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shorn 136 tod. glb. 6oz. 2dr. which at pound and odd shilling per tod would yield L. 143 3 0. Our author was too familiar with the subject to be suspected of inaccuracy. RITSON.

P. 146, 1. 12. I cannot do't without counters.] By the help of small circular pieces of base metal, all reckonings were, anciently adjusted among the illi terate and vulgar. Thus Iago, in contempt of Cassio, calls him counter-caster. STEEVENS.

P. 146, 1. 13. — what am I to buy for our sheepshearing feast?] The expense attending these festi vities, appears to have afforded matter of complaint. Thus in Questions of Profitable and Plea sant Concernings, etc. 1594: If it be a sheep. shearing feast, maister Baily can entertaine you with his bill of reckonings to his maister of three shcapheard's wages, spent on fresh cates, besides spices and saffron pottage." STEEVENS.

P. 146, 1. 18. 19. three-man song-men all,] i. c. singers of catches in three parts. A six-man song occurs in The Tournament of Tottenham. See The Reliques of Ancient English Poetry, Vol. II. P. 24. PERCY.

P. 146, 1. 20. -- means and bases:] Means are tenors. STEEVENS.

P. 146, 1. 23. to colour the warden pies;] War dens are a species of large pears. I believe the name is disused at present. It however afforded Ben Jonson room for a quibble in his masque of Gypsies Metamorphosed:

A deputy tart, a church-warden pye.”

It appears from a passage in Cupid's Revenge, by Beaumont and Fletcher, that these pears were usually eaten roasted:

I would have had him roasted like a warden,
In brown paper."

The French call this pear the poire de garde.
STEEVENS

Barrett, in his Alvearie, voce Warden Tree, [Volemum] says, Volema autem pyra sunt praegrandia, ita dicta quod impleant volam. REED.

P. 146, 1. 29. I the name of me,] This is a vulgar exclamation, which I have often heard used. So, sir Andrew Ague-check:

a good wench." STEEVENS.

Before me, she's

Trou-madame,

P. 147, 1. 52. Trol-my-dames: French. 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 aggreable, 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 pigeonholes; as the archers in the machine through which the balls are rolled, resemble the cavities made for pigeons in a dove house. STEEVENS.

Mr. Steevens is perfectly accurate in his description of the game of Trou-madame, or pigeon Nine holes is quite another thing; Thus :

holes.

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being so many holes made in the ground, into which they are to bowl a pellet. I O have seen both played at. RITSON.

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P. 148, 1. 4. To abide, here, must signify, to sojourn, to live for a time without a settled habitation. JOHNSON.

P. 148, 1. 7. —then he compass'd a motion of etc.] i. e. the puppet-shew, then called motions. A term frequently occurring in our author. WARBURTON. P. 149, 1. 12. To prig is to filch. MALONE.

In the canting language Prig is a thief or pickpocket; and therefore in The Beggars Bush, by Beaumont and Fletcher, Prig is the name of a knavish beggar. WHALLEY.

P. 148, 1. 33-35. If I make not this cheat etc, let me be unroll'd, etc.] Begging gypsies, in the time of our author, were in gangs and companies, that had something of the show of an incorporated body. From this noble society he wishes he may be unrolled, if he does not so and so.

WARBURTON.

P. 149, first 1. Jog on, jog on, the foot-path way,} 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.

P. 149, 1. 2. 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. STEEVENS.

P. 149, l. 14. To chide at your extremes,] This 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 prank'd her up most goddess-like." The following words, O pardon that I name them, prove this to be her meaning. M. MASON.

P. 149, 1. 16. The gracious mark o'the land, The object of all men's notice and expectation.

JOHNSON.

P. 149, 1. 18. To prank is to dress with ostentation.

STEEVENS.

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In every mess have folly, and the feeders
Digest it with a custom, I should blush

To see you so attired; sworn, I think,

To shew 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
Digest it with a custom, (sworn I think,)
To see you so attired, I should blush

To show myself a glass.

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."

Sir T. Hanmer There is, in my

Florizel is here Perdita's glass. reads swoon, instead of sworn. opinion, no need of change; and the words to shew 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.

P. 149, 1. 27. To me, the difference forges dread;} Meaning the difference between his rank and hers. M. MASON.

P. 149, 1. 30-32.

O, the fates!

How would he look, to see his work, so noble, 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.

P. 150, 1. 12. Nor in a way] Read: way. RITSON.

Nor any

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. P. 150, 1. 23. forc'd thoughts,] That is, thoughts far-fetched, and not arising from the present objects. M. MASON.

P. 151.

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