FIRAGO-FISH.

165

destroyed, and of them was made a plain field to shoot in. It was called Finsbury field, in which there were three windmills, and here they usually shoot at twelve score: Stow, 1633, p. 913. In Jonson's time, this was the usual resort of the plainer citizens. People of fashion, or who aspired to be thought so, probably mixed but little in those parties; and hence we may account for the indignation of Master Stephen at being suspected of such vulgarity [see Jonson's Every Man in his Humour, act i. sc. 1]. An idea of a similar kind occurs in Shakespeare, 'As if thou ne'er walk'dst,' &c.” Gifford's note on Jonson's Works, vol. i. p. 10. firago-1 have not seen such a, iii. 372: “firago.. a corruption for virago, like fagaries for vagaries" (MALONE): Sir Toby means, "I never saw one that had so much the look of woman with the prowess of man" (JOHNSON): "The word virago is certainly inapplicable to a man, a blustering hectoring fellow, as Sir Toby means to represent Viola; for he cannot possibly entertain any suspicion of her sex: but it is no otherwise so than Rounceval is to a woman, meaning a terrible fighting blade; from Ronceval or Roncesvalles, the famous scene of that fabulous combat with the Saracens, 'When Charlemagne and all his peerage fell, By Fontarabia'" (RITSON).

•

fire is in mine ears?— What, ii. 108: "Alluding to a proverbial saying of the common people, that their ears burn when others are talking of them" (WARBURTON).

fire, fire; cast on no water, iii. 155: "There is an old popular catch of three parts in these words;

'Scotland burneth, Scotland burneth.
Fire, fire ;-Fire, fire;

Cast on some more water.''

(BLACKSTONE).

firebrand brother-Our, vi. 41: "Hecuba, when pregnant with Paris, dreamed she should be delivered of a burning torch " (STEEVENS).

fire-drake-That, v. 571: The word fire-drake had several meanings -viz. a fiery dragon, a meteor, and a sort of fire-work: that here it is used to describe a person with a red nose is proved by what immediately precedes.

fire-new, (newly come from the fire) bran-new, ii. 165; iii. 359; v.

357; viii. 115.

firk, iv. 493 (twice): Seems to mean "beat:" "The word firk is so variously used by the old writers, that it is almost impossible to ascertain its precise meaning" (STEEVENS).

first son

-My, vi. 220: Here first is explained by Warburton "noblest and most eminent of men."

fish lives in the sea—!

—The, vi. 389: see note 22, vi. 389.

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FISH-FLAW.

fish-Here's another ballad, Of a, &c., iii. 471: Mr. Collier is, I believe, right when, in opposition to Malone, he denies that here we have an allusion to a particular publication: Shakespeare, he thinks, does not refer to any one of the many productions of this kind, but to the whole class.

fishmonger-You are a, vii. 342: "Perhaps a joke was here intended. Fishmonger was a cant term for a wencher" (MALONE). fit or two o' the face-A, A grimace or two, v. 487.

fits-Well you say so in, vi. 55: "A quibble is intended. A fit was a

part or division of a song [or ballad] or tune. The equivoque lies between fits, starts or sudden impulses, and fits in its musical acceptation" (SINGER).

fitchew, a polecat, vi. 104 ; viii. 97; (as a cant term for a strumpet), viii. 212.

fitly, exactly even so most fitly As you malign our senators, vi. 136. five-finger-tied-Knot, "A knot tied by giving her hand to Diomed" (JOHNSON), Vi. III.

five wits: see wits, &c.

fives-The, An inflammation of the parotid glands in horses (Fr. avives), iii. 148.

fixure, fixture, fixedness, iii. 507; vi. 24. flap-dragon-A, ii. 219; flap-dragons, iv. 344: "A flap-dragon is some small combustible body, fired at one end, and put afloat in a glass of liquor. It is an act of a toper's dexterity to toss off the glass in such a manner as to prevent the flap-dragon from doing mischief" (JOHNSON): In former days gallants used to vie with each other in drinking off flap-dragons to the health of their mistresses,—which flap-dragons were generally raisins, and sometimes even candles' ends, swimming in brandy or other strong spirits, whence, when on fire, they were snatched by the mouth and swallowed.

flap-dragoned it, swallowed it as gallants in their revels swallow a flap-dragon, iii. 453.

flap-jacks, pancakes, ix. 29.

flask, a soldier's powder-horn: The carved-bone face on a flask, ii. 244. flaunts, fineries, showy attire: in these my borrow'd flaunts, iii. 462. flaw, a sudden and violent blast of wind ("A flaw (or gust) of wind. Tourbillon de vent." Cotgrave's Fr. and Engl. Dict.: “A flaw of wind is a gust, which is very violent upon a sudden, but quickly endeth." Smith's Sea Grammar, 1627, p. 46: the second of these quotations I owe to Mr. Bolton Corney): standing every flaw, vi.

FLAW-FLOWER-DE-LUCE.

167

255; the winter's flaw, vii. 418; I do not fear the flaw, ix. 50; foul flaws, ix. 238.

flaw, a tempestuous uproar, a stormy tumult: this mad-bred flaw, v.

160.

flaw, a sudden commotion of mind : 0, these flaws and starts, vii. 251. flaw-How Antony becomes his, "How Antony conforms himself to this breach of his fortune" (JOHNSON), viii. 326.

flaws, congealèd in the spring of day, iv. 379: Here Edwards rightly explains flaws to mean "small blades of ice;" I have myself heard the word used to signify both "thin cakes of ice” and “the bursting of those cakes."

flecked, spotted, dappled, vi. 410.

fleet, to float: Have knit again, and fleet, viii. 333.

fleet, to make to pass: fleet the time, iii. 9.

fleeting, inconstant: false, fleeting ("changing sides," JOHNSON),

perjur'd Clarence, v. 362; the fleeting moon, viii. 375 (The word fleeting applied to a person, as in the first of the above passages, is of very rare occurrence: I therefore notice that Sir John Harington, in his Orlando Furioso, has

"But Griffin (though he came not for this end,

For praise and bravery at tilt to run,

But came to find his fleeting female friend)," &c. B. xvii. st. 18).

fleshment, "pride, encouraged by a successful attempt; being fleshed with, or having tasted success" (Nares's Gloss.), viii. 45. flew'd, having large hanging flews or chaps, ii. 311. Flibbertigibbet, viii. 70, 84: This fiend is called Fliberdigibbet

and Fliberdigibet in Harsnet's Declaration of egregious Popish Impostures, 1603, pp. 49, 119; which book Shakespeare is supposed to have used for the names of several fiends in King Lear.

flight-At the, At the shooting with flights, long and light-feathered arrows that went straight to the mark, ii. 74.

flirt-gills, flirting gills,-wenches of light behaviour, vi. 417.

Florentius' love-Be she as foul as was, Be she as ugly as was, &c., iii. 121: 66 The allusion is to a story told by Gower in the First Book De Confessione Amantis. Florent is the name of a knight who had bound himself to marry a deformed hag, provided she taught him the solution of a riddle on which his life depended" (STEEVENS): The story is of great antiquity.

flote, flood, wave, sea (now generally referred to the Anglo-Saxon; but Minsheu has " A flote or waue. G. Flot. L. Fluctus." The Guide into Tongues, ed. 1617), i. 207.

flower-de-luce being one!—Lilies of all kinds, The, iii. 466: “I

168

FLUELLEN-FOOL.

think the flower meant by the poet is the white lily (Lilium Album)." Beisly's Shakspere's Garden, &c., p. 84.

Fluellen, iv. 452, &c.: “This is only the Welsh pronunciation of Lluellyn. Thus also Floyd instead of Lloyd" (STEEVENS).

fluxive, flowing with tears, ix. 415.

flying at the brook: see brook, &c.

foin, to push, to thrust, in fencing ("Estoquer. To thrust, or foyne at.” Cotgrave's Fr. and Engl. Dict.), i. 398; iv. 324 ; foining, ii. 137; iv. 344.

foins, pushes, thrusts: no matter vor your foins, viii. 101.

foison, plenty, store, i. 223, 255, 472; viii. 298; ix. 198, 358; foisons, vii. 273.

fold up Parca's fatal web, "put thee to death" (JOHNSON), iv. 509. folly, depravity, wantonness: She turn'd to folly, viii. 238; feeds his vulture folly, ix. 288; tyrant folly lurk in gentle (well-born) breasts, ix. 297.

fond, to dote: I fond as much on him, iii. 355.

• ..

fond, foolish, simple, silly: this fond Love, i. 345; fond (=foolishly valued) shekels, i. 488; fond wretch, i. 541 ; how fond I am, ii. 301; thou art so fond, ii. 389; so fond to overcome, iii. 28; Fond done (=foolishly done, but the line seems to be corrupted), iii. 214; fond mad woman, iv. 181; fond woman, ibid.; vi. 305; thou fond many, iv. 323; to see your ladyship so fond, v. 34; If it be fond, v. 149; this fond affiance, v. 150; I wonder he's so fond, v. 391; I, too fond, v. 399; this fond exploit, v. 457; 'Tis fond to wail, vi. 219; fond mad man, vi. 439; prove so fond, vii. 19; fond men, vii. 52 ; Be not fond, vii. 146; an idle and fond bondage, viii. 19; fond paradoxes, viii. 161; peevish-fond, v. 435 (see peevish); fonder than ignorance, vi. 7.

fondly, foolishly: how fondly dost thou reason! ii. 44; fondly pass our proffer'd offer, iv. 23; speak fondly, iv. 159; fondly dost thou spur, iv. 166; Fondly brought here, iv. 374; fondly gave away, v. 254; fondly you would here impose, v. 409.

fool and death-To please the, ix. 54: “I have seen (though present means of reference to it are beyond my reach) an old Flemish print in which Death is exhibited in the act of plundering a miser of his bags, and the Fool (discriminated by his bauble, &c.) is standing behind, and grinning at the process" (STEEVENS): "Cerimon in most express terms declares that he feels more real satisfaction in his liberal employment as a physician, than he should in the uncertain pursuit of honour, or in the mere accumulation of wealth; which would assimilate him to a miser, the result of whose labour is merely to entertain the fool and death. . . . The allusion therefore

FOOL.

169

is to some such print as Mr. Steevens happily remembered to have seen, in which death plunders the miser of his money-bags, whilst the fool is grinning at the process. It may be presumed that these subjects were common in Shakespeare's time. They might have ornamented the poor man's cottage in the shape of rude prints, or have been introduced into halfpenny ballads long since consigned to oblivion. The miser is at all times fair game; and to prove that this is not a chimerical opinion, and at the same time to show the extensive range of this popular subject, a few prints of the kind shall be mentioned. I. Death and the two misers, by Michael Pregel. 2. An old couple counting their money, death and two devils attending, a mezzotint by Vander Bruggen. 3. A similar mezzotint by Meheux without the devils. 4. An old print on a single sheet of a dance of death, on which both the miser and the fool are exhibited in the clutches of the grim monarch. The rear may be closed with the same subject as represented in the various dances of death that still remain. Nor should it be concluded that because these prints exhibit no fool to grin at the impending scene, others might not have done so. The satirical introduction of this character on many occasions supports the probability that they did. Thus in a painting of the school of Holbein, an old man makes love to a girl, attended by a fool and death, to show, in the first instance, the folly of the thing, and, in the next, its consequences. It is unnecessary to pursue the argument, as every print of the above kind that may in future occur will itself speak much more forcibly than any thing which can here be added" (DoUCE).

fool-Merely, thou art death's, i. 500: The allusion in this passage is to a struggle between Death and the Fool; and would certainly seem to have no connection with the allusion in the passage of Pericles," To please the fool and death :" "Bishop Warburton and Mr. Malone have referred to old Moralities, in which the fool escaping from the pursuit of Death is introduced. Ritson has denied the existence of any such farces, and he is perhaps right with respect to printed ones; but vestiges of such a drama were observed several years ago at the fair of Bristol by the present writer [See what follows]" (DouUCE): "Mr. Douce, to whom our readers are indebted for several happy illustrations of Shakespeare, assures me that some years ago, at a fair in a large market-town, he observed a solitary figure sitting in a booth, and apparently exhausted with fatigue. This person was habited in a close black vest painted over with bones in imitation of a skeleton. But my informant being then very young, and wholly uninitiated in theatrical antiquities, made no inquiry concerning so whimsical a phenomenon. [Douce observes that the following additional circumstances communicated by him to Steevens had probably escaped his recollection," that his informant concerning the skeleton character at the fair remembered also to have seen another personage in the habit of a fool; and that arriving when the performances at