Page images
PDF
EPUB

GRU. Ay, but the mustard is too hot a little ".
KATH. Why, then the beef, and let the mustard

rest.

GRU. Nay, then I will not; you shall have the mustard,

Or else you get no beef of Grumio.

KATH. Then both, or one, or any thing thou wilt.
GRU. Why, then the mustard without the beef.
KATH. Go, get thee gone, thou false deluding

slave,

[Beats him. That feed'st me with the very name of meat : Sorrow on thee, and all the pack of you, That triumph thus upon my misery!

Go, get thee gone, I say.

Enter PETRUCHIO with a dish of meat; and
HORTENSIO.

PET. How fares my Kate? What, sweeting, all

amort9?

HOR. Mistress, what cheer?

KATH. 'Faith, as cold as can be. PET. Pluck up thy spirits, look cheerfully upon me.

and preserves its meaning; for phlegmatick, irregularly derived. from yo, might anciently have been a word in physical use, signifying inflammatory, as phlegmonous is at present. STEEVENS.

[ocr errors]

Ay, but the mustard is too hot a little.] This is agreeable to the doctrine of the times. In The Glass of Humours, no date, p. 60, it is said, But note here, that the first diet is not only in avoiding superfluity of meats, and surfeits of drinks, but also in eschewing such as are most obnoxious, and least agreeable with our happy temperate state; as for a cholerick man to abstain from all salt, scorched, dry meats, from mustard, and such like things as will aggravate his malignant humours," &c.

So Petruchio before objects to the over-roasted mutton. REED. 9 — What, sweeting, all AMORT?] This gallicism is common to many of the old plays. So, in Wily Beguiled:

"Why how now, Sophos, all amort?" Again, in Ram Alley, or Merry Tricks, 1611 : "What all amort! What's the matter?" That is, all sunk and dispirited. MALONE.

STEEVENS.

Here, love; thou see'st how diligent I am,
To dress thy meat myself, and bring it thee:

Sets the dish on a table. I am sure, sweet Kate, this kindness merits thanks. What, not a word? Nay then, thou lov'st it not; And all my pains is sorted to no proof 1:Here, take away this dish.

KATH.

1

'Pray you, let it stand.

PET. The poorest service is repaid with thanks; And so shall mine, before you touch the meat. KATH. I thank you, sir.

HOR. Signior Petruchio, fye! you are to blame! Come, mistress Kate, I'll bear you company.

PET. Eat it up all, Hortensio, if thou lov'st me.[Aside.

Much good do it unto thy gentle heart!
Kate, eat apace :-And now, my honey love,
Will we return unto thy father's house;
And revel it as bravely as the best,

With silken coats, and caps, and golden rings,
With ruffs, and cuffs, and farthingales, and things2;
With scarfs, and fans, and double change of bravery,
With amber bracelets, beads, and all this knavery.

1 And all my pains is SORTED to no proof:] And all my labour has ended in nothing, or proved nothing. "We tried an experiment, but it sorted not." Bacon. JOHNSON.

2

farthingales, and THINGS;] Though things is a poor word, yet I have no better, and perhaps the author had not another that would rhyme. I once thought to transpose the word rings and things, but it would make little improvement. JOHNSON.

However poor the word, the poet must be answerable for it, as he had used it before, Act II. Sc. V.: when the rhyme did not force it upon him:

"We will have rings and things, and fine array." Again, in The Tragedy of Hoffman, 1632:

""Tis true that I am poor, and yet have things,

"And golden rings," &c.

A thing is a trifle too inconsiderable to deserve a particular discrimination. STEEVENS.

[blocks in formation]

What, hast thou din'd? The tailor stays thy lei

sure,

To deck thy body with his ruffling treasure 3.

Enter Tailor.

Come, tailor, let us see these ornaments *;

3 with his RUFFLING treasure.] This is the reading of the old copy, which Mr. Pope changed to rustling, I think, without necessity. Our author has indeed in another play—“ Prouder than rustling, in unpaid for silk;" but ruffling is sometimes used in nearly the same sense. Thus, in King Lear:

66 -

the bleak winds

"Do sorely ruffle."

There clearly the idea of noise as well as turbulence is annexed to the word. A ruffler in our author's time signified a noisy and turbulent swaggerer; and the word ruffling is here applied in a kindred sense to dress. So, in King Henry VI. P. II. :

"And his proud wife, high-minded Eleanor,
"That ruffles it with such a troop of ladies,

"As strangers in the court take her for queen."

Again, more appositely, in Camden's Remaines, 1605: "There there was a nobleman merrily conceited and riotously given, that having lately solde a manor of a hundred tenements, came ruffling into the court in a new sute, saying, Am not I a mightie man that beare an hundred houses on my backe."

Boyle speaks of the ruffling of silk; and ruffled is used by so late an author as Addison in the sense of plaited; in which last signification perhaps the word ruffling should be understood here. Petruchio has just before told Katharine that she "should revel it with ruffs and cuffs;" from the former of which words, ruffled, in the sense of plaited, seems to be derived. As ruffling therefore may be understood either in this sense, or that first suggested, (which I incline to think the true one,) I have adhered to the reading of the old copy.

To the examples already given in support of the reading of the old copy, may be added this very apposite one from Lyly's Euphues and his England, 1580: "Shall I ruffle in new devices, with chains, with bracelets, with rings, with roabes?" Again, in Drayton's Battaile of Agincourt, 1627:

"With ruffling banners, that do brave the sky." MALONE. 4 Come, tailor, let us see these ornaments ;] In our poet's time, women's gowns were usually made by men. So, in the Epistle to the Ladies, prefixed to Euphues and his England, by John Lyly, 1580: "If a taylor make your gown too little, you

Enter Haberdasher 5.

Lay forth the gown.-What news with you, sir?

cover his fault with a broad stomacher; if too great, with a number of pleights; if too short, with a fair guard; if too long, with a false gathering." MALONE.

5 Enter Haberdasher.] Thus, in the original play :

"San. Master, the haberdasher has brought my mistris home hir cap here.

"Feran. Come hither, sirha: what have you there? "Haber. A velvet cap, sir, and it please you.

"Feran. Who spoke for it? Didst thou, Kate?

"Kate. What if I did? Come hither, sirha, give me the cap;

ile see if it will fit me.

[She sets it on her head.

"Feran. O monstrous! why it becomes thee not.

"Let me see it, Kate: here, sirha, take it hence;

"This cap is out of fashion quite.

"Kate. The fashion is good inough: belike you mean to make a fool of me.

"Feran. Why true, he means to make a foole of thee, "To have thee put on such a curtald cap:

"Sirha, begone with it.

"Enter the Taylor, with a gowne.

"San. Here is the Taylor too with my mistris gowne.

"Feran. Let me see it, Taylor: What, with cuts and jags? "Sounes, thou villaine, thou hast spoil'd the gowne.

"Taylor. Why, sir, I made it as your man gave me direction; "You may read the note here.

"Feran. Come hither, sirha: Taylor, read the note.

66

Taylor. Item, a faire round compass'd cape.

"San. I, that's true.

"Taylor. And a large truncke sleeve.

"San. That's a lie maister; I said two truncke sleeves.

"Feran. Well, sir, go forward.

"Taylor. Item, a loose-bodied gowne.

"San. Maister, if ever I said loose bodies gowne,

"Sew me in a seame, and beat me to death

"With a bottom of browne thred.

"Taylor. I made it as the note bade me.

"San. I say the note lies in his throate, and thou too, an thou sayest it.

"Taylor. Nay, nay, ne'er be so hot, sirha, for I feare you not. "San. Doost thou heare, Tailor? thou hast braved many men: "Brave me not. Th'ast fac'd many men.

"Taylor. Wel, sir.

"San. Face not me: I'le neither be fac'd, nor braved, at thy hands, I can tell thee.

HAB. Here is the cap your worship did bespeak. PET. Why, this was moulded on a porringer; A velvet dish;-fye, fye! 'tis lewd and filthy: Why, 'tis a cockle, or a walnutshell,

A knack, a toy, a trick, a baby's cap;

Away with it, come, let me have a bigger.

KATH. I'll have no bigger; this doth fit the time,

And gentlewomen wear such caps as these.

PET. When you are gentle, you shall have one too,

"Kate. Come, come, I like the fashion of it well inough; "Heere's more adoe than needes; I'le have it, I;

"And if you doe not like it, hide your eies :

"I thinke I shall have nothing by your will.

"Feran. Go, I say, and take it

up for your maister's use!

"San. Souns villaine, not for thy life; touch it not :

"Souns, take up my mistris gowne to his maister's use!

"Feran. Well, sir, what's your conceit of it?

"San. I have a deeper conceit in it than you think for. Take

up my mistris gowne to his maister's use!

"Feran. Taylor, come hither; for this time make it :

"Hence againe, and Ile content thee for thy paines.

66

Taylor. I thanke you, sir.

[Exit Tailer.

"Feran. Come, Kate, wee now will go see thy father's house, "Even in these honest meane abiliments:

"Our purses shall be rich, our garments plaine,

"To shrowd our bodies from the winter rage;

"And that's inough, what should we care for more?

"Thy sisters, Kate, to-morrow must be wed,

"And I have promised them thou should'st be there:

"The morning is well up; let's haste away;

"It will be nine a clocke ere we come there.

"Kate. Nine a clocke! why 'tis already past two in the af

ternoon, by al the clockes in the towne.

"Feran. I say 'tis but nine a clocke in the morning.

"Kate. I say 'tis two a clocke in the afternoone.

"Feran. It shall be nine then ere you go to your fathers:

"Come backe againe; we will not go to day:

"Nothing but crossing me stil?

"Ile have you say as I doe, ere I goe.

[ocr errors]

[Exeunt omnes." STEEVENS.

6 on a PORRINGER;] The same thought occurs in King -rail'd upon me till her pink'd porringer fell off STEEVENS.

Henry VIII. : her head."

« PreviousContinue »