NOTES.

THE list of Dramatis Persona was first prefixed to the play by Rowe in 1709. It is not found in the quartos or folios.

ACT I.

Scene I.

In the quartos the play is not divided into acts and scenes.

The division

was first made in the folio of 1623, Actus Primus, Scena Prima,' &c., but only as far as the second scene of the second act.

No indication of the place of each scene is given in the quartos and folios. 2. me. Emphatic.

3. Long live the king! The watchword for the night.

6. upon your hour. An unusual phrase, meaning 'just as your hour is about to strike.' Compare Richard III, iii. 2. 5, upon the stroke of four,' and in the same play, iv. 2. 115, 'upon the stroke of ten.' See also Measure for Measure, iv. I. 17, 'much upon this time have I promised here to meet.' As Francisco speaks the clock is heard striking midnight.

7. For now struck Steevens guessed 'new struck,' which Elze inserted in his text.

8. much thanks. For this use of 'much' with a noun of plural form, compare Luke xii. 19, 'Thou hast much goods laid up for many years.' 'Much,' like the A.S. micel, mycel, mucel, from which it is derived, was once used not only, as it is now, with abstract or collective nouns, but generally in the sense of great.' So in Richard III, iii. 7. 159, Yet so much is my poverty of spirit,' and Measure for Measure, v. I. 534, Thy much goodness.' Abbott's Shakespeare Grammar, § 51.

6

Ib. bitter cold. Here bitter' is used adverbially to qualify the adjective 'cold.' So we have 'daring hardy' in Richard II, i. 3. 43. Where the combination is likely to be misunderstood, modern editors generally put a hyphen between the two words.

6

9. sick at heart. So Macbeth, v. 3. 19, 'I am sick at heart.' We have also in Love's Labour's Lost, ii. 1. 185, sick at the heart,' and Romeo and Juliet, iii. 3. 72, heart-sick groans.'

13. rivals. It is remarkable that the quarto of 1603 gives ‘partners,' which is the meaning of 'rivals' here. 'Rivals' originally meant those who

dwelt by the same rivus' or stream, having a right to use it for purposes of irrigation. Hence frequent contentions, and hence the metaphorical sense of the word, so much more used both in Latin and modern languages. This is the only passage of Shakespeare in which the word is employed in its earlier and rarer sense. He has however 'rivality,' meaning 'partnership,' in Antony and Cleopatra, iii. 5. 8, Cæsar, having made use of him in the wars 'gainst Pompey, presently denied him rivality; would not let him partake in the glory of the action.' Ritson quotes from Heywood's Rape of Lucrece (sig. E2 recto, ed. 1630),

Tullia. Aruns, associate him.

Aruns. A riuall with my brother in his honours.'

And The Tragedy of Hoffman,

And make thee rival in those governments.'

2. 322.

See i. 2. 44.

15. the Dane, i. e. the chief Dane, the King of Denmark. So 'the Turk,' for the Grand Turk,' in Henry V, v. 16. Give you, i. e. ' God give you.' This seems a more probable ellipsis than I,' which is suggested by Delius. We do not find the complete phrase 'I give you good night,' or 'I give you good morning,' but we have many examples of the other, as Romeo and Juliet, i. 2. 59, 'God gi' god-den,' i. e. 'God give good even,' and Love's Labour's Lost, iv. 2. 84, 'God give you good morrow, master parson.' Compare Beaumont and Fletcher's Knight of the Burning Pestle, epilogus, God give you good night.' We have examples of the same ellipsis in the phrases, 'Bless you,' 'Save you,' for 'God bless you,' 'God save you.' The omission of 'I' before such words as 'pray' is not a parallel case.

19. A piece of him. This is, of course, said jestingly. But the German editor Tschischwitz finds a deeper meaning. 'The philosophic Horatio,' he says, ' regards the personality of a man in his merely physical aspect as only a part of himself.' Another editor, Max Moltke, takes the same view. He supposes that Horatio, being a sceptic as to the reality of the Ghost, does not bring with him that belief which predominates in and fills the whole being of Bernardo and Marcellus, and thus the whole Horatio is not present but only a piece of him.

21. What. As in line 19, an exclamation, not interrogation. Cæsar, ii. I. I: 'What, Lucius, ho!'

So Julius

23. fantasy, imagination. Both 'fantasy' and 'fancy' are commonly used by Shakespeare in this sense. The former is however found in the

modern sense of whim,'' caprice,' in Othello, iii. 3. 299:

'I nothing, but to please his fantasy.'

25. seen of us. The quarto of 1603 has seen by us.' This use of the preposition of' is frequent, as in 1 Corinthians xv. 5-8, 'seen of Cephas,' &c., and with other participles, Luke xiv. 8, and I Corinthians xi. 32.

29. approve, prove, attest, corroborate. See Merchant of Venice, iii. 2. 79:

'What damned error, but some sober brow
Will bless it and approve it with a text?'

33. What we have two nights seen. A comma is usually placed after 'story,' and the construction is as if 'let us tell you' had been used instead of 'let us assail your ears.' It is an instance of what the Greek grammarians called σχῆμα πρὸς τὸ σημαινόμενον. But we may omit the comma, and take 'what...seen' as an epexegesis of 'story.'

36. yond. This word, used as an adjective or adverb, is spelt indifferently in either sense, 'yond' or 'yon.'

37. illume. Not used elsewhere by Shakespeare. We have however ‘relume,' Othello, v. 2. 13.

39. beating, striking. The quarto of 1603 has towling.'

42. a scholar, i. e. able to speak Latin, in which language the formula of exorcism prescribed by the Church were of course written. See Much Ado about Nothing, ii. 1. 264, ' I would to God some scholar would conjure her.' Reed quotes Beaumont and Fletcher's Night Walker, ii. 1,

'It grows still longer;

"Tis steeple-high now .....

Let's call the butler up, for he speaks Latin,

And that will daunt the devil.'

'In like manner,' continues Reed, the honest butler in Mr. Addison's Drummer recommends the steward to speak Latin to the ghost in that play.' In Guy Mannering, ch. xlvi, Dominie Sampson endeavours to exorcise Meg Merrilies by his Latin.

44. harrows. See i. 5. 16.

45. It would be spoke to. It wishes to be spoken to.

There was, and is,

a notion that a ghost cannot speak till it has been spoken to. For this form of the participle spoke,' see our note on Macbeth, i. 4. 3, and on Richard II, iii. 1. 13.

49. sometimes. Here used, as in Richard II, i. 2. 54, and v. 5. 75, in the sense of 'sometime.'

55. on 't, of it. See King Lear, i. 4. 114: 'Why, this fellow has banished two on 's daughters.'

56. might not, could not.

Measure for Measure, ii. 2. 53:

Compare Hamlet, i. 2. 141, ii. 2. 132, and

'Ang. Look, what I will not, that I cannot do.

Isab. But might you do 't and do the world no wrong?'

So 'may' for 'can,' Merchant of Venice, i. 3. 7, ' May you pleasure me?' Abbott, § 312.

57. avouch does not occur elsewhere as a substantive in Shakespeare. For substantives of similar formation, see our note on Richard II, i. 2. 2, and Abbott, § 451. See also 'cast' in line 73 of the present scene, 'hatch' and 'disclose' in iii. 1. 166, and remove,' iv. 5. 62.

61. Norway, i. e. the King of Norway, as in i. 2. 28. So also Tempest,

i. 2. 109, absolute Milan,' i. e. Duke of Milan.

France' and 'England' repeatedly.

62. parle, parley. See note on Richard II, i. 1. 192.

So in the Histories

63. sledded, from 'sled.' Cotgrave (French Dict.) gives · Train, a sled, a drag or dray without wheeles.'

·

Ib. Polacks. The quartos have 'pollax,' the two earliest folios Pollax," the third Polax,' the fourth Poleaxe.' Pope read Polack,' and Malone 'Polacks.' The word occurs four times in Hamlet. For the sledded Polacks' Moltke reads 'his leaded pole-axe.' But this would be an anticlimax, and the poet having mentioned 'Norway' in the first clause, would certainly have told us with whom the 'angry parle' was held.

65. jump. So the quartos. The folios have just,' which means the same thing. We have the former word in Othello, ii. 3. 392, 'And bring him jump when he may Cassio find.'

And again in Hamlet, v. 2. 359,

'So jump upon this bloody question.'

Ib. dead. See Measure for Measure, iv. 2. 67 :

'Tis now dead midnight.'

67, 68. I know not what special line of thought to follow, but in the general tendency of my views, &c.

68. in the gross.

gross.'

Compare Merchant of Venice, iii. 2. 160, to term in

Ib. scope, field of view, range. Compare King John, v. 2. 122: 'And, as you answer, do I know the scope

And warrant limited unto my tongue.'

70. Good now. Compare Winter's Tale, v. i. 19:

72. toils, causes to toil. Many verbs which we only use as intransitive were used in Shakespeare's time also as transitive, e. g. ' to fear,'' to learn,' 'to cease,' 'to remember,' and some which we only use as transitive were used as intransitive also, e. g. 'to show,' 'to want,'' to look.'

that Ends Well, iii. 6. 115.)

(All's Well

Ib. the subject, used collectively for 'the people,' as in i. 2. 33. Compare Measure for Measure, iii. 2. 145: The greater file of the subject held the duke to be wise.' In a similar use we have the general,' Hamlet, ii. 2. 423.

73. cast, casting. See line 57, and compare impress,' line 75, and 'know' for knowing,' the reading of the folios in v. 2. 44.

74. mart, market, marketing, purchasing. See Taming of the Shrew, ii. I. 329: And venture madly on a desperate mart,' where it means a mercantile expedition.