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And, like a rat without a tail3,
I'll do, I'll do, and I'll do.

by Mr. Perry, of the Morning Chronicle,) that "aroynt ye, witch," may be a corruption for a rowan tree, i. e. the mountain ash, which is said to be considered in Scotland to this day as a preservative against witchcraft. My friend Mr. Talbot has pointed out to me a passage in Evelyn's Sylva, which shows that the same superstition prevailed in Wales: "This tree is so sacred (scil. in Wales), that there is not a churchyard without one of them planted in it (as, among us, the yew); so, on a certain day in every year, every body religiously wears a cross made of the wood; and the tree is by some authors called Fraxinus Cambro-Britannica, reputed to be a preservative against fascinations and evil spirits; whence, perhaps, we called it witchen." Millar, adds Mr.

Talbot, gives this account of it: "In Scotland, and the North of England, it is called roan tree, and the name is variously spelt rowen, radden, and rantry." The sailor's wife, being in possession of this charm, is safe; and therefore the witch wreaks her vengeance upon her husband, who has no such talisman to protect him. If the phrase Aroynt ye, had occurred but once, we might be disposed to adopt this explanation; but it is not likely that the same mistake should have occurred twice, supported as the text is by the Cheshire proverb. If we were even to suppose that a rowan tree was the origin of the phrase, it is probable that Shakspeare adopted the corruption as he found it; as he has done handsaw, for hernshaw, in Hamlet. BosWELL.

There is no doubt that aroint signifies away! run! and that it is of Saxon origin. The original Saxon verb has not been preserved in any other way; but the glossaries supply ryne for running; and, in the old Islandic, runka signifies to agitate, to move. DOUCE.

2 the RUMP-FED ronyon-] The chief cooks in noblemen's families, colleges, religious houses, hospitals, &c. anciently claimed the emoluments or kitchen fees of kidneys, fat, trotters, rumps, &c. which they sold to the poor. The weird sister in this scene, as an insult on the poverty of the woman who had called her witch, reproaches her poor abject state, as not being able to procure better provision than offals, which are considered as the refuse of the tables of others. COLEPEPER.

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So, in The Ordinance for the Government of Prince Edward, 1474, the following fees are allowed : mutton's heads, the rumpes of every beefe," &c. Again, in The Ordinances of the Household of George Duke of Clarence: "- the hinder shankes of the mutton, with the rumpe, to be feable."

Again, in Ben Jonson's Staple of News, old Penny-boy says to the Cook:

2 WITCH. I'll give thee a wind 7. 1 WITCH. Thou art kind.

"And then remember meat for my two dogs;
"Fat flaps of mutton, kidneys, rumps," &c.

Again, in Wit at Several Weapons, by Beaumont and Fletcher: A niggard to your commons, that you're fain

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"To size your belly out with shoulder fees,

"With kidneys, rumps, and cues of single beer."

In The Book of Haukynge, &c. (commonly called The Book of St. Albans) bl. 1. no date, among the proper terms used in kepyng of haukes, it is said: "The hauke tyreth upon rumps." STEEVENS.

3- ronyon cries.] i. e. scabby or mangy woman. Fr. rogneux, royne, scurf. Thus Chaucer, in The Romaunt of the

Rose, p.

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551 :

her necke

"Withouten bleine, or scabbe, or roine.” Shakspeare uses the substantive again in The Merry Wives of Windsor, and the adjective-roynish, in As You Like It.

STEEVENS.

4 — in a sieve I'll thither sail,] Reginald Scott, in his Discovery of Witchcraft, 1584, says it was believed that witches "could sail in an egg shell, a cockle or muscle shell, through and under the tempestuous seas." Again, says Sir W. D'Avenant, in his Albovine, 1629:

"He sits like a witch sailing in a sieve."

Again, in Newes from Scotland: Declaring the damnable Life of Doctor Fian a notable Sorcerer, who was burned at Edenbrough in Januarie last, 1591; which Doctor was Register to the Devill, that sundrie Times preached at North Baricke Kirke, to a Number of notorious Witches. With the true Examinations of the said Doctor and Witches, as they uttered them in the Presence of the Scottish King. Discovering how they pretended to bewitch and drowne his Majestie in the Sea comming from Denmarke, with other such wonderful Matters as the like hath not bin heard at anie Time. Published according to the Scottish Copie. Printed for William Wright: and that all they together went to sea, each one in a riddle or cive, and went in the same very substantially with flaggons of wine, making merrie and drinking by the way in the same riddles or cives," &c. Dr. Farmer found the title of this scarce pamphlet in an interleaved copy of Maunsell's Catalogue, &c. 1595, with additions by Archbishop Harsenet and Thomas Baker the Antiquarian. It is almost needless to mention that I have since met with the pamphlet itself. STEEVENS.

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5 And, like a rat without a tail,] It should be remembered,

3 WITCH. And I another.

1 WITCH. I myself have all the other; And the very ports they blow,

All the quarters that they know

(as it was the belief of the times,) that though a witch could assume the form of any animal she pleased, the tail would still be wanting.

The reason given by some of the old writers, for such a deficiency, is, that though the hands and feet, by an easy change, might be converted into the four paws of a beast, there was still no part about a woman which corresponded with the length of tail common to almost all our four-footed creatures. STEEVENS. 6 I'll do, I'll do, and I'll do.

I' the shipman's card.
Look what I have.-

Show me, show me.

Thus do go about, about;] As I cannot help supposing this scene to have been uniformly metrical when our author wrote it, in its present state I suspect it to be clogged with interpolations, or mutilated by omissions.

Want of corresponding rhymes to the foregoing lines, induce me to hint at vacuities which cannot be supplied, and intrusions which (on the bare authority of conjecture) must not be expelled.

Were even the condition of modern transcripts for the stage understood by the public, the frequent accidents by which a poet's meaning is depraved, and his measure vitiated, would need no illustration. STEEVENS.

7 I'll give thee a wind.] This free gift of a wind is to be considered as an act of sisterly friendship, for witches were supposed to sell them. So, in Summer's Last Will and Testament, 1600: in Ireland and in Denmark both,

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"Witches for gold will sell a man a wind,

"Which in the corner of a napkin wrap'd,

"Shall blow him safe unto what coast he will."

Drayton, in his Mooncalf, says the same. It may be hoped, however, that the conduct of our witches did not resemble that of one of their relations, as described in an Appendix to the old translation of Marco Paolo, 1579: "they demanded that he should give them a winde; and he shewed, setting his handes behinde, from whence the wind should come," &c. STEEVENS.

8 And the VERY PORTS they blow,] As the word very is here of no other use than to fill up the verse, it is likely that Shakspeare wrote various, which might be easily mistaken for very, being either negligently read, hastily pronounced, or imperfectly heard. JOHNSON.

The very ports are the exact ports.

Very is used here (as in a

I' the shipman's card 9.

I will drain him dry as hay':
Sleep shall, neither night nor day,
Hang upon his pent-house lid 2;
He shall live a man forbid 3:

thousand instances which might be brought) to express the declaration more emphatically.

Instead of ports, however, I had formerly read points; but erroneously. In ancient language, to blow sometimes means to blow upon. So, in Dumain's Ode in Love's Labour's Lost:

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Air, quoth he, thy cheeks may blow—.”

i. e. blow upon them. We still say, it blows East, or West, without a preposition. STEEVENS.

The substituted word was first given by Sir W. D'Avenant, who, in his alteration of this play, has retained the old, while at the same time he furnished Mr. Pope with the new reading: "I myself have all the other.

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"And then from every port they blow,

From all the points that seamen know." MALONE.

9- the shipman's card] So, in The Microcosmos of John Davies, of Hereford, 4to. 1605:

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"Beside the chiefe windes and collaterall

"(Which are the windes indeed of chiefe regard)
"Seamen observe more, thirtie two in all,

"All which are pointed out upon the carde."

The card is the paper on which the winds are marked under the pilot's needle; or perhaps the sea-chart, so called in our author's age. Thus, in The Loyal Subject, by Beaumont and Fletcher: "The card of goodness in your minds, that shews you "When you sail false."

Again, in Churchyard's Prayse and Reporte of Maister Martyne Forboisher's Voyage to Meta Incognita, &c. 12mo. bl. l. 1578 : "There the generall gaue a speciall card and order to his captaines for the passing of the straites," &c. STEEVENS.

I-dry as hay:] So, Spenser, in his Fairy Queen, b. iii. c. ix. : "But he is old and withered as hay." STEEVENS.

2 Sleep shall, neither night nor day,

Hang upon his PENT-HOUSE LID;] So, in Decker's Gul's Horne-booke: "The two eyes are the glasse windowes, at which light disperses itselfe into every roome, having goodly penthouses of haire to overshaddow them." So, also in David and Goliah, by Michael Drayton :

"His brows, like two steep pent-houses, hung down
"Over his eye-lids."

This poem is inserted in a Collection which Drayton entitles
VOL. XI.

D

Weary sev'n-nights, nine times nine,
Shall he dwindle, peak, and pine:

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The Muses Elysium, which being dedicated to Edward Earl of Dorset, Knight of the most noble order of the Garter," must have been published after 1625, that nobleman having been then invested with the order of the garter. I do not know of any earlier edition of the piece entitled David and Goliah; but another poem which appears in this collection, Moses his Birth and Miracles, had been published originally in 4to. in 1604, under the title of Moyses in A Map of his Miracles. MALONE.

3 He shall live a man FORBID] i. e. as one under a curse, an interdiction. So, afterwards in this play :

"By his own interdiction stands accurs'd."

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So, among the Romans, an outlaw's sentence was, Aquæ et ignis interdictio;" i. e. he was forbid the use of water and fire, which implied the necessity of banishment. THEOBALD.

Mr. Theobald has very justly explained forbid by accursed, but without giving any reason of his interpretation. To bid is originally to pray, as in this Saxon fragment:

He is pir bit bote, &c.

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"He is wise that prays and makes amends."

As to forbid therefore implies to prohibit, in opposition to the word bid in its present sense, it signifies by the same kind of opposition to curse, when it is derived from the same word in its primitive meaning. JOHNSON.

To bid, in the sense of to pray, occurs in the ancient MS. romance of The Sowdon of Babyloyne, p. 78:

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Kinge Charles kneled adown

"To kisse the relikes so goode,
"And badde there an oryson

"To that lorde that deyde on rode."

A forbodin fellow, Scot. signifies an unhappy one.

STEEVENS.

It may be added, that "bitten and Verbieten, in the German, signify to pray and to interdict." S. W.

4 Shall he DWINDLE, &c.] This mischief was supposed to be put in execution by means of a waxen figure, which represented the person who was to be consumed by slow degrees.

So, in Webster's Dutchess of Malfy, 1623:

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"Than wer't my picture fashion'd out of wax,
"Stuck with a magick needle, and then buried
"In some foul dunghill."

So Holinshed, speaking of the witchcraft practised to destroy King Duffe:

found one of the witches roasting upon a wooden broch

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