serve the world for no honest use; therefore you must die. Come, headsmen, off with his head.

PAR. O Lord, sir; let me live, or let me see my death!

1 SOLD. That shall you, and take your leave of all your friends. [Unmuffling him. So, look about you; Know you any here? BER. Good morrow, noble captain.

2 LORD. God bless you, captain Parolles.
1 LORD. God save you, noble captain.

2 LORD. Captain, what greeting will you to my lord Lafeu? I am for France.

1 LORD. Good captain, will you give me a copy of the sonnet you writ to Diana in behalf of the count Rousillon? an I were not a very coward, I'd compel it of you; but fare you well.

[Exeunt BERTRAM, Lords, &c. 1 SOLD. You are undone, captain: all but your scarf, that has a knot on't yet.

PAR. Who cannot be crushed with a plot ?

1 SOLD. If you could find out a country where but women were that had received so much shame, you might begin an impudent nation. Fare you well, sir; I am for France too; we shall speak of you there. [Exit. PAR. Yet am I thankful: if my heart were great, 'Twould burst at this: Captain, I'll be no more; But I will eat and drink, and sleep as soft As captain shall: simply the thing I am

Shall make me live. Who knows himself a braggart,
Let him fear this; for it will come to pass,
That every braggart shall be found an ass.
Rust, sword! cool, blushes! and Parolles, live
Safest in shame! being fool'd, by foolery thrive !
There's place, and means, for every man alive.
I'll after them.

[Exit.

SCENE IV.

Florence. A Room in the Widow's House.

Enter HELENA, Widow, and DIANA.

HEL. That you may well perceive I have not wrong'd you,

One of the greatest in the Christian world

Shall be my surety; 'fore whose throne, 'tis need

ful,

Ere I can perfect mine intents, to kneel:
Time was, I did him a desired office,
Dear almost as his life; which gratitude
Through flinty Tartar's bosom would peep forth,
And answer, thanks: I duly am inform'd,
His grace is at Marseilles; to which place
We have convenient convoy. You must know,
I am supposed dead: the army breaking,

My husband hies him home; where, heaven aiding,
And by the leave of my good lord the king,

We'll be, before our welcome.

WID.

Gentle madam,

You never had a servant, to whose trust
Your business was more welcome.

HEL.
Nor you, mistress,
Ever a friend, whose thoughts more truly labour
To recompense your love; doubt not, but heaven
Hath brought me up to be your daughter's dower,
As it hath fated her to be my motive*

2 His grace is at MARSEILLES, &c.] From this line, and others, it appears that Marseilles was pronounced by our author as a word of three syllables. The old copy has here Marcella, and in the last scene of this Act, Marcellus. MALONE.

3 Nor You,] Old copy-Nor your. Corrected by Mr. Rowe. MALONE.

4

my MOTIVE-]

Motive for assistant. WARBURTON.

And helper to a husband. But O strange men!
That can such sweet use make of what they hate,
When saucy trusting of the cozen'd thoughts
Defiles the pitchy night! so lust doth play
With what it loaths, for that which is away:
But more of this hereafter :--You, Diana,
Under my poor instructions yet must suffer
Something in my behalf.

DIA.

Let death and honesty"

Go with your impositions", I am yours
Upon your will to suffer.

HEL.

Yet, I pray you,▬▬

But with the word, the time will bring on summer, When briars shall have leaves as well as thorns, And be as sweet as sharp. We must away;

Rather for mover. So, in the last Act of this play :

66

" — all impediments in fancy's course

"Are motives of more fancy." MALONE.

5 When SAUCY trusting of the cozen'd thoughts

Defiles the pitchy night!] Saucy may very properly sig

nify luxurious, and by consequence lascivious.

So, in Measure for Measure:

6

JOHNSON.

"Their saucy sweetness, that do coin heaven's image
"In stamps that are forbid." MALONE.

So, in

death and honesty ] i. e. an honest death. another of our author's plays, we have "death and honour honourable death. STEEVENS.

Rather, death accompanied by honesty. BosWELL.

7- your IMPOSITIONS,] i. e. your commands. MALOne. An imposition is a task imposed. The term is still current in Universities. STEEVENS.

8 But WITH THE WORD, the time will bring on summer, &c.] "With the word," i. e. in an instant of time. WARBURTON.

The meaning of this observation is, that as briars have sweet ness with their prickles, so shall these troubles be recompensed with joy. JOHNSON.

I would read:

66

"Yet fray you

"But with the word: the time will bring," &c.

And then the sense will be, "I only frighten you by mentioning the word suffer for a short time will bring on the season of happiness and delight." BLACKSTONE.

:

9

Our waggon is prepar'd, and time revives us": All's well that ends well1: still the fine's2 the

crown;

Whate'er the course, the end is the renown.

[Exeunt.

As the beginning of Helen's reply is evidently a designed aposiopesis, a break ought to follow it, thus:

66

· Hel. Yet, I pray you

The sense appears to be this :-Do not think that I would engage you in any service that should expose you to such an alternative, or, indeed, to any lasting inconvenience; "But with the word," i. e. But on the contrary, you shall no sooner have delivered what you will have to testify on my account, than the irksomeness of the service will be over, and every pleasant circumstance to result from it will instantaneously appear. HENLEY..

9 Our waggon is prepar'd, and time REVIVES us:] The word revives conveys so little sense, that it seems very liable to suspi

cion :

66

and time revyes us :

i. e. looks us in the face,

calls upon us to hasten. WARBURTON. The present reading is corrupt, and I am afraid the emendation none of the soundest. I never remember to have seen the word revye. One may as well leave blunders as make them. Why may we not read for a shift, without much effort, the time invites us? JOHNSON.

166 :

To vye and revye were terms at several ancient games at cards, but particularly at Gleek. So, in Greene's Art of Coney-catching, 1592: "I'll either win something or lose something, therefore I'll vie and revie every card at my pleasure, till either yours or mine come out; therefore 12d. upon this card, my card comes first." Again - so they vie and revie till some ten shillings be on the stake," &c. Again: "This flesheth the Conie, and the sweetness of gain makes him frolick, and none more ready to vie and revie than he." Again: "So they vie and revie, and for once that the Barnacle wins, the Conie gets five." Perhaps, however, revyes is not the true reading. Shakspeare might have written-time reviles us, i. e. reproaches us for wasting it. Yet, "time revives us" may mean, it rouses us. So, in another play of our author:

STEEVENS.

66 -I would revive the soldiers' hearts, "Because I found them ever as myself." "Time revives us," seems to refer to the happy and speedy termination of their embarrassments. She had just before said:

"With the word, the time will bring on summer." HENLEY.

SCENE V.

Rousillon. A Room in the Countess's Palace.

Enter Countess, LAFEU, and Clown.

LAF. No, no, no, your son was misled with a snipt-taffata fellow there; whose villainous saffron would have made all the unbaked and doughy youth of a nation in his colour: your daughter-in-law

1 All's well that ends well ;] So, in The Spanish Tragedy: "The end is crown of every work well done." "All's well that ends well," is one of Camden's proverbial

sentences.

2

-the FINE'S] Fine is end. So, in The London Prodigal, 1605:

"Nature hath done the last for me, and there's the fine."

MALONE.

still the fine's the crown." So, in Chapman's version of the second Iliad :

"We fly, not putting on the crown of our so long-held war." Again, ibid. :

66

and all things have their crown,

"As he interpreted." STEEVENS.

These words seem to be merely a translation of the common Latin proverb: "Finis coronat opus." BOSWELL.

3

whose villainous saffron would have made all the unbaked

and doughy youth of a nation in his colour :] Parolles is represented as an affected follower of the fashion, and an encourager of his master to run into all the follies of it; where he says: "Use a more spacious ceremony to the noble lords-they wear themselves in the cap of time-and though the devil lead the measure, such are to be followed." Here some particularities of fashionable dress are ridiculed. Snipt-taffata needs no explanation; but villainous saffron is more obscure. This alludes to a fantastic fashion, then much followed, of using yellow starch for their bands and ruffs. So, Fletcher, in his Queen of Corinth :

"Dislik'd your yellow starch; or said your doublet
"Was not exactly frenchified

And Jonson's Devil's an Ass :

?"

"Carmen and chimney-sweepers are got into the yellow

starch."