THER. I would have peace and quietness, but the fool will not he there; that he; look you there.. AJAX. O thou damned cur! I shall ACHIL. Will you set your wit to a fool's? THER. No, I warrant you; for a fool's will shame it. PATR. Good words, Thersites. ACHIL. What's the quarrel? AJAX. I bade the vile owl, go learn me the tenour of the proclamation, and he rails upon me. THER. I serve thee not. AJAX. Well, go to, go to. THER. I serve here voluntary. ACHIL. Your last service was sufferance, 'twas not voluntary; no man is beaten voluntary; 2 Ajax was here the voluntary, and you as under an impress. THER. Even so?-a great deal of your wit too lies in your sinews, or else there be liars. Hector shall have a great catch, if he knock out either of your brains; 'a were as good crack a fusty nut with no kernel. ACHIL. What, with me too, Thersites ? THER. There's Ulysses, and old Nestor,-whose wit was mouldy ere your grandsires had nails on ——is beaten voluntary;] i. e. voluntarily. Shakspeare often uses adjectives adverbially. See Vol. XI. p. 386, n. 9. MALONE. 3 Hector shall have a great catch, if he knock out either of your brains; &c.] The same thought occurs in Cymbeline: 66 not Hercules "Could have knock'd out his brains, for he had none." STEEVENS, Nestor, whose wit was mouldy ere your grandsires had nails-] [Old copies their grandsires.] This is one of their toes,-yoke you like draught oxen, and make you plough up the wars. to! ACHIL. What, what? THER. Yes, good sooth; To, Achilles! tó, Ajax! AJAX. I shall cut out your tongue. THER. 'Tis no matter; I shall speak as much as thou, afterwards. PATR. No more words, Thersites; peace, THER. I will hold my peace when Achilles' brach bids me, shall I ? 5 these editors' wise riddles. What! was Nestor's wit mouldy before his grandsire's toes had nails? Preposterous nonsense! and yet so easy a change as one poor pronoun for another, sets all right and clear. THEOBALD. -when Achilles' brach bids me,] The folio and quarto read-Achilles brooch. Brooch is an appendant ornament. The meaning may be equivalent to one of Achilles' hangers-on. JOHNSON. Brach I believe to be the true reading. He calls Patroclus, in contempt, Achilles's dog. So, in Timon of Athens: "When thou art Timon's dog" &c. A brooch was a cluster of gems affixed to a pin, and anciently worn in the hats of people of distinction. See the portrait of Sir Christopher Hatton. STEEVENS. I believe brache to be the true reading. It certainly means a bitch, and not a dog, which renders the expression more abusive and offensive. Thersites calls Patroclus Achilles' brache, for the same reason that he afterwards calls him his male harlot, and his masculine whore. M. MASON. I have little doubt of broch being the true reading, as a term of contempt. The meaning of broche is well ascertained-a spit-a bodkin; which being formerly used in the ladies' dress, was adorned with jewels, and gold and silver ornaments. Hence in old lists of jewels are found brotchets. I have a very magnificent one, which is figured ... described by Pennant, in the second volume of his Tour to Scotland, in 1772, ACHIL. There's for you, Patroclus. THER. I will see you hanged, like clotpoles, ere I come any more to your tents; I will keep where there is wit stirring, and leave the faction of fools, [Exit. PATR. A good riddance. ACHIL. Marry, this, sir, is proclaimed through all our host: That Hector, by the first hour of the sun, p. 14, in which the spit or bodkin forms but a very small part of the whole. LORT. Broch was, properly, a trinket with a pin affixed to it, and is consequently used by Shakspeare for an ornament in general. So, in Hamlet: But Thersites could not mean to compliment Patroclus, and therefore this cannot, I think, be the true reading. Brach, which was introduced by Mr. Rowe, might serve well enough, but that it certainly meant a bitch. [See Vol. IX. p. 16, n. 9.] It is possible, however, that Shakspeare might have used the word as synonymous to follower, without any regard to sex. I have sometimes thought that the word intended might have Been Achilles's brock, i. e. that over-weening conceited coxcomb, who attends upon Achilles. Our author has used this term of contempt in Twelfth-Night: "Marry, hang thee, brock!" So, in The Jests of George Peele, quarto, 1657: "This self-conceited brock had George invited," &c. MALONE. A brock, literally, means-a badger. STEEVENS. MALONE. AJAX. Farewell. Who shall answer him? ACHIL. I know not, it is put to lottery; otherwise, He knew his man. AJAX. O, meaning you :-I'll go learn more of it. SCENE II. [Exeunt. Troy. A Room in Priam's Palace. Enter PRIAM, HECTOR, TROILUS, PARIS, and PRI. After so many hours, lives, speeches spent, Thus once again says Nestor from the Greeks; Deliver Helen, and all damage else— As honour, loss of time, travel, expence, Wounds, friends, and what else dear that is consum'd In hot digestion of this cormorant war, Shall be struck off:-Hector, what say you to't? HECT. Though no man lesser fears the Greeks than I, As far as toucheth my particular, yet, Dread Priam, There is no lady of more softer bowels, More spungy to suck in the sense of fear, More ready to cry out-Who knows what follows? * Than Hector is: The wound of peace is surety, 7 66 spungy-] So, in Macbeth: his spungy officers." STEEVENS. Who knows what follows?] Who knows what ill consequences may follow from pursuing this or that course? MALONE. Surety secure; but modest doubt is call'd TRO. Fye, fye, my brother! Weigh you the worth and honour of a king, So great as our dread father, in a scale Of common ounces? will you with counters sum And buckle-in a waist most fathomless, As fears and reasons? fye, for godly shame! reasons, 2 9 -many thousand dismes,] Disme, Fr. is the tithe, the tenth. So, in the Prologue to Gower's Confessio Amantis, 1554: "The disme goeth to the battaile." Again, in Holinshed's Reign of Richard II: "-so that there was levied, what of the disme, and by the devotion of the people," &c. STEevens. The past-proportion of his infinite?] Thus read both the copies. The meaning is, that greatness to which no measure bears any proportion. The modern editors silently give: 9 The vast proportion-. JOHNSON. -though you bite so sharp at reasons, &c.] Here is a wretched quibble between reasons and raisins, which in Shakspeare's time, were, I believe, pronounced alike. Dogberry, in Much Ado about Nothing, plays upon the same words: "If Justice cannot tame you, she shall never weigh more reasons in her balance." MALONE.. |