Cath. What, was your vifor made without a tongue ? Long. I know the reason, lady, why you ask. And would afford my speechless vizor half. Cath. Veal, quoth the Dutchman: Is not veal a calf? Long. A calf, fair lady? Cath. No, a fair lord calf. Cath. No, I'll not be your half : Take all, and wean it; it may prove an ox. Long. Look, how you butt yourself in these sharp mocks ! Will you give horns, chafte lady? do not fo. keen. As is the razor's edge invisible, Cutting a smaller hair than may be seen : Above the sense of sense; so fenfible Seemeth their conference; their conceits have wings, Fleeter than arrows, bullets, wind, thought, swifter things. Rof. Not one word more, my maids ; break off, break off. Biron. By heaven, all dry-beaten with pure fcoff! King. Farewel, mad wenches; you have fimple wits. [Exeunt King, and lords. Prin. Twenty adieu's, my frozen Mufcovites.Are these the breed of wits fo wondred at? Boyet. Tapers they are, with your sweet breaths puff'd out, Rof. Rof. Well-liking wits they have; grofs, gross; fat, fat. Prin. O poverty in wit-kingly-poor flout! Will they not (think you) hang themfelves to night? Or ever, but in vizors, fhew their faces? This pert Biron was out of countenance quite. Rof. O they were all in lamentable cafes! The king was weeping-ripe for a good word. Prin. Biron did fwear himself out of all fuit. Mar. Dumain was at my fervice, and his sword: No, print, quoth I; my fervant ftrait was mute. Cath. Lord Longaville faid, I came o'er his heart; And, trow you, what he call'd me? Prin. Qualm, perhaps. Cath. Yes, in good faith.. Prin. Go, fickness as thou art! Rof. Well, better wits have worn plain ftatute caps. 7 But better wits have worn plain ftatute-caps.] This line is not univerfally understood, because every reader does not know that a ftatute cap is part of the academical habit. Lady Rofaline declares that her expectation was difappointed by these courtly ftudents, and that better wits might be found in the common places of education. JOHNSON. 86 Rof. Well, better wits have worn plain ftatute-caps. Woollen caps were enjoined by act of parliament, in the year 1571, 13th queen Elizabeth. Befides the bilis paffed into acts this parliament, there was one which I judge not amifs to be taken notice "of-it concerned the queen's care for employment for her poor. "fort of fubjects. It was for continuance of making and wear"ing woollen caps, in behalf of the trade of cappers; providing, "that all above the age of fix years, (except the nobility and "fome others) fhould on fabbath days, and holy days, wear caps "of wool, knit, thicked, and dreft in England, upon penalty of "ten groats." Dr GRAY. I think my own interpretation of this paffage right. JOHNSON. Probably the meaning may be-better wits may be found among the citizens, who are not in general remarkable for fallies of imagination. In Mariton's Dutch Courtezan, 1605, Mrs. Mulligrub fays, But will you hear? the king is my love fworn. me. Cath. And Longaville was for my service born. Mar. Dumain is mine, as fure as bark on tree. Boyet. Madam, and pretty mistresses, give ear : Immediately they will again be here In their own fhapes; for it can never be, Boyet. They will, they will, God knows ; Prin. How, blow? how blow? fpeak to be understood. 8 Boyet. Fair ladies, mask'd, are roses in their bud; fays, Dif though my husband be a citizen, and his cap's made of wool, yet I have wit." So in the Family of Love, 1608. "'Tis "a law enacted by the common-council of ftatute-caps." STEEVENS, Fair ladies, mafk'd, are roses in the bud; This ftrange nonfenfe, made worse by the jumbling together and Or angels veil'd in clouds: are roses blown, Difmafk'd, their damask fweet commixture fewn. But he, willing to fhew how well he could improve a thought, would print it, Or angel-veiling clouds i. e. clouds which veil angels: and by this means gave us, as the old proverb fays, a cloud for a Juno. It was Shakespeare's purpose to compare a fine lady to an angel; it was Mr. Theobald's chance to compare her to a cloud and perhaps the ill-bred reader will fay a lucky one. However I fuppofed the poet could never be fo nonfenfical as to compare a masked lady to a cloud, though he might compare her mask to one. The Oxford editor, who had the ad Difmask'd, their damask fweet commixture fhewn, Prin. Avaunt, perplexity! What shall we do, Rof. Good madam, if by me you'll be advis'd, Let's mock them ftill, as well known, as disguş'd : Let us complain to them what fools were here, Difguis'd, like Mufcovites, in fhapeless gear; And, wonder what they were; and to what end Their fhallow shows, and prologue vilely penn'd, And their rough carriage fo ridiculous, Should be presented at our tent to us. Bayet. Ladies, withdraw, the gallants are at hand. Prin. Whip to our tents, as roes run o'er the land. [Exeunt ladies. Enter the King, Biron, Longaville, and Dumain in their own habits. King. Fair Sir, God fave you! Where's the prin- . cefs? Boyet. Gone to her tent: Please it your majesty Command me any service to her? advantage both of this emendation and criticism, is a great deal more fubtile and refined, and fays it fhould not be but angels veil'd in clouds, -angels vailing clouds, i. e. capping the fun as they go by him, juft as a man vails his bonnet. WARBURTON. I know not why fir T. Hanmer's explanation fhould be treated with fo much contempt, or why vailing clouds fhould be capping the fun. Ladies unmask'd, fays Boyet, are like angels vailing clouds, or letting those clouds which obfcured their brightness, fink from before them. What is there in this abfurd or contemptible? JOHNSON. -fhapelefs gear ;] Shapeless, for uncouth, or what Shakespeare elsewhere calls diffufed. WARBURTON. * Exeunt Ladies.] Mr. Theobald ends the fourth act here. JOHNSON. King. That the vouchfafe me audience for one word. Boyet. I will; and fo will fhe, I know, my lord. [Exit. Biron. This fellow picks up wit, as pigeons peas;* And utters it again, when Jove doth please: He is wit's pedlar; and retails his wares At wakes and waffels, meetings, markets, fairs: And we that fell by grofs, the Lord doth know, Have not the grace to grace it with fuch show. This gallant pins the wenches on his fleeve; Had he been Adam, he had tempted Eve. He can carve too, and lifp: Why, this is he, That kiss'd away his hand in courtesy; This is the ape of form, Monfieur the nice, That, when he plays at tables, chides the dice In honourable terms: nay, he can fing, A mean most mainly, and, in ufhering, Mend him who can: the ladies call him, fweet; The ftairs, as he treads on them, kiss his feet. This is the flower, that fmiles on every one, 3 To fhew his teeth, as white as whale his bone :— -as pigeons peas ;] This expreffion is proverbial. "Children pick up words as pigeons peas, "And utter them again as God fhall please." See Ray's Collection. STEEVENS. And * A mean most mainly, &c.] The mean, in mufic, is the tenor. So Bacon: "The treble cutteth the air fo fharp, as it returneth "too fwift to make the found equal; and therefore a mean or tenor " is the sweetest." STEEVENS. 3 This is the flower, that fmiles on every one,] The broken dif jointed metaphor is a fault in writing. But in order to pafs a true judgment on this fault, it is ftill to be observed, that when a metaphor is grown fo common as to defert, as it were, the figurative, and to be received into the common ftile, then what may be affirmed of the thing reprefented, or the fubftance, may be af firmed of the thing reprefenting, or the image. To illuftrate this by the inftance before us, a very complaifant, finical, over-gracious perfon, was fo commonly called the flower, or, as he elfewhere expreffes it, the pink of courtesy, that in common talk, or in the lowest ftile, this metaphor might be used without keeping up the |