Humbling their deities to love," have taken Per. O but, dear sir,2 Oppos'd, as it must be, by the power o' the king: Which then will speak; that you must change this pur pose, Or I my life. 9 The gods themselves, Humbling their deities to love,] This is taken almost literally from the novel: "The Gods above disdaine not to love women beneath. Phœbus liked Daphne; Jupiter Io; and why not I then Faunia? One something inferior to these in birth, but far superior to them in beauty; born to be a shepherdesse, but worthy to be a goddesse." Again: "And yet, Dorastus, shame not thy shepherd's weed.—The heavenly gods have sometime earthly thought; Neptune became a ram, Jupiter a bull, Apollo a shepherd: they gods, and yet in love;-thou a man, appointed to love." Malone. 1 Nor in a way-] Read:-Nor any way. Ritson. Nor in a way so chaste:] It must be remembered that the transformations of gods were generally for illicit amours; and consequently were not "in a way so chaste" as that of Florizel, whose object was to marry Perdita. A. C. 20 but, dear sir,] In the oldest copy the word—dear, is wanting. Steevens. The editor of the second folio reads-O but, dear sir; to complete the metre. But the addition is unnecessary; burn in the preceding hemistich being used as a dissyllable. Perdita in a former part of this scene addresses Florizel in the same respectful manner as here: "Sir, my precious lord," &c. I formerly, not adverting to what has been now stated, propose to take the word your from the subsequent line; but no change is necessary. Malone. I follow the second folio, confessing my inability to read-burn, as a word of more than one syllable. Steevens. With these forc'd thoughts, I pr'ythee, darken not I be not thine: to this I am most constant, Of celebration of that nuptial, which We two have sworn shall come. Per. Stand you auspicious! O lady fortune, Enter Shepherd, with POLIXENES and CAMILLO, disguised; Clown, MOPSA, DORCAS, and Others. Flo. See, your guests approach: Address yourself to entertain them sprightly, Shep. Fy, daughter! when my old wife liv'd, upon This day, she was both pantler, butler, cook; Both dame and servant: welcom'd all; serv'd all: With labour; and the thing, she took to quench it, As your good flock shall prosper. Per. Welcome, sir! [to PoL. 3 With these forc'd thoughts,] That is, thoughts far-fetched, and not arising from the present objects. M. Mason. A That which you are, mistress o' the feast:] From the novel: "It happened not long after this, that there was a meeting of all the farmers' daughters of Sicilia, whither Faunia was also bidden as mistress of the feast." Malone. It is my father's will, I should take on me The hostesship o' the day :-You're welcome, sir! Pol. Shepherdess, (A fair one are you) well you fit our ages With flowers of winter. Per. Sir, the year growing ancient,— Not yet on summer's death, nor on the birth Of trembling winter,-the fairest flowers o' the season Pol. Do you neglect them? Per. Wherefore, gentle maiden, For I have heard it said, There is an art, which, in their piedness, shares With great creating nature.7 5 For you there's rosemary, and rue; these keep Seeming, and savour, all the winter long: Grace, and remembrance, be to you both,] Ophelia distributes the same plants, and accompanies them with the same documents. "There's rosemary, that's for remembrance. There 's rue for you: we may call it herb of grace." The qualities of retaining seeming and savour, appear to be the reason why these plants were considered as emblematical of grace and remembrance. The nosegay distributed by Perdita with the significations annexed to each flower, reminds one of the ænigmatical letter from a Turkish lover, described by Lady M. W. Montagu. Henley. Grace, and remembrance,] Rue was called herb of Grace. Rosemary was the emblem of remembrance; I know not why, unless because it was carried at funerals. Johnson. Rosemary was anciently supposed to strengthen the memory, and is prescribed for that purpose in the books of ancient physick. Steevens. 6 For I have heard it said,] For, in this place, signifies-because that. So, in Chaucer's Clerkes Tale, Mr. Tyrwhitt's edit. v. 8092: "She dranke, and for she wolde vertue plese, "She knew wel labour, but non idel ese." 7 There is an art, which, in their piedness, shares Steevens. With great creating nature.] That is, as Mr. T. Warton ob Pol. Say, there be; Yet nature is made better by no mean, But nature makes that mean: so, o'er that art, That nature makes. You see, sweet maid, we marry And make conceive a bark of baser kind By bud of nobler race; This is an art Which does mend nature,—change it rather: but Pol. Then make your garden rich in gillyflowers, And do not call them bastards. serves, "There is an art which can produce flowers, with as great a variety of colours as nature herself." This art is pretended to be taught at the ends of some of the old books that treat of cookery, &c. but, being utterly impracticable, is not worth exemplification. Steevens. 8 in gillyflowers,] There is some further conceit relative to gill flowers than has yet been discovered. The old copy, (in both instances where this word occurs) reads-Gilly'vors, a term still used by low people in Sussex, to denote a harlot. In A Wonder, or a Woman never vex'd, 1632, is the following passage: A lover is behaving with freedom to his mistress as they are going into a garden, and after she has alluded to the quality of many herbs, he adds: "You have fair roses, have you not?" "Yes, sir, (says she) but no gilliflowers." Meaning, perhaps, that she would not be treated like a gill-flirt, i. e. wanton, a word often met with in the old plays, but written flirt-gill in Romeo and Juliet. I suppose gill-flirt to be derived, or rather corrupted, from gill flower or carnation, which, though beautiful in its appearance, is apt, in the gardener's phrase, to run from its colours, and change as often as a licentious female. Prior, in his Solomon, has taken notice of the same variability in this species of flowers: 66 the fond carnation loves to shoot "Two various colours from one parent root." In Lyte's Herbal, 1578, some sorts of gilliflowers are called small honesties, cuckoo gillofers, &c. And in A. W.'s Commendation of Gascoigne and his Posies, is the following remark on this species of flower: "Some thinke that gilliflowers do yield a gelous smell.” See Gascoigne's Works, 1587. Steevens. The following line in The Paradise of Daintie Devises, 1578, may add some support to the first part of Mr. Steevens's note: "Some jolly youth the gilly-flower esteemeth for his joy." Malone. Per. I'll not put The dibble in earth to set one slip of them: No more than, were I painted, I would wish This youth should say, 'twere well; and only therefore The marigold, that goes to bed with the sun, Per. Out, alas! You'd be so lean, that blasts of January Would blow you through and through.-Now, my fairest friend, I would, I had some flowers o' the spring, that might 9 dibble-] An instrument used by gardeners to make holes in the earth for the reception of young plants. See it in Minshieu. Steevens. 1 The marigold, that goes to bed with the sun, And with him rises] Hence, says Lupton, in his Sixth Book of Notable Things: "Some calles it, Sponsus Solis, the Spowse of the Sunne; because it sleepes and is awakened with him." 2 O Proserpina, Steevens. For the flowers now, that, frighted, thou let'st fall From Dis's waggon!] So, in Ovid's Metam. B. V: "ut summa vestem laxavit ab ora, "Collecti flores tunicis cecidere remissis." The whole passage is thus translated by Golding, 1587: Steevens. "While in this garden Proserpine was taking her pastime, "The ladie with a wailing voice afright did often call "And as she from the upper part hir garment would have rent, "By chance she let her lap slip downe, and out her flowers went." Ritson. |