopt_, &c.] Something seems to have dropt out before these words.
# 1102:
_laugh and lie down_] See note, p. 269.
# 1103:
_toy_] See note, p. 378.
# 1104:
_beaten_] i. e. trite.
# 1105:
_take on_] i. e. grieve bitterly.
# 1106:
_searchers_] i. e. persons appointed officially to examine bodies, and report the cause of death.
# 1107:
_spirits_] See note, p. 421.
# 1108:
_the great_] i. e. the gross.
# 1109:
_brave_] i. e. richly dressed.
# 1110:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 1111:
Immediately before these exclamations the old eds. have a stage-direction (a warning for the bell-ringer and performers to be in readiness), “_A Bell Toales, a Confused crie within_.” The bell, of course, does not toll till the Boy has been sent to “bid ’em ring out.”
# 1112:
_reap’t_] Old eds. “reape it.”
# 1113:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 1114:
_mought_] i. e. might.
# 1115:
_and_] i. e. if.
# 1116:
_passion_] i. e. sorrow.
# 1117:
_ringing_] See p. 493.
# 1118:
_the hospital boys_] Compare Brome: “He is indeed my brother, and has been one of the true blew _Boyes of the Hospitall; one of the sweet singers to the City Funeralls_ with a two penny loafe under his arme.” _The City Wit_, act iii. sc. 1.—(_Five New Playes_, 1653.)
# 1119:
_censure_] i. e. opinion.
# 1120:
_I’ve_] Old eds. “I have.”
# 1121:
_One_] So ed. 1630. First ed. “Ont.”
# 1122:
_hear_] So ed. 1630. First ed. “feare.”
# 1123:
_lewd_] i. e. vile, base.
# 1124:
_A coffin brought in_, &c.] The stage-direction in the old eds. is, “_A counterfet Coarse brought in, Tomazin and al the mourners equally counterfeit_:” but we find there (see next page) a subsequent stage-direction, “_Pointing after the_ coffin.”
# 1125:
_T.’s Moth._] The old eds. (which do not mark her entrance) merely prefix “_Moth._” to her speeches.
# 1126:
_cousin_] i. e. kinsman, relation: in Shakespeare, Olivia calls her uncle Toby _cousin_ (_Twelfth Night_); and the king says,
“But now my _cousin_ Hamlet and my son.”
I suspect that the word was sometimes used (and perhaps is so in the present passage) as a familiar address to a person who was not related to the speaker.
# 1127:
_I’ve_] Old eds. “I have.”—The line is the second of a couplet.
# 1128:
_I’ve_] Old eds. “I have.”
# 1129:
_I’ve_] Old eds. “I have.”
# 1130:
_No eye offends us: let this kiss_, &c.] An imperfect couplet: see note, p. 424.
# 1131:
_with writings_] The old eds. add, “_having cousned Sim Quomodo_.”
# 1132:
_I’ve_] Old eds. “I have.”
# 1133:
_Enter Thomasine_, &c.] Old eds. “_Enter Quomodoes wife marryed to Easie_:” see note, p. 443.
# 1134:
_I’ve_] Old eds. here and in the next line but two, “I have.”
# 1135:
_agen_] See note, p. 416.
# 1136:
_Enter Officers_, &c.] The old eds. have no stage- direction here. From the words which presently follow, “This is the other,” it seems that Falselight had been previously taken into custody; and as they both afterwards make their appearance together at the justice’s house, I have thought it best to despatch them thither in company.
# 1137:
_lands_] Old eds. “lands.”
# 1138:
_as before_] See p. 496.
# 1139:
_Saint Antling’s_] For an account of the church and parish so called, see Stow’s _Survey of London_: “First you have the fair Parish Church of St. Anthonines, in Budge Row (more vulgarly known by the name of St. Antlins),” &c.—B. iii. p. 15, &c. ed. 1720.
# 1140:
_byrlady_] See note, p. 365.
# 1141:
_owe_] i. e. own.
# 1142:
_hither_] So ed. 1630. First ed. “thether.”
# 1143:
_beset_] i. e. perplexed, embarrassed.
# 1144:
_Who’s this? ’Tis_] First ed. “_Whose? tis_.” Ed. 1630, “_Whose? this_.”
# 1145:
_Had-land_] Is given as two distinct words in the old eds.: but compare our author’s _Trick to catch the Old One_, act i. sc. 2, where the Host says to Witgood, “what’s the news, bully _Had-land_?”
# 1146:
_Enter Officers_, &c.] The only stage-direction of the old eds. in this scene is, “_Enter Lethe with Officers, taken with his Harlot_:” that the additions which I have made to it are necessary, the following scene will shew.
# 1147:
_’Twixt_] Old eds. “Betwixt.”
# 1148:
_I’m_] Old eds. “I am.”
# 1149:
_lewd_] See note, p. 498.
# 1150:
_does it_] These words ought perhaps to be thrown out.—In several parts of this scene the corruption of the text has affected the metre.
# 1151:
_resolve_] i. e. convince, satisfy.
# 1152:
_Sale._] Old eds. “_Gent._:” for which I have substituted _Salewood_, who, as we may gather from act iii. sc. 5 (see p. 484), was privy to the design of exposing Lethe.
# 1153:
_vild_] See note, p. 94.
# 1154:
_lashes_] So ed. 1630. First ed. “lastes.”
# 1155:
_Sale._] See note, p. 510.
# 1156:
_His own mother_, &c.] Before this speech something seems wanting.
# 1157:
_Mistress_] So ed. 1630. First ed. “Maister.”
# 1158:
_again_] i. e. against.
# 1159:
_defy_] i. e. reject, renounce.
# 1160:
_Shortyard, we banish thee; it is our pleasure_] Old eds. “_Shortyard we banish_, ’tis _our pleasure_.”—I may remark that, though the guilty are deservedly punished, the judge administers justice somewhat arbitrarily in this scene, which is evidently supposed to pass in a private dwelling.
Transcriber’s Note
The footnote scheme used lettered references, repeating a-z. On numerous of occasions, letters were skipped or repeated. The resequencing of notes here resolves those lapses. Footnotes on occasion are themselves footnoted. For uniqueness, these are referenced as, for example, ‘35A’.
One unanchored footnote at p. 239 l. 10 was mentioned at the bottom of that page, glossing the word ‘precept’. That anchor has been added as 239.10.
An errata section was prepated by the Editor and included in this first volume, which provides additions and corrections to all five volumes in this set. The relevant sections will be repeated at the end of the Transcriber’s note of each subsequent volume.
Stage directions, except for entrances, can be:
in-line in the middle of a line and delimited with ‘[ ]’,
end of line right-justified on the same line where there is room, with only the leading ‘[’,
next line right-justified on the following line, where there is insufficent room, with a hanging indent.
The same convention is followed here. Since this version is wider than the original, most directions are on the same line as the speech.
Entrances were centered and separated slightly from lines above and below. This is rendered here as a full blank line.
Other errors deemed most likely to be the printer’s have been corrected, and are noted here. The references are to the page and line in the original.
51.8 the end of serving[ /-]men: Added. 65.9 LYS. We’re for you, sir[,/.] Replaced. 343.5 [a/A]nd a loft above Replaced.