Lep. What, shall I find you here?

Oct. Or here, or at

The Capitol.

494. Ant. This is a slight unmeritable man,

Meet to be sent on errands: Is it fit,

The three-fold world divided, he should stand
One of the three to share it ?

Oct. So you thought him;

And took his voice who should be pricked to die
In our black sentence and proscription.

496. Ant. Octavius, I have seen more days than you;
And though we lay these honours on this man,
To ease ourselves of divers slanderous loads,
He shall but bear them as the ass bears gold;
To groan and sweat under the business,
Either led or driven, as we point the way;
And, having brought our treasure where we will,
Then take we down his load, and turn him off,
Like to the empty ass, to shake his ears,
And graze on commons.

Oct. You may do your will;

But he's a tried and valiant soldier.

498. Ant. So is my horse, Octavius; and, for that,
I do appoint him store of provender.

It is a creature that I teach to fight,
To wind, to stop, to run directly on;

His corporal motion governed by my spirit.
And, in some taste, is Lepidus but so;

He must be taught, and trained, and bid go forth:
A barren-spirited fellow; one that feeds

On objects, arts, and imitations,

Which, out of use, and staled by other men,

Begin his fashion: Do not talk of him,

But as a property.

And now, Octavius,

Listen great things.-Brutus and Cassius

Are levying powers; we must straight make head:

Therefore let our alliance be combined,

[Exit LEPIDUS.

Our best friends made, and our best means stretched out;

And let us presently go sit in counsel

How covert matters may be best disclosed,

And open perils surest answered.

499. Oct. Let us do so: for we are at the stake,

T

And bayed about with many enemies;

And some, that smile, have in their hearts, I fear,
Millions of mischiefs.

[Exeunt.

The Same. A Room in Antony's House.-The original heading is only, "Enter Antony, Octavius, and Lepidus." The Same, meaning at Rome, was supplied by Rowe. It is evident (especially from 492 and 493) that the scene is placed at Rome, although in point of fact the triumvirs held their meeting in a small island in the river Rhenus (now the Reno) near Bononia (Bologna), where, Plutarch says, they remained three days together.

486. These many.—An archaic form for so many, this number.

486. Their names are pricked.-Vid. 352.

490. Who is your sister's son, Mark Antony.-This is a mistake. The person meant is Lucius Cæsar, who was Mark Antony's uncle, the brother of his mother.

491. Look, with a spot I damn him.-Note him as condemned, by a mark or stigma (called pricking his name in 486, and pricking him down in 489, and pricking him in 495).

491. Fetch the will hither, and we shall determine.— This is the reading of all the old copies, and is properly retained by Mr Knight. In the Variorum edition we have (and without warning) will substituted for shall; and this alteration Mr Collier also adopts in his regulated text, although it does not appear to be one of the corrections of his manuscript annotator.

494. This is a slight unmeritable man.-So afterwards in 535, “Away, slight man!" said by Brutus, in momentary anger, to Cassius. Vid. 522.- Unmeritable should mean incapable of deserving.

494. Meet to be sent on errands.-Errand is an Original English word, arend (perhaps from ær, or ar, before, whence also ere and early). It has no connexion with errant, wandering (from the Latin erro, whence also err, and error, and erroneous).

496. To groan and sweat under the business.—Business is commonly only a dissyllable with Shakespeare; and it may be no more here upon the principle explained in the note on "She dreamt to-night she saw my statue in 246. There are a good many more instances of lines concluding with business, in which either it is a trisyllable (although commonly only a dissyllable in the middle of a line) or the verse must be regarded as a hemistich, or truncated verse, of nine syllables.

496. Either led or driven, etc.-The three last Folios, and also Rowe, have "print the way." The we of this line, and the our and the we of the next, are all emphatic. There is the common irregularity of a single short superfluous syllable (the er of either).

496. And graze on commons.—In is the reading of all the old copies. On is the correction of Mr Collier's MS. annotator.

498. Store of provender.-Provender, which Johnson explains to mean "dry food for brutes," and which also appears in the forms provand and provant, is immediately from the French provende, having the same signification; but the origin of the French word is not so clear. The Italian, indeed, has provianda, a feminine substantive in the singular; but this signifies victuals in general, or flesh-meat in particular, and is the same word with the French viande and the English viands, which are com'monly traced to the Latin vivere (quasi vivenda), an etymology which receives some support from the existence of vivanda in the Italian as apparently only another form of provianda. Another derivation of the French provende brings it from provenire and proventus, in which case it would signify properly increase, growth, crop; and another would bring it from provideo, making it only a variation or corruption of provision. The parentage of the word, therefore, may be said to be contested between vivo, venio, and video. Possibly vendo might also put in

a claim. Webster has :vender, originally signified a vessel containing a measure of corn daily given to a horse or other beast." By whom this is stated, or in what language the words are said to have this meaning, he does not inform us. He also adduces the Norman provender, a prebendary, and provendre, a prebend, and the Dutch prove, a prebend. The Latin præbenda (from præbeo), the undoubted original of prebend, may have got confounded with provende in the obscurity enveloping the origin and proper meaning of the latter term.

"It is said that provend, pro

498. And, in some taste.-It might seem at first that this phrase, as it may be said to be equivalent in effect to our common "in some sense,' so is only another wording of the same conception or figure, what is called a sense in the one form being called a taste in the other. But, although taste is reckoned one of the senses, this would certainly be a wrong explanation. The expression "in some sense" has nothing to do with the powers of sensation or perception; sense here is signification, meaning, import. Neither does taste stand for the sense of taste in the other expression. The taste which is here referred to is a taste in contradistinction to a more full enjoyment or participation, a taste merely. "In some taste" is another way of saying, not "in some sense," but "in some measure, or degree."

498. On objects, arts, and imitations, etc.-This passage, as it stands in the Folios, with the sentence terminating at "imitations," has much perplexed the commentators, and, indeed, may be said to have proved quite inexplicable, till a comma was substituted for the full point by Mr Knight, which slight change makes everything plain and easy. Antony's assertion is, that Lepidus feeds, not on objects, arts, and imitations generally, but on such of them as are out of use and staled (or worn out: Vid. 50) by other people, which, notwithstanding, begin his fashion

(or with which his following the fashion begins). Theobald reduces the full point to a comma, as other editors do to a colon or a semicolon; but it is evident, nevertheless, from his note that he did not regard the relative clause as a qualification or limitation of what precedes it. 498. Listen great things.—Listen has now ceased to be used as an active verb.

498. Our best friends made, and our best means stretched out. This is the reading of the Second Folio. It seems to me, I confess, to be sufficiently in Shakespeare's manner. The First Folio has "Our best Friends made, our meanes stretcht,"—which, at any rate, it is quite impossible to believe to be what he wrote.

498. And let us presently go sit in counsel, etc.—The more ordinary phraseology would be "Let us sit in consultation how," or "Let us consult how." The word in the First Folio is "Councell," and most, if not all, modern editions have "sit in council." But Vid. 263.

499. And bayed about with many enemies.-Vid. 349 (for bayed), and 363 (for with).

499. Millions of mischiefs.-This is the reading of all the old editions. Mr Knight has "mischief," no doubt by an error of the press. In the Winter's Tale, iv. 2, however, we have, in a speech of the Clown, "A million of beating may come to a great matter."

SCENE II.-Before BRUTUS's Tent, in the Camp near Sardis. Drum.-Enter BRUTUS, LUCILIUS, TITINIUS, and Soldiers: PINDARUS meeting them: LUCIUS at a distance.

Bru. Stand, ho!

Lucil. Give the word, ho! and stand.

502. Bru. What now, Lucilius? is Cassius near?

503. Lucil. He is at hand; and Pindarus is come To do you salutation from his master.

[PINDARUS gives a letter to BRUTUS.

504. Bru. He greets me well.-Your master, Pindarus,