So fways fhe level in her husband's heart. More longing, wavering, fooner loft and worn, Than women's are. Vio. I think it well, my lord. Duke. Then let thy love be younger than thyself, For women are as rofes; whofe fair flower, Re-enter CURIO, and Clown. Duke. O fellow, come, the fong we had last night :Mark it, Cefario; it is old, and plain : The fpinfters and the knitters in the fun, And the free 7 maids that weave their thread with bones, Do use to chaunt it; it is filly footh, And dallies with the innocence of love, Like the old age9. Clown. Are you ready, fir? [Mufick. 6 -loft and worn,] Though left and worn may mean loft and worn out, yet loft and won being, I think, better, thefe two words coming ufually and naturally together, and the alteration being very flight, I would fo read in this place with Sir Thomas Hanmer. JOHNSON. 7-free-] is, perhaps, vacant, unengaged, eafy in mind. JOHNSON. Perhaps free means here-not having yet furrendered their liberty to man;-unmarried. MALONE. 8 -filly footh,] It is plain, fimple truth. JOHNSON. 9 And dailies with the innocence of love, Like the old age.] i. e. fports and plays with a love fubject, as they did in old times. EDWARDS. To dally is to play harmlessly. So, in A&t III. "They that dally nicely with words." STEEVENS. The old age is the ages paft, the times of fimplicity. JOHNSON. SONG. SONG. Clown. Come away, come away, death, My part of death no one so true Not a flower, not a flower fweet, My poor corpfe, where my bones fhall be thrown: Lay me, 0, where Sad true-lover ne'er find my grave, Duke. And in fad cypress let me be laid ;] In the books of our author's age the thin tranfparent lawn called cyprus, which was formerly ufed for fcarfs and hatbands at funerals, [See Supp. to Shakip are, Vol. II. p. 533.] was, I believe, conftantly ipelt cypress. So, in the Winter's Tale, edit. 1623: "Cypreffe black as e'er was crow, where undoubtedly cyprus was meant. So again, in the play before us, edit. 1623, (as Mr. Warton has obferved) 66 a cypreffe, not a bofom, See alfo Mintheu's Dict. in v. "Cypres or Cyprefs, a fine curled linen.” It is from the context alone therefore that we can afcertain whether cyprus or cypress was intended by our old writers. Mr. Warton has fuggefted in his late edition of Milton's Poems, that the meaning here is," Let me be laid in a fhroud made of cyprus, not in a coffin made of cypress wood." But in a fubfequent line of this fong the shroud, we find, is white. There was indeed white cyprus as well as black; but the epithet fad is inconfiftent with white, and therefore I fuppofe the wood to have been here meant. MALONE. 2 Fly away, fly away,-] The old copy reads-Fie away. The emendation is Mr. Rowe's. MALONE. 3 My part of death no one fo true Did fhare it.] Though death is a part in which every one acts his fhare, yet of all thefe actors no one is fo true as I. JOHNSON. 4 Sad true lover-] Mr. Pope rejected the word fad, and other modern Duke. There's for thy pains. Clown. No pains, fir; I take pleasure in finging, fir. Duke. I'll pay thy pleasure then. Clown. Truly, fir, and pleasure will be paid, one time or another. Duke. Give me now leave to leave thee. Clown. Now, the melancholy god protect thee; and the tailor make thy doublet of changeable taffata, for thy mind is a very opal 5!-I would have men of such conftancy put to fea, that their bufinefs might be every thing, and their intent every where; for that's it, that always makes a good voyage of nothing -Farewel. [Exit Clown. Duke. Let all the reft give place.-Once more, Cefario, [Exeunt CURIO and Attendants. Get thee to yon fame fovereign cruelty: Tell her, my love, more noble than the world, Prizes not quantity of dirty lands; her, The parts that fortune hath beftow'd upon you, fir? modern editors have unneceffarily changed true lover to-true love. By making never one fyllable, the metre is preferved. MALONE. 5 - a very opal!] The opal is a gem which varies its appearance as it is viewed in different lights. "In the opal (fays P. Holland's tranflation of Pliny's Nat. Hift. b. xxxvii. c. 6.) you fhall fee the burning fire of the carbuncle or rubie, the glorious purple of the amethyst, the green fea of the emeraud, and all glittering together mixed after an incredible manner." STEEVENS. 6 that their business might be every thing, and their intent every where; An intent every where, is much the fame as an intent no where, [the reading propofed by Dr. Warburton] as it hath no one particular place more in view than another. HEATH. 7 But 'tis that miracle, and queen of gems, That nature pranks ber in,-] The miracle and queen of gems is her beauty. Shakspeare does not fay [as Dr. Warburton has afferted,] that nature pranks her in a miracle, but in the miracle of gems, that is, in a gem miraculously beautiful. JOHNSON. To prank is to deck out, to adorn. See Lye's Etymologicon. ΗΣΑΤΗ, Duke. Duke. I cannot be fo answer'd3. Vio. 'Sooth, but you must. Say, that fome lady, as, perhaps, there is, Can bide the beating of fo ftrong a paffion, Vio. Ay, but I know, Duke. What doft thou know? Vio. Too well what love women to men may owe: In faith, they are as true of heart as we. My father had a daughter lov'd a man, As it might be, perhaps, were I a woman, I fhould your lordship. Duke. And what's her history? Vio. A blank, my lord: She never told her love, Feed 8 I cannot be &c.] The folio reads-It cannot be &c. STEEVENS. The correction was made by Sir T. Hanmer. I am not sure that it is neceffary, though it has been adopted in the late editions. The Duke may mean, My fuit cannot be fo anfwered. However, Viola's reply strongly fupports the emendation. MALONE. 9 That fuffer furfeit, cloyment, and revolt ;] The Duke has changed his opinion of women very fuddenly. It was a few minutes before that he faid they had more conftancy in love than men. MASON. Mr. Mafon would read-fuffers; but there is no need of change. Suffer is governed by women, implied under the words "their love." The love of women &c. who fuffer. MALONE. like a worm i'the bud,] So, in the 5th fonnet of Shakspeare: "Which, like a eanker in the fragrant rofe, "Doth spot the beauty of thy budding name." STEEVENS. Feed on her damafk cheek: fhe pin'd in thought*; Was not this love, indeed? Smiling at grief3. Again, in our author's Rape of Lucrece: We "Why should the worm intrude the maiden bud ş” Again, in King Richard II: But now will canker forrow eat my bud, "And chafe the native beauty from his cheek." MALONE. She pin'd in thought;] Thought formerly signified melancholy. So, in Hamlet: "Is ficklied o'er with the pale caft of thought." Again, in the Tragical Hiftory of Romeus and Juliet, 1562: The caufe of this her death was inward care and thought." 3 She fat like patince on a monument, Smiling at grief.] So Chaucer: "And her befidis wonder discreetlie "Dame Patience yfitting there I fonde, MALONE. "With facé pale upon a hill of fonde." THEOBALD. This celebrated image was not improbably first sketched out in the old play of Pericles: (I think Shakspeare's hand may be traced in the latter part of it, and there only :) thou [Marina] doft look "Like Patience, gazing on kings' graves, and smiling So, in our author's Rape of Lucrece: "So mild, that Patience feem'd to fcorn his woes." In the paffage in the text, our author perhaps meant to perfonify GRIEF as well as PATIENCE; for we can fcarcely underftand "at grief" to mean "in grief;" as no ftatuary could, I imagine, form a countenance in which fmiles and grief fhould be at once expressed. Shakspeare might have borrowed his imagery from fome ancient monument on which thefe two figures were reprefented. The following lines in the Winter's Tale feem to countenance fuch an idea: "I doubt not then, but innocence fhall make "Falfe accufation blush, and TYRANNY "Tremble at PATIENCE." In King Lear, we again meet with the two perfonages introduced in the text: "Patience and Sorrow ftrove, "Who should exprefs her goodlieft." Again, in Cymbeline, the fame kind of imagery may be traced: VOL. IV. E nobly |