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looking him earnestly in the face, and seeing so proper a gentleman in so bitter a passion, was mooved with so great pitie, that rising from the table, he tooke him by the hand and badde him welcome, willing him to sit downe in his place, and in his roome not onely to eat his fill, but the lord of the feast. Gramercy, sir, (quoth Rosader,) but I have a feeble friend that lyes hereby famished almost for food, aged and therefore lesse able to abide the extremitie of hunger then my selfe, and dishonour it were for me to taste one crumme, before I made him partner of my fortunes:

therefore I will runne and fetch him, and then I will gratefully accept of your proffer. Away hies Rosador to Adam Spencer, and tels him the newes, who was glad of so happie fortune, but so feeble he was that he could not go; wherupon Rosader got him up on his backe, and brought him to the place. Which when Gerismond and his men saw, they greatly applauded their league of friendship; and Rosader, having Gerismonds place assigned him, would not sit there himselfe, but set downe Adam Spencer."-ROSALYNDE, p. 53.

АСТ III.

(1) SCENE I.-Seek him with candle.] Referring, it is supposed, to the passage in St. Luke, ch. xv. ver. 8:“Either what woman having ten pieces of silver, if she lose one piece, doth not light a candle, and sweep the house, and seek diligently till she find it?"

(2) SCENE II.-And thou, thrice-crowned queen of night.] Johnson conjectured this was an allusion to the triple character of Proserpine, Cynthia, and Diana, given by some mythologists to the same goddess :

"Terret, lustrat, agit, Proserpina, Luna, Diana, Ima, superna, feras, sceptro, fulgore, sagittis ;" but Mr. Singer quotes a passage from one of Chapman's Hymns, which he thinks was probably in Shakespeare's mind:

"Nature's bright eye-sight, and the Night's fair soul,
That with thy triple forehead dost control
Earth, seas, and hell."

Hymnus in Cynthiam, 1594.

(3) SCENE II.-I was never so be-rhymed since Pythagoras' time, that I was an Irish rat.] Rosalind is a very learned lady. She alludes to the Pythagorean doctrine, which teaches that souls transmigrate from one animal to another, and relates that in his time she was an Irish rat, and by some metrical charm was rhymed to death. The power of killing rats with rhymes Donne mentions in his Satires, and Temple in his Treatises. Dr. Grey has produced a similar passage from Randolph :

My poets

Shall with a satire, steep'd in gall and vinegar,
Rhyme them to death, as they do rats in Ireland."
JOHNSON.

(4) SCENE II.-Gargantua's mouth.] "Although there had been no English translation of Rabelais in Shakespeare's time, yet it is evident, from several notices, that a chap-book history of the giant Garagantua, who swallowed five pilgrims, their staves and all, in a salad, was very popular in this country in the sixteenth century. The 'witless devices of Gargantua' are decried among the vain and lewd books of the age' by Edward Dering, in his epistle to the reader, prefixed to A Brief and Necessary Instruction, 1572. The history of Garagantua formed one of the pieces in the singular library of Captain Cox, so ludicrously described by Laneham, in the Letter from Kenilworth, 1575 :-'King Arthurz book, Huon of Burdeaus, Friar Rous, Howleglass, and Gargantua.' The 'monstrous fables of Garagantua' are also enumerated among many other 'infortunate treatises' in Hanmer's Eusebius, 1577. In the books of the Stationers' Company for 1592, is found an entry of Gargantua his Prophecie;' and in those for 1594 of a booke entitled the History of Garagantua.'"-HALLIWELL.

(5) SCENE III.-I will not to wedding with thee.] These lines are probably quoted from the old ballads mentioned in the following entries on the Registers of the Stationers' Company, 1584-5:—

"6 AUGUSTI. "Ric. Jones. Rd of him, for his licence to printe A Ballat of O swete Olyver, Leave me not behind thee.

iiijd."

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(6) SCENE V.-And why, I pray you?] Compare the parallel scene in "Rosalynde:"

"Ganimede, overhearing all these passions of Montanus, could not brooke the crueltie of Phoebe, but starting from behind the bush said: And if, damzell, you fled from mee, I would transforme you as Daphne to a bay, and then in contempt trample your branches under my feet. Phoebe at this sodaine replye was amazed, especially when shee saw so faire a swaine as Ganimede; blushing therefore, she would have bene gone, but that he held her by the hand, and prosecuted his reply thus: What, shepheardesse, so faire and so cruell? Disdaine beseemes not cottages, nor coynesse maids; for either they be condemned to be too proud, or too froward. Take heed, faire nymph, that in despising love, you be not over-reacht with love, and in shaking off all, shape yourselfe to your owne shadow, and so with Narcissus prove passionat and yet unpitied. Oft have I heard, and sometime have I seene, high disdaine turned to hot desires. Because thou art beautifull be not so coy as there is nothing more fair, so there is nothing more fading; as momentary as the shaddowes which growes from a clowdy sunne. Such (my faire shepheardesse) as disdaine in youth desire in age, and then are they hated in the winter, that might have been loved in the prime. A wringled mayd is like to a parched rose, that is cast up in coffers to please the smell, not worne in the hand to content the eye. There is no folly in love to had I wist, and therefore be rulde by mee. Love while thou art yoong, least thou be disdained when thou art olde. Beautie nor time cannot be recalde, and if thou love, like of Montanus; for if his desires are many, so his deserts are great."ROSALYNDE, p. 97.

(7) SCENE V.

Dead shepherd! now I find thy saw of might;
Who ever lov'd, that lov'd not at first sight?]

The "dead shepherd" here apostrophised was Marlowe, and the line Phebe quotes is from his once popular poem of "Hero and Leander," first published in 1598:

"It lies not in our power to love or hate,
For will in us is over-rul'd by fate.

When two are stripp'd, long ere the course begin,
We wish that one should lose, the other win.
And one especially do we affect

Of two gold ingots, like in each respect :
The reason no man knows; let it suffice,
What we behold is censur'd by our eyes.
Where both deliberate the love is slight:
Who ever lov'd, that lov'd not at first sight?"
P. 10, Edit. 1821.

Shakespeare has before referred to this favourite poem in "The Two Gentlemen of Verona," Act I. Sc. 1.

(1) SCENE III.

in which hurtling From miserable slumber I awak'd.]

ACT IV.

The touching incident of the meeting of the two brothers is thus narrated in Lodge's story:-"Saladyne, wearie with wandring up and downe, and hungry with long fasting, finding a little cave by the side of a thicket, eating such fruite as the forest did affoord, and contenting himselfe with such drinke as nature had provided and thirst made delicate, after his repast he fell in a dead sleepe. As thus he lay, a hungry lyon came hunting downe the edge of the grove for pray, and espying Saladyne began to ceaze upon him but seeing he lay still without any motion, he left to touch him, for that lyons hate to prey on dead carkasses; and yet desirous to have some foode, the lyon lay downe and watcht to see if he would stirre. While thus Saladyne slept secure, fortune that was careful of her champion began to smile, and brought it so to passe, that Rosader (having stricken a deere that but slightly hurt fled through the thicket) came pacing downe by the grove with a boare-speare in his hande in great haste. He spyed where a man lay a sleepe, and a lyon fast by him: amazed at this sight, as he stoode gazing, his nose on the sodaine

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bledde, which made him conjecture it was some friend of his. Whereuppon drawing more nigh, he might easily discerne his visage, perceived by his phisnomie that it was his brother Saladyne, which drove Rosader into a deepe passion, as a man perplexed at the sight of so unexpected a chance, marvelling what should drive his brother to traverse those secrete desarts, without any companie, in such distresse and forlorne sorte. But the present time craved no such doubting ambages, for he must eyther resolve to hazard his life for his reliefe, or else steale away and leave him to the crueltie of the lyon. which doubt hee thus briefly debated with himselfe. **** With that his brother began to stirre, and the lyon to rowse himselfe, whereupon Rosader sodainly charged him with the boare speare, and wounded the lion very sore at the first stroke. The beast feeling himselfe to have a mortall hurt, leapt at Rosader, and with his pawes gave him a sore pinch on the brest that he had almost faln; yet as a man most valiant, in whom the sparks of Sir John Bourdeaux remained, he recovered himselfe, and in short combat slew the lion, who at his death roared so lowd that Saladyne awaked, and starting up, was amazed at the sudden sight of so monstrous a beast lying slaine by him, and so sweet a gentleman wounded."-ROSALYNDE, p. 79.

ACT V.

(1) SCENE IV.-O, sir, we quarrel in print, by the book.] The particular book here ridiculed, is conjectured to be a treatise in 4to. published in 1595, entitled "Vincentio Saviolo his Practice. In two Bookes. The first intreating of the use of the Rapier and Dagger. The second of Honor and honorable Quarrels." "A Discourse," says the author, speaking of the second part, "most necessarie for all Gentlemen that have in regarde their honors, touching the giving and receiving of the Lie, whereupon the Duello and the Combats in divers sortes doth insue, and many other inconveniences, for lack only of the true knowledge of honor and the contrarie: and the right understanding of wordes." The contents of the several chapters are as follows:-"I. What the reason is, that the partie unto whom the lie is given ought to become Challenger: and of the nature of Lies. II. Of the manner and diversitie of Lies. III. Of Lies certaine. IV. Of conditionall Lyes. V. Of the Lye in generall. VI. Of the Lye in particular. VII. Of foolish Lyes. VIII. A conclusion touching the Challenger and the Defender, and of the wresting and returning back of the Lye, or Dementie." In the chapter of conditional lies, he says: "Conditionall lyes be such as are given conditionally: as if a man should saie or write these wordes:-If thou hast saide that I have offered my Lord abuse, thou lyest; or if thou saiest so hereafter, thou shalt lye. ** * Of these kind of lyes given in this manner, often arise much contention in words ****

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whereof no sure conclusion can arise." "By which," observes Warburton, "he means, they cannot proceed to cut one another's throat, while there is an if between." See note (6), p. 216, Vol. I.

(2) SCENE IV.-As you have books for good manners.] Such works were not uncommon in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Mr. Halliwell mentions a book of this description, published by Wynkyn de Worde in 1507, the colophon of which is as follows,-" Here endeth and fynysshed the boke named and Intytled Good Maners." There was also "The Boke of Nurture, or Schoole of Good Maners for Men, Servants, and Children," 8vo. 1577, written by Hugh Rhodes; another called "Galateo of Maister John Della Casa, Archebishop of Beneventa. Or rather, A treatise of the maners and behaviours, it behoveth a man to use and eschewe, in his familiar conversation. A worke very necessary and profitable for all Gentlemen or other. First written in the Italian tongue, and now done into English by Robert Peterson, of Lincoln's Inne Gentleman," 4to. 1576: and in the Stationers' Registers, under the year 1576, is an entry

"Ric. Jones. Receyved of him, for his lycense to ymprinte a booke intituled how a yonge gentleman may behave him self in all cumpanies, &c. iiijd. and a copie."

EPILOGUE.

(1) Good wine needs no bush.] Mr. Halliwell remarks that the custom of hanging out a bush as a sign for a tavern, or a place where wine was to be sold, was of great antiquity in this country; and he supplies an interesting example from an illuminated MS. of the fourteenth century, preserved in the Hunterian Museum at Glasgow, where a party of travellers are observed approaching a wayside inn, indicated by a huge bush depending from the sign. Chaucer alludes to the custom, and in an early poem in MS., Cotton. Tiber. A. vii. fol. 72, we read :

"Ryght as off a tavernere,

The greene busche that hangeth out,

Is a sygne, it is no dowte,

Outward ffolkys ffor to telle

That within is wyne to selle."

The bush is very frequently alluded to as having been formed of ivy, in which there appears a trace of classical

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allusion, as the ivy was always sacred to Bacchus ; perhaps continued from heathen times. So in "Gascoigne's Glass of Government," 1575: "Now-a-days the good wyne needeth none ivye garland." And in Florio's "Second Frutes," 1591: Like unto an ivy bush, that cals men to the tavern, but hangs itselfe without to winde and wether." Kennett, in his Glossary, says, that "the tavern-bush, or frame of wood, was drest round with ivy forty years since, though now left off for tuns or barrels hung in the middle of it. This custom gave birth to the present practice of putting out a green bush at the door of those private houses which sell drink during the fair, a practice stated to be still prevalent in many of the provinces." Notices of the tavern-bush abound in our early writers, and the name is traced in the sign of the "Bush," still retained by many inns in England. The petty taverns of Normandy are, indeed, to this day distinguished by bushes.

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“Ir would be difficult to bring the contents within the compass of an ordinary narrative; nothing takes place, or rather what is done is not so essential as what is said; even what may be called the dénouement is brought about pretty arbitrarily. Whoever can perceive nothing but what can, as it were, be counted on the fingers, will hardly be disposed to allow that it has any plan at all. Banishment and flight have assembled together, in the forest of Arden, a strange band: a Duke dethroned by his brother, who, with the faithful companions of his misfortune, lives in the wilds on the produce of the chase; two disguised Princesses, who love each other with a sisterly affection; a witty court fool; lastly, the native inhabitants of the forest, ideal and natural shepherds and shepherdesses. These lightly-sketched figures form a motley and diversified train; we see always the shady dark-green landscape in the background, and breathe in imagination the fresh air of the forest. The hours are here measured by no clocks, no regulated recurrence of duty or of toil: they flow on unnumbered by voluntary occupation or fanciful idleness, to which, according to his humour or disposition, every one yields himself, and this unrestrained freedom compensates them all for the lost conveniences of life. One throws himself down in solitary meditation under a tree, and indulges in melancholy reflections on the changes of fortune, the falsehood of the world, and the self-inflicted torments of social life; others make the woods resound with social and festive songs, to the accompaniment of their hunting-horns. Selfishness, envy, and ambition, have been left behind in the city; of all the human passions, love alone has found an entrance into this wilderness, where it dictates the same language alike to the simple shepherd and the chivalrous youth, who hangs his love-ditty to a tree. A prudish shepherdess falls at first sight in love with Rosalind, disguised in men's apparel; the latter sharply reproaches her with her severity to her poor lover, and the pain of refusal, which she feels from experience in her own case, disposes her at length to compassion and requital. The fool carries his philosophical contempt of external show, and his raillery of the illusion of love so far, that he purposely seeks out the ugliest and simplest country wench for a mistress. Throughout the whole picture, it seems to be the poet's design to show that to call forth the poetry which has its indwelling in nature and the human mind, nothing is wanted but to throw off all artificial constraint, and restore both to mind and nature their original liberty. In the very progress of the piece, the dreamy carelessness of such an existence is sensibly expressed: it is even alluded to by Shakspeare in the title. Whoever affects to be displeased, if in this romantic forest the ceremonial of dramatic art is not duly observed, ought in justice to be delivered over to the wise fool, to be led gently out of it to some prosaical region."-SCHLEGEL.

"

Though this play, with the exception of the disguise and self-discovery of Rosalind, may be said to be destitute of plot, it is yet one of the most delightful of the dramas of Shakspeare. There is something inexpressibly wild and interesting both in the characters and in the scenery; the former disclosing the moral discipline and the sweets of adversity, the purest emotions of love and friendship. of gratitude and fidelity, the melancholy of genius, and the exhilaration of innocent mirth, as opposed to the desolating effects of malice, envy, and ambition; and the latter unfolding, with the richest glow of fancy, landscapes to which, as objects of imitation, the united talents of Ruysdale, Claude, and Salvator Rosa could alone do justice.

"From the forest of Arden, from that wild wood of oaks,

-“whose boughs were moss'd with age, And high tops bald with dry antiquity,"—

from the bosom of sequestered glens and pathless solitudes, has the poet called forth lessons of the most touching and consolatory wisdom. Airs from paradise seem to fan with refreshing gales, with a soothing consonance of sound, the interminable depth of foliage, and to breathe into the hearts of those who have sought its shelter from the world, an oblivion of their sorrows and their cares. The banished Duke, the much-injured Orlando, and the melancholy Jaques, lose in meditation on the scenes which surround them, or in sportive freedom, or in grateful occupation, all corrosive sense of past affliction. Love seems the only passion which has penetrated this romantic seclusion, and the sigh of philosophic pity, or of wounded sensibility, (the legacy of a deserted world,) the only relique of the storm which is passed and gone.

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'Nothing, in fact, can blend more harmoniously with the romantic glades and magic windings of Arden, than the society which Shakspeare has placed beneath its shades. The effect of such scenery, on the lover of nature, is to take full possession of the soul, to absorb its very faculties, and, through the charmed imagination, to convert the workings of the mind into the sweetest sensations of the heart, into the joy of grief, into a thankful endurance of adversity, into the interchange of the tenderest affections and find we not here, in the person of the Duke, the noblest philosophy of resignation; in Jaques, the humorous sadness of an amiable misanthropy; in Orlando, the mild dejection of self-accusing humility; in Rosalind and Celia, the purity of sisterly affection; whilst love in all its innocence and gaiety binds in delicious fetters, not only the younger exiles, but the pastoral natives of the forest? A day thus spent, in all the careless freedom of unsophisticated nature, seems worth an eternity of common-place existence !"-DRAKE.

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