So far beneath your soft and tender breeding,
And fince you call'd me master for so long,
Here is my hand; you fhall from this time be
Your master's mistress.

MAL. Lady, you have. Pray you, peruse that letter:

You must not now deny it is your hand,
Write from it, if you can, in hand, or phrase;
Or fay, 'tis not your feal, nor your invention:
You can fay none of this: Well, grant it then,
And tell me, in the modesty of honour,

Why you have given me fuch clear lights of favour;

Bade me come fmiling, and crofs-garter'd to you,
To put on yellow ftockings, and to frown
Upon fir Toby, and the lighter people:
And, acting this in an obedient hope,
Why have you fuffer'd me to be imprifon'd,
Kept in a dark houfe, vifited by the priest,

'Tis only title thou difdain'ft in her " i. e. the want of title. Again, in King Richard III: "The forfeit, fovereign, of my fervant's life-" that is, the remiffion of the forfeit. MALONE.

lighter-] People of lefs dignity or importance.

JOHNSON.

And made the most notorious geck,' and gull,
That e'er invention play'd on? tell me why.

OLI. Alas, Malvolio, this is not my writing,
Though, I confefs, much like the character:
But, out of question, 'tis Maria's hand.
And now I do bethink me, it was fhe

First told me, thou waft mad; then cam'st in fmiling,

And in fuch forms which here were prefuppos'd'
Upon thee in the letter. Pr'ythee, be content:
This practice hath moft fhrewdly pafs'd upon thee;
But, when we know the grounds and authors of it,
Thou shalt be both the plaintiff and the judge
Of thine own caufe.

FAB.

Good madam, hear me speak;

geck,] A fool. JOHNSON.

So, in the vifion at the conclufion of Cymbeline:

"And to become the geck and scorn

"Of th' other's villainy."

Again, in Ane verie excellent and delectabill Treatife intitulit PHILOTUS, &c. 1603:

Again:

"Thocht he be auld, my joy, quhat reck,
"When he is gane give him ane geck,
"And take another be the neck."

"The carle that hecht fa weill to treat you,
" I think fall get ane geck.” STEEVENS.

-then cam'ft in fmiling,] i. e. then, that thou cam'ft in fmiling. MALONE.

I believe the lady means only what fhe has clearly expreffed: "then thou cameft in fmiling;" not that she had been informed of this circumftance by Maria. Maria's account, in fhort, was juftified by the fubfequent appearance of Malvolio. STEEVENS. 3 —— here were prefuppos'd-] Presuppos'd, for imposed. WARBURTON. Prefuppos'd rather feems to mean previously pointed out for thy imitation; or fuch as it was fuppofed thou would'ft affume after thou hadst read the letter. The fuppofition was previous to the act. STEEVENS.

And let no quarrel, nor no brawl to come,
Taint the condition of this present hour,
Which I have wonder'd at. In hope it shall not,
Moft freely I confefs, myself, and Toby,
Set this device against Malvolio here,
Upon some stubborn and uncourteous parts
We had conceiv'd against him: Maria writ
The letter, at fir Toby's great importance; '
In recompence whereof, he hath married her.
How with a sportful malice it was follow'd,
May rather pluck on laughter than revenge;
If that the injuries be juftly weigh'd,
That have on both fides past.

OLI. Alas, poor fool! how have they baffled
thee?"

CLO. Why, Some are born great, fome atchieve greatnefs, and fome have greatness thrown upon them. I was one, fir, in this interlude; one fir Topas, fir; but that's all one:-By the Lord, fool, I am not mad;-But do you remember? Madam, why laugh

4 Upon fome Stubborn and uncourteous parts We had conceiv'd against him:] -conceiv'd in him. TYRWHITT.

Surely we fhould rather read

5 at fir Toby's great importance;] Importance is importunacy, importunement. STEEVENS.

6 Alas, poor fool!] See notes on King Lear, A&t V. fc. iii.

7

REED.

how have they baffled thee?] See Mr. Tollet's note on a paffage in the first scene of the first act of King Richard II: "I am difgrac'd, impeach'd, and baffled here."

STEEVENS,

But do you remember? Madam,] The old copy points this paffage erroneously:-"But do you remember, madam," &c. I have followed the regulation propofed in the subsequent note. STEEVENS.

As the Clown is fpeaking to Malvolio, and not to Olivia, I think this paffage should be regulated thus-but do you remember ?— Madam, why laugh you, &c. TYRWHITT.

you at fuch a barren rafcal? an you smile not, he's gagg'd: And thus the whirligig of time brings in his revenges.

MAL. I'll be revenged on the whole pack of

you.

Exit.

OLI. He hath been moft notoriously abus'd. DUKE. Pursue him, and entreat him to a peace :He hath not told us of the captain yet; When that is known, and golden time convents, A folemn combination fhall be made Of our dear fouls-Mean time, fweet fifter, We will not part from hence.-Cefario, come; For fo you fhall be, while you are a man; But, when in other habits you are seen, Orfino's mistress, and his fancy's queen.

SONG.

CLO. When that I was and a little tiny boy,
With bey, ho, the wind and the rain,

9

A foolish thing was but a toy,

For the rain it raineth every day.

Exeunt.

-convents,] Perhaps we should read-confents. To convent, however, is to affemble; and therefore, the count may mean, when the happy hour calls us again together. STEEVENS.

convents,] i. e. fhall ferve, agree, be convenient. DoUCE. When that I was and a little tiny boy, &c.] Here again we have an old fong, scarcely worth correction. 'Gainft knaves and thieves muft evidently be, against knave and thief.-When I was a boy. my folly and mischievous actions were little regarded; but when I came to manhood, men shut their gates against me, as a knave and a thief.

Sir Thomas Hanmer rightly reduces the fubfequent words, beds and heads, to the fingular number: and a little alteration is still wanting at the beginning of fome of the stanzas.

Mr. Steevens obferves in a note at the end of Much ado about Nothing, that the play had formerly passed under the name of

But when I came to man's eftate,
With bey, bo, the wind and the rain,
'Gainft knave and thief men fhut their gate,
For the rain it raineth every day.

But when I came, alas! to wive,
With bey, bo, the wind and the rain,
By fwaggering could I never thrive,
For the rain it raineth every day.

But when I came unto my bed,

With hey, ho, the wind and the rain,
With tofs-pots ftill had drunken head,
For the rain it raineth every day.

A

great while ago the world begun,

With bey, bo, the wind and the rain,

But that's all one, our play is done,

And we'll ftrive to pleafe you every day.

[Exit.

Benedict and Beatrix. It feems to have been the court-fashion to alter the titles. A very ingenious lady, with whom I have the honour to be acquainted, Mrs. Afkew of Queen's-Square, has a fine copy of the fecond folio edition of Shakspeare, which formerly belonged to King Charles I. and was a prefent from him to his Master of the Revels, Sir Thomas Herbert. Sir Thomas has altered five titles in the lift of the plays, to "Benedick and Beatrice, Pyramus and Thifty,—Rofalinde,—Mr. Paroles, and Malvolio."

It is lamentable to fee how far party and prejudice will carry the wifeft men, even against their own practice and opinions. Milton, in his Exovoxhases, cenfures King Charles for reading "one whom (fays he) we well knew was the clofet companion of his folitudes, William Shakspeare." FARMER.