and foining o'nights, and begin to patch up thine old body for heaven? Enter behind, Prince HENRY and POINS, disguised like Drawers. FAL. Peace, good Doll! do not speak like a death's head:9 do not bid me remember mine end. DOL. Sirrah, what humour is the prince of? FAL. A good shallow young fellow he would have made a good pantler, he would have chipped bread well. See also D'Avenant's burlesque Verses on a long Vacation, written about 1630: 9 "Now London's chief on saddle new "Rides into fair of Barthol'mew; "As if to fright the head of pig, "That gaping lies on greasy stall, "Till female with great belly call," &c. MALONE, - like a death's head;] It appears from the following passage in Marston's Dutch Courtezan, 1605, that it was the custom for the bawds of that age to wear a death's head in a ring, very probably with the common motto, memento mori. Cocledemoy, speaking of some of these, says: -as for their death, how can it be bad, since their wickedness is always before their eyes, and a death's head most commonly on their middle finger." Again, in Massinger's Old Law: sell some of my cloaths to buy thee a death's head, and put it upon thy middle finger : your least considering bawds do so much." Again, in Northward Hoe, 1607: " as if I were a bawd, no ring pleases me but a death's head." On the Stationers' books, Feb. 21, 1582, is entered a ballad intitled Remember thy End. STEEVENS. Falstaff's allusion, I should have supposed, was to the death's head, and motto on hatchments, grave-stones, and the like.Such a ring, however, as Mr. Steevens describes, but without any inscription, being only brass, is in my possession. RITSON. SC. IV. STANTO KING HENRY IV. DOL. They say, Poins has a good wit. 1 101 FAL. He a good wit? hang him, baboon! his wit is as thick as Tewksbury mustard; there is no more conceit in him, than is in a mallet.2 DOL. Why does the prince love him so then? FAL. Because their legs are both of a bigness; and he plays at quoits well; and eats conger and fennel; and drinks off candles' ends for flap-dragons; and rides the wild mare with the boys; 1 Tewksbury mustard:] Tewksbury is a market town in the county of Gloucester, formerly noted for mustard-balls made there, and sent into other parts. GREY. 2 in a mallet.] So, in Milton's Prose Works, 1738, Vol. I, 300: P. 66 Though the fancy of this doubt be as obtruse and sad as any mallet." TOLLET. 3 eats conger and fennel; and drinks off candles' ends for flap-dragons;] Conger with fennel was formerly regarded as a provocative. It is mentioned by Ben Jonson, in his Bartholomew Fair: "like a long-laced conger with green fennel in the joll of it." And in Philaster, one of the ladies advises the wanton Spanish prince to abstain from this article of luxury. Greene likewise, in his Quip for an upstart Courtier, calls fennel "women's weeds,"-" fit generally, for that sex, sith while they are maidens they wish wantonly." The qualification that follows, viz. that of swallowing candles' ends by way of flap-dragons, seems to indicate no more than that the Prince loved him, because he was always ready to do any thing for his amusement, however absurd or unnatural. Nash, in his Pierce Pennylesse his Supplication to the Devil, advises hard drinkers " to have some shooing horne to pull on their wine, as a rasher on the coals, or a red herring; or to stir it about with a candle's end to make it taste the better," &c. And Ben Jonson, in his News from the Moon, &c. a masque, speaks of those who eat candles' ends, as an act of love and gallantry; and Beaumont and Fletcher, in Monsieur Thomas: carouse her health in cans, and candles' ends." 66 In Rowley's Match at Midnight, 1633, a captain says, that his "corporal was lately choaked at Delf by swallowing a flapdragon." 6 and jumps upon joint-stools; and swears with a good grace; and wears his boot very smooth, like unto the sign of the leg;5 and breeds no bate with telling of discreet stories, and such other gambol faculties he hath, that show a weak mind and an able body, for the which the prince admits him: for the prince himself is such another; the weight Again, in Marston's Dutch Courtezan, 1605: "have I not been drunk to your health, swallowed flapdragons, eat glasses, drank urine, stabbed arms, and done all the offices of protested gallantry for your sake?" Again, in The Christian turn'd Turk, 1612: as familiarly as pikes do gudgeons, and with as much facility as Dutchmen swallow flapdragons." STEEvens. A flap-dragon is some small combustible body, fired at one end, and put afloat in a glass of liquor. It is an act of a toper's dexterity to toss off the glass in such a manner as to prevent the flap-dragon from doing mischief. JOHNSON. 4 and rides the wild mare with the boys;] He probably means the two-legged mare mentioned by Mr. Steevens in 54, n. 8. MALONE. p. If Poins had ever ridden the mare alluded to by Mr. Steevens, she would have given him such a fall as would effectually prevent him from mounting her a second time. We must therefore suppose it was a less dangerous beast, that would not have disabled him from afterwards jumping upon joint stools, &c. 5 DOUCE. wears his boot very smooth, like unto the sign of the leg;] The learned editor of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, 1775, observes, that such is part of the description of a smart abbot, by an anonymous writer of the thirteenth century: "Ocreas habebat in cruribus, quasi innatæ essent, sine plicâ porrectas." MS. Bod. James, n. 6, p. 121, STEEVENS. 6 ° discreet stories,] We should read-indiscreet. WARBURTON. I suppose by discreet stories is meant what suspicious masters and mistresses of families would call prudential information; i. e. what ought to be known, and yet is disgraceful to the teller. Among the virtues of John Rugby, in The Merry Wives of Windsor, Mrs. Quickly adds, that "he is no tell-tale, no breed-bate." STEEVENS. of a hair will turn the scales between their avoirdu pois. P. HEN. Would not this nave of a wheel" have his ears cut off? POINS. Let's beat him before his whore. P. HEN. Look, if the withered elder hath not his poll clawed like a parrot. 8 POINS. Is it not strange, that desire should so many years outlive performance? FAL. Kiss me, Doll. P. HEN. Saturn and Venus this year in conjunction!9 what says the almanack to that? POINS. And, look, whether the fiery Trigon,' his 7 nave of a wheel-] Nave and knave are easily reconciled, but why nave of a wheel? I suppose from his roundHe was called round man, in contempt, before. ness. JOHNSON. So, in the play represented before the king and queen in Hamlet: 8 "Break all the spokes and fellies of her wheel, his poll clawed like a parrot.] This custom, we may suppose, was not peculiar to Falstaff, especially as it occurred among the French, to whom we were indebted for most of our artificial gratifications. So, in La Venerie &c. by Jaques de Fouilloux, &c. Paris, 4to. 1585: "Le seigneur doit auoir sa petite charette, là où il sera dedans, auec sa fillette, aagée de seize a dix sept ans, la quelle lui frottera la teste par les chemins." A wooden cut annexed, represents this operation on an old man, who lies along in his carriage, with a girl sitting at his head. STEEVENS. This was, 9 Saturn and Venus this year in conjunction!] indeed, a prodigy. The astrologers, says Ficinus, remark, that Saturn and Venus are never conjoined. JOHNSON. 1the fiery Trigon, &c.] Trigonum igneum is the astronomical term when the upper planets meet in a fiery sign. 2 man, be not lisping to his master's old tables; his note-book, his counsel-keeper. The fiery Trigon, I think, consists of Aries, Leo, and Sagittarius. So, in Warner's Albion's England, 1602, B. VI. chap. xxxi: "Even at the fierie Trigon shall your chief ascendant be." 66 Again, in Pierce's Supererogation, or a new Praise of the old Asse, &c. by Gabriel Harvey, 1593: -now the warring planet was expected in person, and the fiery Trigon seemed to give the alarm." STEEVENS. So, in A Dialogue both pleasaunt and pietifull, &c. by Wm. Bulleyne, 1564: Aries, Leo, and Sagittarius, are hotte, drie, bitter, and cholerike, governing hot and drie thinges, and this is called the fierie triplicitie." MALONE. 2 lisping to his master's old tables; &c.] We should read-clasping too his master's old tables; &c. i. e. embracing his master's cast off whore, and now his bawd [his note-book, his counsel-keeper.] We have the same phrase again in Cymbeline: "You clasp young Cupid's tables." WARBURTon. I believe the old reading to be the true one. Bardolph was very probably drunk, and might lisp a little in his courtship; or might assume an affected softness of speech, like Chaucer's Frere: Tyrwhitt's edit. Prol. v. 266: "Somewhat he lisped for his wantonnesse, "To make his English swete upon his tonge." Or, like the Page, in The Mad Lover of Beaumont and Fletcher, who 66 'Lisps when he list to catch a chambermaid." Again, in Love's Labour's Lost: 66 He can carve too and lisp." Again, in Marston's 8th Satire: "With voyce distinct, all fine, articulate, "Lisping, Fayre saint, my woe compassionate: STEEVENS. Certainly the word clasping better preserves the integrity of the metaphor; or, perhaps, as the expression is old tables, we might read licking: Bardolph was kissing the Hostess; and old ivory books were commonly cleaned by licking them. FARMER. The old table-book was a counsel-keeper, or a register of |