Thou hast robb'd me of this deed: I would, re venges, That possible strength might meet', would seek us through, And put us to our answer. BEL. Well, 'tis done : We'll hunt no more to-day, nor seek for danger Till hasty Polydore return, and bring him Poor sick Fidele ! ARV. [Exit. O thou goddess, BEL. Thou divine Nature, how thyself thou blazon'st In these two princely boys! They are as gentle That possible strength might meet,] Such pursuit of vengeance as fell within any possibility of opposition. JOHNSON. To gain his colour,] i. e. to restore him to the bloom of health, to recall the colour of it into his cheeks. STEEVENS. 8 ? I'd let a PARISH of such Clotens blood,] I would, says the young prince, to recover Fidele, kill as many Clotens as would fill a parish. JOHNSON. "His visage, (says Fenner of a catchpole,) was almost eaten through with pock-holes, so that half a parish of children might have played at cherry-pit in his face." FARMER. Again, in The Wits, by Davenant, fol. 1673, p. 222 : REED. "Heaven give you joy sweet master Palatine "And to you sir a whole parish of children.' The sense of the passage is, I would let blood (or bleed) a whole parish, or any number, of such fellows as Cloten; not, would let out a parish of blood." EDWARDS. Mr. Edward is, I think, right. 66 This man- -hath In the fifth Act we have: "More of thee merited, than a band of Clotens 66 Had ever scar for." MALOne. O thou goddess, Thou divine Nature, How thyself thou blazon'st In these two princely boys!] The first folio has: As zephyrs, blowing below the violet, Not wagging his sweet head and yet as rough, That wildly grows in them, but yields a crop "Thou divine Nature; thou thyself thou blazon'st-." In the old copy the word thou was inadvertently repeated by the compositor "Thou divine Nature; thou thyself thou blazon'st." For this slight emendation, which the context fully supports, I am responsible. MALONE. 2 I have received this emendation, which is certainly judicious. They are as gentle As zephyrs, blowing below the violet, Not wagging his sweet head; and yet as rough, STEEVENS Their royal blood enchaf'd, as the rud'st wind, &c.] So, in our author's Lover's Complaint: "His qualities were beauteous as his form, "For maiden tongu'd he was, and thereof free; 66 Yet, if men mov'd him, was he such a storm "As oft 'twixt May and April is to see, 66 When winds breathe sweet, unruly though they be." 66 MALONE. 3- 'Tis wonderful,] Old copies-wonder. The correction is Mr. Pope's. So, in The Merry Wives of Windsor: Keep a good student from his book, and it is wonderful." STEEVENS. 4 That an invisible instínct should frame them] The metre, says Mr. Heath, would be improved by reading: "That an instinct invisible should frame them-." He probably did not perceive that in Shakspeare's time the accent was laid on the second syllable of the word instinct. So, in one of our poet's Sonnets: "As if by some instinct the wretch did find—.” The old copy is certainly right. MALONE. GUI. Re-enter GUIDERIUS. Where's my brother? I have sent Cloten's clotpoll down the stream, BEL. [Solemn Musick. My ingenious instrument! He went hence even now. GUI. What does he mean? since death of my dear'st mother It did not speak before. All solemn things Is Cadwal mad ? Re-enter ARVIRAGUS, bearing IMOGEN as dead, in BEL. his Arms. Look, here he comes, And brings the dire occasion in his arms, Of what we blame him for! The bird is dead, ARV. 5 lamenting TOYS,] Toys formerly signified freaks, or frolicks. One of N. Breton's poetical pieces, printed in 1557, is called, "The toyes of an idle head." See Cole's Dict. 1679, in v. MALONE. Toys are trifles. So, in King Henry VI. Part I.: "That for a toy, a thing of no regard." Again, in Hamlet: "Each toy seems prologue to some great amiss." STEEVENS. GUI. BEL. O, melancholy! Who ever yet could sound thy bottom? find The ooze, to show what coast thy sluggish crare Might easiliest harbour in '?-Thou blessed thing! 6 O, melancholy! Who ever yet could sound thy bottom?] So, in Alba, the Monthes Mind of a Melancholy Lover, by R. T. 1598: "This woeful tale, where sorrow is the ground, "Whose bottom's such as nere the depth is found." what coast thy sluggish CRARE Might easiliest harbour in ?] The folio reads: 66 thy sluggish care?" MALONE. which Dr. Warburton allows to be a plausible reading, but substitutes carrack in its room; and with this, Dr. Johnson tacitly acquiesced, and inserted it in the text. Mr. Simpson, among his notes on Beaumont and Fletcher, has retrieved the true reading, which is "In some decay'd crare of his own." A crare, says Mr. Heath, is a small trading vessel, called in the Latin of the middle ages crayera. The same word, though somewhat differently spelt, occurs in Harrington's translation of Ariosto, book xxxix Stanza 28 : "To ships, and barks, with gallies, bulks and crayes," &c. Again, in Heywood's Golden Age, 1611: "Behold a form to make your craers and barks." Again, in Drayton's Miseries of Queen Margaret : "After a long chase took this little cray, "Which he suppos'd him safely should convey." Again, in the 22d Song of Drayton's Polyolbion : some shell, or little crea, 66 Hard labouring for the land on the high working sea." Again, in Amintas for his Phillis, published in England's Helicon, 1600: "Till thus my soule dooth passe in Charon's crare.” Mr. Tollet observes that the word often occurs in Holinshed, as twice, p. 906, vol. ii. STEEVENS. Jove knows what man thou might'st have made; but I 8, Stark, as you see : Thou diedst, a most rare boy, of melancholy!- His arms thus leagu'd: I thought, he slept; and put My clouted brogues' from off my feet, whose rude ness Answer'd my steps too loud. The word is used in the stat. 2 Jac. i. c. 32: “ of every ship, vessel, or crayer." TYRWHITT. Perhaps Shakspeare wrote-"thou, sluggish crare, might'st," &c. The epithet sluggish is used with equal propriety, a crayer being a very slow-sailing unwieldy vessel. See Florio's Italian Dict. 1598," Vurchio. A hulke, a crayer, a lyter, a wherrie, or such vessel of burthen." MALONE. 8 - but I,] This is the reading of the first folio, which later editors not understanding, have changed into "but ah!" The meaning of the passage I take to be this ::—" Jove knows, what man thou might'st have made, but I know, thou died'st," &c. TYRWHITT. I believe," but ah!" to be the true reading. Ay is through the first folio, and in all books of that time, printed instead of ah! Hence probably I, which was used for the affirmative participle ay, crept into the text here. "Heaven knows (says Belarius) what a man thou would'st have been, had'st thou lived; but alas! thou died'st of melancholy, while yet only a most accomplished boy." MALONE. 9 Stark,] i. e. stiff. So, in Measure for Measure : 66 guiltless labour "When it lies starkly in the traveller's bones." Again, in King Henry IV. Part I. : "And many a nobleman lies stark "Under the hoofs of vaunting enemies." STEEvens. |