King. Come hither, count. Do you know these women? Ber. My lord, I neither can, nor will deny But that I know them. Do they charge me further?

Dia. Why do you look so strange upon your wife?

Ber. She's none of mine, my lord.
Dia.

If you shall marry,
You give away this hand, and that is mine;
You give away heaven's vows, and those are mine;
You give away myself, which is known mine;
For I by vow am so embodied yours,
That she which marries you must marry me;
Either both, or none.

Laf. [To BERTRAM.] Your reputation comes too short for my daughter: you are no husband for her. Ber. My lord, this is a fond and desperate

Ask him upon his oath, if he does think

He had not my virginity.

King. What say'st thou to her?
Ber.

She's impudent, my lord; And was a common gamester to the camp.

Dia. He does me wrong, my lord: if I were so, He might have bought me at a common price: Do not believe him. O! behold this ring, Whose high respect, and rich validity, Did lack a parallel; yet, for all that, He gave it a commoner o' the camp, If I be one.

Count.

He blushes, and 'tis his :

Of six preceding ancestors, that gem

Conferr'd by testament to the sequent issue,
Hath it been ow'd and worn. This is his wife:
That ring's a thousand proofs.
King.

Methought, you said,
You saw one here in court could witness it.
Dia. I did, my lord, but loth am to produce
So bad an instrument: his name's Parolles.
Laf. I saw the man to-day, if man he be.
King. Find him, and bring him hither.
Ber.
What of him?

He's quoted for a most perfidious slave,
With all the spots o' the world tax'd and debauch'd,
Whose nature sickens but to speak a truth.
Am I or that, or this, for what he'll utter,
That will speak any thing?
King.

She hath that ring of yours.

Ber. I think, she has: certain it is, I lik'd her,
And boarded her i' the wanton way of youth.
She knew her distance, and did angle for me,
Madding my eagerness with her restraint,
As all impediments in fancy's course
Are motives of more fancy; and, in fine,
Her insuit coming with her modern grace,
Subdued me to her rate: she got the ring,
And I had that, which any inferior might
At market-price have bought.

Dia.
I must be patient:
You, that have turn'd off a first so noble wife,

you,

Not fearing the displeasure of your master, (Which, on your just proceeding, I'll keep off,) By him, and by this woman here, what know you!

Par. So please your majesty, my master hath been an honourable gentleman: tricks he hath had in him, which gentlemen have.

King. Come, come; to the purpose. Did he love this woman?

Par. 'Faith, sir, he did love her; but how?
King. How, I pray you?

Par. He did love her, sir. as a gentleman loves

Dia. Do you know, he promised me marriage! Par. 'Faith, I know more than I'll speak.

King. But wilt thou not speak all thou know'st! Par. Yes, so please your majesty. I did go between them, as I said; but more than that, he loved her, for, indeed, he was mad for her, and talked of Satan, and of limbo, and of furies, and I know not what yet I was in that credit with them at that time, that I knew of their going to bed, and of other motions, as promising her marriage, and things that would derive me ill will to speak of: therefore, I will not speak what I know.

King. Thou hast spoken all already, unless thou

ACT I.-SCENE 1.

"-to whom I am now in WARD"-"It is now almost forgotten in England, (says Johnson,) that the heirs of great fortunes were the king's wards. Whether the same practice prevailed in France it is of no use to inquire, for Shakespeare gives to all nations the manners of England." Knight justly observes that, "The particular expression here used by Shakespeare does not necessarily imply that the feudal rights of the sovereign over tenants in chief, during their minority, were assumed to be exercised in the case of Bertram. Those rights did not extend to all France, but were confined to Normandy. Our Poet followed, without regard to the general question of wards, the story of Boccaccio, in which the Bertram of the novel is represented as being left by his father under the guardianship of the king. But in Shakespeare's day the rights of wardship were exercised by the crown very oppressively, and an English audience would quite understand how a sovereign could claim the privilege of disposing of his tenant in marriage."

"-how sad a PASSAGE 'tis"-"Passage' is any thing that passes. So we now say, 'a passage of an author;' and we said about a century ago, the passages of a reign.' When the Countess mentions Helena's loss of a father, she recollects her own loss of a husband, and stops to observe how heavily the word had passes through her mind."-JOHNSON.

Thus, in the COMEDY OF ERRORS, (act iii. scene 1:)Now in the stirring passage of the day.

"A FISTULA"-In the Poet's time, this term did not convey so disagreeable and repulsive an idea as now. In Painter's novel the passage relating to the disorder of the king of France runs thus:-"She heard by report that the French king had a swelling upon his breast,

which, by reason of ill cure, was growen to be a fistule which did put him to marveilous paine and griefe; and that there was no Phisician to be found (although many were proved) that could heale it."

"these GREAT TEARS grace his remembrance""The great tears' which the departure of Bertram causes her to shed, being imputed to her grief for her father, grace his remembrance more than those which she really shed for him." This interpretation, obvious in itself, need not have been given, (we owe it first to M. Mason,) had not eminent annotators interpreted the "great tears" as "tears shed by the great," (i. e. the king, etc.,) for Helena's father.

"In his bright radiance and collateral light"—i. e. I cannot be united with him, and move in the same sphere, but must be comforted at a distance by the radiance that shoots on all sides from him.

"- our heart's TABLE"-A "table" was the old word for a picture: here it is used for the canvass on which a picture was to be painted. Shakespeare uses "table of my heart" in his Twenty-fourth "Sonnet." Trick.

in the next line, means personal peculiarity, as in LEAR-"the trick of his voice;" though it may be derived, as Collier interprets it, from the technicalities of drawing, or painting.

"-too CAPABLE"-Here, and afterwards in Parolles's phrase of "capable of a courtier's counsel," we have the word used as it is in HAMLET, in a common old sense, given in the old dictionaries, for able to receive or comprehend; susceptible.

"And you, MONARCH"-The word queen had a double sense-a royal personage or a scold. When Helena says, "And you, monarch," she may intend a reference to a fantastical character called Monarcho, in the time

of Shakespeare. (See note to LOVE'S LABOUR'S LOST, act iv. scene 1.) A Monarcho seems to have been a blustering braggart, not unlike Parolles.

"some STAIN of soldier in you"-i. e. Some tincture, or colour of a soldier.

"There shall your master have a thousand loves"It is not clear to what the adverb "there" applies: whether to Helena's virginity, as Stevens maintains, or to the French court, whither Bertram had gone. The last is by far the more probable; but the whole speech is abrupt and obscure, and possibly, as Hanmer contended, something has been lost-such as the words, "You're for the court." Or, the preceding words in Parolles's speech, "Will you any thing with it?" may be a misprint for "Will you any thing with the court?" "— pretty, fond, adoptious CHRISTENDOMS"-The pretty, fond, adoptious christendoms,

That blinking Cupid gossips

of which we have here an example, are taken from the fashionable love-phrases of the day, which were adopted from the Italian poets, so familiarly known in the court of Elizabeth; and Heath says that an "authority for most, if not all of them, can be found in the love-poetry of those times." "Christendoms" is used, as in other writers of the age, for Christian names, for which Cupid acts as "gossip," (i. e. sponsor, being the old primitive sense of that word;) God-sibs, e. sib, or related in a religious relation.

"— a virtue of a GOOD WING"-This is a metaphor from Shakespeare's favourite source, falconry. A bird of "good wing" was a bird of swift and strong flight. "If your valour will suffer you to go backward for advantage, and your fear, for the same reason, will make you run away, the composition is a virtue that will fly far and swiftly." Mason thinks we should read-" is like to wear well."

"The mightiest space in fortune nature brings""The meaning is this:-The affections given us by nature often unite persons between whom fortune or accident has placed the greatest distance, or disparity; and cause them to join like likes (instar parium) like persons in the same situation or rank of life.' Thus, in TIMON:

Thou solderest close impossibilities,
And mak'st them kiss.

'The mightiest space in fortune,' for persons the most widely separated by fortune, is certainly a licentious expression; but it is such a license as Shakespeare often takes. Thus, in CYMBELINE, the diminution of space is used for the diminution, of which space, or distance, is the cause."-MALONE.

SCENE II.

66 Florentines and SENOYS"-The "Senoys" are the inhabitants of the republic of Sienna, so called by Painter in his novel, after the French.

"He had the wit, which Ican well observe”—“ Honour is not dignity of birth or rank, but acquired reputation: 'Your father (says the King) had the same airy flights of satirical wit with the young lords of the present time, but they do not what he did, hide their unnoted levity in honour-cover petty faults with great merit.' This is an excellent observation. Jocose follies, and slight offences, are only allowed by mankind in him that overpowers them by great qualities."-JOHNSON.

"So like a courtier, contempt NOR bitterness"—" Nor' was used without reduplication. So, in MEASURE FOR MEASURE:

More nor less to others paying, Than by self-offences weighing. The old text needs to be explained. He was so like a courtier, that there was in his dignity of manner nothing contemptuous, and in his keenness of wit nothing bitter. If bitterness or contemptuousness ever appeared, they had been awakened by some injury, not of a man

"-and CLOWN"-The "Clown," in this comedy, is a domestic fool of the same kind as Touchstone. Such fools were, in the Poet's time, maintained in all great families, to keep up merriment in the house. Cartwright, in one of the copies of verses prefixed to the works of Beaumont and Fletcher, censures such dialogues as this, and that between Olivia and the Clown, in TWELFTH NIGHT:

Shakespeare to thee was dull, whose best jest lics, I' th' lady's questions, and the fool's replies, Old-fashion'd wit, which walk'd from town to town In trunk-hose, which our fathers called the clown. "to EVEN your CONTENT"-i. e. To come up to your wishes. In this rather too quaint phrase, the Steward says he wishes that the pains he has taken to fulfil the lady's hopes, might be learned from the memory of the acts themselves; for the necessity of self-commendation is painful, besides lessening the lustre of merit.

"to go to the world"-This phrase signifies to be married: thus, in As You LIKE IT, Audrey says, "It is no dishonest desire, to desire to be a woman of the world."

"BARNES are blessings"-"Barnes" is the word still used in Scotland for children, with a slight change both of sound and orthography. It is on account of this difference, however slight, as marking the history of language, that I have retained the old spelling, instead of conforming it, with most later editors, to the Scotch.

"EEN great friends"-The old copy reads, “in great friends;" which Johnson and Knight retain, and understand as expressing that "she is not skilled in the matter of great friends.' But in for "e'en" is a misprint which occurs often; and the sense supports the correction.

HOW SOME'ER their hearts are severed"-The modern editions invariably read howsoe'er, and the ancient copies howsomere, or howsome'er, which most likely was meant for a vulgarism on the part of the Clown. If there be any personal allusion in the names of Charbon and Poysam, (Collier says,) it has not been discovered.

"the NEXT way"-i. e. The nearest, or most direct way. This is still used in Warwickshire.

"— FOND done"-i. e. Done foolishly. "Fond," for foolish, was common in Old-English, and indeed seems the primitive sense. It acquired the modern sense of tender, loving, from being first used habitually to express excessive or doating affection.

"ON every blazing star"-The old copy has, "ere every blazing star"-a misprint, for which different editors have read for, ere, and or, (in its old sense of before.) "On" is Singer's conjecture, and seems the most probable, though the choice is immaterial.

"Though honesty be no puritan"-" The Clown answers, with the licentious petulance allowed to the character, that if a man does as a woman commands, it is likely he will do amiss;' that he does not amiss, he makes the effect not of his lady's goodness, but of his own honesty, which, though not very puritanical, will do no hurt, but, unlike the puritans, will comply with the injunctions of superiors, and wear the surplice of humility over the black gown of a big heart'-will obey commands, though not much pleased with a state of subjection."-JOHNSON.

"DIANA, no queen of virgins"—"The passage in the original stands thus: Love, no god, that would not extend his might only where qualities were level; queen of virgins, that would suffer her poor knight surprised without rescue,' etc. The introduction of Diana, no' and to be' was made by Theobald. We adopt such changes with great reluctance; but, as the text in the original is certainly corrupt, we prefer a reading that has been generally received to any new conjecture. It would certainly be a less violent alteration to let the description of Fortune and Love terminate without the introduction of Diana; and to suppose the Steward to be translating into narrative an apostrophe of Helena to the Queen of Virgins."-KNIGHT.

"Why, that you are my daughter"-In the old copies, there is a long dash before "Why, that you are my daughter?" to indicate a pause, and an interrupted sentence. The obvious meaning is, "Why, because I call you my daughter, does your eye put on this appearance?"

"were you BOTH our mothers"-A colloquial carelessness of expression, for "were you mother to us both." "I care no more for, than I do for heaven," is in the same free idiom for "I wish as much," "I should joy in it as much as in heaven, provided he were not there also my brother."

-CAPTIOUS and INTENIBLE sieve"-Malone, Collier and Knight, agree with Stevens in taking "captious" for capable of receiving, which, however, the next word ("intenible") contradicts. Johnson is at a loss,

66

having never found captious in this sense," and supposes it may have been meant for carious. But Mr. Singer has shown conclusively, from the authority of the contemporary old dictionaries, (Cooper's, 1584, Latin and English; Cotgrave's, French and English; and Florio's, Italian,) that "captious" then meant deceitful.

"There's something IN'T"-Many editors adopt the emendation of Hanmer, "There's something hints;" but the old copies read, "There's something in't," which is very intelligible, and ought to be preserved. In TWELFTH NIGHT, (act iv. scene 3,) the same expression

occurs.

as

"let HIGHER Italy

(Those 'BATED, that inherit but the fall
Of the last monarchy,)" etc.

This passage is obscure, and probably corrupt. The meaning, according to Johnson, is this:-" Let Upper Italy, where you are to exercise your valour, see tast you come to gain honour, to the abatement (i. e. to the disgrace and depression) of those that have now los their ancient military fame, and inherit but the fall of the last monarchy." Knight and others refer “higher to the general dignity of Rome, and interpret "'bated" excepting those, as unfit judges of honour," whe inherit not Roman virtue, but its decay. To these explanations must be added the conjecture of Coleridge It ought to be observed that Hanmer was before his in the "guess" of bastards for "bated:"-" It wond be, I own, an audacious and unjustifiable change of the text; but yet, as a mere conjecture, I venture to saygest bastards for 'bated.' As it stands, I can make little or nothing of it. Why should the King except the then most illustrious states, which, as being republies were the more truly inheritors of the Roman grandear' With my conjecture the sense would be, Let higher or the more northern part of Italy, (unless higher be a corruption of hir'd, the metre seeming to demand a monosyllable,) those bastards that inherit only the infa my of their fathers, see,' etc. The following woo' and 'wed' are so far confirmative as they indicate Shakespeare's manner of connection by unmarked influences of association from some preceding metaphor. This it is which makes his style so peculiarly vital and organic Likewise, those girls of Italy' strengthen the guess."(Literary Remains.)

Johnson's seems to me the most satisfactory comment. unless we accept this very probable correction.

"one to DANCE with"-In Shakespeare's time it was usual for gentlemen to dance with swords on.

11

- there do muster true gait"-Several editors have thought this a misprint-one for "master true gait," another for "muster with true gait," and others again for "they muster," etc. I am content with the old reading, and Henley's explanation:-"The obscurity of the passage arises from the fantastical language of a character like Parolles, whose affectation of wit urges his imagination from one allusion to another, without allowing time for his judgment to determine their congruity. The cap of time' being the first image that occurs, 'true gait,' manner of eating, speaking, etc.. are the several ornaments which they muster,' place, or arrange in time's cap. This is done under the influence of the most received star,' (i. e. the person in the highest repute for setting the fashions;) and though the devil were to lead the 'measure,' or dance of fashion. such is their implicit submission, that even he must be followed."

"SEE thee to stand up"-So the original: in modern editions, fee. "I'll see thee to stand up" is, I'll notice you when you stand up."

"ACROSS"-This word, which is taken from breaking a spear "across" in chivalric exercises, is used elsewhere by Shakespeare where a pass of wit miscarries. (See As You LIKE IT, act iii. scene 4.)