Oh, train me not, sweet mermaid, with thy note, Spread o'er the silver waves thy golden hairs, And, in that glorious supposition, think Ant. S. For gazing on your beams, fair sun, being by. Ant. S. As good to wink, sweet love, as look on night. Ant. S. Thy sister's sister. Luc. Ant. S. That's my sister. No; It is thyself, mine own self's better part; Mine eye's clear eye, my dear heart's dearer heart; Luc. Oh, soft, sir! hold you still: [Exit. I'll fetch my sister, to get her good-will. 7 SISTER'S flood of tears.] The folio of 1623 has it "sister flood of tears," but it is altered, as it stands in the text, in the folio of 1632. 8 And as a BED I'll take thee,] The earliest folio has bud for "bed;" the correction is made in the second folio. 9 Let Love, being light, be drowned if SHE sink!] Shakespeare and writers of his day not unfrequently make "Love" feminine. 1 Not mad, but MATED ;] The words which follow "mated "—“ how, I do not know"-support the notion of Monck Mason, that a play was intended on the double meaning of "mated," as confounded or bewildered, and as matched with a wife. Regarding mated, see Vol. vi. p. 594. 2 Gaze WHERE you should,] The old copies read when for "where" it is amended to "where" in the corr. fo. 1632. 3 I AIM thee.] "I am thee" in the old copies, which Shakespeare could not have written. It was not peculiar to him to convert "aim" into a verb transitive: "I aim thee " means I aim at thee; thou art my aim. Enter DROMIO of Syracuse, running. Ant. S. Why, how now, Dromio! where run'st thou so fast? Dro. S. Do you know me, sir? am I Dromio? am I your man? am I myself? Ant. S. Thou art Dromio, thou art my man, thou art thyself. Dro. S. I am an ass; I am a woman's man, and besides myself. Ant. S. What woman's man? and how besides thyself? Dro. S. Marry, sir, besides myself, I am due to a woman; one that claims me, one that haunts me, one that will have me. Ant. S. What claim lays she to thee? Dro. S. Marry, sir, such claim as you would lay to your horse; and she would have me as a beast: not that, I being a beast, she would have me; but that she, being a very beastly creature, lays claim to me. Ant. S. What is she? Dro. S. A very reverend body; ay, such a one as a man may not speak of, without he say sir-reverence'. I have but lean luck in the match, and yet she is a wondrous fat marriage. Ant. S. How dost thou mean a fat marriage? Dro. S. Marry, sir, she's the kitchen-wench, and all grease; and I know not what use to put her to, but to make a lamp of her, and run from her by her own light. I warrant, her rags, and the tallow in them, will burn a Poland winter: if she lives till doomsday, she'll burn a week longer than the whole world. Ant. S. What complexion is she of3? Dro. S. Swart, like my shoe, but her face nothing like so clean kept for why she sweats; a man may go over shoes in the grime of it. Ant. S. That's a fault that water will mend. Dro. S. No, sir; ''tis in grain: Noah's flood could not do it. - without he say SIR-REVERENCE.] A very ancient corruption of save-revesalva reverentiâ. rence, 5 What complexion is she of?] From this question down to "Oh! sir, I did not look so low," is crossed out with a pen in the corr. fo. 1632, perhaps as not acted, or not considered necessary to the performance. Ant. S. What's her name? Dro. S. Nell, sir; but her name is three quarters, that is, an ell ̊; and three quarters will not measure her from hip to hip. Ant. S. Then she bears some breadth? * Dro. S. No longer from head to foot, than from hip to hip: she is spherical, like a globe; I could find out countries in her. Ant. S. In what part of her body stands Ireland? Dro. S. Marry, sir, in her buttocks: I found it out by the bogs. Ant. S. Where Scotland? Dro. S. I found it by the barrenness', hard, in the palm of the hand. Ant. S. Where France ? Dro. S. In her forehead; arm'd and reverted, making war against her heir". Ant. S. Where England? Dro. S. I look'd for the chalky cliffs, but I could find no whiteness in them; but I guess, it stood in her chin, by the salt rheum that ran between France and it. Ant. S. Where Spain ? Dro. S. Faith, I saw it not; but I felt it hot in her breath. 6 that is, AN ELL ;] Or a Nell. This reply has been strangely misprinted and misunderstood by all the commentators: they altered "is" to and, because they were puzzled by the old punctuation, and because they did not know that "an ell" Flemish is three quarters of a yard. Dromio merely says, that "an ell,” or three quarters of a yard," will not measure her from hip to hip." 7 I found it by the BARRENNESS,] Hence Malone concluded hastily that "The Comedy of Errors was not revived after the accession of James I., "otherwise the passage would have been struck out by the Master of the Revels." See, however, the "Introduction," by which it appears that "The Comedy of Errors" was revived at court in 1604-5. 8 - arm'd and reverted, making war against her HEIR.] Theobald thought, and Malone concurred with him, that Shakespeare in this passage about France, intended a covert reference to the state of that country after the assassination of Henry III. in 1589, when the people were "making war against the heir" to the throne, Henry IV. In 1591, Elizabeth sent over the Earl of Essex to Henry's assistance, and the conjecture is that "The Comedy of Errors was produced soon afterwards. In this opinion Johnson does not concur, and sees in the passage nothing more than an equivocation respecting the corona veneris, a disorder which he supposes Dromio to impute to the kitchen-wench. There can be little doubt that Theobald is right; for if no allusion to the heir of France had been meant, hair would, probably, not have been spelt heire, as it stands in the oldest copy, though the second folio converts it into haire: the words "arm'd and reverted also would hardly have been employed by Shakespeare, had he not intended more than Johnson saw in the passage. Ant. S. Where America, the Indies? Dro. S. Oh! sir, upon her nose, all o'er embellished with rubies, carbuncles, sapphires, declining their rich aspect to the hot breath of Spain, who sent whole armadoes of carracks to be ballast at her nose. Ant. S. Where stood Belgia, the Netherlands? swore, Dro. S. Oh! sir, I did not look so low. To conclude, this drudge, or diviner, laid claim to me; call'd me Dromio; I was assured to her: told me what privy marks I had about me, as the mark of my shoulder, the mole in my neck, the great wart on my left arm, that I, amazed, ran from her as a witch and, I think, if my breast had not been made of faith, and my heart of steel, she had transform'd me to a curtail-dog, and made me turn i' the wheel'. Ant. S. Go, hie thee presently post to the road, Dro. S. As from a bear a man would run for life, Ant. S. There's none but witches do inhabit here, 9 [Exit. and made me turn i' the wheel.] i. e. The wheel attached to the spit, she being the kitchen-maid. It may be doubted whether "steel" and "wheel" were not intended to rhyme, and the elision "i' the," for the purpose of making in the one syllable, looks like it. Mr. Singer, very justifiably, takes advantage of this hint, contained in our first edition, and prints the two lines separately, as rhymes; but as he says nothing about our suggestion, it appears as if it were his own emendation. This was, no doubt, an oversight of what, at best, is a trifle; but until our proposal of it in 1843, the change was never contemplated. 1 - guilty To self-wrong,] This is an instance of difference in the use of prepositions of old: we should now say "guilty of self-wrong," and of was doubtless substituted for "to" in the time of the corrector of the folio, 1632: he makes the needless change in his margin. Enter ANGELO. Ang. Master Antipholus? Ant. S. Ay, that's my name. Ang. I know it well, sir. Lo, here is the chain. I thought to have ta'en you at the Porcupine'; The chain unfinish'd made me stay thus long. you. have. Ant. S. What is your will that I shall do with this? Ant. S. I pray you, sir, receive the money now, [Exit. But this I think, there's no man is so vain, I see, a man here needs not live by shifts, When in the streets he meets such golden gifts. If any ship put out, then straight away. [Exit. : 2 I thought to have ta'en you at the PORCUPINE;] The Rev. Mr. Dyce is very strenuous and elaborate upon the word "porcupine," and would fain have us print it here, as well as before and afterwards, porpentine: and why? because, he says, it is so spelt in the old copies; but so are hundreds of other words, which have in modern times been systematically changed. Besides, of old, there was no uniformity sometimes it was spelt " porcupine," and porkepyne, and sometimes porpyn, porkpen, and porpentine, altogether regardless of etymology. Why are we to revive obsolete absurdities, and not adhere to the consistent orthography happily adopted in our day? Mr. Dyce rouses himself to unusual energy upon this great porcupine question: he sets up his quills alarmingly, and is not satisfied merely with the aid of Italic type, but resorts even to capitals in order to give emphasis to his opinions: if he reserved his strength for some really important point, we should read his criticisms with pleasure, and not unfrequently (as we have done elsewhere) profit by his advice. The case would be different, if he could show us that any thing would be gained by compelling our readers to pronounce it porkpen, porpyn, or porpentine, instead of "porcupine," as we have uniformly printed it without wasting time upon useless notes. We should have passed the matter over silently now, as we did twelve years ago, if Mr. Dyce ("Remarks," pp. 27, 28, 29) had not filled a whole octavo page and a half with this truly small matter. We humbly, but strongly protest against the re-introduction of merely ignorant archaisms. |