More tuneable than lark to fhepherd's ear, O teach me, how you look; and with what art Her. I frown upon him, yet he loves me ftill. Her. I give him curfes, yet he gives me love. Her. Take comfort; he no more fhall fee my face; Seem'd Athens like a paradife to me. Davies calls Elizabeth, lode-ftone to hearts, and lode ftone to all eyes. JOHNSON. In Hall's Chronicle, Henry V. promises his friends to be their "guide, lodefman, and conductor." STEEVENS. This emendation is taken from the Oxford edition. The old reading is, Your words I'd catch. JOHNSON. The folio and one of the quarto's read, His folly, Helena, is none of mine. JOHNSON. 6 Perhaps every reader may not difcover the propriety of these lines. Hermia is willing to comfort Helena, and to avoid all appearance of triumph over her. She therefore bids her not to confider the power of pleafing, as an advantage to be much envied or much defired, fince Hermia, whom the confiders as poffeffing it in the fupreme degree, has found no other effect of it than the lofs of happiness. JOHNSON. O then O then, what graces in my love do dwell, Lyf. Helen, to you our minds we will unfold; Decking with liquid pearl the bladed grass; Her. And in the wood, where often you and I 7 Emptying our bofoms of their counfels fwell'd; To feek new friends, and ftrange companions.] This whole scene is strictly in rhyme; and that it deviates in these two couplets, I am perfuaded, is owing to the ignorance of the firft, and the inaccuracy of the later editors: I have therefore ventured to restore the rhymes, as I make no doubt but the poet first gave them. Sweet was eafily corrupted into fwell'd, because that made an antithefts to emptying and strange companions our editors thought was plain English; but firanger companies, a little quaint and unintelligible. Our author very often uses the subftantive Stranger adjectively; and companies, to fignify compani ons: as Rich. II. act I. To tread the stranger paths of banishment. And Hen. V. His Companies unletter'd, rude and shallow. THEOBALD. Dr. Warburton retains the old reading, and perhaps juftifiably. Shakespeare is fometimes negligent in these small matters; and a bofom fwell'd with fecrets does not appear as an expreffion unlikely to have been used by our author, who speaks of a stuff'd bojom in Macbeth. STEEVENS. Keep Keep word, Lyfander :-we must ftarve our fight 8 Things base and vile, holding no quantity, Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind; 9 no quantity] quality feems a word more fuitable to the sense than quantity, but either may ferve. JOHNSON. In game Game here fignifies not contentious play, but Sport, jeft. So Spenfer, 'Twixt earnest and 'twixt game. JOHNSON. Hermia's eyne,] This plural is common both in Chaucer and Spenfer. Chaucer, Prierefs Prologue, 153; "While flashing beams do dare his feeble eyen." STEEVENS. And And when this hail fome heat from Hermia feel, [Exit. Enter Quince the carpenter, Snug the joiner, Bottom the weaver, Flute the bellows-mender, Snout the tinker, and Starveling the taylor. 2 Quin. Is all your company here? Bot. You were beft to call them generally, man by man, according to the fcrip. 3 Quin. Here is the fcrowl of every man's name, which is thought fit, through all Athens, to play in -this hail] Thus all the editions, except the quarto, 1600, printed by Roberts, which reads inftead of this hail, bis hail. STEEVENS. 2 In this fcene Shakespeare takes advantage of his knowledge of the theatre, to ridicule the prejudices and competitions of the players. Bottom, who is generally acknowledged the principal actor, declares his inclination to be for a tyrant, for a part of fury, tumult, and noife, fuch as every young man pants to perform when he first steps upon the stage. The fame Bottom, who feems bred in a tiring-room, has another hiftrionical paffion. He is for engroffing every part, and would exclude his inferiors from all poffibility of diftinction. He is therefore defirous to play Pyramus, Thibe and the Lyon at the fame time. JOHNSON. 3 the fcrip.] A fcrip, Fr. fcript, now written ecrit. "Scripe nor bil." STEEVENS. our our interlude before the duke and dutchefs, on his wedding-day at night. Bot. First, good Peter Quince, fay what the play treats on; then read the names of the actors; and fo grow on to a point. Quin. Marry our play is The most lamentable comedy, and moft cruel death of Pyramus and Thisby. Bot. A very good piece of work, I affure you, and a merry. Now, good Peter Quince, call forth your actors by the fcrowl. Mafters, fpread yourselves. Quin. Anfwer, as I call you.-Nick Bottom the weaver. Bot. Ready: name what part I am for, and proceed. Quin. You, Nick Bottom, are fet down for Pyra mus. Bot. What is Pyramus? a lover, or a tyrant? Quin. A lover, that kills himself most gallantly for love. Bot. That will afk fome tears in the true performing of it: if I do it, let the audience look to their eyes; I will move ftorms; I will condole in fome measure. To the reft ;-yet, my chief humour is for a tyrant! I could play Ercles rarely, or a part to tear a cat in: To make all split 5 "The 4 Dr. Warburton read go on; but grow is used, in allufion to his name, Quince. JOHNSON. The quarto reads-grow to a point. STEEVENS. And fo grow on to a point.] The fenfe, in my opinion, hath been hitherto mistaken; and inftead of a point, a fubftantive, I would read appoint, a verb, that is, appoint what parts each actor is to perform, which is the real cafe. Quince first tells them the name of the play, then calls the actors by their names, and after that, tells each of them what part is fet down for him to act. WARNER. 5 I could play Ercles rarely, or a part to tear a CAT in.] We should read, A part to tear a CAP in. for as a ranting whore was called a tear-fheet, [ad Part of Hen. IV.] fo a ranting bully was called a tear-cap. For this reafon it is, VOL. III. lear-cap. the. |