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By history, report, or his own proof,

What woman is, yea, what she cannot choose
But must be,-will his free hours languish for
Assured bondage?

IMO.

Will my lord say so?

LACH. Ay, madam; with his eyes in flood with

laughter.

It is a recreation to be by,

And hear him mock the Frenchman: But, heavens

know,

Some men are much to blame.

IMO.

Not he, I hope.

LACH. Not he: But yet heaven's bounty towards

him might

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Be us'd more thankfully. In himself, 'tis much⭑ In you,-which I account his, beyond all talents,Whilst I am bound to wonder, I am bound

To pity too

IMO.

What do you pity, sir?

LACH. Two creatures, heartily.

IMO.

Am I one, sir?

You look on me; What wreck discern you in me,

Deserves your pity?

LACH.

Lamentable! What!

To hide me from the radiant sun, and solace

I' the dungeon by a snuff?

IMO.

I pray you, sir, Deliver with more openness your answers demands. Why do you pity me?

To

my

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"Or give me ribs of steel! I shall split all

"In pleasure of my spleen-." HARRIS.

In himself, 'tis much ;] If he merely regarded his own character, without any consideration of his wife, his conduct would be unpardonable. MALONE,

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I was about to say, enjoy your-But
It is an office of the gods to venge it,
Not mine to speak on't.

IMO. You do seem to know Something of me, or what concerns me; 'Pray you, (Since doubting things go ill, often hurts more Than to be sure they do: For certainties Either are past remedies; or, timely knowing", The remedy then born ',) discover to me What both you spur and stop.

Had I this cheek

Ілсн. To bathe my lips upon; this hand, whose touch, Whose every touch, would force the feeler's soul To the oath of loyalty; this object, which

6 timely KNOWING,] Rather-timely known. JOHNSON. I believe Shakspeare wrote-known, and that the transcriber's ear deceived him here as in many other places. MALONE. 7 For certainties

Either are past remedies; or, timely knowing,

The remedy then born,] We should read, I think: "The remedy's then born-." MALONE. Perhaps the meaning is, as I have pointed the passage: For certainties

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"Either are past remedy; or timely knowing

"The remedy, then borne."

They are either past all remedy; or, the remedy being timely suggested to us by the knowing them, they are the more easily borne. J. BOADEN.

8 What both you spur and stop.] What it is that at once incites you to speak, and restrains you from it. JOHNSON. This kind of ellipsis is common in these plays. What both you spur and stop at, the poet means. See a note on Act II. Sc. III. MALONE.

The meaning is, 'what you seem anxious to utter, and yet withhold.'

M. MASON.

The allusion is to horsemanship. So, in Sidney's Arcadia, booki." She was like a horse desirous to runne, and miserably spurred, but so short-reined, as he cannot stirre forward." Again, in Ben Jonson's Epigram to the Earl of Newcastle :

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"Provoke his mettle, and command his force." STEEVENS. - this hand, whose touch,

would force the feeler's soul

To the oath of loyalty?] There is, I think, here a reference

Takes prisoner the wild motion of mine eye,
Fixing it only here1: should I (damn'd then,)
Slaver with lips as common as the stairs

That mount the Capitol 2; join gripes with hands

Made hard with hourly falsehood (falsehood, as
With labour;) then lie peeping in an eye3,
Base and unlustrous as the smoky light
That's fed with stinking tallow; it were fit,
That all the plagues of hell should at one time
Encounter such revolt.

to the manner in which the tenant performed homage to his lord. "The lord sate, while the vassal kneeling on both knees before him, held his hands jointly together between the hands of his lord, and swore to be faithful and loyal." See Coke upon Littleton, sect. 85. Unless this allusion be allowed, how has touching the hand the slightest connection with taking the oath of loyalty? HOLT WHITE.

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The very touch of such a hand would make the feeler swear to be true. BosWELL.

FIXING it only here:] The old copy has-Fiering. The correction was made in the second folio. MALONE.

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That mount the Capitol ;] Shakspeare has bestowed some ornament on the proverbial phrase as common as the highway." STEEVENS.

3-join gripes with hands, &c.] The old edition reads join gripes with hands

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"Made hard with hourly falsehood (falsehood as
"With labour) then by peeping in an eye," &c.

I read :

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then lie peeping-."

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Hard with falsehood, is, hard by being often griped with frequent change of hands. JOHNSON.

♦ Base and UNLUSTROUS-] Old copy-illustrious. Corrected by Mr. Rowe. That illustrious was not used by our author in the sense of inlustrous or unlustrous, is proved by a passage in the old comedy of Patient Grissell, 1603: “ the buttons were illustrious and resplendent diamonds." MALONE.

A "lack-lustre eye" has been already mentioned in As You Like It. STEEVENS.

IMO.

Іасн.

Has forgot Britain.

My lord, I fear,

And himself. Not I,

Inclin'd to this intelligence, pronounce

The beggary of his change; but 'tis your graces That, from my mutest conscience, to my tongue, Charms this report out.

IMO.

Let me hear no more.

LACH. O dearest soul! your cause doth strike my

heart

With pity, that doth make me sick. A lady
So fair, and fasten'd to an empery",

Would make the great'st king double! to be partner'd

With tomboys, hir'd with that self-exhibition"

5- to an EMPERY,] Empery is a word signifying sovereign command; now obsolete. Shakspeare uses it in King Richard III.: "Your right of birth, your empery, your own." STEEVENS.

6 With TOMBOYS,] We still call a masculine, a forward girl, tomboy. So, in Middleton's Game at Chess :

"Made threescore year a tomboy, a mere wanton." Again, in W. Warren's Nurcerie of Names, 1581:

"She comes not unto Bacchus' feastes,
"Or Flora's routes by night,

"Like tomboyes such as lives in Rome
"For euery knaues delight."

Again, in Lyly's Midas, 1592: "If thou should'st rigg up and down in our jackets, thou would'st be thought a very tomboy." Again, in Lady Alimony:

"What humourous tomboys be these?

"The only gallant Messalinas of our age."

It appears from several of the old plays and ballads, that the ladies of pleasure, in the time of Shakspeare, often wore the habits of young men. So, in an ancient bl. 1. ballad, entitled The Stout Cripple of Cornwall :

"And therefore kept them secretlie

"To feede his fowle desire,
"Apparell'd all like gallant youthes,
"In pages' trim attyre,

Which your own coffers yield! with diseas'd ven

tures,

That play with all infirmities for gold

Which rottenness can lend nature! such boil'd stuff,
As well might poison poison! Be reveng'd;
Or she, that bore you, was no queen, and
Recoil from your great stock.

IMO.

you

Reveng❜d!
How should I be reveng'd? If this be true,
(As I have such a heart, that both mine ears
Must not in haste abuse,) if it be true,
How should I be reveng'd?

"He gave them for their cognizance
"A purple bleeding heart,

"In which two silver arrows seem'd
"The same in twaine to part.
"Thus secret were his wanton sports,
"Thus private was his pleasure;
"Thus harlots in the shape of men
"Did waft away his treasure."

Verstegan, however, gives the following etymology of the word tomboy: "Tumbe. To dance. Tumbod, danced; hereof we yet call a wench that skippeth or leapeth lyke a boy, a tomboy: our name also of tumbling cometh from hence." STEEVENS.

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7 — hir'd with that self-exhibition, &c.] Gross strumpets, hired with the very pension which you allow your husband. JOHNSON. such BOIL'D Stuff,] The allusion is to the ancient process of sweating in venereal cases. See Timon of Athens, Act IV. Sc. III. So, in The Old Law, by Massinger :

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look parboil'd,

"As if they came from Cupid's scalding-house."

Again, in Troilus and Cressida: "Sodden business! there's a stewed phrase indeed." Again, in Timon of Athens: "She's e'en setting on water to scald such chickens as you are." All this stuff about boiling, scalding, &c. is a mere play on stew, a word which is afterwards used for a brothel by Imogen.

STEEVENS. The words may mean,-such corrupted stuff; from the substantive boil. So, in Coriolanus:

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boils and plagues

"Plaster you o'er!

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But, I believe, Mr. Steevens's interpretation is the true one.

MALONE.

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