DREAD. Act III., Sc. 1. "Well, my dread lord; so must I call you now." Dread, most dread, was a royal title-Rex metuendissimus. One of the old quartos reads dear, but this does not mark the new title by which York addresses his brother. ENGROSS. Act III., Sc. 7. "Not sleeping, to engross his idle body." Engross is to make gross. HUMPHREY HOWER. Act IV., Sc. 4. "Faith, none, but Humphrey Hower." Malone thinks this term is "merely used in ludicrous language for hour, like Tom Troth for truth." Other commentators believe that it is an allusion to the saying of dining with Duke Humphrey IN. Act I., Sc. 2. "I'll turn yon' fellow in his grave. "Was not insensed by his subtle mother." To insense, says Grose, is "to make a man understand a thing." "His fears are shallow, without instance." Instance here, as elsewhere in Shakspere, signifies example, proof, corroboration. INTENDING. Act III., Sc. 5. "Intending deep suspicion." Intending, in the sense of pretending. INWARD. Act III., Sc. 4. "Who is most inward with the noble duke?" Inward is intimate with, in the confidence of. JACK. Act IV., Sc. 2. "Because that, like a Jack, thou keep'st the stroke." The "Jack of the Clock-house" was an automaton, which struck the hour upon a bell. JET. Act II., Sc. 4. "Insulting tyranny begins to jet." To jet is, as Mr. Dyce has pointed out, to encroach upon. KEY-COLD. Act I., Sc. 2. "Poor key-cold figure of a holy king!" Key-cold was an epithet common to our old writers. Shakspere has used it in his 'Lucrece,' and Gurnall, in his Christian in complete Armour,' a popular work of the seventeenth century, has-" But for Christ, and obtaining an interest in him, O how key-cold are they." "Too late he died, that might have kept that title." LIE. Act I., Sc. 1. "I will deliver you, or else lie for you." LIGHTLY. Act III., Sc. 1. "Short summers lightly have a forward spring." Lightly is used in the sense of commonly. LIVELIHOOD. Act III., Sc. 4. "By any livelihood he show'd to-day." Livelihood is here used for liveliness, cheerfulness. In 'All's Well that Ends Well' (Act I., Sc. 1), it is used with a similar meaning:-"The tyranny of her sorrows takes all livelihood from her cheek." "And to give order, that no manner person." This, in our old language, was a common idiom. NIECE. Act IV., Sc. 1. "My niece Plantagenet." Niece is used in the sense of relation. daughter was the duchess's grand-daughter. OBSEQUIOUSLY. Act I., Sc. 2. Clarence's young "Whilst I a while obsequiously lament." Obsequiously is performing obsequies. PEISE Act V., Sc. 3. 66 Lest leaden slumber peise me down to-morrow." PEW-FELLOW. Act IV., Sc. 4. "9 "And makes her pew-fellow with others' moan.' Pew-fellow is companion, the occupier of the same seat. REASON. Act II., Sc. 3. "You cannot reason almost with a man.' To reason with is to converse; the phrase is yet in use. REDUCE. Act V., Sc. 4. "That would reduce these bloody days again." Reduce is used in its Latin sense of bring back. RETAIL'D. Act III., Sc. 1. "As 't were retail'd to all posterity." Retail and detail are both, according to Horne Tooke, derived from the Anglo-Saxon tale, a number, reckoning, while the verb tellan or talian was to speak or recount, as well as to enumerate. In Milton's 'L'Allegro'— "And every shepherd tells his tale," is not tells his story-but, counts over the number of his sheep as he lets them out of their fold, in the earliest hour of the morning. SENIORY. Act IV., Sc. 4. "Give mine the benefit of seniory." Seniory is seniority. STATUAS. Act III., Sc. 7. "Like dumb statuas or breathing stones." Statuas, or statues, was probably used here, as well as in 'The Two Gentlemen of Verona' (Act IV., Sc. 4), for pictures, a distinguished from "breathing stones." TEEN. Act IV., Sc. 1. "And each hour's joy wrack'd with a week of teen." Teen, from the Anglo-Saxon teon, is injury, and thence sorrow. TOUCH. Act IV., Sc. 2. "Now do I play the touch." Touch is used for touchstone. UNRESPECTIVE. Act IV., Sc. 2. "Unrespective boys." Unrespective is inconsiderate. "Away to heaven respective lenity" occurs in 'Romeo and Juliet,' Act III., Sc. 1. VICE, INIQUITY. Act III., Sc. 1. "Thus, like the formal Vice, Iniquity." The Vice of the old drama was a perfect counterpart, says Gifford, "of the Harlequin of the modern stage, and had a twofold office; to instigate the hero of the piece to wickedness, and at the same time to protect him from the devil, whom he was permitted to buffet and battle with his wooden sword till the process of the story required that both the protector and the protected should be carried off by the fiend." WARN. Act I., Sc. 3. "Sent to warn them to his royal presence." Warn, says Phillips, for one of its meanings, is to cite or summon to a court of justice. WATCH. Act V., Sc. 3. "Give me a watch!" Richard is not here asking for a sentinel, as has been supposed, but a watch-light, as is proved by the use of the word give, and the subsequent expression-"Bid my guard watch." The night-candle was divided by marks to show the time it had burned. "Then where you please, and shall be thought most fit." Where is understood between and and shall; there is then no obscurity in the sentence. |