write down the prince's officer coxcomb.—Come, bind them:-Thou naughty varlet !

Con. Away! you are an ass, you are an ass.

Dogb. Dost thou not suspect my place? Dost thou not suspect my years?-0 that he were here to write me down-an ass!—but, masters, remember, that I am an ass; though it be not written down, yet forget not that I am an ass:—No, thou villain, thou art full of piety, as shall be proved upon thee by good witness. I am a wise fellow; and, which is more, an officer; and, which is more, a housholder; and, which is more, as pretty a piece of flesh as any is in Messina; and one that knows the law, go to; and a rich fellow enough, go to; and a fellow that hath had losses; and one that hath two gowns, and every thing handsome about him :-Bring him away. O, that I had been writ down—an ass! [Exeunt.

ACT V..... SCENE I.

Before LEONATO's House.

Enter LEONATO and ANTONIO.

Ant. If you go on thus, you will kill yourself;
And 'tis not wisdom, thus to second grief
Against yourself.
Leon.

I pray thee, cease thy counsel,
Which falls into mine ears as profitless
As water in a sieve: give not me counsel;
Nor let no comforter delight mine ear,
But such a one whose wrongs do suit with mine.
Bring me a father, that so lov'd his child,
Whose joy of her is overwhelm'd like mine,
And bid him speak of patience;1
Measure his woe the length and breadth of mine,
And let it answer every strain for strain;

and Cowley, are placed at the beginning of the speeches, instead of the proper words. Johnson. 1 And bid him speak of patience ; ] Read

“ And bid him speak to me of patience.” Ritson.

As thus for thus, and such a grief for such,
In every lineament, branch, shape, and form:
If such a one will smile, and stroke his beard;
Cry--sorrow, wag! and hem, when he should groan;'

2 Cry-sorrow, wag! and hem, when he should groan;] The quarto 1600 and folio 1623, read

“ And sorrow, wagge, cry hem,” &c. Mr. Rowe and Mr. Pope

“ And hallow, wag,” &c. Mr. Theobald

“ And sorrow wage,” &c. Sir Tho. Hanmer and Dr. Warburton

“ And sorrow waive,” &c. Mr. Tyrwhitt

“And sorrow gagge," &c. Mr. Heath and Mr. T. Warton

“ And sorrowing cry hem,” &c. I had inadvertently offered

“And sorry wag !” &c. Mr. Ritson

“ And sorrow waggery,” &c. Mr. Malone

“ In sorrow wag,” &c. But I am persuaded that Dr. Johnson's explanation as well as arrangement of the original words, is apposite and just: “ I cannot (says he) but think the true meaning nearer than it is imagined.

If such a one will smile, and stroke his beard,

And, sorrow, wag! cry; hem, when he should groan, &c. That is, “If he will smile, and cry sorrow be gone! and hem in. stead of groaning. The order in which and and cry are placed, is harsh, and this harshness made the sense mistaken. Range the words in the common order, and my reading will be free from all difficulty.

If such a one will smile, and stroke his beard,

Cry, sorrow, wag! and hem when he should groan Thus far Dr. Johnson; and in my opinion he has left succeed. ing criticks nothing to do respecting the passage before us.

Let me, however, claim the honour of supporting his opinion.

To cry-Care away! was once an expression of triumph. So, in Acolastus, a comedy, 1540: “— I may now say, Care awaye.”' Again, ibidem: “ Now grievous sorrowe and care away.'” Again, at the conclusion of Barnaby Googe's third Eglog:

“ Som chestnuts have I there in store,

“ With cheese and pleasaunt whaye; “God sends me vittayles for my nede,

“ And I synge Care awaye .!” Again, as Dr. Farmer observes to me, in George Withers's Philarete, 1622;

Patch grief with proverbs; make misfortune drunk
With candle-wasters; 3 bring him yet to me,
And I of him will gather patience.
But there is no such man: For, brother, men
Can counsel, and speak comfort to that grief
Which they themselves not feel; but, tasting it,
Their counsel turns to passion, which before
Would give preceptial medicine to rage,
Fetter strong madness in a silken thread,
Charm ach with air, and agony with words:
No, no; 'tis all men's office to speak patience

“Why should we grieve or pine at that?

Hang sorrow! Care will kill a cat.” Sorrow go by! is also (as I am assured) a common exclamation of hilarity even at this time, in Scotland. Sorrow wag! might have been just such another. The verb, to wag, is several times used by our author in the sense of to go, or pack off.

The Prince, in the First Part of K. Henry IV, Act II, sc. iv, says_“The cry hem! and bid you play it off. And Mr. M. Mason observes, that this expression also occurs in As you Like it, where Rosalind says—“ These burs are in my heart;” and Celia replies—" Hem them away.” The foregoing examples sufficiently prove the exclamation hem, to have been of a comic

Steevens.

make misfortune drunk With candle-wasters ;] This may mean, either wash away his sorrow among those who sit up all night to drink, and in that sense may be styled wasters of candles; or overpower his misfor. tunes by swallowing flap-dragons in his glass, which are described by Falstaff as made of candles' ends. Steevens.

This is a very difficult passage, and hath not, I think, been satisfactorily cleared up. The explanation I shall offer, will give, I believe, as little satisfaction; but I will, however, venture it. Candle-wasters is a term of contempt for scholars: thus Jonson, in Cynthia's Revels, Act III, sc. i: “ spoiled by a whoreson book-worm, a candle-waster.” In The Antiquary, Act III, is a like term of ridicule: “ He should more catch your delicate court-ear, than all your head-scratchers, thumb-biters, lampwasters of them all.” The sense then, which I would assign to Shakspeare, is this: “If such a one will patch grief with pro. verbs,-case or cover the wounds of his grief with proverbial say-' ings; make misfortune drunk with candle-wasters, --stupify misfortune, or render himself insensible to the strokes of it, by the conversation or lucubrations of scholars; the production of the lamp, but not fitted to human nature.” Patch in the sense of mending a de. fect or breach, occurs in Hamlet, Act V, sc. i:

“O, that that earth, which kept the world in awe,
“Should patch a wall, to expel the winter's flaw. Whalley.

turn.

3

To those that wring under the load of sorrow;
But no man's virtue, nor sufficiency,
To be so moral, when he shall endure
The like himself: therefore give me no counsel:
My griefs cry louder than advertisement.“

Ant. Therein do men from children nothing differ.

Leon. I pray thee, peace; I will be flesh and blood;
For there was never yet philosopher,
That could endure the tooth-ach patiently;
However they have writ the style of gods,5
And made a pish at chance and sufferance.6

Ant. Yet bend not all the harm upon yourself;
Make those, that do offend you, suffer too.

Leon. There thou speak’st reason: nay, I will do so:
My soul doth tell me, Hero is bely’d:
And that shall Claudio know, so shall the prince,
And all of them, that thus dishonour her.

Enter Don PEDRO and CLAUDIO.
Ant. Here comes the prince, and Claudio, hastily.
D. Pedro. Good den, good den.
Claud.

Good day to both of you.
Leon. Hear you, my lords,-
D. Pedro.

We have some haste, Leonato.
Leon. Some haste, my lord! well, fare you well, my

lord:

than advertisement.] That is, than admonition, than moral instruction. Fohnson.

5 However they have writ the style of gods,] This alludes to the extravagant titles the Stoics gave their wise men. Sapiens ille cum Diis, ex pari vivit. Senec. Ep. 59. Jupiter quo antecedit virum bonum? diutius bonus est. Sapiens nihilo se minoris æstimat.-Deus non vincit sapientem felicitate. Ep. 73. Warburton.

Shakspeare might have used this expression, without any acquaintance with the hyperboles of stoicism. By the style of gods, he meant an exalted language ; such as we may suppose would be written by beings superior to human calamities, and therefore regarding them with neglect and coldness.

Beaumont and Fletcher have the same expression in the first of their Four Plays in One :

“ Athens doth make women philosophers,

“-And sure their children chat the talk of gods.” Steevens. 6 And made a pish at chance and sufferance.] Alludes to their famous apathy. "Warburton.

The old copies read-push. Corrected by Mr. Pope. Malone.

Are you so hasty now?-well, all is one.

D. Pedro. Nay, do not quarrel with us, good old man. Ant. If he could right himself with quarreling, Some of us would lie low. Claud.

Who wrongs him? Leon.

Marry,
Thou, thou? dost wrong me; thou dissembler, thou:-
Nay, never lay thy hand upon thy sword,
I fear thee not.
Claud.

Marry, beshrew my hand,
If it should give your age such cause of fear:
In faith, my hand meant nothing to my sword.

Leon. Tush, tush, man, never fleer and jest at me:
I speak not like a dotard, nor a fool;
As, under privilege of age, to brag
What I have done being young, or what would do,
Were I not old: Know, Claudio, to thy head,
Thou hast so wrong'd mine innocent child and me,
That I am forc'd to lay my reverence by;
And, with grey hairs, and bruise of many days,
Do challenge thee to trial of a man.
I say, thou hast bely'd mine innocent child;
Thy slander hath gone through and through her heart,
And she lies buried with her ancestors:
O! in a tomb where never scandal slept,
Save this of her's, fram'd by thy villainy.

Claud. My villainy!
Leon.

Thine, Claudio; thine, I say.
D. Pedro. You say not right, old man.
Leon.

My lord, my lord,
I 'll prove it on his body, if he dare;
Despite his nice fence, 8 and his active practice,
His May of youth, and bloom of lusty hood.

Claud. Away, I will not have to do with you.
Leon. Canst thou so daff me?' Thou hast kill'd my child;

8

7 Thou, thou - ] I have repeated the word-thou, for the sake of measure. Steevens.

Despite his nice fence,] i. e. defence, or skill in the science of fencing, or defence. Douce.

9 Can'st thou so daff me?] This is a country word, Mr. Pope tells us, signifying, daunt. It may be so; but that is not the exposition here: To daff and doff are synonymous terms, that

VOL. IV.

Bb