Enter Biron. Biron. O my good knave Coftard, exceedingly well

met.

you well.

Coft. Pray you, Sir, how much carnation ribbon may a man buy for a remuneration ?

Biron. What is a remuneration ?
Coft. Marry, Sir, half-penny farthing.
Biron. O, why then three farthings worth of filk.
Cof. I thank your worship, God be with you.

Biron. O stay, slave, I must employ thee:
As thou wilc win my favour, my good knave,
Do one thing for me that I shall intreat.

Coft. When would you have it done, Sir?
Biron. O, this afternoon.
Coft. Well, I will do it, Sir : fare
Biron. O, thou knowest not what it is.
Coft. I shall know, Sir, when I have done it.
Biron. Why, villain, thou must know first.
Coft. I will come to your worship to morrow morn-

ing:
Biron. It must be done this afternoon.
Hark, flave, it is but this :
The Princess comes to hunt here in the park :
And in her train there is a gentle lady;
When tongues speak sweetly, then they name her name,
And Rosaline they call her; ask for her,
And to her sweet hand see thợu do commend
This seal'd up counsel. There's thy guerdon; go.

Coft. Guerdon, O sweet guerdon! better than remuneration, eleven pence farthing better : moft sweet guerdon! I will do it, Sir, in print. Guerdon, remu . neration.

[Exit. Biron. O! and I, forsooth, in love! I, that have been love's whip; A very beadle to a humorous figh:

Passage has hitherto been writ, and pointed, without any Regard to Common Sense, or Meaning. The Reform, that I have made, flight as it is, makes it both intelligible and humourous.

A critick; nay, a night-watch constable,
A domineering pedant o'er the boy,
Than whom no mortal more magnificent.
This whimpled, whining, purblind wayward boy,
This Signior Junio's giant-dwarf, Dan Cupid, (17)
Regent of love-rímes, lord of folded arms,
Th’ anointed Soveraign of fighs and groans:
Leige of all loyterers and malecontents :
Dread Prince of plackets, King of codpieces :
Sole Imperator, and great General
Of trotting parators. (O my little heart!)
And I to be a corporal of his File, (18)
And wear his colours! like a tumbler, stoop!

What?

(17) This Signior Junio's giant-dwarf, Dan Cupid.] It was some time ago ingeniously hinted to me, and I readily came into the Opinion) that as there was a Contrast of Terms in giant-dwarf, fo, probably, there should be in the Words immediately preceding them ; and therefore that we should restore,

This Senior-junior, giant-dwarf, Dan Cupid. i. e. this old, young Man. And there is, indeed, afterwards in this Play, a Description of Çupid, which forts very aptly with such an Emendation.

That was the way to make his Godhead wax,

For he hath been five thousand years a boy. The Conjecture is exquisitely well imagin'd, and ought by, all Means to be embrac'd, unless there is Reason to think, that, in the former Reading, there is an Allusion to some Tale, or Character in an old Play. I have not, on this Account, ventur'd to difturb the Text, because there seems to me fome Reason to suspect, that our Author is here alluding to Beaumont and Fletcher's Bonduca. In that Tragedy there is the Character of one Funius, a Roman Captain, who falls in Love to Distraction with one of Bonduca's Daughters; and becomes an arrant : whining Slave to this passion. He is afterwards cur’d of his Infirmity, and is as absolute a Tyrant against the Sex. Now, with Regard to these two Extremes, Cupid might very properly be ftiled Funius's giant-dwarf: a Giant in his Eye, while the Dotage was upon him ; but shrunk into a Dwarf, so soon as he had got the Better of it. Our Poét writing the Name with the Italian Termination, and calling him Signior Junio, would, I think, be an Objection of little Weight to urge, that the Roman Captain could not therefore be meant. (18) And I to be a Corporal of his Field,

And wear his Colours like a Tumbler's hoop!] A Corporal of a Field is quite a new Term: neither did the Tumblers ever adorn their Hoops with Ribbands, that I can learn : for Those were not carried in Parade about with them, as the Fencer carries his

Sword:

What? I love! I sue! I seek a wife!
A Woman, that is like a German clock,
Still a repairing; ever out of frame,
And never going aright, being a watch,
But being watch'd, that it may still go right!
Nay, to be perjur’d, which is worst of all :
And among three, to love the worst of all;
A whitely wanton with a velvet brow,
With two pitch balls stuck in her face for eyes;
Ay, and by heav'n, one that will do the deed,
Tho' Argus were her eunuch and her guard ;
And I to figh for her! to watch for her!
To pray for her! go to:— It is a plague,
That Cupid will impose for my neglect
Of his almighty, dreadful, little, Might.
Well, I will love, write, figh, pray, sue and groan:
Some men must love my lady, and some Joan. [Exit.

SCENE, a Pavilion in the Park near

the Palace.

Enter the Princess, Rosaline, Maria, Catharine, Lords,

Attendants, and a Forefter.

WAS

PRIN CE S s.
AS that the King, that spur’d his horse so

hard
Against the steep uprising of the hill ?

Sword: Nor, if they were, is the Similitude at all pertinent to the Case in hand. But to floop like a Tumbler agrees not only with that Profession, and the servile Condescensions of a Lover, but with what follows in the Context. What misled the wise Transcribers at first, seems This: When once the Tumbler appear’d, they thought, his Hoop must not be far behind.

Mr. Warburton.

Boyet.

Boyet. I know not; but, I think, it was not he.

Prin. Who e'er he was, he shew'd a mounting mind. Well, lords, to day we shall have our dispatch; On Saturday we will return to France. Then Forester, my friend, where is the bush, That we must stand and play the murtherer in ?

For. Here by, upon the edge of yonder coppice ; A ftand, where you may make the fairest shoot.

Prin. I thank my beauty, I am fair, that shoot:
And thereupon thou speak'st the fairest shoot.

For. Pardon me, madam: for I meant not so.
Prin. What, what? first praise me, then again

say, no?
O short-liv'd pride! not fair? alack, for wo!

For. Yes, madam, fair.

Prin. Nay, never paint me now ;
Where fair is not, praise cannot mend the brow.
Here, good my glass, take this for telling true;
Fair payment for foul words is more than due.
For. Nothing but fair is that, which you

inherit.
Prin. See, see, my beauty will be sav'd by merit.
O heresie in fair, fit for these days!
A giving hand, though foul, shall have fair praise.
But come, the bow; now mercy goes to kill,
And shooting well is then accounted ill.
Thus will I save my credit in the shoot,
Not wounding, Pity would not let me do't :
If wounding, then it was to shew my Skill ;
That more for praise, than purpose, meant to kill.
And, out of question, so it is sometimes;
Glory grows guilty of detested crimes ;
When for fame's fake, for praise, an outward part,
We bend to that the working of the heart.
As I for praise alone now seek to spill
The poor deer's blood, that my heart means no ill.

Bojet. Do not curst wives hold that self-soveraignty Only for praise-fake, when they strive to be Lords o'er their lords?

Prin. Only for praise; and praise we may afford To any lady, that fubdues her lord.

Enter

Enter Coftard. Boyet. Here comes a member of the common

wealth. Coft. God dig-you-den all; pray you, which is the head lady?

Prin. Thou shalt know her, fellow, by the rest that have no heads.

Coft. Which is the greatest lady, the highest ?
Prin. The thickest and the tallest.
Coft. The thickest and the tallest? it is so, truth is

truth.
An your waste, mistress, were as slender as my wit,
One o' these maids girdles for your wafte Thould be fit.
Are not you the chief woman? you are the thickett

here. Prin. What's your will, Sir? what's your will ? Coft. I have a letter from Monsieur Biron, to one

lady Rosaline. Prin. O thy letter, thy letter : he's a good friend

of mine. Stand aside, good bearer. Boyet, you can carve ; (19) Break up this capon.

Boyet. I am bound to serve.
This letter is mistook, it importeth none here;
It is writ to Jaquenetta.

Prin. We will read it, I swear.
Break the neck of the wax, and every one give ear.

(19) Boyet, you can carve ;

Break up this Capon.] i. e. open this Letter. Our Poet úses this Metaphor, as the French do their Poulet ; which fignifies both a young Fowl, and a Love-letter. Poulet, amatoriæ Litteræ ; says Richelet : and quotes from Voiture, Répondre au plus obligeant Poulet du Monde ; To reply to the most obliging Letter in the World. The Italians use the same manner of Expression, when they call a LoveEpifle, una Pollicetta amorosa. I ow'd the Hint of this equivocal ule of the Word to my ingenious Friend Mr. Bishop. I observe in Weft wardhoe, a Comedy written by a Contemporary with our Author, that one of these Letters is likewise call'd a Wild-fowl. Act. 2. Sc. 2.

At the Skirt of that Sheet in black Work is wrought his Name. Break net the Wild-fowl till aron, and then feed upon him in Private.

Boyer