II.i.40 (24,6) [Those that Hobgoblin call you, and sweet Puck, You
do their work] To those traditionary opinions Milton has reference
in L'Allegro,
_Then to the spicy nut-brown ale,
With stories told of many a feat.
How Fairy Mab the junkets eat;
She was pinch'd and pull'd she said.
And he by Frier's lapthorp led;
Tells how the drudging goblin sweat
To earn his cream-bowl duly set,
When in one night ere glimpse of morn
His shadowy flail had thresh'd the corn
Which ten day-labourers could not end.
Then lies him down the_ lubber _fiend_.
A like account of Puck is given by Drayton,
_He meeteth Puck, which most men call
Hobgoblin, and on him doth fall.--
This Puck seems but a dreaming dolt,
Still walking like a ragged colt,
And oft out of a bed doth bolt,
Of purpose to deceive us;
And leading us makes us to stray.
Long winter's nights out of the way.
And when we stick in mire and clay.
He doth with laughter leave us._
It will be apparent to him that shall compare Drayton's poem with
this play, that either one of the poets copied the other, or, as
I rather believe, that there was then some system of the fairy
empire generally received, which they both represented as accurately
as they could. Whether Drayton or Shakespeare wrote first,
I cannot discover.
II.i.42 (25,7) [_Puck_. Thou speak'st aright] I have filled up the
verse which I suppose the author left complete,
It seems that in the Fairy mythology Puck, or Hobgoblin, was
the trusty servant of Oberon, and always employed to watch or detect
the intrigues of Queen Mab, called by Shakespeare Titania.
For in Drayton's Nynphidia, the same fairies are engaged in the
sane business. Mab has an amour with Pigwiggen; Oberon being
jealous, sends Hobgoblin to catch them, and one of Mab's nymphs
opposes him by a spell.
II.i.54 (26,8) [And _tailor_ cries] The custom of crying _tailor_ at a
sudden fall backwards, I think I remember to have observed. He
that slips beside his chair falls as a taylor squats upon his
board. The Oxford editor and Dr. Warburton after him, read _and
rails or cries_, plausibly, but I believe not rightly. Besides,
the trick of the fairy is represented as producing rather merriment
than anger.
II.i.56 (26,9) [And waxen] And _encrease_, as the _moon waxes_.
II.i.58 (26,1) [But room, Faery] All the old copies read--_But room
Fairy_. The word Fairy or Faery, was sometimes of three syllables,
as often in Spenser.
II.i.84 (28,5) [paved fountain] A fountain laid round the edge with
stone.
II.i.88 (28,6) [the winds, piping] So Milton,
_While rocking winds are piping loud._
II.i.91 (28,7) [pelting river] Thus the quarto's: the folio reads
_petty_.
Shakespeare has in Lear the same word, _low pelting farms_. The
meaning is plainly, _despicable, mean, sorry, wretched_; but as it
is a word without any reasonable etymology, I should be glad to
dismiss it for _petty_, yet it is undoubtedly right. We have _petty
pelting officer_ in Measure for Measure.
II.i.92 (28,8) [over-born their continents] Born down the banks
that contained then. So in Lear,
_Close pent guilts
Rive their concealing_ continents.
II.i.98 (29,1) [The nine-men's morris] This was some kind of rural
game played in a marked ground. But what it was more I have not
found.
II.i.100 (29,2) [The human mortals want their winter here] After all
the endeavours of the editors, this passage still remains to me
unintelligible. I cannot see why winter is, in the general confusion
of the year now described, more wanted than any other season.
Dr. Warburton observes that he alludes to our practice of
singing carols in December; but though Shakespeare is no great
chronologer in his dramas, I think he has never so mingled true
and false religion, as to give us reason for believing that he
would make the moon incensed for the omission of our carols. I
therefore imagine him to have meant heathen rites of adoration.
This is not all the difficulty. Titania's account of this calamity
is not sufficiently consequential. _Men find no winter_, therefore
they sing no hymns; the moon provoked by this omission, alters the
seasons: that is, the alteration of the seasons produces the alteration
of the seasons. I am far from supposing that Shakespeare
might not sometimes think confusedly, and therefore am not sure
that the passage is corrupted. If we should read,
_And human mortals want their_ wonted year,
yet will not this licence of alteration much mend the narrative;
the cause and the effect are still confounded. Let us carry
critical temerity a little further. Scaliger transposed the
lines of Virgil's Gallus. Why may not the same experiment be
ventured upon Shakespeare.
_The human mortals want_ their wonted year,
_The seasons alter; hoary-headed frosts
Fall in the fresh lap of the crimson rose;
And on old_ Hyems' _chin, and icy crown,
An od'rous chaplet of sweet summer buds
Is, as in mock'ry set. The spring, the summer,
The chiding autumn, angry winter, change
Their wonted liveries; and the 'mazed world,
By their increase, now knows not which is which.
No night is now with hymn or carol blest;
Therefore the moon, the governess of floods,
Pale in her anger, washes all the air;
And thorough this distemperature, we see
That rheumatick diseases do abound.
And this same progeny of evil comes
From our debate, from our dissension._
I know not what credit the reader will give to this emendation,
which I do not much credit myself.