These lovely caves, these round enchanting pits,
Open'd their mouths to swallow Venus' liking:
Being mad before, how doth she now for wits?
Struck dead at first, what needs a second striking?
Poor queen of love, in thine own law forlorn,
To love a cheek that smiles at thee in scorn!

Now which way shall she turn? what shall she say? Her words are done, her woes the more increasing; The time is spent, her object will away,

And from her twining arms doth urge releasing: (she crys) some favour,

Pity,

morse 7

some re

Away he springs, and hasteth to his horse.

But lo, from forth a copse that neighbours by,
A breeding jennet, lusty, young, and proud,
Adonis' trampling courser doth espy,
And forth she rushes, snorts, and neighs aloud :
The strong-neck'd steed, being tied unto a tree,
Breaketh his rein, and to her straight goes he.

Imperiously he leaps, he neighs, he bounds,
And now his woven girths he breaks asunder;
The bearing earth with his hard hoof he wounds,
Whose hollow womb resounds like heaven's thunder;

6 Struck dead at first, what needs a second striking ?] So, in Cymbeline:

What shall I need to draw my sword? The "Hath cut her throat already." W.

some REMORSE ;]

vol. ix. p. 391, n. 1:

Some tenderness.

66 shall be in me remorse,

"What bloody business ever." MALONE.

paper

See Othello,

8 The bearing earth with his hard hoof he wounds,] So Virgil, Æneid viii.:

Quadrupedante putrem sonitu quatit ungula campum.

MALONE.

The iron bit he crusheth 'tween his teeth,
Controlling what he was controlled with '.

His ears up prick'd; his braided hanging mane
Upon his compass'd crest' now stand on end 2;
His nostrils drink the air, and forth again,
As from a furnace, vapours doth he send*:
His eye, which scornfully glisters like fire,
Shews his hot courage, and his high desire.

Sometime he trots, as if he told the steps,
With gentle majesty, and modest pride;
Anon he rears upright, curvets and leaps",
As who should say, lo! thus my strength is try'd;

9 CONTROLLING what he was CONTROLLED with.] So, in King John :

"Controulment for controulment. So answer France." STEEVENS.

I Upon his COMPASS'D crest-] compass'd ceiling" is a phrase yet in So, in Troilus and Cressida :

66

Compass'd is arch'd. use. MALONE.

"A

she came to him the other day into the compass'd window," i. e. 'the bow window.' STEEVENS. his braided hanging MANE

21

Upon his compass'd crest now STAND on end;] Our author uses mane, as composed of many hairs, as plural. So army, fleet, &c. Malone.

3 His nostrils DRINK THE AIR,] So, Ariel in The Tempest: "I drink the air before me." STEEVENS.

Again, in Timon of Athens :

66

"- and through him

66 'Drink the free air." MALONE.

+ His nostrils drink the air, and forth again,

As from a furnace, vapours doth he send ;] So, in As You Like It:

And then the lover,

"Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad."

In this description of a horse Shakspeare seems to have had the book of Job in his thoughts. MALONE.

“As from a furnace vapours doth he send;" So, in Cymbeline:

5

"He furnaceth the thick sighs from him." STEEVENS. and LEAPS.] The corresponding rhyme shews that the pronunciation of Shakspeare's time was lep, in the midland coun

And this I do, to captivate the eye
Of the fair breeder that is standing by.

What recketh he his rider's angry stir,
His flattering holla', or his Stand, I say?
What cares he now for curb, or pricking spur?
For rich caparisons, or trapping gay?

He sees his love, and nothing else he sees,
For nothing else with his proud sight agrees.

Look, when a painter would surpass the life,
In limning out a well-proportion'd steed,
His art with nature's workmanship at strife,
As if the dead the living should exceed;

So did this horse excell a common one,
In shape, in courage, colour, pace, and bone.

ties, not leap, as the word is now commonly pronounced in England. In Ireland, where much of the phraseology and pronunciation of the age of Elizabeth is still retained, the ancient mode of pronouncing this word is preserved. So also Spenser, Faery Queen, b. i. c. 4, st. 39.

6 And THIS I do,] So the quarto 1593. In later editions we find-And thus I do. MALONE.

7 His flatt'ring HOLLA,] This seems to have been formerly a term of the manege. So, in As You Like It: "Cry holla to thy tongue, I pr'ythee: it curvets unseasonably."

Again, in Marlowe's Tamburlaine :

"Holla, ye pamper'd jades of Asia," &c.

See Cotgrave's French Dictionary: "Hola, interjection. Enough; soft, soft; no more of that, if you love me."

MALONE.

8 His ART with NATURE's workmanship at STRIFE,] So, in Daniel's Complaint of Rosamond, 1592:

"He greets me with a casket richly wrought;

"So rare, that art did seem to strive with nature,

"To express the cunning workman's curious thought."

See also Timon of Athens, vol. xiii. p. 253, n. 1 :

"It tutors nature: artificial strife,

"Lives in these touches, livelier than life." STEEVENS.

Round-hoof'd, short-jointed, fetlocks shag and long, Broad breast, full eye, small head, and nostril wide, High crest, short ears, straight legs, and passing

strong,

Thin mane, thick tail, broad buttock, tender hide: Look what a horse should have, he did not lack, Save a proud rider on so proud a back.

2

Sometime he scuds far off, and there he stares;
Anon he starts at stirring of a feather1 ;
To bid the wind a base he now prepares",
And whe'r he run, or fly, they know not whether ;
For through his mane and tail the high wind
sings,

Fanning the hairs, who wave like feather'd wings.

He looks upon his love, and neighs unto her;
She answers him, as if she knew his mind:
Being proud, as females are, to see him woo her,
She puts on outward strangeness *, seems unkind;

9

full EYE,] So the original copy 1593, and the 16mo. 1596. Later editions-full eyes. MALONE.

Anon he starts at stirring of a feather;] So, in King Richard III.:

"Tremble and start at wagging of a straw." MALONE. 2 TO BID the wind A BASE he now prepares,] To "bid the wind a base," is to challenge the wind to a contest for superiority.' Base is a rustick game, sometimes termed prison-base; properly prison bars. It is mentioned by our author in Cymbeline "lads more like to run the country base," &c. Again, in The Two Gentlemen of Verona :

"Indeed I bid the base for Protheus."

MALONE.

3 And WHE'R he run, or fly, they know not whether;] Whe'r, for whether. So, in King John:

"Now shame upon thee, wher he does or no." Again, in a poem in praise of Ladie P-, Epitathes, Epigrammes, &c. by G. Turberville, 1567:

4

-

"I doubt where Paris would have chose

"Dame Venus for the best." MALONE.

outward STRANGENESS,] i. e. seeming coyness, shy

Spurns at his love, and scorns the heat he feels, Beating his kind embracements with her heels.

Then, like a melancholy malecontent,
He vails his tail", that, like a falling plume
Cool shadow to his melting buttock lent°;
He stamps, and bites the poor flies in his fume:
His love perceiving how he is enrag'd,
Grew kinder, and his fury was assuag'd.

His testy master goeth about to take him;
When lo, the unback'd breeder, full of fear,
Jealous of catching, swiftly doth forsake him,
With her the horse, and left Adonis there :

As they were mad, unto the wood they hie them,
Out-stripping crows that strive to over-fly them.

All swoln with chasing, down Adonis sits,
Banning' his boist'rous and unruly beast;
And now the happy season once more fits,
That love-sick Love by pleading may be blest;
For lovers say, the heart hath treble wrong,
When it is barr'd the aidance of the tongue

8

ness, backwardness. Thus Iachimo, speaking of his servant to
Imogen: "He's strange and peevish." STEEVENS.
Again, more appositely, in Romeo and Juliet :

"But trust me, gentlemen, I'll prove more true,
"Than those who have more cunning to be strange."

MALONE.

5 He VAILS his tail,] To vail, in old language, is to lower.

6

MALONE.

to his melting BUTTOCK lent ;] So the quarto 1593, and the 16mo. of 1596. That of 1600 and the modern editions have

-buttocks. MALONE.

7 BANNING] i. e. cursing. So, in King Richard III. : "Fell banning hag," &c. STEEVens.

8 the heart hath treble wrong,

When it is barr'd the aidance of the tongue.] So, in Mac

beth: