CYPRESS-DAGONET.

113

context would rather show that (as Nares in Gloss. suggests) it is equivalent to "cutter, swaggerer, bully." (Todd, in his ed. of Johnson's Dict., says that Shakespeare's commentators "were not aware that cuttle is a serious term [for a knife], in use long before Shakespeare wrote:" What should have made him suppose that they were not aware of it ?)

66

cypress let me be laid-In sad, Let me be laid in a coffin made of sad cypress-wood, iii. 352: Here some prefer understanding cypress to mean a shroud of cypress or cyprus" (see the next article): but it is at least certain that formerly coffins were frequently made of cypress-wood; and Douce remarks that "the expression laid seems more applicable to a coffin than to a shroud, and also that the shroud is afterwards expressly mentioned by itself."

cyprus, cipres, or cypress, a fine transparent stuff, similar to crape,

either white or black, but more commonly the latter, iii. 363, 472. (It appears by a letter of H. Walpole to Sir H. Mann, dated April 25th, 1743, that even at that period cypress was synonymous with crape: "If one did lose a husband or a lover, there are those becoming comforts, weeds and cypresses, jointures and weeping Cupids." Letters, vol. i. p. 240, ed. Cunningham.)

D.

daff, to doff, to do off, to put off, ii. 131; iv. 266; vii. 567; daffed, ii. 100; viii. 447, 459; daffest, vii. 449.

dagger hath mista'en, for, lo, his house Is empty on the back of Montague-This, vi. 471: His dagger having been worn, as daggers often were, behind his back.

dagger-Laying down her, vi. 455: see, Knife I'll help, &c.

dagger of lath, the wooden instrument which was sometimes carried by the Vice in the old Moralities, and with which he used to belabour the Devil (see Vice, &c.), iii. 383; iv. 236.

Dagonet in Arthur's show—I was then Sir, iv. 361: "The question

whether Shallow represented Sir Dagonet at Mile-end-green or Clement's inn, although it has been maintained on either side with great plausibility, must ever remain undecided; but Mr. Malone's acute and ingenious conjecture, that Arthur's show was an exhibition of archery, and not an interlude, will no longer admit of any doubt. The truth of both these positions will appear from the following circumstances. In 1682 there was published 'A remembrance of the worthy show and shooting by the Duke of Shoreditch and his associates the worshipful citizens of London upon Tuesday the 17th of September 1583, set forth according to the truth thereof to the everlasting honour of the game of shooting in

VOL. IX.

I

the long bow. By W. M.,' in p. 40 of which book is this passage: 'The prince of famous memory King Henry the Eighth, having red in the chronicles of England, and seen in his own time how armies mixed with good archers have evermore so galled the enemy, that it hath been great cause of the victory, he being one day at Mile-end when prince Arthur and his knights were there shooting did greatly commend the game, and allowed thereof, lauding them to their encouragement.' One should be very much inclined to suppose this decisive of the first question, and that these shows were usually held at Mile-end; but this is by no means the case. The work proceeds to state that King Henry the Eighth, keeping at one time a princely court at Windsor, caused sundry matches to be made concerning shooting with the long bow; at which one Barlo, who belonged to his majesty's guard, remaining to shoot, the king said to him,' Win thou all, and thou shalt be duke over all archers.' Barlo drew his bow and won the match; whereat the king being pleased, commended him for his good archery; and the man dwelling in Shoreditch, the king named him Duke of Shoreditch. One of the successors to this duke appointed a show on the 17th of September 1583, to be held in Smithfield and other parts of the city, which is here very circumstantially described; and among many other curious particulars it is mentioned that the citizens and inhabitants of Fleetbridge, &c. followed with a show worth beholding of seemly archers; then the odd devise of Saint Clements parish, which but ten days before had made the same show in their own parish, in setting up the queen's majesties stake in Holborn fields, which stakemaster Knevit, one of the gentlemen of her majesties chamber, gave unto them at his cost and charges; and a gunn worth three pound, made of gold, to be given unto him that best deserved it by shooting in a peece at the mark which was set up on purpose at Saint Jame's wall.' This, however, was not solely a shooting with fire-arms, but also with bows: for in the account of the show itself, which immediately follows, men bearing 'shields and shafts' are mentioned, and 'a worthy show of archers following.' In the continuation of the description of the Smithfield show mention is made of 'the baron Stirrop, whose costly stake will be in memorys after he is dead, now standing at Mileend;' and again, ' And this one thing is worthy of memory, that upon the day of Prince Arthur's shooting, which was five weeks before this show, the duke, willing to beautifie the same in some seemly sort, sent a buck of that season by the marquess Barlo (the name of this person was kept up long after his decease), accompanied with many goldsmiths, who coming in satten dublets and chains of gold about their bodies, with horns at their backs, did all the way wind their horns, and presented the same to prince Arthur, who was at his tent, which was at Mile-end-green.' We see therefore that Shakespeare having both these shows in his recollection, has made Shallow, a talkative simpleton, refer to them indistinctly,

and that probably by design, and with a due attention to the nature of his character. What Shallow afterwards says about the management of the little quiver fellow's piece, or caliver, will not weigh in either scale; because in all these shows there were musketeers. In that at Smithfield the feryers marched, consisting of one hundred handsome fellowes with calivers on their necks, all trimly decked with white feathers in their hats.' Maister Thomas Smith, who in Mr. Malone's note is said to have personated Prince Arthur, was 'chiefe customer to her majesty in the port of London;' and to him Richard Robinson, a translator of several books in the reign of Elizabeth, dedicated his Auncient order, societie and unitie laudable of Prince Arthure and his knightly armory of the round table, with a threefold assertion frendly in favour and furtherance of English archery at this day, 1583, 4to. Such part of this work as regards Prince Arthur is chiefly a translation from the French, being a description of the arms of the knights of the round table; the rest is a panegyric in verse by Robinson himself in praise of archery. It appears from the dedication that King Henry VIII. confirmed by charter to the citizens of London, the 'famous order of knightes of prince Arthur's round table or society like as in his life time when he sawe a good archer in deede, he chose him and ordained such a one for a knight of the same order.' . . . . Whatever part Sir Dagonet took in this show would doubtless be borrowed from Mallory's romance of the Mort Arture, which had been compiled in the reign of Henry VII. What there occurs relating to Sir Dagonet was extracted from the excellent and ancient story of Tristan de Leonnois, in which Dagonet is represented as the fool of king Arthur. He is sometimes dressed up in armour and set on to attack the knights of Cornwall, who are uniformly described as cowards. It once happened that a certain knight, who for a particular reason had been called Sir Cotte mal taillée by Sir Kay, king Arthur's seneschal, was, at the instance of Sir Kay, attacked by poor Dagonet; but the latter was very soon made to repent of his rashness and thrown over his horse's crupper. On another occasion Tristan himself, in the disguise of a fool, handles Sir Dagonet very roughly; but he, regardless of these tricks of fortune, is afterwards persuaded to attack Mark the king of Cornwall, who is in reality a coward of the first magnitude. Mark, supposing him to be Lancelot of the lake, runs away, and is pursued by the other; but the persons who had set on Sir Dagonet, becoming apprehensive for the consequences, follow them, as they would not,' says the romance, for no good, that Sir Dagonet were hurt; for king Arthur loved him passing well, and made him knight with his owne hands.' King Mark at length meets with another knight, who, perceiving his cowardice, attacks Dagonet and tumbles him from his horse. In the romance of Sir Perceval li Gallois, Kay, the seneschal of Arthur, being offended with Dagonet for insinuating that he was not the most

116

DAINTRY-DANSKERS.

valorous of knights, kicks him into the fire. So much for the hero personated by Master Justice Shallow" (DOUCE).

Daintry, Daventry, v. 305.

dainty-Make: see make dainty.

daisy-There's a, vii. 184: Does Ophelia mean that the daisy is for herself? (6 Greene, in his Quip for an Upstart Courtier, has explained the significance of this flower: '-Next them grew the dissembling daisie, to warne such light-of-love wenches not to trust every faire promise that such amorous bachelors make them' [Sig. B 2 verso, ed. 1620]" (HENLEY).

Damascus, be thou cursed Cain-This be, v. 15: Ritson quotes; "Damascus is as moche to saye as shedynge of blood. For there Chaym slowe Abell, and hidde hym in the sonde." Polychronicon, fo. xii.

:

damn, to condemn with a spot I damn him, vi. 663; or else we damn thee, vii. 498.

damn'd in a fair wife, vii. 376: see note 6, vii. 471.

Damon dear, vii. 160: The ballad (for it would seem to have been a ballad) which furnished this quotation, was most probably on the story of Damon and Pythias.

Dan Cupid, ii. 187: Dan-lord, sir, master-is the corruption of Dan, for Dominus; originally a title applied to monks, which at last, when it became rather obsolete, was used sportively, as in the present passage.

dance, to make to dance: more dances my rapt heart, vi. 209.

dancing horse-The: see horse, &c.

dancing-rapier-A, vi. 298: Compare no sword worn But one to dance with! iii. 223, and he at Philippi kept His sword e'en like a dancer, vii. 554.

danger—Within one's, Meant properly "within one's power or control, liable to a penalty which he might impose ;" but it was often, as in the first of the following passages, equivalent to "in debt to one:" You stand within his danger, do you not? ii. 399; Come not within his danger by thy will, viii. 260 (With the first of these passages compare the xxviiith of A Hundred Mery Talys, 1526, in which tale a woman, having vainly tried to borrow " a cuckold's hat" from her female married acquaintance, declares to them at last, "yf I lyue another yere I wyll haue one of myn own and be out of my neyghbours daunger" (i.e. be not under the necessity of standing indebted to my neighbours), p. 53, ed. 1866).

dank here as a dog-As: see dog-As dank, &c.

Danskers, Danes, vii. 128.

DARE-DARRAIGN.

117

dare, a defiance, a challenge: Sextus Pompeius Hath given the dare to Cæsar, vii. 504.

dare, to terrify: dare the field, iv. 478; dare us with his cap like larks, v. 539,-on which passage Steevens observes; "It is well known that the hat of a cardinal is scarlet; and that one of the methods of daring larks was by small mirrors fastened on scarlet cloth, which engaged the attention of these birds while the fowler drew his net over them." (" They set out their faces as Fowlers do their daring glasses, that the Larkes that soare highest may stoope soonest." Greene's Neuer too late, First Part, sig. B 3 verso, ed. 1611.) Darius-The rich-jewell'd coffer of, v. 22: "When Alexander the

Great took the city Gaza, the metropolis of Syria, amidst the other spoils and wealth of Darius treasured up there, he found an exceeding rich and beautiful little chest or casket. Having surveyed the singular rarity of it, and asked those about him what they thought fittest to be laid up in it; when they had severally delivered their opinions, he told them, he esteemed nothing so worthy to be preserved in it as Homer's Iliads. Vide Plutarchum in Vita Alexand. Magni" (THEOBALD): "The very words of the text are found in Puttenham's Arte of English Poesie, 1589; 'In what price the noble poemes of Homer were holden with Alexander the Great, insomuch as every night they were layd vnder his pillow, and by day were carried in the rich iewell cofer of Darius, lately before vanquished by him in battaile' [p. 12]" (MALONE). darkling, in darkness, ii. 284; vii. 269, 581.

darnel, iv. 500; v. 43; vii. 319: This weed, "darnel (lolium temulentum), annual darnel or ray grass, grows in fields, has a tall stout stem with rough leaves, flowers in July and August," &c. Beisly's Shakspere's Garden, &c. p. 113: On the second of the passages referred to in this article Steevens has the following note; "Darnel (says Gerard) hurteth the eyes, and maketh them dim, if it happen either in corne for breade, or drinke.' Hence the old proverbLolio victitare, applied to such as were dim-sighted . . . . Pucelle means to intimate, that the corn she carried with her, had produced the same effect on the guards of Rouen; otherwise they would have seen through her disguise, and defeated her stratagem." darraign your battle, v. 259: Johnson explains this, "Range your host, put your host in order :" Steevens observes, "The quartos read 'Prepare your battle:'" Nares, in his Gloss., gives "To Darraign. To arrange an army, or set it in order of battle. Of uncertain derivation . . . Often for to fight a battle, and even when between two combatants." ("Dare, Audere Hinc etiam daren, darraine, darreigne battle frequenter occurrunt apud Chaucerum. Nisi putes hæc à causis forensibus ad armorum certamina fuisse translata: ut sint à Normannico desrener, quod idem cum Dirationare vel Disrationare." Junii Etymol. Angl.: "Desrener. To dereine;