be an additional recommendation to the Duke, and it entirely avoids the objectionable repetition: if Antonio were of 'worth,' and 'worthy estimation,' he could not well be so reputed without desert.'" necessary to substitute another word for "worth," must be determined by the dramatic propriety, where the rhetorical enforcement of a previous idea is not necessarily an "objectionable repetition." "She shall be dignified with this high honour,- And make rough winter everlastingly." (ACT II. Sc. 4.) The original has "summer-swelling." "The corrector of the folio, 1632, has altered the compound, probably on some good authority, with which we are not now acquainted, to summer-smelling." COLLIER. The corrector of the folio, 1632, has altered the epithet upon the authority of his own preference for a bald prosaic epithet, in place of a poetical one. The rich poetry of the passage is instantly vulgarised by this change. The association of the words root and summer-swelling addresses itself at once to the poetical feeling. "Love bade me swear, and love bids me forswear: The original has, "O sweet suggesting love, if thou hast sinn'd." "When Proteus is lamenting the breach of his vows to Julia, it seems much more natural for him to say, 'if I have sinn'd,' and so it is given by the corrector of the folio, 1632." COLLIER. (ACT II. Sc. 6.) Certainly " 'more natural," in the sense of common and obvious. But Proteus is equivocating with his conscience in laying the fault of his perjury upon "love," which has made him swear and forswear; and, continuing the same idea, he impersonates "love"-"if thou hast sinn'd," teach me, whom thou hast tempted, to make excuses for my sin. "And so by many winding nooks he strays, With willing sport, to the wide ocean." (ACT II. Sc. 7.) The original reads "to the wild ocean." The corrector gives us The current is straying to the ocean, making sweet music, and wide, which, Mr. Collier says, 66 'seems more appropriate." giving a gentle kiss to every sedge. of poetical contrast-wide ocean, "To furnish me upon my loving journey." Julia is about to travel in search of Proteus. Loving journey, says Mr. Collier, in reference to the purpose seems to recommend itself. (ACT II. Sc. 7.) Longing journey, as expressive of earnest desire, needs no recommendation, and no change. "But say this wean her love from Valentine." Weed was displaced by the corrector of the folio, 1632, and wean inserted. (ACT III. Sc. 2.) Mr. Collier calls weed" an error of the press." To weed is to eradicate; and why, therefore, should we adopt another word? "Come, go with us; we 'll bring thee to our cave, (ACT IV. Sc. 1.) Crews are companions. It was not necessary that all the outlaws should be on the stage; and the treasure left unguarded. "Who is Silvia? what is she, " That all our swains commend her? The original has, 'Who is Silvia? what is she, That all our swains commend her? Holy, fair, and wise is she," &c. The repetition of she is an in elegance, says Mr. Collier. (ACT IV. Sc. 2.) The repetition, in a part song, is anything but inelegant. “Madam, I pity much your grievances, Which since I know they virtuously are plac'd," &c. Mr. Collier tells us, in his Preface, that there are nine different places where lines appear to be (ACT IV. Sc. 3.) Undoubtedly this line improves the sense, whether derived from a manuscript, or not. But if griev left out, which are supplied by the old corrector. This is one of them. ances be "sorrowful affections," as Johnson interprets them, the original passage, though obscure, is not wanting in connection. Silvia has spoken of her "griefs,"-Eglamour pities her "grievances;"the words being interchangeable. (ACT IV. Sc. 4.) "Ay, sir; the other squirrel was stolen from me by a hangman boy in the market-place." The first folio reads, "the hangman's boys." "A hangman boy" is a rascally boy-a gallows boy. COLLIER. "Her eyes are green as grass; and In the first folio, says Mr. Collier, Julia, descanting on Silvia's picture, says, "her eyes are grey as glass," which may be right. The second has " grey as grass." The corrector reads "green as grass," and "such, we have good reason to suppose, was the true reading." 66 "The hangman's boys" are boys dedicated to the hangman. so are mine." (ACT IV. Sc. 4.) Julia was not ridiculing Silvia's picture, nor depreciating her own eyes. "Eyen grey as glass" is Chaucer's praise of the Prioress. The light blue tint, which accompanies the eyes that go with the "auburn" hair of Julia and Silvia, was the colour of the glass of Shakspere's time. 'My shame and desperate guilt at once confound me." (ACT V. Sc. 4.) These poor expletives are put in to make what is called a "regular line;" with several other examples of the same kind, in the last scene. "Our day of marriage shall be yours no less, This reading is approved, on the authority of the corrector, that the play may conclude with a couplet. (ACT V. Sc. 4.) The couplet is obtained in the feeble no less, by destroying the original sense: 66 Come, Proteus, 't is your pe nance but to hear The story of your loves discovered: That done, our day of marriage shall be yours," &c. GLOSSARY. ALF. Act II., Sc. 5. "Because thou hast not so much charity in thee as to go to the ale with a Christian." The ale was a rural festival, sometimes connected with the church holidays, as a Whitsun-ale. Speed is called a Jew if he refuses to go to a Christian church feast. ANGERLY. Act I., Sc. 2. "How angerly I taught my brow to frown." Angrily angerly was the form of spelling the adverb in Shakspere's time. BASE. Act I., Sc. 2. 66 'Indeed, I bid the base for Proteus." An allusion to the country game of prison-base, in which one runs and is pursued by another. BEADSMAN. Act I., Sc. 1. "I will be thy beadsman, Valentine." The name of beadsman is derived from the Anglo-Saxon beade -a prayer, which word became transferred to the string of balls, or beads, used in the Romish church for counting the prayers. The beadsman was an almsman, endowed for the purpose of praying for the welfare of some other person, living or dead. The blue-gown Edie Ochiltree, of Sir Walter Scott's Antiquary,' was a "bedesman," and the charity was existing when he wrote, though the services were dispensed with. The boots were instruments of torture. They were of iron, in which the leg was placed, and wedges were driven in between the leg and the iron with a hammer. They were chiefly used in Scotland, and their latest application was against the Covenanters, under Charles the Second. Sir Walter Scott has described the torture in his 'Old Mortality.' Bosoм. Act III., Sc. 1. "Even in the milk-white bosom of thy love." In the sixteenth century ladies were accustomed to have a small pocket in the front of their stays, wherein they de posited letters and other matters considered valuable or private. CANKER. Act I., Sc. 1. "In the sweetest bud The eating canker dwells." Shakspere has frequently used this figure. He found the canker-worm in the Bible (Joel i. 4). In the Geneva Bible, 1561, we find, "That which is left of the palmer-worm hath the grasshopper eaten, and the residue of the grasshopper hath the canker-worm eaten, and the residue of the cankerworm hath the caterpillar eaten." The canker-worms are the larvæ produced in the leaves of many plants, from which spring the caterpillars called leaf-rollers. The canker-worm of the rose is a small dark-brown caterpillar, with a black head and six feet. The grub is produced from eggs deposited in the previous summer; it makes its appearance with the first opening of the leaves, it weaves them together, and thus stops the growth of the bud which forms its canopy. CIRCUMSTANCE. Act I., Sc. 1. "Pro. So, by your circumstance, you call me fool. Val. So, by your circumstance, I fear, you 'll prove." The word is here used by Proteus in the sense of circumstantial deduction; and by Valentine in that of position. CLEFT THE ROOT. Act V., Sc. 4. "How oft hast thou with perjury cleft the root?" An allusion to cleaving the pin in archery, which was splitting the nail attached to the mark in the butt. COMPASS. Act IV., Sc. 2. "Sil. What's your will? Pro. That I may compass yours. Sil. You have your wish." The word compass is here taken in two senses. Proteus, in his reply to Silvia, desires that he may have her will within his power-encompassed. In her reply she takes the word in its meaning of to perform, and informs him what her will is. "Visit by night your lady's chamber window, With some sweet consort." Musicians consorted-banded-together, and were called collectively the consort; the music they played was also called a consort, since become modernised into concert. DESCANT. Act I., Sc. 2. "Too harsh a descant." The descant was what we now call a variation: the simple air was called "the plain song," or ground. |