When, for fome trifling prefent, you have bid me And your great flow of debts. My lov'd lord, Tim. Let all my land be fold. Flav. 'Tis all engag'd, fome forfeited and gone; Tim. To Lacedæmon did my land extend. How quickly were it gone? Tim. You tell me true. Flav. If you fufpect my husbandry, or falfhood, * Return fo much,-] He does not mean fo great a fum, but a certain fum, as it might happen to be. Our author frequently ufes this kind of expreffion. See a note on the words" with so many talents," p. 54, n. 6. MALONE. 4 Though you bear now, (too late!) yet now's a time, The greatest of your having, &c.] Though you now at last liften to my remonftrances, yet now your affairs are in fuch a state that the whole of your remaining fortune will scarce pay half your debts. are therefore wife too late. Sir T. Hanmer reads: You Though you hear now, yet now's too late a time,and his emendation has been adopted in the late editions. But it is certainly unneceffary. MALONE. 5 What fball defend the interim? and at length How goes our reckoning] How will you be able to fubfift in the time intervening between the payment of the prefent demands (which your whole fubftance will hardly fatisfy) and the claim of future dues, for which you have no fund whatfoever; and finally on the fettlement of all accounts in what a wretched plight will you be? MALONE. 60 my good lord, the world is but a word;] The meaning is, as the world itself may be comprised in a word, you might give it away in a breath. WARBURTON, Call Call me before the exacteft auditors, And fet me on the proof. So the gods blefs me, With riotous feeders'; when our vaults have wept And fet mine eyes at flow. Tim. Pr'ythee, no more. Flav. Heavens, have I faid, the bounty of this lord! How many prodigal bits have fiaves, and peasants, This night englutted! Who is not Timon's? What heart, head, fword, force, means, but is lord Timon's? Great Timon, noble, worthy, royal Timon? 7 With riotous feeders ;] Feeders are fervants, whofe low debauche ries are practifed in the offices of a house. See a note on Antony and Cleopatra, A& III. fc. xi: « -one who looks on feeders." It appears that what we now call offices, were anciently called beufes of offices. So, in Chaucer's Clerkes Tale, late edit. v. 8140: "Houfes of office ftuffed with plentee "Ther mayft thou fee of deinteous vittaille." STEEVENS. 8 -a wafieful cock,] i. e. a cockloft, a garret. And a wasteful cock, fignifies a garret lying in wafte, neglected, put to no use. HANMER. Hanmer's explanation is received by Dr. Warburton, yet I think them both apparently mistaken. A wafteful cock is a cock or pipe with a turning ftopple running to wafte. In this fenfe, both the terms have their ufual meaning; but I know not that cock is ever used for cockloft. or wafteful for lying in wafte, or that lying in waste is at all a phrase. JOHNSON. Whatever be the meaning of the prefent paffage, it is certain, that lying in wafte is still a very common phrafe. FARMER. A wafteful cock is what we now call a wafe pipe; a pipe which is continually running, and thereby prevents the overflow of cifterns and other refervoirs, by carrying off their fuperfluous water. This circumftance ferved to keep the idea of Timon's unceafing prodigality in the mind of the fteward, while its remotenefs from the fcenes of luxury within the house, was favourable to meditation. COLLINS. The reader will have a perfect notion of the method taken by Mr. Pope in his edition, when he is informed that, for wasteful cock, that editor reads lonely room. MALONE, The The breath is gone whereof this praife is made: Tim. Come, fermon me no further: No villainous bounty yet hath pafs'd my heart; Why dost thou weep? Canft thou the confcience lack, And try the argument of hearts by borrowing, Flav. Affurance blefs your thoughts! Tim. And, in fome fort, thefe wants of mine are crown'd, That I account them bleffings; for by these Shall I try friends: You fhall perceive, how you Enter FLAMINIUS, SERVILIUs, and other Servants. Tim. I will dispatch you feverally,-You, to lord Lu 9 No villainous bounty yet bath pass'd my beart; Unwifely, not ignobly, bave I given.] Every reader must rejoice in this circumflance of comfort which prefents itself to Timon, who, although beggar'd through want of prudence, confoles himself with reflection that his ruin was not brought on by the purfuit of guilty pleafures. STEEVENS. And try the argument-] The licentioufnefs of our author forces us often upon far fetched expofitions. Arguments may mean contents, as the arguments of a book; or for evidences and proofs. JOHNSON. The matter contained in a poem or play was in our author's time commonly thus denominated. The contexts of his Rape of Lucrece, which he certainly published himself, he calls The Argument. Hence undoubtedly his ufe of the word. If I would, fays Timon, by borrowing, try of what men's hearts are compofed, what they bave in them, &c. The old copy reads-argument, not, as Dr. Johnson fuppofed, arguments. MALONE. 2 — Flaminius !—] The old copy has Flavius. The correction was made by Mr. Rowe. The error probably arole from Fla. only being, fet down in the M. MALONE. 1 cius, cius, to lord Lucullus you; I hunted with his honour to-day;-You, to Sempronius ;-commend me to their loves; and, I am proud, fay, that my occafions have found time to use them toward a fupply of money: let the request be fifty talents. Flam. As you have faid, my lord. Flav. Lord Lucius, and Lucullus? humph! [Afide. Tim. Go you, fir, [to another Serv.] to the fenators, (Of whom, even to the ftate's best health, I have Deferv'd this hearing,) bid 'em fend o' the inftant A thousand talents to me. Flav. I have been bold, (For that I knew it the moft general way 3,) Tim. Is't true? can it be? Flav. They answer, in a joint and corporate voice, That now they are at fall, want treasure, cannot Do what they would; are forry-you are honourable,— But yet they could have wifh'd-they know notSomething hath been amiss-a noble nature May catch a wrench-would all were well-'tis pityAnd fo, intending other ferious matters 4, After diftafteful looks, and these hard fractions", 3 - I knew it the most general way,)] General is not speedy, but compendious, the way to try many at a time. JOHNSON. ← — intending-] is regarding, turning their notice to other things. JOHNSON. To intend and to attend had anciently the fame meaning. So, in the Spanish Curate of Beaumont and Fletcher : "Good fir, intend this bufinefs." STEEVENS. So, in Wits, Fits, and Fancies, &c. 1595: "Tell this man that I am going to dinner to my lord maior, and that I can not now intend his tittle-tattle." Again, in Pafquil's Night-Cap, a poem, 1623: "For we have many fecret ways to spend, "Which are not fit our husbands fhould intend." MALONE. 5-and thefe hard fractions,] Broken hints, interrupted fentences, abrupt remarks. JOHNSON. With certain half-caps, and cold-movings nods", Tim. You gods reward them! 'Pr'ythee, man, look cheerly: Thefe old fellows have Their ingratitude in them hereditary": Their blood is cak'd, 'tis cold, it seldom flows; 'Tis lack of kindly warmth, they are not kind; And nature, as it grows again toward earth, Is fashion'd for the journey, dull, and heavy o.- Thou art true, and honeft; ingenuously I fpeak, I clear'd him with five talents: Greet him from me; Touches his friend', which craves to be remember'd Cold-moving is the fame as coldly-moving. Somperpetual fober gods, for-perpetually fober; lazy-pacing clouds,-loving-jealous, flattering-fweet, &c.—Such diftant and uncourteous falutations are properly termed cold-moving, as proceeding from a cold and unfriendly difpofition. MALONE. 8 in them hereditary :] Hereditary, for by natural constitution. But fome diftempers of natural conftitution being called bereditary, he calls their ingratitude fo. WARBURTON. 9 And nature, as it grows again toward earth, Is fashion'd for the journey, dull and heavy.-] The fame thought eccurs in The Wife for a Month of Beaumont and Fletcher: "Befide, the fair foul's old too, it grows covetousy "And we are earth again." STEEVENS. Bid bim fuppofe, fome good neceffity Touches bis friend,] Good, as it may afford Ventidius an opportunity of exercifing his bounty, and relieving his friend, in return for his former kindness: or, fome boneft necellity, not the confequence of a villainous and ignoble bounty. I rather think this latter is the Dieaning. MALONE. VOL. VIII. E With |