BIRON. Honest plain words best pierce the ear* And by these badges understand the king. Hath much deform'd us, fashioning our humours All wanton as a child, skipping, and vain ; To those that make us both,-fair ladies, you: Your oath I will not trust; but go with speed Change not your offer made in heat of blood; Come challenge me, challenge me by these deserts, I will be thine; and, till that instant, shut For the remembrance of my father's death. KING. If this, or more than this, I would deny, PRIN. We have receiv'd your letters, full of love; With three-fold love I wish you all these three. Your favours, the ambassadors of love; DUM. Our letters, madam, show'd much more LONG. So did our looks. Ros. PRIN. (*) First folio, ears. + Old copies, straying. (1) The quarto omits in. First folio reads these are. (§) First folio, coat. a As bombist, and as lining to the time;] Bombast was a sort of wadding used to fill out the dresses formerly. band last love:] The old copies concur in this reading, but love is not improbably a misprint for proof, "But that it bear this trial and last proof." e In the old copies, and in most of the modern editions also, the following lines now occur: "BIRON. And what to me, my love? and what to me? Ros. You must be purged too, your sins are rank; You are attaint with faults and perjury; Therefore if you my favour mean to get, DUM. O, shall I say, I thank you, gentle wife? a day, I'll mark no words that smooth-fac'd wooers say: Maria? At the twelvemonth's end, MAR. The liker you; few taller are so young. (*) First folio, my. A twelvemonth shall you spend, and never rest, On comparing these five lines of Rosaline with her subsequent speech, of which they are a comparatively tame and feeble abridgement, it is evident that Biron's question and the lady's reply in this place are only part of the poet's first draft, and were intended by him to be struck out when the Play was augmented and corrected. Their retention in the text answers no purpose but to detract from the force and elegance of Rosaline's expanded answer immediately afterwards, and to weaken the dramatic interest of the two leading characters. See Note (4) of the Illustrative Comments on Act IV. d-forsworn agen.] So the old copies, and rightly. Modern editors, regardless of the rhyme, have substituted, again. Ros. Oft have I heard of you, my lord Biron, It cannot be; it is impossible: Ros. Why, that's the way to choke a gibing spirit, Whose influence is begot of that loose grace groans, BIRON. A twelvemonth? well, befal what will befal, I'll jest a twelvemonth in an hospital. PRIN. Ay, Sweet my lord; and so I take my leave. [To the KING. KING. No, madam, we will bring you on your ARM. I will kiss thy royal finger, and take leave: I am a votary; I have vowed to Jaquenetta to hold the plough for her sweet love three years. But, most esteemed greatness, will you hear the dialogue that the two learned men have compiled, in praise of the owl and the cuckoo? it should have followed in the end of our show. KING. Call them forth quickly, we will do so. ARM. Holla! approach. Enter HOLOFERNES, NATHANIEL, MOTH, CosTARD, and others.* This side is Hiems, winter: this Ver, the spring: the one maintained by the owl, the other by the cuckoo. Ver, begin. THE SONG. I. SPRING. When daisies pied, and violets blue, Do paint the meadows with delight, Cuckoo, cuckoo,-O word of fear, II. When shepherds pipe on oaten straws, And merry larks are ploughmen's clocks, When turtles tread, and rooks, and daws, And maidens bleach their summer smocks, ACT V.] IV. When all aloud the wind doth blow, And Marian's nose looks red and raw; ILLUSTRATIVE COMMENTS. АСТ І. (1) SCENE I. -brave conquerors! -for so you are, That war against your own affections, And the huge army of the world's desires.] There is a passage in "The Hystorie of Hamblet, Prince of Denmarke," (London, 1608,) which strikingly resembles the above both in thought and expression. It is there said that Hamlet "in all his honorable actions made himselfe worthy of perpetuall memorie, if one onely spotte had not blemished and darkened a good part of his prayses. For that the greatest victorie that a man can obtaine is to make himselfe victorious and lord over his owne affections, and that restraineth the unbridled desires of his concupiscence;" see Mr. Collier's reprint in " Shakespeare's Library," vol. i. p. 180. (2) SCENE I.-A high hope for a low heaven.] Upon maturer consideration, I am disposed to believe the low heaven, and the god from whom Biron expected high words, refer to the Stage Heaven, and its hectoring Jupiter, whose lofty, huff-cap style was a favourite topic for ridicule. "If Jove speak English, in a thundering cloud, Thwick, thwack,' and riff-raff,' roars he out aloud.' HALL'S Satires, Book 1. Sat. VI. See an interesting and suggestive article on the Heaven of the old theatres in "A Specimen of a Commentary on Shakspeare," by W. Whiter, 1794, pp. 153-166. (3) SCENE II.-You are a gentleman, and a gamester.] Of the extent to which the practice of gambling was carried in Shakespeare's time, we have abundant testimony in the literature of that period. There are few plays or books of any description, illustrative of the social habits of the people, which have not some allusion to this prevalent vice. According to Drake, it "had become almost universal in the days of Elizabeth; and," he remarks, "if we may credit George Whetstone, had reached a prodigious degree of excess. Speaking of the licentiousness of the stage previous to the appearance of Shakspeare, he adds:-'But, there are in the bowels of this famous citie, farre more daungerous playes, & little reprehended: that wicked playes of the dice, first invented by the devyll, (as Cornelius Agrippa wryteth) & frequented by unhappy men: the detestable roote, upon which a thousand villanies growe. "The nurses of thease (worse than heathnysh) hellish exercises are places called ordinary tables: of which there are in London more in nomber, to honor the devyll, then churches to serve the living God.-P. 24. "I costantly determine to crosse the streets where these vile houses (ordinaries) are planted, to blesse me from the enticements of the, which in very deed are See the second part of his work, "The Enemie to Unthryf tinesse" (1586), entitled, "An Addition or Touchstone for the times; exposing the dangerous Mischiefes, that the dyeing Howses (commonly called) Ordinarie Tables, and other (like) Sanctuaries of Iniquitie do dayly breede within the Bowelles of the famous Citie of London, by George Whetstone, Gent." many, and the more dangerous, in that they please with a vain hope of gain. Insomuch on a time, I heard a distemperate dicer solemnly sweare that he faithfully beleeved, that dice were first made of the bones of a witch, & cards of her skin, in which there hath ever sithence remained an inchantment, yt whosoever once taketh delight in either, he shall never have power utterly to leave them; for quoth he, I a hundred times vowed to leave both, yet have not the grace to forsake either.'-P. 32. "No opportunity for the practice of this ruinous habit seems to have been omitted, and we find the modern mode of gambling, by taking the odds, to have been fully established towards the latter end of the sixteenth century; for Gilbert Talbot, writing to his father, the Earl of Shrewsbury, on May the 15th, 1579, after informing His Lordship that the matter of the Queen's marriage with Monsieur is growne very colde,' subjoins, and yet I know a man may take a thousande pounds, in this towne, to be bounde to pay doble so muche when Mons cumethe into Inglande, and treble so muche when he marryethe the Q. Matie, and if he nether doe the one nor the other, to gayne the thousande poundes cleare.'" 6 (4) SCENE II.-The dancing horse will tell you.] This famous quadruped and his exploits are often referred to by the old writers. He was called Marocco, but is usually mentioned as "Bankes's horse," from the name of his owner, and appears to have been an animal of wonderful aptitude and docility. His first exhibition is said to have been in 1589; and Sir Kenelm Digby observes, that he "would restore a glove to the due owner, after the master had whispered the man's name in his ear; would tell the just number of pence in any piece of silver coin, newly showed him by his master," &c.-A Treatise on Bodies, c. xxxviii. p. 393. His most celebrated performance was the ascent to the top of St. Paul's, in 1600, an exploit referred to in Decker's "Gull's Horn-Booke," 1609" from hence you may descend to talk about the horse that went up; and strive if you can to know his keeper;" &c. And also in the Blacke Booke, by Middleton, 1604 :-"May not the devil, pray you, walk in Paul's, as well as the horse go a' top of Paul's, for I am sure I was not far from his keeper." In a rare quarto, called "Tarlton's Jests," &c. published in 1611, we are told,-"There was one Banks (in the time of Tarlton), who served the Earle of Essex, and had a horse of strange qualities; and being at the Crosse-keyes in Gracious street, getting money with him, as he was mightily resorted to; Tarlton, then (with his fellowes) playing at the Bell by, came into the Crosse-keyes (amongst many people) to see fashions; which Banks perceiving, (to make the people laugh,) saies, 'Signor,' (to his horse,) 'go fetch me the veryest foole in the company.' The jade comes immediately, and with his mouth drawes Tarlton forth. Tarlton (with merry words) said nothing but God a mercy, horse l' In the end, Tarlton, seeing the people laugh so, was angry inwardly, and said, Sir, had I power of your horse, as you have, I would do more than that.' 'Whate'er it be,' said Banks (to please master in the master in the Then, him), 'I will charge him to do it.' 'Then,' saies Tarlton, 'charge him to bring me the veriest company.' He shall,' (saies Banks.) 'Signor,' (saies he,) 'bring master Tarlton here, the veriest company.' The horse leades his master to him. God a mercy, horse, indeed!' saies Tarlton. The people had much ado to keep peace; but Banks and Tarlton had But like to have squared, and the horse by to give aim. ever after it was a by-word thorow London, God a mercy, horse!' and is to this day." In 1601 he was exhibited at the Golden Lion, Rue Saint Jaques, in Paris; and in the notes to a French translation of the "Golden Ass" of Apuleius, by Jean de Montlyard, Sieur de Melleray, first pointed out by Douce, he is described as a middle-sized bay English gelding, about fourteen years old. This work furnishes a very good account of his tricks, which seem to have been much of the same description as those practised by the learned pigs, dogs, and horses of our own time. While in France, poor Bankes and his curtail ran a narrow escape of being sacrificed as magicians,-a fate it has been feared, from a passage in Ben Jonson's 134th Epigram, and a note in the mock-romance of "Don Zara del Fogo," 1660, which really did befal them not long afterwards in Rome. (5) SCENE II.-Is there not a ballad, boy, of the King and the beggar!] Two versions of this once popular ditty The elder is probably that printed have come down to us. in " 'Percy's Reliques," vol. i. p. 183, ed. 1767, from Richard Johnson's" Crown garland of Goulden Roses," 1612, and intituled, "A Song of a Beggar and a King." Whether this was the original of which Moth declares "The world was very guilty some three ages since," it is not easy to determine. It begins : "I read that once in Affrica, From nature's laws he did decline, As he out of his window lay He saw a beggar all in gray, The which did cause his paine." The second stanza is memorable, from Mercutio's quoting the opening line :— "Young Abraham Cupid, he that shot so trim, "The blinded boy that shootes so trim He drew a dart and shot at him In place where he did lye; Which soone did pierse him to the quicke, And when he felt the arrow pricke, Which in his tender heart did sticke, He looketh as he would dye. What sudden chance is this, quoth he, That I to love must subject be, Which never thereto would agree, But still did it defie?" There are in all ten stanzas, of which that descriptive of the wedding of the king with "Penelophon" is, perhaps, the best : "And when the wedding day was come The noblemen, both all and some, Upon the queene to wait. And she behav'd herself that day ACT II. Rape of Lucrece" we have the same metaphor :- Could pick no meaning from their parling looks, Writ in the glassy margent of such books." Shakespeare was evidently fond of resembling the face to a book, and having once arrived at this similitude, the comparison, however odd, of the eyes to the margin, wherein of old the commentary on the text was printed, is not altogether unnatural. The following passage, which presents both the primary and subordinate metaphor, is the best example he has given us of this peculiar association of ideas: "What say you? can you love the gentleman? This night you shall behold him at our feast; |