Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 6.djvu/514

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NOTES AND QUERIES. [11 s. vi. NOV. 30, 1912.

(6 2) ' Tit. And.,' I. i. 117-8 :

Wilt thou draw near the nature of the Gods ?

Draw near them then in being merciful :

Cf. ' Merch. Ven.,' IV. i. 196 :

And earthly power doth then show likest God's When mercy seasons Justice.

(c) ' Tit. And.,' IV. ii. 122 : He is your brother, lords, sensibly fed

Of that self blood that first gave life to you, And from that womb, where you imprison'd

were He is enfranchised and come to light :

Cf. ' Rich. II..' I. ii. 22 :

Ah, Gaunt, his blood was thine ! that bed, that

womb,

That metal, that self-mould that fashion'd thee, Made him a man ;

(d) ' Tit. And.,' V. iii. 73 sq. : Lest Rome herself be bane unto herself, And she whom mighty kingdoms court'sy to Like a forlorn and desperate castaway,

Do shameful execution on herself.

Cf. ' Rich. II.,' II. i. 65,

That England, that was wont to conquer others, Hath made a shameful conquest of itself,

and the whole of the preceding panegyric.

(e) The following, minute as it is, will, I am certain, appeal to scholars.

' Tit. And.,' V. iii. 155 : Tear for tear, and loving kiss'for kiss,

Note the place of the epithet, and cf. ' Rich.

II.,' I. i. 18 :

. . . .face to face, And frowning brow to brow,

Also ' K. John,' II. i. 390 :

Turn face to face and bloody point to point ; ' 1 Henry IV.,' IV. i. 121 :

Harry to Harry shall, not horse to horse,

Meet'i &c. ' Henry V.,' V. ii. 30 :

That, face to face and royal eye to eye,

You have congreeted,

Hence the Folios are right when in ' Mac- beth,' I. ii. 56, they give

Point against point, rebellious arm 'gainst arm, with the comma after " point " ; and Theo- bald, though followed, I believe, by all or most editors, is wrong in punctuating after " rebellious/'

It is very noteworthy that the whole of sc. ii. in Act III. appears for the first time in the First Folio (1623). To it belongs the quotation which I have given under (6) supra ; the Cambridge editors conjecture that this scene comes from a MS. in the possession of the players. The First Folio edition is generally printed from Quarto 2

(1611), in their judgment, and they further say that it agrees too closely in style with

the main portion of the play to allow of the supposition that it is due to a different author. I content myself with the view that we have here in part, if not wholly, Shakespeare's hand.

All this is conjecture, but, on the hypo- thesis which I am inclined to make that we have already some evidence that this scene is either wholly or in part Shakespeare's, I dwell further on some resemblances therein,, which otherwise I might not insist upon.

(g) ' Tit. And.,' III. ii. 4 : Marcus, unknit that sorrow-wreathen knot : 'Taming of the Shrew,' V. ii. 136 (con- jectural date 1597, Dowden) :

Fie, fie ! unknit that threatening unkind brow,

(h) ' Tit. And.,' III. ii. ad fin. :

Come, boy, and go with me : thy sight is young, And thou shalt read when mine begins to dazzle.

Cf. ' 3 Henry VI.,' II. i. 25 :

Dazzle mine eyes, or do I see three suns ? and ' Venus and Adonis,' Quarto 159$ (dedicated by Shakespeare to the Earl of Southampton) :

Upon his hurt she looks so steadfastly, That her sight dazzling makes the wound seem three ;

Also ' Love's Labour Lost ' (I. i. 80-82), a quarto of 1598 bearing Shakespeare's name, and speaking of the play as acted before Queen Elizabeth, Christmas, 1597 :

Study me how to please the eye indeed

By fixing it upon a fairer eye, Who dazzling so, that eye shall be his heed

This passive or intransitive use of " dazzle " belongs to an early stage of Shakespeare's diction; two of the instances quo ted are from work unquestionably Shakespeare's. I am making a comparison between the earliest Quartos of the first part of ' The Contention ' and ' The True Tragedy,' on the one hand,, and ' 3 Henry VI.' on the other, and I have found enough to justify me in thinking that the comparison may be fruitful in evidence of Shakespeare's work in these plays. A similar comparison between the Quarto 1594 of ' Titus Andronicus ' and those of 1600. and 1611, might prove no less significant, especially in hands more competent than mine.

But I must add another instance, beyond the limits of the scene just discussed, of a single word, the use of which is note- worthy, i.e. " timeless " in the sense of " untimely,"


 * Tit. And.,' II. iii. 265 :

The complot of this timeless 'tragedy;