unto whom I was going; I shall there have money, or any thing I want: Offer me no money, I pray you; that kills my heart.2 Clo. What manner of fellow was he that robbed you? Aut. A fellow, sir, that I have known to go about with trol-my-dames:3 I knew him once a servant of the prince; I cannot tell, good sir, for which of his virtues it was, but he was certainly whipped out of the court. Clo. His vices, you would say; there's no virtue whipped out of the court: they cherish it, to make it stay there; and yet it will no more but abide.4 Aut. Vices I would say, sir. I know this man well: he hath been since an ape-bearer; then a process-server, 2 that kills my heart.] So, in King Henry V, Dame Quickly, speaking of Falstaff, says "the king hath killed his heart.” Steevens. 3 with trol-my-dames:] Trou-madame, Fr. The game of nine-holes.. Warburton: In Dr. Jones's old treatise on Buckstone Bathes, he says: "The ladyes, gentle woomen, wyves, maydes, if the weather be not agreeable, may have in the ende of a benche, eleven holes made, intoo the which to troule pummits, either wyolent or softe, after their own discretion: the pastyme troule in madame is termed." Farmer. The old English title of this game was pigeon-holes; as the arches in the machine through which the balls are rolled, resemble the cavities made for pigeons in a dove-house. So, in The Antipodes, 1638: got "Three-pence I lost at nine-pins; but I Again, in A Wonder, or a Woman never vex'd, 1632: "What quicksands, he finds out, as dice, cards, pigeon-holes." Steevens. Mr. Steevens is perfectly accurate in his description of the game of Trou-madame, or pigeon-holes. Nine-holes is quite another thing; thus; O oo being so many holes made in the ground, into which ooo they are to bowl a pellet. I have seen both played ooo at. Ritson. This game is mentioned by Drayton in the 14th song of his Polyolbion: "At nine-holes on the heath while they together play." Steevens. 4 abide.] To abide, here, must signify, to sojourn, to live for a time without a settled habitation. Johnson. To abide is again used in Macbeth, in the sense of tarrying for a while: "I'll call upon you straight; abide within." Malone. a bailiff; then he compassed a motion of the prodigal son, and married a tinker's wife within a mile where my land and living lies; and, having flown over many knavish professions, he settled only in rogue: some call him Autolycus. Clo. Out upon him! Prig, for my life, prig: he haunts wakes, fairs, and bear-baitings. Aut. Very true, sir; he, sir, he; that 's the rogue, that put me into this apparel. Clo. Not a more cowardly rogue in all Bohemia; if you had but looked big, and spit at him, he 'd have run. Aut. I must confess to you, sir, I am no fighter: I am false of heart that way; and that he knew, I warrant him. Clo. How do you now ? Aut. Sweet sir, much better than I was; I can stand, and walk: I will even take my leave of you, and pace softly towards my kinsman's. Clo. Shall I bring thee on the way? Aut. No, good-faced sir; no, sweet sir. Clo. Then fare thee well; I must go buy spices for our sheep-shearing. Aut. Prosper you, sweet sir!-[Exit Clo.] Your purse is not hot enough to purchase your spice. I'll be with you at your sheep-shearing too: If I make not this cheat bring out another, and the shearers prove sheep, let me be unrolled, and my name put in the book of virtue!" 5 Jog on, jog on, the foot-path way,8 And merrily hent the stile-a:9 Your sad tires in a mile-a. [Exit. motion of the prodigal son,] i. e. the puppet-shew, then called motions. A term frequently occurring in our author. 6 Warburton. Prig, for my life, prig:] To prig is to filch. Malone. In the canting language Prig is a thief or pick-pocket; and therefore in The Beggars Bush, by Beaumont and Fletcher, Prig is the name of a knavish beggar. Whalley. 7-- let me be unrolled, and my name put in the book of virtue!] Begging gypsies, in the time of our author, were in gangs and companies, that had something of the show of an incorporated VOL. VI. Y SCENE III. The same. A Shepherd's Cottage. Enter FLORIZEL and PERDITA. Flo. These your unusual weeds to each part of you Do give a life: no shepherdess; but Flora, Peering in April's front. This your sheep-shearing you the queen on 't. And body. From this noble society he wishes he may be unrolled, if he does not so and so. Warburton. 8 Fog on, jog on, &c.] These lines are part of a catch printed in An Antidote against Melancholy, made up in Pills compounded of witty Ballads, jovial Songs, and merry Catches, 1661, 4to. p. 69. Reed. And merrily hent the stile-a:] To hent the stile, is to take hold of it. I was mistaken when I said in a note on Measure for Measure, Act IV, sc. ult. that the verb was-to hend. It is to hent, and comes from the Saxon pentan. So, in the old romance of Guy Earl of Warwick, bl. 1. no date: Again: "Some by the armes hent good Guy." "And some by the brydle him hent." Again, in Spenser's Fairy Queen, B. III, c. vii: 1 "Great labour fondly hast thou hent in hand." Steevens. your extremes,] That is, your excesses, the extravagance of your praises. Johnson. By his extremes, Perdita does not mean his extravagant praises, as Johnson supposes; but the extravagance of his conduct, in obscuring himself "in a swain's wearing," while he "pranked her up most goddess-like." The following words, O pardon that I name them, prove this to be her meaning. M. Mason. 2 The gracious mark o' the land,] The object of all men's notice and expectation. Johnson. So, in King Henry IV, P. II: 3 "He was the mark and glass, copy and book, "That fashion'd others." Malone. prank'd up:] To prank is to dress with ostentation. So, in Coriolanus: In every mess have folly, and the feeders "For they do prank them in authority." Again, in Tom Tyler and his Wife, 1661: "I pray you go prank you." Steevens. 4 Digest it-] The word it was inserted by the editor of the second folio. Malone. 5 sworn, I think, To show myself a glass.] i. e. one would think that in putting on this habit of a shepherd, you had sworn to put me out of countenance; for in this, as in a glass, you shew me how much below yourself you must descend before you can get upon a level with me. The sentiment is fine, and expresses all the delicacy, as well as humble modesty of the character. Warburton. Dr. Thirlby inclines rather to Sir T. Hanmer's emendation, which certainly makes an easy sense, and is in my opinion, preferable to the present reading. But concerning this passage I know not what to decide. Johnson. Dr. Warburton has well enough explained this passage according to the old reading. Though I cannot help offering a transposition, which I would explain thus: But that our feasts In every mess have folly, and the feeders i. e. But that our rustick feasts are in every part accompanied with absurdity of the same kind, which custom has authorized, (custom which one would think the guests had sworn to observe,) I should blush to present myself before a glass, which would show me my own person adorned in a manner so foreign to my humble state, or so much better habited than even that of my prince. Steevens. I think she means only to say, that the prince, by the rustick habit that he wears, seems as if he had sworn to show her a glass, in which she might behold how she ought to be attired, instead of being "most goddess-like prank'd up." The passage quoted in p. 254, from King Henry IV, P. II, confirms this interpretation. In Love's Labour's Lost, Vol. IV, p. 55, a forester having given the Princess a true representation of herself, she addresses him :-"Here, good my glass." Again, in Julius Cæsar: I, your glass, "Will modestly discover to yourself, Again, more appositely, in Hamlet: Flo. I bless the time, When my good falcon made her flight across Thy father's ground. Per. Should pass this way, as you did: O, the fates! 8 Vilely bound up? What would he say? Or how Flo. Apprehend Nothing but jollity. The gods themselves, 66 he was indeed the glass, "Wherein the noble youth did dress themselves." Florizel is here Perdita's glass. Sir T. Hanmer reads swoon instead of sworn. There is, in my opinion, no need of change; and the words "to show myself" appear to me inconsistent with that reading. Sir Thomas Hanmer probably thought the similitude of the words sworn and swoon favourable to his emendation; but he forgot that swoon in the old copies of these plays is always written sound or swound. Malone. • When my good falcon made her flight across Thy father's ground.] This circumstance is likewise taken from the novel: ". -And as they returned, it fortuned that Dorastus (who all that day had been hawking, and killed store of game) incountered by the way these two maides." Malone. 7 To me the difference forges dread;] Meaning the difference between his rank and hers. So, in A Midsummer Night's Dream: "The course of true love never did run smooth, "But either it was different in blood 8 his work, so noble, M. Mason. Vilely bound up?] It is impossible for any man to rid his mind of his profession. The authorship of Shakspeare has supplied him with a metaphor, which, rather than he would lose it, he has put with no great propriety into the mouth of a country maid. Thinking of his own works, his mind passed naturally to the binder. I am glad that he has no hint at an editor. Johnson. The allusion occurs more than once in Romeo and Juliet: "This precious book of love, this unbound lover, "To beautify him only lacks a cover." Again: "That book in many eyes doth share the glory, "That in gold clasps locks in the golden story." Steevens. |