Than (living dully fluggardiz'd at home) Pro. Wilt thou be gone? Sweet Valentine, adieu! When thou doft meet good hap; and, in thy danger, Commend thy grievance to my holy prayers, Val. And on a love-book pray for my fuccefs. Pro. Upon fome book I love, I'll pray for thee. Val. That's on fome fhallow ftory of deep love, How young Leander crofs'd the Hellefpont. Pro. That's a deep ftory of a deeper love; For he was more than over fhoes in love. Val. 'Tis true; for you are over boots in love, And yet you never fwom the Hellefpont. Pro. Over the boots? 5 nay, give me not the boots. Val. has escaped corruption, only because being feldom played, it was lefs exposed to the hazards of tranfcription. JOHNSON. 3 Home-keeping youth have ever homely avits:] Milton has the fame play on words: 4 STEEVENS. "It is for homely features to keep home, They had their name thence," -fhapeless idleness.] The expreffion is fine, as implying that idleness prevents the giving any form or character to the manners. WARBURTON. 5 nay, give me not the boots.] A proverbial expreffion, though now difufed, fignifying, don't make a laughing stock of me don't play upon me. The French have a phrase, Bailler foin en corne; which Cotgrave thus interprets, To give one the boots; to feil him a bargain. THEOBALD. Do you know this? why boots at harveft ?] Perhaps this expreffion took its origin from a fport the country people in Warwickshire use at their harvest home, where one fits as judge to try misdemeanors committed in harveft, and the punishment for the men is to be laid on a bench, and flapped on the breech with a pair of boots. This they call giving them the boots. I meet Val. No, I will not; for it boots thee not. Val. To be in love, where fcorn is bought with groans; Coy looks, with heart-fore fighs; one fading moment's mirth, With twenty watchful, weary, tedious nights. Pro. So, by your circumftance, you call me fool. Methinks fhould not be chronicled for wife. Val. And writers fay, as the most forward bud Even fo by love the young and tender wit Once more adieu: my father at the road Pro. And thither will I bring thee, Valentine. meet with the fame expreffion in the old comedy called Mother Bombie: "What do you give me the boots?" STEEVENS. 6 However, but a folly-] This love will end in a foolish action, to produce which you are long to spend your wit, or it will end in the lofs of your wit, which will be overpowered by the folly of love. JOHNSON, At At Milan, let me hear from thee by letters Pro. He after honour hunts, I after love: 8 Enter Speed. Speed. Sir Protheus, fave you: faw you my mafter? Pro. But now he parted hence to imbark for Milan. Speed. Twenty to one then he is shipp'd already, And I have play'd the sheep in lofing him. Pro. Indeed, a fheep doth very often stray, An if the fhepherd be awhile away. Speed. You conclude that my master is a fhepherd then, and I a sheep? Pro. I do. 7 Made wit with mufing weak,-] For made read make. Thou, Julia, haft made me war with good counsel, and make wit weak with mufing. JOHNSON. 8 This whole fcene, like many others in these plays (fome of which I believe were written by Shakespeare, and others interpolated by the players) is compofed of the lowest and moft trifling conceits, to be accounted for only from the grofs tafte of the age he lived in; Populo ut placerent. I wish I had authority to leave them out; but I have done all I could, fet a mark of reprobation upon them throughout this edition. POPE. That this, like many other scenes, is mean and vulgar, will be univerfally allowed; but that it was interpolated by the players feems advanced without any proof, only to give a greater licence to criticism. JOHNSON. Speed. Speed. Why then my horns are his horns, whether I wake or fleep. Pro. A filly answer, and fitting well a sheep. Pro. True; and thy master a shepherd. Speed. Nay, that I can deny by a circumstance. Pro. It fhall go hard, but I'll prove it by another. Speed. The fhepherd feeks the fheep, and not the fheep the fhepherd; but I feek my mafter, and my mafter feeks not me: therefore I am no fheep. Pro. The fheep for fodder follows the fhepherd, the fhepherd for the food follows not the fheep; thou for wages followeft thy mafter, thy mafter for wages follows not thee: therefore thou art a sheep. Speed. Such another proof will make me cry Baâ. Pro. But doft thou hear? gav'st thou my letter to Julia? Speed. Ay, Sir: 9 I, a loft mutton, gave your letter to her, a lac'd mutton; and fhe, a lac'd mutton, gave me, a loft mutton, nothing for my labour. Pro. • I, a loft mutton, gave your letter to her, a lac'd mutton ;- -] Speed calls himself a loft mutton, because he had loft his master, and because Protheus had been proving him a fheep. But why does he call the lady a lac'd mutton? Wenchers are to this day called mutton-mongers; and confequently the object of their paffion must, by the metaphor, be the mutton. And Cotgrave, in his English-French Dictionary, explains lac'd mutton, Une garfe, putain, fille de joye. And Mr. Motteux has rendered this paflage of Rabelais, in the prologue of his fourth book, Cailles coiphees mignonnement chantans, in this manner; Coated quails and lac'd mutton waggishly finging. So that lac'd_mutton has been a fort of standard phrafe for girls of pleasure. THEOBALD. Nafh, in his Have with you to Saffron Walden, 1595, fpeaking of Gabriel Harvey's incontinence, fays, he would not fick to extoll rotten lac'd mutton. So in the comedy of The Shoemaker's Holiday, or the Gentle Craft, 1610. "Why here's good lac'd mutton, as I promis'd you." Again, in Blurt Mafter Conftable, 1602. 66 Cupid hath got me a ftomach, and I long for tac'd mutton." So in Whetstone's Promos and Caffandra, 1578. "And I melt he lov'd lac'd mutton well." Se Pro. Here's too small a pasture for such a store of muttons. Speed. If the ground be overcharg'd, you were best ftick her. I Pro. Nay, in that you are aftray; 'twere best pound you. Speed. Nay, Sir, lefs than a pound shall serve me for carrying your letter. Pro. You mistake: I mean the pound, a pinfold. Speed. From a pound to a pin? fold it over and over, 'tis threefold too little for carrying a letter to your lover. เ Pro. But what faid fhe: did fhe nod? [Speed nods. Speed. I. Pro. Nod-I? why, that's noddy. Speed. You mistook, Sir: I faid, fhe did nod: And you afk me, if she did nod; and I faid, I. Pro. And that fet together, is noddy. Speed. Now you have taken the pains to fet it together, take it for your pains. Pro. No, no, you shall have it for bearing the letter. Speed. Well, I perceive, I must be fain to bear with you. Pro. Why, Sir, how do you bear with me? Speed. Marry, Sir, the letter very orderly; Having nothing but the word noddy for my pains. Pro. Belhrew me, but you have a quick wit. Speed. And yet it cannot overtake your flow purse. Pro. Cóme, come, open the matter in brief: what faid the ? Again Heywood, in his Love's Miftrefs, 1636, speaking of Cupid, fays, he is the "Hero of hie-hoes, admiral of ay-me's, and "monfieur of mutton lac'd." STEEVENS. Nay, in that you are aftray;-] For the reafon Protheus gives, Dr. Thirlby advises that we should read, a ftray, i. e. a fray sheep; which continues Protheus's banter upon Speed. 2 THEOBALD. did fhe nod ?] These words have been fupplied by fome of the editors, to introduce what follows. STEEVENS. Speed. |