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So, in the Midsummer's Night's Dream he applies spleen to the lightning. I am loath to think that Shakspeare meant to play with the double of match for nuptial, and the match of a gun. Jour.

Spleen" is anger, but the word is out of its place. We must read the line thus:

"Swifter than powder can in spleen enforce."

Faulc. Here's a stay,

That shakes the rotten carcase of old death
Out of his rags!-

Here's a stay,

That shakes the rotten carcass of old death

Out of his rags

!

B.

I cannot but think that every reader wishes for some other word in the place of stay, which, though it may signify an hindrance, or man that hinders, is yet very improper to introduce the next line. I read:

Here's a flaw,

That shakes the rotten carcass of old death..

That is, here is a gust of bravery, a blast of menace. This suits well with the spirit of the speech. Stay and flaw, in a careless hand are not casily distinguished; and if the writing was obscure, flaw being a word less usual, was easily missed. JOHN.

I cannot discover any meaning in the present reading, "Here's a stay, &c." and am firmly persuaded that the poet, must have written, Here's a say, i. e. here's a speech, &c. That this is the true reading, the whole tenor of Falconbridge's reply will show. "Here's a mouth, indeed"-" Zounds! I was never so bethump'd with words," &c. "Here's a say," is not, indeed, a very elegant expression; but it accords sufficiently well with the character of Falconbridge. B.

Eli. Urge them, while their souls

Are capable of this ambition;

. Lest zeal, now melted, by the windy breath
Of soft petitions, pity, and remorse,
Cool and congeal again to what it was.

Lest zeal, now melted,--]We have here a very unusual, and, I think, not very just image of zeal, which, in its highest degree, is represented by others as a flame, but by Shakspeare, as a frost. To repress zeal, in the language of others, is to cool, in Shakspeare's to melt it; when it exerts its utmost power it is commonly said to flame, but by Shakspeare to be congealed. JOHN.

Sure the poet means to compare zeal to metal in a state of fusion, and not to dissolving ice. STEEV.

1

The allusion might, I think, have been to dissolving ice, and yet not subject to Dr. Johnson's objection.

The sense may be-Lest the new zealous, and well-affected heart of Philip, which but lately was as cold ice, and has newly been melted and softened by the warm breath of petitions, &c. should again be congealed and frozen. MAL.

"Lest zeal now melted." Mr. Steevens is right in saying that "melted" is used in allusion to the fusion of metal, and not to the dissolving of ice; but still he sees not, any more than Johnson, the sense intended to be conveyed in Elinor's speech: nor is Mr. Malone less mistaken in his interpretation of the passage. The meaning is not Zeal melted by the breath of petitions, &c. but that the "Zeal then melted, might possibly become congealed as before, by means of petitions," &c. When the Poet speaks of "Zeal melted," he uses the expression as significant of zeal commixed or united, for the good of both parties: and when he fears that the zeal may be again congealed, he would, in that particular instance, be understood as noting a partial, a selfish zeal a zeal not put into action for the benefit of France and England mutually, but employed entirely by each on his own part, while indifferent in regard to the welfare of the people of Angiers. "Soft petitions, pity and remorse," is said in reference to Constance and her son. B.

Pand. France, thou may'st hold a serpent by the tongue,

A cased lion by the mortal paw,

A fasting tyger safer by the tooth,

Than keep in peace that hand which thou dost hold.

A cased lion.--All the modern editors read, a chafed lion. I see little reason for change. A cased lion is a lion irritated by confinement. STEEV.

"A cased lion."The Poet is here enumerating instances of danger, and which may be supposed to arise from want of caution. A cased (encaged) lion, however, gives an idea the very reverse of what is intended to be conveyed by the speech. It is evident, then, that we should read:

"France, thou mayst hold a serpent by the tongue,
An uncas'd lion by the mortal paw,

A fasting tyger safer by the tooth, &c."

All is then uniform: the images are perfectly just. B.

K. John. If the midnight bell

Did, with his iron tongue and brazen mouth,
Sound on unto the drowsy race of night;

Sound on unto the drowsy race of night. We should read: Sound one-WARE.

I should suppose sound on (which is the reading of the old copy) to be the true one. The meaning seems to be this; if the midnight bell, by repeated strokes, was to hasten away the race of beings who are busy at that hour, or quicken night itself in its progress, the morning bell (that is, the bell that strikes one) could not, with strict propriety, be made the agent; for the bell has ceased to be in the service of night, when it proclaims the arrival of day. Sound on has a peculiar propriety, because by the repetition of the strokes at twelve, it gives a much more forcible warning than when it only strikes one.

Such was once my opinion concerning the old reading; but on reconsideration, its propriety cannot appear more doubtful to any one than to myself.

It is too late to talk of hastening the night when the arrival of the morning is announced; and I am afraid that the repeated strokes have less of solemnity than the single notice, as they take from the horror and awful silence here described as so propitious to the dreadful purposes of the king. Though the hour of one be not the natural midnight, it is yet the most solemn moment of the poetical one; and Shakspeare himself has chosen to introduce his Ghost in Hamlet:

"The bell then beating one."

Mr. Malone observes, "that one and on, are perpetually confounded in the old copies of our author." STEEV.

Sound on unto the drowsy race of night. Some of the commentators have taken infinite pains to prove that the present reading, sound on, is faulty, and that we ought to read, "sound one," &c. while the others have as stoutly maintained that the text should undoubtedly remain unchanged. I am of opinion, however, that both these readings are wrong, and have therefore ventured to alter the passage thus:

"6 -If the midnight bell

"Hąd, with his iron tongue and brazen mouth,
"Sounden unto the drowsy race of night."

To suppose that the king was unable to communicate his thoughts to Hubert, at any other time than when the bell was sounding on, is truly ridiculous and absurd. But that he should consider midnight as the proper season for conversing with him on the dreadful business in hand, is highly beautiful and just. He therefore says, if the bell had sounded, or sounden, (i. e. if it were midnight) then, &c.

In old language, the participle is frequently formed by the termination en, as it is now by ed. We still retain bounden and other words which are perfectly analogous and in the Comedy of Errors, there will be found the clock has strucken twelve." B.

K. John. Then, in despight of broad-ey'd watchful day,

I would into thy bosom pour my thoughts:

broad-ey'd--] The old copy reads--brooded. Mr. Pope made the alteration, which, however elegant, may be unneces sary. All animals while brooded, i. e. with a brood of young ones under their protection, are remarkably vigilant. STEEV.

"broad-ey'd." A brooded day, is nonsense. If the word brood were admitted, the participle present must be made use of brooding. But the epithet does not well apply in speaking of day. We may read brooched day, i. e. gay, glittering as with ornaments. Brooch in old language is a jewel. This agrees with what John had before remarked, that the day was "too full of gawds to give him audience." B.

K. Phil. Look, who comes here! a grave unto a soul;

Holding the eternal spirit against her will,
In the vile prison of afflicted breath :-

a grave unto a soul,

Holding the eternal spirit, against her will,
In the vile prison of afflicted breath :)

I think we should read earth. The passage seems to have been copied from Sir Thomas More: "If the body be to the soule a prison, how strait a prison maketh he the body, that stuffeth it with riff-raff, that the soule can have no room to stirre itself-but is, as it were, enclosed not in a prison, but in a grave." FAR.

"a grave unto a soul, &c." What can possibly be clearer than the present reading? What can be more easily understood? "Breath" is meant to signify a mortal body: a mere animal existence; and at imprisonment in this mortal body the eternal spirit is supposed to become indignant by reason of its sorrows: to bear it, though but for a time, with pain. It is almost an affront to the reader to offer an explication of the passage; but when the sense of an author is perverted by his editor, it certainly behoves the succeeding one to point out such perversion; and hence an interpretation of what is sufficiently clear. B.

K. Phil. Oh, what love I note

In the fair multitude of those her hairs!

Where but by chance a silver drop hath fallen,
Even to that drop ten thousand wiry friends

Do glow themselves in sociable grief;

---wiry friends] The old copy reads, wiry fiends. Wiery is an adjective used by Heywood in his Silver Age, 1613:

"My vassal furies, with their wiery strings,
"Shall lash thee hence." STEEV.

-' wiry friends '—Mr. Steevens, by bringing "wiery strings in order to illustrate wiery friends,' has shown that he is ignorant of the Poet's meaning, and the same may be observed of the Editors who have acted in concert with him. " Wiery strings," however, are strings like wires: strings that will cut or wound. Thus we have in many writers whips of steel, but wiery has here a different sense-wiery friends' are eye-moistened, weeping friends. It is manifest from the context that such is the sense. B.

Pemb.

to choak his days

With barbarous ignorance, and deny his youth
The rich advantage of good exercise.

-good exercise.] In the middle ages the whole education of princes and noble youths consisted in martial exercises, &c. These could not be casily had in a prison, where mental improvements might have been afforded as well as any where else; but this sort of education never entered into the thoughts of our active, warlike, but illiterate nobility. PERCY.

If, in the middle ages, the whole education of princes and noble youths consisted in martial exercises, &c.-what is meant by the following passage?

-to choak his days

"With barbarous ignorance.'

Sal. The color of the king doth come and go,

Between his purpose and his conscience,

Like heralds 'twixt two dreadful battles set:

B.

Like heralds, 'twixt two dreadful battles set: But heralds are not planted, I presume, 'in the midst betwixt two lines of battle; though they, and trumpets, are often sent over from party to party, to propose terms, demand a párley, &c. I have therefore ventured to read, sent. THEOB.

This Dr. Warburton has followed without much advantage; set is not fired, but only placed; heralds must be set between battles, in order to be sent between them. JOHN.

Like heralds &c. Sent' is the right reading. Heralds are not placed between two lines of battle, as Theobald has very justly observed. They are always in the rear-guard of the army. Beside the very words- the color of the King doth come and go like Heralds,' shows the necessity of the change. B.

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