Abbildungen der Seite
PDF
EPUB

HOL. Joshua, yourself; myself, or this gallant gentleman, Judas Maccabæus; this fwain, because of his great limb or joint, fhall pafs Pompey the great; the page, Hercules.

ARM. Pardon, fir, error: he is not quantity enough for that worthy's thumb: he is not fo big as the end of his club.

HOL. Shall I have audience? he fhall prefent Hercules in minority: his enter and exit shall be ftrangling a fnake; and I will have an apology for that purpose.

MOTH. An excellent device! fo, if any of the audience, hifs, you may cry: well done, Hercules! now thou crufheft the fnake! that is the way to make an offence gracious; though few have the grace to

do it.

9

[merged small][ocr errors]

ARM. We will have, if this fadge not,* an antick. I beseech you, follow.

8

this, &c.

myfelf, or this gallant gentleman,] The old copy has — and The correction was made by Mr. Steevens. We ought, I believe, to read in the next line fhall pass for Pompey the great. If the text be right, the speaker muft mean that the fwain fhall, in reprefenting Pompey, Jurpass him, "because of his great limb." MALONE.

[ocr errors]

"Shall pass Pompey the great, feems to mean, fhall march in the proceffion for him; walk as his reprefentative. STEEVENS.

9

to make an offence gracious; ] i. e. to convert an offence against yourselves, into a dramatic propriety. STEEVENS.

if this fadge not,] i. e. fuit not. Several inftances of the afe of this word are given in Twelfth Night, STEEVENS.

HOL, Via,' goodman Dull! thou haft spoken no word all this while.

DULL. Nor understood none neither, fir.

HOL. Allons! we will employ thee.

DULL. I'll make one in a dance, or fo; or I will play on the tabor to the worthies, and let them dance the hay.

HOL. Moft dull, honest Dull, to our sport, away. [Exeunt.

SCENE II.

Another part of the fame. Before the Princess's Pavilion.

Enter the Princefs, KATHARINE, ROSALINE,
and MARIA.

PRIN. Sweet hearts, we fhall be rich ere we depart,

If fairings come thus plentifully in :

A lady wall'd about with diamonds!

Look you, what I have from the loving king.

Ros. Madam, came nothing elfe along with that? PRIN. Nothing but this? yes, as much love in

rhyme,

As would be cramm'd up in a fheet of paper,
Writ on both fides the leaf, margent and all;
That he was fain to feal on Cupid's name.

3 Via,] An Italian exclamation, fignifying, Courage! come on!

STEEVENS.

Ros. That was the way to make his god-head wax ; 3

For he hath been five thousand years a boy.

KATH. Ay, and a fhrewd unhappy gallows too. Ros. You'll ne'er be friends with him, he kill'd your fifter.

KATH. He made her melancholy, fad, and heavy;
And fo fhe died: had the been light, like you,
Of fuch a merry, nimble, ftirring fpirit,
She might have been a grandam ere fhe died:
And fo may you; for a light heart lives long.
Ros. What's your dark meaning, mouse,* of this
light word?

KATH. A light condition in a beauty dark.
Ros. We need more light to find your meaning

out.

KATH. You'll mar the light, by taking it in fnuff; $

Therefore, I'll darkly end the argument.

3

to make his god-head wax; ] To wax anciently fignified to It is yet faid of the moon, that he waxes and wanes. So, in Drayton's Polyolbion, Song I:

grow.

I view thofe wanton brooks that waxing fill do wane." Again, in Lyly's Love's Metamorphofes, 1601:

"Men's follies will ever wax, and then what reafon can make them wife?"

Again, in the Polyolbion, Song V:

4

"The ftem fall ftrongly wax, as ftill the trunk doth wither."

in Hamlet:

[ocr errors]

STEEVENS.

moufe,] This was a term of endearment formerly. So,

"Pinch wanton on your check; call you his mouse."

taking it in fnuff;] ger, and the fnuff of a candle. K, Henry IV. P. I. A& I. sc. iii.

MALONE.

Snuff is here ufed equivocally for an-
See more inftances of this conceit in

STEEVENS.

Ros. Look, what you do, you do it ftill i' the dark.

KATH. So do not you; for you are a light wench. Ros. Indeed, I weigh not you; and therefore light.

KATH. You weigh me not,—O, that's you care

not for me.

Ros. Great reafon; for, Paft cure is fill paft

care."

PRIN. Well bandied both; a fet of wit' well

play'd.

But Rosaline, you have a favour too:

Who fent it? and what is it?

I would, you knew:

Ros.
An if my face were but as fair as yours,
My favour were as great; be witnefs this.
Nay, I have verfes too, I thank Birón:

The numbers true; and, were the numb'ring too,
I were the faireft goddefs on the ground:
I am compar'd to twenty thousand fairs.
Ọ, he hath drawn my picture in his letter!
PRIN. Any thing like?

[ocr errors]

6 -for, Paft cure is fill past care.] The old copy reads part care is ftill past cure. The tranfpofition was propofed by Dr. Thirlby, and, it must be owned, is fupported by a line in K. Richard II:

Things paft redress are now with me pat care.

[ocr errors]

So alfo in a pamphlet entitled Holland's Leaguer, 4to. 1632: "She had got this adage in her mouth, Things paft cure, paft care. -Yet the following lines in our author's 147th Sonnet seem rather in favour of the old reading:

Paft cure I am, now reafon is past care,

"And frantick mad with evermore unreft.' MALONE.

a fet of wit] A term from tennis. So, in K. Henry Vș play a fet

Shall ftrike his father's crown into the hazard."

STEEVENS

Ros. Much, in the letters; nothing, in the praise. PRIN. Beauteous as ink; a good conclufion. KATH. Fair as a text B in a copy-book.

Ros. 'Ware pencils!' How? let me not die your debtor,

My red dominical, my golden letter:

O, that your face were not fo full of O's!

KATH. A pox of that jeft! and befhrew all fhrows! 9

7 'Ware pencils!

"Were pencils".

The former editions read:

Sir T. Hanmer here rightly restored:

"Ware pencils

Rofaline, a black beauty, reproaches the fair Katharine for painting. JOHNSON.

a

Johnfon miftakes the meaning of this fentence; it is not reproach, but a cautionary threat. Rofaline fays that Biron had drawn her picture in his letter; and afterwards playing on the word letter, Katharine compares her to a text B. Rofaline in reply advises her to beware of pencils, that is of drawing likenesses, left she fhould retaliate; which the afterwards does. by comparing her to a red dominical letter, and calling her marks of the fmall pox oes.

[ocr errors]

M. MASON.

fiery O's and eyes

"Pox of that jeft!"

8 -fo full of O's!] Shakspeare talks of “ of light," in A Midfummer-Night's Dream. STEEVENS, 9 Pox of that jest! and befhrew all Throws!] Mr. Theobald is fcandalized at this language from a princefs. But there needs no alarm- the small pox only is alluded to; with which it feems, Katharine was pitted; or, as it is quaintly expreffed,

her face was full of O's. " Davifon has a canzonet on his lady's fickneffe of the poxe: and Dr. Donne writes to his fifter: "at my return from Kent, I found Pegge had the Poxe-I humbly thank God, it hath not much disfigured her." FARMER.

A pox of that jeft! &c.] This line which in the old copies is given to the princeis, Mr. Theobald rightly attributed to Katharine. The metre, as well as the mode of expreffion, fhew that fhrew," the reading of these copies, was a mistake of the transcriber.

-"I be

MALONE.

« ZurückWeiter »