Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 2.djvu/532

 NOTES AND QUERIES.

[9 th S. II. DEC. 31, '

' Henry IV.,' to which, according to the tradition, it was by royal command a sequel. After James's accession, anything which might possibly give offence would naturally be eliminated from a play belonging to a company which he had so highly honoured as to promote them to the position of " His Majesty's servants." When the first folio was published in 1623 a line which had been omitted in representation for so many years would have small chance of being included.

These considerations will explain why the words quoted above appear in the edition of 1602, which, imperfect as it is, professes to give the play as it was acted in Elizabeth's reign, and not in that of 1623. The fact that they reappear in the quarto of 1619 does not affect the question, for that edition is merely a reprint of the former quarto and has no independent authority. G. CKOSSE.

Oxford.

' CYMBELINE,' I. iii. 8-10.

No, madam ; for so long As he could make me with his eye, or ear, Distinguish him from others.

This passage certainly does not make sense as it stands ; but the emendation (" with this eye or ear ") generally adopted is hardly satis- factory, since the actions of Posthumus specified by Pisanio in the same speech are such as are calculated to appeal to the eye only and not to the ear. I would suggest that Shakespeare wrote :

For so long

As he could make -me with his eye, or I

Distinguish him from others,

the word "make" being equivalent to "make out "or "sight." Such a change in the text as here proposed would bring the passage into closer accord with Imogen's quasi- rebuke,

Thou shouldst have made him

As little as a crow, or less, ere left

To after-eye him,

implying as it does an admission on Pisanio's part that he had "left to after-eye" his master before the latter was actually out of sight. The corruption of the text is easily to be accounted for by the frequent association of "eye "and "ear."

ALFRED E. THISELTON.

'As You LIKE IT,' III. ii. 124-8. .ffo-s. I'll graff it with you, and then I shall graff it with a medlar : then it will be the earliest fruit i' the country ; for you '11 be rotten ere you be half ripe, and that 's the right virtue of the medlar.

The full meaning of these lines has been missed through lack of that accurate informa- tion which Shakespeare so uniformly displays,

and particularly with regard to rural customs. An Englishman, other than city bred, should not need to be told that the fruit of the medlar tree is picked while yet green, laid away in a dark, dry place, and allowed to become mellow through and through, having the appearance of a rotten apple a dark brown colour, when it is considered as in the proper state to be eaten, and is a treat usually reserved by the young people for Christmas Day. With these facts before us, further comment on the passage is unneces- sary to discover the point of the illustration the decay of the fool's mind before reaching ripeness of judgment. The custom of picking the fruit while green explains the idea ex- pressed by "earliest," and answers Steevens's objection that the medlar is, in reality, a late fruit. E. M. DEY.

'As You LIKE IT,' III. v. 37-9. JRos. What though you have no beauty,

As, by my faith, I see no more in you Than without candle may go dark to bed.

I can see no more beauty in you than may safely go to bed in the dark, without a candle to search the room by. E. M. DEY.

' As You LIKE IT,' III. v. 52-3. JRos. 'tis such fools as you

That makes the world full of ill-favour'd children.

I cannot believe that these lines are ad- dressed to Phebe. It is Silvius and such as he who are fools for mating with the Phebes, thereby causing ill-favoured children to be brought into the world perpetuating their mothers' homeliness. It surely was not in- tended to blame the poor girl with the results because some man was fool enough to marry her. E. M. DEY.

' OTHELLO,' I. i. 21 (5 th S. xi. 383; 9 th S. i. 83 283, 422, 483 ; ii. 203, 402).! do not see that lago refers to Cassio's marriage as a matter of public notoriety. Cassio was a Florentine, and his married life at Florence may have been unknown to the Venetians. The word damn may come from the Latin noun or the Latin verb. A fellow almost damned in a fair wife means a fellow to whom a fair wife had almost proved fatal. The word does not imply necessarily public blame or condemna- tion. Referring to another observation of DR. SPENCE, I would say that a handsome husband does not always keep a wife true, nor does a handsome wife always keep a husband true. Referring to my own remark that Shakspeare does not always remember what he has written, I may mention 'The Merry Wives of Windsor ' as an instance of this. It is absolutely impossible to make