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i. e. depends on what you and I are to perform. STEEVENS.

P. 55, 1. 25. A chough - Is a bird of the jack-daw kind. STEEVENS:

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P. 56, 1. 6. And melt ere they molest!] I had rather read

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Would melt ere they molest.

i. c. Twenty consciences, such as stand between me and my hopes, though they were congealed, would melt before they could molest me, or prevent the execution of my purposes.

JOHNSON.

Let twenty consciences be first congealed, and then dissolved, ere they molest me, or prevent me from executing my purposes, MALONE.

If the interpretation of Johnson and Malone is just, and is certainly as intelligible as or; but I can see no reasonable meaning in this interpreta tion. It amounts to nothing more as thus interpreted, than My conscience must melt and be come softer than it is before it molests me; which is an insipidity unworthy of the Poet. would read,,Candy'd be they, or melt ;" and the expression then has spirit and propriety. „Had I twenty consciences, says Antenio, they might be hot or cold for me; they should not give me the smallest trouble" Edinburgh Magazine,

Nov. 1786. STEEVENS.

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P. 56, 1. 12. This ancient morsel.] For morsel Dr. Warburton reads ancient moral, very elegantly and judiciously; yet I know not whe ther the author might not write morsel, as we say a piece of a man. JOHNSON.

P. 56, 1. 14. They'll take suggestion, as a ezt laps milk;] i. e. Receive any hint of villainy. They will adopt, and bear witness to, any tale

you shall invent; you may suborn them as evidences to clear you from all suspicion of having murthered the King. HENLEY.

P. 57, l. 8. drawn. JOHNSON. P. 58, l. 15.

drawn?] Having your swords

months. STEEVENS.

that moe, etc.] i. e. make

P. 58, I. 18. Their pricks etc.] i. e. prickles.

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STEEVENS.

P. 58, l. 19. All wound with adders,] Enwrapped by adders wound or twisted about me.

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JOHNSON.

P. 59, 1. 5. and had but this fish painted,] To exhibit fishes, either real or imaginary," was very common about the time of our author.

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STEEVENS.

P. 59, I. 7. there would this monster make a man;] That is, make a man's fortune.

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P. 59, I. 16. A gaberdine is properly the coarse frock or outward garment of a peasant. Still worn by the peasants in Sussex. STEEVENS

It here however means, I believe, a loose felt cloak. MALONE.

P. 60, 1. 30. Too much means, any sum, ever so much. STEEVENS.

I think the meaning is, Let me take what sum I will, however great, I shall not take too much for him it is impossible for me to sell him too dear. MALONE.

P. 60, last but one line. I know it by thy trembling:] This tremor is always represented, as the effect of being possess'd by the devil. STEEVENS.

P. 61, 1. 2. here is that which will give language to your cat;] Alluding to an old proverb, that good liquor will make a cat speak. STEEVENS,

· P. 613 1. 11. The person of Fame was anciently described in this manner. STEEVENS. Amen!] Means, stop your I will pour

P. 61, 1. 15.

draught: come to a conclusion.

some, etc.

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P. 61, 1. 20. I have no long spoon.] Alluding to the proverb, A long spoon to eat with the devil..

P. 61, 1. 27. 28. Siege signifies stool in every sense of the word, and is here used in the dirtiest, A moon-calf is an inaniraateshapeless mass, supposed by Pliny to be engendered of woman only. STEEVENS. A

P. 62, 1. 22. Hast thou not dropp'd from heaven?] The new-discovered Indians of the island of St. Salvador, asked, by signs, whether Columbus and his companions were not come down from heaven. TOLLET.

P. 62, 31. - a very weak monster:] It is to be observed, that Trinculo the speaker is not charged with being afraid; but it was his consciousness that he was so that drew this brag from him. This is nature. WARBURTON.

P. 63, 1. 27. Young sea-mells] This word has puzzled the commentators: Dr. Warburton reads shamois; Mr. Theobald would read any thing rather than sea-mells. Mr. Holt, who wrote notes upon this play, observes, that limpets are in some places called seams, and therefore I had once suffered scamels to stand. JOHNSON.

Theobaid had very reasonably proposed to read sea-malls, or sea-mells. An e, by these careless printers, was easily changed into a c, and from this accident, I believe, all the difficulty arises, the word having been spelt by the transcriber, seamels. Willoughby mentions the bird as

Theobald has informed us. Had Mr. Holt. told us in what part of England limpets are called' scams, more regard would have been paid to his assertion.

I should suppose, at all events, a bird to have been design'd, as young and old fish are taken with equal facility; but young birds are more easily surprised than old ones. Besides, Caliban had already proffered to fish for Trinculo. In Cavendish's second voyage, the sailors eat young gulls at the isle of Penguins. STEEVENS.

I have no doubt but Theobald's proposed amendment ought to be received. Sir Joseph Banks informs me, that in Willoughby's, or rather John Ray's Ornithology, p. 54, No. 3, is mentioned the common sea-mall, Larus cinereus minor; and that young sea gulls have been esteemed a delicate food in this country, we learn from Plott, who, in his History of Staffordshire, p. 231, gives an account of the mode of taking a species of gulls called in that country pewits! with a plate annexed, at the end of which he writes,,,they being accounted a good dish at the most plentiful tables." To this it may be added, that Sir Robert Sibbald in his Ancient State of the Shire of Fife, mentions, amongst fowls which frequent a neighbouring island, several sorts of sea-malls, and one in particular, the katiewake, a fowl of the Larus or mall kind, of the bigness of an ordinary pigeon, which some hold, says he, to be as savoury and as good meat as a partridge is. REED.

P. 64, 1. 4. Nor scrape trenchering,] In our author's time trenchers were in general use; and male domesticks Were sometimes employed in cleansing them. MALONE.

P. 64, 1. 6.

Get a new man.] When Caliban sings this last part of his ditty, he must be supposed to turn his head scornfully toward the cell of Prospero, whose service he had de

serted. STEEVENS.

P. 65, last line. command. STEEVENS.

best For behest; i. e.

P, 66, 1. 12. Of every creature's best.] Alluding to the picture of Venus by Apelles.

JOHNSON.

P. 66, 1. 30. The flesh-fly blow my mouth.] Mr. Malone observes, that to blow, in this instance, signifies to ,,swell and inflame." But L believe he is mistaken. To blow, as it stands in the text, means the act of a fly by which she lodges eggs in flesh. STEEVENS.

P. 67, 1. 6. Beyond all limit of what else the world,] i. e. of aught else; of whatsoever else there is in the world. MALONE.

P. 67, 1. 8. I am a fool, To weep at what I am glad of.] This is one of those touches of nature that distinguish Shakspeare from all other writers. It was necessary, in support of the character of Miranda, to make her appear unconscious that excess of sorrow and excess of joy find alike, their relief from tears; and as this is the first time that consummate pleasure had made any near approaches to her heart, she calls such a secming contradictory expression of it, folly. STEEVENS.

P. 67, 1. 17.
MALONE.

seeks.

it seeks i. e. my affection

P. 67, 1. 21. your fellow - i. e. companion.

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P. 67, 1. 29. with my heart in't.] It is still customary in the west of England, when the

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