all." The sense then, which I would assign to Shakspere, is this: "If such a one will patch grief with proverbs—case or cover the wounds of his grief with proverbial sayings-make misfortune drunk with candle-wasters-stupify misfortune, or render himself insensible to the strokes of it, by the conversation or lucubrations of scholars; the production of the lamp. but not fitted to human nature. Patch, in the sense of mending a defect or breach, occurs in Hamlet, act v.

scene 1.

"O, that that earth, which kept the world in

awe,

"Should patch a wall, to expel the winter's flaw." WHALLEY. 33. -than advertisement.] That is, than admonition, than moral instruction. JOHNSON. 38. However they have writ the style of gods,] Sapiens ille cum Diis ex pare vivit. Senec. Ep. 59. Jupiter quo anteccdit virum bonum? diutius bonus est. Sapiens nihilo se minoris æstimat.—Deus non vincit sapientem felicitate. Ep. 73. WARBURTON.

By the style of gods, is meant an exalted language; such as we may suppose would be written by beings superior to human calamities, and therefore regarding them with neglect and coldness.

Beaumont and Fletcher have the same expression in the first of their Four Plays in One:

"Athens doth make women philosophers,

"And sure their children chat the talk of gods."

STEEVENS.

39. And made a pish at chance and sufferance.] Alludes to the famous apathy of the stoles.

WARBURTON.

The old copies read push. Mr. Pope, I believe

made the change.

MALONE.

85. Canst thou so daffe me ?------ ] To daffe and doffe are synonymous terms, that mean, to put off: which is the very sense required here, and what Leonato would reply upon Claudio's saying, he would have nothing to do with him. THEOBALD.

Theobald has well interpreted the word. Shakspere uses it more than once:

"The nimble footed mad-cap prince of Wales,

"And his comrades that daff'd the world aside." Again, "I would have daff'd other respects," &c. Again, in the Lover's Complaint:

"There my white stole of chastity I daff'd."

It is perhaps of Scottish origin, as I find it in Ane verie excellent and delectabill Treatise intitulit PHILOTUS, &c. Edinburgh, 1603:

STEEVENS.

"Their daffing does us so undo." 87. Ant. He shall kill two of us, &c.] This brother Anthony is the truest picture imaginable of human nature. He had assumed the character of a sage to comfort his brother, o'erwhelmed with grief for his only daughter's affront and dishonour; and had severely reproved him for not commanding his passion better on so trying an occasion. Yet, immediately after this, no sooner does he begin to suspect that his age and valour are slighted, but he falls into the most intemperate

intemperate fit of rage himself: and all he can do or say is not of power to pacify him. This is copying nature with a penetration and exactness of judgment peculiar to Shakspere. As to the expression, too, of his passion, nothing can be more highly painted.

WARBURTON.
The word is

102. Scambling,—] i. e. scrambling. more than once used by Shakspere. See Dr Percy's note on the first speech of the play of K. Henry V. and likewise the Scots proverb, "It is well ken'd your father's son was never a scambler.” A srambler, in its literal sense, is one who goes about among his friends to get a dinner; by the Irish call'd a cosherer. STEEVENS.

111.

we will not wake your patience.] This conveys a sentiment that the speaker would by no means have implied. That the patience of the two old men was not exercised, but asleep, which upbraids them for insensibility under their wrong. Shakspere must have wrote,

we will not wrack

i. e. destroy your patience by tantalizing you.

WARBURTON.

This emendation is very specious, and perhaps is right; yet the present reading may admit a congruous meaning with less difficulty than many other of Shakspere's expressions.

The old men have been both very angry and outrageous; the prince teils them that he and Claudio will not wake their patience; will not any longer force them

to

to endure the presence of those whom, though they look on them as enemies, they cannot resist.

JOHNSON.

Wake, I believe, is the original word. The ferocity of wild beasts is overcome by not suffering them to sleep. We will not wake your patience, therefore means, we will forbear any further provocation.

HENLEY. 151. Nay, then give him another staff, &c.] An allusion to tilting. See note, As You Like It, act iii. WARBURTON.

SC..4.2

".

155. -to turn his girdle.] We have a proverbial speech, If he be angry, let him turn the buckle of his girdle. But I do not know its original or meaning. JOHNSON.

A corresponding expression is used to this day in Ireland-If he be angry, let him tie up his brogues. Neither proverb, I believe, has any other meaning than this: If he is in a bad humour, let him employ himself till he is in a better.

Dr. Farmer furnishes me with an instance of this proverbial expression as used by Claudio, from Winwood's Memorials, fol. edit. 1725, Vol. I. p. 453. See letter from Winwood to Cecyll, from Paris, 1602, about an affront he received there from an Englishman : "I said what I spake was not to make him angry. He replied, if I were angry, I might turn the buckle of my girdle behind me." So likewise Cowley, On the Government of Oliver Cromwell: "The next month he swears by the living God, that he will turn them out of doors, and he does so in his princely way

of threatening, bidding them, "turne the buckles of their girdles behind them." STEEVENS.

A writer in the Gentleman's Mag. 1783, says, large belts were worn with the buckle before, but in 'wrestling the buckle was turned behind, to give the adversary a fair grasp at the belt; therefore turning the buckle behind was a challenge. REED. 167. —bid-] i. e. asked. Thus in Titus Andronicus, act i. sc. 2.

"I am not bid to wait upon this bride.". And in the New Testament:

"they that were bidden were not worthy."

169. Shall I not find a woodcock too?] A woodcock was a proverbial term for a foolish fellow. So in the London Prodigal, a comedy, 1605: "Woodcock o' my side!" The same words also occur in Law Tricks, a comedy, by John Day, 1608. MALONE.

177. --a wise gentleman;] This jest depending on the colloquial use of words is now obscure; perhaps we should read, a wise gentleman, or a man wise enough to be a coward. Perhaps wise gentleman was in that age used ironically, and always stood for silly fellow. JOHNSON.

goes

210. What a pretty thing man is, when he in his doublet and hose, and leaves off his wit !] It was esteemed a mark of levity and want of becoming gravity, at that time, to go in the doublet and hose, and leave off the cloak, to which this well-turned expression alludes. The thought is, that love makes a man as ridiculous,