"Than I dare blame my weakness"-An obscure passage, which may bear more than one meaning. That given by M. Mason strikes me as the probable one:-"Lafeu's meaning appears to me to be this: That the amazement she excited in him was so great, that he could not impute it merely to his own weakness, but to the wonderful qualities of the object that occasioned it."

11

I am Cressid's uncle"-i. e. Pandarus. (See TROILUS AND CRESSIDA.) This allusion has been thought to throw some light on the relative date of the plays; but Chaucer and his continuator, as well as more humble romancers, had made Cressid and her uncle familiar enough to an English audience to have warranted this allusion, before they were dramatized.

"Since you SET UP YOUR REST 'gainst remedy"This phrase, found in a more solemn use in ROMEO AND JULIET, (act v.)-"set up my everlasting rest")-has been shown by Nares, in his "Glossary," and by several commentators, to have been drawn from the game of Primero, once fashionable throughout Europe, and there meant to stand upon the cards in one's hand. It thence came to mean, in the English of Elizabeth's age, as well as in contemporary Italian and Spanish, "to adventure all, to be determined, to resolve to take the risk of the present state of things." But it should also be borne in mind, (which the critics have not noted,) that this phrase, like many similar ones in all languages, drawn from field-sports, favourite games, etc., having once become familiar in its secondary sense, was then used without any reference or comparison, in the speaker or hearer, to its literal sense. Such phrases become merely a proverbial or idiomatic mode of expression, where the original allusion is quite out of sight. Romeo, in his solemn soliloquy, and Helena here, have no more direct reference to the game which gave birth and popularity to the phrase, than the preacher or orator of the present day, when he speaks of "staking" our hopes, or our all, has to the usages of betting. The metaphorical idea, in both cases, is wholly merged in the secondary and habitual sense.

"When judges have been babes"-The allusion is to St. Matthew's Gospel, (xi. 25:) "I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes." (See also 1 Cor. i. 27.)

- despair most FITS"-The old copies have shifts, which Pope, for the sake of the rhyme, as well as the sense, altered to sits. Collier adopts an old manuscript correction, "fits," which seems still more probable.

Inspired merit so by BREATH is barr'd"—"Breath' expresses human wisdom or opinion, as opposed to the excellence inspired from heaven."

"I am not an impostor"—i. e. I am not an impostor that proclaim one thing and design another; that proclaim a cure, and aim at a fraud: I think what I speak.

"NE worse of worst extended"-Let me be stigmatized as a strumpet, and, in addition, (although that would not be worse, or a more "extended" evil than what I have mentioned, the loss of my honour, which is the worst that could happen,) let me die with torture. "Ne" is not, or nor; common in Saxon and very old English, but of which this is among the latest examples. "Youth, beauty, wisdom, courage, all"-The line is usually printed

Youth, beauty, wisdom, courage, virtue, all. Virtue was added by Warburton, "to supply a defect in the measure." This word, if one be wanted, is not that authorized by the context. The King enumerates all the qualities which are apparent in Helena, which she has displayed in her interview with him. But the metre does not need this help; for though, counted on the fingers, it wants two syllables, yet the marked pauses, between each emphatic word, give the full required length to the ear.

"happiness and PRIME"-"Prime" is here used as a substantive, and means that sprightly vigour which usually accompanies the prime of life. So in Montaigne's "Essays," translated by Florio:-" Many things seem greater by imagination than by effect. I have passed over a good part of my age in sound and perfect health: I say, not only sound, but blithe, and wantonly lustful. That state, full of lust, of prime, and mirth, made me deem the consideration of sickness so irksome that, when I came to the experience of them, I have found their fits but weak."

my hopes of HEAVEN"-The old copies have help for "heaven," which last is probably right; Shakespeare having used the somewhat forced expression, “But will you make it even?" for the sake of closing the couplet emphatically with "heaven." All this part of the scene is in rhyme.

-IMAGE of thy state"-This is the original reading, and gives a sense congruous to the context, such as the author may very well have intended. Yet there is both probability and poetic taste in Warburton's conjecture that the word was impage, from imping, or graftingthus making Helena continue the metaphor by declining to graft on her lowly stock any scion of the royal state of France. The chief objection to adopting this word is that it is not found elsewhere, and, if it was written by the author, must have been of his own coinagewhich is certainly not at all unlikely.

SCENE II.

"-as TIB's RUSH for TOM's FORE-FINGER' -"Tom" and "Tib" were apparently common names for a lad and lass; the rush ring seems to have been a kind of love-token, for plighting of troth among rustic lovers. In Green's "Menaphon" the custom is alluded to"Well, 'twas a goodly worlde when such simplicitie was used, sayes the olde women of our time, when a ring of rush would tie as much love together as a gimmon (gimmal) of golde."

The phrase was still in use among the lighter writers of Charles II.'s time.

SCENE III.

"MODERN and familiar things supernatural and CAUSELESS"-" Modern" is often used by Shakespeare for common. Upon "causeless," Coleridge remarks:"Shakespeare, inspired, as it might seem, with all knowledge, here uses the word 'causeless' in its strict philosophical sense-cause being truly predicable only of phenomena, (i. e. things natural,) and not of novmena, or things supernatural."

your DOLPHIN is not lustier"-Stevens maintains this to mean the Dauphin, or heir of the crown of France; and thus in fact the title was anciently anglicised, by the most accurate writers. Thus old Coryat, the traveller, relates the historical origin of “the title of dolphin to the eldest sonne of the kinge of France." But here I quite agree with Nares, that this is but a colloquial comparison with the dolphin, as an active, lively, jumping fish. Such piscatory comparisons are so common in English usage as to mark the habits of the people-" as sound as a roach;" "as slippery as an eel." If the heir-apparent of France had been meant, it would have been said the Dolphin..

"LUSTICK, as the Dutchman says"-This word came into common use from Holland, in the beginning of the seventeenth century: it occurs, among other authorities, in Decker and Webster's "Wyat's History," (1607 :)— If my old master be hang'd, why so;

If not, why rustick and lustick.

"-to lead her a CORANTO"-i. e. A species of dance often mentioned in writers of Shakespeare's time. It was very active and lively. (See TWELFTH NIGHT, act i. scene 3.)

"to each, BUT ONE"-i. e. I wish a virtuous mistress to each of you, with one exception; meaning Bertram, whom in hope she reserves for herself, whom she could not modestly describe as " fair and virtuous."

"-bay CURTAL"-i. e. A bay docked horse.

"My mouth no more were BROKEN"-A "broken mouth" is one which has lost some of its teeth.

"all the rest is mute”—i. e. "I have no more to say to you;" and she therefore proceeds to the second lord.

great additions SWELL'S"-So the old copy, which abbreviates swell us into "swell's," to show that the line requires it to be pronounced as a monosyllable. "— good alone

111

Is good, without a name; vileness is so," etc. The meaning is-Good is good, independent of any worldly distinction or title: so, vileness is vile, in whatever state it may appear. The same phraseology is found in MACBETH:

Though all things foul would wear the brow of grace,

Yet grace must still look so

(i. e. must still look like grace-like itself.)

"-which to defeat"-The implication, or clause of the sentence, (as the grammarians say,) here serves for the antecedent-"which danger to defeat." So in OTHELLO:

she dying gave it me,

And bid me when my fate would have me wive
To give it her-

(i. e. to my wife, though not mentioned before but by implication.)

"Into the STAGGERS"-The commentators here inform

us that the " staggers" is a violent disease in horses; but the word in the text has no relation, even metaphorically, to it. The reeling and unsteady course of a drunken or sick man is meant. Shakespeare has the same expression in CYMBELINE, where Posthumus

says:

Whence come these staggers on me?

"A counterpoise, if not to thy estate"-i. e. I promise her such rank and wealth as may be an equivalent to them, if not a still fuller scale, outweighing that on your side.

"the NOW-BORN brief"-The old copies read nowborne, which Collier retains, and says the meaning of it is clear" whose ceremony shall seem expedient on the now, to be borne briefly, or concluded briefly." I cannot make out this sense, and (unless the whole be a misprint for something else) prefer the ordinary reading of "now-born brief." "Brief" is used as frequently, by Shakespeare and his contemporaries, for any short writing, or speech; as in this play, (act v. scene 3,)"She told me, in a sweet verbal brief!" The lines there mean "whose ceremony shall seem expedient on the short verbal contract which has now had its birth."

"-and Attendants"-The old copies have the following stage-direction here:-" Parolles and Lafeu stay behind, commenting of this wedding.”

"-for two ORDINARIES"-i. e. While I dined in your company twice. The dining at an ordinary was a fashion of genteel life, in Shakespeare's day, which the change of manners renders every day less common, as well as less fashionable, in England. In this respect, as in many others. American tastes and usages preserve Old-English habits, which have gone out of date at home.

The sturdy ploughman doth the soldier see
All scarfed with pied colours to the see,
Whom Indian pillage hath made fortunate;
And now he 'gins to loath his former state.

"—in what motion age will give me leave”—» ' [ cannot do much, (says Lafeu;) doing I am past, as I will by thee in what motion age will give me leave(i. e. as I will pass by thee as fast as I am able:')-and he immediately goes out."-EDWARDS.

"the dark house, and the detested wife"-The "dark house" is a house made gloomy by discontent. Milton says of Death and the King of Hell, preparing

to combat:

So frowned the mighty combatants, that hell
Grew darker at their frown.

This is much the same thought, though more solemnly expressed, that we meet with in KING HENRY IV, (Part I. :)

he's as tedious As a tired horse, a railing wife; Worse than a smoky house.

SCENE IV.

"and WELL-FED"-" An allusion to the old saving. 'Better fed than taught;' to which the Clown has himself alluded in a preceding scene:- I will show my self highly fed and lowly taught.' "—RITSON.

"but puts it off to a compell'd restraint"—i. e. Postpones it owing to a compulsory restraint.

"the CURBED time"-i. e. The time to which the compell'd restraint applies.

"May make it PROBABLE NEED"—i. e. May give it the appearance of necessity.

SCENE V.

66- I took this LARK for a BUNTING"-" The 'bunting is, in feather, size, and form, so like the sky-lark, as to require nice attention to discover the one from the other: it also ascends and sinks in the air nearly in the same manner; but it has little or no song, which gives estimation to the sky-lark."-J. JOHNSON.

"END, ere I do begin"-All the copies, ancient and modern, until Collier's edition, read, "And ere I do be gin," as if it were a broken sentence; but the true read ing has been pointed out by the MS. corrector of Lord F. Egerton's first folio, where "End" is substituted for And, or rather E for A, in the margin. This happy suggestion gives the meaning of Bertram, that he wil end his matrimonial rite ere he begins it.

661

-like him that leaped into the custard"-Ben Jonson has a passage which illustrates this:

He may perchance, in tail of a sheriff's dinner,
Skip with a rhyme on the table, from New-nothing,
And take his Almain-leap into a custard,
Shall make my lady mayoress and her sisters
Laugh all their hoods over their shoulders.

Devil is an Ass, (act i. scene 1.) The leaper into the custard was the city fool. Gifford has a note on the above passage, which we copy:"Our old dramatists abound with pleasant allusions to the enormous size of their 'quaking custards,' which were served up at the city feasts, and with which such gross fooleries were played. Thus Glassthorne:— I'll write the city annals

In metre, which shall far surpass Sir Guy Of Warwick's history, or John Stow's, upon The custard, with the four-and-twenty nooks At my lord mayor's feast.-Wit in a Constable. Indeed, no common supply was required; for, besides

what the corporation (great devourers of custard) consumed on the spot, it appears that it was thought no breach of city manners to send or take some of it home with them, for the use of their ladies. In the excellent old play quoted above, Clara twits her uncle with this practice:

Nor shall you, sir, as 'tis a frequent custom,
'Cause you're a worthy alderman of a ward,
Feed me with custard and perpetual white broth,
Sent from the lord mayor's feast, and kept ten days,
Till a new dinner from the common-hall
Supply the large defect."

"I have kept of them tame"-" Of them," for "some of them," is a very old idiom, which has gradually become antiquated, though perhaps not yet quite

obsolete.

"Holy seems the quarrel"—This should seem to be the remark of a Florentine lord; as in the old copies the "two Frenchmen" are distinguished by "French E." and "French G.," (perhaps French Envoy and French Gentleman,) before what is assigned to them in the dialogue. Most of the modern editors make no such distinction, but merely call them “1 Lord” and “2 Lord." These appear to be the same "French E." and "French G." who afterwards accompany Helena to Roussillon.

SCENE II.

"- he will look upon his boot, and sing; mend the ruff, and sing"-The tops of the boots, in Shakespeare's time, turned down, and hung loosely over the leg. The folding part, or top, was the "ruff:" it was of softer leather than the boot, and often fringed. Ben Jonson calls it the ruffle :-"Not having leisure to put off my silver spurs, one of the rowels catched hold of the ruffle of my boot."-(Every Man out of his Humour.) To this fashion, also, Bishop Earle alludes in his "Characters," (1638)-" He has learned to ruffle his face from his boot, and takes great delight in his walk to hear his spurs jingle."

"WOMAN me"-i. e. Affect me as my sex are usually affected.

"Which holds him much to have"-The meaning seems to be, that Parolles has a great deal too much of that which it imports him to have much of, in order to keep up appearances-impudence. Heath thought the meaning was, that Parolles had "a deal too much of that which alone can hold or judge that he has much in him-i. e. folly and ignorance."

"Not so, but as we change our courtesies"-"The gentlemen declare that they are servants to the Countess; she replies-No otherwise than as she returns the same offices of civility."-JOHNSON.

"move the STILL-PIECING air"-This is a line doubtful alike in its reading and its meaning. The first folio has still-peering air." This Knight retains, as meaning "appearing still"-a sense, to my mind, not easy to be extracted from the words, and neither very poetical nor appropriate when obtained. The second folio has "still-piercing," which is preferred by Nares and others, as meaning "still or constantly pierced;" the active for the passive participle, as often occurs in old poets. I have preferred the reading suggested by some anonymous critic, and adopted by Stevens and other editors, of "still-piecing," (i. e. which constantly pieces, or makes itself whole.) My chief reason for this preference is one not given by the English editors—the resemblance of the thought and expression to a passage in the TEMPEST, where Ariel tells the three men of sin that their swords

may as well Wound the loud winds, or with bemocked stabs

Kill the still-closing waters.

Thus Helena here charges the bullets to wound the "still-piecing air," which still closes over the wound, and sings as in scorn of it, but to spare her lord. That "still-piecing" is the word designed, is made more probable by the fact that the old orthography would be still-peecing, which requires but the error of one letter to make still-peering, as in the first folio. This idea is oriental and scriptural, and may well have been suggested by a passage in the apocryphal book of the Wisdom of Solomon:"-" As when an arrow is shot at a mark, it parteth the air, which immediately cometh together again, so that a man cannot know where it went through."

"A TUCKET afar off"—A "tucket" was not the name of an instrument, but of the sound produced by an instrument-the trumpet.

"are not the things they GO UNDER"-i. e. Are not the things they pretend to be, under the names of which they go and are known.

"Where do the PALMERS lodge"-" Palmers" were so called from a staff or bough of palm they were wont to carry, especially such as had visited the holy places of Jerusalem. "A pilgrim and a palmer differed thus: a pilgrim had some dwelling-place; a palmer had none The pilgrim travelled to some certain place; the palmer to all, and not to any one in particular. The pilgrim must go at his own charge; the palmer must profess wilful poverty. The pilgrim might give over his profession; the palmer must be constant."-BLOUNT'S Glossary.

"His face I know not"-"Shall we say here (asks Coleridge) that Shakespeare has unnecessarily made his loveliest character utter a lie? Or shall we dare think that, where to deceive was necessary, he thought a pretended verbal verity a double crime, equally with the other a lie to the hearer, and at the same time an attempt to lie to one's own conscience?"

"AY, RIGHT, good creature"-This is the reading of the second folio, which has " Iright good creature," etc.; "Ay" being almost invariably printed I in the folios, as in other books of the time. But the first folio has "I write good creature," etc., which Malone and Collier retain as the phraseology of the day; just as Parolles says, "I write myself man." But Mr. Dyce has shown (Remarks) that this phrase is used only in reference to the speaker, and here would make the Widow say, “I write myself (or pronounce myself) a good creature.' The reading of the text which is the more commonly

received one, as an assent to Helena's remarks, is clear and natural.

"a party of the Florentine army"-The old copies read, "and the whole army"-i. e. the whole army the theatre could put upon the stage.

66

BROKES with all-i. e. Negotiates, bargains; a verb now obsolete, though its noun. broker, is retained, in a more restricted sense.

"I will bestow some precepts or this virgin"-As it is important to preserve the peculiarities of our ancient idiom, I have followed Mr. Collier in rejecting the "on this virgin" of all the other editors, and reading, with the first folio, "of this virgin," which was the language of the time. Thus, in the TAMING OF THE SHREW We had "both of one horse ;" and in the same comedy Petruchio says, "I'll venture so much of my hawk or hound."

"the LEAGUER of his adversaries"—i. e. The camp. Douce aptly quotes the following:-"They will not vouchsafe in their speaches or writings to use our ancient termes belonging to matters of warre, but doo call a camp by the Dutch name of Legar; nor will not affoord to say, that such a towne or such a fort is besieged, but that it is belegard."-SMYTHE's Discourses, (1590.)

"John Drum's entertainment"-This was a common phrase for ill treatment. There is an old motley interlude called "Jack Drum's Entertainment, or the Comedy of Pasquil and Catherine," (1601.) In this Jack Drum is a servant of intrigue, who is ever aiming at projects, and always foiled, and given the drop. Hollingshed has "Tom Drum his Entertainment, which is to hale a man in by the heade, and to thrust him out by the shoulders." And, in Manners and Customs of all Nations," by Ed. Aston, (1611, page 280:)-" Some others on the contrarie part give them John Drum's entertainment, reviling and beating them away from their houses," etc.

"I would have that drum or another, or HIC JACET" "Hic jacet" (here lies) is a common commencement of epitaphs. Parolles means to say, that he would either recover the lost drum, or another belonging to the enemy, or die in the attempt.

neither of them sinned, although the “fact” appeared "sinful." The passage has produced controversy Warburton would read, "And lawful meaning in a wicked act," and Hanmer, "Unlawful meaning in a lawful act;" but no change is required.

ACT IV.-SCENE I.

"what's the INSTANCE"-Johnson says that i stance" here means proof; but it seems rather to mean, as in HAMLET, (act iii. scene 2,) motive. motive is there (asks Parolles) that I should give myse great hurts?" He does not see the necessity of wounding himself, but is resolved to rely upon his tongue.

"— Bajazet's MUTE"-The old copies have "Baje zet's mule," but the writers most conversant with the literature of that age have been unable to hunt out any incident, true or fictitious, to which this can allude and Warburton's emendation of "mute" is natural, and very probable.

“— BARING of my beard”—We have the expressing of "baring" applied to the shaving of the head, in MESURE FOR MEASURE:-"Shave the head, and tie the beard; and say it was the desire of the penitent to be so bared before his death."

"with PAROLLES guarded"-The folios have here "a short alarum within;" no doubt, to give a panic Parolles, as he was taking his departure hoodwinked.

"Inform on that"-So the original. The common reading is, "Inform 'em that." But the change is not wanted. "Inform on that" is, give information a

that point.

SCENE II.

"-do not strive against my vows"-i. e. The vows he has made never to cohabit with his wife.

"What is not holy, that we swear not by"-The tex: here given is that of the old copies, generally followed in the later editions, which is yet certainly very obscure, and very probably rendered so by some omission, transposition, or other misprint. Heath's explanation is the one adopted :

"The sense is-We never swear by what is not holy, but swear by, or take to witness, the Highest, the Divinity. The tenor of the reasoning contained in the following lines perfectly corresponds with this: If I should swear by Jove's great attributes that I loved you dearly, would you believe my oaths, when you found by experience that I loved you ill, and was endeavour. ing to gain credit with you in order to seduce you to your ruin? No, surely; but you would conclude that I had no faith either in Jove or his attributes, and that my oaths were mere words of course. For that oath can certainly have no tie upon us, which we swear by him we profess to love and honour, when at the same time we give the strongest proof of our disbelief in him. by pursuing a course which we know will offend and dishonour him."

Yet it is not easy to extract such a meaning from these lines as they stand, and, with Singer, I strongly incline that they should be read:

If I should swear by Love's great attributes,

I lov'd you dearly, would you believe my oaths,
When I did love you ill? this has no holding,
To swear by him, when I protest to love
That I will work against him.

The first alteration has Johnson's sanction, in the print of the old folio it is doubtful whether it be love's or love's;' and whoever reads Bertram's preceding and succeeding speeches will be convinced that love's was meant. The slight change in punctuation, and the substitution of when for whom, would not be an unwarrant able innovation: they are probably errors of the press. The sense of the last three lines will then be: This has no consistency to swear by love, when, at the same time, I protest in secret to love that I will work against

him, (i. e. against my lover's peace,) by leaving him for another, as Bertram had left his wife for Diana."

"I see, that men make HOPES in such a WAR"Here is again some evident misprint, and Singer's conjecture is so probable, that I have adopted it in the text. The old copy reads, make ropes in such a scarre.' Rowe changed it to make hopes in such affairs;' and Malone to hopes in such a scene.' But affairs and scene have no literal resemblance to the old word scarre. Warre is always so written in the old copy; the change is, therefore, less violent, more probable, and makes better sense."

Knight thus defends and labours to elicit sense from the folio reading:

The reading of the original is startling and difficult. The common reading (that of Rowe) is :

I see that men make hopes, in such affairs.

Malone reads:

Men

I see that men make hopes, in such a scene. Tieck justly observes that to make hopes' is a very weak expression, and in such affairs' equally trivial. In such a scene' is little better. Looking at the tendency of Shakespeare to the use of strong metaphorical expressions, the original reading, however obscure, ought not to be lightly rejected; for unquestionably such a word as scarre was not likely to be substituted by the printer for a more common word, such as scene, or affairs. A scarre is a rock-a precipitous cliff-and thus, figuratively, a difficulty to be surmounted. (says Diana) pretend to show how we can overpass the obstacle. Such terms as 'love is holy,'-' my love shall perséver,'-are the ropes by the aid of which the steep rock is to be climbed. The ropes that we'll forsake, ourselves,' are the supports of which we ourselves lose our hold, after we have unwisely trusted to them. If hopes' is substituted for ropes, and scarre retained, the sense then may be, that men hope, in such a position of difficulty, that we'll forsake ourselves-cease to rely upon ourselves."-KNIGHT.

Finally, Mr. Collier, who also keeps the old text, suggests that staire may be read for scarre; and that the allusion is to a ladder of ropes.

11

- Since Frenchmen are so BRAID"-" The explanation of this word given by Stevens seems the right one, though it has been disputed: Braid signifies crafty, deceitful; and he derives it from the Anglo-Saxon bred, which is usually translated fraus. The ordinary sense is that which Palsgrave gives in his Dictionary, (1530,) hastynesse of mynde.' 'At a braid,' or on a sudden, is a not unusual expression; the meaning of Diana might, therefore, possibly be, that Frenchmen are so hasty and sudden; but this is hardly consistent with what she has previously said of them."-COLLIER.

Richardson, in his Dictionary, adopts the last sense, and Mr. Dyce, agreeing in this derivation, explains it here, "violent in desire, lustful." But there is so much proof of braid, and to bride, signifying, in Old-English, deceit, and to beguile, that I do not doubt the sense first given.

SCENE III.

"EVER tuned his bounty"—-All the authorities and editions have here "even tuned." The sense so clearly indicates a literal error, of even for "ever," that I have not hesitated to correct it."

"Is it not MEAN,-damnable in us"-It is not improbable that this should be printed "meant damnable," or else "most damnable;" but "damnable" for damnably, as "swear horrible" for horribly, is common OldEnglish. "Is it not most wickedly meant, or mean?"

“ — his COMPANY"-i e. His companion; meaning Parolles.

Ber

"that he might take a measure of his own judg ments"-"This is a very just and moral reason. tram, by finding how erroneously he has judged, will

be less confident, and more easily moved by admonition."-JOHNSON.

"dialogue between the fool and the soldier-Collier infers, from the customs of the old stage, that some popular production of the kind probably then existed. It is a species of performance of which John Heywood seems to have been the inventor, in the reign of Henry VIII.

"this counterfeit MODEL"-It is spelled module in the old copies; and module and "model" were the same word differently spelled-"model," from the French modelle, and "module," from the Latin modulus.

"his heels have deserved it, in usurping his spurs so long"-"The punishment of a recreant or coward was to have his spurs hacked off."

"CON him no thanks"-i. e. I am not at all obliged to him for it. To con thanks answers precisely, both in the literal and the idiomatic sense, to the French savoir gré. To "con" is to know. The expression occurs in Chaucer, and later writers, down to Shakespeare's time.

"if I were to live this present hour"-Perhaps we should read, "if I were but to live this present hour;" unless the blunder is meant to show the fright of Parolles.

"a dumb INNOCENT"-i. e. An idiot, or natural fool, (distinguished from the jocose, domestic fool, in many writers, by the term "innocent,") assigned to the care and custody of the sheriff.

"I could endure any thing before but a CAT”—Bertram was one of those described by Shylock, who could not endure "a harmless, necessary cat.'

"he has led the drum before the English tragedians"-The actors of Shakespeare's day, and a little earlier, usually went about the country, preceded by a drum, to give notice of their arrival in any town where they wished to perform. Decker, in his "Belman of London," (quarto, 1608,) mentions the practice when players "travelled upon the hard hoof from village to village."

"at a place there called MILE-END"-" Mile-end" was the place where the citizens of London were often mustered and trained.

-for a QUART D'ECU"-A "quart d'ecu" is the fourth part of the smaller French crown; about eightpence sterling. It is usually spelled cardecue, as in the old copies. It occurs again in the fifth act of this play.

"he will sell the fee-simple of his salvation"— The author, as he frequently does, alludes to the old law of real property, the terms of which he uses with technical familiarity, though not a little out of place in Parolles's mouth, even if we should suppose him to be a Norman, to whom such terms of the common-law would not be unintelligible.