the Urtica Marina,

seas. STEEVENS.

P. 35, 1. 18.

abounding in the Indian

for here comes the trout that must be caught with tickling.] Cogan, in his Haven of Health, 1595, will prove an able commentator on this passage:,,This fish of nature loveth flatterie: for, being in the water, it will suffer it selfe to be rubbed and clawed, and so to be taken. Whose example I would wish no maides to follow, least they repent afterclaps." STEEVENS. P.,35, 1. 30. To jet is to strut, body by a proud motion.

to agitate the STEEVENS.

of the strachy -] Thrace; for so the Mandeville says:

P.' 36, 1. 5. the lady We should read Trachy, i. e. old English writers called it. ,,As Trachye and Macedoigne, of the which Alisandre was Kyng." It was common to use the (article the before names of places: and this was no improper instance, where the scene was in Illyria. WARBURTON.

What we should read is hard to say. Here is an allusion to some old story which I have not yet discovered. JOHNSON.

Straccio (see Torriano's and Altieri's dictiona rics) signifies clouts and tatters: and Torriano in his grammar, at the end of his dictionary, says that straccio was pronounced stratchi. So that it is probable that Shakspeare's meaning was this, that the lady of the Queen's wardrobe had married a yeoman of the King's, who was vastly in ferior to her. SMITH.

Such is Mr. Smith's note; but it does not ap pear that strachy was ever an English word, nor will the meaning given it by the Italians be of any use on the present occasion.

Perhaps a letter has been misplaced, and we ought to read starchy; i. e. the room in which linen underwent the once most complicated 'operation of starching. I do not know that such a word exists; and yet it would not be unanalogically formed from the substantive starch. In Harsnet's Declaration, 1605, we meet with,,a yeoman of the sprucery;" i. e. wardrobe; and in the Northumberland Household Book, nursery is spelt nurcy. Starchy, therefore, for starchery, may be admitted. In Romeo and Juliet, the place where paste was made, is called the pastry. The lady who had the care of the linen may be signi ficantly opposed to the yeoman, i. e. an inferior officer of the wardrobe. While the five different coloured starches were worn, such a term might have been current. In the year 1564, a Dutch woman professed to teach this art to our fair country women. ,,Her usual price (says Stowe) was four or five pounds to teach them how to starch, and twenty shillings how to seeth starch." The alteration was suggested to me by a typogra phical error in The world toss'd at Tennis, no date, by Middleton and Rowley; where straches is printed for starches. I cannot fairly be accused of having dealt much in conjectural emendation, and therefore feel the less reluctance to hazard a guess on this desperate passage.

STEEVENS.

The place in which candles were kept, was for merly called the chandry; and in B. Jonson's Bartholomew Fair, a ginger bread woman is called lady of the basket. The great objection to this emendation is, that from the starchy to the wardrobe is not what Shakspeare calls a very ,,heavy declension." In the old copy the word

is printed in Italicks, as the name of a place, Strachy.

The yeoman of the wardrobe is not an "arbitrary term, but was the proper designation of the wardrobe-keeper, in Shakspeare's time. See Florio's Italian Dictionary, 1598: „Vestiario, a wardrobe-keeper, or a yeoman of a wardrobe.“

P. 36, 1. 8.

MALONE.

look, how imagination blows

him.] i. e. puffs him up. STEEVENS.

P. 36, I. 10. A state, in ancient language, signifies a chair with a canopy over it. STEEVENS. P. 36, 1. 11. a stone bow, that is, a crossbow, a bow which shoots stones. JOHNSON. P. 36, 1. 13. a day-bed, i. e. a couch.

STEEVENS.

P. 36, 1. 25. wind up my watch,] In our author's time watches were very uncommon. When Gry Faux was taken, it was urged as a circumstance of suspicion that a watch was found upon him. JOHNSON.

Pocket watches were brought from Germany into England, about the year 1580. MALONE.

P. 36, 1. 26. courtsies there to me:] From this passage one might suspect that the manner of paying respect, which is now confined to females, was equally used by the other sex. It is probable, however, that the word court'sy was employed to express acts of civility and reverence by either men or women indiscriminately. In an extract

from the Black Book of Warwick, Bibliotheca Topographica Britannica, p. 4, it is said,~,,The pulpeut being sett at the nether end of the Eari of Warwick's tombe in the said quier, the table was placed where the altar had bene. At the coming into the quier my lord made lowe curte

sie to the French King's armes." Lord Herbert of Cherbury, in his Life, speaking of dancing, recom mends that accomplishment to youth,,,that he may know how to come in and go out of a room where company is, how to make courtesies handsomely, according to the several degress of persons he shall encounter.". REED.

P. 36, 1. 28. Though our silence be drawn from us with cars, i. e. though it is the greatest pain to us to keep silence. WARBURTON.

I believe the true reading is: Though our silence be drawn from us with carts, yet peace. In The Two Gentlemen of Verona, one of the Clowns says: „I have a mistress, but who that is, a team of horses shall not pluck from me." So, in this play : ,,Oxen and wainropes will not bring them together" JONNSON.

The old reading is cars, as I have printed it. It is well known that cars and carts have the same meaning, STEEVENS.

if I were to suggest a word in the place of cars, which I think is a corruption, it should be tables. It may be worth remarking, perhaps, that the leading ideas of Malvolio, in his humour of state, bear a strong resemblance to those of Alnaschar in The Arabian Night's Entertain ments. Some of the expressions too are very simiJar TYRWHITT. <

Many Arabian fictions had found their way into.obscure Latin and French books, and thence into English ones long before any professed version of The Arabian Nights' Entertainments had appeared.- I meet with a story similar to that of Ainasehar, in The Dialoges of Creatures Mora lysed, bl. 1. no date, but probably primed abroad. STELVENS.

P. 37, 1. 12. What employment have we here?]

P. 57, 1. 18. and her T's;

equivalent to our com WARBURTON.

What's to do here.

these be her very C's, her Us, and thut makes she her great P's.]

In the direction of the letter which Malvolio reads, there is neither a C, nor a P, to be found. STEEVENS.

From the usual custom of Shakspeare's age, we may easily suppose the whole direction to have run thus: ,,To the Unknown belov'd, this, and my good wishes, with Care Present." RITSON P. 37, 1. 25. - wax. - Soft! It was the custom in our poet's time to seal letters with soft wax, which retained its softness for a good while The wax used at present would have been hardened long before Malvolio picked up this letter. MALONE.

I do not suppose that Soft has any refer ence to the wax; but is merely an exclamation equivalent to Softly? i. e. be not in too much haste. I may also observe, that though it was anciently the custom (as it still is) to seal certain legal instruments with soft and pliable wax, fami-. liar letters (of which I have seen specimens from the time of K. Henry VI. to K. James I) were se cured with wax as glossy and firm as that employed in the, present year. STEEVENS.

P. 38, first 1. Marry, hang thee, brock!i.se. badger. He uses the word as a term of contempt, as if he had said, hang thee, cur! Out filth! to stink like a brock being proverbial. RITSON,

Marry, hang thee, thou vain, conceited cox comb, thou overweening rogue! Brock, which properly, signifies a badger, was used in this sense. in Shakspeare's time. MALone.