SCENE III. P. 153. We have here a very important emendation, supplying a whole line, evidently deficient, and yet never missed by any of the commentators. It is in one of the speeches of Sir Eglamour, wherein he consents to aid Silvia in her escape. Until now, it has run : "Madam, I pity much your grievances; Which since I know they virtuously are plac'd, I give consent to go along with you.” Here there is no connection between the first and the second lines, because Sir Eglamour could not mean that the " "grievances," but that the affections of Silvia were "virtuously placed." Shakespeare must, therefore, have written what we find in an adjoining blank space of the folio, 1632, which makes the sense complete : "Madam, I pity much your grievances, And the most true affections that you bear; I give consent to go along with you." We shall hereafter see that other passages, more or less valuable, are supplied by the corrector of the folio, 1632. These were, probably, obtained from some better manuscript than that used by the old printer. SCENE IV. P. 155. Proteus having sent a little dog as a present to Silvia, meets Launce, and learns that the latter, having lost the little dog, had offered to the lady his own huge cur. him, "What! didst thou offer her this cur from me?" Proteus asks The word cur being derived from the manuscript of the corrector, and necessary to the completion of the line. Besides this novelty, there is an emendation of Launce's reply, which explains a point never yet properly understood. The folio, 1623, reads: "Ay, sir: the other squirrel was stolen from me by the hangman's boys in the market-place," &c, The folio, 1632, gives the hangman only one boy,-" by the hangman's boy in the market-place;" but the true reading seems to be that of the corrected folio, 1632, where "a hangman boy” is used just in the same way that Shakespeare elsewhere speaks of a gallows-boy,-" Ay, sir: the other squirrel was stolen from me by a hangman boy in the market-place;" that is, by a rascally boy. P. 157. We give the following to show how Shakespeare's verse has probably been corrupted. Julia, presenting Silvia with a paper, says, "Madam, please you peruse this letter:" a line which requires two additional syllables, naturally, and most likely truly, furnished by the corrector of the folio, 1632:— "Madam, so please you to peruse this letter." Two little words, not absolutely necessary to the sense, but absolutely necessary to the measure, were omitted by the copyist, or by the old printer. P. 159. It is worth notice that Julia, descanting on Silvia's picture, says, in the first folio, that "her eyes are gray as glass," which may be right; but which the second folio alters to "her eyes are gray as grass," which must be wrong. The manuscript-corrector of the folio, 1632, converts "gray" into green-" her eyes are green as grass;" and such we have good reason to suppose was the true reading. ACT V. SCENE II. P. 162. The sudden entrance of the Duke is not marked in the old copies, and is supplied in manuscript in the folio, 1632, Enter Duke, angerly; and his first speech is there thus corrected : "How now, Sir Proteus! How now, Thurio! The folio, 1623, gives the last line,— "Which of you saw Eglamour of late?" : And the folio, 1632, before it was corrected in manuscript,— "Which of you, say, saw Sir Eglamour of late?" There is no note when the Duke goes out, but Exit in haste, is written in the margin. The additional stage-directions in the corrected folio, 1632, are very numerous throughout this play; but they are, in general, merely explanatory of what may be gathered from the text, so that it is seldom necessary to remark upon them. They must have been intended to make what is technically termed the stage-business quite intelligible. P. 164. Two passages in the speech of Valentine, as they appear in all the printed copies, and as they stand in the manuscript of the corrector of the folio, 1632, require notice, on account of valuable emendations. The usual opening is in these lines :— "How use doth breed a habit in a man! This shadowy desert, unfrequented woods, The manuscript-corrector renders the second line,- Lower down we are informed, in an unprinted stage-direction, that shouts are heard, and then follow these lines: "These my rude mates, that make their wills their law, which is certainly better than the common mode of printing the passage, which leaves the verb "have" without any antecedent:"These are my mates, that make their wills their law, Have some unhappy passenger in chace." The first speech of Proteus to Silvia, on entering, is also altered by reading "have" having, and by making the sentence continuous, as in the old copies, and not, as in modern editions, terminating it by a period at the end of the fourth line. The corrector of the folio, 1632, puts it in this amended form :— "Madam, this service having done for you, (Though you respect not aught your servant doth) To hazard life, and rescue you from him, That would have forc'd your honor and your love, SCENE IV. P. 166. It is admitted by the commentators that the measure in the following extract is defective: they have tried to amend it in various ways, but they have not been so fortunate as to hit upon the right changes. We first quote the passage as Malone regulates it, and follow it by the alteration recommended by the corrector of the folio, 1632. Valentine says "The private wound is deepest: O time most accurst! Prot. My shame and guilt confounds me!" Malone, in justification, observes that Shakespeare sometimes employs lines of twelve syllables; but here, in three lines, we have three varieties; the first line is of twelve syllables, the second of ten, and the third of only seven. We are far from wishing to reduce the language of Shakespearse to a finger-counting standard, but the subsequent emendation shows, at all events, that at an early date the passage was deemed corrupt, and that it ought to run as follows:: "The private wound is deep'st. O time accurst, 'Mongst all my foes, a friend should be the worst! Prot. My shame and desperate guilt at once confound me!" It seems more than likely that we have here recovered the language of Shakespeare; and it is to be remarked that the lines of the poet are regular, both before and after the preceding quotation. P. 170. The following manuscript emendation in the corrected folio, 1632, tends to establish that conclude was the right word, and that "include," adopted by editors from the folios, was a misprint : "Come; let us go: we will conclude all jars With triumphs, mirth, and rare solemnity." The epithet "rare," in the folio, 1623, is all in the folio, 1632; but restored to "rare" by the manuscript-corrector, perhaps from the prior edition, or possibly on some other authority. In all impressions the word stripling, in the next line but two, is omitted in the following speech by Valentine, introducing Julia to the Duke, "What think you of this stripling page, my lord?" Stripling is written in the margin of the corrected folio, 1632, as well as Valentine at the end of the next line but one, where it must have been accidentally left out :— "What mean you by that saying, Valentine?" The two lines which close the play are in rhyme, according to the same authority. In the folio, 1623, they do not rhyme, and there stand,— "That done, our day of marriage shall be yours; One feast, one house, one mutual happiness." The manuscript-corrector of the folio, 1632, tells us that the lines ought to run as follows:: "Our day of marriage shall be yours no less,— One feast, one house, one mutual happiness." We have no doubt that this is an accurate representation of the fact: no fewer than twenty-nine of the thirty-six plays in the folio terminate with couplets; and considering, as already observed, that "The Two Gentlemen of Verona" was written at so early a date, when rhyme was popular, it would be strange if it, of all others, had been an exception. 3 |