FORM-FORTHRIGHT.

175

explanation, I can only hint a reference to the word fourcheure in Cotgrave's Dictionary" (STEEVENS): Warburton's interpretation of this passage has more recently been adopted by a gentleman (Mr. W. C. Jourdain-in Transactions of the Philological Society, 1857, p. 134), who maintains that the lady in our text is looking through her fingers just as a woman is represented doing at the drunken and naked Noah in a picture by Gozzoli in the Campo Santo, and as maids are said to do at a certain object in Jonson's Sad Shepherd: but qy. if Whose face between her forks-i.e. "Whose face half concealed by her fingers"—presages snow reads as a complete sentence? and if it be considered as such, can presages snow mean anything else than "presages a fall of snow"? Besides, does not Whose face presages snow between her forks, ie. "Whose face presages that snow lies inter femora," agree better than the other construction and explanation of the passage with what presently follows,-Down from the waist, &c. ?

form that they cannot sit at ease on the old bench—Who stand so much on the new, A quibble on the double meaning of form, vi. 414. formal, "retaining the proper and essential characteristic" (Johnson's Dict.), rational, sane: To make of him a formal man again (“to bring him back to his senses, and the forms of sober behaviour. So, in Measure for Measure, 'informal women,' for just the contrary," STEEVENS), ii. 57; any formal capacity (“any one in his senses, any one whose capacity is not disarranged, or out of form,” STEEVENS), iii. 350; the formal Vice (the Vice who "puts on a formal demeanour,” THEOBALD; "perhaps means the shrewd, the sensible Vice," MALONE; "the regular Vice, according to the form of the old dramas," Nares's Gloss., sub “Iniquity; " "the Vice who conducts himself according to a set form,” KNIGHT), v. 387 (see Vice —Like to the old, &c.); Not like a formal man (a “decent, regular” man, JOHNSON ; a man in his senses,” STEEVENS; "a man in form, i.e. shape," MALONE; a man "in a right form, an usual shape," Nares's Gloss.), viii. 289.

(C

former ensign, vii. 187: see note 100, vii. 187.

former fortune—A, vi. 259 : see note 248, vi. 259.

forslow, to delay, to loiter, v. 262.

forspent, exhausted, iv. 308; v. 259.

forespoke, spoke against, gainsaid, viii. 316.

forthcoming, in custody: Your lady is forthcoming, v. 136. forthright, a straight path: Or hedge aside from the direct forthright, vi. 71; Through forth-rights and meanders ("The passage is explained by the fact of the allusion being to an artificial maze, sometimes constructed of straight lines (forth-rights), sometimes of circles (meanders)," KNIGHT), i. 246.

176

FORTY-FOUTRA.

forty, used as "the familiar number on many occasions, where no very exact reckoning was necessary" (STEEVENS); “Anciently adopted to express a great many" (STAUNTON): forty shillings, i 366; The Humour of Forty Fancies, iii. 148 (see Humour, &c.); forty pound, iii. 390; these forty years, iv. 114; forty moys, iv. 492 ; forty year, v. 20; these forty hours, v. 534; some forty truncheoners, v. 571; forty of them, vi. 201; forty paces, viii. 284.

forty pence, no, I will bet forty pence that it does not, v. 508: "Forty-pence was, in those days, the proverbial expression of a small wager, or a small sum. Money was then reckoned by pounds, marks, and nobles. Forty-pence is half a noble, or the sixth part of a pound. Forty pence, or three and four pence, still remains, in many offices, the legal and established fee" (STEEVENS). forwearied, worn out, iv. 22.

fosset-seller, one who sells fossets or faucets (Fr. faussets), the

pipes inserted into a vessel to give vent to the liquor, and stopped up by a peg or spigot ("A fosset, dolii sipho." Coles's Lat. and Engl. Dict.), vi. 167.

fought at head-As true a dog as ever, vi. 349: “An allusion to bulldogs, whose generosity and courage are always shown by meeting the bull in front, and seizing his nose" (JOHNSON): Steevens adds, from Sir J. Davies and Marlowe's Epigrams,

""

Amongst the bears and dogs he goes; Where, whilst he skipping cries, 'To head, to head,' &c. Marlowe's Works, p. 363, ed. Dyce, 1858. foul, plain, homely, ugly: Her amber hairs for foul have amber quoted, ii. 206 (see quote); a foul slut, iii. 57; I am foul, ibid.; Foul is most foul, being foul, iii. 64; as foul as was Florentius' love, iii. 121 (see Florentius); Were I hard-favour'd, foul, ix. 227; all they foul, ix. 398.

foulness, plainness, homeliness, ugliness: praised be the gods for thy foulness, iii. 57; in love with her foulness, iii. 64.

found his state in safety-No reason Can, vii. 27: see note 52, vii. 27. found-Well, "Of known, acknowledged excellence" (STEEVENS), "well furnished" (GRANT WHITE-Wrongly), iii. 225.

foundation-God save the, ii. 144: "Such was the customary phrase

employed by those who received alms at the gates of religious houses. Dogberry, however, in the present instance, might have designed to say 'God save the founder !'" (STEEVENS.)

four hours-Any time these, iii. 503; I will peat his pate four days, iv. 509; four hours together, vii. 340; Four feasts are toward, viii. 296; fast from all four days, viii, 301: see note 55, vii. 340.

foutra for the world-A, iv. 400; A foutra for thine office, iv. 401: see

note 105,

iv. 400.

FOX-FRANCE.

177

fox-Thou diest on point of, iv. 492: "This [fox] was a familiar and favourite expression for the old English weapon, the broad-sword of Jonson's days, as distinguished from the small (foreign) sword.” Gifford's note on Jonson's Works, vol. iv. p. 429 : So in Webster's White Devil;

""

O, what blade is't?

A Toledo, or an English fox?" Works, p. 50, ed. Dyce, 1857 : "The name [fox] was given from the circumstance that Andrea Ferrara, and, since his time, other foreign sword-cutlers, adopted a fox as the blade-mark of their weapons. Swords, with a runningfox rudely engraved on the blades, are still occasionally to be met with in the old-curiosity shops of London" (STAUNTON). foxship, cunning, vi. 222.

fracted, broken, iv. 434; vii. 28.

fractions-These hard, vii. 37: "Flavius, by fractions, means broken hints, interrupted sentences, abrupt remarks" (Johnson). frame, order, disposition: frugal nature's frame, ii. 125: see note 54,

ii. 125.

frampal, frampold (different forms of the same word): to be frampal, to be peevish, froward, ix. 165; a very frampold life, a very uneasy, vexatious, turbulent life, i. 391.

France? Mess. From France to England-How goes all in, iv. 65: "The King asks how all goes in France; the Messenger catches the word goes, and answers that whatever is in France goes now into England" (JOHNSON).

France ?... In her forehead, &c.— Where, ii. 36: see Introd. to The Comedy of Errors, ii. 2.

France, Young gentlemen would be as sad as night, Only for wantonness-When I was in, iv. 58: "I doubt whether our author had any authority for attributing this species of affectation to the French. He generally ascribes the manners of England to all other countries" (MALONE): The French may or may not have been the inventors of this singular mark of gentility, which, it is well known, was once highly fashionable in England. But Nash, in one of his tracts, expressly mentions an assumed melancholy as among the follies which "idle travellers" brought home from France. The passage is very curious; "What is there in Fraunce to be learnd more than in England, but falshood in fellowship, perfect slouenrie, to loue no man but for my pleasure, to sweare Ah par la mort Dieu when a mans hammes are scabd? For the idle traueller (I meane not for the souldiour), I haue knowen some that haue continued there by the space of halfe a dozen yeare, and when they come [came] home, they haue hyd a little weerish leane face vnder a broad French hat, kept a terrible coyle with the dust in the streete in their long cloakes of gray paper, and spoke Eng

VOL. X.

M

178

FRANCISCO-FRIEND.

lish strangely. Nought else haue they profited by their trauell saue learnt to distinguish of the true Burdeaux grape, and knowe a cup of neate Gascoygne wine from wine of Orleance; yea, and peraduenture this also, to esteeme of the poxe as a pimple, to weare a veluet patch on their face, and walke melancholy with their armes folded." The Vnfortunate Traveller, Or, The Life of Jacke Wilton, 1594, sig. L 4.

،

Francisco-My, i. 398: "He means 'My Frenchman'" (MALONE). frank, a small enclosure in which animals, generally boars, were fattened, a sty (“Franc. A franke or stie, to feed and fatten hogs in.” Cotgrave's Fr. and Engl. Dict.): in the old frank, iv. 333.

frank'd up, styed up, v. 359, 440.

franklin, a freeholder, iv. 223; viii. 437 ; franklins, iii. 503.

Frateretto, viii. 74: A fiend, with whom, it would seem, Shakespeare became acquainted from Harsnet's Declaration of egregious Popish Impostures, 1603; see p. 49 of that work.

fraughting souls-The, The souls who compose the fraught or

freight, i. 198.

free, liberal: Being free itself, it thinks all others so, vii. 38. free, free from vicious taint, guiltless: More free than he is jealous, iii. 433; Make mad the guilty, and appal the free, vii. 354. free things, "states clear from distress" (JOHNSON), viii. 77. Free-town, vi. 377: see Introd. to Romeo and Juliet, vi. 370. French crown more—A, i. 463: Some of your French crowns have

no hair at all, ii, 269; the French may lay twenty French crowns to one, they will beat us; for they bear them on their shoulders, iv. 480: quibbling allusions to the baldness produced by the French (venereal) disease, which baldness was known by the name of French

crown.

fret me, you cannot play upon me—Though you can, vii. 374: "Here is a play on words, and a double meaning. Hamlet says, though you can vex me, you cannot impose on me; though you can stop the instrument, you cannot play on it" (DOUCE): see the next article.

frets, the stops of instruments of the lute or guitar kind, "small lengths of wire on which the fingers press the strings in playing the guitar" (Busby's Dict. of Musical Terms, third ed.), iii. 133.

friend, a lover—a term applied to both sexes: hath got his friend with child, i. 472; walk about with your friend, ii. 87; come in visard to my friend. ii. 237.

friend-At, On terms of friendship: all greetings, that a king, at friend, Can send his brother, iii. 496.

friend-To, "Is equivalent to 'for friend.' So we say To take to

FRIENDS-FROTH.

179

wife. The German form of to (zu) is used in a somewhat similar manner," &c. (CRAIK): we shall have him well to friend, vii. 153; As I shall find the time to friend, vii. 270; opportunity to friend, viii. 398.

friends to meet; but mountains may be removed, &c.—It is a hard matter for, iii. 49: "Alluding ironically to the proverb, 'Friends may meet, but mountains never greet.' See Ray's Collection [p. 110, ed. 1768]" (STEEVENS).

frippery, a shop for the sale of second-hand apparel (Fr. fripperie), i. 261.

from, away from, departing from: this is from my commission, iii. 328 ; any thing so overdone is from the purpose of playing, vii. 362; from the sense of all civility, viii. 136.

from my house (if I had it)—ii. 80; So, I commend me from our house in grief, ix. 310: The usual formula at the conclusion of letters in Shakespeare's time was from the house of the writer: as to the words, if I had it, in the first of these passages,—the same sort of joke is found in the translation of the Menæchmi, 1595, by W. W. [William Warner?];

"Men. What, mine owne Peniculus ?

Pen. Yours (if aith) bodie and goods, if I had any." Sig. B. front, a beginning: in April's front, iii. 461; in summer's front, ix. 383.

front, to oppose: you four shall front them, iv. 226; to front his revenges with the easy groans of old women, vi. 250; Which fronted mine own peace, viii. 277.

front but in that file Where others tell steps with me, v. 479: Explained by Johnson, "I am but primus inter pares; I am but first in the row of counsellors;" on which explanation Mason remarks, "This was the very idea that Wolsey wished to disclaim. It was not his intention to acknowledge that he was the first in the row of counsellors, but that he was merely on a level with the rest, and stept in the same line with them."

frontier, an outwork in fortification: The moody frontier of a servant brow (the word used metaphorically), iv. 211; Of palisadoes, frontiers, parapets, iv. 229.

frontlet on?-What makes that, viii. 29: A frontlet was a foreheadcloth, worn formerly by ladies at night to give smoothness to their foreheads: here, of course, the word is equivalent to "angry, scowling look."

froth and lime, i. 370: see note 8, i. 370; where Steevens states that "the first was done by putting soap into the bottom of the tankard when they drew the beer: but I question if Shakespeare alludes to frothing beer by means of soap (Compare "You, Tom Tapster,