DEM. I will not stay thy questions; let me go: Or, if thou follow me, do not believe But I fhall do thee mischief in the wood. HEL. Ay, in the temple, in the town, the field, You do me mischief. Fie, Demetrius ! Your wrongs do fet a fcandal on my fex: We cannot fight for love, as men may do; We should be woo'd, and were not made to woo. I'll follow thee, and make a heaven of hell, To die upon the hand I love fo well.s Exeunt DEM. and HEL. OBE. Fare thee well, nymph: ere he do leave this grove, Thou shalt fly him, and he shall feek thy love. Re-enter PUCK. Haft thou the flower there? Welcome, wanderer. Puck. Ay, there it is. OBE. I pray thee, give it me. I know a bank whereon' the wild thyme blows, Where ox-lips and the nodding violet3 grows; 2 7 I will not flay thy queftions;] Though Helena certainly puts a few infignificant queftions to Demetrius, I cannot but think our author wrote-queftion, i. e. difcourfe, converfation. So, in As you like it : "I met the duke yesterday, and had much question with him." STEEVENS. 8 To die upon the hand, &c.] To die upon, &c. in our author's language, I believe, means—" to die by the hand." So, in The Two Gentlemen of Verona: "I'll die on him that says so, but yourself." STEEVENS. 9 whereon -] The old copy reads-where. Mr. Malone fuppofes where to be ufed as a diffyllable; but offers no example of fuch a pronunciation. STEEVENS. Where ox-lips] The oxlip is the greater cowflip. So, in Drayton's Polyolbion, Song XV: 3 "To fort thefe flowers of fhowe, with other that were sweet, "The cowflip then they couch, and th' oxlip for her meet." STEEVENS. the nodding violet -] i. e. that declines its head, like a drowsy perfon. STEEVENS. Quite over-canopied with lufh woodbine, And with the juice of this I'll ftreak her eyes, Take thou fome of it, and feck through this grove: With a difdainful youth: anoint his eyes; 8 Quite over-canopied with lush woodbine,] All the old editions read-lufcious woodbine. On the margin of one of my folios an unknown hand has written lub woodbine, which, I think, is right. This hand I have fince difcovered to be Theobald's. JOHNSON. Lub is clearly preferable in point of fenfe, and abfolutely neceffary in point of metre. Oberon is fpeaking in rhime; but woodbine, as hitherto accented upon the firft fyllable, cannot poffibly corre fpond with eglantine. The fubftitution of lab will reftore the paffage to its original harmony, and the author's idea. RITSON. I have inferted lub in the text, as it is a word already used by Shakspeare in The Tempest, A&t li: "How lub and lufty the grafs looks? how green?" Both lub and lufcious (fays Mr. Henley) are words of the fame origin. Dr. Farmer, however, would omit the word quite, as a useless expletive, and read--- 9 "O'er-canopied with lufcious woodbine." STEEVENS. the man-bath on.] I defire no furer evidence to prove that the broad Scotch pronunciation once prevailed in England, than fuch a rhyme as the firit of these words affords to the fecond. STEEVENS. SCENE III. Another part of the Wood. Enter TITANIA with her train. TITA. Come, now a roundel, and a fairy fong; Then, for the third part of a minute, hence :' 2 - a roundel, and a fairy fong;] Rounds, or roundels, were like the prefent country dances, and are thus defcribed by Sir John Davies, in his Orchestra, 1622: "Then first of all he doth demonftrate plain 66 "The motions feven that are in nature found, * * *** "Thus when at first love had them marshalled, "In a round dance for ever wheeling be." REED. A roundel, rondill, or roundelay, is fometimes ufed to fignify a fong beginning or ending with the fame fentence; redit in orbem. Puttenham, in his Art of Poetry, 1589, has a chapter On the roundel, or sphere, and produces what he calls A general refemblance of the roundel to God, the world, and the queen. STEEVENS. A roundel is, as I fuppofe, a circular dance. Ben Jonfon feems to call the rings which fuch dances are fuppofed to make in the grafs, rondels. Vol. V. Tale of a Tub, p. 23: "I'll have no rondels, I, in the queen's paths." TYRWHITT. So, in The Boke of the Governour by Sir Thomas Elyot, 1537: "In ftede of these we have now base daunces, bargenettes, pavyons, turgions, and roundes." STEEVENS. 3 Then, for the third part of a minute, hence:] Dr. Warburton reads "for the third part of the midnight-." Some, to kill cankers in the mufk-rose buds ; * But the perfons employed are fairies, to whom the third part of a minute might not be a very short time to do fuch work in. The critick might as well have objected to the epithet tall, which the fairy bestows on the cowflip. But Shakspeare, throughout the play, has preferved the proportion of other things in refpect of these tiny beings, compared with whofe fize, a cowflip might be tall, and to whole powers of execution, a minute might be equivalent to an age. STEEVENS. -in the musk-rofe buds ;] What is at prefent called the Musk Rofe, was a flower unknown to English botanifts in the time of Shakspeare. About fifty years ago it was brought into this country from Spain. STEEVENS. 5 with rear-mice -] A rere-moufe is a bat, a mouse that rears itself from the ground by the aid of wings. So, in Albertus Wallenftein, 1640: "Half-fpirited fouls, who ftrive on rere-mice wings." Again, in Ben Jonfon's New Inn: 66 I keep no fhades "Nor fhelters, I, for either owls or rere-mice." Again, in Golding's translation of Ovid's Metamorphofis, B. IV. edit. 1587, p. 58. b: "And we in English language bats or reremice call the fame." Gawin Douglas, in his Prologue to Maphæus's 13th book of the Eneid, alfo applies the epithet leathern to the wings of the Bat: Up gois the bak with her pelit leddren flicht." STEEVENS. 6 --quaint Spirits :] For this Dr. Warburton reads against all authority: -quaint fports." But Profpero, in The Tempeft, applies quaint to Ariel. JOHNSON. "Our quaint fpirits." Dr. Johnfon is right in the word, and Dr. Warburton in the interpretation. A fpirit was fometimes used for a Sport. In Decker's play, If it be not good, the Devil is in It, the king of Naples fays to the devil Ruffman, difguifed in the character of Shalcan: "Now Shalcan, fome new jpirit? Ruff. A thoufand wenches ftark-naked to play at leap-frog. Omnes. O rare fight!" FARMER. SONG. 1. FAI. You Spotted snakes, with double tongue, Chorus. Philomel, with melody, Lulla, lulla, lullaby; lulla, lulla, lullaby : So, good night, with lullaby. II. 2. FAI. Weaving Spiders, come not here ; Chorus. Philomel, with melody, &c. 5 — with double tongue,] The fame epithet occurs in a future fcene of this play : 66 -with doubler tongue "Than thine, thou ferpent," &c. Again, in The Tempeft: adders, who, with cloven tongues, "Do hifs me into madness." By both these terms, I fuppofe, our author means-forked; as the tongues of fnakes are fometimes represented in ancient tapestry and paintings. STEEVENS. Newts, and blind-worms,] The newt is the eft, the blindworm is the Cecilia or flow-worm. They are both ingredients in the cauldron of Macbeth, STEEVENS. |