247. sixpence a day in Pyramus or nothing.] Shakspere has already ridiculed the title-page of Cambyses by Thomas Preston; and here he seems to aim a personal stroke at him. Preston acted a part in John Ritwise's play of Dido, before queen Elizabeth at Cambridge, in 1564; and the queen was so well pleased, that she bestowed on him a pension of twenty pounds a year, which is little more than a shilling a day. Our poet, in the first part of Henry IV. has made Falstaff declare, that when he presented the prince's father, he would do it

editions thrown out of metre. They are very well restored by the later editors.

JOHNSON. 8. Are of imagination all compa:] i. e. made up of mere imagination. So, in As You Like It:

"If he, compact of jars, grow musical.”

STEEVENS.

10. That is the madman; the lover, all as frantick,] Such is the reading of all the old copies; instead of which, the modern editors have given us :

"The madman: while the lover all as frantick."

12. in a fine frenzy rolling,] This seems to have been imitated by Drayton in his Epistle to J. Reynolds on Poets and Poetry: describing Marlowe, he says:

-that fine madness still he did retain, "Which rightly should possess a poet's brain!” MALONE.

The powers of imagination were never more philosophically or poetically expressed than by Shakspere in this description.-The word habitation, in line 17, will illustrate the poet's use of inhabit in Macbeth, which, in defiance of every thing like sense, has been changed to inhibit. HENLEY. 26. Constancy;] Consistency, stability, certainty. JOHNSON.

39. Call Philostrate.] In the folio, 1623, it is, Call Egeus, and all the speeches afterwards spoken by Philostrate, except, that beginning, "No, my noble lord," &c. are there given to that character. But the modern editions, from the quarto 1600, have rightly given them to Philostrate, who appears in the first scene as master of the revels to Theseus, and is there sent out on a similar kind of errand.

In the Knight's Tale of Chaucer, Arcite, under the name of Philostrate, is 'squire of the chamber to Theseus. STEEVENS.

41. Say, what abridgment, &c.] By abridgment our author means a dramatick performance, which crowds the events of years into a few hours. So, in

Hamlet,

Hamlet, act ii. he calls the players, "abridgments, abstracts, and brief chronicles of the time."

Again, in King Henry V.

"Then brook abridgment; and your eyes advance "After your thoughts

STEEVENS.

——a brief,——] i. e. a short account or So, in Gascoigne's Dulce Bellum Inex

44. enumeration.

pertis :

"She sent a brief unto me by her mayd."

STEEVENS.

44. One of the quartos has ripe, the other old editions, rife. JOHNSON. Rife is a word used both by Sidney and Spenser. It means abounding, but it is now almost obsolete. Again, in Stephen Gosson's School of Abuse, 1579:

-you shall find the theaters of the one, the abuses of the other, to be rife among us."

STEEVENS.

46. The. reads.] This is printed as Mr. Theobald gave it from both the old quartos. In the first folio, and all the following editions, Lysander reads the catalogue, and Theseus makes the remarks.

JOHNSON. 54. The thrice three Muses mourning for the death

Of learning, &c.] I do not know whether it has been before observed, that Shakspere here, perhaps, alluded to Spenser's poem, entitled The Tears of the Muses, on the neglect and contempt of learning. This piece first appeared in quarto, with others, 1591. The oldest edition of this play now known is dated 1600. If Spenser's poem be here intended,

tended, may we not presume that there is some earlier edition of this? But however, if the allusion be allowed, at least it seems to bring the play below 1591. WARTON.

This pretended title of a dramatick performance might be designed as a covert stroke of satire on those who had permitted Spenser to die through absolute want of bread in the year 1598 :--late deceas'd in beggary-seems to refer to this circumstance.

STEEVENS.

56. —keen, and critical] Critical here means criticizing, censuring.

So, in Othello:

"O, I am nothing if not critical." STEEVENS. 60. Merry and tragical ?- -] Our poet is still harping on Cambyses.

76.

STEEVENS.

-unbreath'd memories]

That is, unex

STEEVENS.

ercised, unpractised memories.

82. Unless you can find sport in their intents,] Thus all the copies. But as I know not what it is to stretch and con an intent, I suspect a line to be lost.

JOHNSON,

To intend and to attend were anciently synonymous. Of this use several instances are given in a note on the third scene of the first act of Othello. Intents therefore may be put for the object of their attention. We still say a person is intent on his business,

86.

-never any thing can be amiss,

STEEVENS.

When simpleness and duty attend it.] Ben Jon

son

son, in Cynthia's Revels, has employed this sentiment of humanity on the same occasion when Cynthia is preparing to see a masque :

“Nothing which duty and desire to please,

"Bears written on the forehead comes amiss."

STEEVENS.

94. Our sport shall be, &c.] Voltaire says something like this of Louis XIV. who took a pleasure in seeing his courtiers in confusion when they spoke to him. STEEVENS.

95. And what poor duty cannot do,

Noble respect takes it in might, not merit.] In might, is perhaps an elliptical expression for what might have been. STEEVENS. 97. Where I have come, great clerks, have purposed, &c.] So, in Pericles:

"She sings like one immortal, and she dances "As goddess like to her admired lays;

"Deep clerks she dumbs."

It should be observed, periods in the text is used in the sense of full stops.

110.

King Henry V.

MALONE.

-addrest.] That is, ready. So, in

"To-morrow for our march we are addrest:" STEEVENS.

111. [Flourish of trumpets.] It appears from the Gull's Hornbook, by Decker, 1609, that the prologue was anciently usher'd in by trumpets: "Present not yourselfe on the stage (especially at a new play) untill the quaking prologue hath (by rubbing) got

cullor