Page images
PDF
EPUB

ADDITIONAL NOTES

AND SUGGESTED EMENDATIONS.

SUPPLEMENTARY VOLUME.

THE POEMS OF SHAKSPERE.

VENUS AND ADONIS.

Page 29.

"For to a pretty ear she tunes her tale."-Mr Collier asks whether this be not a misprint for air.

In fact, two pages further on, ear is made to rhyme with hair; and it is pronounced air in Shakspere's native county.

Page 32.

"From morn to night."-In every old edition: "From morn till night."

THE RAPE OF LUCRECE.

Page 90.

"And thy ill aim, before thy shoot be ended."-A play is here intended on the words shoot and suit, which were pronounced alike.

406 ADDITIONAL NOTES TO SUPPLEMENTARY VOL.

Page 123.

"But stood, like old acquaintance in a trance,

Met far from home, wondering each other's chance."

No sense here. Every old edition has :

"Both stood, like old acquaintance," &c.

SONNET S.

SONNET XV.

"That this huge state presenteth nought but shows." Stage, in the original. The modern editors merely copy the misprint of Malone's edition.

SONNET XX

"A man in hue, all hues in his controlling."

Hues is spelled Hews in the original, with a capital letter, and in italics, as Will is spelled in Sonnet CXXXVI. It is supposed to refer, perhaps, to "Mr. W. H.," "the only begetter of these sonnets," whose name Tyrwhitt makes out to be Hughes.

SONNET CXXVII.

"Sweet beauty hath no name, no holy hour."

Bower, in the original. The modern editors copy the error of Malone.

SONNET CXXXII.

"Thine eyes I love, and they, as pitying me,
Knowing thy heart, torment me with disdain."

The sense is not clear. Mr Collier, with a very slight altera-
tion, reads, making the second line parenthetical:
"Thine eyes I love, and they, as pitying me,

(Knowing thy heart torments me with disdain),
Have put on black, and loving mourners be."

ADDITIONAL NOTES TO SUPPLEMENTARY VOL. 407

A LOVER'S COMPLAINT.

Page 210.

"Bedded jet."-Probably, "Beaded jet."

Page 213.

"All aids, themselves made fairer by their place,
Can for additions."

"Came for additions."-Malone.

SONG.

Page 235.

Of this song, the first stanza is introduced into "Measure for Measure," and was probably written by Shakspere. We find both stanzas in the "Bloody Brother" of Fletcher. It is demonstrable that the two stanzas are by different hands. The first is the address of a woman to a man, and is, in fact, sung in "Measure for Measure" as applicable to Mariana; the other is the address of a man to a woman. It were easy to multiply proofs.

[graphic][subsumed][ocr errors][merged small]
« PreviousContinue »