PROV. Now, sir, how do you find the prisoner?

DUKE. A creature unprepar'd, unmeet for death; And, to transport him in the mind he is,

Were damnable.

PROV.

8

Here in the prison, father,

There died this morning of a cruel fever

One Ragozine, a most notorious pirate,

A man of Claudio's years; his beard, and head,
Just of his colour: What if we do omit
This reprobate, till he were well inclined;
And satisfy the deputy with the visage
Of Ragozine, more like to Claudio?

DUKE. O, 'tis an accident that heaven provides!
Despatch it presently; the hour draws on
Prefix'd by Angelo: See, this be done,
And sent according to command; whiles I
Persuade this rude wretch willingly to die.

PROV. This shall be done, good father, presently.
But Barnardine must die this afternoon :
And how shall we continue Claudio,

To save me from the danger that might come,
If he were known alive?

DUKE. Let this be done ;-Put them in secret

holds,

Both Barnardine and Claudio: Ere twice
The sun hath made his journal greeting to
The under generation, you shall find
Your safety manifested.

I do not see why this line should be taken from the Duke, and still less why it should be given to the Provost, who, by his question to the Duke in the next line, appears to be ignorant of every thing that has passed between him and Barnardine. TYRWHITT. 8 to TRANSPORT him-] To remove him from one world to another. The French trépas affords a kindred sense. JOHNSON. 9 The UNDER generation,] So, Sir Thomas Hanmer, with true judgment. It was in all the former editions :

"To yonder y under and yonder were confounded.

JOHNSON.

Quick, despatch,

PROV. I am your free dependant.
DUKE.

And send the head to Angelo.

Now will I write letters to Angelo,

[Exit Provost.

The provost, he shall bear them,-whose contents
Shall witness to him, I am near at home;
And that, by great injunctions, I am bound
To enter publickly: him I'll desire

To meet me at the consecrated fount,
A league below the city; and from thence,
By cold gradation and weal-balanced form ',
We shall proceed with Angelo.

Re-enter Provost.

PROV. Here is the head; I'll carry it myself. DUKE. Convenient is it: Make a swift return; For I would commune with you of such things, That want no ear but yours.

PROV.

I'll make all speed.

ISAB. [Within.] Peace, ho, be here!

[Exit.

The old reading is not yonder, but yond. By the under generation our poet means the antipodes. So, in King Richard II.: when the searching eye of heaven is hid

"Behind the globe, and lights the lower world."

Again, in Chapman's version of the nineteenth Iliad :

"Gave light to all; as well to gods, as men of th' under globe."

Again, in Fletcher's Two Noble Kinsmen:

I

clap their wings and sing

"To all the under world." STEEVENS.

WEAL-balanced form,] Thus the old copy. Mr. Heath thinks that well-balanced is the true reading; and Hanmer was of the same opinion.

In Milton's Ode on The Nativity, we also meet with the same compound epithet:

"And the well-balanc'd world on hinges hung." STEEVENS. Weal-balanced is a pompous expression, without any meaning. I agree, therefore, with Heath, in reading-well-balanced.

M. MASON.

DUKE. The tongue of Isabel :-She's come to

know,

If yet her brother's pardon be come hither:
But I will keep her ignorant of her good,
To make her heavenly comforts of despair,
When it is least expected 2.

Enter ISABElla.

ISAB. Ho, by your leave.

DUKE. Good morning to you, fair and gracious daughter.

ISAB. The better, given me by so holy a man. Hath yet the deputy sent my brother's pardon? DUKE. He hath releas'd him, Isabel, from the

world;

His head is off, and sent to Angelo.

ISAB. Nay, but it is not so.
DUKE.

It is no other:

Show your wisdom, daughter, in your close pa

tience.

ISAB. O, I will to him, and pluck out his eyes. DUKE. You shall not be admitted to his sight. ISAB. Unhappy Claudio! Wretched Isabel! Injurious world! Most damned Angelo !

DUKE. This nor hurts him, nor profits you a jot: Forbear it therefore; give your cause to heaven. Mark what I say; which you shall find By every syllable, a faithful verity:

The duke comes home to-morrow ;-nay, dry your

eyes;

One of our convent, and his confessor,

Gives me this instance: Already he hath carried

2 When it is least expected.] A better reason might have been given. It was necessary to keep Isabella in ignorance, that she might with more keenness accuse the deputy. JOHNSON.

Notice to Escalus and Angelo ;

Who do prepare to meet him at the gates, There to give up their power. If you can, pace your wisdom

In that good path that I would wish it go;

3

And you shall have your bosom 3 on this wretch,
Grace of the duke, revenges to your heart,
And general honour.

ISAB.

I am directed by you.

DUKE. This letter then to friar Peter give; "Tis that he sent me of the duke's return: Say, by this token, I desire his company At Mariana's house to-night. Her cause, and yours, I'll perfect him withal; and he shall bring you Before the duke; and to the head of Angelo Accuse him home, and home. For my poor self, I am combined by a sacred vow

4

5

And shall be absent. Wend you with this letter:
Command these fretting waters from your eyes
With a light heart; trust not my holy order,
If I pervert your course.-Who's here?

your bosom -] Your wish; your heart's desire.

JOHNSON.

4 I am COMBINED by a sacred vow,] I once thought this should be confined, but Shakspeare uses combine for to bind by a pact or agreement; so he calls Angelo the combinate husband of Mariana. JOHNSON.

The verb, to combine, appears to be as irregularly used by Chapman, in his version of the sixteenth book of Homer's Odyssey:

"And as thy veins my own true blood combine."

STEEVENS.

3 WEND YOU-] To wend is to go.-An obsolete word. So, in The Comedy of Errors:

"Hopeless and helpless doth Ægeon wend."

Again, in Orlando Furioso, 1599:

"To let his daughter wend with us to France."

STEEVENS.

LUCIO.

Enter LUCIO.

Friar, where is the provost ?
DUKE.

Good even!

Not within, sir.

LUCIO. O, pretty Isabella, I am pale at mine heart, to see thine eyes so red: thou must be patient: I am fain to dine and sup with water and bran; I dare not for my head fill my belly; one fruitful meal would set me to't: But they say the duke will be here to-morrow. By my troth, Isabel, I lov'd thy brother: if the old fantastical duke of dark corners had been at home, he had lived. [Exit ISABELLA. DUKE. Sir, the duke is marvellous little beholden to your reports; but the best is, he lives not in them ".

6

8

LUCIO. Friar, thou knowest not the duke so well as I do: he's a better woodman than thou takest him for.

6-if the OLD, &c.] Sir Thomas Hanmer reads-the odd fantastical duke; but old is a common word of aggravation in ludicrous language, as, "there was old revelling." JOHNSON.

66

duke of dark corners." This duke who meets his mistresses in by-places. So, in King Henry VIII. :

7

"There is nothing I have done yet, o' my conscience,
"Deserves a corner." MALONE.

he LIVES not IN them.] i. e. his character depends not on them. So, in Much Ado About Nothing:

"The practice of it lives in John the bastard." STEEVENS. 8 - woodman -] A woodman seems to have been an attendant or servant to the officer called Forrester. See Manwood on the Forest Laws, 4to. 1615, p. 46. It is here, however, used in a wanton sense, and was, probably, in our author's time, generally so received. In like manner in The Chances, Act I. Sc. IX. the Landlady says:

Well, well, son John,

"I see you are a woodman, and can choose
"Your deer tho' it be i' th' dark." REed.