Are you so fond of your young prince, as we Pol. Leon. So stands this squire Offic'd with me; We two will walk, my lord, And leave you to your graver steps.-Hermione, Next to thyself, and my young rover, he's Her. you there? Go to, go to! [Aside. Observing PoL. and HER. How she holds up the neb, the bill to him! To her allowing husband!" Gone already; Inch-thick, knee-deep; o'er head and ears a fork'd one.8 [Exeunt POL. HER. and Attendants. See p. 39, n. 9. Steevens. poor by the Archbishops See The History of LamNichols. The alms immemorially given to the of Canterbury, is still called the dole. beth Palace, p. 31, in Bibl. Top. Brit. 5 Apparent-] That is, heir apparent, or the next claimant. Johnson. 6 the neb,] The word is commonly pronounced and written nib. It signifies here the mouth. So, in Anne the Queen of Hungarie, being one of the Tales in Painter's Palace of Pleasure, 1566: -the amorous wormes of love did bitterly gnawe and teare his heart wyth the nebs of their forked heads." Steevens. 7 To her allowing husband!] Allowing in old language is approv ing. Malone. 8 a fork'd one.] That is, a horned one; a cuckold. Johnson. So, in Othello: "Even then this forked plague is fated to us, Go, play, boy, play; thy mother plays, and I Or I am much deceiv'd, cuckolds ere now; 9 And many a man there is, even at this present, Where 'tis predominant; and 'tis powerful, think it, It will let in and out the enemy, With bag and baggage: many a thousand of us Leon. What! Camillo there? Why, that's some comfort. Cam. Ay, my good lord. Leon. Go play, Mamillius; thou 'rt an honest man. Camillo, this great sir will yet stay longer. 9 [Exit MAM. even at this present,] i. e. present time. So, in Macbeth: "Thy letters have transported me beyond "This ignorant present;" See note on this passage; Act I, sc. v. Steevens. 1 And his pond fish'd by his next neighbour,] This metaphor perhaps owed its introduction and currency, to the once frequent depredations of neighbours on each others fish, a complaint that often occurs in ancient correspondence. Thus, in one of the Paston Letters, Vol. IV, p. 15: "My mother bade me send you word that Waryn Herman hath daily fished her water all this year." Steevens. 2 they say.] They, which was omitted in the original copy by the carelessness of the transcriber or printer, was added by the editor of the second folio. Malone. Cam. You had much ado to make his anchor hold: When you cast out, it still came home.3 Leon. Didst note it? Cam. He would not stay at your petitions; made His business more material.4 5 Leon. Didst perceive it?— They're here with me already; whispering, rounding," Sicilia is a so-forth: 'Tis far gone, 3 it still came home.] This is a sea-faring expression, meaning, the anchor would not take hold. Steevens. His business more material.] i. e. the more you requested him to stay, the more urgent he represented that business to be which summoned him away. Steevens. 5 They're here with me already;] Not Polixenes and Hermione, but casual observers, people accidentally present. Thirlby. 6 whispering, rounding,] To round in the ear, is to whisper, or to tell secretly. The expression is very copiously explained by M. Casaubon, in his book de Ling. Sax. Johnson. The word is frequently used by Chaucer, as well as later writers. So, in Lingua, 1607: "I helped Herodotus to pen some part of his Muses; lent Pliny ink to write his history; and rounded Rabelais in the ear, when he historified Pantagruel." Again, in The Spanish Tragedy: "Forthwith revenge she rounded me i' th' ear." Steevens. 7 Sicilia is a so-forth:] This was a phrase employed when the speaker, through caution or disgust, wished to escape the utterance of an obnoxious term. A commentator on Shakspeare will often derive more advantage from listening to vulgar than to polite conversation. At the corner of Fleet Market, I lately heard one woman, describing another, say-"Every body knows that her husband is a so-forth." As she spoke the last word, her fingers expressed the emblem of cuckoldom. Mr. Malone reads— Sicilia is a-so-forth. Steevens. In regulating this line, I have adopted a hint suggested by Mr. M. Mason. I have more than once observed, that almost every abrupt sentence in these plays is corrupted. These words without the break now introduced, are to me unintelligible. Leontes means-I think I already hear my courtiers whispering to each other, "Sicilia is a cuckold, a tame cuckold, to which (says he) they will add every other opprobrious name and epithet they can think of" for such, I suppose, the meaning of the words-soforth. He avoids naming the word cuckold, from a horror of the very sound. I suspect, however, that our author wrote-Sicilia is-and so forth. So, in The Merchant of Venice: "I will buy with you, sell with you, talk with you, walk with you, and so following." When I shall gust it last.-How came 't, Camillo, Cam. At the good queen's entreaty. Leon. At the queen's, be 't: good, should be pertinent: But so it is, it is not. Was this taken By any understanding pate but thine? For thy conceit is soaking, will draw in More than the common blocks:-Not noted, is 't, Again, in Hamlet: "I saw him enter such a house of sale, 66 Again, more appositely, in King Henry IV, P. II: 66 with a dish of carraways, AND SO forth." Again, in Troilus and Cressida: "Is not birth, beauty, good shape, discourse, manhood, learning, AND so forth, the spice and salt that season a man?" Malone. 8 9 -gust it-] i. e. taste it. Steevens. "Dedecus ille domus sciet ultimus." Juv. Sat. X. Malone. is soaking,] Dr. Grey would read-in soaking; but I think without necessity. Thy conceit is of an absorbent nature, will draw in more, &c. seems to be the meaning. Steevens. 1 ·lower messes,] I believe, lower messes is only used as an expression to signify the lowest degree about the court. See Anstis. Ord. Gart. 1, App. p. 15: "The earl of Surry began the borde in presence: the earl of Arundel washed with him, and sat both at the first messe.” Formerly not only at every great man's table the visitants were placed according to their consequence or dignity, but with additional marks of inferiority, viz. of sitting below the great saltseller placed in the centre of the table, and of having coarser provisions set before them. The former custom is mentioned in The Honest Whore, by Decker, 1604: " Plague him; set him beneath the salt, and let him not touch a bit till every one has had his full cut." The latter was as much a subject of complaint in the time of Beaumont and Fletcher, as in that of Juvenal, as the following instance may prove : "Uncut up pies at the nether end, filled with moss and stones, 66 Partly to make a shew with, "And partly to keep the lower mess from eating." Woman Hater, Act I, sc. ii. This passage may be yet somewhat differently explained. It appears from a passage in The merye Fest of a Man called Howleglas, bl. 1. no date, that it was anciently the custom in publick houses to keep ordinaries of different prices: "What table will you be at? for at the lordes table thei give me no less than to Perchance, are to this business purblind: say. Cam. Business, my lord? I think, most understand Bohemia stays here longer. Leon. Cam. Ha? Stays here longer. Leon. Ay, but why? Cam. To satisfy your highness, and the entreaties Of our most gracious mistress. Leon. Satisfy The entreaties of your mistress?——————satisfy?— In that which seems so. Cam. Be it forbid, my lord! Leon. To bide upon 't;-Thou art not honest: or, If thou inclin'st that way, thou art a coward; Which hoxes honesty behind,2 restraining From course requir'd: Or else thou must be counted A servant, grafted in my serious trust, And therein negligent; or else a fool, That seest a game play'd home, the rich stake drawn, And tak'st it all for jest. Cam. My gracious lord, shylinges, and at the merchaunts table xvi pence, and at my houshold servantes geve me twelve pence."-Leontes comprehends inferiority of understanding in the idea of inferiority of rank. Steevens. Concerning the different messes in the great families of our ancient nobility, see The Houshold Book of the 5th Earl of Northumberland, 8vo. 1770. Percy. 2 hoxes honesty behind,] To hex is to ham-string. So, in Knolles' History of the Turks: alighted, and with his sword hoxed his horse." King James VI, in his 11th Parliament, had an act to punish "hochares," or slayers of horse, oxen, &c. Steevens. The proper word is, to hough, i. c. to cut the hough, or hamstring. Malone. |