Enter Don PEDRO, attended by BALTHAZAR and others; Don JOHN, CLAUDIO, and BENEDICK.

D. Pedro. Good Signior Leonato, you are come to meet your trouble: the fashion of the world is to avoid cost, and you encounter it.

Leon. Never came trouble to my house in the likeness of your grace: for trouble being gone, comfort should remain; but, when you depart from me, forrow abides, and happiness takes his leave.

D. Pedro. You embrace your charge' too willingly.-I think, this is your daughter.

Leon. Her mother hath many times told me fo.
Bene. Were you in doubt, fir, that you ask'd her?

Leon. Signior Benedick, no; for then were you a child. D. Pedro. You have it full, Benedick: we may guess by this what you are, being a man. Truly, the lady fathers herself-Be happy, lady! for you are like an honourable father.

Bene. If fignior Leonato be her father, she would not have his head on her shoulders for all Messina, as like him as fhe is.

Beat. I wonder, that you will ftill be talking, fignior Benedick; no body marks you.

Bene. What, my dear lady Difdain! are you yet living? Beat. Is it poffible, difdain fhould die, while fhe hath fuch meet food to feed it, as fignior Benedick? Courtesy itself must convert to disdain, if you come in her prefence.

Bene. Then is courtesy a turn-coat-But it is certain, I am loved of all ladies, only you excepted: and I would

your charge] That is, your burthen, your incumbrance.

2 Truly, the lady fathers herself:]

Sit fuo fimilis patri

Manlio, et facile infciis

Nofcitetur ab omnibus,

Et pudicitiam fuæ

Matris indicet ore. Catul. 57. MALONE.

Јонизом.

3-fuch meet food to feed it, as fignior Benedick ?] A kindred thought • occurs in Coriolanus, Act II. fc. 1: "Our very priests must become mackers, if they encounter fuch ridiculous fubjects as you are." STEEV.

I could

I could find in my heart that I had not a hard heart; for, truly, I love none.

Beat. A dear happiness to women; they would elfe have been troubled with a pernicious fuitor. I thank God, and my cold blood, I am of your humour for that; I had rather hear my dog bark at a crow, than a man fwear he loves me.

Bene. God keep your ladyship ftill in that mind! fo fome gentleman or other fhall 'fcape a predeftinate

fcratch'd face.

Beat. Scratching could not make it worse, an 'twere fuch a face as yours were.

Bene. Well, you are a rare parrot-teacher.

Beat. A bird of my tongue, is better than a beast of yours.

Bene. I would, my horfe had the speed of your tongue; and fo good, a continuer: But keep your way o' God's name; I have done.

Beat. You always end with a jade's trick'; I know you of old.

D. Pedro. This is the fum of all: Leonato,-fignior Claudio, and fignior Benedick, my dear friend Leonato hath invited you all. I tell him, we shall stay here at the leaft a month; and he heartily prays, fome occafion may detain us longer: I dare fwear he is no hypocrite, but prays from his heart. 1

Leon. If you fwear, my lord, you fhall not be forfworn -Let me bid you welcome, my lord: being reconciled to the prince your brother, I owe you all duty.

D. John. I thank you: I am not of many words, but I thank you.

1

Leon. Please it your grace lead on? D. Pedro. Your hand, Leonato; we will go together. [Exeunt all but BENEDICK and CLAUDIO. Claud. Benedick, didft thou note the daughter of fignior Leonato ?

Bene. I noted her not; but I look'd on her.

4 I thank you :] The poet has judiciously marked the gloominess of Don John's character, by making him averse to the common forms of civility. Sir J. Hawkins.

P 3

Claud.

Claud. Is the not a modeft young lady ?

Bene. Do you question me, as an honest man should do, for my fimple true judgment? or would you have me fpeak after my cuftom, as being a profeffed tyrant to their fex? Claud. No, I pray thee, fpeak in fober judgment.

Bene. Why, i'faith, methinks fhe is too low for a high praife, too brown for a fair praife, and too little for a great praife only this commendation I can afford her; that were the other than fhe is, the were unhandsome; and being no other but as fhe is, I do not like her.

Glaud. Thou think'ft, I am in fport; I pray thee, tell me truly how thou likeft her. ...

Bene. Would you buy her, that you enquire after her?
Claud. Can the world buy fuch a jewel?

Bene. Yea, and a cafe to put it into. But fpeak you this with a fad brow? or do you play the flouting Jack'; to tell us Cupid is a good hare-finder, and Vulcan a rare

-

the flouting Jack;] Jack, in our author's time, I know not why, was a term of contempt. So, in King Henry IV. P.I. A&III: "the prince is a Jack, a fneak-cup." Again, in the Taming of the Shrew:

(

bretorafeal fidler,prod

"And twangling Jack, with fuch vile terms, &c.”

See in Minfbeu's Dia. 1617, " A Jack fauce, or faucie Jack," See alfo Chaucer's Cant. Tales, ver. 14816, and the note, edit. TyrWhitt. MALONE.

6 -to tell us Cupid is a good bare-finder, &c.] I believe no more is meant by thofe ludicrous expreffions than this.Do you mean, fays Benedick, to amufe us with improbable, stories?

An ingenious correfpondent, whofe fignature is R. W. explains the paffage in the fame fenfe, but more amply. "Do you mean to tell us that love is not blind, and that fire will not confume what is combuftible?"-for both thefe propofitions are implied in making Cupid e good bare-finder, and Vulcan (the God of fire) a good carpenter. In other words, would you convince me, whofe opinion on this bead is well known, that you can be in love without being blind, and can play with the flame of beauty without being fcorched?, STEEVENS.

I explain the paffage thus: Do you scoff and mock in telling us that Cupid, who is blind, is a good kare-finder, which requires a quick eyefight; and that Vulcan, a blacksmith, is a rare carpenter? TOLLET.

After fuch attempts at decent illuftration, I am afraid that he who wishes to know why Cupid is a good bare-finder, must discover it by the afsistance of many quibbling allufions of the fame fort, about bair and boar, in Mercutio's fong in Romeo and Juliet, Act II. COLLINS.

.....

carpenter?

carpenter? Come, in what key shall a man take you, to go in the fong??

Claud. In mine eye, she is the sweetest lady that ever I looked on.

Bene. I can fee yet without fpectacles, and I fee no fuch matter: there's her coufin, an fhe were not poffefs'd with a fury, exceeds her as much in beauty, as the first of May doth the laft of December. But I hope, you have no intent to turn husband; have you?

Claud. I would fcarce truft myself, though I had fworn the contrary, if Hero would be my wife.

Bene. Is't come to this, i'faith? Hath not the world one man, but he will wear his cap with fufpicion? Shall I never see a bachelor of threefcore again? Go to, i'faith; an thou wilt needs thruft thy neck into a yoke, wear the print of it, and figh away Sundays. Look, Don Pedro is return'd to feek you.

Re-enter Don PEDRO.

D. Pedro. What fecret hath held you here, that you followed not to Leonato's?

Bene. I would, your grace would constrain me to tell. : D. Pedro. I charge thee on thy allegiance.

Bene. You hear, Count Claudio: I can be fecret as à dumb man, I would have you think fo; but on my allegiance, mark you this, on my allegiance:-He is in love. With who?-now that is your grace's part.-Mark, how short his answer is With Hero, Leonato's fhort daughter.

Claud.

7 to go in the fong ? ie. to join with you in your fong. STEEV. 8 -wear bis cap with suspicion ?] That is, fubject his head to the difquiet of jealoufy. JOHNSON.

In the Palace of Pleasure, 8vo. 1566, p. 233, we have the following paffage: All they that wear bornes, be pardoned to weare their cappes upon their heads." HENDERSON.

In our author's time none but the inferior claffes wore caps, and fuch perfons were termed in contempt flat-caps. All gentlemen wore bats. Perhaps therefore the meaning is, Is there not one man in the world prudent enough to keep out of that state where he must live in apprehenfion that his night-cap will be worn occafionally by another. So, in Orbellos "For I fear Caffio with my night-cap too." MALONE. 9-figb away Sundays.] A proverbial expreffion to fignify that a man has no reft at all; when Sunday, a day formerly of cafe and diwerfion, was paffed fo uncomfortably. WARBURTON.

The allufion is most probably to the ftrict manner in which the fabBath

P4

Claud. If this were fo, fo were it uttered '.

Bene. Like the old tale, my lord: it is not fo, nor 'twas not fo; but, indeed, God forbid it fhould be fo. Claud. If my paffion change not fhortly, God forbid it fhould be otherwise.

D. Pedro. Amen, if you love her, for the lady is very 'well worthy.

Claud. You fpeak this to fetch me in, my lord.

D. Pedro. By my troth, I fpeak my thought.
Claud. And, in faith, my lord, I spoke mine.

Bene. And, by my two faiths and troths, my lord, I Speak mine.

Claud. That I love her, I feel..

D. Pedro. That she is worthy, I know.

Bene. That I neither feel how the fhould be loved, nor know how the fhould be worthy, is the opinion that fire cannot melt out of me; I will die in it at the stake.

D. Pedro. Thou waft ever an obftinate heretick in the defpight of beauty.

Claud. And never could maintain his part, but in the force of his will 2.

Bene. That a woman conceived me, I thank her; that fhe brought me up, I likewife give her moft humble thanks: but that I will have a recheat winded in my forehead, or hang my bugle in an invisible baldrick, all

women

bath was observed by the puritans, who usually spent that day in fight and gruntings, and other hypocritical marks of devotion. STEEVENS.

Claud. If this were fo, fo were it uttened.] Claudio, evading at firft a confeffion of his paffion, fays; if I had really confided fuch a fecret to him, yet he would have blabbed it in this manner. In his next fpeech, he thinks proper to avow his love; and when Benedick fays, God forbid it fhould be fo, i. e. God forbid he should even wish to many her; Claudio replies, God forbid I fhould not wish it. STEEVENS.

2 but in the force of bis will.] Alluding to the definition of a heretick in the schools. WARBURTON.

3-but that I will have a recheat winded in my forehead,] That is, I will wear a born on my forehead which the buntfman may blow. A recbeate is the found by which dogs are called back. Shakspeare had no mercy upon the poor cuckold, his born is an inexhaustible subject of merriment. JOHNSON.

A recbeate is a particular leffon upon the horn, to call dogs back from the fcent: from the old French word recet. HANMER.

4 — bang my bugle in an invifible baldrick,] Bugle, i. e. bugle-horn

hunting