1. Boyet. This Armado is a Spaniard that keeps here in Court, A phantasme, a monarchos, and one that makes sport To the Prince, and his book-mates. Prin. Thou, fellow, a word; Who gave thee this letter? Coft. I told you; my lord. Prin. To whom shouldst thou give it?" Coft. From my lord to my lady. Prin. From which lord to which lady? Coft. From my lord Biron, a good master of mine, To a lady of France, that he call'd Rosaline. Prin. Thou hast mistaken this letter, Come, lords, away. Here, fweet, put up this; 'twill be thine another day. [Exit Princess attended. Boyet. Who is the shooter? who is the shooter? Rof. Why, she that bears the bow. Finely put off. marry, Hang me by the neck, if horns that year miscarry. Rof. Well then, I am the shooter. Boyet. And who is your Deer? Rof. If we chuse by horns, yourself; come not near. Finely put on indeed. - Mar, You will wrangle with her, Boyet, and she strikes at the brow. Boyet. But she herself is hit lower. Have I hit her now? Rof. Shall I come upon thee with an old faying, that was a man when King Pippin of France was a little boy, as touching the hit it? Boyet. So I may answer thee with one as old, that was a woman when Queen Quinover of Britain was a little wench, as touching the hit it. Rof. Thou can'st not hit it, hit it, hit it. [Singing. Thou can'st not hit it, my good man. Boyet. An' I cannot, cannot, cannot; An I cannot, another can. [Exit Rof. Caft. By my troth, most pleasant; how both did fit it. Mar. A mark marvellous well shot; for they both did hit it. Boyet. A mark? O, mark but that mark! a mark, fays my lady; Let the mark have a prick in't; to meet at, if it may be. : Mar. Wide o'th'bow-hand; i'faith, your hand is out. Coft. Indeed, a'must shoot nearer, or he'll ne'er hit the clout. Boyet. An' if my hand be out, then, belike, your hand is in. Coft. Then will fshe get the upshot by cleaving the pin. Mar. Come, come, you talk greafily; your lips grow foul. Coft. She's too hard for you at pricks, Sir, challenge her to bowl. Boyet. I fear too much rubbing; good night my good owl. [Exeunt all but Costard. Coft. By my foul, a fwain; a most simple clown! Lord, Lord! how the ladies and I have put him down! O' my troth, most sweet jests, most incony vulgar wit, When it comes so smoothly off, so obscenely; as it were, fo fit. Armado o' th' one fide-O, a most dainty man; will fwear: 1 And And his Page o' t'other side, that handful of Wit; SCENE II. [Exit Costard,. [Shouting within, Enter Dull, Holofernes, and Sir Nathanael. Nath. Very reverend sport, truly; and done in the testimony of a good Confcience. Hol. The deer was (as you know) fanguis, in blood; ripe as a pomwater, who now hangeth like a jewel in the goofe flies, Unclaim'd of any man. The place before us seems to be an exception. For by Holofernes is designed a particular character, a pedant and schoolmaster of our author's time, one John Florio, a teacher of the Italian tongue in London, who has given us a small dictionary of that language under the title of A world of words, which in his Epistle Dedicatory he tells us, is of little less value than Stephens's treafure of the Greek tongue, the most compleat work that was ever yet compiled of its kind. In his preface, he calls those who had criticized his works Sea dogs or Land-critics; Monsters of men, if not beafts rather than men; whose teeth are canibals, their toongs addars-forks, their lips afpes poison, their eyes bafilifkes, their breath the breath of a grave, their words like fwordes of Turks that strive which shall dive deepest into a Christian Iying bound before them. Well therefore might the mild Nathanael defire Holofernes to abrogate fcurrility. His profession too is the reason that Holofernes deals so much in Italian sentences. There is an edition of Love's Labour's loft, printed 1598, and faid to be presented before her Highness this last Christmas 1597. The next year 1598, comes out our. John Florio with his World of Words, recentibus odiis; and in the preface, quoted above, falls upon the comic poet for bringing him on the stage. There is another fort of leering curs, that rather snarle than bite, whereof I could instance in one, who lighting on a good fonnet of a gentleman's, a friend of mine, that loved better to be a poet than to be counted fo, called the author a Rymer. -Let Ariftophanes and his comedians make plaies, and fcowre their mouths on Socrates; those very mouths they make to vilifie shall be the means to amplifie bis virtue, &c. Here Shakespeare is so plain ly : the ear of Cœlo, the sky, the welkin, the heav'n; and anon falleth like a crab on the face of Terra, the foil, the land, the earth. Nath. Truly, master Holofernés, the epithets are fweetly varied, like a fcholar at the leaft; but, Sir, I affure ye, it was a buck of the first head, Hol. Sir Nathanael, haud credo. Dull. "Twas not a haud credo, 'twas a pricket. Hol. Moft barbarous intimation; yet a kind of infinuation, as it were in via, in way of explication; ly marked out as not to be mif. taken. As to the fonnet of The Gentleman bis friend, we may be affured it was no other than his own. And without doubt was parodied in the very fonnet beginning with The praiseful Princefs, &c. in which our author makes Holophernes say, He will fomething affect the letter; for is argues facility. And how much John Florio thought this affecta. tion argued facility, or quickness of wit, we fee in this preface where he falls upon his enemy, H. S. His name is H. S. Da not take it for the Roman H. S. unless it be as H. S. is twice as much and an half, as half an AS, With a great deal more to the fame purpose; concluding his preface in these words, The refolute John Florio. From the ferocity of this man's temper it was, that Shakespeare chose for him the name which Rablais gives to his Pedant of Thubal Holoferne. WARBURTON. I am not of the learned commentator's opinion, that the fatire of Shakespeare is so seldom perfonal. It is of the nature of personal invectives to be soon un. intelligible; and the author that gratifies private malice, animam in vulnere ponit, destroys the future efficacy of his own writings, and facrifices the esteem of fucceeding times to the laughter of a day. It is no wonder, therefore, that the sarcasms which, perhaps, in the author's time, fet the playhouse in a roar, are now loft among general reflections, Yet whether the character of Holofernes was pointed at any parti cular man, I am, notwithstanding the plausibility of Dr. Warburton's conjecture, inclined to doubt. Every man adheres as long as he can to his own pre conceptions. Before I read this note confidered the character of Ho lofernes as borrowed from the Rhombus of Sir Philip Sidney, who, in a kind of paftoral entertainment exhibited to Queen Elizabeth, has introduced a schoolmaster so called, speaking a leash of languages at once, and puzzling himself and his auditors with a jargon like that of Holofernes in the present play. Sidney himself might bring the character from Italy; for, as Peacham obferves, the Schoolmaster has long been one of the ridiculous personages in the farces of that country. facere, facere, as it were, replication; or rather, oftentare, to show, as it were, his inclination; after his undressed, unpolished, uneducated, unpruned, untrained, or rather unlettered, or ratherest unconfirmed fashion, to infert again my haud credo for a deer. Dull. I faid, the deer was not a haud credo; 'twas a pricket. Hol. Twice fod fimplicity, bis coctus; O thou monster ignorance, how deformed doft thou look? Nath. Sir, he hath never fed on the dainties that are bred in a book. He hath not eat paper, as it were; he hath not drunk ink. His intellect is not replenished. He is only an animal, only fenfible in the duller parts; * And such barren plants are set before us, that we thankful should be, Which we taste and feeling are for those parts that do fructify in us, more than He. 8 - and fuch barren plants are fet before us, that we thankful should be; which we taste, and feeling are for those parts that do fructify in us more than be.] The Words have been ridiculously, and stupidly, transpos'd and corrupted. I read, we thankful should be for those parts (which we taste and feel ingradare) that do fructify, &c. The emendation I have offer'd, I hope, reftores the author: At least, it gives him sense and grammar: and answers extremely well to his metaphors taken from planting. Ingradare, with the Italians, fignifies, to rise higher and higher; andare di grado in grado, to make a progreffion; and so at length come to fructify, as the poet expresses it. WARBURTON. Sir T. Hanmer reads thus, And fuch barren plants are set before us, that we thankful should be For those parts which we taste and feel do fructify in us morė than be. And Mr. Edwards, in his animadverfions on Dr. Warburton's notes, applauds the emendation. Ithink both the editors mistaken, except that Sir T. Hanmer found the metre though he missed the fenfe. Iread, with a flight change, And fuck barren plants are fet before us, that we thankful hould be; When we taste and feeling are for those parts that do fructify in us more than be. That is, fach barren plants are exhibited in the creation, to make us thankful when we have more taste and feeling than he, of those parts or qualities which pro duce fruit in us, and preserve us from being likewise barren plants, Such is the sense, just in itself and pious, but a little clouded by the diction of Sir Nathanael. For |