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And as a bed I'll take thee,' and there lie;
And, in that glorious supposition, think
He gains by death, that hath such means to die :-
Let love, being light, be drowned if she sink!"
Luc. What, are you mad, that you do reason so?
ANT. S. Not mad, but mated; how, I do not
know.

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as a bed I'll take thee,] The old copy reads—as a bud. Mr. Edwards suspects a mistake of one letter in the pasand would read:

sage,

And as a bed I'll take them, and there lie.

Perhaps, however, both the ancient readings may be right:

As a bud I'll take thee, &c.

i. e. I, like an insect, will take thy bosom for a rose, or some other flower, and

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phoenix like beneath thine eye "Involv'd in fragrance, burn and die."

It is common for Shakspeare to shift hastily from one image to another.

Mr. Edwards's conjecture may, however, receive countenance from the following passage in The Two Gentlemen of Verona,

Act I. sc. ii:

66 my bosom as a bed

"Shall lodge thee."

Mr. Malone also thinks that bed is fully supported by the word -lie. STEEVENS.

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'Let love, being light, be drowned if she sink!] Mr. Ritson observes, that Love, in the present instance, means Venus. Thus, in the old ballad of The Spanish Lady:

"I will spend my days in prayer,

"Love and all her laws defy." STEEVENS.

So, in Antony and Cleopatra:

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"Now for the love of love, and her soft hours.' Again, more appositely, in our author's Venus and Adonis: "Love is a spirit, all compact of fire,

"Not gross to sink, but light, and will aspire."

Venus is here speaking of herself.

Again, ibidem:

"She's love, she loves, and yet she is not lov'd."

MALONE.

Luc. It is a fault that springeth from your eye. ANT. S. For gazing on your beams, fair sun, being by.

Luc. Gaze where3 you should, and that will clear your sight.

ANT. S. As good to wink, sweet love, as look on night.

Luc. Why call you me love? call my sister so. ANT. S. Thy sister's sister.

Luc.

ANT. S.

That's my sister.

No;

It is thyself, mine own self's better part;
Mine eye's clear eye, my dear heart's dearer heart;
My food, my fortune, and my sweet hope's aim,
My sole earth's heaven, and my heaven's claim.+
Luc. All this my sister is, or else should be.
ANT. S. Call thyself sister, sweet, for I aim thee:5

* Not mad, but mated;] i. e. confounded. So, in Macbeth: My mind she has mated, and amaz'd my sight."

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STEEVENS.

I suspect there is a play upon words intended here. Mated signifies not only confounded, but matched with a wife: and Antipholus, who had been challenged as a husband by Adriana, which he cannot account for, uses the word mated in both these M. MASON.

senses.

› Gaze where-] The old copy reads when. STEEvens. The correction was made by Mr. Pope. MALONE.

My sole earth's heaven, and my heaven's claim.] When he calls the girl his only heaven on the earth, he utters the common cant of lovers. When he calls her his heaven's claim, I cannot understand him. Perhaps he means that which he asks of heaven. JOHNSON.

-for I aim thee:] The old copy has-
-for I am thee.

Thee will I love, and with thee lead my life;
Thou hast no husband yet, nor I no wife:
Give me thy hand.

Luc.
O, soft, sir, hold you still;
I'll fetch my sister, to get her good will.

[Exit Luc.

Enter, from the House of ANTIPHOLUS of Ephesus, DROMIO of Syracuse.

ANT. S. Why, how now, Dromio? where run'st thou so fast?

DRO. S. Do you know me, sir? am I Dromio? am I your man? am I myself?

ANT. S. Thou art Dromio, thou art my man, thou art thyself.

DRO. S. I am an ass, I am a woman's man, and besides myself.

ANT. S. What woman's man? and how besides thyself?

DRO. S. Marry, sir, besides myself, I am due to a woman; one that claims me, one that haunts me, one that will have me.

ANT. S. What claim lays she to thee?

Some of the modern editors

I mean thee.

Perhaps we should read:

-for I aim thee.

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He has just told her, that she was his sweet hope's aim. So, in Orlando Furioso, 1594:

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like Cassius,

"Sits sadly dumping, aiming Cæsar's death." Again, in Drayton's Legend of Robert Duke of Normandy: "I make my changes aim one certain end."

STEEVENS.

DRO. S. Marry, sir, such claim as you would lay to your horse; and she would have me as a beast: not that, I being a beast, she would have me; but that she, being a very beastly creature, lays claim

to me.

ANT. S. What is she?

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DRO. S. A very reverent body; ay, such a one as a man may not speak of, without he say, sir-reverence: I have but lean luck in the match, and yet is she a wondrous fat marriage.

ANT. S. How dost thou mean, a fat marriage?

DRO. S. Marry, sir, she's the kitchen-wench, and all grease; and I know not what use to put her to, but to make a lamp of her, and run from her by her own light. I warrant, her rags, and the tallow in them, will burn a Poland winter: if she lives till doomsday, she'll burn a week longer than the whole world.

ANT. S. What complexion is she of?

DRO S. Swart, like my shoe, but her face nothing like so clean kept; For why? she sweats, a man may go over shoes in the grime of it.

ANT. S. That's a fault that water will mend.

DRO. S. No, sir, 'tis in grain; Noah's flood could not do it.

6

ANT. S. What's her name?

DRO. S. Nell, sir;-but her name and three

Swart,] i. e. black, or rather of a dark brown. Thus, in Milton's Comus, v. 436:

"No goblin, or swart fairy of the mine."

Again, in King Henry VI. P. I:

"And whereas I was black and swart before."

STEEVENS.

quarters, that is, an ell and three quarters, will not measure her from hip to hip."

ANT S. Then she bears some breadth?

DRO. S. No longer from head to foot, than from hip to hip: she is spherical, like a globe; I could find out countries in her.

ANT. S. In what part of her body stands Ireland?

DRO. S. Marry, sir, in her buttocks; I found it out by the bogs.

ANT. S. Where Scotland?

DRO. S. I found it by the barrenness; hard, in the palm of the hand.

ANT. S. Where France?

DRO. S. In her forehead; armed and reverted, making war against her hair.R

7 Dro. S. Nell, sir;-but her name and three quarters, that is, an ell and three quarters, &c.] The old copy reads her name is three quarters. STEEVENS.

This passage has hitherto lain as perplexed and unintelligible, as it is now easy and truly humorous. If a conundrum be restored, in setting it right, who can help it? I owe the correction to the sagacity of the ingenious Dr. Thirlby. THEOBALD.

This poor conundrum is borrowed by Massinger, in The Old Law, 1656:

"Cook. That Nell was Hellen of Greece.

"Clown. As long as she tarried with her husband' she was Ellen, but after she came to Troy she was Nell of Troy.

"Cook. Why did she grow shorter when she came to Troy? "Clown. She grew longer, if you mark the story, when she grew to be an ell," &c. MALONE.

In her forehead; armed and reverted, making war against her hair.] All the other countries, mentioned in this description, are in Dromio's replies satirically characterized: but here, as the editors have ordered it, no remark is made upon France; nor any reason given, why it should be in her forehead: but only

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