ther is wife; yet I am well: another virtuous; yet I am well: but till all graces be in one woman, one woman shall not come in my grace. Rich she shall be, that's certain; wife, or I'll none; virtuous, or I'll never cheapen her; fair, or I'll never look on her; mild, or come not near me; noble, or not I for an angel; of good discourse, an excellent mufician, and her hair fhall be of what colour it please God.' Ha! the prince and monfieur Love! I will hide me in the arbour. [Withdraws.

9 - and her hair shall be of what colour it please God.] Perhaps Benedick alludes to a fashion, very common in the time of Shakspeare, that of dying the hair.

Stubbes, in his Anatomy of Abuses, 1595, fpeaking of the attires of women's heads, fays: "If any have haire of her owne naturall growing, which is not faire ynough, then will they die it in divers colours." STEEVENS.

The practice of dying the hair was one of those fashions so frequent before and in Queen Elizabeth's time, as to be thought worthy of particular animadverfion from the pulpit. In the Homily against excefs of apparel, b. 1. 1547, after mentioning the common excufes of fome nice and vain women for painting their faces, dying their hair, &c. the preacher breaks out into the following invective: "Who can paynt her face, and curle her heere, and chaunge it into an unnaturall coloure, but therein doth worke reprofe to her maker who made her? as thoughe fhe coulde make herselfe more comelye than God hath appoynted the measure of her beautie. What do these women but go about to refourme that which God hath made? not knowyng that all thynges naturall is the worke of God: and thynges difguyfed and unnatural be the workes of the devyll," &c. REED.

Or he may allude to the fashion of wearing falje hair," of whatever colour it pleafed God." So, in a subsequent scene: "I like the new tire within, if the hair were a thought browner." Fines Moryfon, defcribing the drefs of the ladies of Shakspeare's time, fays, "Gentlewomen virgins weare gownes close to the body, and aprons of fine linnen, and go bareheaded, with their hair curiously knotted, and raised at the forehead, but many (against the cold, as they fay,) weare caps of hair that is not their own." See The Twe Gentlemen of Verona. MALONE.

The practice of colouring the hair in Shakspeare's time, receives confiderable illuftration from Maria Magdalene her Life and

Enter Don PEDRO, LEONATO, and CLAUDIO.

D. PEDRO. Come, fhall we hear this mufick? CLAUD. Yea, my good lord :-How still the evening is,

As hush'd on purpose to grace harmony!

D. PEDRO. See you where Benedick hath hid himfelf?

CLAUD. O, very well, my lord: the mufick ended, We'll fit the kid-fox with a penny-worth."

Repentance, 1567, where Infidelitie (the Vice) recommends her to a goldfmith to die her hair yellow with fome preparation, when it fhould fade; and Carnal Concupifcence tells her likewise that there was "other geare befides goldfmith's water," for the purpose. DOUCE.

2 Pedro. See you where Benedick hath hid himself? Claudio. O, very well, my lord: the mufick ended,

We'll fit the kid-fox with a penny-worth.] i. e. we will be even with the fox now discovered. So the word kid, or kidde, fignifies in Chaucer :

"The foothfaftness that now is hid,

"Without coverture shall be kid,

"When I undoen have this dreming."

"Perceiv'd or shew'd.

Romaunt of the Rofe, 2171, &c.

Troilus and Creseide, lib. i. 208.

"He kidde anon his bone was not broken."

“With that anon fterte out daungere,
"Out of the place where he was hidde;
"His malice in his cheere was kidde."

Romaunt of the Rofe, 2130. GREY. It is not impoffible but that Shakspeare chofe on this occafion to employ an antiquated word; and yet if any future editor should choofe to read-hid fox, he may obferve that Hamlet has faid— "Hide fox and all after." STEEVENS.

Dr. Warburton reads as Mr. Steevens propofes. MALONE. A kid-fox feems to be no more than a young fox or cub. In As you Like it, we have the expreffion of "two dog-apes." RITSON.

Enter BALTHAZAR, with mufick.

D. PEDRO. Come, Balthazar, we'll hear that fong again."

BALTH. O good my lord, tax not fo bad a voice To flander mufick any more than once.

D. PEDRO. It is the witnefs ftill of excellency, To put a ftrange face on his own perfection:I pray thee, fing, and let me woo no more.

BALTH. Because you talk of wooing, I will fing: Since many a wooer doth commence his fuit To her he thinks not worthy; yet he wooes; Yet will he fwear, he loves.

There's not a note of mine that's worth the noting. D. PEDRO. Why these are very crotchets that he fpeaks;

Note, notes, forfooth, and noting!'

[Mufick. BENE. NOW, Divine air! now is his foul ravish'd!Is it not strange, that fheeps' guts should hale fouls out of men's bodies?-Well, a horn for my money, when all's done.

9 with mufick.] I am not fure that this ftage-direction (taken from the quarto, 1600) is proper. Balthazar might have been defigned at once for a vocal and an inftrumental performer. Shakspeare's orchestra was hardly numerous; and the firft folio, inftead of Balthazar, only gives us Jacke Wilfon, the name of the actor who represented him. STEEVENS.

2 Come, Balthazar, we'll hear that fong again.] Balthazar, the mufician and fervant to Don Pedro, was perhaps thus named from the celebrated Baltazarini, called De Beaujoyeux, an Italian performer on the violin, who was in the highest fame and favour at the court of Henry II. of France, 1577. BURNEY.

3 and noting!] The old copies-nothing. The correction was made by Mr. Theobald. MALONE.

BALTHAZAR fings.

I.

BALTH. Sigh no more, ladies, figh no more,⋆
Men were deceivers ever;

One foot in fea, and one on shore ;
To one thing constant never:
Then figh not fo,

But let them go,

And be you blith and bonny;
Converting all your founds of woe
Into, Hey nonny, nonny.
II.

Sing no more ditties, fing no mo
Of dumps fo dull and heavy;
The fraud of men was ever so,
Since fummer first was leavy.
Then figh not fo, &c.

D. PEDRO. By my troth, a good fong.
BALTH. And an ill finger, my lord.

D. PEDRO. Ha? no; no, faith; thou fing'ft well enough for a fhift.

BENE. [Afide.] An he had been a dog, that should have howl'd thus, they would have hang'd him: and, I pray God, his bad voice bode no mifchief! I had as lief have heard the night-raven,' come what plague could have come after it.

4 Sigh no more, ladies, figh no more,]

66

Weep no more, woful fhepherds, weep no more."
Milton's Lycidas. STEEVENS.

I pray God, his bad voice bode no mischief! I had as lief have heard the night-raven,] i. e. the owl; Txópa. So, in King

Henry VI. P. III. fc. vi:

"The night-crow cried, aboding luckless time." STEVENS

Thus alfo, Milton, in L'Allegro:

"And the night-raven lings." DoUCE.

D. PEDRO. Yea, marry; [To CLAUDIO.]-Doft thou hear, Balthazar? I pray thee, get us fome excellent mufick; for to-morrow night we would have it at the lady Hero's chamber-window. BALTH. The best I can, my lord.

D. PEDRO. Do fo: farewell. [Exeunt BALTHAZAR and mufick.] Come hither, Leonato: What was it you told me of to-day? that your niece Beatrice was in love with fignior Benedick?

CLAUD. O, ay :-Stalk on, stalk on; the fowl fits." [Afide to PEDRO.] I did never think that lady would have loved any man.

LEON. No, nor I neither; but most wonderful, that she should fo dote on fignior Benedick, whom fhe hath in all outward behaviours feem'd ever to abhor.

6 Stalk on, falk on; the fowl fits.] This is an allufion to the falking-horfe; a horfe either real or factitious, by which the fowler anciently sheltered himself from the fight of the game. So, in The Honeft Lawyer, 1616:

"Lye there, thou happy warranted cafe

"Of any villain. Thou haft been my talking-borfe
"Now thefe ten months."

Again, in the 25th Song of Drayton's Polyolbion:

"One underneath his horfe to get a fhoot doth stalk.”

Again, in his Muses' Elyfium :

"Then underneath my horse, I ftalk my game to strike." STEEVENS. Again, in New Shreds of the Old Snare, by John Gee, quarto, p. 23: - Methinks I behold the cunning fowler, fuch as I have knowne in the fenne countries and els-where, that doe fhoot at woodcockes, fnipes, and wilde fowle, by fneaking behind a painted cloth which they carrey before them, having pictured in it the Shape of a horfe; which while the filly fowle gazeth on, it is knockt downe with hale fhot, and fo put in the fowler's budget." REED.

A ftalking-bull, with a cloth thrown over him, was fometimes ufed for deceiving the game; as may be feen from a very elegant cut in Loniceri Venatus et Aucupium. Francofurti, 1582, 4to. and from a print by F. Valeggio, with the motto

"Vefte boves operit, dum fturnos fallit edaces." DoUCE.