27. This man hath bewitch'd. The later folios omit 'man.' Theobald

reads witch'd.'

Ib. bosom, used like

heart' for the seat of the affections and desires. See Lear, v. 3. 49, where 'common bosom' means the affections of the common people :

To pluck the common bosom on his side.'

32. stolen the impression of her fantasy, secretly stamped his image on her imagination.

33. gawds, trifling ornaments, toys. See iv. 1. 166; and Troilus and Cressida, iii. 3. 176:

'One touch of nature makes the whole world kin,

That all with one consent praise new-born gawds.' Both 'gawd' and 'jewel' are derived ultimately from the Latin gaudium ; the latter coming to us immediately from the Old French joel, which itself gaudiale.

Ib. conceits, fanciful devices. Cotgrave has 'Gentilesses. Prettie conceits, deuises, knacks, feats, trickes.'

34. Knacks, knick-knacks, trinkets. Compare Winter's Tale, iv. 4. 360: 'Sooth, when I was young

And handed love as you do, I was wont

To load my she with knacks.'

35. prevailment, influence.

Ib. unharden'd, tender, and capable of receiving impressions; inexperienced.

38. harshness, unkindness, want of tenderness. Compare Lear, ii. 4. 175: 'Thy tender-hefted nature shall not give

Thee o'er to harshness.'

41. Solon's laws gave a father the power of life and death over his child. See Sextus Empiricus, Pyrrhon. Hypot. iii. 24. But we need not suppose that Shakespeare knew of this.

45. Immediately provided &c., as Steevens has remarked, smacks of an attorney's office.

50. and within his power it is &c. For this ellipsis see Abbott § 403. 51. To leave the figure &c., to let the figure remain, or to obliterate it. 54. in this kind, in this respect. Compare As You Like It, ii. 1. 27: And in that kind swears you do more usurp

Than doth your brother that hath banish'd you.' Ib. wanting your father's voice, as he lacks your father's authority or suffrage in your favour. Compare All's Well, ii. 3. 60:

This youthful parcel

Of noble bachelors stand at my bestowing,

O'er whom both sovereign power and father's voice

I have to use.'

60. Nor how it may concern my modesty, nor how much it may affect my modesty.

61. to plead my thoughts, to utter my thoughts by way of plea or argument. Plead' is in many cases little more than ‘speak.'

65. to die the death, to die; generally but not uniformly applied to death inflicted by law: for instance, it is apparently an intensive phrase in Sackville's Induction, 1. 55:

'It taught mee well all earthly things be borne

To dye the death.'

Shakespeare however uses the expression always of a judicial punishment. Compare Antony and Cleopatra, iv. 14. 26:

She hath betray'd me, and shall die the death.'

Even when Cloten says (Cymbeline, iv. 2. 96) to Guiderius 'Die the death,' he looks upon himself as the executioner of a judicial sentence in killing an outlaw. See Matthew xv. 4.

68. Know of your youth, enquire of your youth, ascertain from your youth. So King Lear, v. I. I:

Know of the duke if his last purpose hold.'

Twelfth Night, iii. 4, 278: 'Do me this courteous office, as to know of the knight what my offence to him is.'

Ib. blood, passion as opposed to reason. See below, 1. 74, and Hamlet, iii. 2. 74:

'Whose blood and judgement are so well commingled."

69. Whether, a monosyllable; as frequently in Shakespeare. See iii. 1. 139; iii. 2. 81. It is sometimes written where'; as in The Tempest, v. 2. III, the first folio has 'Where thou bee'st he or no.'

70. the livery of a nun. For the word 'nun' applied to a woman in the time of Theseus see North's Plutarch (1631), p. 2: 'But geus desiring (as they say) to know how he might haue children, went into the city of Delphes, to the Oracle of Apollo: where, by a Nunne of the temple, this notable prophecie was giuen him for an answer.' 'Livery,' which now denotes the dress of servants, formerly signified any distinctive dress, as in the present passage. Compare Pericles, ii. 5. 10:

'One twelve moons more she'll wear Diana's livery.'

Again in the same play, iii. 4. 10:

A vestal livery will I take me to.'

71. For aye, for ever. A. S. á, or aa, ever, always.

Ib. mew'd, penned up, cooped up. Compare Richard III, i. I. 132: 'More pity that the eagle should be mew'd,

While kites and buzzards prey at liberty.'

From the French mue, which Cotgrave defines, 'A Mue, or Coope wherein foule is fattened.'

75. undergo, endure. So in The Tempest, iii. 1. 3:

'Some kinds of baseness

Are nobly undergone.'

Ib. maiden pilgrimage, a course of life passed in virginity. This sense of ‘pilgrimage' is in accordance with the usage of scripture. Compare Genesis xlvii. 9: The days of the years of my pilgrimage are an hundred and thirty years.' And see As You Like It, iii. 2. 138:

'Some, how brief the life of man

Runs his erring pilgrimage.'

76. earthlier happy, more earthly happy, happier in an earthly sense. Pope read earlier happy'; Capell, earthly happier'; and Steevens proposed 'earthly happy.'

Ib. the rose distill'd. Malone refers to other instances in which Shakespeare has used the same figure. See Sonnet v. 13, 14:

'But flowers distill'd, though they with winter meet,
Leese but their show; their substance still lives sweet.'

The next sonnet begins, following up the same idea,

'Then let not winter's ragged hand deface

In thee thy, summer, ere thou be distill'd:
Make sweet some vial, &c.'

80. my virgin patent, my privilege of virginity and the liberty that belongs to it. Compare Othello, iv. 1. 209: If you are so fond over her iniquity, give her patent to offend.' The word is derived from the literæ patentes, or letters patent, which conveyed the privilege.

81. lordship, power, authority; especially used of the authority of a husband, as in All's Well, v. 3. 156:

'I wonder, sir, sith wives are monsters to you,

And that you fly them as you swear them lordship,
Yet you desire to marry.'

Ib. whose unwished yoke. So the quartos and first folio. The second folio, to mend the grammar, read to whose unwish'd yoke.' But the omission of the preposition in such cases is of common occurrence. Compare 1 Henry VI, iii. 2. 25:

'No way to that, for weakness, which she enter'd'; that is, by which she entered. See also Much Ado about Nothing, v. 2.47: 'Let me go with that I came [for]. In his note on Cymbeline, v. 5. 465, Malone quotes Winter's Tale, ii. 1. 94:

'Even as bad as those

That vulgars give bold'st titles [to].'

Again, in the same play, ii. 1. 131:

'That the queen is spotless

I' the eyes of heaven and to you; I mean,
In this which you accuse her [of].'

89. to protest to profess, promise solemnly to observe. Compare Two Gentlemen of Verona, iv. 2. 7:

'When I protest true loyalty to her.'

90. austerity, severe self-mortification; used technically of the religious discipline of a nun.

92. crazed title, a title with a flaw in it. Compare Lyly's Euphues (ed. Arber), p. 58: 'Yes, yes, Lucilla, well doth he knowe that the glasse once crased, will with the least clappe be cracked.'

98. estate, convey as an estate.

In other passages it is used with the

preposition 'on' or 'upon.' See The Tempest, iv. 1. 85:

'And some donation freely to estate

On the blest lovers.'

And As You Like It, v. 2. 13: All the revenue that was old Sir Rowland's will I estate upon you.'

99. derived, descended. So in Two Gentlemen of Verona, v. 4. 146:

6

Thou art a gentleman and well derived.'

100. As well possessed, with as good possessions or property.

102. If not with vantage, if I have not even an advantage over him in this respect.

106. to his head, before his face, openly and unreservedly. Compare Measure for Measure, iv. 3. 147:

He shall bring you

Before the duke, and to the head of Angelo

Accuse him home and home.'

And Much Ado about Nothing, v. 1. 62:

'Know, Claudio, to thy head,

Compare

Thou hast so wrong'd mine innocent child and me.' 110. spotted, polluted, guilty; the opposite of 'spotless.' Richard II, iii. 2. 134:

· Terrible hell make war

Upon their spotted souls for this offence!'

'Spotted, detested, and abominable.'

And Titus Andronicus, ii. 3. 74:

112. spoke. See 1. 175.

113. self-affairs, my own business. Shakespeare has many similar compounds: as 'self-abuse,' for self-deception, Macbeth, iii. 4. 142; 'selfbounty,' natural goodness or benevolence, Othello, iii. 3. 200; 'self-breath,' one's own breath or words, Troilus and Cressida, ii. 3. 182; 'self-danger,' personal risk, Cymbeline, iii. 4. 149; 'self-wrong,' injury done to oneself, Comedy of Errors, iii. 2. 168; &c.

120. extenuate, mitigate, weaken the force of.

123. go along, go with us. So in 3 Henry VI, iv. 5. 25: Huntsman, what say'st thou? wilt thou go along?'

125. nuptial. The second and later folios read 'nuptialls,' in accordance with modern usage. Shakespeare, except in two instances, employs the singular form. See note on The Tempest, v. I. 308. In the same way Compare Julius Cæsar, v. 3. 105:

we have funeral' and 'funerals.'

His funerals shall

not be in our camp';

although in this case it is the singular form that has survived.

126. nearly that concerns, that nearly concerns.

127. Exeunt &c. In the quartos and folios the stage direction is Exeunt. Manet Lysander and Hermia.' It was a strange oversight on the part of Egeus to leave his daughter with Lysander.

129. How chance &c., how chances it. Compare King Lear, ii. 4. 64: 'How chance the king comes with so small a train?'

Abbott, § 37.

130. Belike, probably, by likelihood. See Julius Cæsar, iii. 2. 275:

'Belike they had some notice of the people.'

The word is unusual if not singular in form. It is recorded in Nodal and Milner's Lancashire Glossary as still in use.

131. Beteem them, allow them. Compare Hamlet, i. 2. 141:

'So loving to my mother

That he might not beteem the winds of heaven
Visit her face too roughly.'

In the present passage, as suggested in the notes to Hamlet, there is probably a reference to the other meaning of the word 'to pour.' In this sense 'teem' is still used in the North and East of England.

134 &c. Bishop Newton in his edition of Milton called attention to the resemblance between Lysander's complaint and that of Adam in Paradise Lost, x. 898-906:

'For either

He never shall find out fit mate, but such
As some misfortune brings him, or mistake;

Or whom he wishes most shall seldom gain
Through her perverseness, but shall see her gain'd
By a far worse; or, if she love, withheld

By parents; or his happiest choice too late
Shall meet, already link'd and wedlock-bound
To a fell adversary, his hate or shame.'

136. cross, vexation, trial; from the figurative usage of the word in Scripture. See Matthew x. 38; As You Like It, v. 4. 137; and below, l. 153. Ib. low. Theobald's correction. The quartos and folios read 'loue.' In support of the correction Malone refers to a very parallel passage in Venus and Adonis, 1136-1140: