TITA. Set your heart at rest, The fairy land buys not the child of me. His mother was a vot'refs of my order: And, in the fpiced Indian air, by night, Full often hath fhe goffip'd by my fide; And fat with me on Neptune's yellow fands, Marking the embarked traders on the flood; When we have laugh'd to fee the fails conceive, And grow big-bellied, with the wanton wind: Which the, with pretty and with fwimming gait, (Following her womb, then rich with my young 'fquire,R) halle, &c. There was also a maifter of the henxmen, to fhewe them the fchoole of nurture, and learne them to ride, to wear their harnesse; to have all curtefie-to teach them all languages, and other virtues, as harping, pipynge, finging, dauncing, with honeft behavioure of temperaunce and patyence.' MS. Harl. 293. At the funeral of Henry VIII. nine henchmen attended with fir Francis Bryan, mafter of the henchmen. Strype's Eccl. Mem. v. 2. App. n. 1. TYRWHITT. Henchman. Quafi haunch-man. One that goes behind another. Pedifequus. BLACKSTONE. The learned commentator might have given his etymology fome fupport from the following paffage in King Henry IV. P. II. Act IV. fc. iv: "O Westmoreland, thou art a summer bird, "Which ever in the haunch of winter fings 8 Which fhe, with pretty and with fwimming gait, Following (her womb, then rich with my young 'quire,) Would imitate-] Perhaps the parenthefis thould begin fooner; as I think Mr. Kenrick observes : (Following her womb, then rich with my young fquire,)” So, in Trulla's combat with Hudibras: She prefs'd fo home, "That he retired, and follow'd's bum." And Dryden fays of his Spanish Friar," his great belly walks in ftate before him, and his gouty legs come limping after it." FARMER. I have followed this regulation, (which is likewife adopted by Mr. Steevens,) though I do not think that of the old copy at all liable to the objection made to it by Dr. Warburton. She did 64 Would imitate; and fail upon the land, If you And fee our moon-light revels, go with us; [Exeunt TITANIA, and her train. OBE. Well, go thy way: thou shalt not from this grove, Till I torment thee for this injury. My gentle Puck, come hither: Thou remember'st And heard a mermaid, on a dolphin's back, not, (he fays) follow the fhip whofe motion fhe imitated; for that failed on the water, fhe on land." But might fhe not on land move in the fame direction with the fhip at fea, which certainly would outftrip her? and what is this but following? Which, according to the prefent regulation, muft mean—which motion of the fhip with fwelling fails, &c: according to the old regulation it must refer to " embarked traders." MALONE. 8 Not for thy kingdom.-Fairies, away:] The ancient copies read "Not for thy fairy kingdom.-Fairies, away.' By the advice of Dr. Farmer I have omitted the ufelefs adjective fairy, as it fpoils the metre; Fairies, the following fubftantive, being apparently ufed, in an earlier inftance, as a triffyllable. STEEVENS. 1 And certain ftars fhot madly from their spheres, To hear the fea-maid's mufick." 9 -Thou remember'ft Since once I fat upon a promontory, And heard a mermaid, on a dolphin's back, To hear the fea-maid's mufick.] The firft thing obfervable on these words is, that this action of the mermaid is laid in the fame time and place with Cupid's attack upon the veftal. By the veftal every one knows is meant queen Elizabeth. It is very natural and reasonable then to think that the mermaid stands for fome eminent perfonage of her time. And if fo, the allegorical covering, in which there is a mixture of fatire and panegyric, will lead us to conclude that this perfon was one of whom it had been inconvenient for the author to speak openly, either in praise or dispraife. All this agrees with Mary queen of Scots, and with no other. Elizabeth could not bear to hear her commended; and her fucceffor would not forgive her fatirift. But the poet has fo well marked out every diftinguished circumftance of her life and character in this beautiful allegory, as will leave no room to doubt about his fecret meaning. She is called a mermaid, 1. to denote her reign over a kingdom fituate in the fea, and 2. her beauty, and intemperate luft: may 66 Ut turpiter atrum Definat in pifcem mulier formosa supernè." for as Elizabeth for her chastity is called a veftal, this unfortunate lady on a contrary account is called a mermaid. 3. An ancient ftory be fuppofed to be here alluded to. The emperor Julian tells us, Epiftle 41. that the Sirens (which, with all the modern poets, are mermaids) contended for precedency with the Mufes, who overcoming them, took away their wings. The quarrels between Mary and Elizabeth had the fame caufe, and the fame iffue. on a dolphin's back,] This evidently marks out that diftinguishing circumftance of Mary's fortune, her marriage with the dauphin of France, fon of Henry II. Uttering fuch dulcet and harmonious breath,] This alludes to her great abilities of genius and learning, which rendered her the most accomplished princefs of her age. The French writers tell us, that, while he was in that court, the pronounced a Latin oration in the great hall of the Louvre, with fo much grace and eloquence, as filled the whole court with admiration. PUCK I remember. OBE. That very time I faw, (but thou could'st not,) That the rude fea grew civil at her fong;] By the rude fea is meant Scotland encircled with the ocean which rofe up in arms against the regent, while fhe was in France. But her return home prefently quieted thofe diforders: and had not her itrange ill conduct afterwards more violently inflamed them, the might have paired her whole life in peace. There is the greater juftnefs and beauty in this image, as the vulgar opinion is, that the mermaid always fings in ftorms: And certain flars fhot madly from their fpheres, To hear the jea-maid's mujick.] Thus concludes the defcription, with that remarkable circumittance of this unhappy lady's fate, the deftruction fhe brought upon feveral of the English nobility, whom The drew in to fupport her caufe. This, in the boldest expreffion of the fublime, the poet images by certain fars fhooting madly from their spheres: By which he meant the earls of Northumberland and Weftmoreland, who fell in her quarrel; and principally the great duke of Norfolk, whofe projected marriage with her was attended with fuch fatal confequences. Here again the reader may obferve a peculiar juftnefs in the imagery. The vulgar opinion being that the mermaid allured men to deftruction by her fongs. To which opinion Shakspeare alludes in his Comedy of Errors: "O train me not, fweet mermaid, with thy note, "To drown me in thy fifter's flood of tears." On the whole, it is the nobleft and juftest allegory that was ever written. The laying it in fairy land, and out of nature, is in the character of the fpeaker. And on thefe occafions Shak fpeare always excels himself. He is borne away by the magic of his enthufiafm, and hurries his reader along with him into these ancient regions of poetry, by that power of verfe, which we may well fancy to be like what, Olim fauni vatefque canebant." WARBURTON. And certain ftars fhot madly from their spheres,] So, in our author's Rape of Lucrece: "And little fars shot from their fixed places." MALONE, Every reader may be induced to wish that the foregoing allufion, pointed out by fo acute a critic as Dr. Warburton, fhould remain uncontroverted; and yet I cannot diffemble my doubts concerning it.Why is the thrice-married Queen of Scotland filed a ScaMAID? and is it probable that Shakspeare (who underfood his own political as well as poetical intereft,) fhould have ventured fuch a panegyric on this ill-fated Princefs, during the reign of her rival Elizabeth? If it was unintelligible to his audience, it was thrown away; if obvious, there was danger of offence to her Majetty. Flying between the cold moon and the earth, "A ftar dif-orb'd," however, (See Troilus and Creffida,) is one of our author's favourite images; and he has no where so happily expressed it as in Antony and Cleopatra : the good stars, that were my former guides, "Have empty left their orbs, and hot their fires "Into th' abyfm of hell." To thefe remarks may be added others of a like tendency, which I met with in the Edinburgh Magazine, Nov. 1786. "That a compliment to Queen Elizabeth was intended in the expreffion of the fair Veftal throned in the Weft, feems to be generally allowed; but how far Shakspeare defigned, under the image of the Mermaid, to figure Mary Queen of Scots, is more doubtful. If by the rude fea grew civil at her fong, is meant, as Dr. Warburton fuppofes, that the tumults of Scotland were appeased by her addrefs, the obfervation is not true; for that fea was in a storm during the whole of Mary's reign. Neither is the figure juft, if by the stars fhosting madly from their spheres to hear the fea-maid's mufick, the poet alluded to the fate of the Earls of Northumberland and Weftmoreland, and particularly of the Duke of Norfolk, whose projected marriage with Mary, was the occafion of his ruin. It would have been abfurd and irreconcileable to the good sense of the poet, to have reprefented a nobleman afpiring to marry a Queen, by the image of a ftar fhooting or defcending from its sphere." See alfo Mr. Ritfon's obfervations on the fame fubject. On account of their length, they are given at the end of the play. STEEVENS. 2 Cupid all arm'd:] All arm'd, does not fignify dreffed in panoply, but only enforces the word armed, as we might fay, all booted. So, in Greene's Never ton Late, 1616: JOHNSON, "Or where proud Cupid fat all arm'd with fire." Again, in Lord Surrey's tranflation of the 4th book of the Æneid: "All utterly I could not feem forfaken." Again, in K. Richard III: "His horfe is flain, and all on foot he fights." Shakspeare's compliment to queen Elizabeth has no fmall degree of propriety and elegance to boat of. The fame can hardly be faid of the following, with which the tragedy of Soliman and Perfeda, 1599, concludes. Death is the fpeaker, and vows he will spare none but facred Cynthia's friend, "Whom Death did fear before her life began; |