Ros. Oft have I heard of you, my lord Biron,
Before I saw you; and the world's large tongue
Proclaims you for a man replete with mocks;
Full of comparisons and wounding flouts,
Which you on all estates will execute,
That lie within the mercy of your wit:
To weed this wormwood from your fruitful brain,
And, therewithal, to win me, if you please,
(Without the which I am not to be won,)
You shall this twelvemonth term, from day to day,
Visit the speechless sick, and still converse
With groaning wretches; and your task shall be,
With all the fierce endeavour of your wit,
To enforce the pained impotent to smile.
BIRON. To move wild laughter in the throat of
death?

It cannot be; it is impossible:
Mirth cannot move a soul in agony.

Ros. Why, that's the way to choke a gibing spirit,

Whose influence is begot of that loose grace
Which shallow laughing hearers give to fools:
A jest's prosperity lies in the ear
Of him that hears it, never in the tongue
Of him that makes it: then, if sickly ears,
Deaf'd with the clamours of their own dear
Will hear your idle scorns, continue then,
And I will have you, and that fault withal;
But, if they will not, throw that spirit,
away
And I shall find you, empty of that fault,
Right joyful of your reformation.

groans,

BIRON. A twelvemonth? well, befal what will befal,

I'll jest a twelvemonth in an hospital.

PRIN. Ay, Sweet my lord; and so I take my leave. [To the KING.

KING. No, madam, we will bring you on your

ARM. I will kiss thy royal finger, and take leave: I am a votary; I have vowed to Jaquenetta to hold the plough for her sweet love three years. But, most esteemed greatness, will you hear the dialogue that the two learned men have compiled, in praise of the owl and the cuckoo? it should have followed in the end of our show.

KING. Call them forth quickly, we will do so. ARM. Holla! approach.

Enter HOLOFERNES, NATHANIEL, MOTH, CosTARD, and others.*

This side is Hiems, winter: this Ver, the spring: the one maintained by the owl, the other by the cuckoo. Ver, begin.

THE SONG. I.

SPRING. When daisies pied, and violets blue,
And lady-smocks all silver white,
And cuckoo-buds of yellow hue,"

Do paint the meadows with delight,
The cuckoo then, on every tree,
Mocks married men, for thus sings he,
Cuckoo;

Cuckoo, cuckoo,-O word of fear,
Unpleasing to a married ear!

II.

When shepherds pipe on oaten straws, And merry larks are ploughmen's clocks,

When turtles tread, and rooks, and daws, And maidens bleach their summer

smocks,

ACT V.]

IV.

When all aloud the wind doth blow,
And coughing drowns the parson's saw,
And birds sit brooding in the snow,

And Marian's nose looks red and raw;
When roasted crabs hiss in the bowl,
Then nightly sings the staring owl,
To-who;

(1) SCENE I.

-brave conquerors! -for so you are, That war against your own affections, And the huge army of the world's desires.] There is a passage in "The Hystorie of Hamblet, Prince of Denmarke," (London, 1608,) which strikingly resembles the above both in thought and expression. It is there said that Hamlet "in all his honorable actions made himselfe worthy of perpetuall memorie, if one onely spotte had not blemished and darkened a good part of his prayses. For that the greatest victorie that a man can obtaine is to make himselfe victorious and lord over his owne affections, and that restraineth the unbridled desires of his concupiscence;" see Mr. Collier's reprint in " Shakespeare's Library," vol. i. p. 180.

(2) SCENE I.-A high hope for a low heaven.] Upon maturer consideration, I am disposed to believe the low heaven, and the god from whom Biron expected high words, refer to the Stage Heaven, and its hectoring Jupiter, whose lofty, huff-cap style was a favourite topic for ridicule.

"If Jove speak English, in a thundering cloud, Thwick, thwack,' and riff-raff,' roars he out aloud.' HALL'S Satires, Book 1. Sat. VI. See an interesting and suggestive article on the Heaven of the old theatres in "A Specimen of a Commentary on Shakspeare," by W. Whiter, 1794, pp. 153-166.

(3) SCENE II.-You are a gentleman, and a gamester.] Of the extent to which the practice of gambling was carried in Shakespeare's time, we have abundant testimony in the literature of that period. There are few plays or books of any description, illustrative of the social habits of the people, which have not some allusion to this prevalent vice. According to Drake, it "had become almost universal in the days of Elizabeth; and," he remarks, "if we may credit George Whetstone, had reached a prodigious degree of excess. Speaking of the licentiousness of the stage previous to the appearance of Shakspeare, he adds:-'But, there are in the bowels of this famous citie, farre more daungerous playes, & little reprehended: that wicked playes of the dice, first invented by the devyll, (as Cornelius Agrippa wryteth) & frequented by unhappy men: the detestable roote, upon which a thousand villanies growe.

"The nurses of thease (worse than heathnysh) hellish exercises are places called ordinary tables: of which there are in London more in nomber, to honor the devyll, then churches to serve the living God.-P. 24.

"I costantly determine to crosse the streets where these vile houses (ordinaries) are planted, to blesse me from the enticements of the, which in very deed are

See the second part of his work, "The Enemie to Unthryf tinesse" (1586), entitled, "An Addition or Touchstone for the times; exposing the dangerous Mischiefes, that the dyeing Howses (commonly called) Ordinarie Tables, and other (like) Sanctuaries of Iniquitie do dayly breede within the Bowelles of the famous Citie of London, by George Whetstone, Gent."

many, and the more dangerous, in that they please with a vain hope of gain. Insomuch on a time, I heard a distemperate dicer solemnly sweare that he faithfully beleeved, that dice were first made of the bones of a witch, & cards of her skin, in which there hath ever sithence remained an inchantment, yt whosoever once taketh delight in either, he shall never have power utterly to leave them; for quoth he, I a hundred times vowed to leave both, yet have not the grace to forsake either.'-P. 32.

"No opportunity for the practice of this ruinous habit seems to have been omitted, and we find the modern mode of gambling, by taking the odds, to have been fully established towards the latter end of the sixteenth century; for Gilbert Talbot, writing to his father, the Earl of Shrewsbury, on May the 15th, 1579, after informing His Lordship that the matter of the Queen's marriage with Monsieur is growne very colde,' subjoins, and yet I know a man may take a thousande pounds, in this towne, to be bounde to pay doble so muche when Mons cumethe into Inglande, and treble so muche when he marryethe the Q. Matie, and if he nether doe the one nor the other, to gayne the thousande poundes cleare.'"

6

(4) SCENE II.-The dancing horse will tell you.] This famous quadruped and his exploits are often referred to by the old writers. He was called Marocco, but is usually mentioned as "Bankes's horse," from the name of his owner, and appears to have been an animal of wonderful aptitude and docility. His first exhibition is said to have been in 1589; and Sir Kenelm Digby observes, that he "would restore a glove to the due owner, after the master had whispered the man's name in his ear; would tell the just number of pence in any piece of silver coin, newly showed him by his master," &c.-A Treatise on Bodies, c. xxxviii. p. 393.

His most celebrated performance was the ascent to the top of St. Paul's, in 1600, an exploit referred to in Decker's "Gull's Horn-Booke," 1609" from hence you may descend to talk about the horse that went up; and strive if you can to know his keeper;" &c. And also in the Blacke Booke, by Middleton, 1604 :-"May not the devil, pray you, walk in Paul's, as well as the horse go a' top of Paul's, for I am sure I was not far from his keeper." In a rare quarto, called "Tarlton's Jests," &c. published in 1611, we are told,-"There was one Banks (in the time of Tarlton), who served the Earle of Essex, and had a horse of strange qualities; and being at the Crosse-keyes in Gracious street, getting money with him, as he was mightily resorted to; Tarlton, then (with his fellowes) playing at the Bell by, came into the Crosse-keyes (amongst many people) to see fashions; which Banks perceiving, (to make the people laugh,) saies, 'Signor,' (to his horse,) 'go fetch me the veryest foole in the company.' The jade comes immediately, and with his mouth drawes Tarlton forth. Tarlton (with merry words) said nothing but God a mercy, horse l' In the end, Tarlton, seeing the people laugh so, was angry inwardly, and said, Sir, had I power of your horse, as you have, I would do more than that.' 'Whate'er it be,' said Banks (to please

master in the

master in the Then,

him), 'I will charge him to do it.' 'Then,' saies Tarlton, 'charge him to bring me the veriest company.' He shall,' (saies Banks.) 'Signor,' (saies he,) 'bring master Tarlton here, the veriest company.' The horse leades his master to him. God a mercy, horse, indeed!' saies Tarlton. The people had much ado to keep peace; but Banks and Tarlton had But like to have squared, and the horse by to give aim. ever after it was a by-word thorow London, God a mercy, horse!' and is to this day."

In 1601 he was exhibited at the Golden Lion, Rue Saint Jaques, in Paris; and in the notes to a French translation of the "Golden Ass" of Apuleius, by Jean de Montlyard, Sieur de Melleray, first pointed out by Douce, he is described as a middle-sized bay English gelding, about fourteen years old. This work furnishes a very good account of his tricks, which seem to have been much of the same description as those practised by the learned pigs, dogs, and horses of our own time. While in France, poor Bankes and his curtail ran a narrow escape of being sacrificed as magicians,-a fate it has been feared, from a passage in Ben Jonson's 134th Epigram, and a note in the mock-romance of "Don Zara del Fogo," 1660, which really did befal them not long afterwards in Rome.

(5) SCENE II.-Is there not a ballad, boy, of the King and the beggar!] Two versions of this once popular ditty The elder is probably that printed have come down to us. in " 'Percy's Reliques," vol. i. p. 183, ed. 1767, from Richard Johnson's" Crown garland of Goulden Roses," 1612, and intituled, "A Song of a Beggar and a King." Whether this was the original of which Moth declares "The world was very guilty some three ages since," it is not easy to determine. It begins :

"I read that once in Affrica,
A princely wight did raine,
Who had to name Cophetua,
As poets they did faine.

From nature's laws he did decline,
For sure he was not of my mind,
He cared not for women-kinde,
But did them all disdaine.
But marke what hapned on a day,

As he out of his window lay

He saw a beggar all in gray,

The which did cause his paine."

The second stanza is memorable, from Mercutio's quoting the opening line :—

"Young Abraham Cupid, he that shot so trim,
When King Cophetua lov'd the beggar maid."
Romeo and Juliet, Act II. Sc. 1.

"The blinded boy that shootes so trim
From heaven downe did hie;

He drew a dart and shot at him

In place where he did lye;

Which soone did pierse him to the quicke,

And when he felt the arrow pricke,

Which in his tender heart did sticke,

He looketh as he would dye.

What sudden chance is this, quoth he,

That I to love must subject be,

Which never thereto would agree,

But still did it defie?"

There are in all ten stanzas, of which that descriptive of the wedding of the king with "Penelophon" is, perhaps, the best :

"And when the wedding day was come
The king commanded strait

The noblemen, both all and some,

Upon the queene to wait.

And she behav'd herself that day
As if she had never walk't the way;
She had forgot her gowne of gray,
Which she did weare of late.
The proverbe old is come to passe,
The priest when he begins his masse,
Forgets that ever clerke le was;
He knowth not his estate."

is not altogether unnatural. The following passage, which presents both the primary and subordinate metaphor, is the best example he has given us of this peculiar association of ideas:

"What say you? can you love the gentleman?

This night you shall behold him at our feast;
Read o'er the volume of young Paris' face,
And find delight writ there with beauty's pen;
Examine every married lineament,
And see how one another lends content;
And what obscur'd in this fair volume lies,
Find written in the margent of his eyes."
Romeo and Juliet, Act I. Sc. 3.