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the inquisitive reader. "Item, a challenge playde be fore the King's majestie (Edward VI.) at Westminster, by three maisters, Willym Pascall, Robert Greene, and W. Browne, at seven kynde of weapons. That is to saye, the axe, the pike, the rapier and target, the rapier and cloke, and with two swords, against all alyens and strangers, being borne without the King's dominions, of what countrie so ever he or they were, geving them a warninge by theyr bills set up by the three maisters, the space of eight weeks before the sayd challenge was playde; and it was holden four severall Sundayes, one after another." It appears from the same work that all challenges "to any maister within the realme of Englande being an Englishe man,' were against the statutes of the "Noble science of Defence."

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Beatrice means, that Benedick published a general challenge, like a prize-fighter. STEEVENS.

39. -challenged Cupid at the flight;-] To challenge at the flight, was a challenge to shoot with an arrow. Flight means an arrow, as may be proved from the following lines in Beaumont and Fletcher's Bonduca : -not the quick rack swifter :

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"The virgin from the hated ravisher

"Not half so fearful: not a flight drawn home,
"A round stone from a sling.

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But it is apparent from the following passage in the Civil Wars of Daniel, B. VIII. st. 15. that a flight was not used to signify an arrow in general, but some

particular

particular kind of arrow; I believe one of an unusual length:

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"The archers their flight-shafts to shoot away;
"Which th' adverse side (with sleet and dimness
blind,

"Mistaken in the distance of the way),

"Answer with their sheaf-arrows, that came

short

"Of their intended aim, and did no hurt." Holinshed makes the same distinction in his account of the same occurrence, and adds, that these flights were provided on purpose. Again, in Holinshed, p. 649,-" He caused the soldiers to shoot their flights towards the lord Audlies company."

Mr. Tollet observes, that the length of a flight-shot seems ascertained by a passage in Leland's Itinerary, 1769, Vol. IV. p. 44. "The passage into it at ful se is a flite-shot over, as much as the Tamise is above the bridge."—It were easy to know the length of London-Bridge; and Stowe's Survey may inform the curious reader whether the river has been narrowed by embanking since the days of Leland.

The bird-bolt is a short thick arrow without point, and spreading at the extremity so much, as to leave a flat surface, about the breadth of a shilling. Such are to this day in use to kill rooks with, and are shot from a cross-bow. So, in Marston's What You Will, 1607:

"-ignorance

-ignorance should shoot

"His gross-knobb'd bird bolt.—”

Again, in Love in a Maze, 1632:

Cupid,

"Pox of his bird-bolt! Venus,

"Speak to thy boy to fetch his arrow back,
"Or strike her with a sharp one!"

STEEVENS.

He challenged Cupid at the flight, and my uncle's fool challenged him at the bird-bolt.] The flight was an arrow of a particular kind :—In the Harleian Catalogue of MSS. Vol. I. n. 69. is "a challenge of the lady Maiee's servants to all comers, to be performed at Greenwiche-to shoot standart arrow, or flight." I find the title-page of an old pamphlet still more explicit: "A new post-a marke exceeding necessary for all men's arrows: whether the great man's flight, the gallant's rover, the wise man's pricke-shaft, the poor man's but-shaft, or the fool's bird-bolt.”

FARMER.

The flight, which in the Latin of the middle ages was called flea, was a fleet arrow with narrow feathers, usually employed against rovers. See Blount's Ancient Tenures, 1679.

A bolt seems to have been a general term for an arrow. So, in Shirley's Love's Cruelty: "When the keepers are none of the wisest, their bolts are sooner shot."

There the bolt is supposed to be employed against

deer

deer-stealers. The word is still used in the common proverb: A fool's bolt is soon shot.

That particular species of arrow which was employed in killing birds, appears to have been called a bird-bolt. MALONE.

An arrow employed in war was never termed a bolt. Bolt, therefore, could not have been a general term for

an arrow.

46.

he'll be meet with you,

STEEVENS.

-] This is a very common expression in the midland counties, and signifies, he'll be your match, he'll be even with you. So, in TEXNOTAMIA, by B. Holiday, 1618:

"Go meet her, or else she'll be meet with me.” 55. -Stuff'd with all honourable virtues.] Stuff'd, in this first instance, has no ridiculous meaning. Mr. Edwards observes that Mede in his Discourses on Scripture, speaking of Adam, says, "he whom God had stuffed with so many excellent qualities,"

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"Of stuff'd sufficiency.”

Edwards's MS.

Un homme bien etoffe, signifies, in French, a man in good circumstances.

STEEVENS.

57. -he is no less than a stuff'd man: but for the stuffing-well, we are all mortal.] Mr. Theobald plumed himself much on the pointing of this passage; which, by the way, he might learn from Davenant: but he says not a word, nor any one else that I know of, about the reason of this abruption. The truth is, Beatrice

B

Beatrice starts an idea at the words stuff'd man; and prudently checks herself in the pursuit of it. A stuff'd man was one of the many cant phrases for a cuckold. In Lilly's Midas, we have an inventory of Motto's moveables." Item, says Petulus, one paire of hornes in the bride-chamber on the bed's head.-The beast's head, observes Licio; for Motto is stuff'd in the head, and these are among unmoveable goods." FARMER.

65. four of his five wits- -] In our author's time wit was the general term for intellectual powers. So, Davies on the Soul:

"Wit, seeking truth, from cause to cause ascends,

"And never rests till it the first attain;

"Will, seeking good, finds many middle ends,
"But never stays till it the last do gain."

And, in another part:

"But, if a phrenzy do possess the brain,
"It so disturbs and blots the form of things,
“As fantasy proves altogether vain,

"And to the wit no true relation brings.
"Then doth the wit, admitting all for true,

"Build fond conclusions on those idle grounds."The wits seem to have been reckoned five, by analogy to the five senses, or the five inlets of ideas. JOHNSON.

67. wit enough to keep himself WARM, &c.] Such a one has wit enough to keep himself warm, is a proverbial expression.

"You

So, in the Wise Woman of Hogsden, 1638: are the wise woman, are you? and have wit to keep

yourself

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