When they next wake, all this derision I'll to my queen, and beg her Indian boy; And then I will her charmed eye release From monster's view, and all things shall be peace. At whose approach, ghosts wandering here and there, For fear lest day should look their shames upon, And must for aye consort with black-brow'd night.2 7 wend,] i. e. go. So, in The Comedy of Errors : Hopeless and helpless doth Egeon wend." Steevens. 8 For night's swift dragons, &c.] So, in Cymbeline, Act II, sc. ii: Swift, swift, ye dragons of the night. 66 199 See my note on this passage, concerning the vigilance imputed to the serpent tribe. Steevens. This circumstance Shakspeare might have learned from a passage in Golding's translation of Ovid, which he has imitated in The Tempest: "Among the earth-bred brothers you a mortal war did set, "And brought asleep the dragon fell, whose eyes were never shet." Malone. 9 damned spirits all, That in cross-ways and floods have burial,] The ghosts of self-murderers, who are buried in cross-roads; and of those who being drowned, were condemned (according to the opinion of the ancients) to wander for a hundred years, as the rites of sepulture had never been regularly bestowed on their bodies. That the waters were sometimes the place of residence for damned spirits, we learn from the ancient bl. 1. romance of Syr Eglamoure of Artoys, no date: 1 "Let some preest a gospel saye, "For doubte of fendes in the flode." Steevens. to their wormy beds-] This periphrasis for the grave has been borrowed by Milton, in his Ode on the Death of a fair Infant: "Or that thy beauties lie in wormy bed." Steevens. 2 black-brow'd night,] So, in King John: “ Why, here walk I, in the black-brow of night." Steevens. Obe. But we are spirits of another sort: [Exit OBE. Puck. Up and down, up and down; I will lead them up and down; 3 I with the morning's love have oft made sport;] Thus all the old copies, and I think, rightly. Tithonus was the husband of Aurora, and Tithonus was no young deity. Thus, in Aurora, a collection of sonnets, by Lord Sterline, 1604: "And why should Tithon thus, whose day grows late, Enjoy the morning's love?" Again, in The Parasitaster, by J. Marston, 1606: "Aurora yet keeps chaste old Tithon's bed; Again, in Spenser's Fairy Queen, B. III, c. iii: "Doth by her blushing tell that she did lye Again, in The Faithful Shepherdess of Fletcher: - O, lend me all thy red, "Thou shame-fac'd morning, when from Tithon's bed "Thou risest ever-maiden!" How such a waggish spirit as the King of the Fairies might make sport with an antiquated lover, or his mistress in his absence, may be easily understood. Dr. Johnson reads with all the modern editors: "I with the morning light," &c. Steevens. Will not this passage bear a different explanation? By the morning's love I apprehend Cephalus, the mighty hunter and paramour of Aurora, is intended. The context, " And, like a forester," &c. seems to show that the chace was the sport, which Oberon boasts he partook with the morning's love. Holt White. The connection between Aurora and Čephalus is also pointed out in one of the Poems that form a collection entitled The Phanix Nest, &c. 4to. 1593, p. 95: "Aurora now began to rise againe "From watrie couch and from old Tithon's side, "In hope to kiss upon Acteian plaine 66 Young Cephalus," &c. Steevens. 4 Even till the eastern gate, &c.] What the fairy monarch means to inform Puck of, is this. That he was not compelled, like meaner spirits, to vanish at the first appearance of the dawn. Steevens. I am fear'd in field and town; Here comes one. Enter LYSANDER. Lys. Where art thou, proud Demetrius? speak thou now. Puck. Here villain; drawn and ready. Where art thou? Lys. I will be with thee straight. Puck. To plainer ground. Dem. Follow me then [Exit Lys. as following the voice. Enter DEMETRIUS. Lysander! speak again. Thou runaway, thou coward, art thou fled? Speak. In some bush? Where dost thou hide thy head? Puck. Thou coward, art thou bragging to the stars, Telling the bushes that thou look'st for wars, And wilt not come? Come, recreant; come, thou child; I'll whip thee with a rod: He is defil'd, That draws a sword on thee. Dem. Yea; art thou there? [Exeunt. Puck. Follow my voice; we 'll try no manhood here. Re-enter LYSANDER. Lys. He goes before me, and still dares me on; And here will rest me. Come, thou gentle day! [Lies down. For if but once thou show me thy grey light, [Sleeps. Re-enter PUCK and DEMETRIUS. Puck. Ho, ho! ho, ho! Coward, why com'st thou not?5 5 Puck. Ho, ho! ho, ho! Coward, why com'st thou not?] This exclamation would have been uttered by Puck with greater propriety if he were not now playing an assumed character, which he, in the present instance, seems to forget. In the old song printed by Peck and Percy, in which all his gambols are related, he concludes every stanza with Ho, ho, ho! So, in Grim the Collier of Croydon: Dem. Abide me, if thou dar'st; for well I wot, Thou runn'st before me, shifting every place; And dar'st not stand, nor look me in the face. Where art thou?6 "Ho, ho, ho, my masters! No good fellowship! "Is Robin Goodfellow a bug-bear grown, "That he is not worthy to be bid sit down?" Again, in Drayton's Nymphidia: "Hoh, hoh, quoth Hob, God save thy grace." It was not, however, as has been asserted, the appropriate exclamation in our author's time, of this eccentric character: the devil himself having, if not a better, at least an older, title to it. So, in Histriomastix (as quoted by Mr. Steevens in a note on King Richard III.) a roaring devil enters, with the Vice on his back, Iniquity in one hand, and Juventus in the other, crying: "Ho, ho, ho! these babes mine are all." Again, in Gammer Gurton's Needle: "But Diccon, Diccon, did not the devil cry ho, ho, ho?" And, in the same play: "By the masse, ich saw him of late cal up a great blacke devill. "O, the knave cryed ho, ho, he roared and he thundered." So, in the Epitaph attributed to Shakspeare: "Hoh! quoth the devil, 'tis my John o'Combe." Again, in Goulart's Histories, 1607: "The fellow . . . coming to the stove sawe the Diuills in horrible formes, some sitting, some standing, others walking, some ramping against the walles, but al of them as soone as they beheld him, ran unto him, crying Hoh, Hoh, what makest thou here?" Again, in the same book: "The black guests returned no answer, but roared and cryed out, Hoh sirra let alone the child, or we will teare thee all to pieces." Indeed, from a passage in Wily Beguiled, 1606, (as quoted in the new edition of Dodsley's Old Plays) I suspect that this same "knavish sprite" was sometimes introduced on the stage as a demi-devil: "I'll rather," it is one Robin Goodfellow who speaks, put on my flashing red nose, and my flaming face, and come wrap'd in a calf's skin, and cry ho, ho." See also, Grim the Collier of Croydon. Ritson. The song above alluded to may be found in Percy's Reliques of Ancient Poetry, Vol. III, p. 203. Malone. 6 Where art thou?] For the sake of the measure, which is otherwise imperfect, I suppose we ought to read: "Where art thou now?" Demetrius, conceiving Lysander to have still been shifting his ground, very naturally asks him where he is at that instant. Steevens. Puck. Come hither; I am here. Dem. Nay, then thou mock'st me. Thou shalt buy this dear,7 If ever I thy face by day-light see: Now, go thy way. Faintness constraineth me [Lies down and sleeps. Enter HELENA. Hel. O weary night, O long and tedious night, Abate thy hours: shine, comforts, from the east; That I may back to Athens, by day-light, From these that my poor company detest:- Puck. Yet but three? Come one more; Thus to make poor females mad. Enter HERMIA. Her. Never so weary, never so in woe, [Sleeps. Bedabbled with the dew, and torn with briers; I can no further crawl, no further go; My legs can keep no pace with my desires. Here will I rest me, till the break of day. Heavens shield Lysander, if they mean a fray! Puck. On the ground Sleep sound: I'll apply To your eye, Gentle lover, remedy. [Lies down. [Squeezing the juice on LYSANDER's eye. When thou wak'st, Thou tak'st3 7 ·buy this dear,] i. e. thou shalt dearly pay for this. Though this is sense, and may well enough stand, yet the poet perhaps wrote-thou shalt buy it dear. So, in another place, thou shalt aby it. So, Milton, "How dearly I abide that boast so vain." Johnson. 8 When thou wak'st, Thou tak'st, &c.] The second line would be improved, I think, |