Folios 3, 4, suits'; Pope' shoots.' I am inclined to agree with Mr. A. E. Thiselton that Pope's correction is unimpeachable.

V. ii. 174. my chance,' i.e. my changed fortune, lot; Hanmer reads' mischance'; S. Walker conj., ' my change'; Ingleby conj., adopted by Hudson, ' my glance.'

V. ii. 178-179. We answer others' merits in our name, Are'; Malone's reading; Folios, 'We answer others merits, in our name Are'; etc.

6

V. ii. 352. caves'; so Folios 2, 3, 4; Folio 1, 'caues'; Barry conj., 'canes'; Anon. conj., 'eaves'; Perring conj., ' course.

Explanatory Notes.

The Explanatory Notes in this edition have been specially selected and adapted, with emendations after the latest and best authorities, from the most eminent Shakespearian scholars and commentators, including Johnson, Malone, Steevens, Singer, Dyce, Hudson, White, Furness, Dowden, and others. This method, here introduced for the first time, provides the best annotation of Shakespeare ever embraced in a single edition.

ACT FIRST.
Scene I.

8. reneges:-Coleridge's suggestion that this word should be spelled reneague is supported by the following passage quoted in Richardson's Dictionary from Udal's New Testament, Luke i.: "Those that vaunted themselves by the glorious name of Israel, those he hath reneagued and put away from the inheritance of the promises made unto Israel."

1. There's beggary, etc.:-So in Romeo and Juliet, II. vi. 32: "They are but beggars that can count their worth." And in Martial, vi. 36: Basia pauca cupit, qui numerare potest."

17. Then must thou needs, etc. :-Then must you set the boundary at a distance greater than the present visible universe affords. 44. for the love of Love:-That is, for the sake of the goddess of Love.

53. To-night, etc. :-So in Plutarch's Life of Antonius: "Sometime also, when he would go up and down the city disguised like a slave in the night, and would peer into poor men's windows and their shops, and scold and brawl with them within the house, Cleopatra would be also in a chamber-maid's array, and amble up and down the streets with him."

60. That he confirms the common liar, Fame, in his case to be a true reporter. Shakespeare elsewhere uses approve for prove, as also approof for proof.

Scene II.

23. heat my liver:-The liver being considered the seat of love, Charmian says she would rather heat her liver with drinking than with love's fire. A heated liver was supposed to make a pimpled face.

27. a child at fifty:-" This," says Johnson, “is one of Shakespeare's natural touches. Few circumstances are more flattering to the fair sex than breeding at an advanced period of life."

35. no names:-Charmian has not been married, and, if she is not to have better fortune, her children will not know their father, therefore will be bastards and nameless. So in the Two Gentlemen of Verona, III. i. 14-16: "That's as much as to say, bastard virtues; that, indeed, know not their fathers, and therefore have no names."

49, 50. an oily palm, etc.:-This prognostic is alluded to in Othello, III. iv. :—

"This hand is moist, my lady.

This argues fruitfulness and liberal heart."

101. Stiff news is hard news.

102. Extended Asia from Euphrates:-Extend is often found in the old writers for seize; extent for seizure, etc. So in As You Like It, III. i. 16, 17:—

"And let my officers of such a nature

Make an extent upon his house and lands."

So too in Selimus, Emperor of the Turks, 1594:

Ay, though on all the world we make extent

From the south pole unto the northern bear."

Plutarch tells us that Labienus was by the Parthian king made general of his troops, and had overrun Asia from Euphrates, and Syria to Lydia and Ionia. Euphrates here is accented on the first syllable. Shakespeare uses the name only in this instance. Drayton's Polyolbion, 21, has it accented in the same way in this line: “That gliding go in state, like swelling Euphrates."

125-127. the present pleasure, etc. :-The pleasure of to-day, by revolution of events and change of circumstances, often loses all its value to us, and becomes to-morrow a pain. There seems to be an implied allusion to the turning of a wheel, suggested, as some think, by the "wheel of fortune."

Scene III.

3. I did not send you:-" You must go as if you came without my order or knowledge." So in Troilus and Cressida, IV. ii. 72: "We met by chance; you did not find me here."

8. I do not? We must understand that as supplied: "What should I do that I do not?" The ellipsis of the relative was common then, as it is now.

16, 17. the sides of nature, etc.:-So in Twelfth Night, II. iv. 95, 96:

"There is no woman's sides

Can bide the beating of so strong a passion."

36. in our brows' bent:-That is, in the bending or arching of our brows. The brow is that part of the face which expresses most fully the mental emotions. So in King John, IV. ii. 90: "Why do you bend such solemn brows on me?

57, 58. Though age, etc.:-Cleopatra here apparently means, "Though age could not exempt me from folly, at least it frees me from a childish and ready belief of every assertion. Is it possible that Fulvia is dead? I cannot believe it."

63, 64. vials .. water-Alluding to the lachrymatory vials filled with tears, which the Romans placed in the tomb of a departed friend.

84. Herculean :-Antony traced his descent from Anton, a son of Hercules.

91-93. But that, etc.:-An antithesis is intended between royalty and subject. The meaning is, "But that I know you to be a queen, and that your royalty holds idleness in subjection to you, I should suppose you, from this idle discourse, to be the very genius of idleness itself."

96, 97. Since my becomings, etc. :-That which would seem to become me most is hateful to me when it is not acceptable in your sight.

103, 104. That thou residing here, etc.:—A strikingly similar thought occurs in Sidney's Arcadia:

She went, they staid; or, rightly for to say,
She staid with them, they went in thought with her."

Scene IV.

12, 13. His faults, etc.:-As the stars or spots of heaven appear more bright and prominent from the darkness of the night, so

the faults of Antony seem enlarged by his virtues, which give relief to his faults, and make them show out more prominently. 25-28. If he fill'd . . . call on him for 't:-If Anthony followed his debaucheries at times of leisure only, I should leave him to be punished by their natural consequences, by surfeits and dry bones.

36-38. Pompey

fear'd Cæsar:-Those whom not love but fear made adherents to Cæsar now show their affection for Pompey.

55-71. Antony lank'd not. :-This superb speech is based upon the following passage in Plutarch's Life of Antonius, where the writer is relating what happened after the death of Julius Cæsar, but before the Triumvirate was formed: "Cicero, being the chiefest man of authority and estimation in the city, stirred up all men against Antonius, and sent Hircius and Pansa, then Consuls, to drive him out of Italy. These two Consuls, together with Cæsar, who also had an army, went against Antonius, that besieged the city of Modena, and there overthrew him in battell; but both the Consuls were slain there. Antonius, flying upon this overthrow, fell into great misery al at once; but the chiefest want of al other, and that pinched him most, was famine. Howbeit, he was of such a strong nature, that by patience he would overcome any adversity; and the heavier fortune lay upon him, the more constant he shewed himselfe. And it was a wonderfull example to the souldiers to see Antonius, that was brought up in al finenesse and superfluity, so easily to drink puddle water, and to eate wild fruits and roots. And moreover it is reported, that even as they passed the Alpes they Idid eate the barkes of trees, and such beasts as never man tasted of their flesh before."

Scene V.

4. Mandragora:-Compare Othello, III. iii. 330-333:

"Not poppy, nor mandragora,

Nor all the drowsy syrups of the world,

Shall ever medicine thee to that sweet sleep
Which thou owedst yesterday."

So too in Adlington's translation of The Golden Ass of Apuleius: “I gave him no poyson but a doling drink of mandragora, which is of such force, that it will cause any man to sleepe as though he were dead."