1 WATCH. Never speak; we charge you, let us obey you to go with us.

BORA. We are like to prove a goodly commodity, being taken up of these men's bills.

CON. A commodity in question,' I warrant you. Come, we'll obey you.

SCENE IV.

A Room in Leonato's House.

[Exeunt,

Enter HERO, MARGARET, and Ursula.

HERO. Good Ursula, wake my cousin Beatrice, and desire her to rise.

6

URS. I will, lady.

HERO. And bid her come hither.

URS. Well.

[Exit URSULA.

a goodly commodity, being taken up of these men's bills.] Here is a cluster of conceits. Commodity was formerly as now, the usual term for an article of merchandise. To take up, besides its common meaning, (to apprehend,) was the phrase for obtaining goods on credit. "If a man is thorough with them in honest taking up, (says Falstaff,) then they must stand upon security." Bill was the term both for a single bond, and a halberd.

We have the same conceit in King Henry VI. P. II: "My lord, When shall we go to Cheapside, and take up commodities upon our bills?" MALONE.

7 A commodity in question,] i. e. a commodity subject to judicial trial or examination. Thus Hooker: "Whosoever be found guilty, the communion book hath deserved least to be called in question for this fault." STEEVENS.

MARG. Troth, I think, your other rabato were better.

HERO. No, pray thee, good Meg, I'll wear this. MARG. By my troth, it's not so good; and I warrant, your cousin will say so.

HERO. My cousin's a fool, and thou art another; I'll wear none but this.

MARG. I like the new tire within excellently, if the hair were a thought browner:" and your gown's

- rabato - An ornament for the neck, a collar-band or kind of ruff. Fr. Rabat. Menage saith it comes from rabattre, to put back, because it was at first nothing but the collar of the shirt or shift turn'd back towards the shoulders. T. HAWKINS. This article of dress is frequently mentioned by our ancient comic writers.

So, in the comedy of Law Tricks, &c. 1608:

"Broke broad jests upon her narrow heel,

"Pok'd her rabatoes, and survey'd her steel." Again, in Decker's Guls Hornbook, 1609: “Your stiff-necked rebatoes (that have more arches for pride to row under, than can stand under five London-bridges) durst not then," &c.

Again, in Decker's Untrussing the Humourous Poet: "What a miserable thing it is to be a noble bride! There's such delays in rising, in fitting gowns, in pinning rebatoes, in poaking," &c.

The first and last of these passages will likewise serve for an additional explanation of the poking-sticks of steel, mentioned by Autolycus in The Winter's Tale. STEEVENS.

if the hair were a thought browner:] i. e. the false hair attached to the cap; for we learn from Stubbes's Anatomie of Abuses, 1595, p. 40, that ladies were "not simplie content with their own haire, but did buy up other haire either of horses, mares, or any other strange beasts, dying it of what collour they list themselves." STEEVENS.

-a thought browner:] i. e. a degree, a little, or as would now be said, a shade browner. Thus, in Shirley's Honoria and Mammon, 1659:

"Col. They have city faces.

"Squ. And are a thought too handsome to be serjeants."

a most rare fashion, i'faith. I saw the duchess of Milan's gown, that they praise so.

HERO. O, that exceeds, they say.

MARG. By my troth it's but a night-gown in respect of yours: Cloth of gold, and cuts, and laced with silver; set with pearls, down sleeves, side-sleeves,' and skirts round, underborne with a

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Again, in Guzman de Alfarache, fol. 1628, P. II. B. II. ch. v: that I should lessen it a thought in the waist, for that it sits now well before." REED.

1

-side-sleeves,] Side-sleeves, I believe, mean long ones. So, in Greene's Farewell to Follie, 1617: "As great selfe-love lurketh in a side-gowne, as in a short armour." Again, in Laneham's Account of Queen Elizabeth's Entertainment at Kenelworth-Castle, 1575, the minstrel's " gown had side-sleeves down to the mid-leg." Clement Paston (See Paston Letters, Vol. I. p. 145, 2d edit.) had " a short blue gown that was made of a side-gown," i. e. of a long one. Again, in The last Voyage of Captaine Frobisher, by Dionyse Settle, 12mo. bl. l. 1577: "They make their apparel with hoodes and tailes, &c. The men have them not so syde as the women."

Such long sleeves, within my memory, were worn by children, and were called hanging-sleeves; a term which is preserved in a line, I think, of Dryden:

"And miss in hanging-sleeves now shakes the dice.".

Side or syde in the North of England, and in Scotland, is used for long when applied to the garment, and the word has the same signification in the Anglo-Saxon and Danish. Vide Glossary to Gawine Douglas's Virgil. See also A. Wyntown's Cronykil, B. IX. ch. viii. v. 120:

"And for the hete tuk on syd gwnys."

To remove an appearance of tautology, as down-sleeves may seem synonymous with side-sleeves, a comma must be taken out, and the passage printed thus-" Set with pearls down sleeves, or down th' sleeves." The second paragraph of this note is copied from the Edinburgh Magazine, for Nov. 1786.

STEEVENS.

Side-sleeves were certainly long-sleeves, as will appear from the following instances. Stowe's Chronicle, p. 327, tempore Hen. IV: "This time was used exceeding pride in garments,

blueish tinsel: but for a fine, quaint, graceful, and excellent fashion, yours is worth ten on't.

HERO. God give me joy to wear it, for my heart is exceeding heavy!

MARG. 'Twill be heavier soon, by the weight of a man.2

HERO. Fye upon thee! art not ashamed?

MARG. Of what, lady? of speaking honourably? Is not marriage honourable in a beggar? Is not your lord honourable without marriage? I think, you would have me say, saving your reverence,a husband: an bad thinking do not wrest true speaking, I'll offend no body: Is there any harm inthe heavier for a husband? None, I think, an it be the right husband, and the right wife; otherwise 'tis light, and not heavy: Ask my lady Beatrice else, here she comes.

gownes with deepe and broad sleeves commonly called poke sleeves, the servants ware them as well as their masters, which might well have been called the receptacles of the devil, for what they stole they hid in their sleeves, whereof some hung downe to the feete, and at least to the knees, full of cuts and jagges, whereupon were made these verses: [i. e. by Tho. Hoccleve.]

"Now hath this land little neede of broomes,

"To sweepe away the filth out of the streete, "Sen side-sleeves of pennilesse groomes

"Will it up licke be it drie or weete."

Again, in Fitzherbert's Book of Husbandry: "Theyr cotes be so syde that they be fayne to tucke them up whan they ride, as women do theyr kyrtels when they go to the market," &c.

REED.

'Twill be heavier soon, by the weight of a man.] So, in Troilus and Cressida :

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the heavier for a whore." STEEVENS.

Enter BEATRICE.

HERO. Good morrow, coz.

BEAT. Good morrow, sweet Hero.

HERO. Why, how now! do you speak in the sick tune?

BEAT. I am out of all other tune, methinks.

MARG. Clap us into-Light o' love; that goes without a burden; do you sing it, and I'll dance it.

3

Light o'love;] This tune is alluded to in Fletcher's Two Noble Kinsmen. The gaoler's daughter, speaking of a horse, says:

"He gallops to the tune of Light o'love."

It is mentioned again in The Two Gentlemen of Verona:

"Best sing to the tune of Light o'love."

And in The Noble Gentleman of Beaumont and Fletcher. Again, in A gorgious Gallery of gallant Inventions, &c. 4to. 1578: "The lover exhorteth his lady to be constant to the tune of

"Attend go play thee

"Not Light of love, lady," &c. STEEVENS.

This is the name of an old dance tune which has occurred already in The Two Gentlemen of Verona. I have lately recovered it from an ancient MS. and it is as follows: