as well as from many others in the Reliques of ancient English Poetry. PERCY (P. 205.)-nicely. Depending on their brands. I am not sure that I understand this paffage. Perhaps Shakefpeare meant that the figures of the Cupids were nicely poized on their inverted torches, one of the legs of each of them being taken off the ground, which might render fuch a fupport neceffary. STEEVENS. (P. 207.)- her attendants are all fworn and honourable. It was anciently the custom for the attendants on our nobility and other great perfonages (as it is now for the fervants of the king) to take an oath of fidelity, on their entrance into office. In the houshould book of the 5th earl of Northumberland (compiled A. D. 1512. it is exprefsly ordered [page 49] that what perfon foever he be that comyth to my "Lordes fervice, that incontynent after he be entered in the chequyrroull [check-roll] that he be SWORN in the "countyng hous by a gentillman-ufher or yeman-ufher in the prefence of the hede officers; and on theire abfence before "the clerke of the kechynge either by fuch an oath as is in the BOOK OF OTHES, yff any fuch [oath] be, or ells by "fuch a oth as fhall feyme befte to their difcrecion." Even now every fervant of the king's, at his firft appointment, is fworn in, before a gentleman ufher, at the lord chamberlain's office. PERCY. (P. 256.)- - thy fluggish Crare. The fame word, though fomewhat differently fpelt, occurs in To ships, and barks, with gallies, bulks and Crayes, (P. 257.) the Ruddock would &c. STEEVENS. Is this an allufion to the babes of the wood, or was the notion of the redbreaft covering dead bodies, general before the writing that ballad? (P. 274.) this carle. + PERCY. Carle is ufed by our old writers in oppofition to a gentleman. See the poem of John the Reeve. PERCY. Carlot is a word of the fame fignification, and occurs in our author's As you like it. STEEVENS. (P. 350.) That's a fhealed peafcod. The tobing of Richard IId's effigy in Westminster Abbey is wrought with peafcods open and the peas out; perhaps in 3 allufion allufion to his being once in full poffeffion of fovereignty, but foon reduced to an empty title. TOLLET. (P. 387.) SIZES, certain portions of bread, beer or other victuals, which in public focieties are fet down to the account of particular perfons: a word still used in colleges of the universities. (P. 407.)- blefs thy five wits. So the five fenfes were called by our old writers. Thus in the very ancient interlude of THE FYVE ELEMENTS, one of the characters is SENSUAL APPETITE, who with great fimplicity thus introduces himself to the audience, I am callyd fenfual apetyte, All creatures in me delyte, I comforte the WYTTYS FYVE; The taftyng smelling and Herynge Sig. B. iij. PERCY. (P. 412.) Dr. Percy would substitute the following note, for that which now ftands in its place. Mice and Rats and fuch fmall deere Have been Tom's food for feven long yeare. This diftich has excited the attention of the critics. Inftead of deere, Dr. Warburton would read, geer, and Dr. Grey cheer. The ancient reading is, however, established by the old metrical romance of SIR BEVIS, which Shakespeare had probably often heard fung to the harp, and to which he elfewhere alludes as in the following inftances. As Bevis of Southampton fell upon afcapart Again Hen. VIII. A&. I. That Bevis was believed. This diftich is part of a description there given of the hardfhips fuffered by Bevis when confined for seven years in a dungeon. "Rattes and mice and fuch fmal dere "Was his meate that feven yere. Sig. F. iij. (P. 414.) Child Rowland. PERCY. The word CHILD (however it came to have this fenfe) is often applied to KNIGHTS, &c. in old hiftorical fongs and romances; of this, innumerable inftances occur in the Reliques of ancient Englifb poetry. See particularly in Vol. I. S. IV. V. 97, where in a defcription of a battle between two knights, we find thefe lines, "The Eldridge knighte, he prick'd his steed: "And the timber thefe two CHILDREN bare See in the fame volumes the ballads concerning the child of B. (P. 473) And fire us hence like foxes. PERCY. So in Harrington's tranflation of Ariosto, Book 27. stanza 17. Bolts out, and thro' the smoke and fire he flieth STEEVENS. VOL. X. (P. 5.) carry coals This phrase continued to be in use down to the middle of the last century in a little fatirical piece of Sir John Birkenhead, intitled, "Two centuries [of Books] of St. Paul's Churchyard, &c." published after the death of K. Cha. I. N° 22. page 50, is intitled "FIRE, FIRE! a fmall manual, dedicated to Sir Arthur Hafelridge; in which it is plainly proved by a "whole chauldron of fcripture, that John Lilburn will not "CARRY COALS. By Dr. Gouge. PERCY. (P. 12.) Rom. Out I take out not to be an imperfect part of a fentence cut off by apofiopefis; but rather the interjection ftill used in the north, where they fay Out! much in the fame fenfe as we fay fye! Romeo indeed afterwards tags a fentence with it. but that he is led into by Benvolio's fupplement to the first Out. So p. 116. Out alas! he's cold. PERCY. (P. 26.) The date is out of fuch prolixity. Shakespeare has written a mafque which the reader will find introduced in the 4th act of the Tempeft. It would have been difficult for the reverend annotator to have proved they were difcontinued during any period of Shakespeare's life. PERCY. (P. 33.) Add to the note taken from the Obfervations and Conjectures, printed at Oxford 1766, the following inftances, Much Ado about Nothing, A&t IV. we find, "Princes and counties." All's well that Ends well, "A ring the County wears." The Countie Egmond is fo called more than once in Holingfhead, p. 1150, and in the Burleigh papers, vol. I. p. 204. See alfo p. 7, The Countie Palatine Lowys. However, perhaps, it is as probable that the repetition of the Courtier, which offends us in this paffage, may be owing (not to any error of the prefs, but) to the players having jumbled together the varieties of feveral editions, as they certainly have done in other parts of the play. T. T. (P. 36.) He fhift a trencher, &c. Trenchers were still used by perfons of good fashion in our author's time. In the houfhould book of the earls of Northumberland, compiled at the beginning of the fame century, it appears that they were common to the tables of the first nobility. PERCY. MARCHPANE (p. 36.) a kind of fweet bread or biscuit; called by fome almond-cake. Hermolaus barbarus terms it mazapanis, vulgarly martius panis. G. macepain and massepain. It. marzapane. H. maçapan. B. marcepeyn, i. e. massa pura. But, as few understood the meaning of this term, it began to be generally though corruptly called maffepeyn, marcepeyn, martfepeyn; and in confequence of this mistake of theirs it foon took the name of martius panis, an appellation transferred afterwards into ether languages. See Junius. (P 43. and 44.) When king Cophetua, &c. This whole note of mine is a mistake, and long before it was printed in Dr. Johnfon's appendix, had been fuperfeded and fet right by the real ballad of K. Cophetua &c. printed in the Ift vol. of the Reliques of English poetry. This note therefore fhould be cancelled and the real ballad in that work be referred to. PERCY. (P. 66.) Ah mocker! that's the dog's name. R is for the No, &c. I believe we should read, R is for the dog. No; I know it begins with fome other letter. (P. 156.) to fupprefs His further gait therein, T. T. : gate or gait is here ufed in the northern sense, for proceeding, palage; from the A. S. verb gae. A gate for a path, passage, or freet, is ftill current in the north, PERCY. [There (P. 188.) There is reason to suspect the word unanneal'd is fophifticate, as well as the preceding, unannointed. The old quarto give the whole line thus: Unnuzzled, difappointed, un-anueld. The three first folios read, Unhouzzled, difappointed, unnaneld. Bishop Bonner in his facrament of extreme unction joins the words together:-"He who is dangerously fick, fays he, "and therefore anoyled and anoynted, &c." And king Henry in his expofition of the fame facrament uses the word annoyled. Quare therefore if we should not read the whole line as follows: Unhoufel'd, difannointed, unanoil'd.] (P. 197.) Good Sir, or fo, &c. Dr. Johnson would read-Good Sir, forfoeth, &c. For footh, which has been fometimes supposed to be a form of address, and, fince its proper meaning has been forgot, may perhaps have been fometimes fo applied by vulgar ignorant people, originally had no fuch fignification. It was a more inforcing of an affeveration. Sooth is truth, and infooth or forfooth fignify originally and properly only in truth and for truth. In Shakespeare's time the proper fense was not left out of ufe; and therefore I think he could hardly have inferted forfooth in the text, as a form of addrefs. PERCY. (P. 244.) Vulcan's fithy. Stithy is not, I believe, fimply an anvil, but a forge in general. So in another play, Now by the forge that ftithied Mars's helm. STEEVENS. MICHING, (p. 249.) fecret, covered, lying hid. In this fense Chapman, our author's cotemporary, ufes the word in The Widow's Tears, Dodf. Old Pl. vol. IV. p. 291. Lyfander, to try his wife's fidelity, elopes from her: his friends report that he is dead, and make a mock funeral for him: his wife, to fhew exceffive forrow for the lofs of her husband, fhuts herself up in his monument; to which he comes in disguise, and obtains her love, notwithstanding he had affured her in the mean time, that he was the man who murdered her hus band. On which he exclaims, Out upon the monster! Go tell the governour, let me be brought And |