網頁圖片
PDF
ePub 版

CAM. Sent by the king your father To greet him, and to give him comforts. Sir, The manner of your bearing towards him, with What you, as from your father, shall deliver, Things known betwixt us three, I'll write you down: The which shall point you forth at every sitting, What you must say°; that he shall not perceive, But that you have your father's bosom there, And speak his very heart.

FLO.

There is some sap in this '.

Сам.

I am bound to you:

A course more promising

Than a wild dedication of yourselves

To unpath'd waters, undream'd shores; most cer

tain,

To miseries enough: no hope to help you;
But, as you shake off one, to take another 8:
Nothing so certain as your anchors; who
Do their best office, if they can but stay you
Where you'll be loth to be: Besides, you know,
Prosperity's the very bond of love;

6 Things known betwixt us three, I'll write you down: The which shall point you forth, at EVERY SITTING,

What you must say ;] Every sitting, says Mr. Theobald, methinks, gives but a very poor idea. But a poor idea is better than none; which it comes to when he has altered it to every fitting. The truth is, the common reading is very expressive; and means, at every audience you shall have of the king and council. The council-days being, in our author's time, called in common speech the sittings. WARBurton.

Howel, in one of his letters, says: "My lord president hopes to be at the next sitting in York." FARMER.

7 There is some SAP IN THIS.] So, in Antony and Cleopatra: "There's sap in't yet." STEEvens.

8 miseries

[ocr errors]

But, as you shake off one, to take another:] So, in Cymbeline :

66

to shift his being,

"Is to exchange one misery with another.". STEEVENS. VOL. XIV.

2 C

Whose fresh complexion and whose heart together

Affliction alters.

PER.

One of these is true:

I think, affliction may subdue the cheek,
But not take in the mind 9.

Сам.

Yea, say you so?

There shall not, at your father's house, these seven

years,

Be born another such.

FLO.

My good Camillo,

She is as forward of her breeding, as

She is i' the rear our birth.

CAM.

I cannot say, 'tis pity

She lacks instructions; for she seems a mistress To most that teach.

PER.

Your pardon, sir, for this;

1

I'll blush you thanks 1.

FLO. My prettiest Perdita.➖➖

But, O, the thorns we stand upon!-Camillo,-
Preserver of my father, now of me;

The medicine of our house!-how shall we do?
We are not furnish'd like Bohemia's son ;

Nor shall appear in Sicilia

CAM.

My lord,

Fear none of this: I think, you know, my fortunes

9 But not TAKE IN the mind.] To take in anciently meant to conquer, to get the better of. So, in Antony and Cleopatra "He could so quickly cut th' Ionian seas,

"And take in Toryne."

Mr. Henley, however, supposes that to take in, in the present instance, is simply to include or comprehend. STEevens. 'Your pardon, sir, for this;

I'll blush you thanks.] Perhaps this passage should be råther pointed thus:

"Your pardon, sir; for this

"I'll blush you thanks." MAlone.

In the old copy it is pointed thus:

"Your pardon, for this." Boswell.

Do all lie there: it shall be so my care
To have you royally appointed, as if
The scene you play, were mine.
That you may know you shall not

For instance, sir, want,-one word. [They talk aside.

Enter AUTOLYCUS.

AUT. Ha, ha! what a fool Honesty is! and Trust, his sworn brother, a very simple gentleman! I have sold all my trumpery; not a counterfeit stone, not a riband, glass, pomander, brooch, table-book, ballad, knife, tape, glove, shoe-tye, bracelet, hornring, to keep my pack from fasting: they throng who should buy first; as if my trinkets had been hallowed, and brought a benediction to the buyer: by which means, I saw whose purse was best in picture; and, what I saw, to my good use, I remembered. My clown (who wants but something to be a reasonable man,) grew so in love with the

2

POMANDER,] A pomander was a little ball made of perfumes, and worn in the pocket, or about the neck, to prevent infection in times of plague. In a tract intituled, Certain necessary Directions, as well for curing the Plague, as for preventing Infection, printed 1636, there are directions for making two sorts of pomanders, one for the rich, and another for the poor. GREY.

In Lingua, or a Combat of the Tongue, &c. 1607, is the following receipt given, Act. IV. Sc. III.:

"Your only way to make a good pomander is this: Take an ounce of the purest garden mould, cleansed and steeped seven days in change of motherless rose-water. Then take the best labdanum, benjoin, both storaxes, amber-gris and civet and musk. Incorporate them together, and work them into what form you please. This, if your breath be not too valiant, will make you smell as sweet as my lady's dog."

The speaker represents Odor. STEEVENS.

Other receipts for making pomander may be found in Plat's Delightes for Ladies to adorne their Persons, &c. 1611, and in The accomplisht Lady's Delight, 1675. They all differ. Douce. as if my trinkets had been HALLOWED,] This alludes to beads often sold by the Romanists, as made particularly efficacious by the touch of some relick. JOHNSON.

3

-

5

wenches' song, that he would not stir his pettitoes, till he had both tune and words; which so drew the rest of the herd to me, that all their other senses stuck in ears you might have pinched a placket, it was senseless; 'twas nothing, to geld a codpiece of a purse; I would have filed keys off, that hung in chains no hearing, no feeling, but my sir's song, and admiring the nothing of it. So that, in this time of lethargy, I picked and cut most of their festival purses: and had not the old man come in with a whoobub against his daughter and the king's son, and scared my choughs from the chaff, I had not left a purse alive in the whole army.

[CAMILLO, FLORizel, and Perdita, come forward.

CAM. Nay, but my letters by this means being there

So soon as you arrive, shall clear that doubt.

FLO. And those that you'll procure from king

[blocks in formation]

5

all their other senses stuck IN EARS:] Read:-" stuck in their ears." M. MASON.

6

a PLACKET,] Placket is properly the opening in a woman's petticoat. It is here figuratively used, as perhaps in King Lear: " Keep thy hand out of plackets." This subject, however, may receive further illustration from Skialetheia, a collection of Epigrams, &c. 1598. Epig. 32:

"Wanton young Lais hath a pretty note
"Whose burthen is-Pinch not my petticoate:
"Not that she feares close nips, for by the rood,
"A privy pleasing nip will cheare her blood :
"But she which longs to tast of pleasure's cup,

[ocr errors]

In nipping would her petticoate weare up."

STEEVENS.

We'll make an instrument of this; omit
Nothing, may give us aid.

AUT. If they have overheard me now, hanging.

-why [Aside.

CAM. How now, good fellow? Why shakest thou so? Fear not, man; here's no harm intended to thee.

AUT. I am a poor fellow, sir.

CAM. Why, be so still; here's nobody will steal that from thee: Yet, for the outside of thy poverty, we must make an exchange: therefore, discase thee instantly, (thou must think, there's necessity in't,) and change garments with this gentleman: Though the pennyworth, on his side, be the worst, yet hold thee, there's some boot 7.

AUT. I am a poor fellow, sir :-I know ye well enough. [Aside. CAM. Nay, pr'ythee, dispatch: the gentleman is half flayed already.

AUT. Are you in earnest, sir?-I smell the trick of it.

FLO. Dispatch, I pr'ythee.

[Aside.

AUT. Indeed, I have had earnest; but I cannot with conscience take it.

CAM. Unbuckle, unbuckle.

[FLO. and AUTOL. exchange garments. Fortunate mistress,-let my prophecy

Come home to you!-you must retire yourself

7

-

[ocr errors]

boot.] That is, something over and above, or, as we now say, something to boot. JOHNSON.

8 is half FLAYED already.] I suppose Camillo means to say no more, than that Florizel is half stripped already.

He may however at the same time intend to insinuate that his friend is either half covered with vermin already, or half excoriated by their bite. In Coriolanus the verb is used in its original sense, and was anciently written to flea, though flay seems more proper:

66

66

Who's yonder,

That does appear as he were flead?" MALONE.

« 上一頁繼續 »