p. 100.

p. 101.

"

p. 102.

the passage would be required, had not the reading sug-
gested by Theobald, “the blaze of youth," been generally
adopted. But had the Countess's speech closed with
'youth,' there. would have been no thought of change;
and nothing is more common with Shakespeare than the
expression of one thought by two metaphors.

"a day of season :
"That is," says Henley,
"of uninterrupted rain.
The word is still used
in the same sense in Virginia." But the King says noth-
ing of rain; he speaks of sunshine and hail at once as a
combination which is not of season, i. e., unseasonable.
Monck Mason, with some plausi-

"Our own love":

bility, proposed to read "our old love."

66— O Nature, cesse :- an old form of cease.'

6

The last that ere I took her leave," &c. : — that is, "the last time ere I took leave of her.' Rowe read "ere she took her leave," and Mr. Collier's folio of 1632 reads, "The last time ere she took her leave at Court.” "1 "I stood ingag'd". i. e., pledged to the lady by receiving her gage. This idea is better conveyed by the original orthography, which is here retained, than by reading engaged,' with most modern editors. Malone, considering in' as negative, supposed “ingag'd” to mean, unengaged, free.

66

the tinct and multiplying medicine : - Here 'tinct' is used for tincture;' and the allusion is to the transmuting fluid sought by alchemists.

p. 103. "My fore-past proofs," &c. :- This passage is one of many in this play which seem obscure, but which a little

p. 104.

close attention will soon make clear. In both vanity'
and vain' the idea of futility is conveyed.

"Enter the Astringer": - The folio has "Enter a Gentleman;" but what he says shows that he is the Gentle Astringer of the first Scene of this Act.

"—and towl [him]": - that is, whip him up and
down the fair. Towling, as whipping horses up and
down a fair was called, was a common amusement of mis-
chievous boys. See Halliwell's Dic. of Arch. and Provin.
Words. It has been, hitherto, most strangely taken for
granted that "toule," as the word is printed in the origi-
nal and the succeeding folios, is a misprint for
and upon that assumption a world of comment and con-
jectural emendation, which it is not necessary to notice,
has been based, --- vainly, of course. The disgust of the

toll;'

p. 104.

P. 105.

p. 106.

p. 108.

p. 110.

whimsical old courtier characteristically extends itself to sons-in-law in general; and he proposes to buy one at a fair, and subject him to the discipline of a fair, which he feels inclined to administer to Bertram, whom he can only cast off. The first folio omits him,' which is supplied in

the second.

66

for wives are monsters," &c. :

The original has "fir wives," &c., an easy misprint. Tyrwhitt proposed since,' and was generally followed, until Mr. Collier found for' in Lord Ellesmere's corrected folio.

"Come hither, Count":- Mr. Collier's folio of 1632 has county,' which perfects the line, and which, it is not improbable, was Shakespeare's word. See Note on "a goodly count-confect." Much Ado about Nothing, Act IV. Sc. 1.

" a common gamester -The sense of gamester' here (a common one, of old) appears more clearly in the question addressed by Lysimachus to Mariana in the Bawd's house. Pericles, Act IV. Sc. 6. :

"Were you a gamester at five or at seven?"

66

and 'tis it":— The original has here, and elsewhere, hit," which has hitherto been improperly mistaken for a misprint either for 'his' or 'it.' But it is a remnant of pure Anglo Saxon, in which the neuter personal pronoun was hit, the masculine being he, and the feminine heo. Hit lingered long in our language, and, as an old form, has even some claim to be retained in the text.

66

Methought you said ": :—"The poet has here forgot himself," remarks cross-examining Blackstone, “Diana has said no such thing."

66

Her infinite cunning" :- The original has the manifest corruption "Her infuite comming.' This very happy and ingenious emendation was suggested by Mr. William Sidney Walker, and was several years after found in Mr. Collier's folio of 1632. 66 Modern "here means youth

ful

66

a sense akin to that which it now bears.

but thou art too fine":- i. e., too subtle, too artful. Mr. Collier chops this speech into limping verse: it is prose in the original.

"Is there no exorcist": — Shakespeare and his contemporaries frequently use this word to mean one who raises spirits instead of one who lays them.

"And are by me : which Rowe corrected.

- The original has "And is,"

VOL. V.

J

p. 111.

"The King's a beggar": -The rhythm and the style of this epilogue afford some ground for doubt that it was written by Shakespeare.

"All is well ended if this suit be won,

That you express content,"

is not in the manner of Shakespeare, but rather in that of the author of the Epilogue to the Tempest. See Note on that Epilogue, and on the speech of Time, as Chorus, The Winter's Tale, Act IV.

TWELFTH NIGHT; OR, WHAT YOU WILL.

(147)

Twelfth Night occupies twenty-one pages in the folio of 1623; viz., from p. 255 to p. 275, inclusive, in the division of Comedies. It is there divided into Acts and Scenes, but has no list of Dramatis Personæ.