Taming of the Shrew, p. 8:

My Lord, we must have a Shoulder of Mutton for a Property, and a little Vinegar to make our Devil roar. Our Poet, I think, seems to forget himself. Mutton, indeed, is used in the Interlude; which, being over-roasted, Petruchio throws from the table. But then there is no Devil in the Drama. Or, if there were, or that Shakespeare designed a fling at the Old Plays, in which, as we shall see, Devils were so frequent, yet what can he allude to, by

Vinegar to make a Devil roar?

I confess I am at a fault; and, if I should run upon the wrong scent, I cannot help it. We'll start some game, if we miss that in chace. I would scarce venture to trust any body but Mr. Warburton with the conjecture that I am going to make; because it is a little peremptory, and only depends on the stress of parallel passages for its authority. Granting our Poet only intended a Spear, as I hinted, might he not have wrote,

-and a little wooden dagger to make our Devil roar? The difference of wooden dagger and vinegar, seems at first glance a little startling. But then, if we may call pronunciation into our aid, (Vin, and Wood'n; -egar, and dagger) the difference is not so considerable. And again, may not error have arisen from contraction in the written copies and the current hand of those times, and so w'n (wooden) been mistaken for vin, and d'gar (dagger) for egar? Ne sævi, magne Sacerdos, may I not fairly say? And yet take my parallel authorities; and you may wish, perhaps, I had been right, though you should be forced to determine against me.In the first place I am to remind you, that the Old Plays (especially in the times of Popery, whilst spirits, and witchcraft, and exorcising, held their own) are generally furnished with the character of a Devil, and Buffoon, or arch fool (called Vice), who was equipped with a long coat, a cap and asses ears, and a lath-dagger; and who used to skip on the Devil's

back,

back, and lay on him with a vengeance, ad captandum populum, and set a certain quantity of barren spectators on the grin with his Arlequinades*.

Proofs: I shall begin with a quotation or two from your own pamphlet of "Popish Impostures;" (which I have, as you ordered, delivered to our Friend Concanen.)

I. It was a pretty part in the old Church Plays, when the nimble Vice was to skip nimbly up like a jack-an-apes into the Devil's neck, and ride the Devil a cockhorse, and belabour him with his Wooden Dagger till he made him roar; whereat the people would laugh, to see the Devil so Vice-haunted.

Her Devils, be sure, be some of those old Vicehaunted, casheer'd, wooden-beaten Devils, that were wont to frequent the stages, &c. who are so scared with the idea of a Vice and a dagger, as they durst never since look a paper-Vice in the face. Cap. 19, p. 114, 5.

Again,

This was well roar'd of a young Devil, for a Præludium to the Play. Cap. 14, p. 72. But to fetch some testimonies from the Stage itself: II. Ben Jonson's Staple of News, p. 165, Svo.

There was no Play without a Fool and a Devil in't. He would carry away the Vice on his back, quick to Hell, &c.

III.

And afterwards, p. 187:

But here is never a Friend to carry him away. Besides, he has never a Wooden Dagger! I'd not

* Dr. Warburton, in his own Edition, had not forgotten these ideas. "When the acting the mysteries of the Old and New Testament was in vogue, at the representation of the mystery of the Passion, Judas and the Devil made a part. And the Devil, wherever he came, was always to suffer some disgrace, to make the people laugh: as here, the buffoonery was to apply the gall and vinegar to make him roar. And the Passion being that, of all the mysteries, which was most frequently represented, vinegar became at length the standing implement to torment the Devil; and was used for this purpose even after the mysteries ceased, and the moralities came in vogue; where the Devil continued to have a considerable part. The mention of it here, was to ridicule so absurd a circumstance in these old farces."

give a rush for a Vice that has not a wooden dagger, to snap at every body he meets.

IV. Ben Jonson's Devil 's an Ass, p. 254, 8vo. Iniq. What is he calls upon me, and would seem to lack a Vice?

Ere his words be half spoken, I am with him in a trice.

Here, there, and every where, as the cat is with

the mice:

True, vetus Iniquitas.

friends, or dice?

Lack'st thou cards,

I will teach thee cheat, child, to cog, lie, and
swagger,

And ever and anon to be drawing forth thy
Dagger.

V. And again, p. 256:

When ev'ry great man had his Vice stand by him,
In his long coat, shaking his wooden dagger.

And now to our own Author, who will, at least, I conceive, be explained in these testimonies.

VI. King Henry V. p.

448:

Bardolph and Nim had ten times more valour than this roaring Devil i'th' old Play, every one may pare his nails with a wooden dagger.

VII. And Twelfth Night, p. 241 :

I am gone, Sir; and anon, Sir,
I'll be with you again;

In a trice, like to the old Vice,

Your need to sustain.

Who, with Dagger of Lath, in his rage and his wrath,

Cries, ah ha! to the Devil,

Like a mad lad, pare thy nails, Dad, &c.

And, next, give me leave to throw in a passage, that, I flatter myself, has never yet been understood by common Readers, nor will be but by the aid of these testimonies.

VIII. 2 Henry IV. p. 328, where Falstaff is characterizing Justice Shallow :

And

And now is this Vice's Dagger become a Squire, and talks as familiarly of John of Gaunt, &c.

i. e. Shallow was as impertinent a machine, as the wooden dagger in the hand of a common Buffoon. IX. And so in Hamlet, p. 277:

-A Vice of Kings.

I have a great suspicion the Poet does not mean barely a vicious, execrable King; but one as much the disgrace and mockery of the kingly rank, as the Vice, or Buffoon, was of any character he supported.

X. And may I venture to suspect that another passage (the reading of which has been justly suspected, and ingeniously attempted to be amended) may admit an explication and allowance of being genuine, from the above quotations?

Richard III. p. 341:

Thus, like the formal Vice, Iniquity,

I moralize two meanings in one word.

It is not impossible but Vice may not be the quality, but person here; the Vice, or Buffoon, personating Iniquity; and then a formality of behaviour was essentially a necessary disguise. In Ben Jonson's Devil's an Ass, for example, Iniquity is the very Vice that wants employment on earth. And to this let me add, that, when the Stage increased in refinements, the Buffoon's droll characters were changed into personated qualities, such as Iniquity, Usury, Vanity, Prodigality, &c. of which, perhaps, this speech in Ben Jonson's Staple of News, p. 187, be some confirmation :

may

But

That was the old way, gossip, when Iniquity came in like hocus-pocus, in a jugler's jerkin, with false skirts, like the Knave of Clubs. now they are attir'd like men and women o'the time, the Vices male and female. Prodigality like a young Heir, and his mistress Money prankt up like a prime lady, &c.

Sed réxw, as the grave Dons say. - I have laid ἐπέχω, myself open to you without reserve, and willingly

submit to your determination, whether I have not put in for the Asses Ears, and a slash of the Wooden Dagger into the bargain. But, dear Sir, in the Appendix of your next, give me your conception of this odd passage in Troilus, p. 351, for I want a voucher to my own judgment of it:

Here's Agamemnon, an honest fellow enough, and one that loves quails, but he hath not so much brain as ear-wax.

Your most faithfully obliged humble servant,

LEW. THEOBALD.

LETTER XII.

To the Rev. Mr. WARBURTON.

DEAR SIR,

Wyan's Court, Nov. 6, 1729. I have received the pleasure of yours of the 3d instant, which I ardently expected two posts before. I entirely agree with you in keeping our method of going through with the Plays, in order to which rule I will begin to accommodate myself on Saturday next): not that I may the sooner get rid of a correspondence which I can never account troublesome; but that I may the sooner assist myself with your ingenious remarks. As to your complaint of my silence with regard to the observations you favour It has been me with, I beg you to excuse me. partly because I generally come into your remarks; and, if in any I remain doubtful, I had determined, when we had quite run through, by way of postscript, to communicate my objections, and be more fully informed. Did I enter upon that part at this juncture, I am afraid it would too much interrupt our progress. As to Tonson's Greek Plutarch, I have yet seen no advertisement of it, nor do I believe it is published. I thank you for the friendly hint concerning