Put on with holy prayers: and 'tis spoken, The healing benediction. With this strange virtue, And sundry blessings hang about his throne, That speak him full of grace. Macd. Enter RossE. See, who comes here? Mal. My countryman; but yet I know him not." "A coin that bears the figure of an angel "Stamped in gold, but that 's insculp'd upon." The value of the coin was ten shillings. Steevens. and 'tis spoken To the succeeding royalty be leaves The healing benediction.] It must be owned, that Shak speare is often guilty of strange absurdities in point of history and chronology. Yet here he has artfully avoided one. He had a mind to hint, that a cure of the evil was to descend to the successors in the royal line, in compliment to James the First But the Confessor was the first who pretended to the gift: How then could it be at that time generally spoken of, that the gift was hereditary? This he has solved by telling us that Edward had the gift of prophecy along with it. Warburton. Dr. Warburton here invents an objection, in order to solve it. "The Confessor (says he) was the first who pretended to this gift: how then could it be at that time generally spoken of, that the gift was bereditary? This he [Shakspeare] has solved, by telling us that Edward had the gift of prophecy along with it." But Shakspeare does not say, that it was hereditary in Edward, or, in other words, that he had inherited this extraordinary power from his ancestors; but that "it was generally spoken, that he leaves the healing benediction to succeeding kings:" and such a rumour there might be in the time of Edward the Confessor, (supposing he had such a gift) without his having the gift of prophecy along with it. Shakspeare has merely transcribed what he found in Holinshed, without the conceit which Dr. Warburton has imputed to him: "As hath beene thought, he was inspired with the gift of prophesie, and also to have had the gift of healing infirmities and diseases. He used to helpe those that were vexed with the disease commonlie called the King's Evil, and left that virtue as it were a portion of inheritance unto his successors, the kings of this realme." Holinshed, Vol. I, p. 195. Malone. 7 My countryman; but yet I know him not.] Malcolm discovers Rosse to be his countryman, while he is yet at some distance from him, by his dress. This circumstance loses its Macd. My ever-gentle cousin, welcome hither. Mal. I know him now: Good God, betimes remove The means that make us strangers! Rosse. Macd. Stands Scotland where it did? Sir, Amen. Alas, poor country', Almost afraid to know itself! It cannot air,8 Are made, not mark'd; where violent sorrow eems Is there scarce ask'd, for who; and good men's lives Macd. O, relation, Too nice, and yet too true!2 propriety on our stage, as all the characters are uniformly represented in English habits. Steevens. 8 rent the air,] To rent is an ancient verb, which has been long ago disused. So, in Cesar and Pompey, 1607: "With rented hair and eyes besprent with tears." Again, in The Legend of Orpheus and Eurydice, 1597: Steevens. "While with his fingers he his haire doth rent." Malone. A modern ecstasy;] That is, no more regarded than the contorsions that fanatics throw themselves into. The author was thinking of those of his own times. Warburton. I believe modern is only foolish or trifling. Johnson. Modern is generally used by Shakspeare to signify trite, common; as "modern instances," in As you Like it, &c. &c. See Vol. V, p. 59, n. 4. Steevens. Ecstasy is used by Shakspeare for a temporary alienation of mind. Malone 1 Expire before the flowers in their caps,] So, in All's Well that Ends Well: whose constancies 66 Expire before their fashions." Steevens. Too nice, and yet too true!] The redundancy of this hemiş tich induces me to believe our author only wrote"Too nice, yet true! Steevens. Well too. Macd. The tyrant has not batter'd at their peace? Rosse. No; they were well at peace, when I did leave them. Macd. Be not a niggard of your speech; How goes it? Rosse. When I came hither to transport the tidings, Mal. That Christendom gives out. Rosse. 'Would I could answer This comfort with the like! But I have words, Where hearing should not latch them. Macd. 3 Why, What concern they? well.. -Well too.] So, in Antony and Cleopatra: We use "To say, the dead are well." Steevens. children?] Children is, in this place, used as a tri syllable. So, in The Comedy of Errors: "There are the parents to these children." See note on this passage, Act V. Steevens. 5 To doff their dire distresses ] To doff is to do off, to put off. See King John, Act III, sc. i. Steevens. 6 should not latch them,] Thus the old copy, and rightly. To latch any thing, is to lay hold of it. So, in the prologue to Gower, De Confessione Amantis, 1554: "Hereof for that thei wolden lache, "With such duresse," &c. The general cause? or is it a fee-grief," Due to some single breast? Rosse. No mind, that 's honest But in it shares some woe; though the main part Pertains to you alone. Macd. If it be mine, Keep it not from me, quickly let me have it. Rosse. Let not your ears despise my tongue for ever. Which shall possess them with the heaviest sound That ever yet they heard. Macd. Humph! I guess at it. Rosse. Your castle is surpriz'd; your wife, and babes, Savagely slaughter'd: to relate the manner, Were, on the quarry of these murder'd deer,3 Again, B. I, fol. 27: "When that he Galathe besought "Of love, which he maie not latche." Again, in the first Book of Ovid's Metamorphosis, as transHated by Golding: "As though he would, at everie stride, betweene his teeth hir latch." Again, in the eighth Book: "But that a bough of chesnut-tree, thick-leaved, by the way "Did latch it," &c. To latch (in the North country dialect) signifies the same as to catch. Steevens. 7 -fee-grief,] A peculiar sorrow; a grief that hath a single owner. The expression is, at least to our ears, very harsh. Johnson. So, in our author's Lover's Complaint: 66 My woeful self that did in freedom stand, "And was my own fee-simple." Malone. It must, I think, be allowed that, in both the foregoing instances, the Attorney has been guilty of a flat trespass on the Poet. Steevens. Were, on the quarry of these murder'd deer,] Quarry is a term used both in bunting and falconry. In both sports it means the game after it is killed. So, in Massinger's Guardian: he strikes "The trembling bird, who even in death appears Again, in an ancient MS. entitled The Boke of Huntyng that cleped Mayster of Game: "While that the huntyng lestethy Merciful heaven! To add the death of you. Mal. Rosse. That could be found. Macd. My wife kill'd too? Wife, children, servants, all And I must be from thence! Rosse. I have said. Be comforted should cartes go fro place to place to bringe the deer to the querre," &c. " to kepe the querre, and to make ley it on a rowe, al the hedes o way, and every deeres feet to other's bak, and the hertes should be leyde on a rowe, and the rascaile by hemselfe in the same wise. And thei shuld kepe that no man come in the querre til the king come, safe the maister of the game." It appears, in short, that the game was arranged in a hollow square, within which none but privileged persons, such as had claims to the particular animals they had killed, were permitted to enter. Hence, perhaps, the origin of the term quarry. 9 Steevens. ne'er pull your hat upon your brows;] The same thought occurs in the ancient ballad of Northumberland betrayed by Douglas: Again: "He pulled his hatt over his browe, "And in his heart he was full woe," &c. "Jamey his hatt pull'd over his brow," &c. Steevens. 1 na, 1612: the grief, that does not speak,] So, in Vittoria Coromba "Those are the killing griefs which dare not speak." Cura leves loquuntur, ingentes stupent. Again, in Greene's old bl. 1. novel, entitled The Tragicall History af Faire Bellora: "Light sorrowes often speake, "When great the heart in silence breake " Steevens. In Daniel's Complaint of Rosamond, 1595, we have the like sentiment: "Striving to tell his woes words wouldnot come ; the heart hath tree wrong, Reed. "When it is barr'd t-aidance of the tongue." Malone |