Their smoothness, like a goodly champaign plain,
Lays open all the little worms that creep;
In men, as in a rough-grown grove, remain
Cave-keeping evils that obscurely sleep:

Through crystal walls each little mote will peep: Though men can cover crimes with bold stern looks,

Poor women's faces are their own faults' books".

No man inveigh against the wither'd flower,
But chide rough winter that the flower hath kill'd!
Not that devour'd, but that which doth devour,
Is wortly blame. O, let it not be hild'
Poor women's faults, that they are so fulfill'd
With men's abuses: those proud lords, to blame,
Make weak-made women tenants to their shame.

"Women! help Heaven! men their creation mar
"In profiting by them. Nay, call us ten times frail,
"For we are as soft as our complexions are,

"And credulous to false prints." MALONE.

- women's FACES are their own faults' BOOKS.] So, in

Macbeth:

"Your face, my thane, is as a book, where men

"May read strange matters." STEEVENS.

Our author has advanced a contrary sentiment in another
"The wiles and guiles that women work,
"Dissembled with an outward shew,

"The tricks and toys that in them lurk,

poem :

"The cock that treads them shall not know." MALOne.

6 No man INVEIGH against the wither'd flower,

But CHIDE] Thus the quarto. All the other copies have inveighs and chides. MALONE.

70, let it not be HILD-] Thus the quarto, for the sake of the rhyme. Spenser, in imitation of the Italian poets, often takes the same liberty. See p. 189, n. 2. MAlone.

8 - that they are so FULFILL'D

With men's abuses;] Fulfilled had formerly the sense of filled. It is so used in our liturgy. MALONE.

Fulfilled means completely filled, till there be no room for more. The word, in this sense, is now obsolete. So, in the Prologue to Troilus and Cressida :

"And corresponsive and fulfilling bolts." STEEVENS.

The precedent whereof in Lucrece view,
Assail'd by night, with circumstances strong
Of present death, and shame that might ensue
By that her death, to do her husband wrong;
Such danger to resistance did belong,

That dying fear through all her body spread ;
And who cannot abuse a body dead??

By this, mild patience bid fair Lucrece speak
To the poor counterfeit of her complaining';
My girl, quoth she, on what occasion break
Those tears from thee, that down thy cheeks are
raining?

If thou dost weep for grief of my sustaining,

Know, gentle wench, it small avails my mood: If tears could help, mine own would do me good.

But tell me, girl, when went-(and there she stay'd
Till after a deep groan) Tarquin from hence;
Madam, ere I was up, reply'd the maid,

The more to blame my sluggard negligence :
Yet with the fault I thus far can dispense;
Myself was stirring ere the break of day,
And, ere I rose, was Tarquin gone away.

But lady, if your maid may be so bold,
She would request to know your heaviness.
O peace! quoth Lucrece; if it should be told,

- abuse a body dead?] So, in Romeo and Juliet:

66 - to do some villainous shame

"On the dead bodies" STEEVENS.

To the poor COUNTERFEIT of her complaining:] To her maid, whose countenance exhibited an image of her mistress's grief. A counterfeit, in ancient language, signified a portrait. So, in The Merchant of Venice:

"What have we here? fair Portia's counterfeit?"

MALONE.

The repetition cannot make it less;
For more it is than I can well express:

And that deep torture may be call'd a hell,
When more is felt than one hath power to tell.

Go, get me hither paper, ink, and pen,-
Yet save that labour, for I have them here.
What should I say ?-One of my husband's men
Bid thou be ready, by and by, to bear

A letter to my lord, my love, my dear;
Bid him with speed prepare to carry it:

The cause craves haste, and it will soon be writ..

Her maid is gone, and she prepares to write,
First hovering o'er the paper with her quill:
Conceit and grief an eager combat fight;
What wit sets down, is blotted straight with will;
This is too curious-good, this blunt and ill:
Much like a press of people at a door,
Throng her inventions, which shall go

before 2.

At last she thus begins: "Thou worthy lord
Of that unworthy wife that greeteth thee,
Health to thy person! next vouchsafe t' afford
(If ever, love, thy Lucrece thou wilt see,)
Some present speed, to come and visit me:
So I commend me from our house in grief3;
My woes are tedious, though my words are brief."

2 Much like a PRESS OF PEOPLE at a door,

THRONG her INVENTIONS, which shall go before.] So, in King John:

"-legions of strange fantasies,

"Which, in their throng and press to that last hold,
Confound themselves."

Again, in King Henry VIII.:

66 which forc'd such way,

"That many maz'd considerings did throng,

"And press in with this caution." MALONE.

3 So I commend me FROM OUR HOUSE IN GRIEF ;] Shakspeare

Here folds she up the tenour of her woe,
Her certain sorrow writ uncertainly.

By this short schedule Collatine may know
Her grief, but not her grief's true quality :
She dares not thereof make discovery,

Lest he should hold it her own gross abuse,

Ere she with blood had stain'd her stain'd excuse.

Besides, the life and feeling of her passion

She hoards, to spend when he is by to hear her; When sighs and groans and tears may grace the fashion

Of her disgrace, the better so to clear her

From that suspicion which the world might bear

her.

To shun this blot, she would not blot the letter
With words, till action might become them better.

To see sad sights moves more than hear them told1;
For then the eye interprets to the ear
The heavy motion that it doth behold",
When every part a part of woe doth bear,
'Tis but a part of sorrow that we hear:

has here closely followed the practice of his own times. Thus, Anne Bullen concluding her pathetick letter to her savage murderer: "From my doleful prison in the Tower, this 6th of May." So also Gascoigne the poet ends his address to the Youth of England, prefixed to his works: "From my poor house at Walthamstowe in the Forest, the second of February, 1575.”

MALONE.

4 To see sad sights moves more than hear them told :] Segnius irritant animos demissa per aurem Quam quæ sunt oculis subjecta fidelibus. Hor. MALONE.

Our author seems

5 For then the eye INTERPRETS to the ear The heavy MOTION that it doth behold,] to have been thinking of those heavy motions called Dumb-shows, which were exhibited on the stage in his time. Motion, in old language, signifies a puppet-show; and the person who spoke for the puppets was called an interpreter. So, in Timon of Athens:

to the dumbness of the gesture "One might interpret." MALONE.

Deep sounds make lesser noise than shallow fords", And sorrow ebbs, being blown with wind of words. Her letter now is seal'd, and on it writ,

At Ardea to my lord, with more than haste":
The post attends, and she delivers it,

6 Deep SOUNDS make lesser noise than shallow fords,] Thus the quarto, 1594, and all the subsequent copies. The author probably wrote:

66

Deep floods make lesser noise," &c.

So, before:

"Deep woes roll forward like a gentle flood." MALONE. The old reading is perhaps the true one. A sound, in naval language, is such a part of the sea as may be sounded. We have all heard of Plymouth sound, the depth of which is sufficient to carry vessels that draw the most water. The contradiction in terms is of little moment. We still talk of the back front of a house; and every ford, or sound, is comparatively deep. STEEVENs.

As a meaning may be extracted from the reading of the old copy, I have not disturbed it, though I suspect that Shakspeare wrote not sounds but floods, for these reasons:

1. Because there is scarce an English poet that has not compared real sorrow to a deep water, and loquacious and counterfeited grief to a bubbling shallow stream. The comparison is always between a river and a brook; nor have I observed the sea once mentioned in the various places in which this trite thought is expressed. Shakspeare, we see, has it in this very poem in a preceding passage, in which deep woes are compared to a gentle flood.

2. Because, supposing the poet to have had the sea in his contemplation, some reason ought to be assigned why he should have chosen those parts of it which are called sounds. To give force to the present sentiment, they must be supposed to be peculiarly still; whereas the truth I believe is, that all parts of the ocean are equally boisterous; at least those which are called sounds are not less so than others.

Lastly, because those parts of the sea which are denominated sounds, so far from deserving the epithet deep, are expressly defined to be "shallow seas; such as may be sounded." MALONE. 7- and on it writ,

At Ardea to my lord, WITH MORE THAN HASTE:] Shakspeare seems to have begun early to confound the customs of his own country, with those of other nations. About a century and a half ago, all our letters that required speed were superscribed-With post post haste. STEEVENS.