-insisture, deracinate, dividable. And in the next act: past-proportion, unrespective, propugnation, self-assumption, self admission, assubjugate, kingdom'd, &c.

TYRWHITT.

P. 250, 1. 29. Till then I'll sweat, 1 i. e. adopt the regimen then used for curing what Pistol calls "The malady of France." STEEVENS,

P. 250, last 1. This play is more correctly writ ten than most of Shakspeare's compositions, but it is not one of those in which either the extent of his views or elevation of his faucy is fully displayed. As the story abounded with materials he has exerted little invention; but he has diversified his charac ters with great variety, and preserved them with great exactness. His vicious characters disgust, but cannot corrupt, for both Cressida and Pan¬ darus are detested and contemned. The comick characters seem to have been the favourites of the writer; they are of the superficial kind, and exhibit more of manners than nature; but they are copiously filled and powerfully impressed, Shakspeare has in his story followed, for the greater part, the old book of Caxton, wich was then very popular; but the character of Thersites, of which it makes no mention, is a proof that this play was written after Chapman had published his version of Homer. JOHNSON,

Homer

The first seven books of Chapman's Hon were published in the year 1596, and again in 1598. They were dedicated as follows: To the most honoured now living instance of the Achilleian virtues eternized by divine Homere, -the Earle of Essexe, Earl Marshall, &c, aud

an anonymous Interlude, called THERSYTES his Humours and Conceits, had, been published in 1598. Puttenham also, in his Arte of English Poesy, 1589, p. 35, makes mention of "Thersites the glorious noddie," &c. STEEVENS.

The interlude of Thersites was, I believe, published long before 1598. That date was one of the numerous forgeries of Chetwood the Prompas well as the addition to the title of the

ter,

1

piece, "Thersites his Humours and Conceits;” for no such words are found in the catalogue published in 1671, by Kirkman, who appears to have seen it. MALONE.

END OF THE THIRTEENTH VOLUME.