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Are drown'd and loft in his calamities.-
I have but little gold of late, brave Timon,
The want whereof doth daily make revolt
In my penurious hand: I have heard, and griev'd,
How curfed Athens, mindlefs of thy worth,

Forgetting thy great deeds, when neighbour states,
But for thy fword and fortune, trod upon them,-
TIM. I pr'ythee beat thy drum, and get thee

gone.

ALCIB. I am thy friend, and pity thee, dear Ti

mon.

TIM. How doft thou pity him, whom thou doft trouble?

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ALCIB. When I have laid proud Athens on a

heap,

TIM. Warr'ft thou 'gainst Athens?

ALCIB.

Ay, Timon, and have caufe.

TIM. The gods confound them all i' thy con

queft; and

Thee after, when thou haft conquer'd!

ALCIB.

TIM. That,

Why me, Timon?

By killing villains, thou waft born to conquer
My country.

For another print of this tub, fee Holmes's Academy of Armory.

6

DOUCE

trod upon them, ] Sir T. Hanmer reads-had trod upo, them. Shakspeare was not thus minutely accurate. MALONE.

Put up thy gold; Go on,-here's gold,-go on;
Be as a planetary plague, when Jove
Will o'er fome high-vic'd city hang his poison
In the fick air: Let not thy fword (kip one:
Pity not honour'd age for his white beard,
He's an ufurer: Strike me the counterfeit matron;
It is her habit only that is honest,

Herself's a bawd: Let not the virgin's cheek

Make foft thy trenchant fword; for those milk

paps,

That through the window-bars bore at men's eyes,*

7 Be as a planetary plague, when Jove

Will o'er fome high-vic'd city, hang his poifon

In the fick air: This is wonderfully fublime and pi&uresque.
WARBURTON.

We meet with the fame image again in King Richard 11:

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or fuppofe

"Devouring peftilence hangs in our air.”

MALONE.

That through the window-bars bore at men's eyes, The virgin that fhews her bofom through the lattice of her chamber.

JOHNSON.

Dr. Johnfon's explanation is almoft confirmed by the following paffage in Cymbeline:

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Shakspeare at the fame time might aim a ftroke at this indecency in the wantons of his own time, which is also animadverted on by feveral contemporary dramatifts. So, in the ancient interlude of The repentance of Marie Magdalene, 1567:

"Your garment must be worne alway,

"That your white pappes may be feene if you may.
"If young gentlemen may fee your white fkin,

"It will allure them to love, and foon bring them in.
"Both damfels and wives ufe many fuch feates.
"I know them that will lay out their faire teates."
All this is addreffed to Mary Magdalen.

To the fame purpose, Jovius Pontanus :
"Nam quid ladeolos finus, & ipfas
"Præ te fers fine linteo papillas ?
"Hoc eft dicere, pofce, pofce, trado,
"Hoc eft ad Venerem vocare amantes '

STEEVENS.

Are not within the leaf of pity writ,

Set them down horrible traitors: Spare not the

babe,

Our author has again the fame kind of imagery in his Lover's Complaint:

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fpite of heaven's fell rage,

"Some beauty peep'd through lattice of fear'd age."

I do not believe any particular fatire was here intended. Lady Suffolk, Lady Somerfet, and many of the celebrated beauties of the time of James I., are thus reprefented in their pictures; nor were they, I imagine, thought more reprehenfible than the ladies of the present day, who from the fame extravagant pursuit of what is called fafkion, run into an oppofite extreme. MALONE.

I have not hitherto met with any ancient portrait of a modeft English woman, in which the papillæ exerta were exhibited as described on the present occafion by Shakspeare; for he alludes not only to what he has called in his celebrated fong, the hills of fnow," but to the "pinks that grow" upon their summits. See Vol. VI. p. 141, n. 5. STEEVENS.

I believe we should read nearly thus:
nor thofe milk-paps,

That through the widow's barb hore at men's eyes,
Are not within the leaf of pity writ.

The use of the doubled negative is fo common in Shakspeare, that it is unneceffary to fupport it by inftances. The barbe, I believe was a kind of veil. Creffida, in Chaucer, who appears as a widow, is defcribed as wearing a barbe, Troilus and Creffida, Book II. v. 110. in which place Caxton's edition (as I learn from the Gloffary) readswimple, which certainly fignifies a veil, and was probably fubftituted as a synonymous word for habe, the more autiquated reading of the manufcripts. Unbarbed is ufed by Shakspeare for uncovered, in Coriolanus, A& III. fc. v:

"Muft I go fhew them my unbarbed sconce?"

See alfo Leland's Colle&anea, Vol. V. p. 317, new edit. where the ladies, mourning at the funeral of Queen Mary, are mentioned as having their barbes above their chinnes. TYR WHITT.

The folios read-barne, and not improperly; en is a common termination of a Saxon plural, which we in numberless inflances retain to this day., The word is to be explained by bars, but fhould not bave been removed from the text. RITSON.

? Set them down— ] Old copy, in defiance of metre,—

But fet them down. STREVENS.

Whofe dimpled fmiles from fools exhauft their

mercy;

9

Think it a bastard," whom the oracle

Hath doubtfully pronounc'd thy throat' fhall cut, And mince it fans remorfe: Swear against objects; Put armour on thine ears, and on thine eyes; Whose proof, nor yells of mothers, maids, nor babes,

Nor fight of priests in holy vestments bleeding, Shall pierce a jot. There's gold to pay thy fol

diers:

Make large confufion; and, thy fury spent,
Confounded be thyfelf! Speak not, be gone.
ALCIB. Haft thou gold yet? I'll take the gold
thou giv'ft me,

Not all thy counsel.

9

TIM. Doft thou, or doft thou not, heaven's curfe upon thee!

PHR. AND TYM. Give us fome gold, good Timon Haft thou more?

exhauft their mercy; ] For exhauft, Sir T. Hamner, and after him Dr. Warburton, read-extort; but exhauft here fignifies literally to draw forth. JOHNSON.

2

3

baftard,] An allufion to the tale of Oedipus.

thy throat -] Old copy-the throat.

M. Pope. MALONE.

Swear against objects; ] Sir Thomas Hanmer reads:
·'gainst all objects:

So, in our author's 152d Sonnet:

JOHNSON. Corrected by

Or made them fwear against the thing they fee."

STEEVENS.

Perhaps objeds is here ufed provincially for abjects. FARMER.

Against objects is, againft objects of charity and compaffion. in Troilus and Creffida, Ulyffes fays:

"For Hedor, in his blaze of wrath, fubfcribes

"To tender objects." M. MASON.

TIM. Enough to make a whore forfwear her

trade,

And to make whores, a bawd. 5 Hold up, you fluts.
Your aprons mountant: You are not oathable,-
Although, I know, you'll fwear, terribly fwear,
Into strong fhudders, and to heavenly agues,
The immortal gods that hear you, fpare your
oaths,

6

I'll truft to your conditions: Be whores ftill;
And he whofe pious breath feeks to convert you,
Be ftrong in whore, allure him, burn him up ;
Let your close fire predominate his smoke,
And be no turncoats: Yet may your pains, fix
months,

9

8

Be quite contrary: And thatch your poor thin

roofs 2

5 And to make whores, a bawd.] That is, enough to make a whore leave whoring, and a bawd leave making whores.

JOHNSON.

6 The immortal gods that hear you,] The fame thought is found in Antony and Cleopatra, A& I. fc. iii:

66

Though you with fwearing shake the throned gods." Again, in The Winter's Tale:

66

Though you would feek to unfphere the ftars with oaths."

STEEVENS.

I'll trust to your conditions:] You need not fwear to continue whores, I will truft to your inclinations. JOHNSON.

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And be no turncoats:] By an old ftatute, thofe women who lived in a fate of proftitution, were, among other articles concerning their drefs, enjoined to wear their garments, with the wrong-fide outward, on pain of forfeiting them. Perbaps there is in this paffage a reference to it. HENLEY.

I do not perceive how this explanation of- turncoat, will accord with Timon's train of reafoning; yet the antiquary may perhaps derive fatisfaction from that which affords no affiftance to the com. mentator. STEEVENS.

9 Tet may your pains, fix months,

Be quite contrary:] This is obfcure, partly from the ambiguity

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