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changes incident to vehement and ungovernable minds.

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JOHNS.

P. 145. 1. 21. Thou art perfect the Perfect is often ased by Shakespeare for certain, well affured, or well informed. JOHNS. P. 146. 1. 20. This quas so,- -] rather think ShakeSpeare wrote soo TH, . . a truth, a reality. WARB. P. 147. 1, 19. A favage clamour.] This clamour was the cry of the dogs and hunters; then feeing the bear, he cries, this is the chace, or, the animal pursued. JOHNS. L. 22. Ten and thres and twenty.] Read thirteen and three and twenty. CAP.

P. 148. 15. But I am not te fay, it is a jea, for it is now the sky; betwixt the firmament and it, you cannot thrust a badkin's paine.] I will not be pofitive, our author had Don Quixote here in his eye; but Sancho facetiously fays fomething very like this. Entre el fr y el no de la Muger no me atrever ia yo a poner una punta d' alfiler. Between a woman's ay and no I would not undertake to thrust a pin's point. This changeableness our author, in his Lear has finely call'd, the undistinguish'd space of woman's will. THEOR

L 24 And then for the land-fervice.] Every one fees the humour of this military expreffion of land fervice; and how well it is adapted to the character. Yet the Oxford editor alters it to land-fight. WARD

P. 149. . g. Shep. Would, I had been by to have help'd the old man Tho' all the printed copies concur in this reading, I am perfuaded, we ought to reftore, Nobleman. The thepherd knew nothing of Antigonus's age; befides, the clown had just told his father, that he faid, his name was Antigonus a nobleman, and no less than three times in this short scene, the clown, fpeaking of him, calls him the gentleman. THEOB. and REVI.

L. 15. In former copies, You're a mad old man; · if the fins of your youth are forgiven you, you're well to live. gold ball gold!

This the

alown fays upon his opening his fardel, and difcovering the wealth in it. But this is no reason why he fhould call his father a mad old man. I have ventur'd to corre& in the text -Yu're a made old man, i. e. your fortune's made

by this adventitious treafure. So our poet, in a number of other paffages.

THEOB.

P. 149. I. 30. Enter Time as chorus.] Mr. Theobald and Mr. Warburton have very injudiciously placed this chorus at the end of the third act, which ought (as in Capel) to be in the beginning of the fourth; for its purpofe is to prepare the Spectator for a new scene of action, at a greatly diftant time, in a different court, and in which perfons are introduced with whom without this inftruction he would be ut terly unacquainted. I am perfuaded however, from the infipid flatness of the expreffion, and the poornefs of the fentiment that this chorus is an interpolation of the players, and not the genuine product of Shakespeare's pen. REVI.* Ibid.] I believe this chorus rather begins the fourth act than concludes the third,

JOHNS.

P. 150. l. 1. that make and unfold error;] This does not, in my opinion, take in the poet's thought. Time does not make mistakes, and difcover them, at different conjunctures; but the poet means, that time often. for a seafon covers errors, which he afterwards difplays and brings to light. I chufe therefore to read; that mask and unfold error.

THEOB. and REVE.

L. 5. and leave the GROWTH untry'd of that wide gap: -1 The growth of what? The reading is nonfenfe. Shakespeare wrote and leave the GULF untry'd, i, e. unwaded thro'. By this means, too, the uniformity of the metaphor is restored. All the terms of the fentence, relat ing to a gu'f; as swift passage, -slide overuntry'dwide gap.

WARB

Ibid. This emendation is plaufible, but the common reading is confiftent enough with our author's manner, who attends more to his ideas than to his words. The growth of the wide gap, is fomewhat irregular, but he means, the growth, or progreffion of the time which filled up the gap of the ftory between Perdita's birth and her fixteenth year. To leave this growth untried, is to leave the passages of the intermediate years unnated and unexamined. Untried is not, perhaps, the word which he would have chofen, but which his rhyme required, JOHNS. and REVI

L. 6.

- fince it is in my power, &c.] The reasoning of Time is not very clear; he feems to mean, that he who has broke fo many laws, may now break another; that he who introduced every thing may introduce Perdita ca her fixteenth year; and he intreats that he may pafs as of old, before any order or fucceffion of objects, ancient or modern, diftinguished her periods.

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Gentle fpectators, that I now
In fair Bohemia ;

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-] Time is

JOHNS.

every where

alike. I know not whether both fenfe and grammar may

not dictate,

imagine we,

Gentle fp Elator, that you now may be, &c. Let us imagine that you, who behold thefe scenes, are now in Bohemia.

JOHNS. L. 28. argument is the fame with fubje&. JOHNS. P. 151, 1. 4. Fifteen years.] Read, "Sixteen years." CAPELL. L. 18. and my profit therein the HEAPING fiends] This is nonfenie. We should re d, REAPING friendships. The King had faid his ftudy fhould be to reward his friend's deferts; and then concludes, that his profit in this study fhould be reaping the fruits of his friend's attachment to him; which refers to what he had before faid of the neceffity of Camillo's ftay, or otherwise he could not reap the fruit of those bufines, which Camillo had cut out. WARB.

Tod.] I fee not that the prefent reading is nonfenfe; the fenfe of heaping friendship is, though like many others of our author's' unusual, at leaft unufual to modern ears, not very obfcure. To be more thankful fhall be my study; and my profit therein the heaping friendships." That is, I will for the future be more liberal of recompence, from which I shall receive this advantage, that as I heap benefits I shall heap friendships, as I confer favours on thee, I fhall encrease the friendship between us.

JOHNS. and REVI. P. 152, 1. 2. but I kave (MISSINGLY) noted,] We should tead, but I have (MISSING HIM) noted. This accounts for

the reafon of his taking note, because he often missed him, that is, wanted his agreeable company. For a compliment is intended; and, in that fenfe, it is to be understood. The Oxford Editor reads, "musingly noted." WARB. Ibid.] I fee not how the fenfe is mended by Sir T. Hanmer's alterations, nor how it is at all changed by Dr. War JOHNS. and REVI

burton's.

P. 152, l. 15. That's likewife part of my intelligence; but I fear, the angle that plucks our fon thither.] The disjunctive here, I think, makes ftark nonfenfe of the context: and the editors have palmed an allufion in the word angle, which feems foreign to the fenfe of the paffage. As, before, in the Taming of the Shrew, angel is mistakenly put for Engle: fo, I fufpect, angle, by the fame eafy corruption, is here. THEOB *

Ibid.] I agree with Mr. Theobald that we ought to read, and I fear, instead of But I fear. But he is greatly miftaken in fubftituting Engle for Angle. According to his own interpretation in his note on the Taming of the Shrew, Engle means a Guil, a Cully, which is the direct contrary of the fenfe required. REV. Read, and I fear, CAPELL.* L. 26. Why then COMES in the faucet o' th' year:

For the red blood REIGNS in the WINTER' pale.] 1 think this nonfenfe fhould be read thus,

"Why, then COME in the fweet o' th' year;

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"'FORE the red blood REINS-in the winter pale i.e. Why then come in, or let us enjoy, pleature, while the feafon ferves, before pale winter reins-in the red or youthful blood; as much as to fay, let us enjoy life in youth, before old age comes and freezes up the blood. WARB.

Ibid.] Dr. Thirlby reade, perhaps rightly, certainly with. much more probability, and eafinefs of conftruction;

For the red blood runs in the winter pale.

That is, "for the red blood runs pale in the winter."
Sir T. Hanmer, reads,

For the red blood reigns o'er the winter's pale.

JOHNS.

P. 153, 1. 1. Pugging-tooth.] Sir T. Hanmer, and after him Dr. Warburton and Capell read, progging tooth. It is certain that pugging is not now understood. But Dr. Thirlby obferves, that this is the cant of gypsies.

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P. 153, 1. 18. My faber named me Autolicus, being litter'd under Mecury, who, as I am, was like wife a snapper up if unconfidered trifles.] The Poet's meaning feems to be this: My father named me Autolicus, because I was born under Mercury; who was a thief, as I am. The allufion is, unquestionably, to this paffage in Ovid ;

Alipedis, de ftirpe dei, verfuta protago

Nafcitur Autolycus, furtum ingeniofus ad omne.
Metam. lib. xi.

THEOB.* Ibid. Mr. Theobald fays, "the allufion is unquestionably to Ovid." He is miftaken. Not only the allution, but the whole fpeech is taken from Lucian; who appears to have been one of our Poet's favourite authors, as may be col lected from feveral places of his work. It is from "his difcourfe on judicial Aftrology," where Autolicus talks much in the fame manner; and it is only on this account that he is called the fon of Mercury by the antients, namely because he was born under that planet. And as the infant was fuppofed by the Aftrologers to communicate of the nature of the far which predominated, fo Autolicus was a thief. WARB.

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L. 21. my revenue is the filly chat.] Silly is ufed by the writers of our author's time, for fimple, low, mean; and in this the humour of the fpeech confifts. I do not afpire to arduous and high things, as bridewell or the gallows; I am content with this humble and low way of life, as a fnapper up of unconfidered trifles." But the Oxford Editor, who by his emendations, feems to have declared war against all Shakespeare's humour, alters it to the fly cheat. WARB P.154, 1.5. Three-man Songmen all, and very good ones.] By a three-man forgfter, we are to understand, a finger of catches: which catches were then, and are now most commonly, in thrie paits. THEOB.*

JOHNS.

L. 13. I believe me, fhould be blotted out. P. 155, 1. 13. with trol-my-dames: Troumadame, French. The game of nine-holes. WARB. Trol-madames. CAP.* L.18. but abide] to abide, here, ruft fignify to f journ,to live for a time without a fettled habitation.

JOHNS. L. 21. motion of the prodigal fon,] i. e. the Puppet-sbew, then called Motions, A term frequently occurring in our

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