how foe'er their hearts are fever'd in religion, their heads are both one, they may joll horns together, like any deer i' the herd.

COUNT. Wilt thou ever be a foul-mouth'd and calumnious knave?

CLO. A prophet I, madam; and I fpeak the truth the next way:

For I the ballad will repeat,
Which men full true shall find;
Your marriage comes by deftiny,
Your cuckoo fings by kind.

COUNT. Get you gone, fir; I'll talk with you

more anon.

8 A prophet I, madam; and I speak the truth the next way:] It is a fuperftition, which has run through all ages and people, that natural fools have fomething in them of divinity. On which account they were efteemed facred: Travellers tell us in what esteem the Turks now hold them; nor had they lefs honour paid them heretofore in France, as appears from the old word benet, for a natural fool. Hence it was that Pantagruel, in Rabelais, advised Panurge to go and confult the fool Triboulet as an oracle; which gives occafion to a fatirical ftroke upon the privy council of Francis the Firft-Par l'avis, confeil, prediction des fols vas fcavez quants princes, Ec. ont efté confervez, &c.-The phrafe-peak the truth the next way, means directly; as they do who are only the inftruments or canals of others; fuch as infpired perfons were fuppofed to be. WARBURTON.

See the popular story of Nixon the Idiot's Cheshire Prophecy.

Next way,

DOUCE.

is nearest way. So, in K. Henry IV. Part I: ""Tis the next way to turn tailor," &c. STEEVENS. Next way is a phrase still used in Warwickshire, and fignifies without circumlocution, or going about. HENLEY.

9

-fings by kind.] I find fomething like two of the lines of this ballad in John Grange's Garden, 1577:

"Content yourfelf as well as I, let reafon rule your minde, "As cuckoldes come by deftinie, fo cuckowes fing by kinde."

STEEVENS.

STEW. May it please you, madam, that he bid Helen come to you; of her I am to fpeak.

COUNT. Sirrah, tell my gentlewoman, I would speak with her; Helen I mean.

CLO. Was this fair face the caufe, quoth fbe,

Why the Grecians facked Troy?

Fond done, done fond,

Was this king Priam's joy.

[Singing.

Was this fair face the caufe, &c.] The name of Helen, whom the Countefs has juft cailed for, brings an old ballad on the facking of Troy to the Clown's mind. MALONE.

This is a ftanza of an old ballad, out of which a word or two are dropt, equally neceffary to make the fenfe and alternate rhyme. For it was not Helen, who was King Priam's joy, but Paris. The third line therefore fhould be read thus:

Fond done, fond done, for Paris, he—.

WARBURTON.

If this be a ftanza taken from any ancient ballad, it will probably in time be found entire, and then the restoration may be made with authority. STEEVENS.

In confirmation of Dr. Warburton's conjecture, Mr. Theobald has quoted from Fletcher's Maid in the Mill, the following stanza of another old ballad:

"And here fair Paris comes,

་་

"The hopeful youth of Troy,

Queen Hecuba's darling fon, "King Priam's only joy."

This renders it extremely probable, that Paris was the perfon defcribed as "king Priam's joy" in the ballad quoted by our author; but Mr. Heath has juftly obferved, that Dr. Warburton, though he has fupplied the words fuppofed to be loft, has not explained them; nor indeed do they feem, as they are connected, to afford any meaning. In 1585 was entered on the Stationers' books by Edward White, "The lamentation of Hecuba, and the ladyes of Troye;" which probably contained the ftanza here quoted."

MALONE.

3 Fond done,] Is foolishly done. So, in King Richard III. A& III. fc. iii:

With that he fighed as she stood,
With that he fighed as she stood,♦
And gave this fentence then;
Among nine bad if one be good,
Among nine bad if one be good,
There's yet one good in ten.s

COUNT. What, one good in ten? you corrupt the fong, firrah.

CLO. One good woman in ten, madam; which is a purifying o' the fong: 'Would God would ferve the world fo all the year! we'd find no fault with the tythe-woman, if I were the parfon: One in ten, quoth a'! an we might have a good woman born but every blazing ftar, or at an earthquake, 'twould mend the lottery well; a man may draw his heart out, ere he pluck one.

7

With that he fighed as he flood,] At the end of the line of which this is a repetition, we find added in Italick characters the word bis, denoting, I fuppofe, the neceffity of its being repeated. The correfponding line was twice printed, as it is here inferted, from the oldeft copy. STEEVENS.

5 Among nine bad if one be good,

There's yet one good in ten.] This fecond stanza of the ballad is turned to a joke upon the women: a confeffion, that there was one good in ten. Whereon the Countefs obferved, that he corrupted the fong; which fhows the fong faid-nine good in ten.

If one be bad among ft nine good,

There's but one bad in ten.

This relates to the ten fons of Priam, who all behaved themselves well but Paris. For though he once had fifty, yet at this unfortunate period of his reign he had but ten; Agathon, Antiphon, Deiphobus, Dius, Hetor, Helenus, Hippothous, Pammon, Paris, and Polites. WARBURTON.

6but every blazing ftar,] The old copy reads-but ore every blazing ftar. STEEVENS.

I fuppofe o'er was a mifprint for or, which was used by our old writers for before. MALONE.

7

'would mend the lottery well;] This furely is a ftrange.

COUNT. You'll be gone, fir knave, and do as I command you?

CLO. That man fhould be at woman's command, and yet no hurt done!-Though honefty be no puritan, yet it will do no hurt; it will wear the furplice of humility over the black gown of a big heart. I am going, forfooth: the business is for Helen to come hither. [Exit Clown.

8

kind of phrafeology. I have never met with any example of it in any of the contemporary writers; and if there were any proof that in the lotteries of Queen Elizabeth's time wheels were employed, I fhould be inclined to read-lottery wheel. MALONE.

Clo. That man, &c.] The Clown's anfwer is obfcure. His lady bids him do as he is commanded. He anfwers with the licentious petulance of his character, that if a man does as a woman commands, it is likely he will do amifs; that he does not amifs, being at the command of a woman, he makes the effect, not of his lady's goodness, but of his own honefty, which, though not very nice or puritanical, will do no hurt; and will not only do no hurt, but, unlike the puritans, will comply with the injunctions of fuperiors, and wear the furplice of humility over the black gown of a big heart; will obey commands, though not much pleafed with a ftate of fubjection.

Here is an allufion, violently enough forced in, to fatirize the obftinacy with which the puritans refufed the ufe of the ecclefiaftical habits, which was, at that time, one principal caufe of the breach of the union, and, perhaps, to infinuate, that the modest purity of the furplice was fometimes a cover for pride.

JOHNSON. The averfion of the puritans to a furplice is alluded to in many of the old comedies. So, in Cupid's Whirligig, 1607:

"She loves to act in as clean linen as any gentlewoman of her function about the town; and truly that's the reason that your fincere puritans cannot abide a furplice, because they fay 'tis made of the fame thing that your villainous fin is committed in, of your prophane holland."

Again, in The Match at Midnight, 1633:

64

He has turn'd my ftomach for all the world like a puritan's at the fight of a furplice."

Again, in The Hollander, 1640:

"A puritan, who, becaufe he faw a furplice in the church, would needs hang himself in the bell-ropes." STEEVENS.

COUNT. Well, now.

STEW. I know, madam, you love your gentlewoman entirely.

COUNT. Faith, I do: her father bequeath'd her to me; and the herfelf, without other advantage, may lawfully make title to as much love as the finds there is more owing her, than is paid; and more fhall be paid her, than fhe'll demand.

STEW. Madam, I was very late more near her than, I think, the wifh'd me: alone fhe was, and did communicate to herfelf, her own words to her own ears; fhe thought, I dare vow for her, they touch'd not any ftranger fenfe. Her matter was, fhe loved your fon: Fortune, the faid, was no goddefs, that had put fuch difference betwixt their two eftates; Love, no god, that would not extend his might, only where qualities were level; Diana,

I cannot help thinking we fhould read-Though honefty be a puritan. TYRWHITT.

Surely Mr. Tyrwhitt's correction is right. If our author had meant to fay-though honefty be no puritan,-why fhould he addthat it would wear the furplice, &c. or, in other words, that it would be content to affume a covering that puritans in general reprobated? What would there be extraordinary in this? Is it matter of wonder, that he who is no puritan, fhould be free from the fcruples and prejudices of one?

The Clown, I think, means to fay, "Though honesty be rigid and confcientious as a puritan, yet it will not be obftinate, but humbly comply with the lawful commands of its fuperiors, while at the fame time its proud fpirit inwardly revolts against them." I fufpect however a ftill farther corruption; and that the compofitor caught the words "no hurt" from the preceding line. Our author perhaps wrote "Though honefty be a puritan, yet it will do what is enjoined; it will wear the furplice of humility, over the black gown of a big heart." I will therefore obey my mistress, however reluctantly, and go for Helena. MALONE.

9 only where qualities were level;] The meaning may be, where qualities only, and not fortunes or conditions, were level. Or perhaps only is used for except. "that would not extend his night, except where two perfons were of equal rank." MALONE,