To frown upon the enrag'd Northumberland! TRA. This ftrained paffion" doth you wrong, my lord. and in Timon of Athens. See alfo the Epiftle prefixed to Spenfer's Shepherd's Calender, 1579: as thinking them fitteft for the ruftical rudenefs of fhepheards, either for that their rough found would make his rimes more ragged, and ruftical," &c. The modern editors of Spenfer might here fubftitute the word rugged with just as much propriety as it has been substituted in the prefent paffage, or in that in As you like it. See Vol. VIII. p. 59, n.7. Again, in The Rape of Lucrece: "Thy fecret pleasure turns to open shame, Thy fmoothing titles to a ragged name." Again, in our poet's eighth Sonnet : "Then let not Winter's ragged hand deface Again, in the play before us : MALONE. "A ragged and fore-ftall'd remiffion." And darknefs be the burier of the dead!] The conclufion of this noble speech is extremely ftriking. There is no need to fuppofe it exactly philofophical; darkness, in poetry, may be abfence of eyes, as well as privation of light. Yet we may remark, that by an ancient opinion it has been held, that if the human race, for whom the world was made, were extirpated, the whole fyftem of fublunary nature would ceafe. JOHNSON. 7 This ftrained paffion-] This line, in the quarto, where alone it is found, is given to Umfrevile, who, as Mr. Steevens has obferved, is fpoken of in this very fcene as abfent. It was on this ground probably rejected by the player-editors. It is now, on the fuggeftion of Mr. Steevens, attributed to Travers, who is prefent, and yet (as that gentleman has remarked) “is made to fay nothing on this interefting occafion." MALONE. BARD. Sweet earl, divorce not wisdom from your honour. MOR. The lives of all your loving complices Lean on your health; the which, if you give o'er To ftormy paffion, muft perforce decay. 8 You caft the event of war, my noble lord, And fumm'd the account of chance, before you faid, Let us make head. It was your prefurmife, 2 You caft the event of war, &c.] The fourteen lines, from hence to Bardolph's next speech, are not to be found in the first editions, till that in the folio of 1623. A very great number of other lines in this play were inferted after the first edition in like manner, but of fuch spirit and mastery generally, that the insertions are plainly by Shakspeare himself. POPE. To this note I have nothing to add, but that the editor speaks of more editions than I believe him to have seen, there having been but one edition yet discovered by me that precedes the firit folio. JOHNSON. 9 in the dole of blows-] The dole of blows is the diftribution of blows. Dole originally fignified the portion of alms (confifting either of meat or money) that was given away at the door of a nobleman. See Vol. XI. p. 256, n. 1. You knew, he walk'd o'er perils, on an edge, STEEVENS. More likely to fall in, than to get o'er:] So, in King Henry IV. Part I: "As full of peril and adventurous spirit, "As to o'erwalk a current roaring loud, "On the unsteadfast footing of a fpear." MALONE. You were advis'd, his flesh was capable-] i. e. you knew. So, in The Two Gentlemen of Verona: "How fhall I doat on her with more advice-." i. e. on further knowledge. MALONE. ་ Of wounds, and scars; and that his forward fpirit BARD. We all, that are engaged to this loss,3 MOR. 'Tis more than time: And, my most noble lord, I hear for certain, and do fpeak the truth, Thus alfo, Thomas Twyne, the continuator of Phaer's tranflation of Virgil, 1584, for haud infcius, has advis'd: "He fpake: and ftrait the fword advifde into his throat receives." STEEVENS. 3 We all, that are engaged to this lofs,] We have a fimilar phraseology in the preceding play : "Hath a more worthy intereft to the ftate, MALONE. The gentle &c.] Thefe one-and-twenty lines were added fince the first edition. JoHNSON. This and the following twenty lines are not found in the quarto, 1600, either from fome inadvertence of the transcriber or compofitor, or from the printer not having been able to procure a perfect copy. They first appeared in the folio, 1623; but it is manifeft that they were written at the same time with the rest of the play, Northumberland's answer referring to them. MALONE. My lord your fon had only but the corps, Suppos'd fincere and holy in his thoughts, NORTH. I knew of this before; but, to speak truth, This prefent grief had wip'd it from my mind. Get pofts, and letters, and make friends with speed; 5 Tells them, he doth beftride a bleeding land,] That is, ftands over his country to defend her as the lies bleeding on the ground. So Falstaff before fays to the Prince, If thou see me down, Hal, and beftride me, fo; it is an office of friendship. JOHNSON. And more, and lefs,] More and less mean greater and lefs. So, in Macbeth : "Both more and less have given him the revolt." STEEVENS. SCENE II. London. A Street. Enter Sir JOHN FALSTAFF, with his Page bearing his Sword and Buckler. FAL. Sirrah, you giant, what fays the doctor to my water?? PAGE. He faid, fir, the water itself was a good healthy water: but, for the party that owed it, he might have more diseases than he knew for. 7 what fays the doctor to my water?] The method of inveftigating diseases by the inspection of urine only, was once fo much the fashion, that Linacre, the founder of the College of Phyficians, formed a ftatute to restrain apothecaries from carrying the water of their patients to a doctor, and afterwards giving medicines, in confequence of the opinions they received concerning it. This ftatute was, foon after, followed by another, which forbade the doctors themselves to pronounce on any diforder from fuch an uncertain diagnostic. John Day, the author of a comedy called Law Tricks, or Who would have thought it? 1608, defcribes an apothecary thus: "his house is fet round with patients twice or thrice a day, and because they'll be fure not to want drink, every one brings his own water in an urinal with him." Again, in Beaumont and Fletcher's Scornful Lady: It will scarcely be believed hereafter, that in the years 1775 and 1776, a German, who had been a fervant in a public riding-school, (from which he was discharged for infufficiency,) revived this exploded practice of water-cafting. After he had amply increased the bills of mortality, and been publicly hung up to the ridicule of those who had too much sense to confult him, as a monument of the folly of his patients, he retired with a princely fortune, and perhaps is now indulging a hearty laugh at the expence of English credulity. STEEVENS. |