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Alas, how love can trifle with itself!
Here is her picture:-Let me see; I think,
If I had such a tire, this face of mine
Were full as lovely as is this of hers:
And yet the painter flatter'd her a little,
Unless I flatter with myself too much.
Her hair is auburn, mine is perfect yellow:
If that be all the difference in his love,
I'll get me such a colour'd periwig.1

Her eyes are grey as glass; 2 and so are mine:

should thus describe herself, when she is alone. Sir T. Hanmer reads-" his mistress;" but without necessity. Our author knew that his audience considered the disguised Julia, in the present scene, as a page to Proteus, and this, I believe, and the love of antithesis, produced the expression. Malone.

1 I'll get me such a colour'd periwig.] It should be remembered, that false hair was worn by the ladies, long before wigs were in fashion. These false coverings, however, were called periwigs. So, in Northward Hoe, 1607: "There is a new trade come up for cast gentlewomen, of perriwig-making: let your wife set up in the Strand."-" Perwickes, however, are mentioned by Churchyard, in one of his earliest poems. Steevens.

See Much Ado about Nothing, Act II, sc. iii: " - and her hair shall be of what colour it please God." And The Merchant of Venice, Act III, sc. ii:

"So are crisped snaky golden locks," &c.

Again, in The Honestie of this Age, proving by good Circumstance, that the World was never honest till now, by Barnabe Rich, quarto, 1615: "My lady holdeth on her way, perhaps to the tire-maker's shop, where she shaketh her crownes, to bestow upon some newfashioned attire ;-upon such artificial deformed periwigs, that they were fitter to furnish a theatre, or for her that in a stage play should represent some hag of hell, than to be used by a Christian woman." Again, ibid: "These attire-makers, within these forty years were not known by that name; and but now very lately, they kept their lowzie commodity of periwigs, and their monstrous attires, closed in boxes,-and those women that used to weare them would not buy them but in secret. But now they are not ashamed to set them forth upon their stalls,-such monstrous mop-powles of haire, so proportioned and deformed, that but within these twenty or thirty years would have drawne the passers-by to stand and gaze, and to wonder at them."

Malone.

2 Her eyes are grey as glass;] So Chaucer, in the character of his Prioress:

"Ful semely hire wimple y-pinched was;
“Hire nose tretis; hire eyen grey as glas." Theobald.

Ay, but her forehead's low,3 and mine 's as high.
What should it be, that he respects in her,
But I can make respective in myself,

If this fond love were not a blinded god?
Come, shadow; come, and take this shadow up,
For 'tis thy rival. O thou senseless form,

Thou shalt be worshipp'd, kiss'd, lov'd, and ador'd;
And, were there sense in his idolatry,

My substance should be statue in thy stead.5

3 her forehead's low,] A high forehead was, in our author's time, accounted a feature eminently beautiful. So, in The History of Guy of Warwick, "Felice his lady" is said to "have the same high forehead as Venus." Johnson.

4 respective —] i. e. respectable. Steevens.

5. My substance should be statue in thy stead.] It would be easy to read, with no more roughness than is found in many lines of Shakspeare:

<< should be a statue in thy stead."

The sense, as Mr. Edwards observes, is, " He should have my substance as a statue instead of thee [the picture] who art a senseless form." This word, however, is used without the article a, in Massinger's Great Duke of Florence:

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it was your beauty,

"That turn'd me statue."

And again, in Lord Surrey's translation of the 4th Æneid: "And Trojan statue throw into the flame."

Again, in Dryden's Don Sebastian:

66 try the virtue of that Gorgon face,

"To stare me into statue." Steevens.

Steevens has clearly proved that this passage requires no amendment; but it appears from hence, and a passage in Massinger, that the word statue was formerly used to express a portrait. Julia is here addressing herself to a picture; and in the City Madam, the young ladies are supposed to take leave of the statues of their lovers, as they style them, though Sir John, at the beginning of the scene, calls them pictures, and describes them afterwards as nothing but superficies, colours, and no substance. M. Mason.

statue-] Statue here, I think, should be written statua, and pronounced as it generally, if not always, was in our author's time, a word of three syllables. It being the first time this word occurs, I take the opportunity of observing that alterations have been often improperly made in the text of Shakspeare, by supposing statue to be intended by him for a dissyllable. Thus, in King Richard III. Act III, sc. vii:

"But like dumb statues or breathing stones."

Mr. Rowe has unnecessarily changed breathing to unbreathing, for a supposed defect in the metre, to an actual violation of the

sense.

I'll use thee kindly for thy mistress' sake,
That us'd me so; or else, by Jove I vow,
I should have scratch'd out your unseeing eyes,
To make my master out of love with thee.

Again, in Julius Cæsar, Act II, sc. ii:

"She dreamt to-night she saw my statue."

[Exit.

Here, to fill up the line, Mr. Capell adds the name of Decius; and the last editor, deserting his usual caution, has improperly changed the regulation of the whole passage. Again, in the same play, Act III, sc. ii:

"Even at the base of Pompey's statue.”

In this line, however, the true mode of pronouncing the word is suggested by the last editor, who quotes a very sufficient authority for his conjecture. From authors of the times, it would not be difficult to fill whole pages with instances to prove that statue was at that period a trisyllable. Many authors spell it in that manner. On so clear a point the first proof, which occurs, is enough. Take the following from Bacon's Advancement of Learning, 4to. 1633: "It is not possible to have the true pictures or statuaes of Cyrus, Alexander, Cæsar, no nor of the kings or great withpersonages of much later years," &c. p. 88. Again:"out which the history of the world seemeth to be as the Statua of Polyphemus with his eye out," &c. Reed.

It may be observed, on this occasion, that some Latin words, which were admitted into the English language, still retained their Roman pronunciation. Thus heroe and heroes are constantly used for trisyllables; as in the following instances, by Chapman: "His speare fixt by him as he slept, the great end in the

ground,

"The point, that brisled the darke earth, cast a reflection round

"Like pallid lightnings throwne by Jove. Thus his Heroe

lay,

"And under him a big oxe hide." 10th Iliad.

Again, in the same book:

"This said, he on his shoulders cast a yellow lion's hide,

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Big, and reacht earth; then took his speare; and Nestor's will applide,

"Rais'd the Heroes, brought them both. All met, the round they went."

Steevens.

•your unseeing eyes,] So, in Macbeth:

"Thou hast no speculation in those eyes." Steevens.

ACT V.....SCENE I.

The same. An Abbey.

Enter EGLAMOUR.

Egl. The sun begins to gild the western sky;
And now, it is about the very hour,

That Silvia, at Patrick's cell, should meet me."
She will not fail; for lovers break not hours,
Unless it be to come before their time;
So much they spur their expedition.

Enter SILVIA.

See, where she comes! Lady, a happy evening!
Sil. Amen, amen! go on, good Eglamour!
Out at the postern by the abbey-wall;

I fear, I am attended by some spies.

Egl. Fear not: the forest is not three leagues off; If we recover that, we are sure enough.

SCENE II.

[Exeunt.

The same. An Apartment in the Duke's Palace.
Enter THURIO, PROTEUS, and JULIA.

Thu. Sir Proteus, what says Silvia to my suit?
Pro. O, sir, I find her milder than she was;
And yet she takes exceptions at your person.
Thu. What, that my leg is too long?

Pro. No; that it is too little.

Thu. I'll wear a boot, to make it somewhat rounder. Pro. But love will not be spurr'd to what it loathes.

Thu. What says she to my face?

Pro. She says, it is a fair one.

Thu. Nay, then the wanton lies; my face is black. Pro. But pearls are fair; and the old saying is,

7 That Silvia, at Patrick's cell, should meet me.] The old copy redundantly reads: " -friar Patrick's cell." But the omission of this title is justified by a passage in the next scene, where the Duke says

"At Patrick's cell this even; and there she was not."

Steevens.

8 sure enough.] Sure is safe, out of danger. Johnson.

Black men are pearls in beauteous ladies' eyes.9

Jul. 'Tis true, such pearls as put out ladies' eyes; For I had rather wink than look on them.

Thu. How likes she my discourse?

Pro. Ill, when you talk of war.

[Aside.

Thu. But well, when I discourse of love, and peace? Jul. But better, indeed, when you hold your peace.

[Aside.

Thu. What says she to my valour?

Pro. O, sir, she makes no doubt of that.

Jul. She needs not, when she knows it cowardice.

[Aside.

Thu. What says she to my birth?

Pro. That you are well deriv'd.

Jul. True; from a gentleman to a fool.

[Aside.

Thu, Considers she my possessions?

Pro. O, ay; and pities them.

Thu. Wherefore?

Jul. That such an ass should owe them.

[Aside.

Pro. That they are out by lease.1

Jul. Here comes the duke.

Enter DUKE.

Duke. How now, sir Proteus? how now, Thurio? Which of you saw sir Eglamour of late?

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9 Black men are pearls, &c.] So, in Heywood's Iron Age, 1632: a black complexion

"Is always precious in a woman's eye."

Again, in Sir Giles Goosecap:

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but to make every black slovenly cloud a pearl in her eye." Steevens.

"A black man is a jewel in a fair woman's eye," is one of Ray's proverbial sentences. Malone.

1 That they are out by lease.] I suppose he means, because Thurio's folly has let them on disadvantageous terms. Steevens. She pities Sir Thurio's possessions, because they are let to others, and are not in his own dear hands. This appears to me to be the meaning of it. M. Mason.

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By Thurio's possessions, he himself understands his lands and estate. But Proteus chooses to take the word likewise in a figurative sense, as signifying his mental endowments: and when he says, they are out by lease, he means they are no longer enjoyed by their master, (who is a fool) but are leased out to another." Edinburgh Magazine, Nov. 1786. Steevens.

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