ber, one said there were no sallets in the lines, to make the matter savoury; nor no matter in the phrase, that might indite the author of affection: but called it, an honest method, as wholesome3 as sweet, and by very much more handsome than fine. One speech in it I chiefly loved: 'twas Eneas' tale to Dido; and thereabout of it especially, where he speaks of Priam's slaughter: If it live in your memory, begin at this line; let me see, let me see;

The rugged Pyrrhus, like the Hyrcanian beast,a. 'tis not so; it begins with Pyrrhus.

9 there were no sallets &c.] Such is the reading of the old copies. I know not why the later editors continued to adopt the alteration of Mr. Pope, and read,—no salt, &c.

Mr. Pope's alteration may indeed be in some degree supported by the following passage in Decker's Satiromastix, 1602: “ prepar'd troop of gallants, who shall distaste every unsalted line in their fly-blown comedies." Though the other phrase was used as late as in the year 1665, in A Banquet of Fests, &c. “ junkets, joci; and for curious sallets, sales." Steevens.

1.

for

-indite the author of affection:] Indite, for convict. Warburton. indite the author of affection:] i. e. convict the author of being a fantastical affected writer. Maria calls Malvolio an affectioned ass: i. e. an affected ass; and in Love's Labour's Lost, Nathaniel tells the Pedant, that his reasons "have been witty, without affection”

Again, in the translation of Castiglione's Courtier, by Hobby, 1556: "Among the chiefe conditions and qualityes in a waitinggentlewoman," is, "to flee affection or curiosity."

Again, in Chapman's Preface to Ovid's Banquet of Sense, 1595: "Obscuritie in affection of words and indigested concets, is pedanticall and childish." Steevens.

2- but called it, an honest method,] Hamlet is telling how much his judgment differed from that of others. One said, there was no sallets in the lines, &c. but called it an honest method. The author probably gave it,-But I called it an honest method, &c. Johnson.

➖➖➖➖ an honest method,] Honest, for chaste. Warburton. 3 as wholesome &c.] This passage was recovered from the quartos by Dr. Johnson. Steevens.

"Fabula nullius veneris, morataque recte." M. Mason. 4 The rugged Pyrrhus, &c.] Mr. Malone once observed to me, that Mr. Capell supposed the speech uttered by the Player before Hamlet, to have been taken from an ancient drama, entitled, "Dido Queen of Carthage." I had not then the means of justifying or confuting his remark, the piece alluded to having escaped

The rugged Pyrrhus,—he, whose sable arms,

the hands of the most liberal and industrious collectors of such curiosities. Since, however, I have met with this performance, and am therefore at liberty to pronounce that it did not furnish our author with more than a general hint for his description of the death of Priam, &c. ; unless with reference to

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the whiff and wind of his fell sword

"The unnerved father falls,

we read, ver. *:

"And with the wind thereof the king fell down;" and can make out a resemblance between

"So as a painted tyrant, Pyrrhus stood;"

and ver. **:

“So leaning on his sword, he stood stone still." The greater part of the following lines are surely more ridiculous in themselves, than even Shakspeare's happiest vein of burlesque or parody could have made them:

"At last came Pirrhus fell and full of ire,

"His harnesse dropping bloud, and on his speare
"The mangled head of Priams youngest sonne;
"And after him his band of Mirmidons,

"With balles of wild-fire in their murdering pawes,
"Which made the funerall flame that burnt faire Troy:
"All which hemd me about, crying, this is he.

"Dido. Ah, how could poor Æneas scape their hands?
"En. My mother Venus, jealous of my health,
"Convaid me from their crooked nets and bands:
"So I escapt the furious Pirrhus wrath,
"Who then ran to the pallace of the King,
"And at Jove's Altar finding Priamus,
"About whose withered neck hung Hecuba,

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66

Foulding his hand in hers, and joyntly both

Beating their breasts and falling on the ground, "He with his faulchions point raisde up at once; "And with Megeras eyes stared in their face, “Threatning a thousand deaths at every glaunce. "To whom the aged king thus trembling spoke: &c."Not mov'd at all, but smiling at his teares, "This butcher, whil'st his hands were yet held up, "Treading upon his breast, stroke off his hands.

"Dido. O end, Eneas, I can hear no more.

"En. At which the franticke queene leapt on his face,.
“And in his eyelids hanging by the nayles,
"A little while prolong'd her husband's life:
"At last the souldiers puld her by the heeles,
"And swong her howling in the emptie ayre,
"Which sent an echo to the wounded king:
"Whereat he lifted up his bedred lims,

"And would have grappeld with Achilles sonne,
Forgetting both his want of strength and hands;

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Black as his purpose, did the night resemble
When he lay couched in the ominous horse,
Hath now this dread and black complexion smear'd
With heraldry more dismal; head to foot
Now is he total gules; horridly trick'd
With blood of fathers, mothers, daughters, sons;
Bak'd and impasted with the parching streets,
That lend a tyrannous and a damned light

To their lord's murder: Roasted in wrath, and fire,
And thus o'er-sized with coagulate gore,
With eyes like carbuncles, the hellish Pyrrhus
Old grandsire Priam seeks;-So proceed you.

"Which he disdaining, whiskt his sword about,
*" And with the wound thereof the king fell downe:
"Then from the navell to the throat at once,
"He ript old Priam; at whose latter gaspe
"Jove's marble statue gan to bend the brow,
"As lothing Pirrhus for this wicked act:
"Yet he undaunted took his fathers flagge,
"And dipt it in the old kings chill cold bloud,
"And then in triumph ran into the streetes,

Through which he could not passe for slaughtred men :

**"So leaning on his sword he stood stone still,

"Viewing the fire wherewith rich Ilion burnt." Act II. The exact title of the play from which these lines are copied, is as follows: The-Tragedie of Dido | Queen of Carthage | Played by the Children of her | Majesties Chapel Written by Christopher Marlowe, and | Thomas Nash, Gent. |—Actors Fupiter. | Ganimed. | Venus | Cupid. | Juno. | Mercurie, or-Hermes, Eneas. Ascanius. | Dido. | Anna. Achates. | Ilioneus. | Iarbas. Cloanthes. Sergestus. | At London, | Printed, by the Widdowe Orwin, for Thomas Woodcocke, and | are to be solde at his shop, in Paules Church-yeard, at | the signe of the black Beare. 1594. | Steevens.

5 Now is he total gules;] Gules is a term in the barbarous jargon peculiar to heraldry, and signifies red. Shakspeare has it again in Timon of Athens:

"With man's blood paint the ground; gules, gules." Heywood, in his Second Part of the Iron Age, has made a verb from it:

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-old Hecuba's reverend locks

"Be gul'd in slaughter

وو

Steevens.

trick'd] i. e. smeared, painted. An heraldick term.

See Vol. V, p. 162, n. 8. Malone.

7 With eyes like carbuncles,] So, in Milton's Paradise Lost, B. IX, 1. 500:

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and carbuncles in his eyes." Steevens.

8 So proceed you.] These words are not in the folio. Malone.

Pol. 'Fore God, my lord, well spoken; with good açcent, and good discretion.

1 Play. Anon he finds him

Striking too short at Greeks; his antique sword,
Rebellious to his arm, lies where it falls,
Repugnant to command: Unequal match'd,
Pyrrhus at Priam drives; in rage, strikes wide;
But with the whiff and wind of his fell sword
The unnerved father falls. Then senseless Ilium,
Seeming to feel this blow, with flaming top
Stoops to his base; and with a hideous crash
Takes prisoner Pyrrhus' ear: for, lo! his sword
Which was declining on the milky head

Of reverend Priam, seem'd i' the air to stick:
So, as a painted tyrant, Pyrrhus stood;
And, like a neutral to his will and matter,
Did nothing.

But, as we often see, against some storm,
A silence in the heavens, the rack stand still,
The bold winds speechless, and the orb below
As hush as death:1 anon, the dreadful thunder
Doth rend the region: So, after Pyrrhus' pause,
A roused vengeance sets him new a work;
And never did the Cyclops' hammers fall
On Mars's armour, forg'd for proof eterne,
With less remorse than Pyrrhus' bleeding sword

as a painted tyrant,] Shakspeare was probably here thinking of the tremendous personages often represented in old tapestry, whose uplifted swords stick in the air, and do nothing. Malone.

1 as we often see, against some storm, The bold winds speechless, and the orb below As hush as death:] So, in Venus and Adonis :

"Even as the wind is hush'd before it raineth."

This line leads me to suspect that Shakspeare wrote-the bold wind speechless. Many similar mistakes have happened in these plays, where the word ends with the same letter with which the next begins. Malone.

2 And never did the Cyclops' hammers fall

On Mars's armour, &c.] This thought appears to have been adopted from the 3d Book of Sidney's Arcadia: "Vulcan, when he wrought at his wive's request Eneas an armour, made not his hammer beget a greater sound than the swords of those noble knights did" &c. Steevens.

Now falls on Priam.-

Out, out, thou strumpet, Fortune! All you gods,
In general synod, take away her power;

Break all the spokes and fellies from her wheel,

And bowl the round nave down the hill of heaven,
As low as to the fiends!

Pol. This is too long.

Ham. It shall to the barber's, with your beard.Pr'ythee, say on:-He's for a jig, or a tale of bawdry,3 or he sleeps:-say on: come to Hecuba.

3

1 Play. But who, ah woe!4 had seen the mobled queens

He's for a jig, or a tale of bawdry,] See note on " your only jig-maker," Act III, sc. ii. Steevens.

A jig, in our poet's time, signified a ludicrous metrical composition, as well as a dance. Here it is used in the former sense. So, in Florio's Italian Dict. 1598: "Frottola, a countrie jigg, or round, or countrie song, or wanton verses.' Malone.

4 But who, ah woe!] Thus the quarto, except that it has-a woe. A is printed instead of ah in various places in the old copies. Woe was formerly used adjectively for woeful. So, in Antony and Cleopatra:

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Woe, woe are we, sir, you may not live to wear "All your true followers out.'

The folio reads-But who, O who, &c. Malone.

5

the mobled queen] Mobled or mahled signifies, veiled. So, Sandys, speaking of the Turkish women, says, their heads and faces are mabled in fine linen, that no more is to be seen of them than their eyes. Travels. Warburton.

Mobled signifies huddled, grossly covered. Johnson.

I meet with this word in Shirley's Gentleman of Venice: "The moon does mobble up herself." Farmer.

Mobbled is, I believe, no more than a depravation of muffled. It is thus corrupted in Ogilby's Fables, Second Part: "Mobbled nine days in my considering cap, "Before my eyes beheld the blessed day."

In the West this word is still used in the same sense; and that is the meaning of mobble in Dr. Farmer's quotation. H. White. The mabled queen, (or mobled queen, as it is spelt in the quarto,) means, the queen attired in a large, coarse, and careless head-dress. A few lines lower we are told she had " a clout upon that head, where late the diadem stood."

To mab, (which in the North is pronounced mob, and hence the spelling of the old copy in the present instance,) says Ray in his Dict. of North Country words, is “to dress carelessly. Mabs are slatterns."