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ANT. This fame is fhe, and I do give you her.
CLAUD. Why, then fhe's mine: Sweet, let me
fee your face.

LEON. No, that you fhall not, till you take her
hand

Before this friar, and fwear to marry her.

CLAUD. Give me your hand before this holy friar;

I am your husband, if you like of me.

HERO. And when I liv'd, I was your other wife:

[Unmasking. And when you lov'd, you were my other husband. CLAUD. Another Hero?

HERO.

Nothing certainer:

One Hero died defil'd; but I do live,

And, furely as I live, I am a maid.

D. PEDRO. The former Hero! Hero that is dead!
LEON. She died, my lord, but whiles her flander

liv'd.

FRIAR. All this amazement can I qualify;
When, after that the holy rites are ended,
I'll tell you largely of fair Hero's death :·
Mean time, let wonder feem familiar,
And to the chapel let us prefently.

BENE. Soft and fair, friar.-Which is Beatrice?
BEAT. I answer to that name; [ Unmasking] What
is your will?

BENE. Do not you love me?

4 Ant. This fame, &c.] This fpeech is in the old copies given to Leonato. Mr. Theobald firft affigned it to the right owner. Leonato has in a former part of this fcene told Antonio, that he

must be father to his brother's daughter, and give her to young Claudio," MALONE,

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BEAT.

No, no more than reafon. ' BENE. Why, then your uncle, and the prince, and Claudio,

Fave been deceived; for they fwore you did."
BEAT. Do not you love me?

BENE.

No, no more than reason. 7

BEAT. Why, then my cousin, Margaret, and

Urfula,

Are much deceiv'd; for they did fwear, you did. BENE. They fwore that you were almost fick for

me.

BEAT. They swore that you were well-nigh dead for me.

BENE. 'Tis no fuch matter:-Then, you do not love me?

BEAT. No, truly, but in friendly recompence. LEON. Come, coufin, I am fure you love the gentleman.

CLAUD. And I'll be fworn upon't, that he loves
her;

For here's a paper, written in his hand,
A halting fonnet of his own pure brain,
Fashion'd to Beatrice.

HERO.

And here's another,

No, no more than reafon.] The old copies, injuriously to metre, read Why, no c. It fhould feem that the compofitor's eye had caught the here unneceffary adverb from the following speech. STEEVENS.

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for they wore you did.] For, which both the sense and metre require, 'was inferted by Sir Thomas Hanmer. So, below: "Are much deceiv'd; for they did fwear you did."

MALONE,

7 No, no more than reafon.] Here again the metre, in "the old copies, is overloaded by reading-Troth, no, no more, &c.

STEEVENS.

Writ in my coufin's hand, ftolen from her pocket, Containing her affection unto Benedick.

BENE. A miracle! here's our own hands against our hearts! Come, I will have thee; but, by this light, I take thee for pity.

BEAT. I would not deny you;-but, by this good day, I yield upon great perfuafion; and, partly, to fave your life, for I was told you were in a confumption.

BENE. Peace, I will ftop your mouth. 7

[Kiffing her. D. PEDRO. How doft thou, Benedick the mar

ried man?

BENE. I'll tell thee what, prince, a college of wit-crackers cannot flout me out of my humour:

6 I would not deny you; &c.] Mr. Theobald fays, is not this mock-reafoning? She would not deny him, but that he yields upon great perfuafion. In changing the negative, I make no doubt but I have retrieved the poet's humour and fo changes not into yet. But is not this a mock-critic? who could not fee that the plain obvious fenfe of the common reading was this, I cannot find in my heart to deny you, but for all that I yield, after having flood out great perfuafions to fubmiffion. He had faid I take thee for pity, the replies I would not deny thee, i. e. I take thee for pity too but as I live, I am won to this compliance by importunity of friends. Mr. Theobald, by altering not to yet, makes it fuppofed that he had been importunate, and that he had often denied, which was not the cafe. WARBURTON.

7 Bene. Peace, I will stop your mouth. [Kiffing her.] In former copies :

Leon, Peace, I will flop your mouth.

What can Leonato mean by this? Nay, pray, peace, niece! don't keep up this obftinacy of profeffion, for I have proofs to flop your mouth." The ingenious Dr. Thirlby agreed with me, that this ought to be given to Benedick, who, upon faying it, kifles Beatrice; and this being done before the whole company, how natural is the reply which the prince makes upon it? How doft thou, Benedick the married man? Befides, this mode of fpeech, preparatory to a falute, is familiar to our poet in common with other ftage-writers. THEOBALD.

Doft thou think, I care for a fatire, or an epigram? No: if a man will be beaten with brains, he fhall wear nothing handsome about him: In brief, fince I do purpose to marry, I will think nothing to any purpofe that the world can fay against it; and therefore never flout at me for what I have faid against it; for man is a giddy thing, and this is my conclufion. For thy part, Claudio, I did think to have beaten thee; but in that thou art like to be my kinfman, live unbruis'd, and love my coufin,

CLAUD. I had well hoped, thou wouldst have denied Beatrice, that I might have 'cudgell'd thee out of thy fingle life, to make thee a double dealer; which, out of question, thou wilt be, if my coufin do not look exceeding narrowly to thee..

BENE. Come, come, we are friends :-let's have a dance ere we are married, that we may lighten our own hearts, and our wives' heels.

LEON. We'll have dancing afterwards.

BENE. First, o' my word; therefore, play, mufick.

Prince, thou art fad; get thee a wife, get thee a wife there is no ftaff more reverend than one tipp'd with horn. 9

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in that i. e. because. So, Hooker : Things are preached not in that they are taught, but in that they are publifhed." STEEVENS.

9 -no staff more reverend than one tipp'd with horn.] This paffage may admit of fome explanation that I am unable to furnish. By accident I loft feveral inftances I had collected for the purpose of throwing light on it. The following, however, may affift the

future commentator.

MS. Sloan, 1691.

THAT A FELON MAY WAGE BATTAILE, WITH THE

ORDER THEREOF.

by order of the lawe both the parties muft at their owne charge be armed withoute any yron or long armoure, and theire

Enter a Meffenger.

MESS. My lord, your brother John is ta'en in flight,

And brought with armed men back to Meffina.

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BENE. Think not on him till to-morrow; I'll devife thee brave punifliments for him.-Strike up, pipers.

[Dance. [Exeunt.

heades bare, and bare-handed and bare-footed, every one of them having a bafton horned at ech ende, of one length," &c. Again, in Stowe's Chronicle, edit. 1615, p. 669: " bafton a staffe of an elle long, made taper-wife, tipt with horne, &c. was borne after him."

STEEVENS.

his

Again, Britton, Pleas of the Crown, c. xxvii. f. 18. "Next let them go to combat armed without iron and without linnen armour, their heads uncovered and their hands naked, and on foot, with two baftons tipped with horn of equal length, and each of them a target of four corners, without any other armour, whereby any of them may annoy the other; and if either of them have any other weapon concealed about him, and therewith annoy his adveifary, let it be done as shall be mentioned amongst combats in a plea of land." REED.

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Mr. Steevens's explanation is undoubtedly the true one. The allufion is certainly to the ancient trial by wager of battel, in fuits both criminal and civil. The quotation above given recites the form in the former cafe, viz. an appeal of felony. The practice was nearly fimilar in civil cafes, upon iffue joined in a writ of right. Of the laft tria! of this kind in England, (which was in the thirteenth year of Queen Elizabeth,) our author might have read a particular account in Stowe's Annales. Henry Nailor, master of defence, was champion for the demandants, Simon Low and John Kyme; and George Thorne for the tenant, (or defendant,) Thomas Paramoure. The combat was appointed to be fought in Tuthill-fields, and the Judges of the Common Pleas and Serjeants at law attended. But a compromife was entered into between the parties, the evening before the appointed day, and they only went through the forms, for the greater fecurity of the tenant. Among other ceremonies Stowe mentions, that the gauntlet that was caft down by George Thorne was borne before the fayd Nailor, in his paffage through London, upon a fword's point, and his bafton (a

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