P. 53, l. 19. 20. - then if your husband have stables enough, you'll see he shall lack no barns.] A quibble between barns, repositories of corn, and bairns, the old word for children, JOHNSON, P. 53, 1. 25. 26. „Heigh ho for a husband, or the willing maid's wants made known," is the title of an old ballad in the Pepysian Collection, in Magdalen College, Cambridge. MALONE P. 53, 1. 27. For the letter that begins them. all, H.] This is a poor jest, somewhat obscured, and not worth the trouble of elucidation. / Margaret asks Beatrice for what she cries, hey ho; Beatrice answers, for an H. that is for an ache, or pain. JOHNSON. P. 53, L. 28. - an you be not turn'd Turk,] i. e. taken captive by love, and turned a renegado to his religion. WARBURTON This interpretation is somewhat far-fetched, yet, perhaps, it is right. JOHNSON. Hamlet uses the same expression, and talks of his fortune's turning Turk. To turn Turk, was a common phrase for a change of condition or opinion.. STEEVENS. '. P. 53, 1. 30. What means the fool, trow? This.. obsolete exclamation of enquiry, is corrupted from I trow, or trow you, and occurs again in The Merry Wives of Windsor: Who's there, trow?" To trow, is to imagine, to conceive. So, in Romeo and Juliet, the Nurse says:,,'Twas no need, I trow, to bid me trudge." STEEVENS. . P. 54, L. 9. Carduus Benedictus, or blessed thistle (says Cogan in his Haven of Health, 1595) so worthily named for the singular virtues that it hath." ,,This herbe may worthily be called Benedictus, or Omnimorbia, that is, a salve for every sore, not knowen to physitians of old time, but lately revealed by the speciall providence of Almighty God." STEEVENS. P. 54, 1. 14. you have some moral in this Benedictus.] That is, some secret meaning, like the moral of a fable. JOHNSON. he eats his meat without P. 54, 1. 26. grudging:] I do not see how this is a proof of Benedick's change of mind. It would afford more proof of amorousness to say, he eats not his meat without grudging; but it is impossible to. fix the meaning of proverbial expressions, perhaps, to eat meat without grudging, was the same as, to do as others do: and the meaning is, he is content to live by eating like other mortals, and will be content, notwithstanding his boasts, like other mortals, to have a wife. JOHNSON. Johnson considers this passage too literally. The meaning of it is, that Benedick is in love, and takes kindly to it. M. MASON. The meaning, I think is,,,and yet now, in spite of his resolution to the contrary, he feeds on love, and likes his food." MALONE. P. 54, 1. 28. you look with your eyes as other women do.] i. e. you direct your eyes toward the same object; viz. a husband. STERVENSA P. 55, 1. 18. but, in 'faith, honest, as the skin between his brows.] This is a proverbial expression. STEEVENS. P. 55, 1. 20- 22. I am as honest as 'any man living, that is an old man, and no honester than I.] There is much humour, and extreme good sense under the covering of this blundering expression. It is a sly insinuation, that length of years, and the being much hacknied in the ways of men, as Shakspeare expresses it, take off the gloss of virtue, and bring much-defilement of the manners, For, as a great wit [Swift] says, Youth is the season of virtue: corruptions grow with years, and I believe the oldest rogue in England is the greatest. WARBURTON. Much of this is true, but I believe Shakspeare did not intend to bestow all this reflection on the speaker. JOHNSON. P. 55, 1. 23. palabras, -] So, in The taming of a Shrew, the Tinker says, pocas pallabras, i, e. few words. A scrap of Spanish, which might once have been current among the vulgar, and had appeared, as Mr., Henley observes, in The Spanish Tragedy: „Pocas pallabras, milde as the lambe." STEEVENS. P. 55, 1. 26. 27. It pleases your Worship to say so, but we are the poor Duke's officers;] This stroke of pleasantry has already occurred in Measure for Measure, Act II. sc. i. where Elbow says: ,,If it please your Honour, I am the poor Duke's constable." STEEVENS. P. 56, 1. 11. it is a world to see!] i. e. it is wonderful to see. STEEVENS. P. 56, 1. 13. An two men ride of a horse, one must ride behind :] This is not out of place, or without meaning. Dogberry, in his vanity of superior parts, apologizing for his neighbour, observes, that of two men on an horse, one must ride behind. The first place of rank or understanding can belong but to one, and that happy one ought not to despise his inferiour. JOHNSON. P. 57, 1. 9. here's that shall drive some of them to a non com:] i. e.. to a non compos mentis; put them out of their wits: he confounds the term with non-plus. or perhaps MALONE. P. 58, first 1. If either of you know any in ward impediment, why you should not be conjoined, etc.] This is borrowed from our marriage Ceremony, which (with a few slight changes inphraseology) is the same as was used in the time of Shakspeare.. Douce. P. 58, 1. 12. Why, then some be of laughing, ha! ha! he!] This is a quotation from the Accidence. JOHNSON. as, P. 58, last but one 1. Luxurious is, lascivious. Luxury is the confessor's term for unlawful ́ plea sures of the sex. JOHNSON. P. 59, 1. 4. In your own proof may signify in your own trial of her. TYRWHITT. P. 59, L. 13. I never tempted her with word too large;] So he uses large jests in this play, for licentious, not restrained within due bounds. JOHNSON. P. 59, 1. 20. As chaste as is the bud ere it be blown;] Before the air JOHNSON. has tasted its sweetness. P. 59, 1. 25. that he doth speak so wide?}, i. e. so remotely from the present business. P. 60, l. 7. kindly power is, natural power. Kind is nature. JOHNSON,, P. 60, 1. 31. here, as in many - like a liberal villain,] Liberal places of these plays, means frank frank beyond honesty, or decency. Free of tongue. Dr. Warburton unnecessarily reads, illiberal. JOHNSON. This sense of the word liberal is not peculiar to Shakspeare, John Taylor, in his Suite concerning Players, complains of the ,,many aspersions very liberally, unmannerly, and ingratefully bestowed upon him " FARMER. P. 61, 1. 4. I am afraid here the word Hero. what a Hero hadst thou been,] is intended a poor conceit upon JOHNSON. P. 61, 1. 11. Conjecture is here used for suspi cion. MALONE. P. 61, 1, 13. 1 gracious.] i. e. lovely, attractive. MALONE. P. 62, first 1. The story that is printed in her blood? That is, the story which her blushes discover to te true. JOHNSON. P. 62, 1. 8. Chid I for that at frugal nature's frame?] Frame is contrivance, order, disposition of things. STEEVENS.. It seems to me, that by frugal nature's frame, Leonato alludes to the particular formation of himself, or of Hero's mother, rather than to the universal system of things. Frame means here framing, as it does where Benedick says of John, that ,,His spirits toil in frame of villains." The meaning, I think, is, M. MASON. Grieved I at na ture's being so frugal as to have framed for me only one child? MALONE. P. 62, l. 16. But mine, and mine I lov'd, and mine I prais'd, And mine that I was proud on; -] The sense requires that we should read, as in 14 |