p. 308. p. 309. p. 311. p. 312. guage meaning merely ignorant,' of which numberless shall I always keep below stairs? Mr. Singer plausibly suggests that we should read, "keep them below stairs." Under the circumstances, however, Margaret's wit may limit the purposes for which she would go above stairs. i. e., I give thee the "I give thee the bucklers": victory, my shield as well as yours. "The god of love Steevens says that this is the beginning of an old ballad by William Elderton. It is printed as prose in folio and quarto. 66 for I cannot woo," &c.: with that I came [for]": The quarto has "nor." Both the old edi tions omit' for,' which was supplied by Rowe. "Yonder's old coil at home : We have seen before (Merry Wives, Act I. Sc. 4) that 'old' was an augmentative: coil' meant confusion.' SCENE III. "It is, my lord : This reply is assigned to an attendant "Lord" in folio and quarto. The heading, "Epitaph," is upon the same line; but there can be no doubt that Claudio reads the verses which he has brought to hang upon the tomb of his mistress. The lines, "Now unto thy bones," &c., which can belong to none but him, have the prefix "Lo." "Heavenly, heavenly." The quarto has, by a misprint which may almost be called obvious, "heavily, heavily heavily, heavily;" the mistake being caused by a supposition that this line was meant for a repetition of the third above. This reading, however, although destructive of the fine sense that death is to be uttered (i. e., expelled, outer-ed) by the power of Heaven, and indeed of all sense whatever, has yet been p. 313. p. 314. adopted by most modern editors; and it is advocated by Mr. Dyce, because "it goes so heavily with my disposition," (Hamlet, Act II. Sc. 2,) is misprinted, "it goes so heavenly," &c., in the folio! SCENE IV. [Here comes," &c.]: The folio omits this line. "This same is she," &c. : Theobald, who has been followed by almost all editors, gave this speech to Antonio. Folio and quarto assign it to Leonato; and as he had already, in the first Scene of this Act, offered and promised the hand of his pretended niece to Claudio, there can be surely nothing more improper in his giving it to her. "One Hero died [defil'd] fil'd.' The folio omits deMr. Collier's folio of 1632 reads belied,' a specious suggestion; but the correctness of the old word is established by the remainder of Hero's speech: [for] they swore you did": The old copies omit for. Hanmer inserted it, and it was found in Mr. Collier's folio of 1632. There can hardly be a doubt that this was proper, especially as deceived,' which is contracted in the corresponding line below, is not contracted in this, thereby rendering one syllable necessary to the rhythm. In the folio this speech is printed as prose. "They swore that you," &c.: in this and in the next line, and The folio omits that such' in the third. "Peace! I will stop your mouth": In folio and quarto this speech has the prefix Leon.; but the error is too plain to permit us to defer, with Mr. Collier, to their authority. How was Leonato to stop Beatrice's mouth? and why, if Leonato stopped it, does the Prince immediately cry, "How dost thou, Benedick, the married man?" for [what] I have said against it : The folio omits what.' "A PLEASANT Conceited Comedie CALLED, Loues labors lost. As it was presented before her Highnes this last Christmas. Newly corrected and augmented By W. Shakespere. Imprinted at London by W. W. for Cutbert Burby." 1598. 4to. 38 leaves. Love's Labour's Lost occupies twenty-three pages in the folio of 1623, viz., from p. 122 to p. 144, inclusive, in the division of Comedies. It is there divided into Acts, but not into Scenes, and is without a list of Dramatis Personæ, which was first supplied by Rowe. (344) LOVE'S LABOUR'S LOST. INTRODUCTION. COLERIDGE'S opinion in favor of the very early production CO of Love's Labour's Lost has been quoted by most recent editors; but surely no intelligent and observant reader can need the aid of so eminent a critic to establish in him the belief that this play is among the first that Shakespeare wrote. No other seems to present so many claims to be considered the very first that he composed entirely. The earliest known edition is the quarto of 1598; but as the copy from which this professes to be printed was “newly corrected and augmented,” in order to its presentation at Court, that date is but the limit before which it must have been originally written, successfully performed, and partly rewritten; so that the mention of it by Meres, in the same year, is of no consequence. This correction and augmentation, too, diminished the amount of internal evidence as to the early writing of the play in its original form; for it cannot be doubted that Shakespeare applied the knife to those parts which bore most unmistakable marks of youth and inexperience, and that what he added was, in style at least, worthy of him in his thirty-fifth year. These latter passages hardly any intelligent reader can fail to detect when told that they exist. The end of the fifth Act, after the announcement of the death of the King of France, is one of them; and there accident left trace of the alteration to which the play had been subjected, in the printing of a passage which was, or which should have been erased, because it was superseded by an augmentation of the identical thought in another and a more appropriate place. But had there been an edition previous to the correction, its date would hardly reach back to that of the production of the comedy, which was probably not later than 1588. The reasons for believing it to be the earliest of its author's v 2 (345) |