of the Serving-man's Comfort &c. fhall be ascertained by VOL. II. circumftances which at prefent are beyond our reach. STEEVENS.

-

431. Who is the footer.] To follow Mr. Steevens's note.So, in Effays and Characters of a Prifon and Prisoners, by GM. 1618: "The King's guard are counted the strongest archers, but here are better fuitors." So, in Antony and Cleopatra, we meet in the old copy: (owing probably to the tranfcriber's ear having deceived him)

66

-A grief that fuits

"My very heart at root."

inftead of a grief that shoots.

Again, in the Rape of Lucrece, 1594, we find shoot inflead of fuit:

"End thy ill aim before thy fhoot be ended."

Here clearly the author meant fuit.

In Ireland, where there is reason to believe that much of the pronunciation of queen Elizabeth's time is yet retained, the word suitor is at this day pronounced by the vulgar as if it were written fhooter. The word in the text ought, I think, to be written fuitor, as in the inftance above quoted from Effays &c. by G. M.

The mistake arose from the fimilarity of the founds; and this is one of many proofs, that when these plays were tranfcribed for the prefs, the copies were made out by the car.

66

MALONE.

441. Faufte precor gelida.] From a paffage in Nafhe's Apologie of Pierce Pennileffe, 1593, the Eclogues of Mantuanus appear to have been a fchool-book in our author's time: With the firft and fecond leafe he plaies very prettilie, and, in ordinarie terms of extenuating, verdits Pierce PenniLeffe for a grammar-school wit; faies, his margine is as deeplie learned as Faufte precor gelida." MALONE.

452. Her hairs were gold, chryftal the other's eyes.] The first folio reads: On her hairs &c. The context, I think, clearly fhews that we ought to read:

One, her hairs were gold, chryftal the other's eyes. i. e. the hairs of one of the ladies were of the colour of gold, and the eyes of the other as clear as chryftal. The king is speaking of the panegyricks pronounced by the two lovers on their miftreffes.

One was formerly pronounced on. Hence the mistake. See a note on The Two Gentlemen of Verona, ante p. 87.

The

Love's LAB. LOST.

VOL. II.

The fame miftake has happened in All's Well that ends Love's Well; (first folio.)

LAB. LOST.

66

A traveller is a good thing after dinner-but on that lies two thirds &c."

The two words are frequently confounded in our ancient dramas. MALONE.

454. And critick Timon.] After Mr. Steevens's note.Mr. Steevens's obfervation is fupported by our author's 112th Sonnet:

"my adder's fenfe

"To cryttick and to flatterer ftopped are."

MALONE. 463. Add to my note-Again, in Storer's Life and Death of Cardinal Wolley, a Poem, 1599:

"With whofe hart-ftrings Amphion's lute is ftrung, "And Orpheus harp hangs warbling at his tongue." STEEVENS.

468. audacious without impudency] Audacious was not always used by our ancient writers in a bad fenfe. It means no more here, and in the following inftance from Ben Jonfon's Silent Woman, than liberal or commendable boldness: fhe that fhall be my wife, must be accomplished

with courtly and audacious ornaments."

STEEVENS.

Ibid. He is too piqued.] The following paffage in Nashe's Apologie of Pierce Penniless, 1593, may ferve to corroborate Mr. Tyrwhitt's explanation: "And he might have shrowded a picked effeminate carpet knight under the fictionate perfon of Hermaphroditus." Again, in Wilfon's Arte of Rhetorique, 1553: "Such riot, dicyng, cardyng, pikyngs -must needs bring him to naught." MALONE.

487. Add to my last note :] Again, in Newes from Hell, brought by the Devil's Carrier, 1606: "in a bowl ing alley in a flat cap like a fhop-keeper." STEEVENS.

496. Add to my note 2.] Again, in Randolph's Poems, 1664:

"The titles of their fatires fright fome more,
"Than Lord have mercy writ upon a door."

MALONE. Ibid. Add to my note :] Again, in More Fools yet, a collection of Epigrams by R. S. 1610:

"To declare the infection for his fin,

"A croffe is fet without, there's none within." Again, ibid.

"But

OBSERVATION S.

"But by the way he saw and much respected
"A doore belonging to a house infected,
"Whereon was plac'd (as 'tis the custome still)
"The Lord have mercy on us this fad bill
"The fot perus❜d- ." STEEVENS.

520. And cuckow-buds of yellow hue.] Mr. Whalley, the
learned editor of B. Jonfon's works, many years ago pro-
pofed to read crocus buds. The cuckow-flower, he obferved,
could not be called yellow, it rather approaching to the
colour of white, by which epithet, Cowley, who was
himself no mean botanift, has diftinguished it:
Albaque cardamine &c.

MALONE.

VOL. II.

LOVE'S

LAB. LOST.

VOL. I.

1

VO,

VOL. III.

VOLUME III.

MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM.

P. 7. But earthly happier-] This is a thought in which MIDSUM. Shakspeare feems to have much delighted. We meet with N. DREAM. it more than once in his Sonnets!

"Then were not fummer's diftillation left, "A liquid prifoner pent in walls of glass, "Beauty's effect with beauty were bereft, "Nor it, nor no remembrance what it was. "But flowers diftill'd, though they with winter meet, "Leefe but their fhow, their fubftance ftill lives fweet.

"Then let not winter's ragged hand deface
"In thee thy fummer, ere thou be diftill'd;

"Make sweet some phial; treasure thou fome place
"With beauty's treasure, ere it be felf-kill'd."

Again, in the 54th Sonnet:

Fifth and fixth Sonnet.

They live unwoo'd, and unrespected fade,
"Die to themfelves. Sweet rofes do not fo;

"Of their fweet deaths are sweetest odours made:
"And fo of you, beautecus and lovely youth,
"When that fhall fade, my verfe difiils your truth."

9.

MALONE.

The courfe of true love &c.] This paffage feems to have been imitated by Milton. Paradife Loft, B. 10.-896.

MALONE. 10.Making it momentany-] After Dr. Johnson's note.— The first folio has not momentany but momentary.

MALONE.

II. From Athens is her house remote feven leagues.] Remov'd, which is the reading of the folio, was, I believe, the author's word. -He ufes it again in Hamlet, for re

möte :

"He wafts you to a more removed ground."

MALONE.

14. when

14.

15.

when Phabe doth behold &c.
―deep midnight.

}

VOL. III.

MIDSUM.

Shakspeare has a little forgotten himself. It appears from N. DREAM. page 4 that to-morrow night would be within three nights of the new moon, when there is no moonshine at all, much lefs at deep midnight. The fame overfight occurs in page 59.

-E.

15. Emptying our bofoms of their counfels fwell'd] I think, fweet, the reading propofed by Theobald, is right.

Counfels relates in conftruction to emptying-and not to the laft word in the line, as it is now made to do by reading fwell'd. A fimilar phrafeology is used by a writer contemporary with Shakspeare:

"So ran the poor girls filling the air with fhrieks,
"Emptying of all the colour their pale cheeks."

Heywood's Apology for Actors, Sig. B. 4. 1610.
The adjective all here added to colour, exactly answers, in
conftruction, to sweet in the text, as regulated by Theobald.
MALONE.

18. and fo grow to a point.] The firft folio reads: and fo grow on to a point. MALONE.

22. I will roar you an it were &c.] The first folio omits you. MALONE.

23. After the first inftance in note, add] So, in The Ball, by Chapman and Shirley, 1639:

66

have you devices to jeer the reft?

"Luc. All the regiment on 'em, or I'll break my bowArings." STEEVENS. 6

24. Add to my note :] So, in a letter from Gabriel Harvey to Spenfer, 1580: "Have we not God bys wrath, for Goddes wrath, and a thoufand of the fame ftampe, wherein the corrupte orthography in the mofte, hath been the fole or principal cause of corrupte profodye in overmany?" STEEVENS.

26. After Steevens's note on fquare:] It is fomewhat whimfical, that the glaziers ufe the words fquare and quarrel as fynonymous terms, for a pane of glass.

E.

29-fweet Puck.] After Mr. Tyrwhitt's note add-So, in The Scourge of Venus, or the Wanton Lady, with the rare Birth of Adonis, 1614:

"Their bed dath shake and quaver as they lie,

"As if it groan'd to beare the weight of finne; "The fatal night-crowes at their windowes flee, "And crie out at the fhame they do live in :

I 2

"And