8 And France, (whofe armour confcience buckled on But the word maid, cheats the poor maid of that) The world, who of itself is peised well, This bawd, this broker, this all-changing word, Again, in the Downfal of Robert E. of Huntington, 1601: "The world shall not depart us 'till we die." STEEVens. 8 -rounded in the ear] i. e. Whispered in the ear. The word is frequently used by Chaucer, as well as later writers. So, in Lingua, or A Combat of the Tongue, &c. 1607: "I help'd Herodotus to pen fome part of his Mufes; lent Pliny ink to write his hiftory, and rounded Rabelais in the car when he hiftorified Pantagruel. Again, in The Spanish Tragedy: "Forthwith Revenge, he rounded me i th' ear." STEEVENS. • Commodity, the bias of the world;] Commodity is intereft. So, in Damon and Pythias, 1582: Again: 66 for vertue's fake only, "They would honour friendship, and not for commoditie.” "I will use his friendship to mine own commoditie.” STEEVENS. Το To a most base and vile-concluded peace.- I But for because he hath not woo'd me yet: Gain, be iny lord; for I will worship thee! [Exit. ACT III. SCENE I. -The French king's pavilion. Enter Conftance, Arthur, and Salisbury. Conft. Gone to be marry'd! gone to fwear a peace! Falfe blood to falfe blood join'd! Gone to be friends! Shall Lewis have Blanch? and Blanch thofe provinces ? It is not fo; thou haft mif-fpoke, mif-heard; 1 -clutch my hand,] To clutch my hand, is to clafp it close. So, in Antonio's Revenge, 1602: "The fist of strenuous vengeance is clutch'd." STEEVENS. VOL. V. E Thou Thou shalt be punifh'd for thus frighting me, Opprefs'd with wrongs, and therefore full of fears; And though thou now confefs, thou didst but jeft, Sal. As true, as, I believe, you think them false, That give you caufe to prove my faying true. Conft. Oh, if thou teach me to believe this forrow, Teach thou this forrow how to make me die; And let belief and life encounter fo, As doth the fury of two defperate men, Which, in the very meeting, fall, and die.— Arth. I do befeech you, madam, be content. Ugly, If thou, &c.] Maffinger appears to have copied this paffage in The Unnatural Combat: "If thou hadst been born "Deform'd and crooked in the features of Thy Ugly, and fland'rous to thy mother's womb, 3 "Thy body, as the manners of thy mind, "I had been bleft." STEEVENS. fightless] The poet ufes fightlefs for that which we now exprefs by unfightly, difagreeable to the eyes. JOHNSON. 4 -prodigious,] That is, portentous, fo deformed as to be ta ken for a foretoken of evil. JOHNSON. In this fenfe it is used by Decker in the first part of the Honeft Whore, 1635: yon comet fhews his head again; "Twice hath he thus at crofs-turns thrown on us Again, in The Revenger's Tragedy, 1607: "Over whofe roof hangs this prodigious comet." Again, in the English Arcadia, by Jarvis Markham, 1607: yes, I was prodigious to thy birth-right, and as a blazing ftar at thine unlook'd for funeral." STEEVENS. Sal. Pardon me, madam, I may not go without you to the kings. I will inftruct my forrows to be proud; Enter makes its owner stout.] The old editions have :-makes its owner toop: the emendation is Hanmer's. JOHNSON. So, in Daniel's Civil Wars, b. vi: "Full with fout grief and with disdainful woe.” To me, and to the ftate of my great grief, Let kings affemble; STEEVENS. In Much ado about Nothing, the father of Hero, depreffed by her difgrace, declares himself fo fubdued by grief that a thread may lead him. How is it that grief in Leonato and lady Constance produces effects directly oppofite, and yet both agreeable to nature? Sorrow foftens the mind while it is yet warmed by hope, but hardens it when it is congealed by despair. Diftrefs, while there remains any profpect of relief, is weak and flexible, but when no fuccour remains, is fearless and stubborn; angry alike at those that injure, and at those that do not help; careless to please where nothing can be gained, and fearlefs to offend when there is nothing further to be dreaded. Such was this writer's knowledge of the paffions. JOHNSON. 7 -bid kings come bow to it.] I must here account for the liberty I have taken to make a change in the divifion of the ad and 3d acts. In the old editions, the 2d act was made to end here; though it is evident, lady Conftance here, in her defpair, feats herself on the floor: and the muft be fuppofed, as I formerly obferved, immediately to rife again, only to go off and end the act decently; or the fat fcene muft fhut her in from the fight of the audience, an abfurdity I cannot accuse Shakespeare of. Mr. Gildon and fome other criticks fancied, that a confiderable part of the 2d act was loft; and that the chaẩm began here. I had joined in |