Caius. I pray you bear vitness that me have stay fix or feven, two, tree hours for him, and he is no

come.

Shal. He is the wifer man, mafter doctor: he is a curer of fouls, and you a curer of bodies; if you fhould fight, you go against the hair" of your profes fions is it not true, mafter Page?

Page. Mafter Shallow, you have yourself been a great fighter, though now a man of peace..

Shal. Body-kins, mafter Page, though I now be old, and of the peace, if I fee a fword out, my finger itches to make one: though we are juftices, and doctors, and churchmen, mafter Page, we have fome falt of our youth in us; we are the fons of women, mafter Page..

Page. "Tis true, mafter Shallow.

Shal. It will be found fo, mafter Page. Master doctor Caius, I am come to fetch you home. I am fworn of the peace: you have fhew'd yourself a wife phyfician, and Sir Hugh hath fhewn himself a wife

were held in great contempt after the bufinefs of the Armada. Thus we have a Treatife Paranetical, wherein is fhewed the right way to refift the Caftilian king and a fonnet, prefixed to Lea's Anfwer to the Untruths published in Spain, in glorie of their fuppofed Victory atchieved against our English Navie, begins:

"Thou fond Caftilian king!" and fo in other places.

FARMER. Mr. Farmer's obfervation is juft. Don Philip the Second, affected the title of King of Spain, but the realms of Spain would not agree to it, and only ftyled him King of Caftile and Leon, &c. and fo he wrote himfelf. His cruelty and ambitious views upon other ftates, rendered him univerfally detefted. The Caftilians, being defcended chiefly from Jews and Moors, were deemed to be of a malign and perverfe difpofition; and hence perhaps, the termCaftilian became opprobrious. I have extracted this note from an old pamphlet, called The Spanish Pilgrime, which I have reason to fuppofe is the fame difcourfe with the Treatife Parænetical, men tioned by Dr. Farmer. TOLLET.

9 against the hair &c.] This phrafe is proverbial, and is taken from stroking the hair of animals a contrary way to that in which it grows.We now fay against the grain. STEEVENS.

and:

and patient churchman: you must go with me,

ter doctor.

me, maf

Hoff. Pardon, gueft juftice :-A word, monfieur * mock-water.

Caius. Mock-vater! vat is dat ?

Hoft. Mock-water, in our English tongue, is va❤ lour, bully.

Caius. By gar, then I have as much mock-vater as de Englishman-Scurvy-jack-dog-prieft! by gar, me vill cut his ears.

Hoft. He will clapper-claw thee tightly, bully.
Caius. Clapper-de-claw! vat is dat ?

Hoft. That is, he will make thee amends.

Caius. By gar, me do look, he fhall clapper-declaw me; for, by gar, me vill have it.

Hoft. And I will provoke him to't, or let him wag. Caius. Me tank you for dat.

Hoft. And moreover, bully,But first, mafter guest, and mafter Page, and eke cavalero Slender, go you through the town to Frogmore. [Afide to them

Page. Sir Hugh is there, is he?

Hoft. He is there: fee what humour he is in; and I will bring the doctor about the fields: will it do

mock-water.] The hoft means, I believe, to reflect on the infpection of urine, which made a confiderable part of practical phyfick in that time; yet I do not well see the meaning of mock-water. JOHNSON.

· Perhaps by mock-water is meant-counterfeit. The water of a gem is a technical term. So in Timon, act I. fe. i: “ -here is

a water, look you." _Mock-water may therefore fignify a thing of a counterfeit luftres To mock, however, in Antony and Cleopatra, undoubtedly fignifies to play with. Shakespeare may therefore chufe to reprefent Caius as one to whom a urinal was a play-thing. STEEVENS.

Caius. By gar, me vill kill de prieft; for he speak for a jack-an-ape to Anne Page.

Hoft. Let him die: but, firft, fheath thy impatience; throw cold water on thy choler: go about the fields with me through Frogmore; I will bring thee where mistress Anne Page is, at a farm-house a feafting; and thou fhalt woo her: Cry'd game, faid I well?

In old editions,

Caius.

I will bring thee where Anne Page is, at a farm-boufe a feafting; and thou shalt woo her: CRY'D GAME, faid I well?] Mr. Theobald alters this nonfenfe to try'd game; that is, to nonfenfe of a worse complexion. Shakespeare wrote and pointed thus, CRY AIM, said I well? i. e. confent to it, approve of it. Have not I made a good propofal? for to cry aim fignifies to confent to, or ap prove of any thing. So again in this play: And to thefe violent proceedings all my neighbours fhall CRY AIM, i. e. approve them. And again, in King John, act II. fc. ii:

"It ill becomes this prefence to CRY AIM

"To thefe ill-tuned repetitions."

i.e. to approve of, or encourage them. The phrafe was taken, originally, from archery. When any one had challenged another to shoot at the butts, (the perpetual diverfion, as well as exercife, of that time) the ftanders-by used to fay one to the other, Cry aim, i. e. accept the challenge. Thus Beaumont and Fletcher, in The Fair Maid of the Inn, act V. make the Duke say:

-muft I cry AIME

"To this unheard of infolence?".

i. e. encourage it, and agree to the request of the duel, which one of his fubjects had infolently demanded against the other. But here it is remarkable, that the fenfelefs editors, not knowing what to make of the phrafe, Cry aim, read it thus:

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muft I cry AI-ME,"

as if it was a note of interjection. So again, Maflinger, in his Guardian:

"I will CRY AIM, and in another room
"Determine of my vengeance”.

And again, in his Renegado:

66

-to play the pander

"To the viceroy's loose embraces, and CRY AIM,
"While he by force or flattery".

But the Oxford editor transforms it to Cock o' the Game; and his improvements of Shakespeare's language abound with these modern elegancies of fpeech, fuch as mynbeers, bull-baitings, &c.

WARBURTON.

Dr.

I

Caius. By gar, me tank you for dat: by gar, love you; and I fhall procure-a you de good gueft,

de

Dr. Warburton is right in his explanation of cry aim, and in fuppofing that the phrafe was taken from archery; but is certainly wrong in the particular practice which he affigns for the original of it. It feems to have been the office of the aim-crier, to give notice to the archer when he was within a proper distance of his mark, or in a direct line with it, and to point out why he failed to strike it, So, in All's loft by Luft, 1633:

"He gives me aim, I am three bows too fhort;

"I'll come up nearer next time."

Again, in Vittoria Corombona, 1612: "I'll give aim to you,

"And tell how near you shoot."

Again, in the Spanish Gipfie, by Rowley and Middleton, 1653: "Though I am no great mark in respect of a huge butt, yet I can tell you, great bobbers have shot at me, and fhot golden arrows; but I myself gave aim thus: -wide, four bows; short, three and a half, &c." Again, in Green's Tu Quoque: (no date) "We'll stand by, and give aim, and holoo if you hit the clout." Again, in Jarvis Markham's English Arcadia, 1607; "Thou fmiling aim-crier at princes' fall." Again, ibid. while her own creatures, like aim-criers, beheld her mifchance with nothing. but lip-pity." In Ames's Typographical Antiquities, p. 402, a book is mentioned, called "Ayme for Finfburie Archers, or an Alphabetical Table of the name of every Mark in the fame Fields, with their true Diftances, both by the Map and the Dimensuration of the Line, &c. 1594." Shakespeare uses the phrase again in the Two Gentlemen of Verona, fcene the laft, where it undoubtedly means to encourage:

"Behold her that gave aim to all thy vows." So, in The Palgrave, by W. Smith, 1615:

"Shame to us all if we give aim to that."

So, in the Revenger's Tragedy, 1608:

"A mother to give aim to her own daughter!"

The original and literal meaning of this expreffion, may be afcertained from fome of the foregoing examples, and its figurative one from the reft; for as Dr. Warburton obferves, it can mean nothing in these later inftances, but to confent to, approve, or encourage. It is not, however, the reading of Shakespeare in the paffage before us, and therefore, we must trive to produce fome lenfe from the words which we find there-cry'd game.

We yet fay, in colloquial language, that fuch a one is -gameor game to the back. There is furely no need of blaming Theobald's emendation with fuch feverity. Cry'd game, might mean,

de earl, de knight, de lords, de gentlemen, my pa

tients.

Hoft. For the which, I will be thy adversary toward Anne Page; faid I well?

Caius. By gar, 'tis good; vell faid.

Hoft. Let us wag then.

Caius. Come at my heels, Jack Rugby. [Exeunt.

ACT III. SCENE I

Frogmore.

Enter Evans and Simple.

Eva. I pray you now, good mafter Slender's ferv ing-man, and friend Simple by your name, which way have you looked for mafter Caius, that calls himfelf Doctor of Phyfick

in those days-a profefs'd buck, one who was as well known by the report of his gallantry, as he could have been by proclamation, Thus, in Troilus and Creffida:

On whofe bright creft, fame, with her loud'ft O yes, "Cries, this is he."

Again, in All's well that ends well, act II. fc, i:

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find what you feek,

"That fame may cry you loud."

Again, in Ford's Lover's Melancholy, 1629:

"A gull, an arrant gull by proclamation."

Again, in King Lear: -A proclaim'd prize." Again, in Troilus and Crefida:

"Thou art proclaim'd a fool, I think."

Cock of the game, however, is not, as Dr. Warburton pronounces it, a modern elegancy of speech, for it is found in Warner's Albions England, 1602: b. xii. c. 74. "This cocke of game, and (as might feeme) this hen of that fame fether." Again, in the Mar◄ tial Maid, by B. and Fletcher:

"Oh craven chicken of a cock o' th' game.” And in many other places, STEEVENS.