BENE. I have almoft matter enough in me for fuch an embaffage; and fo I commit

you

CLAUD. To the tuition of God: From my house, (if I had it,)

D. PEDRO. The fixth of July: Your loving friend,

Benedick.

4

BENE. Nay, mock not, mock not: The body of your difcourfe is fometimes guarded with fragments, and the guards are but flightly basted on neither : ere you flout old ends any further,' examine your confcience; and fo I leave you. [Exit BENEDICK.

guarded with fragments,] Guards were ornamental lace or borders. So, in The Merchant of Venice:

give him a livery

"More guarded than his fellows. '

Again, in Henry IV. Part I:

ere you flout old ends, &c.] Before you endeavour to diftin guish yourself any more by antiquated allufions, examine whether you can fairly claim them for your own. This, I think is the meaning: or it may be understood in another sense, examine, if your farcafms do not touch yourself. JOHNSON.

The ridicule here is to the formal conclufions of Epiftles dedicatory and Letters. Barnaby Googe thus ends his dedication to the first edition of Palingenius, 12mo. 1560: "And thus committyng your Ladifhip with all yours to the tuicion of the mofte mercifull God, I ende. From Staple Inne at London, the eighte and twenty of March. The practice had however become obfolete in Shakspeare's time. In A pofte with a Packet of mad Letters, by Nicholas Breton, 4to. 1607; I find a Letter ending in this manner, entitled, A letter to laugh at after the old fashion of love to a Maide. " REED.

By

Dr. Johnson's latter explanation is, I believe, the true one. old ends the speaker may mean the conclufion of letters commonly ufed in Shakspeare's time; "From my houfe this fixth of July," &c. So, in the conclufion of a letter which our author fuppofes Lucrece to write :

"So I commend me from our houfe in grief;

33

"My woes are tedious, though my words are brief. See The Rape of Lucrece, p. 547: edit. 1780, and the note there,

CLAUD. My liege, your highness now may do me good.

D. PEDRO. My love is thine to teach; teach it but how.

And thou shalt fee how apt it is to learn

Any hard lesson that may do thee good.
CLAUD. Hath Leonato any
fon, my

lord?

D. PEDRO. No child but Hero, fhe's his only heir: Doft thou affect her, Claudio?

CLAUD.
O my lord,
When you went onward on this ended action,
I look'd upon her with a foldier's eye,
That lik'd, but had a rougher task in hand
Than to drive liking to the name of love:
But now I am return'd, and that war-thoughts.
Have left their places vacant, in their rooms
Come thronging foft and delicate defires,
All prompting me how fair young Hero is,
Saying, I lik'd her ere I went to wars.

D. PEDRO. Thou wilt be like a lover presently,
And tire the hearer with a book of words;
If thou doft love fair Hero,
And I will break with her,

cherish it;

and with her father,

Old ends, however, may refer to the quotation that D. Pedro had made from The Spanish Tragedy. "Ere you attack me on the subje& of love, with fragments of old plays, examine whether you are yourfelf free from its power." So, King Richard:

"With odd old ends, ftol'n forth of holy writ."

This kind of conclufion to letters was not obfolete in our au thor's time, as has been fuggetted. Michael Drayton concludes one of his letters to Drummond of Hawthornden, in 1619, thus: "And fo wifhing you all happiness, I commend you to God's tuition, and reft your affured friend." So alfo Lord Salisbury concludes a letter to Sir Ralph Winwood, April 7th, 1610: “— And fo I commit you to God's protection."

Winwood's Memorials, III. 147. MALONE.

And thou fhalt have her: Was't not to this end,
That thou began'ft to twift fo fine a story?

CLAUD. How fweetly do you minister to love, That know love's grief by his complexion! But left my liking might too sudden seem, I would have falv'd it with a longer treatife. D. PEDRO. What need the bridge much broader than the flood?

The fairest grant is the neceffity: 6

Look, what will ferve, is fit: 'tis once, thou lov'ft;"
And I will fit thee with the remedy.

I know, we shall have revelling to-night;
I will affume thy part in fome disguise,
And tell fair Hero I am Claudio;
And in her bofom I'll unclafp my heart,
And take her hearing prifoner with the force
And ftrong encounter of my amorous tale:
Then, after, to her father will I break;

6 The fair eft grant is the neceffity:] i. e. no one can have a better reason for granting a request than the neceffity of its being granted. WARBURTON.

Mr, Hayley with great acutenefs proposes to read,

The fairest grant is to néceffity. STEEVENS.

Thefe words cannot imply the fense that Warburton contends for; but if we fuppofe that grant means concelhon, the sense is obvious; and that is no uncommon acceptation of that word.

7

M. MASON.

'tis once, thou lov't;] This phrase, with concomitant obfcurity, appears in other dramas of our author, viz. The Merry Wives of Windfor, and K. Henry VIII. In The Comedy of Errors, it ftands as follows:

"Once this

- Your long experience of her wisdom," &c. Balthafar is speaking to the Ephefian Antipholis.

Once may therefore mean "once for all," “'tis enough to say at once." STEEVENS.

Once has here, I believe, the force of once for all. So, in Coriolanus: Once, if he do require our voices, we ought not të MALONE.

deny him."

And, the conclufion is, fhe fhall be thine:

In practice let us put it presently.

SCENE II.

An Room in LEONATO's Houfe.

Enter LEONATO and ANTONIO.

[Exeunt.

LEON. How now, brother? Where is my coufin, your fon? Hath he provided this mufick?

ANT. He is very bufy about it. But, brother, I can tell you ftrange news that you yet dream'd not of. LEON. Are they good?

ANT. As the event flamps them; but they have a good cover, they fhow well outward. The prince and Count Claudio, walking in a thick-pleached alley in my orchard, were thus much overheard by a man of mine: The prince discovered to Claudio, that he loved my niece your daughter, and meant to acknowledge it this night in a dance; and, if he found her accordant, he meant to take the prefent time by the top, and inftantly break with you of it.

LEON. Hath the fellow any wit, that told you this? ANT. A good fharp fellow? I will fend for him, and question him yourself.

V

LEON. No, no; we will hold it as a dream, till it appear itself: but I will acquaint my daughter withal, that she may be the better prepared for an

7 frange news Thus the quarto, 1600. The folio omits the epithet, which indeed is of little value. STEEVENS. 8 - a thick-pleached alley] Thick-pleached is thickly interSo afterwards, A& III. fc. i:

woven.

anfwer, if peradventure this be true. Go you, and tell her of it. [Several perfons cross the ftage.] Coufins, you know what you have to do.-O, I cry you mercy, friend; go you with me, and I will use your fkill: Good coufins, have a care this bufy time.

Exeunt.

SCENE III.

Another Room in LEONATO's Houfe.

Enter Don JOHN and CONRADE.

2

CON. What the goujere, my lord! why are you thus out of measure fad?

D. JOHN. There is no measure in the occafion that breeds it, therefore the fadnefs is without limit. CON. You fhould hear reafon.

D. JOHN. And when I have heard it, what bleffing bringeth it?

CON. If not a prefent remedy, yet a patient fufferance.

D. JOHN. I wonder, that thou being (as thou fay'st thou art) born under Saturn, goeft about to apply a moral medicine to a mortifying mischief. I cannot hide what I am: 3. I must be fad when I have

9 Coufins, you know—]—and afterwards, good coufins.] Coufins were anciently enrolled among the dependants, if not the domefticks, of great families, fuch as that of Leonato. Petruchio, while intent on the fubjection of Katharine, calls out, in terms imperative, for his coufin Ferdinand. STEEVENS.

2 What the goujere,] i. e. morbus Gallicus. The old copy corruptly reads, " good-year." The fame expreffion occurs again in K. Lear, Aa V. fc. iii:

The goujeres fhall devour them, flesh and fell." See note on this paffage. STEEVENS.

3 I cannot hide what I am:] This is one of our author's natural touches. An envious and unfocial mind, too proud to give