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knows not which is which. This being owing then to the feafons changing their garb, the last line was doubtless wrote thus,

By their inchafe now knows not which is which.

i. e. by the temperature in which they are fet. The metaphor before was taken from cloathing, here from jewels. Inchafe coming from the French, Enchaffeure, a term in use amongft goldsmiths for the setting a stone in gold.

The chiding autumn.] The quarto of 1600, and the folio of 1623, read childing, and this is right. It is an old word which fignified teeming, bearing fruit. So Chaucer, in his Ballade of our Ladie, fays,

Chofin of Jofeph, whom he toke to wive,
Unknowyng hym, childing by miracle-

This is the proper epithet of autumn, and not chiding.

WARB.* By their increafe.] That is, by their produce. Sir T. H. reads falfely, inverfe. JOHNSON, & REVISAL. L. 20. Henchman.] Page of honour. The office was abolished by Queen Elizabeth.

GRAY.

L. 30. Which he with pretty and with fwimming gate Following (her womb then rich with my young fquire) Would imitate] Following what? the did not follow the fhip, whofe motion the imitated: for that failed on the water, fhe on the land. If by following we are to understand imitating, it will be a mere pleonafm-imitating would imitate. From the poet's defcription of the actions it plainly appears we should read

FOLLYING

Would imitate

wantoning in fport and gaiety. Thus the old English writers and they beleeven folyly and falselysays Sir J. Maundeville, from and in the fenfe of folatrer, to play the wanton. This exactly agrees to the action described full often bas fhe goffipt by my fide-and when we have laugh'd to fee. WARB.

Ibid.] The foregoing note is very ingenious, but fince follying is a word of which I know not any example, and the favourite might, without much licentiousness of language, be faid to follow a ship that failed in the direction of the coaft, I think there is no fufficient reafon for adopting it.

The coinage of new words is a violent remedy, not to be afed but in the laft neceffity.

JOHNSON. Ibid.] If the reader ever hath seen a ship scudding before the wind, with its fore-fail grown big-bellied, as the poet ex-preffes it, with the fwelling breeze; he must recollect that in fuch a cafe, the fail projects fo far forward, that it seems to a spectator on the fhore, to go in a manner before the rest of the veffel; which for the fame reafon, appears to follow, though closely, after, with an easy swimming motion. This was the image, which the fairy's favourite, taking the hint from, and the advantage of her pregnancy, endeavoured to imitate; and this she did, by wantonly displaying before her the convexity of her swelling belly, and moving after it, asʼ the poet defcribes "with pretty and with fwimming gait.” -Such being the sense of the paflage, the text is easily af certained by pointing and reading thus:

Which the, with pretty and with swimming gait
Following her womb, then rich with my young squire,
Would imitate.
KENRICK.*

P. 102. 1. 16,

-Thou remember'ft

Since once I fat upon a promontory,

And beard a mermaid on a dolphin's back,
Uttering fuch dulcet and harmonious breath,
That the rude fea grew civil at her fong;

And certain ftars Jbot madly from their fpheres

To hear the fea-maid's mufic-] The first 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 ftands 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 difpraise. All this agrees with Mary Queen of Scots, and with no other. Queen Elizabeth could not bear to hear her commended; and her fucceffor would not forgive her fatyrift. 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 fituated in the fea, and 2. her beauty and intemperate luft,

-Ut turpiter atrum

Definat in pifcem mulier formosa supernè.

For as Elizabeth for her chastity is called a Vestal, this unfortunate lady on a contrary account is called a Mermaid. 3. An antient story may be fuppofed to be here alluded to. The emperor Julian tells us, Epifle 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. WARB.

Ibid] "Ut turpiter atrum

"Definat in pifcem mulier formofa fuperne." which those who do not understand Latin, will perhaps think, is a proof of what Mr. W. afferts; or at leaft fomething to his purpofe. Not to take notice of the fameness of the cause; if what Mr. Warburton fays of the ifjue be true, then leads and wings are the fame; for Queen Mary loft her bead. CANONS.*

-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 fhe was in that court, the pronounced a Latin oration in the great hall of the L'ouvre, with fo much grace and eloquence, as filled the whole court with admiration.

That the rude fea grew civil at her fong.] By the rude fea is meant Scotland encircled with the ocean; which rose up in arms against the regent, while fhe was in France. But her return home presently quieted those disorders; and had not her ftrange ill conduct afterwards more violently inflamed them, the might have paffed her whole life in peace. There is the greatest juftness and beauty in this image, as the vulgar opinion is, that the mermaid always fings in ftorms.

And certain ftars fhot madly from their Spheres,

To bear the fea-maid's mufic.] This concludes the defcription, with that remarkable circumstance of this unhappy lady's fate, the deftruction fhe brought upon feveral of the English nobility, whom the drew in to fupport her cause. This, in the boldeft expreffion of the fublime, the poet images by certain ftars fhooting madly from their Spheres: By which he meant the earls of Northumberland and Weftmorland, 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 juftness in the imag'ry. The vulgar opinion being that the mermaid allured men, to deftruction by her fongs. To which opinion Shakespeare 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 jufteft allegory that was ever written. The laying it in fairy land, and out of nature, is in the character of the speaker. And on these occafions Shakespeare always excels himself. He is borne away by the magic of his enthusiasm, and hurries his reader along with him into these ancient regions of poetry, by that power of verse, which we may well fancy to be like what,

-Olim Fauni Vatefque canebant.

WARB.

L. 26. Cupid all-arm'd;] Surely, this prefents us with a very unclaffical image. Where do we read or fee, in ancient books, or monuments, Cupid arm'd more than with his bow and arrow; and with these we for ever fee him arm'd. And these are all the arms he had occafion for in this prefent action; a more illuftrious one, than any, his friends, the claf'ficks, ever brought him upon.-The change I make is fo small, but the beauty of the thought fo great, which this alteration carries with it, that, I think, we are not to hefitate upon it. For what an addition is this to the compliment made upon this Virgin Queen's celibacy, that it alarm'd the power of love? as if his empire was in danger, when this Imperial Votrefs had declared herself for a fingle life: fo powerful would her great example be in the world.-Queen

Elizabeth could not but be pleased with our author's address WARB. upon this head.

our author.

Ibid.] All-arm'd, does not fignify dressed in panoply, but only enforces the word armed, as we might fay all-booted. I am afraid that the general sense of alarmed, by which it is used for put into fear or care by whatever caufe, is later than JOHNSON. P. 103. 1. 6. And maidens call it love in idleness.] This is as fine a metamorphofis as any in Ovid, with a much better moral; intimating that irregular love has only power when people are idle, or not well employed. WARB.

L. 25. I am invifible.] I thought proper here to ob- . ferve, that as Oberon and Puck his attendant, may be frequently obferved to speak, when there is no mention of their entering; they are defigned by the poet to be fuppofed on the stage during the greatest part of the remainder of the play; and to mix, as they pleafe, as fpirits, with the other actors; and embroil the plot, by their interpofition, without being feen or heard, but when to their own purpose. THEOB.

P. 104. 1. 1. The one I'll stay, the other stayeth me.] Thus it has been in all the editions hitherto: but Dr. Thirlby ingeniously faw, it must be, The one I'll flay, the other flayeth THEOB.

me.

Ibid. The one I'll flay; the other flayeth me.] There is not the leaft foundation for imputing this bloody difpofition to Demetrius. His real intention is fufficiently expressed in the common reading,

The one I'll stay; the other stayeth me.

I will arrest Lyfander, and disappoint his scheme of carrying off Hermia; for it is upon the account of this latter that I am wafting away the night in this wood.' I believe too another inftance cannot be given, wherein a lady is faid to lay her lover by the flight she expreffes for him. The verb, flay, always implies violence, and generally by fome kind of weapon. REVISAL. L.-Wood within this wood.] Wode, or mad, wild, rav

ing.

P. 106. 1. 4.] All the old editions have,
Quite over-canopied with luscious woodbine.

POPE.

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