BECOMED-BEHAVE.

becomed, for becoming: what becomed love I might, vi. 458.

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becoming, an adorning, the power of setting-off: Whence hast thou

this becoming of things ill, ix. 407.

becoming-So fill'd and so, iii. 450: see note 75, iii. 450.

becomings-My, What becomes me, viii. 266.

bedfellow-The man that was his, iv. 435: “This unseemly custom [of men sleeping together] continued common till the middle of the last century, if not later" (Malone).

Bedlam-Tom o'; the Bedlam; Bedlam beggars: see Tom o' Bedlam, &c.

beg us-You cannot, ii. 240: Costard means, "We are not fools:" "To beg a person for a fool; to apply to be his guardian. In the old common law was a writ de idiota inquirendo, under which, if a man was legally proved an idiot, the profits of his lands and the custody of his person might be granted by the king to any subject. See Blackstone, B. i. ch. 8, § 18. Such a person, when this grant was asked, was said to be begged for a fool; which that learned judge regarded as being still a common expression. See his note, loc. cit." Nares's Gloss.: “Frequent allusions to this practice occur in the old comedies. In illustration of it Mr. Ritson has given a curious story, which, as it is mutilated in the authority which he has used [Cabinet of Mirth, 1674], is here subjoined from a more original source, a collection of tales, &c., compiled about the time of Charles the First, preserved among the Harleian Mss. in the British Museum, No. 6395. 'The Lord North begg'd old Bladwell for a foole (though he could never prove him so), and having him in his custodie as a lunaticke, he carried him to a gentleman's house, one day, that was his neighbour. The L. North and the gentleman retir'd awhile to private discourse, and left Bladwell in the dining roome, which was hung with a faire hanging. Bladwell walking up and downe, and viewing the imagerie, spyed a foole at last in the hanging, and without delay drawes his knife, flyes at the foole, cutts him cleane out, and layes him on the floore. My L. and the gentl. coming in againe, and finding the tapestrie thus defac'd, he ask'd Bladwell what he meant by such a rude uncivill act: he answered, Sr., be content, I have rather done you a courtesie than a wrong, for if ever my L. N. had seene the foole there, he would have begg'd him, and so you might have lost your whole suite.' The same story, but without the parties' names, is related in Fuller's Holy State, p. 182” (DOUCE).

Beggar and the King—The,” iv. 185: see Cophetua-King.

beguil❜d with outward honesty, covered with the mask of honesty,

ix. 317.

behave, to govern, to manage: He did behave his anger, vii. 51.

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BEHEST-BENISON.

behest, a command, viii. 492.

beholding, beholden, i. 344, 368, 534; ii. 349; iii. 68, 127, 130; iv. 12, 169; v. 374, 387, 491, 543, 568, 575; vi 291, 360; vii. 160 (twice); ix. 43.

beldam, a grandmother: the old beldam earth, iv. 248 (where, in the next line but one, is Our grandam earth, as synonymous); To show the beldam daughters of her daughter, ix. 300; Old men and beldams (old women), iv. 68.

beldam, used as a term of contempt,- -a hag: Beldam, I think we watch'd you, v. 128; beldams as you are, vii. 254.

be-lee'd and calm'd, viii. 133: "I have been informed that one vessel is said to be in the lee of another when it is so placed that the wind is intercepted from it. Iago's meaning therefore is, that Cassio had got the wind of him, and be-calm'd him from going on. Το be-calm (as I learn from Falconer's Marine Dictionary) is likewise to obstruct the current of the wind in its passage to a ship, by any contiguous object" (STEEVENS).

Bell, book, and candle shall not drive me back, iv. 48: "In the solemn form of excommunication used in the Romish Church, the bell was tolled, the book of offices for the purpose used, and three candles extinguished with certain ceremonies." Nares's Gloss. (So Dekker; "Bell, booke, or candle cannot curse me out."

If it be not good, the Deuil is in it, 1612, sig. в 3.)

Bellona's bridegroom, vii. 207: Means Macbeth.

bells-If Warwick shake his, v. 227 : An allusion to the bells with which falcons were furnished.

be-mete, to be-measure, iii. 170.

bemoiled, bemired, iii. 157.

benches-Sleeping upon, iv. 205; .e. sleeping upon ale-house benches,―a habit of idle sots: see Gifford's note on Jonson's Works, vol. i. p. 103.

bench-holes, holes of privies, viii. 343.

bending author-Our, iv. 522: "By bending our author meant unequal to the weight of his subject, and bending beneath it; or he may mean, as in Hamlet, 'Here stooping to your clemency" (STEEVENS).

beneath-world-This, vii. 7: compare th' under generation; see note 142, i. 531.

benefit proceeding from our king—Of, v. 96: “Benefit is here a term of law. Be content to live as the beneficiary of our king" (JOHNSON).

benison, blessing, vii. 239; viä. 15, 107; ix. 24.

BENT-BESONIAN.

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bent-Her affections have their full, ii. 103; the very bent of honour, ii. 127; thy affection cannot hold the bent, iii. 343; in the full bent, vii. 336; fool me to the top of my bent, vii. 374: "Bent is used by our author for the utmost degree of any passion or mental quality. The expression is derived from archery; the bow has its bent when it is drawn as far as it can be" (JOHNSON). Bergomask dance-A, ii. 328; your Bergomask, ibid.: “A dance after the manner of the peasants of Bergomasco, a county in Italy belonging to the Venetians. All the buffoons in Italy affect

to imitate the ridiculous jargon of that people, and from thence it became a custom to mimic also their manner of dancing" (HANMER).

Bermoothes-The, The Bermudas, i. 207.

beshrew, to curse,—but a mild form of imprecation,=

a mischief on," ‚” i. 285; ii. 365, 377; vi. 472; vii. 335; and in many other passages.

besmirch, to be-smut, vii. 315; besmirch'd, iv. 491 : see smirch. besonian, iv. 401; besonians, v. 182: The Italian origin of the word besonian (see post) shows that it properly means a needy fellow, a beggar:" but it was also used in the sense of " a raw or needy soldier ;" and eventually it became a term of reproach,——“ a knave, a scoundrel" ("Bisogno, need, want. Also a fresh needy soldier. Bisognoso, needy, necessitous.” Florio's Ital. and Engl. Dict. "Bisongne... a filthie knaue, or clowne; a raskall, bisonian, base humored scoundrell." Cotgrave's Fr. and Engl. Dict. For the following illustrations of the word I am indebted to Mr. Bolton Corney; "Their order is [in Spain], where the warres are present, to supplie their regiments, being in action, with the garrisons out of all his dominions and prouinces before they dislodge, besonios supply[ing] their places, raw men, as wee tearme them. By these meanes hee traines his besonios, and furnisheth his armie with trained souldiers." A brief discourse of Warre, by Sir Roger Williams, 1590, 4to, p. 11: "Bisognio or Bisonnio, a Spanish or Italian word, and is, as we terme it, a raw souldier, unexpert in his weapon, and other military points." The theorike and practike of moderne warres, by Robert Barret, 1598, folio, sig. Y 4: "Bisoños, Voyez Visoños. . . . Visoño, nouueau soldat, apprenty." Tesoro de las dos lengvas Francesa y Española, por Cesar Ovdin, 1607, 4to: “Bisoño, el soldado nueuo en la milicia, es nōbre casual y moderno," &c. Tesoro de la lengva Castellana, o Española, por D. Sebastian de Cobarruuias, 1611, sig. s 2 verso: Cobarruuis or Covarruvias gives us twenty-five lines on this word: he states that some Spanish soldiers in Italy learned the word Visoño, and were accustomed to ask alms, saying Visoño pan, Visoño carne, &c., and were thence called Visoños; which circumstance is alluded to by one of their dramatists, Torres Naharro).

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BESORT-BEVIS.

besort, attendance, train: With such accommodation and besort, viii. 150. besort, to suit, to befit, to become: such men as may besort your age, viii. 32.

best-Send us to Rome The, vi. 163: Here the best means "the chief persons of Corioli."

best men-Men of few words are the, iv. 453: "best men, that is, bravest; so, in the next lines, good deeds are brave actions” (JOHNSON).

Best-That did betray the, iii. 420: An allusion to Judas Iscariot. best-condition'd, endowed with the best disposition, ii. 387: see condition.

best-indu'd, "gifted or endowed in the most extraordinary manner (STEEVENS), iv. 439.

bested-Worse, "In a worse plight" (JOHNSON), v. 142. bestow, to stow, to lodge, to place: bestow your luggage, i. 275; bestow these papers, vii. 125; bestow ourselves, vii. 356, 357; I will bestow him, vii. 386; you have bestow'd my money, ii, 13; our bloody cousins are bestow'd In England, vii. 241; will you see the players well bestowed? vii. 353; Where the dead body is bestow'd, vii. 390; the old man and his people Cannot be well bestow'd, viii. 59; Where he bestows himself, vii. 257.

bestow, to carry, to show: see Falstaff bestow himself to-night in his true colours, iv. 333; bestows himself Like a ripe sister, iii. 76. bestowed her on her own lamentation, "gave her up to her sorrows' (STEEVENS), i. 508.

bestraught, distraught, mad, iii. 106.

beteem, to give in streaming abundance: which I could well Beteem them from the tempest of mine eyes, ii. 263.

beteem, to suffer, "deign to allow" (CALDECOTT): That he might not beteem the winds of heaven, &c., vii. 310.

better, and worse-Still, “Better in regard to the wit of your double entendre, but worse in respect to the grossness of your meaning" (STEEVENS), vii. 369.

bettering thy loss makes the bad-causer worse, v. 426: "Bettering is amplifying, magnifying thy loss. Shakespeare employed this word for the sake of an antithesis, in which he delighted, between better and loss" (MALONE).

bevel, crooked, ix. 393.

Bevis was believ'd-That, That the incredible incidents in the famous romance of Bevis of Southampton were now believed, v. 470.

BEWRAY-BILBOES.

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bewray, to discover, v. 233, 285; vi. 255, 310, 347; viii. 40, 77; bewray'd, v. 64; ix. 322, 439.

bias, swelled, out of shape ("as the bowl on the biassed side,” Johnson's Dict.): thy spherèd bias cheek, vi. 91.

bid, to invite: I will bid the duke to the nuptial, iii. 83; bid your friends, iii. 84; he hath bid me to a calf's-head and a capon, ii. 139; I am bid forth to supper, ii. 362 ; I am not bid to wait upon this bride, vi. 287; bid me to 'em, vii. 19.

bid, endured: for whom you bid like sorrow, v. 432.

bid the base, and run the base: see base,—prison-base, &c. Biddy, come with me, iii. 367; see note 92, iii. 367.

bide upon't-To, equivalent to "My abiding opinion is,” iii, 414.

("Captain, thou art a valiant gentleman;
To abide upon't, a very valiant man.

Beaumont and Fletcher's King and No King, act iv. sc. 3.

"The wife of the said Peter then said, to abide upon it, I thinke that my husband will neuer mend," &c. Potts's Discoverie of Witches in the Countie of Lancaster, 1613, sig. T 4.)

bigamy-Loath'd, v. 410: "Bigamy, by a canon of the council of

Lyons, A.D. 1274 (adopted in England by a statute in 4 Edw. I.), was made unlawful and infamous. It differed from polygamy or having two wives at once; as it consisted in either marrying two virgins successively, or once marrying a widow" (BLACKSTONE). (Fielding, in his Amelia, applies the term bigamy to marrying two wives successively; vol. ii. p. 240, vol. iii. p. 19, ed. 1752.)

biggen, iv. 383: “A cap, quoif, or dress for the head, formerly worn by men, but now limited, I believe, almost entirely to some particular cap or bonnet for young children. . . . Caps or coifs were probably first called beguins or biggins, from their resemblance to the caps or head-dress worn by those Societies of young women who were called Beguines in France, and who led a middle kind of life between the secular and religious, made no vows, but maintained themselves by the work of their own hands." Boucher's Glossary of Arch. and Prov. Words.

bilberry, wortleberry, i. 447.

bilbo, a sword (so called from Bilboa in Spain, which was famous for its manufacture of sword-blades), i. 365, 421.

bilboes-The vii. 423: "The bilboes is a bar of iron with fetters annexed to it, by which mutinous or disorderly sailors were anciently linked together. The word is derived from Bilboa, a place in Spain where instruments of steel were fabricated in the utmost perfection. To understand Shakespeare's allusion completely, it