Cor. And they are often tarr'd over with the furgery of our fheep; And would you have us kiss tar? The courtier's hands are perfumed with civet. TOUCH. Most shallow man! Thou worms-meat, in respect of a good piece of flesh: Indeed!-Learn of the wife, and perpend: Civet is of a baser birth than tar; the very uncleanly flux of a cat. Mend the instance, shepherd. Cor. You have too courtly a wit for me; I'll reft. TOUCH. Wilt thou rest damn'd? God help thee, shallow man! God make incifion in thee! thou art raw.9 8 - make incifion in thee!] To make incision was a proverbial expression then in vogue for, to make to understand. So, in Beaumont and Fletcher's Humorous Lieutenant: "Thus he begins, thou life and light of creatures, Angel-ey'd king, vouchsafe at length thy favour; "And so proceeds to incifion" . i. e. to make him understand what he would be at. WARBURTON. Till I read Dr. Warburton's note, I thought the allusion had been to that common expression, of cutting fuch a one for the fimples; and I must own, after consulting the passage in the Humorous Lieutenant, I have no reason to alter my supposition. The editors of Beaumont and Fletcher declare the phrafe to be unintelligible in that as well as in another play where it is introduced. I find the fame expression in Monfieur Thomas: "We'll bear the burthen: proceed to incision, fidler." STEEVENS. I believe that Steevens has explained this passage justly, and am certain that Warburton has entirely mistaken the meaning of that which he has quoted from The Humourous Lieutenant, which plainly alludes to the practice of the young gallants of the time, who used to cut themselves in such a manner as to make their blood flow, in order to show their passion for their mistresses, by drinking their healths, or writing verses to them in blood. For a more full explanation of this custom, see a note on Love's Labour's Loft, At IV. fc. iii: M. MASON. 9-thou art raw.] i. e. thou art ignorant; unexperienced. Cor. Sir, I am a true labourer; I earn that I eat, get that I wear; owe no man hate, envy no man's happiness; glad of other men's good, content with my harm: and the greatest of my pride is, to fee my ewes graze, and my lambs fuck. TOUCH. That is another simple sin in you; to bring the ewes and the rams together, and to offer to get your living by the copulation of cattle: to be bawd to a bell-wether; and to betray a she-lamb of a twelvemonth, to a crooked-pated, old, cuckoldly ram, out of all reasonable match. If thou be'st not damn'd for this, the devil himself will have no shepherds; I cannot see else how thou shouldst 'scape. Cor. Here comes young master Ganymede, my new mistress's brother. Enter ROSALIND, reading a paper. Ros. From the east to western Ind, Let no face be kept in mind, r T 1N So, in Hamlet: " - and yet but raw neither, in respect of his quick fail." MALONE. *bawd to a bell-wether;) Wether and ram had anciently the fame meaning. JOHNSON. 3 - fairest lin'd,] i. e. most fairly delineated. Modern editors read-limn'd, but without authority, from the ancient copies. " STEEVENS. 4 But the fair of Rofalind.] Thus the old copy. Fair is beauty, complexion. See the notes on a paffage in The Midsummer Night's Dream, Act I. fc. i. and The Comedy of Errors, Act II. fc. i. The : TOUCH. I'll rhime you so, eight years together; dinners, and suppers, and fleeping hours excepted: it is the right butter-woman's rate to market. Ros. Out, fool! TOUCH. For a tafte: If a bart do lack a bind, modern editors read the face of Rosalind. Lodge's Novel will " Then muse not, nymphes, though I bemone "Since for her faire there is fairer none," &c. Again, "And hers the faire which all men do respect." STEEVENS. Face was introduced by Mr. Pope. MALONE. 4 rate to market. So, Sir T. Hanmer. In the former editions-rank to market. JOHNSON. Dr. Grey, as plausibly, proposes to read-rant. Gyll brawled like a butter-whore, is a line in an ancient medley. The sense defigned, however, might have been-" it is such wretched rhime as the butter-woman fings as she is riding to market." So, in Churchyard's Charge, 1580, p. 7: " And use a kinde of ridynge rime". Ratt-ryme, however, in Scotch, signifies some verse repeated by rote. See Ruddiman's Glofsary to G. Douglas's Virgil. STEEVENS. The Clown is here speaking in reference to the ambling pace of the metre, which, after giving a specimen of, to prove his affertion, he affirms to be " the very false gallop of verses." HENLEY. I am now perfuaded that Sir T. Hanmer's emendation is right. The hobbling metre of these verses, (fays Touchstone,) is like the ambling, shuffling pace pace of a butter-woman's horse, going to market, The fame kind of imagery is found in K. Henry IV. P. I: " And that would fet my teeth nothing on edge, Nothing so much, as mincing poetry; "'Tis like the forc'd gait of a shuffling nag." MALONE, Winter-garments must be lin'd, This is the very false gallop of verses; Why do you infect yourself with them? Ros. Peace, you dull fool; I found them on a tree. TOUCH. Truly, the tree yields bad fruit. Ros. I'll graff it with you, and then I shall graff it with a medlar: then it will be the earliest fruit" in the country; for you'll be rotten ere you be half ripe, and that's the right virtue of the medlar. TOUCH. You have faid; but whether wisely or no, let the foreft judge. Enter CELIA, reading a paper. Ros. Peace! Here comes my fister, reading; stand aside. CEL. Why should this defert filent be?? 3 This is the very false gallop of verses;] So, in Nashe's Apologie of Pierce Pennileffe, 4to. 1593: "I would trot a false gallop through the rest of his ragged verses, but that if I should retort the rime doggrell aright, I must make my verses (as he doth his) run hobbling, like a brewer's cart upon the stones, and observe no measure in their feet." MALONE. 6 - the earlieft fruit-) Shakspeare seems to have had little knowledge in gardening. The medlar is one of the latest fruits, being uneatable till the end of November. STEEVENS. Why should this defert filent be?] This is commonly printed: Tongues I'll hang on every tree, 'Twixt the fouls of friend and friend: but although the metre may be assisted by this correction, the sense ftill is defective; for how will the hanging of tongues on every tree, make it less a defert? I am perfuaded we ought to read: Why should this defert filent be? TYRWHITT. The notice which this emendation deserves, I have paid to it, by inserting it in the text. STEEVENS. 8 That shall civil sayings show.] Civil is here used in the fame sense as when we say civil wisdom or civil life, in oppofition to a folitary state, or to the state of nature. This defert shall not appear unpeopled, for every tree shall teach the maxims or incidents of focial life. JOHNSON. Civil, I believe, is not designedly opposed to folitary. It means only grave, or folemn. So, in Twelfth Night, Act III. fc. iv: "Where is Malvolio? he is fad and civil." i. e. grave and demure. Again, in A Woman's Prize, by Beaumont and Fletcher: STEEVENS. 9 in little show.] The allusion is to a miniature-portrait. The current phrafe in our author's time was" painted in little." MALONE. So, in Hamlet: " - a hundred ducats a-piece, for his picture in little." STEEVENS. |