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P. 158, 1.9-13. Here's another ballad, Of a fish, etc.] Perhaps in later times prose has obtained a triumph over poetry, though in one of its meanest depart ments; for all dying speeches, confessions, narratives of murders, executions, etc. seem anciently to have been written in verse. Whoever was hanged or burnt, a merry, or a lamentable ballad (for both rpithets are occasionally bestowed on these compo. sitions,) was immediately entered on the books of the Company of Stationers. Thus, in a subsequent scene of this play: ..Such a deal of wonder is broken out within this hour, that ballad-makers cannot be able to express it." STEEVENS.

In 1604 was entered on the books of the Statio. ners' Company, "A strange reporte of a monstrous fish that appeared in the form of a woman, from her waist upward, scene in the sea." To this it is highly probable that Shakspeare alludes. MALONE. P. 158, 1. 14. for · i. e. because. RERD. So, in Othello: Haply, for 1 am black."

MALONE.

P. 159, 1. 11. — sad] For serious. JOHNSON,
P. 159, 1. 25. To utter. To bring out, or produce.
JOHNSON.

To utter is a legal phrase often made use of in law proceedings and acts of Parliament, and signifies to vend y retail. From many instances I shall se lect the first which occurs. Stat. 21. Jac. I. c. 3. declares that the provisions therein contained shall not prejudice certain letters patent or commission granted to a corporation concerning the licensing of the keeping of any tavern or taverns, or selling, utter ing, or retailing of wines to be drunk or spent in the mansion-house of the party so selling or uttering the same." REED.

See Minshen's Dict. 1617: An utterance, or sale." MALONE.

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P. 159, 1. 30. Men of hair, are hairy men, satyrs. A dance of satyrs was no unusual entertainment in the middle ages. At a great festival cele. brated in France, the King and some of the nobles personated satyrs dressed in close habits, tufted or shagged all over, to imitate hair. They began a wild dance, and in the tumult of their merriment one of them went too near a candle and set fire to his satyr's garb, the flame ran instantly over the loose tufts, and spread itself to the dress of those that were next him; a great number of the dancers were cruelly scorched, being neither able to throw off their coats nor extinguish them. The King had set himself in the lap of the Dutchess of Burgundy, who threw her robe over him and saved him. JOHNSON.

Melvil's Memoirs, p. 152, edit. 1735, bear additional testimony to the prevalence of this species of mummery.

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The following copy of an illumination in a fine Ms. of Froissart's Chronicle preserved in the British Museum, will serve to illustrate Dr. Johnson's note, and to convey some idea, not only of the manner in which these hairy men were habited, but also of the rude simplicity of an ancient Ball-room and Masquerade. See the story at large in Froissart, B. IV. chap. lii. edit. 1559. DOUCE.

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P. 159, last l. but one. — they call themselves saltiers :) He means Satyrs. Their dress was perhaps made of goat's skin. Cervantes mentions in the preface to his plays that in the time of an early Spanish writer, Lope de Rueda, all the furniture and utensils of the actors consisted of four shepherds' jerkins, made of the skins of sheep with the wool on, and adorned with gilt leather trimming: four beards and periwigs, and four pastoral crooks; little more or less." Probably a similar shepherd's jerkin was used in our author's theatre. MALONE.

P. 159, last 1. · gallimaufry ~] Gockeram, in his Dictionarie of hard words, 12mo. 1622, says, a gallimaufry is a confused heape of things together."

STEEVENS.

P. 160, 1. 2. Bowling, I believe, is here a term for a dance of smooth motion, without great exertion of agility. JOHNSON.

The allusion is not to a smooth dance, as Johnson supposes, but to the smoothness of a bowling green.

M. MASON.

P. 160, 1. 10. 11. but jumps twelve foot and a half by the squire.] i. e. by the foot-rule: Esquierre, Fr. MALONE.

P. 160, 1. 17. 18. O, father, you'll know more of that hereafter.] This is replied by the King in answer to the shepherd's saying, since these good men are pleased. WARBURTON.

This dance which has intervened would take up too much time to preserve any connection between the two speeches. The line spoken by the King seems to be in reply to some unexpressed question from the old shepherd. RITSON.

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This is an answer to something which the Shepherd is supposed to have said to Polixenes during the dance. M. MASON.

P. 160, 1. 29.

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straited] i. e. put to difficulties.

STEEVENS.

P. 162, 1. 20. dispute his own estate?] Perhaps for dispute we might read compute; but dispute his estate may be the same with talk over his affairs. JOHNSON.

Does not this allude to the next heir suing for the estate in case of imbecillity, lunacy, etc.?

CHAMIER.

It probably means - ..Can he assert and vindicate his right to his own property?" M. MASON. P. 163, 1. 26. 27. Not hold thee of our blood, no not our kin,

Far than Deucalion off:] I think for far than we should read far as. We will not hold thee of our kin even so far off as Deucalion the common ancestor of all. JOHNSON.

The old reading farre, i. e. further, is the true one. The ancient commparative of fer was ferrer. See the Glossaries to Robert of Glocester and Robert of Brunne. This, in the time of Chaucer, was softoned into ferre. TYRWHITT.

P. 164, 1. 3. 4. Per. Even here undone!

I was not much afeard:] The character is here finely sustained. To have made her quite astonished at the King's discovery of himself had not become her birth; and to have given her presence of mind to have made this reply to the King, had not become her education. WARBURTON.

P. 146, 1. 8. To look upon, without any substantive annexed, is a mode of expression, which, though now unusual, appears to have been legitimate in Shakspeares time. MALONE.

To look upon, in more modern phrase, is to look

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