Изображения страниц
PDF
EPUB

24. "Made that night-walkers, and evisdropers, like punishment."

25. "No hammar-man, as a smith, a pewterer, a founder, and all artificers making great sound, shall not worke after the houre of nyne at night," &c.

30. "No man shall, after the hour of nyne at night, keepe any rule, whereby any such suddaine outcry be made in the still of the night, as making any affray, or beating his wyfe, or servant, or singing, or revyling in his house, to the disturbaunce of his neighbours, under payne of iiis. iiiid." &c. &c.

Ben Jonson, however, appears to have ridiculed this scene in the Induction to his Bartholomew-Fair:

"And then a substantial watch to have stole in upon 'em, and taken them away with mistaking words, as the fashion is in the stage practice." STEEVENS. 369. -thou art unconfirm'd :--] i. e. unpractised in the ways of the world. WARBURTON. 387. reechy painting ;] Is painting stain'd by smoke. So, in Han's Beer Pot's Invisible Comedy, 1618:

-he look'd so reechily

"Like bacon hanging on the chimney's roof." From Recan, Anglo-Saxon, to reek, fumare, Lat. STEEVENS.

388. --sometime, like the shaven Hercules, &c.] The shaven Hercules, meant Hercules when shaved to make him look like a woman, while he remained in the service of Omphale, his Lydian mistress. STEEVENS.

389.

smirch'd] Smirch'd is soiled, ob

scured. So, in As you Like It, act i. sc. 3. "And with a kind of umber smirch my face." STEEVENS.

425. --wears a lock.] So in the Return from Parnassus, 1600:

"He whose thin fire dwells in a smoky roofe, "Must take tobacco, and must wear a lock." STEEVENS. 426. Conr. Masters, Masters, &c.] In former copies :

See Dr. Warburton's Note, act v. sc. 1.

Conr. Masters.

2 Watch. You'll be made bring Deformed forth, I war.

rant you.

Conr. Masters never speak, we charge you, let us obey you to go with us.

The regulation which I have made in this last speech, though against the authority of all the printed copies, I flatter myself, carries its proof with it. Conrade and Borachio are not designed to talk absurd nonsense. It is evident, therefore, that Conrade is attempting his own justification; but is interrupted in it by the impertinence of the men in office. THEOBALD, 441. rabato--] A neckband; a ruff. Rabat, French. HANMER.

Rabato, an ornament for the neck, a collar-band, or kind of ruff. Fr. Rabat. Menage saith it comes from rabattre to put back, because it was at first nothing but the collar of the shirt or shift turn'd back towards the shoulders.

Eij

HAWKINS.

This

This article of dress is frequently mentioned by our ancient comick writers.

So, in the comedy of Law Tricks, &c. 1608:

"Broke broad jests upon her narrow heel, "Pok'd her rabatos, and survey'd her steel.” Again, in Decker's Satiromastix, 1602:-" He would persuade me that love was a rabato, and his reason was, that a rabato was worn out with pinning," &c.

Again, in Decker's Untrussing the Humourous Poet: What a miserable thing it is to be a noble bride! There's such delays in rising, in fitting gowns, in pinning rebatoes, in poaking," &c.

The first and last of these passages will likewise serve for an additional explanation of the poking-sticks of steel, mentioned by Autolycus in the Winter's Tale.

STEEVENS. 479. —Light oʻlove ;- -] This tune is mentioned in Beaumont and Fletcher's Two Noble Kinsmen. The gaoler's daughter, speaking of a horse, says,

"He gallops to the tune of Light o'love."

It is mentioned again in the Two gentlemen of Verona, "Best sing it to the tune of Light o’love.”

And in the Noble gentleman of Beaumont and Fletcher.

STEEVENS.

Light o'love.] This is the name of an old dance tune which has occurred already in the Two Gentlemen of Verona: I have lately recovered it from an ancient MS. and it is as follows:

SIR JOHN HAWKINS.

484. --no barns.] A quibble between barns, repositories of corn, and bairns, the old word for children.

JOHNSON.

So, in the Winter's Tale: "Mercy on us, a barn! a

very pretty barn!"

489. Hey ho!

STEEVENS.

Marg. For a hawk, a horse, or a husband?] “Heigh ho for a husband, or the willing maid's wants made

[blocks in formation]

known;" is the title of an old ballad in the Pepysian Collection, in Magdalen-College, Cambridge.

MALONE.

491. 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. Heywood, among his Epigrams, published in 1566, has one on the letter H,

"His worse among letters in the cross-row :
"For if thou find him either in thine elbow,
"In thine arm, or leg, in any degree;
"In thine head, or teeth, or toe, or knee;
"Into what place soever H may pike him,
"Wherever thou find ache thou shalt not like
STEEVENS.

him."

492. ――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. So, in The Honest Whore, by Decker, 1616 :

"If you turn Turk again," &c.

513.

STEEVENS.

some moral-] That is, some secret mean

ing, like the moral of a fable.

4

JOHNSON.

A moral

« ПредыдущаяПродолжить »