COR. And they are often tarr'd over with the furgery of our sheep; And would you have us kifs tar? The courtier's hands are perfumed with civet. TOUCH. Moft fhallow man! Thou worms-meat, in respect of a good piece of flesh: Indeed!-Learn of the wife, and perpend: Civet is of a baser birth than tar; the very uncleanly flux of a cat. Mend the inftance, fhepherd. COR. You have too courtly a wit for me; I'll reft. TOUCH. Wilt thou reft damn'd? God help thee, fhallow man! God make incifion in thee! thou art raw." make incifion in thee!] To make incifion was a proverbial expreffion then in vogue for, to make to understand. So, in Beaumont and Fletcher's Humorous Lieutenant: 66 O excellent king, "Thus he begins, thou life and light of creatures, i. e. to make him understand what he would be at. WARBURTON. Till I read Dr. Warburton's note, I thought the allufion had been to that common expreffion, of cutting fuch a one for the fimples; and I must own, after confulting the paffage in the Humorous Lieutenant, I have no reason to alter my fuppofition. The editors of Beaumont and Fletcher declare the phrafe to be unintelligible in that as well as in another play where it is introduced. I find the fame expreffion in Monfieur Thomas: "We'll bear the burthen: proceed to incifion, fidler." STEEVENS. I believe that Steevens has explained this paffage juftly, and am certain that Warburton has entirely mistaken the meaning of that which he has quoted from The Humourous Lieutenant, which plainly alludes to the practice of the young gallants of the time, who ufed to cut themselves in fuch a manner as to make their blood flow, in order to fhow their paffion for their miftreffes, by drinking their healths, or writing verfes to them in blood. For a more full explanation of this cuftom, fee a note on Love's Labour's Loft, Act IV. fc. iii: M. MASON. 9-thou art raw.] i. e. thou art ignorant; unexperienced. DUKE S. If that you were the good fir Rowland's fon, As you have whisper'd faithfully, you were; So, in the Sonnet introduced into Love's Labour's Loft: "All unfeen 'gan paffage find." STEEVENS. Again, in Measure for Measure: "To be imprifon'd in the viewless winds." MALONE. 5 Though thou the waters warp,] The furface of waters, so long as they remain unfrozen, is apparently a perfect plane; whereas, when they are, this furface deviates from its exact flatnefs, or warps. This is remarkable in fmall ponds, the furface of which when frozen, forms a regular concave; the ice on the fides rifing higher than that in the middle. KENRICK. To warp was probably in Shakspeare's time, a colloquial word, which conveyed no diftant allufion to any thing elfe, phyfical or mechanical. To warp is to turn, and to turn is to change: when milk is changed by curdling, we now fay it is turned: when water is changed or turned by froft, Shakspeare fays, it is curdled. To be warp'd is only to be changed from its natural ftate. JOHNSON. Dr. Johnfon is certainly right. So, in Cynthia's Revels, of Ben Jonfon. "I know not, he's grown out of his garb a-late, he's warp'd.-And fo, methinks too, he is much converted." Thus the mole is called the mould-warp, because it changes the appearance of the furface of the earth. Again, in The Winter's Tale, Act I: 66 My favour here begins to warp." Dr. Farmer fuppofes warp'd to mean the fame as curdled, and adds that a fimilar idea occurs in Timon: "That curdled by the froft," &c. STEEVENS. Among a collection of Saxon adages in Hickes's Thefaurus, Vol. I. p. 221, the fucceeding appears: pinten rceal zeþeonpan peden, winter shall warp water. So that Shakspeare's expreffion was anciently proverbial. It should be remarked, that among the numerous examples in Manning's excellent edition of Lye's Dictionary, there is no inftance of peonpan or zepeoppan, implying to freeze, bend, turn, or curdle, though it is a verb of very extenfive fignification. Probably this word ftill retains a fimilar fenfe in the Northern part of the Ifland, for in a Scottish parody on Dr. Percy's elegant ballad, beginning, "O Nancy, wilt thou go with me,' And as mine eye doth his effigies witness That lov'd your father: The refidue of your fortune, Go to my cave and tell me.-Good old man, Thou art right welcome as thy mafter is :Support him by the arm.-Give me your hand, And let me all your fortunes understand. [Exeunt. I find the verfe "Nor fhrink before the wintry wind," is altered to "Nor fhrink before the warping wind." HOLT WHITE. The meaning is this: Though the very waters, by thy agency, are forced, against the law of their nature, to bend from their ftated level, yet thy fting occafions lefs anguish to man, than the ingratitude of those he befriended. HENLEY. Wood is faid to warp when its furface, from being level, becomes bent and uneven; from warpan, Sax. to caft. So, in this play, A&t III. fc. iii: “ - then one of you will prove a fhrunk pannel, and, like green timber, warp, warp." I doubt whether the poet here alludes to any operation of froft. The meaning may be only, Thou bitter wintry fky, though thou curleft the waters, thy fting, &c. Thou in the line before us refers only to-bitter fky. The influence of the winter's fky or feafon may, with fufficient propriety, be faid to warp the furface of the ocean, by agitation of its waves alone. That this paffage refers to the turbulence of the fky, and the confequent agitation of the ocean, and not to the operation of froft, may be collected from our author's having in King John described ice as uncommonly smooth: "To throw a perfume on the violet, "Tofmooth the ice," &c. MALONE. 6 As friend remember'd not.] Remember'd for remembering. So, afterwards, Act III. fc. last: "And now I am remember'd" i. e. and now that I bethink me, &c. MALONE. 7 as thy mafter is:] The old copy has-mafters. Corrected by the editor of the fecond folio. MALONE. Enter Duke FREDERICK, OLIVER, Lords, and DUKE F. Not fee him fince? Sir, fir, that cannot be: But were I not the better part made mercy, I should not feek an absent argument 8 Of my revenge, thou present: But look to it; Seek him with candle; bring him dead or living, Thy lands, and all things that thou doft call thine, Worth feizure, do we feize into our hands; OLI. O, that your highness knew my heart in this! I never lov'd my brother in my life. DUKE F. More villain thou.-Well, push him out of doors; an abfent argument-] An argument is ufed for the contents of a book, thence Shakspeare confidered it as meaning the fubject, and then used it for fubject in yet another sense. JOHNSON. 9 Seek him with candle;] Alluding, probably, to St. Luke's Gofpel, ch. xv. v. 8: "If the lofe one piece, doth fhe not light a candle,—and feek diligently till fhe find it?" STEEVENS. And let my officers of fuch a nature [Exeunt. SCENE II. The Foreft. Enter ORLANDO, with a Paper. ORL. Hang there, my verse, in witness of my love: And, thou, thrice-crowned queen of night, fur vey With thy chafte eye, from thy pale sphere above, Thy huntress' name, that my full life doth sway.* 9 And let my officers of fuch a nature Make an extent upon his house and lands:] "To make an extent of lands," is a legal phrafe, from the words of a writ, (extendi facias) whereby the theriff is directed to caufe certain lands to be appraised to their full extended value, before he delivers them to the perfon entitled under a recognizance, &c. in order that it may be certainly known how foon the debt will be paid. MALONE. 2 expediently,] That is, expeditiously. JOHNSON. Expedient, throughout our author's plays, fignifies-expeditious. So, in King John: "His marches are expedient to this town." Again, in King Richard II: "Are making hither with all due expedience." STEEVENS. 3 thrice-crowned queen of night,] Alluding to the triple character of Proferpine, Cynthia, and Diana, given by fome mythologists to the fame goddefs, and comprised in these memorial lines: Terret, luftrat, agit, Proferpina, Luna, Diana, JOHNSON. 4 that my full life doth fway.] So, in Twelfth Night: "M. O. A. I. doth faway my life." STEEVENS. |