BENE. Which is one? MARG. I fay my prayers aloud. BENE. I love you the better; the hearers may cry, amen. MARG. God match me with a good dancer! MARG. And God keep him out of my fight, when the dance is done!-Anfwer, clerk. BALTH. No more words; the clerk is anfwer'd. URS. I know you well enough; you are fignior Antonio. ANT. At a word, I am not. URS. I know you by the waggling of your head. ANT. To tell you true, I counterfeit him. URS. You could never do him fo ill-well,' unless you were the very man: Here's his dry hand' up and down; you are he, you are he. ANT. At a word, I am not. URS. Come, come; do you think I do not know you by your excellent wit? Can virtue hide itself? Go to, mum, you are he: graces will appear, and there's an end. BEAT. Will you not tell me who told you fo? BENE. No, you shall pardon me. BEAT. Nor will you not tell me who BENE. Not now. you are? You could never do him fo ill-well,] A fimilar phrafe occurs in The Merchant of Venice: "He hath a better bad habit of frowning, than the Count Palatine." STEEVENS. bis dry hand-] A dry hand was anciently regarded as the fign of a cold conftitution. To this, Maria, in Twelfth Night, alludes, Act I. fc. iii. STEEVENS. BEAT. That I was difdainful,—and that I had my good wit out of the Hundred merry Tales; *—Well, this was fignior Benedick that faid fo, BENE. What's he? BEAT. I am fure, you know him well enough. 4 Hundred merry Tales;] The book, to which Shakspeare alludes, might be an old tranflation of Les cent Nouvelles Nouvelles, The original was published at Paris, in the black letter, before the year 1500, and is faid to have been written by fome of the royal family of France. Ames mentions a translation of it prior to the time of Shakspeare. In The London Chaunticleres, 1659, this work, among others, is cried for fale by a ballad-man. "The Seven Wife Men of Gotham; a Hundred merry Tales; Scoggin's Jefts," &c. Again, in The Nice Valour, &c. by Beaumont and Fletcher: the Almanacs, "The Hundred Novels, and the Books of Cookery." Of this collection there are frequent entries in the register of the Stationers' Company. The first I met with was in Jan. 1581. 66 STEEVENS, This book was certainly printed before the year 1575, and in much repute, as appears from the mention of it in Laneham's Letter concerning the entertainment at Kenelworth - Castle, Again, in The English Courtier and the Cuntrey Gentleman, bl. 1. 1586. fig. H 4: wee want not also pleasant mad headed knaves that bee properly learned and well reade in diverse pleasant bookes and good authors. As Sir Guy of Warwicke, the Foure Sonnes of Aymon, the Ship of Fooles, the Budget of Demaundes, the Hundredth merry Tales, the Booke of Ryddles, and many other excellent writers both witty and pleafaunt," It has been fuggefted to me that there is no other reason than the word hundred to fuppofe this book a translation of the Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles. I have now but little doubt that Boccace's Decameron was the book here alluded to. It contains just one hundred Novels. So, in Guazzo's Civile Conversation, 1586, p. 158; " — we do but give them occafion to turne over the Hundred Novelles of Boccace, and to write amorous and lafcivious letters," REED, The Hundred merry Tales can never have been a translation of Les cent Nouvelles Nouvelles, many of which are very tragical relations, and none of them calculated to furnish a lady with good q. It should seem rather to have been a sort of jeft-book, RITSON, BENE. Not I, believe me. BEAT. Did he never make you laugh? BEAT. Why, he is the prince's jefter: a very dull fool; only his gift is in devifing impoffible flanders: ' none but libertines delight in him; and the commendation is not in his wit, but in his villainy; for he both pleaseth men, and angers them, and then they laugh at him, and beat him: I am fure, he is in the fleet; I would he had boarded me. BENE. When I know the gentleman, I'll tell him what you fay. BEAT. Do, do: he'll but break a comparison or two on me; which, peradventure, not mark'd, or not laugh'd at, ftrikes him into melancholy; and then there's a partridge' wing faved, for the fool will eat no fupper that night. [Mufick within.] We must follow the leaders. BENE. In every good thing. BEAT. Nay, if they lead to any ill, I will leave them at the next turning. [Dance. Then exeunt all but Don JOHN, BORACHIO, and CLAUDIO. his gift is in devifing impoffible flanders:] We fhould read impaffible, i. e. flanders fo ill invented, that they will pass upon no body. WARBURTON. Impoffible flanders are, I fuppofe, fuch flanders as, from their abfurdity and impoffibility, bring their own confutation with them. JOHNSON. Johnfon's explanation appears to be right. Ford fays, in The Merry Wives of Windfor, that he fhall fearch for Falftaff in "impoffit le places." The word impoffible is alfo ufed in a fimilar fense in Jonfon's Sejanus, where Silius accufes Afer of "Malicious and manifold applying, "Foul wrefting, and impoffible conftruction." M. MASON. 6 -his villainy;] By which the means his malice and impiety. By his impious jefts, fhe infinuates, he pleafed libertines; and by his devifing flanders of them, he angered them. WARBURTON. D. JOHN. Sure, my brother is amorous on Hero, and hath withdrawn her father to break with him about it: The ladies follow her, and but one vifor remains. BORA. And that is Claudio: I know him by his bearing.' D. JOHN. Are not you fignior Benedick? CLAUD. You know me well; I am he. D. JOHN. Signior, you are very near my brother in his love: he is enamoured on Hero; I pray you, diffuade him from her, fhe is no equal for his birth: you may do the part of an honeft man in it. CLAUD. How know you he loves her? D. JOHN. I heard him fwear his affection. BORA. So did I too; and he fwore he would marry her to-night. D. JOHN. Come, let us to the banquet. [Exeunt Don JOHN and BORACHIO, CLAUD. Thus answer I in name of Benedick, But hear thefe ill news with the ears of Claudio.'Tis certain fo;-the prince wooes for himself. Friendship is conftant in all other things, Save in the office and affairs of love: Therefore, all hearts in love use their own tongues; Let every eye negotiate for itself, And truft no agent: for beauty is a witch, Against whofe charms faith melteth into blood." - his bearing.] i. e. his carriage, his demeanour. So, in Meafure for Measure: "How I may formally in perfon bear me." STEEVENS. 8 Therefore, &c.] Let, which is found in the next line, is underftood here. MALONE. beauty is a witch, Against whofe charms faith melteth into blood.] i. e. as wax This is an accident of hourly proof, Which I mistrusted not: Farewell therefore, Hero! Re-enter BENEDICK. BENE. Count Claudio? CLAUD. Yea, the fame. BENE. Come, will you go with me? BENE. Even to the next willow, about your own bufinefs, count. What fashion will you wear the garland of? About your neck, like an usurer's chain? or under your arm, like a lieutenant's fcarf? when opposed to the fire kindled by a witch, no longer preferves the figure of the perfon whom it was defigned to reprefent, but flows into a fhapeless lump; fo fidelity, when confronted with beauty, diffolves into our ruling paffion, and is loft there like a drop of water in the fea. That blood fignifies (as Mr. Malone has alfo obferved) amorous heat, will appear from the following paffage in All's well that ends well, A& III. sc. vii: "Now his important blood will nought deny "That fhe'll demand." STEEVENS. -ufurer's chain?] Chains of gold, of confiderable value, were in our author's time, ufually worn by wealthy citizens, and others, in the fame manner as they now are, on publick occafions, by the Aldermen of London. See The Puritan, or the Widow of Watling-Street, Act III. fc. iii. Albumazar, A& I. fc. vii. and other pieces. REED. Ufury feems about this time to have been a common topic of invective. I have three or four dialogues, pafquils, and difcourfes on the fubject, printed before the year 1600. From every one of thefe it appears, that the merchants were the chief ufurers of the age. STEEVENS. So, in The Choice of Change, containing the triplicitie of Divinitie, Philofophie, and Poetrie, by S. R. Gent. 4to. 1598: "Three fortes of people, in respect of use in neceffitie, may be accounted good:Merchantes, for they may play the ufurers, inftead of the Jewes." Again, ibid: "There is a fcarcitie of Jewes, because Chriftians make an occupation of ufurie." MALONE. |