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There must be needs a like proportion
Of lineaments, of manners, and of spirit;
Which makes me think, that this Antonio,
Being the bosom lover of my lord,5

3 Whose souls do bear an equal yoke &c.] The folio, 1623, reads -egal, which, I believe, in Shakspeare's time was commonly used for equal. So it was in Chaucer's:

"I will presume hym so to dignifie
"Yet be not egall."

Again, in Gorboduc:

Prol. to The Remedy of Love.

"Sith all as one do bear you egall faith." Steevens.

4 Of lineaments, of manners, &c.] The wrong pointing has made this fine sentiment nonsense. As implying that friendship could not only make a similitude of manners, but of faces. The true sense is, lineaments of manners, i. e. form of the manners, which, says the speaker, must needs be proportionate. Warburton.

The poet only means to say, that corresponding proportions of body and mind are necessary for those who spend their time together. So, in King Henry IV, P. II:

"Dol. Why doth the prince love him so then?

"Fal. Because their legs are both of a bigness," &c. Every one will allow that the friend of a toper should have a strong head, and the intimate of a sportsman such an athletic constitution as will enable him to acquit himself with reputation in' the exercises of the field. The word lineaments was used with great laxity by our ancient writers. In The learned and true Assertion of the Original, Life, &c. of King Arthur, translated from the Latin of John Leland, 1582, it is used for the human frame in general. Speaking of the removal of that prince's bones,-he calls them Arthur's lineaments, three times translated; and again, all the lineaments of them remaining in that most stately tomb, saving the shin bones of the king and queen, &c.

Again, in Greene's Farewell to Follie, 1617: "Nature hath so curiously performed his charge in the lineaments of his body," &c.

Again, in Chapman's version of the fifth Iliad:

66 took the weariness of fight

"From all his nerves and lineaments, ·

Again, in the thirteenth Iliad:

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"Of his illustrious lineaments so out of nature bound,
"That back nor forward he could stir,

99 Steevens.

the bosom lover of my lord,] In our author's time this term was applied to those of the same sex who had an esteem for each other. Ben Jonson concludes one of his letters to Dr. Donne, by telling him: "he is his true lover." So, in Coriolanus: "I tell thee, fellow, thy general is my lover." Many more instances might be added. See our author's Sonnets, passim.

Malone.

Must needs be like my lord: If it be so,
How little is the cost I have bestow'd,
In purchasing the semblance of my soul
From out the state of hellish cruelty?
This comes too near the praising of myself;
Therefore, no more of it: hear other things.—
Lorenzo, I commit into your hands

The husbandry and manage of my house,
Until my lord's return: for mine own part,
I have toward heaven breath'd a secret vow,
To live in prayer and contemplation,
Only attended by Nerissa here,

Until her husband and my lord's return:
There is a monastery two miles off,

And there we will abide. I do desire you,
Not to deny this imposition;

The which my love, and some necessity,
Now lays upon you.

Lor.

Madam, with all my heart;

I shall obey you in all fair commands.

Por. My people do already know my mind,
And will acknowledge you and Jessica
In place of lord Bassanio and myself.

So fare you well, till we shall meet again.

Lor. Fair thoughts, and happy hours, attend on you! Jes. I wish your ladyship all heart's content.

Por. I thank you for your wish, and am well pleas'd To wish it back on you: fare you well, Jessica.— [Exeunt JEs. and LOR.

Now, Balthazar,

As I have ever found thee honest, true,

So let me find thee still: Take this same letter,
And use thou all the endeavour of a man,

In speed to Padua ;7 see thou render this

6

-hear other things.] In former editions: This comes too near the praising of myself; Therefore no more of it: here other things,

Lorenzo I commit &c.

Portia finding the reflections she had made came too near selfpraise, begins to chide herself for it; says, She'll say no more of that sort; but call a new subject. The regulation I have made in the text was likewise prescribed by Dr. Thirlby. Theobald.

7 In speed to Padua ;] The old copies read-Mantua; and thus

Into my cousin's hand, doctor Bellario;

And, look, what notes and garments he doth give thee, Bring them, I pray thee, with imagin'd speedR

9

Unto the tranect, to the common ferry

Which trades to Venice:-waste no time in words,
But get thee gone: I shall be there before thee.

Balth. Madam, I go with all convenient speed. [Exit.
Por. Come on, Nerissa; I have work in hand,
That you yet know not of:
Before they think of us.
Ner.

we 'll see our husbands,

Shall they see us?
Por. They shall, Nerissa; but in such a habit,
That they shall think we are accomplished
With what we lack. I'll hold thee any wager,
When we are both accouter'd1 like young men,
I'll prove the prettier fellow of the two,
And wear my dagger with the braver grace;
And speak, between the change of man and boy,

all the modern editors implicitly after them. But 'tis evident to any diligent reader, that we must restore, as I have done,-In speed to Padua: for it was there, and not at Mantua, Bellario liv'd. So, afterwards :-A messenger, with letters from the Doctor, new come from Padua-And again: Came you from Padua, from Bellario? And again, It comes from Padua, from Bellario.-Besides, Padua, not Mantua, is the place of education for the civil law in Italy. Theobald.

8 with imagin'd speed-] i. e. with celerity like that of imagination. So, in the Chorus preceding the third Act of King Henry V:

"Thus with imagin'd wing our swift scene flies."

Again, in Hamlet: "swift as meditation—." Steevens.

9 Unto the tranect,] The old copies concur in this reading, which appears to be derived from tranare, and was probably a word current in the time of our author, though I can produce no example of it. Steevens.

Mr. Rowe reads—traject, which was adopted by all the subsequent editors.-Twenty miles from Padua, on the river Brenta there is a dam or sluice, to prevent the water of that river from mixing with that of the marshes of Venice. Here the passageboat is drawn out of the river, and lifted over the dam by a crane. From hence to Venice the distance is five miles. Perhaps some novel-writer of Shakspeare's time might have called this dam by the name of the tranect. See Du Cange in v. Trana. Malone. 1-accouter'd-] So, the earliest quarto, and the folio. The other quarto-apparel'd. Malone.

With a reed voice; and turn two mincing steps
Into a manly stride; and speak of frays,
Like a fine bragging youth: and tell quaint lies,
How honourable ladies sought my love,
Which I denying, they fell sick and died;
I could not do with all; 2-then I'll repent,
And wish, for all that, that I had not kill'd them:
And twenty of these puny lies I'll tell,

That men shall swear, I have discontinued school
Above a twelvemonth:-I have within my mind
A thousand raw tricks of these bragging Jacks,
Which I will practise.

Ner.

Why, shall we turn to men?

Por. Fye! what a question 's that,
If thou wert near a lewd interpreter?
But come, I'll tell thee all my whole device
When I am in my coach, which stays for us
At the park gate; and therefore haste away,
For we must measure twenty miles to-day.

SCENE V.

The same. A Garden.

Enter LAUNCELOT and JESSICA.

[Exeunt.

Laun. Yes, truly:-for, look you, the sins of the father are to be laid upon the children; therefore, I promise you, I fear you. I was always plain with you, and so now I speak my agitation of the matter: Therefore, be of good cheer; for, truly, I think you are damn'd. There is but one hope in it that can do you any good; and that is but a kind of bastard hope neither.

2

Jes. And what hope is that, I pray thee?

do with all;] For the sense of the word do, in this place, see a note on Measure for Measure. Collins.

The old copy reads-withall. Corrected by Mr. Pope. Malone. therefore, I promise you, I fear you.] I suspect for has been inadvertently omitted; and we should read-I fear for you.

3

Malone.

There is not the slightest need of emendation. The disputed phrase is authorized by a passage in King Richard III:

"The king is sickly, weak, and melancholy,
“And his physicians fear him mightily.” Steevens.

Laun. Marry, you may partly hope that your father got you not, that you are not the Jew's daughter.

Jes. That were a kind of bastard hope, indeed; so the sins of my mother should be visited upon me.

Laun. Truly then I fear you are damn'd both by father and mother: thus when I shun Scylla, your father, I fall into Charybdis, your mother:4 well, you are gone both ways.

4

thus when I shun Scylla, your father, I fall into Charybdis, your mother] Originally from the Alexandreis of Philippe Gualtier; but several translations of this adage were obvious to Shakspeare. . Among other places, it is found in an ancient poem intitled "A Dialogue between Custom and Veritie, concerning the use and abuse of Dauncing and Minstrelsie," bl. 1. no date:

"While Silla they do seem to shun,

"In Charibd they do fall," &c.

Philip Gualtier de Chatillon (afterwards Bishop of Megala) was born towards the latter end of the 12th Century. In the fifth Book of his heroic poem, Darius (who escaping from Alexander, fell into the hands of Bessus) is thus apostrophized:

"Nactus equum Darius, rorantia cæde suorum

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"Retrogrado fugit arva gradu. Quo tendis inertem
"Rex periture fugam? nescis, heu! perdite, nescis
Quem fugias, hostes incurris dum fugis hostem:
"Incidis in Scyllam, cupiens vitare Charibdim.
"Bessus, Narzabanes, rerum pars magna tuarum,
Quos inter proceres humili de plebe locasti,

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"Non veriti temerare fidem, capitisq verendi
"Perdere caniciem, spreto moderamine juris,
"Proh dolor! in domini conjurant fata clientes."

The author of the line in question (who was unknown to Erasmus) was first ascertained by Galeottus Martius, who died in 1476; (See Menagiana, Vol. I, p. 173, edit. 1729,) and we learn from Henricus Gandavensis de Scriptoribus Ecclesiasticis, [i. e. Henry of Gaunt] that the Alexandreis had been a common schoolbook. "In scholis Grammaticorum tantæ fuisse dignitatis, ut præ ipso veterum Poetarum lectio negligeretur." Barthius also, in his notes on Claudian, has words to the same effect. "Et media barbarie non plane ineptus versificatur Galterus ab Insula (qui tempore Joannis Saresberiensis, ut ex hujus ad eum epistolis discimus, vixit)-Tam autem postea clarus fuit, ut expulsis quibusvis bonis auctoribus, scholas tenuerit." Freinsheim, however, in his comment on Quintus Curtius, confesses that he had never seen the work of Gualtier.

The corrupt state in which this poem (of which I have not met with the earliest edition) still appears, is perhaps imputable to frequent transcription, and injudicious attempts at emendation. Every pedagogue through whose hands the MS. passed, seems

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