And be a day before our husbands home: This deed will be well welcome to Lorenzo. Enter GRATIANO. GRA. Fair sir, you are well overtaken : Hath sent you here this ring; and doth entreat POR. That cannot be : This ring I do accept most thankfully, And so, I pray you, tell him: Furthermore, pray you, show my youth old Shylock's house. GRA. That will I do. Ner. Sir, I would speak with you :I'll see if I can get my husband's ring, [TO PORTIA. Which I did make him swear to keep for ever. POR. Thou may'st, I warrant; We shall have old swearing1, That they did give the rings away to men; 9 house? upon more ADVICE,] i. e. more reflection. So, in All's Well that Ends Well: "You never did lack advice so much," &c. STEEVENS. OLD swearing,] Of this once common augmentative in colloquial language, there are various instances in our author. Thus, in The Merry Wives of Windsor: "Here will be an old abusing of God's patience and the King's English." Again, in King Henry IV. P. II.: "here will be old utis." The same phrase also occurs in Macbeth. STEEVENS. ACT V. SCENE I. Belmont. Avenue to PORTIA'S House. Enter LORENZO and JESSICA. LOR. The moon shines bright :-In such a night as this 2, When the sweet wind did gently kiss the trees, JES. LOR. In such a night, 2 In such a night as this,] The several speeches beginning with these words, &c. are imitated in the old comedy of Wily Beguiled; which though not ascertaining the exact date of that play, prove it to have been written after Shakspeare's : 66 In such a night did Paris win his love. "Lelia. In such a night, Æneas prov'd unkind. Orig. of the Drama, vol. iii. p. 865. WHALLEY. Wily Beguiled was written before 1596, being mentioned by Nashe in one of his pamphlets published in that year. MALONE. Troilus, methinks, mounted the Trojan walls,] This image is from Chaucer's Troilus and Cresseide, 5 B. 666 and 1142: "Upon the wallis fast eke would he walke, "And on the Grekis host he would y-se, &c. "The daie goth fast, and after that came eve "And yet came not to Troilus Cresseide, "He lokith forth, by hedge, by tre, by greve, "And ferre his heade ovir the walle he leide," &c. Again, ibid. : "And up and doune by west and eke by est, 66 STEEVENS. Stood Dido with a willow in her hand 4 Upon the wild sea-banks, and wav'd her love JES. Medea gather'd the enchanted herbs That did renew old son. LOR. In such a night, In such a night, Did Jessica steal from the wealthy Jew: 4 In such a night, Stood Dido with a willow in her hand-] This passage contains a small instance out of many that might be brought to prove that Shakspeare was no reader of the classicks. STEEVENS. For the willow the poet must answer; but I believe he here recollected Chaucer's description of Ariadne in a similar situation : "Alas (quod she) that ever I was wrought! "I am betrayed, and her heere to-rent, "And to the stronde barefote fast she went, "And cried; Theseus, mine-hert swete, "Where be ye, that I may nat with you mete; "And might thus with beestes bin yslaine. "The halow rockes answerde her againe. "No man she saw, and yet shone the moone.— "Her kerchefe on a pole sticked she, "Ascaunce he should it well ysee, "And him remember that she was behind, "And turne againe, and on the stronde her find." Legend of Good Women, p. 194, b. Mr. Warton suggests in his History of English Poetry, that Shakspeare might have taken this circumstance of the willow from some ballad on the subject. MALONE. 5 In such a night, &c.] So, Gower, speaking of Medea: "Thus it befell upon a night "Whann there was nought but sterre light, "She was vanished right as hir list, "That no wight but herself wist: "And that was at midnight tide, "The world was still on every side," &c. Confessio Amantis, 1554. STEEVENS. JES. In such a night, Did young Lorenzo swear he lov'd her well; And ne'er a true one. LOR. In such a night, Did pretty Jessica, like a little shrew, JES. I would out-night you, did no body come : But, hark, I hear the footing of a man. Enter STEPHANO. LOR. Who comes so fast in silence of the night? STEPH. A friend. LOR. A friend? what friend? your name, I pray you, friend? STEPH. Stephano is my name; and I bring word, My mistress will before the break of day Be here at Belmont: she doth stray about By holy crosses', where she kneels and prays For happy wedlock hours. LOR. Who comes with her? STEPH. None, but a holy hermit, and her maid. I pray you, is my master yet return'd? • AND in such a night,] The word—and was necessarily added by Mr. Pope, for the sake of metre, both in this and the following speech of Lorenzo. STEEVENS. No alteration is necessary: two hemistichs frequently occur at the end of one speech and the commencement of another. See the Essay on Shakspeare's Versification. It might as well be objected that the close and beginning of the preceding speeches are redundant. BOSWELL. she doth stray about By holy CROSSES,] So, in The Merry Devil of Edmonton : "But there are Crosses, wife; here's one in Waltham, "Another at the Abbey, and the third "At Ceston; and 'tis ominous to pass Any of these without a Pater-Noster." And this is a reason assigned for the delay of a wedding. STEEVENS. LOR. He is not, nor we have not heard from him. But go we in, I pray thee, Jessica, And ceremoniously let us prepare Some welcome for the mistress of the house. Enter LAUNcelot. LAUN. Sola, sola, wo ha, ho, sola, sola! LOR. Who calls? LAUN. Sola! did you see master Lorenzo, and mistress Lorenzo! sola, sola! LOR. Leave hollaing, man; here. LAUN. Sola! where? where? LOR. Here. LAUN. Tell him, there's a post come from my master, with his horn full of good news; my master will be here ere morning. [Exit. LOR. Sweet soul, let's in, and there expect their coming. And yet no matter;-Why should we go in ? [Exit STEPHANO. 8 Sweet soul,] These words in the old copies are placed at the end of Launcelot's speech. MALONE. These two words should certainly be placed at the beginning of the following speech of Lorenzo : "Sweet soul, let's in," &c. Mr. Pope, I see, has corrected this blunder of the old edition, but he has changed soule into love, without any necessity. TYRWHITT. Mr. Rowe first made the present regulation, which appears to me to be right. But instead of soul he reads-love, the latter word having been capriciously substituted in the place of the former by the editor of the second folio, who introduced a large portion of the corruptions, which for a long time disfigured the modern editions. MALONE. I rather suppose, that the printer of the second folio, judici |