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Biron. An amber-colour'd raven was well noted. [Ajide. Dum. As upright as the cedar.

Biron.

Stoop, I fay;

Her fhoulder is with child.

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Dum

As fair as day.

Biron. Ay, as fome days; but then no fun muft shine.

[Afide.

Dum. O that I had my wish!

Long.

And I had mine! [Afide.

King. And I mine too, good Lord!

[Afide.

Biron. Amen, fo I had mine: Is not that a good word?

[Afide.

Dum. I would forget her; but a fever fhe

Reigns in my blood, and will remember'd be.

Biron. A fever in your blood! why, then incifion

Would let her out in faucers; + Sweet mifprifion!

[Afide

Dum. Once more I'll read the ode that I have writ.
Biron. Once more I'll mark how love can vary wit.

Dum. On a day, (alack the day!)

[Afide.

Love, whofe month is ever May,

N 4

Spied

calls foulness. The hair of his mistress in varied fhadows exceeded those of amber. Foul may be used (as Fair often is) as a fubftantive.

STEEVENS.

Quoted here, I think, fignifies marked, written down. MALONE The word here intended, though mifpelled, is quoted, which fignifies. obferved or regarded, both here and in every place where it occurs in these plays; and the meaning is, that amber itfeif is regarded as foul, when compared with her hair.

M. MASON.

4 It was the fashion among the young gallants of that age, to ftab themfelves in the arms, or elsewhere, in order to drink their mistress's health, or write her name in their blood, as a proof of their paffion.

Thus in The Humourous Lieutenant, a gentleman gives the following defcription of him, when in love with the King.

"Thus he begins, thou light and life of creatures,

"Angel-ey'd King, vouchsafe at length thy favour;
"And fo proceeds to incifion."

But the custom is more particularly defcribed in Jonfon's Cynthia's Revels, where Phantafte, defcribing the different modes of making love, says— ' A fourth with ftabbing himself, and drinking healths, or writing languishing letters in his blood.”—And in the Palinode, at the end or the play, Amorphus fays, " From Babbing of arms, &c. Good Mercury deliver us!" M. MASON.

Spied a bloffom, passing fair,
Playing in the wanton air:
Through the velvet leaves the wind,
All unfeen, 'gan paffage find;
That the lover, fick to death,
Wifb'd himself the heaven's breath.
Air, quoth he, thy cheeks may blow;
Air, would I might triumph fo! 5
But alack, my hand is fworn,6
Ne'er to pluck thee from thy thorn:
Vow, alack, for youth unmeet ;
Youth fo apt to pluck a fweet.
Do not call it fin in me,
That I am forfworn for thee:

Thou for whom even Jove would fwear,
Juno but an Ethiop were ;

And deny himself for Jove,

Turning mortal for thy love.

This will I fend; and fomething elfe more plain,
That fhall exprefs my true love's fafting pain."
O, would the king, Biron, and Longaville,
Were lovers too! Ill, to example ill,

Would from my forehead wipe a perjur'd note;
For none offend, where all alike do dote.

Long. Dumain, [advancing.] thy love is far from charity,

That in love's grief defir'ft fociety:

You may look pale, but I should blush, I know,

To be o'erheard, and taken napping fo.

King. Come, fir, [advancing.] you blufh; as his your cafe is fuch;

You chide at him, offending twice as much :-
You do not love Maria; Longaville

5 Perhaps we may better read:

Ah! would I might triumph fo!" JOHNSON.

Did

A copy of this fonnet is printed in England's Helicon, 1614, and reads:

"But, alas! my hand bath fworn."

It is likewife printed as Shakspeare's, in Jaggard's Collecti n, 1599.

7 Fafting is longing, bungry, wanting. JOHNSON.

STEEVENS

Did never fonnet for her fake compile ;
Nor never lay his wreathed arms athwart
His loving bofom, to keep down his heart.
I have been clofely fhrouded in this bufh,
And mark'd you both, and for you both did blufh.
I heard your guilty rhymes, obferv'd your fashion;
Saw fighs reek from you, noted well your paffion :
Ah me! fays one; O Jove! the other cries;

One, her hairs were gold, cryftal the other's eyes:
You would for paradife break faith and troth; [To LONG.
And Jove, for your love, would infringe an oath.

[To DUMAIN,

What will Birón fay, when that he shall hear
A faith infring'd, which fuch a zeal did swear?
How will he fcorn? how will he fpend his wit?
How will he triumph, leap, and laugh at it?
For all the wealth that ever I did fee,

I would not have him know fo much by me.
Biron. Now ftep I forth to whip hypocrify.-
Ah, good my liege, I pray thee, pardon me:

[Defcends from the tree
Good heart, what grace haft thou, thus to reprove
Thefe worms for loving, that art most in love?
Your eyes do make no coaches; 9 in your tears,
There is no certain princefs that appears •
You'll not be perjur'd, 'tis a hateful thing;
Tufh, none but minstrels like of fonneting.
But are you not afham'd? nay, are you not,
All three of you, to be thus much o'er-fhot?
You found his mote; the king your mote did fee
But I a beam do find in each of three..

O, what a scene of foolery I have seen,
Of fighs, of groans, of forrow, and of teen!

N. 5

2

O me,

Thefe worms for loving,] So, in The Tempest, Profpero addreffing Miranda, fays

"Poor worm, thou art infected." STEEVENS.

9 Alluding to a paffage in the king's fonnet.

"No drop but as a coach doth carry thee." STEEVENS The old copy has--couches. Mr. Pope corrected it. MALONE teen!] ie, grief. STEEVENS..

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3

O me, with what ftrict patience have I fat,
To fee a king transformed to a grat!
To fee great Hercules whipping a gigg,
And profound Solomon to tune a jigg,
And Neftor play at pufh-pin with the boys,
And critick Timon laugh at idle toys!
Where lies thy grief, O tell me, good Dumain?
And, gentle Longaville, where lies thy pain?
And where my liege's? all about the breaft :-
A caudle, ho!

+

King. Too bitter is thy jeft.
Are we betray'd thus to thy over-view?
Biron. Not you by me, but I betray'd to you;
I, that am honeft; I, that hold it fin

To break the vow I am engaged in ;

3 Mr. Theobald and the fucceeding editors read-to a knot.

I am

Knet has no fenfe that can fuit this place. We may read-fot. The rhymes in this play are fuch as that fut and for may be well enough admitted. JOHNSON.

A knot is, I believe, a true lover's knot, meaning that the king

lay'd his wreathed arms athwart

His loving befom

fo long; i. e. remained fo long in the lover's pofture, that he seemed actually transformed into a knot. The word fat is in fome counties pronounced for. This may account for the feeming want of exact rhyme.

The old copy, however, reads—a gnat, and Mr. Tollet feems to think it contains an allufion to St. Matthew, xxiii. 24. where the metaphorical term of a gnat means a thing of leaft importance, or what is proverbially fmal!. The fmalinefs of a gat is likewife mentioned in Cymbeline.

STEEVENS.

A knott is likewife a Lincoln fhire bird of the fnipe kind. It is foolish even to a proverb, and it is faid to be eafily enfnared. Ray, in his Ornitbology, obferves, that it took its name from Canute, who was particularly fond of it. COLLINS.

Alluding to the finging of that infect, fuggefted by the poetry the king had been detected in. HEATH.

Gnat is undoubtedly the true reading, and is that, it feems, of the old copy. Biron is abufing the King for his fonnetting like a minstrel, and compares him to a gnat, which always fings as it flies. Befides, the word gat preferves the rhime, which is here to be attended to. M. MASON.

4 Critic and critical are used by our author in the fame fenfe as cynis and cynical. Tago, fpeaking of the fair fex as harfhly as is sometimes the practice of Dr. Warburton, declares he is nothing if not critical. STELVENS

I am betray'd, by keeping company

Or

With moon-like men, of Itrange inconftancy.
When fhall you fee me write a thing in rhyme?
groan for Joan? or fpend a minute's time
In pruning me? When fhall you hear that I
Will praife a hand, a foot, a face, an eye,
A gait, a state, a brow, a breast, a waist,
A leg, a limb?-

King.

Soft; Whither away so fast?

A true man, or a thief, that gallops fo?

Biron. 1 poft from love; good lover, let me go,

Enter JAQUENETTA and COSTARD.

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Coft. Nay, it makes nothing, fir.
King.

If it mar nothing neither,

The treafon, and you, go in peace away together.
Jaq. I befeech your grace, let this letter be read;
Our parfon mifdoubts it; 'twas treafon, he faid.
King. Biron, read it over.

Where hadit thou it?

Faq. Of Coftard.

N6

[Giving him the letter.

King.

5 The old copy reads " MEN-like men." STEEVENS. This is a strange fenfelefs line, and should be read thus: "With vane-like men, of ftrange inconftancy. WARBURTON. This is well imagined, but the poet perhaps may mean, with men like tommon men. JOHNSON.

I agree with the editors in confidering this paffage as erroneous, but not in the amendment propofed. That which I would fuggeft is, to read moon-like, instead of men-like, which is a poetical expreffion, and nearer to the old reading than vane-like. M. MASON.

I have not fcrupled to place this happy emendation in the text; re marking at the fame time that a vane is no where ftyled inconftant, although our author bestows that epithet on the moon in Romeo and Juliet. STEEVENS.

6 A bird is said to prune himself when he picks and fleeks his feathers.

STEEVENS. 7 State, I believe, in the prefent inftance, is opposed to gait,, (i. ea motion), and fignifies the act of standing, STEEVENS.

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