And as the soldiers bore dead bodies by, He call'd them untaught knaves, unmannerly, 45 With many holiday and lady terms He question'd me; amongst the rest, demanded I then, all smarting with my wounds being cold, 50 Out of my grief and my impatience, rest. Answer'd neglectingly I know not what, He should, or he should not; for he made me mad 42. bore] bare Ff. 46. terms] tearme F. 47. amongst] Qq 1, 2; among the 49. I then,] I, then Pope. all smarting] hyphened Ff. 50. pester'd] Pope; pestred Qq 1-3; pestered the rest. popinjay] Qq 7, 8; Popingay the rest. 53. or he] or Ff. Howes, Stowes Annales, ed. 1615, p. 948). For "to take in snuff,” to take offence at, cf. Jonson, The Poetaster, II. i: "I take it highly in snuff," and J. Phillips, Maronides, 1672. 46. holiday] choice, not of the common work-a-day kind. Cf. Lyly, Pappe with an Hatchet (Bond, iii. 401): "Put on your holie day English, and the best wit you have for high daies"; Lodge and Greene, A Looking-Glass for London and England, 1594 (Dyce's Greene and Peele, p. 125): "she will call me rascal, rogue, runagate, varlet, vagabond, slave and knave; and these be but holiday-terms, but if you heard her working-day words, in faith, sir, they be rattlers like thunder"; and Nashe, A Prognostication (Grosart, ii. 157): "Knave and slave shal be but holyday words to their husbands." Cf. "his holyday hose and his best jacket" in Greene's Dorastus and Fawnia, 1588 (Collier, Shakespeare's Library, i. 45). See also Merry Wives of Windsor, III. ii. 69. 46. lady] ladylike, effeminate. Antony and Cleopatra, v. ii. 165: some lady trifles," and Middleton, Anything for a Quiet Life, iv. ii:— "Mistriss Knavesby. Thou art a beast, an horned beast, an ox! Are these ladies Knavesby. terms? - 47. question'd] Perhaps "talked to," as sometimes elsewhere. 49. smarting cold] Malone quotes from Drayton, Mortimeriados, 1596: "As when the blood is cold, we feel the wound,' and Tollet from Barnes's History of Edward III. p. 786: "the wounds began with loss of blood to cool and smart." 50, 51. Following a suggestion made by Edwards, Capell transposed these lines. The order of lines 49 and 50, however, corresponds with the order of ideas in line 51, "grief" being the pain caused by the wounds, "impatience the annoyance given by the popinjay. "To be popinjay" bracketed in F, is, in fact, parenthetical; it does not depend upon "smarting" in line 49 as some commentators construe. 50. pester'd with] pestered by, as in Troilus and Cressida, v. i. 38. 50. popinjay] a parrot, whence, as here, a prating coxcomb. Fáck Juggler (Hazlitt's Dodsley, ii. 117) :— "she chatteth like a pie all day, And speaketh like a parrot popin jay. Cotgrave has "Papegay; m. a Parrot, or Popingay." 51. grief pain, as in Shelton, Don Quixote, Part II. lx: "the grief of his wounds would not suffer him to go any farther." 52. neglectingly]negligently, thoughtlessly. Schmidt explains as "slightingly." 54. shine so brisk] Cf. Chapman, Jonson and Marston, Eastward Ho, III. ii: "Good Lord, how he shines! and Donne, Satires, i. 19: a brisk, perfum'd pert Courtier,' And talk so like a waiting-gentlewoman 55 Of guns and drums and wounds,-God save the woman 58. parmaceti] Parmacitie 55. talk waiting-gentlewoman] to be "the most sovereign and precious I hope to hit the = 'Every man thynke on hys trewe love And marke hym to the Trenite." 57, 58. the sovereign'st . . . bruise] that spermaceti was the most efficacious remedy for an internal injury or bruise. Sovereign'st, supremely excellent, most efficacious; Lyly, Mother Bombie, II. v: "it [sack] is the soueraigntest drinke in the world," and Jonson, Every Man in his Humour, III. ii, where Bobadil affirms tobacco 58. parmaceti] a corruption of " spermaceti," the spelling "Parmacitie or Parmacity" (Qq, F) being apparently due to a fanciful etymology from Parma City. Thus Minshew: "Parmacetie, confectio optima à Civitate Parmae ita dicta, aut à ducibus Parmae usitata." Reed quotes from Sir R. Hawkins's Voyage into the South Sea (Hakluyt Soc. ed., p. 73): "his [the whale's] spawne wee corruptly call parmacettie; of the Latine word Sperma-ceti." Bucknill (Shakespeare's Medical Knowledge, p. 145) shows that spermaceti was believed to be an anodyne and to resolve coagulated blood, whence, he observes, its supposed efficacy on an inward bruise. Mizaldus (Lupton, A Thousand Notable Things, ed. 1660, p. 104) affirms that there is " a marvellous strength" in it, and that it will "penetrate and go through the boxes or things wherein it is kept, with a certain moisture, or sweating drops." Bullokar (Expositor, 1617) says that it "is used in Physicke against bruisings of the bodie." See also The True Travels of Captaine John Smith, 1629 (Arber, Scholar's Library, p. 889); Middleton, Anything for a Quiet Life, v. ii; Overbury, Characters, An ordinarie Fencer: "for an inward bruise, lambstones and sweet-breads are his onely spermaceti." For "inward,” internal, cf. IV. i. 31 post, and Drayton, The Man in the Moon: "The well . . . hath the pain appeas'd Of th' inward griev'd, and outwardly diseas'd." Which many a good tall fellow had destroy'd And I beseech you, let not his report 65 Come current for an accusation Betwixt my love and your high majesty. Blunt. The circumstance consider'd, good my lord, King. Why, yet he doth deny his prisoners, But with proviso and exception, That we at our own charge shall ransom straight Who, on my soul, hath wilfully betray'd 64. himself have been] haue been himselfe Qq 4-8. 62. tall] in the obsolete sense of 64. soldier] a trisyllable, as in Hazlitt's Dodsley, ix. 36. 65. bald unjointed] trivial and disconnected, trashy and inconsequent. Comedy of Errors, II. ii. 110: "a bald conclusion." 66. indirectly] not to the point, with out direct reference to his questions or demands. See line 52 ante, and cf. II. iii. gr post. 68. Come current] be received as true or valid. Cf. Richard II. 1. iii. 231, and Nashe, The Unfortunate Traveller (McKerrow, ii. 297): "their oaths went for currant; I was quit by proclamation." 71. Whate'er Lord] F reads What euer for Whate'er, the extra syllable supplying the loss of Lord, which 70 75 80 66. I answer'd] Pope; 67. his] Q 1; this the rest. 71. Lord Q1; What e're (or er'e) Qq 2-8; 81. on] Qq 1, 2; in the rest. dropped out of the text in the second and subsequent Qq. 71-76. The subject of "impeach" is, I think, lines 71-73, Whate'er Lord.. and its object "him," understood from the preceding clause: "May whatever he then said be forgotten and never again be cited to injure him or in any way discredit him-provided that he unsay now what then he said." "What then he said" is in apposition to and defines "it," the object of unsay.' The obscurity of the whole passage is removed by putting a dash after "impeach." Johnson regarded "what then he said" as the subject of "may rise," interpreting: "Let what he then said never rise to impeach him, so he unsay it now." So Elton, who puts a semicolon after "die." Wright explains "To do him said" as "to injure him or in any way put such a construction upon his words as to make them the foundation of a criminal charge.” 77. yet he doth] he doth yet. For the transposition, Rolfe compares line ... Against that great magician, damn'd Glendower, Hot. Revolted Mortimer! He never did fall off, my sovereign liege, 84. the] that Q I. 85 90 95 89. mountains] F 4; 94, 95. liege... to] 96. tongue for] Hanmer; tongue, 98. sedgy] sedgie F 4; siedgie 83. that] Qq 1, 2; the the rest. mountaines Q1; mountaine (mountain Q 3, F 3) the rest. liege. But. .. war To Upton conj. for Rowe; tongue: for Qq; tongue. For Ff. the rest. She should employ it." "I would not have her forc'd; Turn into fears, and fly from their It seems clear from the words and 2 Henry IV. IV. v. 196, where "all these bold fears are the King's disaffected and turbulent nobles whom he has cause to fear. Daniel (Civil Wars, iv) describes Mortimer as "A man the King much fear'd," but it is improbable that so astute a politician as Henry would publicly and in the presence of the Percys have proclaimed his fear of a rival. Hanmer reads foes, Knight feres, i.e. vassals; Johnson conjectured peers. 94. fall off] revolt, go over to the enemy; as in King John, v. v. II, and often. 95-97. to prove mouthed wounds] A similar figure occurs in Julius Cæsar, III. i. 259-261:— "thy wounds Which, like dumb mouths, do ope their ruby lips, To beg the voice and utterance of Cf. also Coriolanus, 11. iii. 6-8; and "dead Henry's wounds Open their congeal'd mouths and bleed afresh!" In single opposition, hand to hand, He did confound the best part of an hour 100 In changing hardiment with great Glendower: Three times they breathed and three times did they drink, Upon agreement, of swift Severn's flood; Who then, affrighted with their bloody looks, And hid his crisp head in the hollow bank Colour her working with such deadly wounds; Then let not him be slander'd with revolt. 105 106. crisp head] crispe-head Qq, F; crisped-head Ff 2-4. the] a Ff 2-4. 108. bare] Qq; base Ff. 112. not him] him not Qq 6-8, Ff. slander'd] Ff 3, 4; sland'red Ff 1, 2; slandered Qq. "the Volga trembled. And hid his seven curl'd heads": Dekker, Londons Tempe (Pearson, iv. 120):— "swift Volga... whose curld head lies On Seauen rich pillowes." 108. bare] I retain the bare of Qq, explaining it, with Johnson, as "lying open to detection." Cf. Milton, Samson Agonistes, 901, 902:— "These false pretexts and varnish'd colours failing, Bare in thy guilt, how foul must thou appear." We meet in Hooker, Eccles. Pol., many such expressions as "bare and naked " (ii. 7), and "bare and unbuilded" (ii. 7). Some editors prefer the base of F. 108. policy] craft, cunning, as elsewhere in Shakespeare. Cf. 3 Henry VI. II. vi. 65. 109. Colour her working] disguise its proceedings, or render them specious. Shelton, Don Quixote, Part IV. vii; "Leonela . . stanched her lady's blood, which was just as much as might serve to colour her invention" and Munday, Drayton, Wilson and Hathaway, Life of Sir John Oldcastle, IV. ii : |