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Ib. ib.

Forth to sale. Mr. Steevens conjectured, that sell was the author's word, and such was the read, ing of the MS. in the possession of Samuel Lysons, Esq. MALONE.

Ib. 1. 23, That which with scorn, &c. Other copies read---That with such scorn, &c.

P. 51, 1. 2. And ban; i. e. curse.

Ib. 1. 7. And to her will, &c.

MALONE.

This and the follow

ing stanza very properly precede the two stanzas which

here

go before them, in the MS. already mentioned, according to Mr. Malone's information.

Ib. 1. 16.

Seek never, &c.

Please never, &c. Other copies read-→→

Ib. 1. 18. Put it back. Read--put thee back. P. 52, 1. 1, 2, 3, 4. Think women, &c. These four lines are according to the modern editions; but the old manuscript copy, which is followed by Mr. Malone, and is far more intelligible and poetical, reads thus :--"Think women love to match with men, "And not to live so like a saint:

"Here is no heaven; they holy then

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Begin, when age doth them attaint." Ib. 1. 8 and 9. Lest that my mistress.

cording to the more correct copy :--

"For if my lady hear my song,
"She will not stick to ring mine ear."

Ib. 1. 18. So gracious is us mine.

EDITOR.

Read ac

a

Gracious was fre

quently used by our author and his contemporaries, in

the sense of beautiful. MALONE.

Ib. 1. 23. Beated and chopp'd with tann'd antiquity.
Thus the old copy.
Beated was, perhaps, a misprint

B

for 'bated. 'Bated is properly overthrown, laid low; abated, from abattre, F. Hence (if this be the true reading) it is here used by our author, with his usual license, for disfigured; reduced to a lower or worse state Beated, however, the regular participle

than before.

MALONE.
STEEVENS.

Read---Nor Mars's

from the verb to beat, may be right. I think we should read---blasted. P. 53, 1. 12. Nor Nar's sword. sword, &c. or, according to the original---Nor Mars his sword, &c.

Ib. 1. 24. For blunting, &c. i. e. For fear of blunting, &c. MALONE.

P. 54, l. 1. Feasts so solemn and so rare. He means the four festivals of the year. STEEVENS.

Ib. 1. 4. Or captain jewels in the carcanet. Jewels of superior worth. The carcanet was an ornament worn round the neck.

P. 55, 1. 9.

MALONE.

Make you woe.

Make you grieve.

Woe is here a verb. EDITOR.

Ib. 1. 11. Compounded am with clay. Compounded

is mixed, blended. MALONE.

Ib. 1. 21. To do more for me now.

P. 56, 1. 1.

I am sham'd.

Dele now.

For I'm asham'd. Other copies read--

Ib. 1. 9. The earth can have but earth. Shakespeare seems here to have had the burial service in his thoughts. MALONE.

Ib. 1. 10. My sprite. Read---My spir't. See notes p. 57, l. 9; and p. 61, l. 10.

Ib. 1. 20. The ornament of beauty is suspect. Suspision, or slander, is a constant attendant on beauty, and

adds new lustre to it.

Suspect is used as a substantive

in King Henry VI. P. II. MALONE.

See also, p. 57, 1, 5. EDITOR.

Ib. 1. 23. Their worth be greater, &c.

Read--Thy

worth (this being an error of the old copy); the greater be, having been, perhaps, an alteration of the editor of a modern edition, in order to render the old reading somewhat intelligible.

I strongly suspect the latter words of this line also to be corrupt. What idea does worth woo'd of (that is, by) time present? Perhaps the poet means, that, however slandered his friend may be at present, his worth shall be celebrated in all future time. MALONE.

Perhaps we are to disentangle the transposition of the passage thus: So thou be good, slander, being woo'd of time, doth but approve thy worth the greater; i. e. if you are virtuous, slander being the favourite of the age, only stamps the stronger mark of approbation on your merit. I have already shewn, on the authority of Ben Jonson, that "of time" means of the then present one. STEEVENS.

Might we not read--being woo'd of time? taking woo'd for an epithet applied to slander, signifying frantic, doing mischief at random. Shakespeare often uses this old word. So in "Venus and Adonis :"--

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Life-poisoning pestilence and frenzies woo'd."

I am far from being satisfied with this conjecture, but can make no sense of the words as they are printed. ANONYMOUS,

P. 57, 1. 9. Knowing a better spirit doth use your name. Spirit is here, as in many other places, used as

a monosyllable. Curiosity will naturally endeavour to find out who this better spirit was, to whom even ShakeThere was cer speare acknowledges himself inferior.

tainly no poet in his own time with whom he needed to have feared a comparison; but these sonnets being, probably, written when his name was but little known, and at a time when Spenser was in the zenith of his reputation, I imagine he was the person here alluded to. MALONE.

P. 58, 1. 12. To the marriage of true minds. To the sympathetic union of souls.

P. 59, I. 17.

Ib. 1. 20.

And therefore

LONE.

Ib. 1. 22.

MALONE.

To you fuir, &c. Read---to your fair, &c.
And therefore have I slept in your report.

I have not sounded your praises. MA

How far a modern quill, &c. Modern,

formerly, signified common or trite. MALONE.

Ib. 1. 23.

better read--

What worth in you doth grow? We might

"that worth in doth grow."

i. e. that worth, which, &c. MALONE.

Ib. 1. 27.

you

When others would give life, and bring a

tomb. When others endeavour to celebrate chia

your

racter, while, in fact, they disgrace it by the meanness of their compositions. MALONE.

P. 60, l. 16. Making him still, &c. Read-Making his stile, &c.

Ib. 1. 17 and 18.

Beauteous blessing---Being fond of praise, which makes your praises worse. Read---beauteous blessings, &c. Also,---Being fond on praise, &c. Being fond of such panegyrick as debases what is praiseworthy in you, instead of exalting it. On, in an

elent books, is often printed for of. It may mean behaving foolishly on receiving praise." STEEVENS. Fond on was certainly used by Shakespeare for fond of. MALONE.

Ib. 1. 21. Reserve their character. Reserve has here the sense of preserve.

Ib. 1. 22. By all the muses filled. Read---fil'd; i. e. polished.

P. 61, 1. 8.

1

Ib. 1. 10.

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Was it his spirit, by spirits taught, &c.

Spirit is here both as a monosyllable and dissyllable.

"Was it his spir't, by spirits," &c. EDITOR.

Ib. 1. 14 and 15.

That affable familiar ghost, which nightly, &c. Alluding, perhaps, to the celebrated Dr. Dee's pretended intercourse with an angel, and other familiar spirits. STEEVENS.

Ib. 1. 18.

Fill'd up his line, Read---fil'd up, &c.

i. e. polish'd it. STEEVENS.

Ib. 1. 23.

out of date.

Determinate; i. e. determined, ended, MALONE.

P. 62, 1. 12. As it fell upon a day, &c. This ode was inserted in "The Passionate Pilgrim," by William Jaggard, in 1598, as the production of Shakespeare ; but is said to have been written by Richard Barnefield : it contains, however, some lines (on friendship) which would not have disgraced our author, EDITOR.

P. 64, 1. 20. Upon thy side against thyself, &c. Read ---against myself, &c.

P. 65, 1. 14. I will acquaintance strangle. I will put an end to our familiarity. MALONE.

P. 66, 1. 2. Rereward. Read-rearward.

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