Phang. Sirrah, where's Snare? Hoft. O lord, ay; good mafter Snare. Phang. Snare, we must arreft fir John Falstaff. and all. Snare. It may chance coft fome of us our lives, for he will ftab. Hoft. Alas the day! take heed of him; he stabb'd me in mine own house, and that most beastly: he cares not what mischief he doth, if his weapon be out he will foin like any devil; he will fpare neither man, woman, nor child, Phang. If I can clofe with him, I care not for his thruft. Hoft. No, nor I neither; I'll be at your elbow. Phang. An I but fift him once; an he come but within my vice ; Hoft. I am undone by his going; I warrant you, he's an infinitive thing upon my score:-Good mafter Phang, hold him fure;-good master Snare, let him not fcape. He comes continuantly to Pye-corner, (faving your manhoods) to buy a faddle; and he's indited to dinner to the lubbar's head in Lumbart-street, to mafter Smooth's the filkman: I pray ye, fince my cxion is enter'd, and my cafe fo openly known to the world, let him be brought in to his anfwer. 9 A hun if he come but within my vice ;—] Vice or grafp; a metaphor taken from a fmith's vice: there is another reading in the old edition, view, which I think not fo good. PoOPE, lubbar's-bead-] This is, I fuppofe, a colloquial corruption of the Libbard's-head. JOHNSON. A hundred mark is a long one--] A long one? a long what? It is almoft needless to obferve, how familiar it is with our poet to play the chimes upon words fimilar in found, and differing in fignification; and therefore I make no question but he wrote: A hundred mark is a long lone for a poor lone woman to bear : 1. e. 100 mark is a good round fum for a poor widow to venture on truft, THEOBALD, dred dred mark is a long loan for a poor lone woman to bear and I have borne, and borne, and borne; and have been fub'd off, and fub'd off, from this day to that day, that it is a fhame to be thought on. There is no honefty in fuch dealing; unless a woman fhould be made an ass, and a beaft, to bear every knave's wrong. Enter Sir John Falstaff, Bardolph, and the Page. 4 Yonder he comes; and that arrant malmfey-nofe knave, Bardolph, with him. Do your offices, do your offices, mafter P'hang, and mafter Snare; do me, do me, do me your offices. Fal. How now? who's mare's dead? what's the matter? Phang. Sir John, I arreft you at the fuit of miftrefs Quickly. Fal. Away, varlets!-Draw, Bardolph; cut me off the villain's head; throw the quean in the kennel. Hoft. Throw me in the kennel? I'll throw thee in the kennel. Wilt thou? wilt thou? thou baftardly rogue!-Murder, murder! O thou honey-fuckle 3 —a poor lone woman] A lone woman is a defolate, unfriended woman. So in Maurice Kyffin's Tranflation of Terence's Andria, 1588: Moreover this Glycerie is a lone Woman;" "tum hæc fola eft mulier." In the first part of K. Henry IV. Mrs. Quickly had a husband alive. She is now a widow. STEEVENS. •malmfey-nofe-] That is, red nofe, from the effect, of malmfey wine. JOHNSON. In the old fong of Sir Simon the King the burthen of each stanza is this: 5 "Says old Sir Simon the king, "Says old Sir Simon the king, "And his malmfey-nofe, 66 Sing hey ding, ding a ding." PERCY. -boney-fuckle villain!honey-feed rogue!-] The land jady's corruption of homicidal and homicide. Hh 4 THEOBALD, villain! villain! wilt thou kill God's officers, and the king's? O thou honey-feed rogue! thou art a honey-feed; a man-queller, and a woman-queller. Fal. Keep them off, Bardolph. Hoft. Good people, bring a rescue or two." Thou wo't, wo't thou? thou wo't, wo't thou? do, do, thou rogue! do, thou hemp-feed! Fal. Away, you fcullion! you rampallian! you fuftilarian! I'll tickle your catastrophe '. Enter the Chief Justice, attended. Ch. Juft. What's the matter? keep the peace here, ho! a man-queller,] Wicliff, in his Tranflation of the New Teftament, ufes this word for carnifex, Mark vi. 27. "Herod fent a man-queller, and commanded his head to be "brought." STEEVENS. 7 8 -Thou wo't, wo't thou? &c.] The first folio reads, I think, lefs properly, thou wilt not? thou wilt not? JOHNSON. Fal. Away, you fcullion!-] This fpeech is given to the Page in all the editions to the folio of 1664. It is more proper for Falftaff, but that the boy must not stand quite filent and useless on the stage. JOHNSON. 9 rampallian!-fuftilarian!-] The first of these terms of abuse may be derived from ramper, Fr. to be low in the world. The other from fuftis, a club; i. e. a perfon whose weapon of defence is a cudgel, not being entitled to wear a sword. The following paffage however, in A new Trick to cheat the Devil, 1639, feems to point out another derivation of Rampallian : "And bold Rampallian like, fwear and drink drunk." It may therefore mean a ramping riotous ftrumpet. Thus in Greene's Ghoft haunting Coneycatchers," Here was Wilee Beguily rightly acted, and an aged rampalion put befide her schooletricks." STEEVENS. I I'll tickle your catastrophe.] This expreffion occurs feveral times in the Merry Devil of Edmonton, 1626: Again : "Oh, it tickles our catastrophe." "to feduce my blind customers, I tickle bis catastrophe for this." STEEVENS. Hoft. Hoft. Good my lord, be good to me! I befeech you, ftand to me! Ch. Juft. How now, fir John? what, are you brawling here? Doth this become your place, your time, and bufinefs? You should have been well on your way to York.Stand from him, fellow; Wherefore hang'ft thou on him? Hoft. O my moft worshipful lord, an't please your grace, I am a poor widow of Eaft-cheap, and he is arrested at my fuit. Ch. Juft. For what fum ? Hoft. It is more than for fome, my lord; it is for all, all I have: he hath eaten me out of house and home; he hath put all my fubftance into that fat belly of his -but I will have fome of it out again, or I'll ride thee o'nights, like the mare. 2 Fal. I think, I am as like to ride the mare, if I have any vantage of ground to get up. Ch. Juft. How comes this, fir John? Fie! what man of good temper would endure this tempeft of exclamation? Are you not asham'd, to enforce a poor widow to fo rough a course to come by her own? Fal. What is the grofs fum that I owe thee? Hoft. Marry, if thou wert an honeft man, thyself, and the money too. Thou didst fwear to me upon to ride the Mare,] The Hoftess had threatened to ride Falstaff like the Incubus or Night-mare; but his allufion, (if it be not a wanton one) is to the Gallows, which was ludicrously called the Timber, or two-legg'd Mare. So, in Like will to like, quoth the Devil to the Collier, 1587. The Vice is talking of Tyburn: Again: "This piece of land wherto you inheritors are, "I will help to bridle the two-legged Mare STEEVENS. a parcel 3a parcel-gilt goblet, fitting in my Dolphin-chamber, at the round table, by a fea-coal fire, on wednesday in Whitfun-week, when the prince broke thy head * for likening his father to a finging-man of Windfor; thou didst fwear to me then, as I was wafhing thy wound, to marry me, and make me my lady thy wife. Canft thou deny it? Did not goodwife Keech', the butcher's wife, come in then, and call me goffip Quickly? coming in to borrow a mess of vinegar; telling us, the had a good difh of prawns; whereby thou didst defire to eat fome; whereby I told thee, they were ill for a green wound? And didft thou not, 3 -a parcel-gilt goblet,-] A parcel-gilt goblet is a goblet only gilt over, not of folid gold. So, in B. Jonfon's Alchemift: 66 or changing "His parcel-gilt to maffy gold." The fame expreffion occurs in many other old plays. So, in Humour out of Breath, a comedy, by John Day, 1608: "She's parcel poet, parcel fidler already, and they com"monly fing three parts in one." Again, in Heywood's Silver Age, 1613: "I am little better than a parcel-gilt bawd.” Again, in A Chriflian turn'd Turk, 1612: "You parcel bawd, all usher, answer me." Holinfhed, defcribing the arrangement of Wolfey's plate, fays -" and in the council-chamber was all white, and parcel-gilt plate." STEEVENS. 4 for likening his father to a finging-man-] Such is the reading of the first edition; all the reft have for likening him to a finging-man. The original edition is right; the prince might allow familiarities with himself, and yet very properly break the knight's head when he ridiculed his father. JoHNSON. 5 -good-wife Keech, the butcher's wife,] A Keech is the fat of an ox rolled up by the butcher into a round lump. STEEVENS. a mess of vinegar;] So, in Mucedorus: 6 "I tell you all the meffes are on the table already, Again, in an ancient interlude published by Raftel; no title or date : "Ye mary fometyme in a meffe of vergee." A mess feems to have been the common term for a fmall tion of any thing belonging to the kitchen, STEEVENS. propor when |