MESS. It is spoke freely out of many mouths, (How probable, I do not know,) that Marcius, Join'd with Aufidius, leads a power 'gainst Ròme ; And vows revenge as spacious, as between The young'st and oldest thing.

SIC.

This is most likely ! BRU. Rais'd only, that the weaker sort may wish Good Marcius home again.

The very trick on't.

SIC.

8

MEN. This is unlikely :
He and Aufidius can no more atone R,
Than violentest contrariety".

Enter another Messenger.

MESS. You are sent for to the senate;

8 can no more ATONE,] To atone, in the active sense, is to reconcile, and is so used by our author. To atone here, is in the neutral sense, to come to reconciliation. To atone is to unite.

JOHNSON.

Atone seems to be derived from at and one ;-to reconcile to, or, to be at, union. In some books of Shakspeare's age I have found the phrase in its original form : to reconcile and make them at one." MALONE.

66

The etymology of this verb may be known from the following passage in the second book of Sidney's Arcadia: "Necessitie made us see, that a common enemie sets at one a civil warre."

STEEVENS.

Hall, in his Satires, uses at onement for reconciled, in a humorous description a contest between the Back and the Belly of a Fop:

"Ye witlesse gallants, I beshrew your hearts,
"That sets such discord 'twixt agreeing parts;
"Which never can be set at onement more,

"Untill the mawes wide mouth be stopt with store."
Lib. III. Sat. VII.

BosWELL.

9 — violentest contrariety.] I should read-violentest contrarieties. M. MASON.

Mr. M. Mason might have supported his conjecture by the following passage in King Lear:

"No contraries hold more antipathy

"Than I and such a knave." STEEVENS.

A fearful army, led by Caius Marcius,
Associated with Aufidius, rages
Upon our territories; and have already,
O'erborne their way, consum'd with fire, and took
What lay before them.

Enter COMINIUS.

COм. O, you have made good work!

MEN.

What news? what news? COм. You have holp to ravish your own daughters, and

1

To melt the city leads 1 upon your pates;

To see your wives dishonour'd to your noses ;-—
MEN. What's the news? what's the news?
COM. Your temples burned in their cement; and
Your franchises, whereon you stood, confin'd
Into an augre's bore 2.

MEN.

Pray now, your news ?-1 You have made fair work, I fear me :-Pray, your news?

If Marcius should be join'd with Volcians,
Сом.

He is their god; he leads them like a thing
Made by some other deity than nature,
That shapes man better: and they follow him,
Against us brats, with no less confidence,
Than boys pursuing summer butterflies,
Or butchers killing flies.

MEN.

You have made good work, You, and your apron men; you that stood so much

Into an augre's bore.] So, in Macbeth :

66

1

the city leads -] Our author, I believe, was here thinking of the old city gates of London. MALONE.

The same phrase has occurred already, in this play. See p. 71. Leads were not peculiar to our city gates. Few ancient houses of consequence were without them. STEEVENS.

2 confin'd

our fate hid in an augre-hole." STEEVENS.

If!

Upon the voice of occupation 3, and
The breath of garlick-eaters *!

COM.

Your Rome about your ears.
MEN.

As Hercules

Did shake down mellow fruit: You have made fair

work!

BRU. But is this true, sir?

Сом.

3. Upon the voice of OCCUPATION,] Occupation is here used for mechanicks, men occupied in daily business. So again, in Julius Cæsar, Act 1. Sc. II. : "An I had been a man of any occupation," &c.

So, Horace uses artes for artifices :

Urit enim fulgore suo, qui prægravat artes
Infra se positas. MALONE.

He will shake

Ay; and you'll look pale

66

In the next page but one, the word crafts is used in the like manner, where Menenius says:

66

you have made fair hands,

'You, and your crafts !" M. MASON.

4 The breath of garlick-eaters!] To smell of garlick was once such a brand of vulgarity, that garlick was a food forbidden to an ancient order of Spanish knights, mentioned by Guevara.

JOHNSON.
So, in Measure for Measure: " he would mouth with a beg-
gar, though she smelled brown bread and garlick." MALONE.
To smell of leeks was no less a mark of vulgarity among the
Roman people in the time of Juvenal. Sat. iii. :

quis tecum sectile porrum

Sutor, et elixi vervecis labra comedit?

And from the following passage in Deckar's If this be not a good Play, the Devil is in it, 1512, it should appear that garlick was once much used in England, and afterwards as much out of fashion:

"Fortune favours nobody but garlick, nor garlick neither now: yet she has strong reason to love it: for though garlick made her smell abominably in the nostrils of the gallants, yet she had smelt and stunk worse for garlick."

Hence, perhaps, the cant denomination Pil-garlick for a deserted fellow, a pe son left to suffer without friends to assist him. STEEVENS.

5 As Hercules, &c.] A ludicrous allusion to the apples of the Hesperides. STEEVENS,

Before you find it other. All the regions
Do smilingly revolt ; and, who resist,
Are mock'd for valiant ignorance',

And perish constant fools. Who is't can blame

him?

Your enemies, and his, find something in him.
MEN. We are all undone, unless
The noble man have mercy.

COM.

Who shall ask it? The tribunes cannot do't for shame; the people Deserve such pity of him, as the wolf

Does of the shepherds: for his best friends, if they Should say, Be good to Rome, they charg'd him

8

even

As those should do that had deserv'd his hate,
And therein show'd like enemies.

MEN.

"Tis true :

If he were putting to my house the brand
That should consume it, I have not the face
To say, 'Beseech you, cease.-You have made fair

hands,

You, and your crafts! you have crafted fair!

COM.

You have brought A trembling upon Rome, such as was never So incapable of help.

6 Do SMILINGLY revolt;] Smilingly is the word in the old copy, for which seemingly has been printed in late editions.

To revolt smilingly is to revolt with signs of pleasure, or with marks of contempt. STEEVENS.

66

7 Are ONLY mock'd for VALIANT IGNORANCE,] So, in Troilus and Cressida: I had rather be a tick in a sheep, than such a valiant ignorance."

The adverb-only, was supplied by Sir Thomas Hanmer to complete the verse. STEEVENS.

8- they charg'd him, &c.] Their charge or injunction would show them insensible of his wrongs, and make them show like enemies. JOHNSON.

"They charg'd, and therein show'd," has here the force of 'They would charge, and therein show.' MALONE.

"

TRI.

Say not, we brought it.

MEN. How! Was it we? We lov'd him; but, like beasts,

And cowardly nobles, gave way to your clusters, Who did hoot him out o' the city.

COM.
But, I fear
They'll roar him in again', Tullus Aufidius,
The second name of men, obeys his points
As if he were his officer:-Desperation
Is all the policy, strength, and defence,
That Rome can make against them.

Enter a Troop of Citizens.

MEN. Here come the clusters.. And is Aufidius with him ?-You are they That made the air unwholesome, when you cast Your stinking, greasy caps, in hooting at Coriolanus' exile. Now he's coming; And not a hair upon a soldier's head,

Which will not prove a whip; as many coxcombs, As you threw caps up, will he tumble down,

And pay you for your voices. "Tis no matter;
If he could burn us all into one coal,

We have deserv'd it.

CIT. 'Faith, we hear fearful news. 1 CIT.

When I said, banish him, I said, 'twas pity.

2 CIT. And so did I.

For mine own part,

3 CIT. And so did I; and, to say the truth, so did very many of us: That we did, we did for the

9 And cowardly nobles,] I suspect that our author wrotecoward, which he sometimes uses adjectively. So, in K. John: "Than e'er the coward hand of France can win."

STEEVENS.

I They'll roar him in again.] As they hooted at his departure, they will roar at his return; as he went out with scoffs, he will come back with lamentations. JOHNSON.