guerdon! I will do it, Sir, in print. Guerdon, remune ration. Biron. O! and I, forfooth, in love! I, that have been love's whip; A very beadle to a humorous figh: A critick; nay, a night-watch conftable, [Exit. This whimpled, whining, purblind wayward boy, Of trotting parators. (O my little heart!) (17) This Signior Junio's giant-dwarf, Dan Cupid.] It was fome time ago ingeniously hinted to me, (and I readily came into the opinion;) that as there was a contrast of terms in giant-dwarf, so, probably, there should be in the words immediately preceding them; and therefore that we fhould reftore, This Senior-junior, giant-dwarf, Dan Cupid. i. e. this old, young man. And there is, indeed, afterwards in this play, a description of Cupid, which forts very aptly with fuch an emendation. That was the way to make his godhead wax, For be bath been five thousand years a boy. The conjecture is exquifitely well imagin'd, and ought by all means to be embrac'd, unless there is reafon to think, that, in the former reading, there is an allufion to fome tale, or character in an old play. I have not, on this account, ventur'd to disturb the text, because there feems to me some reason to fufpect, that our author is here alluding to Beaumont and Fletcher's Bonduca. In that tragedy there is the character of one Junius, a Roman captain, who falls in love to diftraction with one of Bonduca's daughters; and becomes an arrant whining flave to this paffion. He is afterwards cur'd of his infirmity, and is as abfolute a tyrant against the fex. Now, with regard to thefe two extremes, Cupid might very properly be filed Junius's giant-dwarf : a giant in his eye, while the dotage was upon him; but shrunk into a dwarf, fo foon as he had got the better of it. Our poet writing the name with the Italian termination, and calling him Signior Junio, would, I think, be an objection of little weight to urge, that the Roman captain could not therefore be meant. And And I to be a corporal of his file, (18) With two pitch balls stuck in her face for eyes; Of his almighty, dreadful, little, might. Well, I will love, write, figh, pray, fue and groan: Some men must love my Lady, and fome Joan. [Exit. (18) And I to be a coporal of his field, And wear his colours like a tumbler's hoop!] A corporal of a field is quite a new term: neither did the tumblers ever adorn their boops with ribbands, that I can learn for those were not carried in parade about with them, as the fencer carries his fword: Nor, if they were, is the fimilitude at all pertinent to the cafe in hand. But to floop like a tumbler agrees not only with that profeffion, and the fervile condefcenfions of a lover, but with what follows in the context. What mifled the wife tranfcribers at firft, feems this: When once the tumbler appear'd, they thought, his boop must not be far behind. Mr. Warburton. ACT A CT III. SCENE, a Pavilion in the Park near the Enter the Princess, Rofaline, Maria, Catharine, Lords, Attendants, and a Forefter. W PRINCESS. 'AS that the King, that spurr'd his horse so hard Against the steep uprifing of the hill? Boyet. I know not; but, I think, it was not he. Prin. Who e'er he was, he fhew'd a mounting mind. Then Forester, my friend, where is the bush, For. Pardon me, madam: for I meant not fo. Prin. Nay, never paint me now; Where fair is not, praise cannot mend the brow. For. Nothing but fair is that, which you inherit. A giving hand, though foul, fhall have fair praise. If If wounding, then it was to fhew my skill; When for fame's fake, for praise, an outward part, The poor deer's blood, that my heart means no ill. Prin. Only for praife; and praife we may afford Enter Coftard. Boyet. Here comes a member of the commonwealth. Coft. God dig-you-den all; pray you, which is the head Lady? Prin. Thou shalt know her, fellow, by the reft that have no heads. Ceft. Which is the greateft Lady, the highest? Coft. The thickeft and the talleft? it is fo, truth is truth. Prin. Othy letter, thy letter: he's a good friend of mine. Stand afide, good bearer.-Boyet, you can carve; (19) Break (19) Boyet, you can carve Break up this capon.] i. e. open this letter. Our poet ufes this metaphor, as the French do their poulet; which fignifies both a young fowl, and a love letter. Poulet, amatoriæ litteræ ; fays Richelet and quotes from Voiture, repondre au plus obligeant poulet du monde; to reply to the moft obliging letter in the world. The Italians ufe the fame manner of expreffion, when they call a love-epiftle, una pollicetta amorofa. I ow'd the hint of this equivocal ufe of the word. to my ingenious friend Mr. Bijkop. 1 obferve in Westwardboe, a comedy written Break up this capon. Boyet. I am bound to ferve. This letter is mistook, it importeth none here; Prin. We will read it, I fwear. Break the neck of the wax, and every one give ear. BY Y heaven, that thou art fair, is moft infallible; true, that thou art beauteous; truth itself, that thou art lovely; more fairer than fair, beautiful than beauteous, truer than truth itself; have commiferation on thy heroical vaffal. The magnanimous and most illuftrate King Cophetua fet eye upon the pernicious and indubitate beggar Zenelophon; and he it was that might rightly fay, veni, vidi, vici; which to anatomize in the vulgar, (O base and obfcure vulgar!) videlicet, he came, saw, and overcame; he came, one; saw, two; overcame, three. Who came? the King. Why did he come to fee. Why did he fee? to overcome. To whom came he? to the beggar. What faw he? the beggar. Who overcame he? the beggar. The conclufion is victory; on whofe fide? the King's; the captive is inrich'd: on whofe fide? the beggar's. The catastrophe is a nuptial: on whose fide? the King's? no, on both in one, or one in both: I am the King, (for fo ftands the comparison) thou the beggar, for fo witneffeth thy lowlinefs. Shall I command thy love? I may. Shall I enforce thy love? I could. Shall I entreat thy love? I will. What fhalt thou exchange for rags? robes; for tittles? titles: for thyfelf? me. Thus expecting thy reply, I prophane my lips on thy foot, my eyes on thy picture, and my heart on thy every part. Thine in the dearest defign of industry. Don Adriano de Armado. written by a contemporary with our author, that one of thefe letters is likewife call'd a wild-fowl. Act. 2. Sc. 2. At the skirt of that sheet in black work is wrought his name. Break not up the wild-fowl till anon, and then feed upon him in private. Thus |