_Passage in "Tempest."--_
"Thy banks with pioned and twilled brims,
Which spongy April at thy best betrims,
To make cold nymphs chaste crowns."
_Tempest_, Act IV. Sc. 1.
The above is the reading of the first folio. _Pioned_ is explained by
MR. COLLIER, "to dig," as in Spenser; but MR. HALLIWELL (_Monograph
Shakspeare_, vol. i. p. 425.) finds no authority to support such an
interpretation. MR. COLLIER'S anonymous annotator writes "tilled;" but
surely this is a very artificial process to be performed by "spongy
April." Hanmer proposed "peonied;" Heath, "lilied;" and MR. HALLIWELL
admits this is more poetical (and surely more correct), but appears to
prefer "twilled," embroidered or interwoven with flowers. A friend of
mine suggested that "lilied" was peculiarly appropriate to form "cold
nymphs chaste crowns," from its imputed power as a preserver of
chastity: and in MR. HALLIWELL'S folio, several examples are quoted from
old poets of "peony" spelt "piony;" and of both _peony_ and _lily_ as
"defending from unchaste thoughts." Surely, then, the reading of the
first folio is a mere typographical error, and _peonied_ and _lilied_
the most poetical and correct.