Pro. We'll both attend upon your ladyship. [Exeunt Silvia and Thurio. Val. Now, tell me, how do all from whence you came? Pro. Your friends are well, and have them much commended. Val. And how do yours? Pro. I left them all in health. Val. How does your lady? and how thrives your love? Pro. My tales of love were wont to weary you; me With bitter fasts, with penitential groans, With nightly tears, and daily heart-sore sighs; Love hath chased sleep from my enthralled eyes, And made them watchers of mine own heart's sorrow. O gentle Proteus, Love's a mighty lord, 131. "Whose high imperious thoughts have punished me"; Johnson proposed to read "those" for "whose," as if the "imperious thoughts" are Valentine's and not "Love's"; the word "thoughts" certainly presents a difficulty, being used here probably in the sense of "dispositions of the mind."-I. G. 139. That is, no misery compare to that inflicted by love;-a form of speech not unusual in the old writers: Thus an old ballad: "There is no comfort in the world To women that are kind.”—H. N. H, 140 Nor to his service no such joy on earth. Pro. Enough; I read your fortune in your eye. Val. Even she; and is she not a heavenly saint? Pro. I will not flatter her. Val. O, flatter me; for love delights in praises. Val. Then speak the truth by her; if not divine, Sovereign to all the creatures on the earth. Val. Sweet, except not any; Except thou wilt except against my love. Pro. Have I not reason to prefer mine own? Val. And I will help thee to prefer her too: She shall be dignified with this high honor,To bear my lady's train, lest the base earth 160 Should from her vesture chance to steal a kiss, And, of so great a favor growing proud, Disdain to root the summer-smelling flower, And make rough winter everlastingly. Pro. Why, Valentine, what braggardism is this? Val. Pardon me, Proteus: all I can is nothing 152, 153. A “principality” is an angel of the highest order, and therefore next to divine. "Speak the truth by her," that is, speak the truth of her; an obsolete use of a preposition.-H. N. H. Pro. To her, whose worth makes other worthies nothing; She is alone. Then let her alone. Val. Not for the world: why, man, she is mine own; And I as rich in having such a jewel As twenty seas, if all their sand were pearl; Pro. But she loves you? 170 Val. Aye, and we are betroth'd: nay, more, our marriage-hour, 180 With all the cunning manner of our flight, Determined of; how I must climb her window; The ladder made of cords; and all the means Plotted and 'greed on for my happiness. Good Proteus, go with me to my chamber, In these affairs to aid me with thy counsel. Pro. Go on before; I shall inquire you forth: I must unto the road, to disembark Some necessaries that I needs must use; And then I'll presently attend you. Val. Will you make haste? Pro. I will. 190 [Exit Val. Even as one heat another heat expels, So the remembrance of my former love 200 Her true perfection, or my false transgression, 210 197. "Is it mine, or Valentine's praise"; the first Folio reads, "It is mine, or Valentine's praise"; the later Folios, "Is it mine then, or Valentinean's praise?" Theobald's suggestion, "mine eye," has been generally adopted; "if this were unsatisfactory," the Camb. editors remark, "another guess might be hazarded:— Is it mine unstaid mind or Valentine's praise." In the latter case "Valentine's" must be read as a dissyllable; in the former as a quadrisyllable; it is not necessary to read, as has been proposed "Valentino's" or "Valentinus'." Two other ingenious emendations are noteworthy:-"her mien,” “mine eyne," ("thine eyne" occurs as a rhyme in Midsummer Night's Dream, III. ii. 138).— I. G. 202. It was anciently supposed that if a witch made a waxen image of anyone she wished to destroy or torment, and hung it by the fire, as the image wasted away the original would do so too. Hence the allusion in the text.-H. N. H. 210. Dr. Johnson censures the Poet for making Proteus say he has but seen the "picture" of Silvia, when he has just been talking with the lady herself. The great Doctor was not great enough to catch Shakespeare so, and in this case he made a blunder, instead of finding one. Proteus wants to get deeper in love with Silvia, and so And that hath dazzled my reason's light; SCENE V The same. A street. Enter Speed and Launce severally. Speed. Launce! by mine honesty, welcome to Launce. Forswear not thyself, sweet youth; Speed. Come on, you madcap, I'll to the ale house with you presently; where, for one 10 resorts to the argument, that the little he has seen of her is as though he had but seen her picture. The figure is not more apt for his purpose than beautiful in itself. Advice, in the two lines above, is used in the sense of acquaintance.-H. N. H. II. v. 1; III. i. 81; V. iv. 129. The Cambridge editors have retained the reading of the Folios in these lines, “Padua” in the first passage, and "Verona" in the second and third, "because it is impossible that the words can be a mere printer's, or transcriber's error. These inaccuracies are interesting as showing that Shakespeare had written the whole of the play before he had finally determined where the scene was to be laid"; the scene is in each case undoubtedly Milan (perhaps "Milano," metri causa).—I. G. |