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5. The lines which Shakespeare makes Alcibiades read in the concluding speech of the play, "Here lies a wretched corse," &c., are found, with the difference of a single word ("wretches" instead of "caitiffs"), in The Life of Antony apud North's Plutarch; but neither in that Life, nor in the novel on the subject of Timon in Painter's Palace of Pleasure, - with which also Shakespeare was doubtless acquainted,— is there the remotest hint of "an inscription by Timon to indicate his death and point to the epitaph on his tomb.”

6. I think it quite plain that the insculpture on Timon's tomb is in the common language of the country, and that it is unintelligible to the Soldier only because he cannot read any sort of writing (in the next scene he confesses his "poor ignorance"). Why should Timon engrave his epitaph in characters which were to be deciphered by the learned alone?

JULIUS CÆSAR.

P. 304,-act i. sc. 2.

"That her wide walls encompass'd but one man?'

WALLS] The early impressions have walks for 'walls' of the corr. fo. 1632, and Mr. Singer, adopting 'walls' (and he could not well avoid it), in this instance fairly admits his obligation to the old annotator."

Mr. Singer ought to have known that the reading "walls" is found in several editions of Shakespeare published during the last century (in Pope's and in Theobald's, for instance,— which happen to be now lying on my table).

P. 307,-act i. sc. 2.

"Casca. He fell down in the market-place, and foamed at mouth, and was speechless.

Bru. 'Tis very like he hath the falling-sickness."

The second of these speeches is pointed in opposition to the sense it should stand,

""Tis very like, he hath the falling-sickness;"

for Brutus knew very well that Cæsar was subject to that disease. Vide North's Plutarch, p. 719, ed. 1612.

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Here Mr. Collier wrongly puts an interrogation-point after these words; and Mr. Craik, in his English of Shakespeare, &c., as erroneously prints

"What a night is this!"

thinking "the a is plainly indispensable; for surely Casca cannot be supposed to ask what day of the month it is. What he says can only be understood as an exclamation, similar to that of Cinna, 'What a fearful night is this!' p. 114. Of course Casca is uttering an exclamation: but it ought to stand,

"Cassius, what night is this!"

without the "a" which Mr. Craik interpolates; for in such exclamations the article was frequently omitted by our early writers compare Twelfth-Night, act ii. sc. 5,

:

"Fab. What dish o' poison has she dressed him!

Sir To. And with what wing the staniel checks at it!"

(where, by the by, Mr. Collier silently gives the modern alteration, "What a dish of poison has she dressed him!"), and The Two Gentlemen of Verona, act i. sc. 2,

"What fool is she, that knows I am a maid,

And would not force the letter to

my

view !"

P. 340,-act iii. sc. 1.

"Over thy wounds now do I prophesy,

(Which, like dumb mouths, do ope their ruby lips
To beg the voice and utterance of my tongue)

A curse shall light upon the loins of men ;

Domestic fury, and fierce civil strife,

Shall cumber all the parts of Italy:
Blood and destruction shall be so in use,
And dreadful objects so familiar,

That mothers shall but smile, when they behold
Their infants quarter'd with the hands of war,
All pity chok'd with custom of fell deeds ;
And Cæsar's spirit, ranging for revenge,
With Até by his side, come hot from hell,

N

Shall in these confines, with a monarch's voice,
Cry 'Havock!' and let slip the dogs of war,' &c.

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A curse shall light upon the LOINS of men ;] i.e. Upon the generations of mankind the old reading, from the folios, has been upon the limbes of men,' which few, but Steevens, have tolerated, and which most have denounced as next to nonsense. Hanmer proposed kind, Warburton line, and Johnson lives or lymnes-all equally wrong. There can be no doubt, among impartial readers, that we have here recovered the true word of the poet."

Mr. Craik, too, in his English of Shakespeare, &c., adopts, and prodigally praises, the correction "loins." But, allowing that the old reading "limbs" is wrong and I am far from defending it—I cannot believe that "loins" is the word which ought to supply its place; for "the loins of men" in the sense of "the generations of men" is such an expression as we should hardly expect to find even in those writers who have been the most censured for taking liberties with language. (Mr. Collier explains it "the generations of mankind," — not perceiving that Antony is speaking only of his countrymen, as the context shows-"all the parts of Italy" — and "in these confines.") In short, Johnson's emendation, "lives," appears to me much more probable than that of the Ms. Corrector.

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"The enemy, marching along by them,

By them shall make a fuller number up,

Come on refresh'd, new-hearted, and encourag'd,' &c. new-HEARTED,] So the corr. fo. 1632, and not new-added,' as in the older and subsequent impressions: we see in the preceding line that Brutus contemplated that addition would be made to the force of the enemy, and in this line he states that the foe would, in consequence, come on, not only 'refresh'd,' but 'new-hearted and encourag'd.' 'New-aided,' which is the Rev. Mr. Dyce's emendation, is only saying the same thing over again that appears in the line just above,—

'By them shall make a fuller number up.'

'New-hearted' is a strong and expressive compound, and, as Mr. Craik observes (Engl. of Shakesp.' p. 260), 'the very sort of word that one would expect to find where it stands in association with 'refresh'd' and 'encourag'd.'"

1. The word substituted here by the Ms. Corrector, "hearted," bears not the most distant resemblance, either in spelling or in sound, to the original word "added;" from which the word substituted by me, "aided," differs only in a single letter.

2. Mr. Collier declares that "new-aided' is only saying the same thing over again that appears in the line just above:" but how came it to escape him that

"new-hearted, and encourag'd"

are synonymous terms?—

66

"TO HEART. To encourage; to hearten."

Todd's Johnson's Dictionary.

3. Mr. Craik, as his note on the passage shows, was not aware of my conjecture "new-aided;" though the reader would be apt to conclude, from what Mr. Collier says above, that it was known to Mr. Craik and had been condemned by him, in which case, let me add (without any disrespect to Mr. Craik), I should not have thought the worse of it.

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"And fortune, on his damned quarry smiling,' &c. damned QUARRY] i.e. His army doomed, or damned, to become the 'quarry,' or prey, of his enemies. This is the reading of all the old copies, which has been deserted by most editors, although giving an obvious and striking meaning, much more forcible than quarrel, which, at Johnson's instance, they substituted for 'quarry.' It is also amended to quarrel in the corr. fo. 1632, the old annotator, or the actor whose word he repeated, perhaps, not understanding quarry' so applied. Respecting 'quarry,' see Vol. iv. p. 607."

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On this passage, -in which Mr. Collier has deserted the authority of the Ms. Correcter, when he ought to have stuck to it, see the note in my edition of Shakespeare.

P. 389,- act i. sc. 3.

"I' the shipman's card to show.'

'To show' is obtained from the corr. fo. 1632 : the line is imperfect, end

ing with 'card,' and we may feel sure that we thus recover two words Shakespeare wrote, but which had dropped out in the press.”

If in this lyric portion of the play the present place were the only one where there is no rhyme, we might suspect that some words had dropped out: but the fact that in four other places we have lines without any rhyme forbids such a suspicion.

"And, like a rat without a tail,
I'll do, I'll do, I'll do.

2 Witch. I'll give thee a wind."
"Yet it shall be tempest-toss'd.-
Look what I have.

2 Witch. Show me, show me.

1 Witch. Here I have a pilot's thumb, Wreck'd," &c.

"The weird sisters, hand in hand,

Posters of the sea and land,

Thus do go about, about:

Thrice to thine, and thrice to mine,

And thrice again, to make up nine,
Peace!-the charm's wound up."

P. 399,- act i. sc. 6.

"Where they much breed and haunt, I have observ'd,

The air is delicate.'

Where they MUCH breed] The folios have 'Where they must breed,' but it should appear from the corr. fo. 1632 that must was misheard, and therefore misprinted for 'much.""

Far preferable surely to the Corrector's emendation is the common modern reading,

Where they Most breed and haunt,” &c.

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We fail?] This is the punctuation of the folios, 1623, 1632, 1664, and 1685, and in this case, perhaps, we may take it as some evidence of the ancient mode of delivering the two words, 'We fail?' interrogatively. Malone substituted a mark of admiration, 'We fail!' and Steevens pursued the same course. The Rev. Mr. Dyce, who is generally hyper

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