(Vol. vii., p. 520.)
We are under great obligations to the REV. MR. ARROWSMITH for his very
interesting illustration of several misunderstood archaisms; and it may not
be unacceptable to him if I call his attention to what seems to me a
farther illustration of the above singular idiom, from Shakspeare himself.
In _As You Like It_, Act I. Sc. 3., where Rosalind has been banished by the
Duke her uncle, we have the following dialogue between Celia and her
cousin:
"_Cel._ O my poor Rosalind! whither wilt thou go?
Wilt thou change fathers? I will give thee mine.
I charge thee, be not thou more grieved than I am.
_Ros._ I have more cause.
_Cel._ Thou hast not, cousin:
Pr'ythee be cheerful: know'st thou not, the duke
Hath banish'd me, his daughter?
_Ros._ That he hath not.
_Cel._ _No hath not?_ Rosalind lacks, then, the love
Which teacheth thee that thou and I _are_ one.
Shall we be sunder'd," &c.
From wrong pointing, and ignorance of the idiomatic structure, the passage
has hitherto been misunderstood; and Warburton proposed to read, "Which
teacheth _me_," but was fortunately opposed by Johnson, although _he_ did
not clearly understand the passage. I have ventured to change _am_ to
_are_, for I cannot conceive that Shakspeare wrote, "that thou and I _am_
one!" It is with some hesitation that I make this trifling innovation on
the old text, although we have, a few lines lower, the more serious
misprint of _your change_ for _the charge_. I presume that the abbreviated
form of _the = y^e_ was taken for for _y^r_, and the _r_ in _charge_
mistaken for _n_; and in the former case of _am_ for _are_, indistinctness
in old writing, and especially in such a hand as, it appears from his
autograph, our great poet wrote, would readily lead to such mistakes. That
the correction was left to the printer of the first folio, I am fully
persuaded; yet, in comparison with the second folio, it is a correct book,
notwithstanding all its faults. That it was customary for men who were
otherwise busied, as we may suppose Heminge and Condell to have been, to
leave the correction entirely to the printer, is certain; for an
acquaintance of Shakspeare's, Resolute John Florio, distinctly shows that
it was the case. We have this pithy brief Preface to the second edition of
his translation of Montaigne:
"_To the Reader._
"Enough, if not too much, hath beene said of this translation. If the
faults found even by myselfe in the first impression, be now by the
printer corrected, as he was directed, the work is much amended: if
not, know that through mine attendance on her Majesty, I could not
intend it; and blame not Neptune for my second shipwracke. Let me
conclude with this worthy man's daughter of alliance: 'Que t'ensemble
donc lecteur?'
_Still Resolute_ JOHN FLORIO."