[1] 4tos. _Will_.
[2] References to the lapwing's subtlety are very common. Cf. Shakesp.,
_Measure for Measure_, i. 4, 32, &c.
[3] An old game at cards; it is supposed to have resembled cribbage.
[4] "To make ready," meaning "to dress," is a very common expression in
old authors.
[5] An obvious reference to Queen Elizabeth.
[6] So Elbow:--"My wife, Sir, whom I _detest_ before heaven and your
honour," &c. (_M. for M_., II. 1).
[7] Ovid, Metamorph. I. 1.
[8] People who walk with _mincing_ steps. I have not met the word
elsewhere. (Cf. dancitive, p. 31.)
[9] A beggar (Ital. besogno) Vid. Dyce's Glossary under "Besonian".
[10] "Knight of the post" was the name given to those who gained their
living by giving false evidence at law-courts. Nares quotes from Nash's
"Pierce Pennilesse":--"A knight of the post, quoth he, for so I am
tearmed: a fellow that will swear any thing for twelve pence."
[11] Cf. Lear, iii. 2. _Vaunt-curriors_ to oak-cleaving thunder-bolts.
(First folio.)
[12] "Division" was a technical term in music for "the running a simple
strain into a great variety of shorter notes to the same modulation"
(Nares). The "plain song" was the simple air without variations.
[13] Sir Thomas Overbury says, in his character of 'A very woman,' that
'her lightnesse gets her to swim at top of the table, where her wee
little finger bewraies carving'.
[14] 4tos. Ladies.
[15] 4tos. Eternesses.
[16] To do anything with 'a wet finger' is to do it easily. 'It seems
not very improbable that it alluded to the vulgar and very inelegant
custom of wetting the finger to turn over a book with more
ease.'--_Nares_.
[17] Ov. Metam. I., ll. 322-23.
[18] Ed. 1606, one; ed. 1636, on.
[19] The 1606 ed. marks "Exit" Penelope.
[20] Here Momford retires to the back of the stage, where Clarence is
waiting. The 4tos. mark "Exit." I thought the lines "_Mens est_," etc.,
were Horace's, but cannot find them. "Menternque" destroys sense and
metre. An obvious correction would be "et nomen."
[21] "_Falsus_ honos juvat, _et_ mendax infamia terret
Quem, nisi mendosum et medicandum."
Hor. Ep. l. 16, ll. 39, 40.
[22] A card that cools a player's courage (I. Hy. VI., v. 3, 1. 83, &c.).
[23] The "Family of Love" was the name given to a fanatical sect; David
George, of Delph (obiit 1556), was the founder.
[24] The reference is to the visit of the Maréchal de Biron and his
suite in the autumn of 1601.
[25] 4tos. _Foul_.
[26] Pick-thatcht, ed. 1606.
[27] A term in card-playing; to "vie" was to cover a stake.
[28] The name of a famous bear. Cf. Epigrams by J. D.--
"Leaving old Plowden, Dyer and Brooke alone,
To see old Harry Hankes and Sacarson."
Master Slender ("Merry Wives," I. 1) told Anne Page: "I have seen
Sackarson loose twenty times and have taken him by the chain."
[29] 4tos. _King_.
[30] The reference is, I suppose, to Roger Bacon's "Libellus de
retardandis Senectutis accidentibus et de sensibus conservandis.
Oxoniae, 1590."
[31] Quy. inframed (F.G. Fleay).
[32] Ed. 1636, "state."
[33] Ed. 1636 makes sad work of the text here:--
"_Merry_ clad in inke,
Is but a _manner_" &c.
[34] Quy. thridlesse (sc. that cannot be pierced). Mr. Fleay suggests
"rimelesse."
[35] Ed. 1636 reads "antheame."
[36] "White-boy" was a common term of endearment for a favourite son.
[37] Quy., hot.
[38] i.e., companions.
[39] Doubtless the writer was thinking of Dogberry's "Comparisons are
odorous."
[40] A pun is intended. "Cast of merlins" = a flight of merlins (small
hawks); and "cast-of" = cast-off.
[41] "Foisting-hound." A small lap-dog with an evil smell, "Catellus
graveolens."
[42] The 'clap-dish' which beggars used to beat in order to attract the
attention of the charitable.
[43] Both quartos give "all."
[44] Ovid, Metam., I., 523.
[45] Ed. 1606: _Antevenit sortem moribus_.
[46] 4tos. weend.
[47] "That most lovely and fervid of all imaginative
panegyrics."--Swinburne's "Study of Shakespeare," p. 141.
[48] "Dr. Dodypoll" is a very rare play, to be found only in the
libraries of wealthy collectors. The copy in the library of the British
Museum is catalogued as "imperfect; wanting Sig. A 2"; but it
corresponds in all respects with Mr. Huth's. Perhaps an "Address to the
Reader," or a "Dedication" was cancelled.
[49] Before the reader goes further, let him turn to Sonnet xvii. in Mr.
Swinburne's series of "Sonnets on English Dramatic Poets."
[50] The author was doubtless thinking of _Romeo and Juliet_, iii. 2:--
"And when he shall die,
Take him and cut him out in little stars,
And he will make the face of heaven so fine,
That all the world will be in love with night,
And pay no worship to the garish sun."
[51] 4to. Form.
[52] 4to. adorning. Possibly there is the same confusion in _Antony and
Cleopatra_, ii. 2:--"And made their bends adornings."
[53] See notes of the commentators on _Hamlet_, i. 1, 165, "Then no
planets strike."
[54] See the commentators on _As You Like It_, iii. 2. "I was never so
be-rhymed since Pythagoras's time that I was an Irish rat." A short time
ago the subject of "rhyming rats to death" was discussed anew in "Notes
and Queries."
[55] Qto. cockfromb in cony. The word "incony" (meaning sweet, delicate)
occurs twice in _Love's Labour Lost_. Its derivation is uncertain.
[56] 4to. With.
[57] This word is found in Holland's "Ammianus" and Harrington's
"Epigrams" (see Nares' "Glossary," ed. Halliwell). A similar compound
(of more common occurrence) is "smell-smock."
[58] The reader will remember the punning lines in 3 _Henry VI_.,
v. 1:--
"Why, what a peevish fool was that of Crete,
That taught his son the office of a fowl!
And yet, for all his wings, the fool was drown'd."
[59] 4to. Wilt it.
[60] 4to. _Flor_.
[61] A perfume-ball worn round the neck or carried in the pocket.
[62] The trials of the Scotch witches in 1590 (for practising to
shipwreck James VI. on his return with his bride from Denmark) were too
horrible to be soon forgotten.
[63] 4to Ape.
[64] Quy. cliffe.
[65] I suspect that we should read--
"What rock hath bred this savage-minded man
That such true love in such rare beautie _shuns_?"
[66] 4to. clime.
[67] Quy. lead.
[68] 4to. _Alp_.
[69] Vide note on vol. I, p. 117.
[70] The direction in the 4to is "_Enter Flores and Homer_!"
[71] Vide note [16].
[72] 4to. craines.
[73] Compare _Midsummer Nights Dream_, ii. 1, 15: "And hang a pearl on
every cowslip's ear."
[74] 4to. where.
[75] Not marked in the 4to.
[76] 4to. rake.
[77] 4to. Sorrowed tired.
[78] The 4to prints the lines thus:--
"Where since he found you not,
He asked of me the place of your abode,--
And heere I have brought him?"
In other passages I have restored the metre silently.
[79] Qto. visition.
[80] I regret to say that Mr. Fleay was misled by a mistake of mine. In
my first hasty reading of the play I took the long double "s" to be a
double "f": the character is "La Busse."
[81] Mr. C.H. Herford, to whom I showed the MS., writes as follows:--
"The first two words make it highly probable that the whole inscription
is, like them, in Italian. In that case the first two Greek letters give
very easily the word 'fideltà' (=_phi, delta_), which combines naturally
with the _nella_. The second part is more difficult, but perhaps not
hopeless. [Greek: fnr] may, perhaps be read _phi ny_ (as Latinised
spelling of [Greek: nu]), _rô_, or finirô. Then, for the 'La B.,' suppose
that the words form, as emblems often do, a rhymed couplet; then 'B.'
would stand for Beltà, and naturally fall in with 'la.' The whole would
then read--
'_Nella fideltà_,
Finiro la Beltà.
This does not seem to me very excellent Italian, but we need not suppose
the author was necessarily a good scholar; and in that case we might
extract from it the fairly good sense: 'I will make fidelity the end
(the accomplishment) of beauty.'" This explanation seems to me very
satisfactory.
["'La Bussa' suits my explanation as well as, if not better than 'La
Buffa.' The meaning now is, 'I will end my _task_ faithfully, with an
equivoque on 'I will end _La Busse_, or the play containing him as a
character, faithfully.' There is no shadow of reason for supposing a
rhyme, or for Field's thinking that any reader would interpret La B. by
_la beltà_. Moreover no other name but Field's out of the 200 known
names of dramatic writers anterior to 1640, can be found in the letters.
There are other works of Field than those commonly attributed to him
still extant, as will be seen in a forthcoming paper of mine."
--F.G. FLEAY.]
[82] So the MS., but I suspect that we should read "ruyne," which gives
better sense and better metre.
[83] The next line, as in many instances, has been cut away at the foot
of the page.
[84] "The _close contriver_ of all harms."--Macbeth, iii. 5.
[85] "The glow-worm shows the matin to be near,
And 'gins to pale his _uneffectual fire_."--Hamlet, i. 5.
[86] "Blacke and blewe," i.e., first as a kitchen-drudge and afterwards
as a personal attendant. Blue was the livery of serving-men.
[87] It is not always easy to distinguish between final "s" and "e" in
the MS. I printed "blesseing_e_" in the Appendix to vol. II.
[88] Devices on shields.
[89] A baser sort of hawk (kestrel).
[90] A word before or after "thys" seems wanted to complete the line:
"yet, _Richard_, thys;" or, "yet thys disgrace."
[91] Gervase Markham in the Second Part (cap. vi.) of the "English
Husbandman" gives the following explanation of the term
_plashing_.--"This plashing is a halfe cutting or deviding of the quicke
growth, almost to the outward barke, and then laying it orderly in a
sloape manner, as you see a cunning hedger lay a dead hedge, and then
with the smaller and more plyant branches to wreathe and binde in the
tops, making a fence as strong as a wall, for the root which is more
then halfe cut in sunder, putting forth new branches which runne and
entangle themselves amongst the old stockes, doe so thicken and fortifie
the Hedge that it is against the force of beasts impregnable" (ed. 1635,
pp. 68-9).
[92] The first five lines of this speech are crossed through in the MS.
[93] In the MS. "reverend prelats" is crossed out and "preists" written
above. To make sure that the correction was understood, the author or
reviser has written in the left-hand margin, "read preists."
[94] i.e., star.
[95] "Brawl" was the name of a dance.
[96] Old terms in the art of fencing.
[97] In Halliwell's "Nares" two instances of the transitive use of stoop
("to lower, humiliate") are given, and _both are from Chapman_.
[98] On the upper stage, a balcony raised a few feet from the ground.
Cf. stage-direction in Day's _Humour out of Breath_, iv. 3. "_Enter
Aspero, like Hortensio, Florimell, and Assistance on the upper stage_."
Later in the same scene: "_They renew Blind mans Buff on the Lower
stage_." See also Dyce's note on Middleton's _Family of Love_, i. 3.
[99] A correction in the MS. for _Musquett_.
[100] In the Appendix to Vol. II. I printed "misse"; and so one would
naturally read the word before becoming thoroughly acquainted with the
handwriting.
[101] The words "so begett" are repeated in the MS.
[102] i.e. prisons.
[103] MS. good.
[104] The expression "Fool's paradise" was common long before Milton
used it. A writer in _Notes and Queries_ (Jan. 7, 1882) gives instances
of its occurrence in Udall's "Apophthegmes of Erasmus," 1542. I have met
it in Bullein's "Dialogue against the Fever Pestilence," 1564.
[105] For the spelling cf., Vol. ii. pp. 139 (l. 14), 179 (l. 12).
"Diety" for "deity" is not uncommon in print as well as MS.; cf.,
Saltonstall's translation of Ovid's "Ars Amoris," 1639, p. 14:--
"Oft pray'd she to the gods, but all in vaine,
To appease their _Dieties_ with blood of beasts thus slaine."
[106] In the MS. these lines are scored through.
[107] The juxtaposition of this anagram with the preceding motto (which
did not appear in the Appendix to Vol. ii.) strongly confirms my
interpretation of La B. as _la bussa_; for the anagram is a kind of
paraphrase on the motto, and should be read doubly in this way:
Natanièle Field, il fabro, Nella fideltà finiro la Bussa. I, Nathaniel
Field, the author will finish the work (_terminat auctor opus_)
faithfully (i.e., at the time appointed, _terminat hora diem_).
--F.G. Fleay.
["Terminat hora" &c. or some similar tag, is frequently found at the end
of old plays. I cannot see that Mr. Fleay's interpretation is strongly
confirmed,--or affected at all,--by the presence of the motto.]
[108] See Henslowe's Diary, ed. Collier, p. 220:--"Lent unto Thomas
Downton the 4 of maye 1602 to bye a boocke of harye Cheattell and Mr.
Smyth called the Love partes frenship the some of" ... ...
[109] _King John_, i. 2.--"And now instead of bullets _wrapt in fire_."
[110] Another form of the apologetical expression "save-reverence."
[111] i.e. cheated, cozened.
[112] An echo from "King John," I. 2:--
"And now instead of _bullets wrapt in fire_
To make a shaking fever of your walls," &c.
[113] A common proverbial expression. The dish is the wooden "clap-dish"
on which beggars clattered to attract attention.
[114] I should prefer "true heart his loyalty"--for the metre's sake.
[115] 4to. staffe.
[116] 4to. strayne.
[117] 4to. his passions.
[118] "A corrupt oath, the origin of which is obscure and not worth
inquiring."--Nares.
[119] The author certainly had in his mind Falstaff's puns on the names
of the recruits, Mouldy, Shadow, &c. (ii. _Henry IV_. iii. 2).
[120] An extemporal play by the famous Richard Tarleton. The "plat" is
preserved at Dulwich College. See Collier's "Hist. of Dramatic Poetry,"
iii. 394 (first edition).
[121] So the 4to, but I should prefer "So I have discharg'd myselfe of
these hot-shots." The term "hot-shot" seems to have been originally
applied to sharp-shooters.
[122] i.e., maid: an East-Anglian usage of the word "mother." See
Forby's "Vocabulary of East Anglia." "Mauther" is the commoner form
(found in Ben Jonson and others), but "mother" occurs in Chettle and
Day's _Blind Beggar_ and elsewhere.
[123] I find this expression of feminine impatience in Dekker's _Honest
Whore_ (Dramatic Works, ii. 26):--"_Marry muffe_, sir, are you growne so
dainty!"
[124] Let me understand you. The expression is of constant occurrence.
[125] A term of contempt like "pilchard" and "poor John." "Haberdine"
was the name for an inferior kind of cod used for salting.
[126] So Pistol, "A foutre for the world, and worldlings base!"
"A foutre for thine office!" ii. _Henry IV_. v. 3.
[127] Verjuice was made by pounding crab-apples.
[128] Kite.
[129] Dingy. "Russet" or "russeting" was the name of the coarse brown
dress worn by shepherds.
[130] In _Henry V_., iv. 1, Pistol accosts the king with "Che vous la?"
according to the first folio. Modern editors correct the intentional
blunder.
[131] To "outface with a card of ten" was just what we mean by
"browbeat." The expression (which is very common) was no doubt drawn
from the game of primero.
[132] Old spelling of "pumpkin."
[133] The officer of lowest rank (now called "lance corporal").
[134] _Quart d'écu_.
[135] Cf. Day's _Ile of Guls_, ii. 2:--
"But forresters, like images, set forth
The tyrannie of greatness without pittie."
Everybody remembers Jaques' moralising in _As You Like It_, ii. 1.
[136] Cf. Day's _Humour out of Breath_, I. 2:--"Deceive the _watry
subjects_."
[137] To "kill with kindness" was a proverbial saying.
[138] A falconer's term: to flap the wings when preparing for flight.
[139] A giant who was conquered by Sir Bevis of Southampton. See notes
of the commentators on _2 Henry VI_., ii. 3: "Therefore, Peter, have at
thee with a downright blow, as Bevis of Southampton fell upon Ascapart."
[140] i.e., a vain boaster. "Puckfist" is the fungus commonly known as
"puff-ball."
[141] "Carbonade. A carbonado, a _rasher on the coals_."--COTGRAVE.
[142] Cf. _Antony and Cleopatra_, i. 3:--
"Upon your sword sit laurel victory."
The form of expression is common. Cf. _Knight of Malta_, iv. 2
(Fletcher's portion):--
"Art thou a knight? did ever on that sword
The Christian cause sit nobly?"
I make this note because I find Mr. G.C. Macaulay, in his interesting
"Study of Francis Beaumont," choosing the words, "Victory sits on his
sword" (_Maid's Tragedy_, i. 1), as one of the "special passages which
suggest imitation, conscious or unconscious," of Shakespeare.
[143] 4to. honord. The correction (which would occur to most readers) is
made by Dyce on the fly-leaf of his copy in the Dyce and Forster
Library.
[144] If we retain "unscorcht" we must suppose the construction to be
proleptic. But quy. "sun-scorcht."
[145] The stage-direction is my own.
[146] Ink-stand (more commonly "standish").
[147] Plan, design. Cf. _Arden of Feversham_, ii. 1. "And I will lay the
_platform_ of his death."
[148] "Termagant" or "Trivigant" is often coupled with "Mahound." Cf.
"Faery Queene," vi. 7. (47):--
"And oftentimes by Termagant and Mahound swore."
Our ancestors were not accustomed to draw fine distinctions. They
regarded Mohammedans as heathens, and Termagant and Mahound as false
gods.
[149] 4to. Ruthelesse and bloudy slaughters.
[150] "Pickt-hatch" was a notorious brothel in or near Turnbull Street.
[151] See Strutt's "Sports and Pastimes," p. 212 (ed. 1801).
[152] Swaggered, crowed.
[153] i.e. sucking rabbit. So Falstaff,--"Hang me up by the heels for
a _rabbit sucker_" (I _Henry IV_., ii. 4).
[154] A variation of Bobadil's oath "By the foot of Pharaoh."
[155] For the sake of the metre I should like to read "You, Pembrooke,
worthy knight."