HERMIONE is brought in, guarded; PAULINA and Ladies, attending. Leon. Read the indictment. Offi. Hermione, queen to the worthy Leontes, king of Sicilia, thou art here accufed and arraigned of high treason, in committing adultery with Polixenes, king of Bohemia; and confpiring with Camillo to take away the life of our fovereign lord the king, thy royal bufband: the pretence whereof being by circumstances partly laid open, thou, Hermione, contrary to the faith and allegiance of a true fubject, didft counsel and aid them, for their better fafety, to fly away by night. Her. Since what I am to fay, must be but that Which contradicts my accufation; and The teftimony on my part, no other But what comes from myfelf; it shall scarce boot me Being counted falfehood, fhall, as I exprefs it, I doubt not then, but innocence shall make Tremble at patience.- -You, my lord, best know, A moiety of the throne, a great king's daughter, As 91s, in this place, taken for a fcheme laid, a defign formed; to pretend means to defign, in The Two Gentlemen of Verona. JOHNSON. 2 That is, my virtue being accounted wickedness, my affertion of it will pafs but for a lie. Falfehood means both treachery and lie. JOHNSON. 3 That is, which unhappiness. MALONE. 4 Life is to me now only grief, and as fuch only is confidered by me; I would therefore willingly difmifs it. JOHNSON. As I weigh grief, which I would fpare :5 for honour, "Tis a derivative from me to mine, 6 And only that I ftand for. I appeal To your own confcience, fir, before Polixenes With what encounter fo uncurrent I Have strain'd, to appear thus: 7 if one jot beyond 0 3 The 5 To Spare any thing is to let it go, to quit the possession of it. JOHNSON. This fentiment, which is probably borrowed from Ecclefiafticus, iii. 11. cannot be too often impreffed on the female mind; "The glory of a man is from the honour of his father; and a mother in dishonour, is a reproa.b untu ber children." STEEVENS. 7 Thefe lines I do not understand; with the licence of all editors, what I cannot understand I suppose unintelligible, and therefore propose that they may be altered thus: Since be came, With what encounter fo uncurrent have I At least I think it might be read: With what encounter fo uncurrent have I JOHNSON. The fenfe feems to be this: what fudden flip bave I made, that I fhould catch a wrench in my character. An uncurrent encounter feems to mean an irregular, unjustifiable congrefs. Perhaps it may be a metaphor from tilting, in which the shock of meeting adverfaries was fo called. The fenfe would then be: -In what bafe reciprocation of love have I caught this ftrain? Uacurrent is what will not pass, and is, at prefent, only applied to money. Mrs. Ford talks of-fame ftrain in her character, and in Beaumont and Fletcher's Cuftom of the Country, the fame expreffion occurs. To frain, I believe, means to go awry. STEEVENS. The bounds of bonour, which are mentioned immediately after, justify Mr. Steevens in fuppofing the imagery to have been taken from tilting. HENLEY. Johnfon thinks it neceffary for the fenfe, to tranfpofe these words and read, "With what encounter fo uncurrent have I ftrained to appear thus?" But he could not have propofed that alteration, had he confidered, with attention, the construction of the paffage, which runs thuse "I appeal to your own confcience with what encounter," &c. That is, "I appeal to your own conscience to declare with what encounter fo uncurrent I have strained to appear thus." He was probably misled by the point of interrogation at the end of the sentence, which ought not to have been there. M. MASON. The The bound of honour; or, in act, or will, Leon. That any I ne'er heard yet, of thefe bolder vices wanted Lefs impudence to gainfay what they did, Than to perform it first. Her. That's true enough; Though 'tis a faying, fir, not due to me. Leon. You will not own it. Her. At all acknowledge. For Polixenes, To you, and toward your friend; whofe love had fpoke, That The precife meaning of the word encounter in this passage may be ga thered from our author's use of it elsewhere: "Who hath "Confefs'd the vile encounters they have had "A thousand times in fecret." Mush ado about Nothing, As, to pass or utter money that is not current, is contrary to law, I believe our author in the present paffage, with his accustomed licence, uses the word uncurrent as fynonymous to unlawful. I have firain'd, may perhaps mean-I have fwerved or deflected from the ftrict line of duty. To appear thus," is, to appear in such an assembly as this; to be put on my trial. MALONE. It is apparent that according to the proper, at least according to the prefent, ufe of words, lefs fhould be more, or wanted fhould be bad. But Shakspeare is very uncertain in his ufe of negatives. It may be neceffary once to obferve, that in our language, two negatives did not originally affirm, but ftrengthen the negation. This mode of fpeech was in time changed, but, as the change was made in oppofition to long custom, i proceeded gradually, and uniformity was not obtained but through an in❤ termediate confufion. JOHNSON. 1 That it was yours. Now, for confpiracy, Is, that Camillo was an honeft man; And, why he left your court, the gods themselves, Leon. You knew of his departure, as you know You fpeak a language that I understand not : Leon. Your actions are my dreams; You had a baftard by Polixenes, 2 And I but dream'd it :- -As you were past all shame, Thy brat hath been caft out, like to itself, 04 No 9 To be in the level is, by a metaphor from archery, to be within the reach. JOHNSON. This metaphor, (as Mr. Douce has already obferved,) is from gunnery. STEEVENS. 2 I do not remember that fact is ufed any where abfolutely for guilt, which must be its fenfe in this place. Perhaps we should read: Thofe of your pack are e fo. Pack is a low coarfe word well fuited to the rest of this royal invective. JOHNSON. I should guess fect to be the right word. See King Henry IV. P. II. A&t II. fc. iv. In Middleton's Mad World, my Mafters, a Courtezan fays: "It is the eafieft art and cunning for our ject to counterfeit fick, that are always full of fits when we are well." FARMER. Thus, Falstaff, fpeaking of Dol Tearsheet: So is all her fect: if they be once in a calm, they are fick Thofe of your fact may, however, mean-thofe who have done as you do. STEEVENS. That fact is the true reading, is proved decifively from the words of 'the novel, which our author had in his mind, both here, and in a former paffage ["I ne'er heard yet, That any of thefe bolder vices, &c J And as for her [faid Pandofto] it was her part to deny fuch a monftrous crime, and to be impudent in forfwearing the fact, fince he had passed all fhame in committing the fault." MALONE. 3 It is your bufinefs to deny this charge, but the mere denial will be ufelefs; will prove nothing. MALONE. No father owning it, (which is, indeed, Her. The crown and comfort of my life,4 your favour. But know not how it went: My fecond joy, The innocent milk in its moft innocent mouth, 1 prize it not a ftraw:-but for mine honour, (Which I would free,) if I fhall be condemn'd Upon furmifes; all proofs fleeping elfe, But what your jealoufies awake; I tell you, 'Tis rigour, and not law.- Your honours all, I do refer me to the oracle ; Apollo be my judge. 1. Lord. This your request Is altogether juft: therefore, bring forth, And 4 The fupreme bleffing of my life. MALONE. si. e. born under an inaufpicious planet. STEEVENS. 6 I know not well how ftrength of limit can mean firength to pass the limits of the child-bed chamber; which yet it must mean in this place, unless we read in a more easy phrase, ftrength of limb. And now, &c. JOHNSON. Mr. M. Mafon judiciously conceives ftrength of limit to mean, the mited degree of ftrength which it is customary for women to acquire, before they are fuffered to go abroad after child bearing. STEEVENS. |