Than such as most seem yours:-I say, I come Leon. Good queen! · Paul. Good queen, my lord, good queen: I queen; say, good And would by combat make her good, so were I A man, the worst about you.1 Leon. Force her hence. Paul. Let him, that makes but trifles of his eyes, Leon. [Laying down the Child. Out! A mankind witch!2 Hence with her, out o' door: 1 To comfort, in old language, is to aid and encourage. Evils here mean wicked courses. Malone. 1 And would by combat make her good, so were I A man, the worst about you.] The worst means only the lowest. Were I the meanest of your servants, I would yet claim the com. bat against any accuser. Johnson. The worst, (as Mr. M. Mason and Mr. Henley observe) rather means the weakest, or the least expert in the use of arms. Steevens. Mr. Edwards observes, that "The worst about you," may mean the weakest, or least warlike. So, "a better man, the best man in company, frequently refer to skill in fighting, not to moral goodness." I think he is right. Malone. 2 A mankind witch!] A mankind woman is yet used in the midland counties, for a woman violent, ferocious, and mischievous. It has the same sense in this passage. Witches are supposed to be mankind, to put off the softness and delicacy of women; therefore Sir Hugh, in The Merry Wives of Windsor, says of a woman suspected to be a witch, "that he does not like when a woman has a beard." Of this meaning Mr. Theobald has given examples. Johnson. So, in The Two angry Women of Abington, 1599: "That e'er I should be seen to strike a woman.. 66 Why she is mankind, therefore thou may'st strike her." Again, as Dr. Farmer observes to me, in A. Fraunce's Iviechurch: He is speaking of the Golden Age: "Noe man murdring man with teare-flesh pyke or a poll ax; "Tygers were then tame, sharpe tusked boare was obeis sant; "Stoordy lyons lowted, noe wolf was knowne to be mankinde." A most intelligencing bawd.! Paul. Not so; I am as ignorant in that, as you In so entitling me: and no less honest Than you are mad; which is enough, I'll warrant, Traitors! Leon. Will you not push her out? Give her the bastard:Thou, dotard, [to ANT.] thou art woman-tir'd,3 unroosted So, in M. Frobisher's first Voyage for the Discoverie of Cataya, 4to. bl. l. 1578, p. 48: "He saw mightie deere, that seemed to be mankind, which ranne at him, and hardly he escaped with his life," &c. Steevens. I shall offer an etymology of the adjective mankind, which may perhaps more fully explain it. Dr. Hickes's Anglo-Saxon Grammar, p. 119, edit. 1705, observes: "Saxonicè man est a mein quod Cimbrice est nocumentum, Francicè est nefas, scelus." So that mankind may signify one of a wicked and pernicious nature, from the Saxon man, mischief or wickedness, and from kind, na ture. Tollet. Notwithstanding the many learned notes on this expression, I am confident that mankind, in this passage, means nothing more than masculine. So, in Massinger's Guardian: "I keep no mankind servant in my house, And Jonson, in one of his Sonnets, says: "Pallas, now thee I call on, mankind maid!" The same phrase frequently occurs in Beaumont and Fletcher. Thus, in Monsieur Thomas, when Sebastian sees him in womens' clothes, and supposes him to be a girl, he says: "A plaguy mankind girl; how my brains totter!" And Gondarino, in The Woman-Hater: "Are women grown so mankind?” In all which places mankind means masculine. M. Mason. 3 thou art woman-tir'd,] Woman-tir'd, is peck'd by a woman; hen-pecked. The phrase is taken from falconry, and is often employed by writers contemporary with Shakspeare.-So, in The Widow's Tears, by Chapman, 1612: "He has given me a bone to tire on." Again, in Decker's Match me in London, 1631: 66 the vulture tires "Upon the eagle's heart." Again, in Chapman's translation of Achilles' Shield, 4to. 1598: "Like men alive they did converse in fight, "And tyrde on death with mutuall appetite." Partlet is the name of the hen in the old story book of Reynard the Fox. Steevens. By thy dame Partlet here,-take up the bastard; Paul. Unvenerable be thy hands, if thou For ever Tak'st up the princess, by that forced baseness* He dreads his wife. Leon. Paul. So, I would, you did; then, 'twere past all doubt, You'd call your children yours. Leon. A nest of traitors! Nor I, nor any, Ant. I am none, by this good light. But one, that 's here: and that's himself: for he His hopeful son's, his babe's, betrays to slander, thy crone.] i. e. thy old worn-out woman. A croan is an old toothless sheep: thence an old woman. So, in Chaucer's Man of Lawes Tale: "This olde Soudanesse, this cursed crone." Again, in The Malcontent, 1606: "There is an old crone in the court, her name is Maquerelle." Again, in Love's Mistress, by T. Heywood, 1636: "Witch and hag, crone and beldam." Again, in Heywood's Golden Age, 1611: "All the gold in Crete cannot get one of you old crones with child." Again, in the ancient interlude of The Repentance of Marie Magdalene, 1567: "I have knowne painters, that have made old crones, "To appear as pleasant as little prety young Jones." Steevens. 5 Unvenerable be thy hands, if thou Tak'st up the princess, by that forced baseness-] Leontes had ordered Antigonus to take up the bastard; Paulina forbids him to touch the Princess under that appellation. Forced is false, uttered with violence to truth. Johnson. A base son was a common term in our author's time. So, in King Lear: 7 66 Why brand they us "With base? with baseness? bastardy?" Malone. his babe's,] The female infant then on the stage. slander, Malone. Whose sting is sharper than the sword's;] Again, in Cymbeline : "Whose edge is sharper than the sword, whose tongue "Out-venoms all the worms of Nile." Douce. (For as the case now stands, it is a curse Leon. A callat, Of boundless tongue; who late hath beat her husband, And now baits me!-This brat is none of mine; It is the issue of Polixenes; Hence with it; and, together with the dam, And, might we lay the old proverb to your charge The trick of his frown, his forehead; nay,, the valley, The ordering of the mind too, 'mongst all colours 8 his smiles;] These two redundant words might be reject ed, especially as the child has already been represented as the inheritor of his father's dimples and frowns. Steevens. Our author and his contemporaries frequently take the liberty of using words of two syllables, as monosyllables. So, eldest, highest, lover, either, &c. Dimples is, I believe, employed so here; and of his, when contracted, or sounded quickly, make but one syllable likewise. In this view there is no redundancy. Malone. How is the word-dimples, to be monosyllabically pronounced? Steevens. 9 No yellow in 't;] Yellow is the colour of jealousy. Johnson. So, Nym says, in The Merry Wives of Windsor: “I will possess him with yellowness." Steevens. 11 lest she suspect, as he does, Her children not her husband's!] In the ardour of composition Shakspeare seems here to have forgotten the difference of sexes. No suspicion that the babe in question might entertain of her future husband's fidelity, could affect the legitimacy of her offspring. Unless she were herself a "bed-swerver," (which is not supposed) she could have no doubt of his being the father of her children. However painful female jealousy may be to her that feels it, Pau Leon, That wilt not stay her tongue. Hang all the husbands, Ant. Hardly one subject. Leon. Once more, take her hence. Paul. A most unworthy and unnatural lord Can do no more. Leon. Paul. I'll have thee burn'd. It is an heretick, that makes the fire, I care not: Not she, which burns in 't. I'll not call you tyrant; Than your own weak-hing'd fancy) something savours Leon. Out of the chamber with her. On your allegiance, Where were her life? she durst not call me so, Paul. I pray you, do not push me; I'll be gone. Look to your babe, my lord; 'tis yours: Jove send her A better guiding spirit!—What need these hands?— You, that are thus so tender o'er his follies, lina, therefore, certainly attributes to it, in the present instance, a pang that it can never give. Malone. I regard this circumstance as a beauty, rather than a defect. The seeming absurdity in the last clause of Paulina's ardent address to Nature, was undoubtedly designed, being an extravagance characteristically preferable to languid correctness, and chastised declamation. Steevens. 2 And, lozel,] "A Losel is one that hath lost, neglected, or cast off his owne good and welfare, and so is become lewde and carelesse of credit and honesty." Verstegan's Restitution, 1605, p. 335. Reed. This is a term of contempt frequently used by Spenser. I likewise meet with it in The Death of Robert Earl of Huntington,1601: "To have the lozel's company." A lozel is a worthless fellow. Again, in The Pinner of Wakefield, 1599: "Peace, prating lozel," &c. Steevens. |