Be this sweet Helen's knell, and now forget her. Send forth your amorous token for fair Maudlin: The main consents are had; and here we'll stay To fee our widower's fecond marriage-day.

COUNT. Which better than the firft, O dear heaven, blefs!

Or, ere they meet, in me, O nature, cease!3
LAF. Come on, my fon, in whom my house's

name

Must be digested, give a favour from you,
To sparkle in the fpirits of my daughter,
That the may quickly come.-By my old beard,
And every hair that's on't, Helen, that's dead,
Was a sweet creature; fuch a ring as this,

I cannot comprehend this paffage as it ftands, and have no doubt but we should read

Our old love waking, &c.

Extinctus amabitur idem.

Our own love, can mean nothing but our felf-love, which would not be fenfe in this place; but our old love waking, means our former affection being revived. M. MASON.

This conjecture appears to me extremely probable; but waking will not, I think, here admit of Mr. M. Mafon's interpretation, being revived; nor indeed is it neceffary to his emendation. It is clear from the fubfequent line that waking is here used in its ordinary fenfe. Hate fleeps at eafe, unmolefted by any remembrance of the dead, while old love, reproaching itself for not having been fufficiently kind to a departed friend, "wakes and weeps;" crying, "that's good that's gone." MALONE.

3 Which better than the firft, O dear heaven, blefs!

Or, ere they meet, in me, O nature, ceafe!] I have ventured against the authorities of the printed copies, to prefix the Countess's name to these two lines. The king appears, indeed, to be a favourer of Bertram: but if Bertram fhould make a bad husband the fecond time, why fhould it give the king fuch mortal pangs? A fond and difappointed mother might reafonably not defire to live to fee fuch a day: and from her the wifh of dying, rather than to behold it, comes with propriety. THEOBALD.

The last that e'er I took her leave at court,
I faw upon her finger.

BER.

Hers it was not.

KING. Now, pray you, let me fee it; for mine eye, While I was speaking, oft was faften'd to't.This ring was mine; and, when I gave it Helen, I bade her, if her fortunes ever stood

Neceffitied to help, that' by this token

I would relieve her: Had you that craft, to reave her Of what fhould ftead her moft?

I have seen her wear it; and the reckon'd it
At her life's rate.

LAF.

I am fure, I faw her wear it. BER. You are deceiv'd, my lord, fhe never faw it: In Florence was it from a cafement thrown me," Wrapp'd in a paper, which contain'd the name Of her that threw it: noble fhe was, and thought I ftood ingag'd: but when I had fubfcrib'd

The last that e'er I took her leave-] The laft time that I faw her, when he was leaving the court. Mr. Rowe and the fubfequent editors read-that e'er fhe took, &c. MALONE.

s I bade her, if her fortunes ever flood

Neceffitied to help, that-] Our author here, as in many other places, feems to have forgotten in the close of the fentence how he began to conftruct it. See p. 189, n. 9. The meaning however is clear, and I do not fufpect any corruption. MALONE.

In Florence was it from a cafement thrown me,] continues to have too little virtue to deserve Helen. know indeed that it was Helen's ring, but he knew it not from a window. JOHNSON.

Bertram still He did not that he had

Thus the old copy. Dr. Johnfon reads→→→

7 — noble she was, and thought I food ingag'd:] engaged. STEEVENS,

To mine own fortune, and inform'd her fully,
I could not answer in that courfe of honour
As she had made the overture, she ceas'd,
In heavy fatisfaction, and would never
Receive the ring again.

KING.

Plutus himself,

That knows the tinct and multiplying medicine,
Hath not in nature's mystery more science,
Than I have in this ring: 'twas mine, 'twas Helen's,
Whoever gave it you: Then, if you know
That you are well acquainted with yourself,
Confefs 'twas hers, and by what rough enforcement

The plain meaning is, when the faw me receive the ring, she thought me engaged to her. JOHNSON.

Ingag'd, may be intended in the fame fenfe with the reading propofed by Mr. Theobald, [ungag'd] i. e. not engaged; as Shakfpeare in another place ufes gag'd for engaged. Merchant of Venice, Â& I. fc. i. TYRWHITT.

I have no doubt that ingaged (the reading of the folio) is right. Gaged is ufed by other writers, as well as by Shakspeare, for engaged. So, in a Paftoral, by Daniel, 1605:

Not that the earth did gage

"Unto the husbandman

"Her voluntary fruits, free without fees."

Ingaged, in the fenfe of unengaged, is a word of exactly the fame formation as inhabitable, which is used by Shakspeare and the contemporary writers for uninhabitable. MALONE.

8 Plutus himself,

That knows the tinct and multiplying medicine,] Plutus, the grand alchemift, who knows the tincture which confers the properties of gold upon bafe metals, and the matter by which geld is multiplied, by which a fmall quantity of gold is made to communicate its qualities to a large mafs of bafe metal.

In the reign of Henry the Fourth a law was made to forbid all men thenceforth to multiply gold, or ufe any craft of multiplication. Of which law, Mr. Boyle, when he was warm with the hope of tranfmutation, procured a repeal. JOHNSON.

9 -Then, if you know

That you are well acquainted with yourself,

Confefs 'twas hers,] i. e. confefs the ring was hers, for you know it as well as you know that you are yourself. EDWARDS.

You got it from her: fhe call'd the faints to furety, That the would never put it from her finger, Unless she gave it to yourself in bed,

(Where you have never come,) or fent it us Upon her great difafter.

BER.

She never faw it.

KING. Thou fpeak'ft it falfely, as I love mine ho

nour;

And mak❜ft conjectural fears to come into me,
Which I would fain fhut out: If it fhould prove
That thou art so inhuman,-'twill not prove fo;-
And yet I know not:-thou didst hate her deadly,
And he is dead; which nothing, but to clofe
Her eyes myself, could win me to believe,
More than to fee this ring.-Take him away.-
[Guards feize BERTRAM.

My fore-paft proofs, howe'er the matter fall,
Shall tax my fears of little vanity,

Having vainly fear'd too little.-Away with him;—-
We'll fift this matter further.

BER.

If you fhall prove

This ring was ever hers, you fhall as easy
Prove that I husbanded her bed in Florence,
Where yet she never was.

[Exit BERTRAM, guarded.

The true meaning of this expreffion is, If you know that your faculties are fo found, as that you have the proper confciousness of your own actions, and are able to recollect and relate what have done, tell me, &c. JOHNSON.

2 My fore-paft proofs, howe'er the matter fall, Shall tax my fears of little vanity,

you

Having vainly fear'd too little.] The proofs which I have already had are fufficient to fhow that my irrational. I have rather been hitherto and have unreasonably had too little fear.

fears were not vain and more eafy than I ought, JOHNSON.

Enter a Gentleman.

KING. I am wrapp'd in dismal thinkings.

GENT.

Gracious fovereign, Whether I have been to blame, or no, I know not; Here's a petition from a Florentine,

Who hath, for four or five removes, come short
To tender it herself. I undertook it,

Vanquish'd thereto by the fair grace and speech
Of the poor fuppliant, who by this, I know,
Is here attending: her bufinefs looks in her
With an importing visage; and fhe told me,
In a sweet verbal brief, it did concern
Your highness with herself.

KING. [Reads.]-Upon his many proteftations to marry me, when his wife was dead, I blush to say it, he won me. Now is the count Roufillon a widower; his vows are forfeited to me, and my honour's paid to him. He fole from Florence, taking no leave, and I follow him to his country for justice: Grant it me, O king; in you it beft lies; otherwife a feducer flourishes, and a poor maid is undone.

DIANA CAPULET.

LAF. I will buy me a fon-in-law in a fair, and toll him: for this, I'll none of him."

3 Who bath, for four or five removes, come fort, &c.] Who hath miffed the opportunity of prefenting it in perfon to your majefty, either at Marseilles, or on the road from thence to Roufillon, in confequence of having been four or five removes behind you.

Removes are journies or poft-flages. JOHNSON.

MALONE.

4 I will buy me a fon-in-law in a fair, and toll him: for this, I'll none of him.] Thus the fecond folio. The firft omits-him. Either reading is capable of explanation.

The meaning of the earliest copy feems to be this: I'll buy me a new fon-in-law, &c. and toll the bell for this; i. e. look upon him