Come, go with me;-Go, sirrah, trudge about Whose names are written there, [gives a paper] and to them say, My house and welcome on their pleasure stay. [Exeunt CAP. and PAR. Serv. Find them out, whose names are written here?9 It is written-that the shoemaker should meddle with his yard, and the tailor with his last, the fisher with his pencil, and the painter with his nets; but I am sent to find those persons, whose names are here writ, and can never find what names the writing person hath here writ. I must to the learned :-In good time. Enter BENVOLIO and ROMEO. Ben. Tut, man! one fire burns out another's burning, One pain is lessen'd by another's anguish; Turn giddy, and be holp by backward turning; One desperate grief cures with another's languish "No knight or gentleman of high or low renown This passage is neither intelligible as it stands, nor do I think it will be rendered so by Steevens's amendment.-"To search amongst view of many," is neither sense nor English. The old folio, as Johnson tells us, reads Which one more view of many And this leads us to the right reading, which I should suppose to have been this: Whilst on more view of many, mine being one, &c. With this alteration the sense is clear, and the deviation from the folio very trifling. M. Mason. 8 - find those persons out, Whose names are written there,] Shakspeare has here closely followed the poem already mentioned: "No lady fair or foul was in Verona town, "No knight or gentleman of high or low renown, "Or by his name, in paper sent, appointed as a guest." Malone. 9 Find them out, whose names are writtten here?] The quarto 1597, adds: “And yet I know not who are written here: I must to the learned to learn of them: that 's as much as to say, the tailor," &c. Steevens. 1 with another's languish:] This substantive is again found Take thou some new infection to thy eye, Rom. Your plantain leaf is excellent for that.2 Rom. For your broken shin. Ben. Why, Romeo, art thou mad? Rom. Not mad, but bound more than a madman is: Shut up in prison, kept without my food, Whipp'd, and tormented, and—-Good-e'en, good fellow. [Reads. Signior Martino, and his wife, and daughters; County Anselme, and his beauteous sisters; The lady widow of Vitruvio; Signior Placentio, and his lovely nieces; Mercutio, and his brother Valentine; Mine uncle Capulet, his wife, and daughters; My fair niece Rosaline; Livia; Signior Valentio, and his cousin Tybalt; Lucio, and the lively Helena. A fair assembly; [gives back the note] Whither should they come? found in Antony and Cleopatra.—It was not of our poet's coinage, occurring also (as I think) in one of Morley's songs, 1595: "Alas, it skills not, "Now tormented, "Live in love and languish." Malone. 2 Your plantain leaf is excellent for that.] Tackius tells us, that a toad, before she engages with a spider, will fortify herself with some of this plant; and that, if she comes off wounded, she cures herself afterwards with it. Dr. Grey, The same thought occurs in Albumazar, in the following lines: "Help, Armellina, help! I'm fall'n i' the cellar: "Bring a fresh plantain leaf, I've broke my shin." Again, in The Case is Alter'd, by Ben Jonson, 1609, a fellow who has had his head broke, says: "Tis nothing, a fillip, a device: fellow Juniper, prithee get me a plantain.” The plantain leaf is a blood-stauncher, and was formerly applied to green wounds. Steevens. Serv. Up. Rom. Whither? Serv. To supper; to our house.3 Rom. Whose house? Serv. My master's. Rom. Indeed, I should have asked you that before. Serv. Now I'll tell you without asking: My master is the great rich Capulet; and if you be not of the house of Montagues, I pray, come and crush a cup of wine.* Rest you merry. Ben. At this same ancient feast of Capulet's [Exit. Rom. When the devout religion of mine eye Maintains such falsehood, then turn tears to fires! And these, who, often drown'd, could never die,Transparent hereticks, be burnt for liars! One fairer than my love! the all-seeing sun But in those crystal scales,5 let there be weigh'd 3 To supper; to our house.] The words to supper are in the old copies annexed to the preceding speech. They undoubtedly belong to the Servant, to whom they were transferred by Mr. Theobald. Malone. 4 - crush a cup of wine.] This cant expression seems to have been once common among low people. I have met with it often in the old plays. So, in The Two Angry Women of Abington, 1599: "Fill the pot, hostess &c. and we 'll crush it." Again, in Hoffman's Tragedy, 1631: 66 we 'll crush a cup of thine own country wine." Again, in The Pinder of Wakefield, 1599, the Cobler says: "Come, George, we 'll crush a pot before we part." We still say, in cant language-to crack a bottle. Steevens. S in those crystal scales,] The old copies have-that crys tal, &c. The emendation was made by Mr. Rowe. I am not sure that it is necessary. The poet might have used scales for the entire machine. Malone. 6 let there be weigh'd Your lady's love against some other maid-] Your lady's low That I will show you, shining at this feast, SCENE III. A Room in Capulet's House. Enter Lady CAPULET and Nurse. [Exeunt. La. Cap. Nurse, where 's my daughter? call her forth to me. Nurse. Now, by my maiden-head, at twelve year old,— I bade her come.. What, lamb! what, lady-bird!- La. Cap. This is the matter:-Nurse, give leave awhile, We must talk in secret.-Nurse, come back again; Nurse. 'Faith, I can tell her age unto an hour. I'll lay fourteen of my teeth, And yet, to my teen" be it spoken, I have but four,--She is not fourteen: How long is it now To Lammas-tide? La. Cap. A fortnight, and odd days. Nurse. Even or odd, of all days in the year, Come Lammas-eve at night, shall she be fourteen. is the love you bear to your lady, which in our language is commonly used for the lady herself. Heath. 7 to my teen-] To my sorrow. Johnson. So, in Spenser's Fairy Queen, B. I, c. ix: 66 for dread and doleful teen." This old word is introduced by Shakspeare for the sake of the jingle between teen, and four, and fourteen. Steevens, Were of an age.-Well, Susan is with God; Shake, quoth the dove-house: 'twas no need, I trow, To bid me trudge. And since that time it is eleven years: For then she could stand alone;1 nay, by the rood, 8 'Tis since the earthquake now eleven years;] But how comes the Nurse to talk of an earthquake upon this occasion? There is no such circumstance, I believe, mentioned in any of the novels from which Shakspeare may be supposed to have drawn his story; and therefore it seems probable, that he had in view the earthquake, which had really been felt in many parts of England, in his own time, viz. on the 6th of April, 1580. [See Stowe's Chronicle, and Gabriel Harvey's Letter in the Preface of Spenser's Works, edit. 1679.] If so, one may be permitted to conjecture, that Romeo and Juliet, or this part of it at least, was written in 1591; after the 6th of April, when the eleven years since the earthquake were completed; and not later than the middle of July, a fort night and odd days before Lammas-tide. Tyrwhitt. 9 Nay, I do bear a brain:] That is, I have a perfect remem brance or recollection. So, in The Country Captain, by the Duke of Newcastle, 1649, p. 51: "When these wordes of command are rotten, wee will sow some other military seedes; you beare a braine and memory." Reed. So, in Ram-Alley, or Merry Tricks, 1611: 1 "Dash, we must bear some brain." Steevens. could stand alone;] The quarto, 1597, reads: "could stand high lone," i. e. quite alone, completely alone. So, in another of our author's plays, high fantastical means entirely fantastical. Steevens. |