I am not Adriana, nor thy wife.

The time was once, when thou, unurg'd, wouldst

vow,

That never words were musick to thine ear,
That never object pleafing in thine eye,
That never touch well-welcome to thy hand,
That never meat fweet-favour'd in thy taste,
Unless I fpake, or look'd, or touch'd, or carv'd to
thee.

How comes it now, my husband, oh, how comes it,
That thou art then eftranged from thyself?
Thyfelf I call it, being ftrange to me;
That, undividable, incorporate,

Am better than thy dear felf's better part.
Ah, do not tear away thyself from me:
For know, my love, as eafy may'st thou fall
A drop of water in the breaking gulph,
And take unmingled thence that drop again,
Without addition or diminishing,

As take from me thyfelf, and not me too.
How dearly would it touch thee to the quick,
Shouldft thou but hear, I were licentious?
And that this body, confecrate to thee,
By ruffian luft fhould be contaminate?
Wouldst thou not spit at me, and spurn at me,
And hurl the name of hufband in my face,
And tear the ftain'd fkin off my harlot-brow,
And from my falfe hand cut the wedding-ring,
And break it with a deep-divorcing vow?

I know thou can'ft; and therefore, fee, thou do it.
I am poffefs'd with an adulterate blot;

My blood is mingled with the crime of luft: *

+ I am poffefs'd with an adulterate blot;
My blood is mingled with the CRIME of lust :]

Both the integrity of the metaphor, and the word blot, in the
ceding line, fhew that we fhould read,

M 4

For,

pre

-with

For, if we two be one, and thou play false,
I do digeft the poifon of thy flefh,
Being ftrumpeted by thy contagion.

Keep then fair league, and truce with thy true bed,
I live dif-ftain'd, thou undifhonoured. 5

Ant. Plead you to me, fair dame? I know you not; In Ephefus I am but two hours old,

As ftrange unto your town as to your talk:
Who, every word by all my wit being fcann'd,
Wants wit in all one word to understand.

Luc. Fy, brother! how the world is chang'd with

you;

When were you wont to use my fifter thus ?
She fent for you by Dromio home to dinner.
Ant. By Dromio?

S. Dro. By me?

Adr. By thee; and thus thou didst return from him,

That he did buffet thee; and, in his blows
Deny'd my houfe for his, me for his wife.

Ant. Did you converfe, fir, with this gentlewoman?
What is the courfe and drift of your compact?
S. Dro. I, fir? I never faw her 'till this time.
Ant. Villain, thou lieft; for even her very words

with the GRIME of luft:

i. e. the fain, fmut. So again in this play,-A man may go over fees in the GRIME of it. WARBURTON.

5 I live diftain'd, thou undishonoured.] To diftaine (from the French word, deaindre) fignifies, to ftain, defile, pollure. But the context requires a fenfe quite oppofite. We muft either read, unfain'd; or, by adding an hyphen, and giving the prepofition a privative force, read dif-ftain'd; and then it will mean, unstain'd, adefiled. THEOBALD.

I would read,

I live diftained, thou dishonoured.

That is, As long as thou continueft to difhonour thyfelf, I also live diftained.

REVISAL.

Didft

Didft thou deliver to me on the mart.

S. Dro. I never fpoke with her in all my life. Ant. How can fhe thus then call us by our names, Unless it be by infpiration?

1

Adr. How ill agrees it with your gravity,
To counterfeit thus grofly with your flave,
Abetting him to thwart me in my mood?
Be it my wrong, you are from me exempt,
But wrong not that wrong with a more contempt.
Come, I will faften on this fleeve of thine;
Thou art an elm, my husband, I a vine;
Whose weakness, marry'd to thy stronger ftate,
Makes me with thy ftrength to communicate:
If aught poffefs thee from me, it is dross,
Ufurping ivy, briar, or idle mofs;

Who, all for want of pruning, with intrusion
Infect thy fap, and live on thy confusion.

Ant. To me fhe fpeaks; the moves me for her theme.

What, was I marry'd to her in my dream?
Or fleep I now, and think I hear all this?
What error drives our eyes and ears amifs?
Until I know this fure uncertainty,

I'll entertain the favour'd fallacy. 7

Luc. Dromio, go bid the fervants spread for dinner. S. Dro. Oh, for my beads! I crofs me for a finner.

you are from me exempt.] Exempt, feparated, parted. The fenfe is, If I am doomed to suffer the wrong of separation, yet injure not with contempt me who am already injured. JOHNSON. -the favour'd fallacy.

Thus the modern editors. The old copy reads,

the free'd fallacy.

Which perhaps was only, by miftake, for

the offer'd fallacy.

This conjecture is from an anonymous correspondent.

STEEVENS.

This is the fairy land: oh, fpight of fpights!-
We talk with goblins, owls, and elvifh fprights;
If we obey them not, this will enfue,

They'll fuck our breath, and pinch us black and blue.
Luc. Why prat'ft thou to thyfelf, and answer'ft

not??

Dromio, thou drone, thou fnail, thou flug, thou fot!
S. Dro. I am transformed, master, am I not?
Ant. I think, thou art in mind, and fo am I.

We talk with goblins, owls, and elvish Sprights;] Here Mr. Theobald calls out in the name of Nonfenfe, the first time he had formally invoked her, to tell him how owls could fuck their breath, and pinch them black and blue. He therefore alters owls to cuphs, and dares fay, that his readers will acquiefce in the juftness of his emendation. But, for all this, we must not part with the old reading. He did not know it to be an old popular fuperftition, that the fcretch owl fucked out the breath and blood of infants in the cradle. On this account, the Italians called witches, who were fuppofed to be in like manner mischievously bent against children, frega, from firix, the foretch-owl. This fuperftition they had derived from their pagan ancestors, as appears from this paffage of Ovid,

Sunt avida volucres; non quæ Phineïa menfis

Guttura fraudabant : fed genus inde trahunt.
Grande caput : ftantes oculi: roftra apta rapina:
Canities pennis, unguibus hamus inefi.

Note volant, PUEROSQUE PETUNT nutricis egentes ;
Et vitiant CUNIS corpora rapta fuis.
Carpere dicuntur luctantia vifcera roftris ;

Et plenum poto fanguine guttur habent.

Eft illis ftrigibus nomen :

Why prat't thou to thyself?

Lib. 6. Faft.

WARBURTON.

Dromio, thou Dromio, jnail, thou flug, thou fot!]

In the first of these lines, Mr. Rowe and Mr. Pope have both, for what reason I cannot tell, curtailed the measure, and dismounted the doggrel rhyme, which I have replaced from the first folio. The fecond verfe is there likewife read;

Dromio, thou Dromio, thou fnail, thou flug, thou fot. The verse is thus half a foot too long; my correction cures that fault: befides drone correfponds with the other appellations of reproach. THEOBALD.

S. Dre.

S. Dro. Nay, mafter, both in mind, and in my

shape.

Ant. Thou haft thine own form.

S. Dro. No, I am an ape.

Luc. If thou art chang'd to aught, 'tis to an afs.
S. Dro. 'Tis true; fhe rides me, and I long for
grais.

'Tis fo, I am an afs; elfe it could never be,
But I fhould know her, as well as fhe knows me.
Adr. Come, come, no longer will I be a fool,
To put the finger in the eye and weep,

Whilft man, and mafter, laugh my woes to fcorn.-
Come, fir, to dinner; Dromio, keep the gate :-
Hufband, I'll dine above with you to-day,
And thrive you' of a thousand idle pranks :-
Sirrah, if any afk you for your mafter,
Say, he dines forth, and let no creature enter:
Come, fifter; Dromio, play the
porter well.
Ant. Am I in earth, in heaven, or in hell?
Sleeping or waking? mad, or well advis'd?
Known unto these, and to myself difguis'd?
I'll fay as they say, and perfever so;
And in this mist at all adventures go.

S. Dro. Mafter, fhall I be porter at the gate ?
Adr. Ay, let none enter, left I break your pate.
Luc. Come, come, Antipholis, we dine too late.

[Excunt.

And forive you--] That is, I will call you to confeffion, and make you tell your tricks. JOHNSON.

ACT