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sworn in at Westminster. Drake, Sh. and his Times, p. 424, describes the occasion thus: 'This day of St. Simon and Jude he (the Mayor) enterth into his estate and office: and the next daie following he goeth by water to Westminster, in most triumphlike manner. His barge beinge garnished with the armes of the citie: and nere the sayd barge goeth a shypbote of the Queenes majesties being trimmed upp, and rigged lyke a shippe of warre, with dyvers peces of ordinance, standards, penons, and targets of the proper armes of the sayd Mayor, the armes of the Citie, of his company.' Having taken the oath at Westminster, he returns by water to Paul's wharf, takes horse with the rest of the aldermen, and enters at the gate of Cheapside to Guildhall to dine in company with a thousand people at the charge of the mayor and sheriffs.

144. Ratcliffe. A name belonging to a manor and hamlet in the parish of Stepney. Stow, Survey 4. 43, speaks of it as 'a good mile from the tower', connected with the city by almost a continual line of houses. 'Ratcliffe hath increased in building eastward (in place where I have known a large highway, with fair elm trees on both the sides), that the same hath now taken hold of Limehurst... sometime distant a mile from Ratcliffe. . . . Of late years shipwrights, and (for the most part) other marine men have built many large and strong houses for themselves, and smaller for sailors.'

ACT IIII. SCENE III.

14. I'll call you Morose. The custom among women of calling themselves by their husbands' names is satirized again in D. A. 4. 1, p. 98:

LADY T. Pray thee call me Tailbush,

As I thee Eitherside; I love not this madam.

LADY E. Then I protest to you, Tailbush, I am glad Your business so succeeds.

LADY T. Thank thee, good Eitherside.

21. your coach, and foure horses, &c. The extravagant household planned by Centaure was the ideal of this extravagant age. Gifford's Massinger, Works 4. 43, 44: Alsoe I haue six or eight gentlemen; and I will haue my two coaches, one lyned with veluett to myself, with four very fayre horses, and a coach for my women. . . . I will haue twoe coachmen, one for my owne coach, and other

for my women.... Alsoe, for laundresses, when I trauayle I will haue them sent away before with the carrydges to see all safe, and the chambermayde I will haue goe before with the groomes.... Alsoe, for that yt is indecent to crowd upp myself with my gentleman-vsher in my coach I will haue him to haue a convenyent horse to attend me either in city or country. And I must haue two footmen.'

24. Bed'lem. The Hospital of St. Mary of Bethlehem was situated at first outside Bishopsgate, close to St. Botolph's Church. It was endowed as a convent by Simon FitzMary, Sheriff in the year 1240. In 1547, on the petition of Sir John Gresham, Lord Mayor, Henry VIII gave the building of the dissolved priory to the City of London as a hospital for lunatics. Visitors were allowed to see the inmates on payment of an entrance fee, and at one time the hospital' derived a revenue of at least 400 pounds a year from the indiscriminate admission of visitors'. The inmates were for the most part wretchedly cared for, many were chained, and most in miserable garments, with no better beds than ones of straw. In 1775 an end was made of the practice of converting the hospital into a public spectacle. Subtle speaks of it in that capacity, Alchem. 4. 2, p. 132 (of Dame Pliant):

To hurry her through London, to the Exchange,
Bethlem, the China-houses.

Cf. 1 Honest Whore 5. 2, which has its scene laid in the Bethlehem Hospital, and illustrates the deplorable condition of affairs therein.

47. tell us the newes. Jonson's comedy The S. of News is the best commentary to this line. For the love of news, and the early manner of gathering and disseminating it, cf. Mr. Winter's Introd. pp. xxv ff. in his edition of the comedy.

48. Make anagrammes of our names. The transforming of letters in a word, name, or phrase, to form a new word thereby was as common as inventing riddles and writing sonnets. N. E. D. says that the earliest recorded one is in Puttenham, English Poesie (1589), Arber's Reprint. Jonson shows how little he values them in his Execration upon Vulcan, vol. 8. 400 (cf. note 4. 1. 120), but he is nevertheless the coiner of some himself, Masque of Hymen, vol. 7. 56:

REA. Juno, whose great name
Is Unio, in the anagram.

Honour of Wales, vol. 7. 330:

Ev. You will still pyt your selve to these plunses, you mean his madestee's anagrams of Charles James Stuart.

JEN. Ay, that is Claims Arthur's Seate.

Cf. also Babington, Queen of Arrag. (1640). Haz.-Dods. 13. 334,
Cleanthe admires men:

Who on my busk, even with a pin, can write
The anagram of my name; present it humbly.
Fall back, and smile.

48. cock-pit. Any of the numerous places of resort where the sport of cock-fighting was carried on, may be meant. The one later known as the Phoenix Theatre stood in the parish of St. Giles-inthe-Fields, and is said by Prynne to have demoralized the whole of Drury Lane. This place was torn down by the 'prentices in one of their raids on Shrove Tuesday, March 4, 1616-17. The Cock-pit in St. James's Park stood at some steps leading from the Birdcage Walk into Dartmouth Street, near the top of Queen Street. There was the no less famous Cock-pit built at Whitehall by Henry VIII, which was later used as a hall for political speeches. Then there was another in Jewin Street, and one in Shoe Lane. It was very much a thing of fashion to witness the sport of cockfighting in Jonson's time, for it was a favorite pastime of the monarch, who went where it might be enjoyed at least twice a week. Stow says, 'Cocks of the game are yet cherished by divers men for their pleasures, much money being laid on their heads when they fight in pits, whereof some be costly made for that purpose.'

53. there be in presence. Ellipsis of the nominative; cf. Abbott, § 399.

55. a neighing hobby-horse. Originally this was a horse of Irish breed very popular in England. Later it was the name given to a horse made of wicker-work or other light material introduced into the morris and on the stage. Naturally the name of the performer came to be hobby-horse', and finally it was applied in derision to any foolish person. So Much Ado 3. 2.

72:

BENED. Old Signior walk aside with me; I have studied eight or nine wise words to speak to you which these hobby-horses must not hear.

ACT IIII. SCENE IIII.

1. O my cursed angell, that instructed me to this fate. A harsh construction, in which little excuse can be found by calling it Latinized. Cursed angell is bad angel, concerning the doctrine of which beings we find in Scot, Discoverie of Witchcraft, pp. 5, 6; and Lavaterus, Of Ghosts and Spirits walking by night, 160 ff. 2 Hen. IV 1. 2. 186: 'You follow the young prince up and down like his ill angel.' 2 Hen. IV 2. 4. 362: There is a good angel about him.' Dekker, Old Fortunatus 1. 2: 'Thou hast looked very devilishly ever since the good angel left thee.'

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13. bellfry. Belfry is not connected with bell. It is of berfray from MH.Ger. ber(c)veit (modern Bergfriede), "place of safety", from bergen," conceal", and vride (modern Friede), "peace ", " protection". Its original sense was a kind of tower". The bells came later and are unessential.'-W. and their W., p. 337. Westminster-hall. This was a noisy place enough; its courts of justice always in session, and its shops full of business. The building had been put up during the last three years of Richard II's reign, 1397-9. The early parliaments sat here; the law courts were held in the open hall, the Exchequer Court at the entrance end, and the Court of Chancery and Kings at the opposite end. Part of the great hall was rented to sellers of books, stationers, sempstresses, toy-dealers, &c., and the rent went to the Warden of the Fleet. These dealers were still a nuisance in the days after the Restoration. Wycherley, Epilogue to the Plain Dealer: 'In hall of Westminster sleek sempstress vends amidst the court her wares.' Pepys, Diary, Jan. 20, 1659-60: 'At Westminster Hall, where Mrs. Lane and the rest of the maids had their white scarfs, all having been at the burial of a young bookseller in the Hall.'

14. i' the cock-pit. That Morose rightly named this among the noisiest places in London Brand's description confirms, Pop. Antiq. 2. 59 ff. Especially boisterous was it when on Shrove Tuesday the game of cock-throwing was indulged in. Cf. Volp. 3.2.7.237:

The bells in time of pestilence, ne'er made
Like noise, or were in that perpetual motion!
The Cock-pit comes not near it.

the fall of a stagge. 'In the time of James this must have been a very noisy scene-hurrahing, blowing horns, and sounding trumpets. Sometimes the royal feet were assiduously bathed in the warm blood.'-C. tower-wharfe. Noisy because the ordnance was stored here; cf. note, 1. 2. 15.

16. Belins-gate. Stow, Survey 1. 2, writes that Belinsgate is ' now used as an especial port or harbor for small ships and boats coming thereto, and is now the largest watergate on the River of Thames.' He quotes Geoffrey of Monmouth as affirming that the gate was built by Belin, a king of the Britons. He describes it further, 2. 165. In Jonson's time Billingsgate remained the busiest London wharf except Queenhithe. The fish-markets for which it became notorious were established 1599. The foul language of the fishwives and others gave a new word to the English language. Fuller, Worthies (ed. 1662), p. 197, writes: One may term this the Esculine Gate of London. Here one may hear linguas jurgatrices! The character of the old wharf and market is unchanged to-day.

17. I would sit out a play. One of the many Jonsonian passages which has been splenetically interpreted, and charged with being written in derision of Shakespeare. This particular passage, says Malone, is aimed at Ant. and Cleop. with its simple stage direction: 'Alarum afar-off, as at a sea-fight'. G. has more than vindicated Jonson of such charges, in his Proofs of Ben Jonson's Malignity, vol. 1. 193. The references to Epicone are 206, 208, 212, 220, and the note to the passage under consideration, Works 3. 423.

58. it's melancholy. It is the disease called melancholy.' This was supposedly caused by a superfluous amount of black bile in the system. Black bile was one of the four liquids or humors recognized by ancient physiology as belonging to the body. The others were blood, phlegm, and bile.

60. Pliny, and Paracelsvs. The old first-century encyclopedist is here named with the mediaeval Paracelsus because of his studies in natural history. His writings are multifarious-military, grammatical, rhetorical, biographical, historical, besides his most important Historia Naturalis, of which thirty-seven books are preserved. Paracelsus was a famous German-Swiss physician and alchemist who lived 1493-1541. A student, and later a lecturer on medicine at the University of Basel, he did much for enlightened

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