under regimen by his physician. Taking diet was a cant term of the times, for the abstinence required in a certain distemper.

25-Hallowmas.] That is about the feast of AllSaints, when winter begins, and the life of a vagrant becomes less comfortable.

JOHNSON..

26-for going ungartered!] That is, to go as a sloven. The poets have always given to lovers, at least to lovers who were suspicious of not being favored by their mistresses, a negligence in dress.

27 Oh excellent motion! &c.] Motion in Shakspeare's time signified puppet. See The City Match, 1639, by Jasper Maine :

"Who follows strange sights out of town, and

Nothing but a motion?

"A puppet pilgrim?”

23 Sir Valentine and servant,] Here Silvia calls her lover servant, and again below her gentle servant. This was the language of ladies to their lovers at the time when Shakspeare wrote.

SIR J. HAWKINS.

So in Marston's What you will, 1607: "Sweet sister, let's sit in judgment a little; faith upon my

servant monsieur Laverdure."

STEEVENS.

29 reasoning with yourself?] That is, discoursing, talking. An Italianism.

JOHNSON.

30 —like a wood woman ;] i. e. a frantic or distracted woman. The word is very frequently used in Chaucer, and sometimes is written wood, sometimes wode.

31

-if the ty'd were lost;] I should not have noted this contemptible jeu de mots, were it not to vindicate Shakspeare for the use of such puerilities, by the custom of the times he wrote in. Chapman in his Andromeda outrages every thing like euphony for the sake of the same quibble:

"And now came roaring to the tied the tide."

32 -no woe to his correction,] No misery that can be compared to the punishment inflicted by love. Herbert called for the prayers of the liturgy a little before his death, saying, None to them; none to them.

JOHNSON.

33-a principality,] The first or principal of women. So the old writers use state. "She is a lady, a great state." Latymer. "This look is called in states warlie, in others otherwise." Sir T. More. JOHNSON.

34 -a waxen image 'gainst a fire.] See the Treatise on Dæmonologie, written by king James. "To some others at these times he teacheth how to make pictures of ware or claye, that by the wasting thereof the persons that they bear the name of may be continually melted, and dried away by continual sicknesse."

35 'Tis but her picture-] This is evidently a slip of attention, for he had seen her in the last scene, and in high terms offered her his service.

JOHNSON.

I believe Proteus means, that, as yet, he had seen

only her outward form, without having known her long enough to have any acquaintance with her mind.

STEEVENS.

36 O sweet-suggesting love,] To suggest is to tempt, in our author's language. So again :

"Knowing that tender youth is soon suggested." The sense is, O tempting love, if thou hast influenced me to sin, teach me to excuse it.

JOHNSON.

37 —this drift!] I suspect that the author concluded the act with this couplet, and that the next scene should begin the third act; but the change, as it will add nothing to the probability of the action, is of no great importance.

JOHNSON.

38-with a cod-piece, &c.] Whoever wishes to be acquainted with this particular, relative to dress, may consult Bulwer's Artificial Changeling, in which such matters are very amply discussed.

STEEVENS.

39 -jealous aim-] Aim is here guess.

40-in Milan here,] It ought to be thus, instead of -in Verona, here-for the scene apparently is in Milan, as is clear from several passages in the first act, and in the beginning of the first scene of the fourth act. A like mistake has crept into the eighth scene of Act II. where Speed bids his fellow-servant Launce welcome to Padua.

POPE.

41-Merops' son,)] Thou art Phaeton in thy rashness, but without his pretensions; thou art not the son of a divinity, but a terræ filius, a low-born wretch; Me

rops is thy true father, with whom Phaeton was falsely reproached.

JOHNSON.

42 Even in the milk-white bosom of thy love.] Alluding to the ancient usage of the women, whose pocket was placed in the front of their stays instead of being worn at the side. These pockets at the side we have lived to see again discarded.

43 —if he be but one knave.] Warburton would have us read if he be but one kind, but Dr. Johnson's remark is much to the purpose. "I know not whether, in Shakspeare's language, one knave may not signify a knave on only one occasion, a single knave. We still use a double villain for a villain beyond the common rate of guilt."

44

she hath had gossips:] The term gossip, amongst its other significations, is applied to the tribe of females who run to the houses of such of their acquaintances as are expecting labour. This makes the ambigu, of which our author is always so fond.

45-the son of thy grandmother:] "It is a wise son," says the proverb, "that knows his own father."

46-Saint Nicholas be thy speed!] St. Nicholas presided over scholars, who were therefore called St. Nicholas's clerks. Hence, by a quibble between Nicholas, and old Nick, highwaymen, in the first part of Henry the Fourth, are called Nicholas's clerks.

47-stock.] i. e. stocking.

WARBURTON.

48-sweet mouth.] or, sweet tooth.

49-praise her liquor.] by drinking frequently.

50 —more hair than wit,] See Ray's collection of English proverbs, " Bush natural, more hair than wit." 51 Trenched in ice;] Cut, carved in ice. Trancher, to cut, French.

52

JOHNSON.

-to bottom it on me.] The housewife's term for a ball of thread wound upon a central body is, a bottom of thread.

JOHNSON.

53 -such integrity:] Mr. Malone suspects that a line following this has been lost: but surely there is little need for such a conjecture. It is not a very forced reading to consider integrity as signifying an unity of feeling and expression.

54 Tune a deploring dump ;] A dump is the same with an elegy.

JOHNSON.

55 —I will pardon you.] I will excuse you from waiting. 56-of awful men:] Men who respect authority, and are therefore to be respected.

57 -sudden quips,] hasty passionate reproaches and scoffs.

JOHNSON.

58-beauty lives with kindness:] Beauty without kindness dies unenjoyed, and undelighting.

JOHNSON.

59-out of all nick.] Beyond all reckoning or count. Reckonings are kept upon nick'd or notch'd sticks or tallies.

WARBURTON.

60 You have your wish; my will is even this,] The word will is here ambiguous. He wishes to gain her will: she tells him, if he wants her will he has it.

JOHNSON,