If speaking, why, a vane blown with all winds;* URS. Sure, sure, such carping is not commend. able. 5 HERO. No: not to be so odd, and from all fashions, As Beatrice is, cannot be commendable: It appears both from the passage just quoted, and from one of Sir John Harrington's epigrams, 4to. 1618, that agates were commonly worn in Shakspeare's time: THE AUTHOR TO A DAUGHTER NINE YEARS OLD. "Though pride in damsels is a hateful vice, "Yet could I like a noble-minded girl, "Rich velvet gowns, pendents, and chains of pearle, "Cark'nets of agats, cut with rare device," &c. These lines, at the same time that they add support to the old reading, shew, I think, that the words, vilely cut," are to be understood in their usual sense, when applied to precious stones, viz. awkwardly wrought by a tool, and not, as Mr. Steevens supposes, grotesquely veined by nature. MALONE. a vane blown with all winds;] This comparison might have been borrowed from an ancient black-letter ballad, entitled A Comparison of the Life of Man : "I may compare a man againe, "That changeth even as doth the wind; STEEVENS. No: not to be so odd, &c.] I should read-nor to be so odd, &c. M. MASON. Out of myself, press me to death with wit." URS. Yet tell her of it; hear what she will say. 8 URS. O, do not do your cousin such a wrong. She cannot be so much without true judgment, (Having so swift and excellent a wit, As she is priz'd to have,) as to refuse So rare a gentleman as signior Benedick. HERO. He is the only man of Italy, Always excepted my dear Claudio. URS. I pray you, be not angry with me, madam, Speaking my fancy; signior Benedick, -press me to death-] The allusion is to an ancient punishment of our law, called peine fort et dure, which was formerly inflicted on those persons, who, being indicted, refused to plead. In consequence of their silence, they were pressed to death by an heavy weight laid upon their stomach. This punishment the good sense and humanity of the legislature have within these few years abolished. MALONE. 7 Which is as bad as die with tickling.] The author meant that tickling should be pronounced as a trisyllable; tickeling. So, in Spenser, B. II. canto xii; 66 a strange kind of harmony; "Which Guyon's senses softly tickeled," &c. MALOne. so swift and excellent a wit,] Swift means ready. So, in As you like it, Act V. sc. iv: "He is very swift and sententious." STEEVENS. For shape, for bearing, argument," and valour, HERO. Indeed, he hath an excellent good name. URS. His excellence did earn it, ere he had it. When are you married, madam? HERO. Why, every day;-to-morrow: Come, go in ; I'll show thee some attires; and have thy counsel, Which is the best to furnish me to-morrow, URS. She's lim'd' I warrant you; we have caught her, madam.. HERO. If it prove so, then loving goes by haps: Şome Cupid kills with arrows, some with traps. [Exeunt HERO and URSULA. BEATRICE advances. BEAT. What fire is in mine ears?2 Can this be true? Stand I condemn'd for pride and scorn so much? Contempt, farewell! and maiden pride, adieu! No glory lives behind the back of such. argument,] This word seems here to signify discourse, or, the powers of reasoning. JOHNSON. Argument, in the present instance, certainly means conversation. So, in King Henry IV. P. I: "It would be argument for a week, laughter for a month, and a good jest for ever." STEEVENS. 1 She's lim'd-] She is ensnared and entangled as a sparrow with birdlime, JOHNSON. So, in The Spanish Tragedy: "Which sweet conceits are lim'd with sly deceits." The folio reads-She's ta'en. STEEVENs. What fire is in mine ears?] Alluding to a proverbial saying of the common people, that their ears burn, when others are talking of them. WARBURTON. And, Benedick, love on, I will requite thee; [Exit. The opinion from whence this proverbial saying is derived, is of great antiquity, being thus mentioned by Pliny: "Moreover is not this an opinion generally received, That when our ears do glow and tingle, some there be that in our absence doe talkę of us?" Philemon Holland's translation, B. XXVIII. p. 297, and Brown's Vulgar Errors. REED, Thus, in The Castell of Courtesie, whereunto is adioyned The Holde of Humilitie, &c. &c. By James Yates Seruingman, 4to. 1582, p. 73: "Of the burning of the eares," "That I doe credite giue "vnto the saying old, "Which is, when as the eares doe burne, "some thing on thee is told." Chapman has transplanted this vulgarism into his version of the 22d Iliad: 3 66 Now burnes my ominous eare "With whispering, Hector's selfe conceit hath cast away his host." STEEVENS. Taming my wild heart to thy loving hand;] This image is taken from falconry. She had been charged with being as wild as haggards of the rock; she therefore says, that wild as her heart is, she will tame it to the hand, JOHNSON, C SCENE II. A Room in Leonato's House. Enter Don PEDRO, Claudio, Benedick, and D. PEDRO. I do but stay till your marriage be consummate, and then I go toward Arragon, CLAUD. I'll bring you thither, my lord, if you'll vouchsafe me, D. PEDRO, Nay, that would be as great a soil in the new gloss of your marriage, as to show a child his new coat, and forbid him to wear it. I will only be bold with Benedick for his company; for, from the crown of his head to the sole of his foot, he is all mirth, he hath twice or thrice cut Cupid's bow-string, and the little hangman dare not shoot at him he hath a heart as sound as a bell, and as to show a child his new coat, and forbid him to wear it.] So, in Romeo and Juliet: "As is the night before some festival, "To an impatient child, that hath new robes, STEEVENS. the little hangman dare not shoot at him:] This character of Cupid came from the Arcadia of Sir Philip Sidney: "Millions of yeares this old drivell Cupid lives; "While still more wretch, more wicked he doth prove: "Of all those fooles that will have all they see." |