496 WEET-WELL-FITTED. tears" ("And thenne sire Lamorak knelyd adoune, and vnlaced fyrst hys vmberere, and thenne his owne, and thenne eyther kyssed other with wepynge teres." Morte Darthur, B. viii. c. 41, vol. i. p. 310, ed. Southey: "Many a wydowe with wepyng teyres Ther makes they fette away." The Battle of Otterbourne,-Percy's Rel. of A. E. P. vol. i. p. 33, ed. 1794: "the weeping teares Of widdows, virgins, nurses, sucking babes." weet, to know, vii. 498. A Pleasant Commodie called Looke about you, 1600, sig. B). weigh out, to outweigh, to counterbalance: They that must weigh out my afflictions, v. 527. weird sisters,-The, vii. 8, 14, 21, 42, 50; the weird women, vii. 31 : "Weird Sisters, the Fates. This corresponds to Lat. Parca. 'The remanant hereof, quhat euer be it, The weird sisteris defendis that suld be wit.' Doug. Virgil, 80. 48; i.e. forbid that it should be known. 'The weird sisters wandring, as they were wont then,' &c. Montgomerie, Watson's Coll. iii. 12. A. S. wyrd, fatum, fortuna, eventus; Wyrde, Fata, Parcæ," &c. Jamieson's Etym. Dict. of the Scot. Lang. &c.: "Cloto. . . anglice, one of the thre wyrde systers." Ortus Vocabulorum, ed. 1514: Holinshed (on whose narrative Shakespeare formed his Macbeth), speaking of the "three women in strange and wild apparell, resembling creatures of elder world," who prophesied to Macbeth and Banquo, and then disappeared, observes, "afterwards the common opinion was, that these women were either the weird sisters, that is (as ye would say) the goddesses of destinie, or else some nymphs or feiries," &c. Chronicles (Scotland), vol. v. pp. 268-9, ed. 1807-8. welkin, the sky, i. 177, 355; ii. 184; iii. 347; iv. 68, 71, 345; v. 452; vi. 318 (twice); viii. 270. welkin eye, a sky-coloured, a sky-blue eye, iii. 424. well, at rest, happy: the former queen is well, iii. 491; seeing that she is well, vi. 459; Then she is well, vi. 462; we use To say the dead are well, vii. 525. well-advised: see advised. well-appointed: see appointed. well desir'd," much solicited by invitation" (STEEVENS): you shall be well desir'd in Cyprus, vii. 400. well-favoured, good-looking, i. 274, 371; ii. 109; iii. 339; vii. 291; viii. 48: see favour. well-fitted, "well-qualified" (JOHNSON): Well-fitted in the arts, ii. 176. WELL-A-NEAR-WHAT. 497 well-a-near, viii. 36: "This exclamation is equivalent to well-aday, and is still used in Yorkshire, where I have often heard it. The Glossary to The Praise of Yorkshire Ale, 1697, says-wellaneerin is lack-a-day or alas, alas !" (REED): So in Coles's Lat. and Engl. Dict., "Well a day, Well a-neer, Well a way, Eheu.” well-found-In what he did profess, iii. 225: Here Steevens explains well-found "of known, acknowledged excellence," Mr. Grant White "well furnished :" well skilled? well-liking, good-conditioned, plump, ii. 218: see liking. well said, equivalent to "well done :" Well said! thou lookest cheerly, iii. 30; Well said, Hall! iv. 285; Well said, i' faith, Wart, iv. 361 ; well said, Davy, iv. 393; Well said, my masters, v. 125; Why, that's well said, v. 153; Well said, my lord, v. 501; 0, well said, Lucius! vi. 333; Well said, my hearts! vi. 406; 0, that's well said ;—the chair, vii. 457; this way; well said, vii. 567; Well said, well said, viii. 41. (I believe I was the first to point out the meaning of this expression, which occurs very frequently in our early writers.) well scen, well-skilled, proficient, iii. 124. Welsh hook-Upon the cross of a, iv. 241: A Welsh hook was a sort of bill, hooked at the end, and with a long handle: "Minsheu, in his Dict. [sub "Hooke"], 1617, explains it thus; 'Armorum genus est ære in falcis modum incurvato, pertica longissimæ præfixo.' Cotgrave calls it 'a long hedging-bill, about the length of a partisan'" (MALONE): and see sword-To swear by a. wend, to go, i. 503; ii. 9, 301; iii. 457. wesand, the throat, i. 212. westward-ho! iii. 363: one of the exclamations of the watermen who plied on the Thames (So in Peele's Edward I.; "Q. Elinor. Ay, good woman, conduct me to the court, That there I may bewail my sinful life, And call to God to save my wretched soul. [A cry of Westward, ho!' Woman, what noise is this I hear? Potter's Wife. An like your grace, it is the watermen that call for passengers to go westward now." Works, p. 409, ed. Dyce, 1861: and in Day's Isle of Guls; "A stranger? the better welcome: comes hee East-ward, West-ward, or North-ward hoe?" Sig. A 2, ed. 1606). whales-bone-As white as, ii. 220: Our ancient writers appear to have supposed that ivory, formerly made of the teeth of the walrus, was part of the bones of the whale (This simile was a standard one with the earliest English poets). what is he for a fool that betroths himself to unquietness? ii. 84: The expression what is he for a fool is equivalent to "what manner of fool is he?"-"what fool is he?" (Compare Middleton's A Mad World, my Masters; What is she for a fool would marry thee, a KK 498 WHEEL WHERE. madman ?" Works, vol. ii. p. 421, ed. Dyce: and Warner's Syrinx, &c. ; "And what art thou for a man that thou shouldest be fastidious of the acquaintance of men ?" Sig. Q 4 verso, ed. 1597.) wheel becomes it!—O, how the, vii. 184: Malone was "inclined to think that wheel is here used in its ordinary sense, and that these words allude to the occupation of the girl who is supposed to sing the song alluded to by Ophelia :" but most critics seem now to agree with Steevens in supposing that wheel signifies the burden or refrain of the song. wheels! That it (the world) might go on, vii. 535: A proverbial expression; which Taylor the water-poet made the title of one of his pamphlets,―The World runnes on wheeles, or, Oddes betwixt Carts and Coaches. Wheeson-week, the Hostess's blunder for Whitsun-week, iv. 331. whelk'd, "twisted, convolved. A welk or whilk is a small shellfish ["The Welke (a shell-fish): Turbin." Cotgrave's Fr. and Engl. Dict.]" (MALONE), vii. 324. whelks, wheals, pustules (“ A whelk, Papula, pustula." Coles's Lat. and Engl. Dict.), iv. 462. when? an expression of impatience: Come, thou tortoise! when? i. 187; Why, when, I say? iii. 153; When, Harry? when? iv. 109; Nay, when? v. 306; When, Lucius, when? vi. 630 (This expression is occasionally found in dramatists long after Shakespeare's time; e.g. in the Duke of Buckingham's Rehearsal; "Where the devil is he?—Why, Prettyman? why, when, I say?" Works, vol. i. p. 63, ed. 1775). when? can you tell? ii. 23; when? canst tell? iv. 224: a proverbial expression. ("Still good in Law; ile fetch him ore of all, When, can you tell?” Day's Law-Trickes, 1608, sig. D3.) whenas, when: Whenas your husband, all in rage, ii. 42; Whenas the enemy hath been ten to one, v. 245; Whenas the noble Duke of York was slain, v. 253; whenas he meant all harm, v. 320; Whenas the one is wounded with the bait, vi. 337; Whenas a lion's whelp shall, &c. vii. 734; Whenas I met the boar, viii. 272; Whenas thy love hath cast his utmost sum, viii. 373; Whenas himself to singing he betakes, viii. 457; Whenas thine eye hath chose the dame, viii. 462. wher, whether, i. 229; iv. 7, 17; v. 160, 164, 415; vi. 616, 683, 684; viii. 249, 378. : where, whereas where I thought the remnant of mine age, &c. i. 293; Where now his knowledge must prove ignorance, ii. 178; where thou now exact'st the penalty, ii. 395; Where I was wont to feed you with my blood, v. 69; Where Reignier sooner will receive than give, WHERE-WHIPPING-CHEER. 499 v. 80; Where, from thy sight, I should be raging mad, v. 163; where th' other instruments Did see and hear, vi. 137; where I thought to crush him, vi. 158; where, if you violently proceed, vii. 260 ; Where now you're both a father and a son, viii. 10; Where now his son's like glow-worm in the night, viii. 27; Where this man calls me traitor, viii. 173; Where now I have no one to blush with me, viii. 310. where my poor young was lim'd, was caught, and kill'd-Have now the fatal object in my eye, v. 316: In this passage (which Shakespeare retained from The True Tragedie, &c.) where is very licentiously used. where that, whereas: And where that you have vow'd to study, ii. 205. whereas, where: Whereas the king and queen do mean to hawk, v. 117; Whereas no glory's got to overcome, viii. 18; whereas he stood, viii. 456. wherein went he? how was he dressed? iii. 41. can force his whether, whichever, which of the two whether cousin, viii. 177; Whether I lov'd, viii. 185. whiffler, iv. 495: "The term is undoubtedly borrowed from whiffle, another name for a fife or small flute; for whifflers were originally those who preceded armies or processions as fifers or pipers. . . . In process of time the term whiffler, which had always been used in the sense of a fifer, came to signify any person who went before in a procession" (DOUCE). while, until: While we return these dukes what we decree, iv. 116; Read o'er this paper while the glass doth come, iv. 164; while then, God b' wiyou! vii. 32 (The word occurs with this meaning even in Defoe's Colonel Jack; "I could not rest night or day while I made the people easy from whom the things were taken," p. 55, ed. 1738). whileas, while: Whileas the silly owner of the goods, &c. v. 115 (where by mistake is printed "While as"). while-ere, ere- while, some time before, i. 213. while the grass grows,—the proverb is something musty, vii. 162: Malone quotes this proverb in full from Whetstone's Promos and Cassandra, 1578, Whylst grass doth growe, oft sterves the seely steede;" and from The Paradise of Daintie Devises, 1578 [first ed. 1576], "While grass doth growe, the silly horse he starves:" I find it, with a variation, in Whitney's Emblemes, 1586; "While grasse doth growe, the courser faire doth sterue." p. 26. whiles, until: Whiles you are willing it shall come to note, iii. 384. whip of your bragg'd progeny―That was the, vi. 154: see note 52, vi. 246. whipping-cheer, iv. 397: "Whipping-cheer, Verbera.” “Verberi'bus accipere, to give one whipping Chear." Coles's Lat. & Engl. Dict. 500 WHIPSTOCK-WHORES. whipstock, the stock or handle of a whip, sometimes put for the whip itself, iii. 346; viii. 26 (where, as Steevens observes, it means "the carter's whip"), 131. whist, still, hushed, i. 189. whistle her off, and let her down the wind, To prey at fortune-Id, vii. 424: "Ajetter un oiseau. To cast, or whistle, off a hawke; to let her goe, let her flie." Cotgrave's Fr. and Engl. Dict.: “The falconers always let fly the hawk against the wind; if she flies with the wind behind her, she seldom returns. If therefore a hawk was for any reason to be dismissed, she was let down the wind, and from that time shifted for herself, and preyed at fortune" (JOHNSON). white-The; see clout: though you hit the white (with a quibbling allusion to the name Bianca), iii. 179. White Hart in Southwark-That you should leave me at the, v. 182: A quibble (white heart),-" that you should desert me like cowards:" The White Hart is described as having stood "on the east side of the Borough of Southwark, towards the south end ;" see Cunningham's Handbook for London. white herring-Two, Two fresh (opposed to red) herrings, vii. 306. white-livered, iv. 452; v. 437: "Pusillanime. Dastardly, cow ardly, faint-hearted, white-liuered." Cotgrave's Fr. and Engl. Dict. whitely, whitish: A whitely wanton, ii. 187 (In illustration of this passage, the Rev. W. R. Arrowsmith, having remarked that "whiteness is a peculiar attribute of dark features," cites from Heywood's Troja Britannica, 66 'That hath a whitely face, and a long nose, And for them both I wonderous well esteeme her." Cant. v. st. 74; "which lines," he says, "do not merely furnish an instance of the epithet 'whitely,' but, in such company as parallels Shakespeare's coupling of it with 'a wanton;'" for "wantonness' and 'a long nose'" were considered by our early writers as near allied: see Shakespeare's Editors and Commentators, p. 4, note). whither, whithersoever: Whither I go, thither shall you go too, 232; A fool go with thy soul, whither it goes! iv. 281. whiting-time, bleaching-time, i. 383. whitsters, bleachers of linen, i. 381. whittle, a small clasp-knife, vi. 570. whoobub, a hubbub, iii. 484; viii. 155. iv. who, for whoever: "Who's a traitor, Gloster he is none," v. 148. whoop, to exclaim with surprise: That admiration did not whoop at them, iv. 440. whooping-Out of all, Out of all measure, iii. 41 (Akin to this are the phrases Out of all cry and Out of all ho). whores indulgences to sin-Thou that giv'st, v. 15: The stews in |