The

change of a single tense, (wash'd for washes, the omission of the useless copulatives ans) and question of Leonine, and the reply of Marina, which were introduced after the words,

are just as proper

burst the deck,

former

"situation but do not, as now arranged, interrupt the narrative of Marina. STEEVENS

sigion P. 651. 15. They skip from stem to stern: The old copies read→ From stern to stern. But we certainly ought to read - From stem to stern.

3

MALONE.
LITONY OF

P56 1. 24, 25, These roving thieves serve the great pirate Valdes"}] Old copyroguing. The Spanish armada, I believe, famished our author with this name. I Don Pedro de Valdes was au admiral in that fleet, and had the command of the great galleon of Andalu sia. His ship being disabled, he was taken by Sir Francis Drake, on the twenty-second of July, 1598, and sent to Dartmouth. This play therefore, we may conclude, was not written till after that pe riod. The making one of this Spaniard's ances tors a pirate, was probably relished by the au dience in those days. MALONE.

In Robert Greene's Spanish Masquerado, 158098 the curious reader may find a very particular account of this Valdes, who was commander of the Andalusian troops, and then prisoner in England, STEEVENS.

We should probably read → These roving thie-* The idea of roguery is necessarily implied in the word thieves. M. MASON.

aves

P. 57, 1. 17. 18. If there be not a conscience to be us'd in every trade, we shall never prosper.} The sentiments incident to vicious professions suffer VOL. XVIII.

18

#hittle change within a century and a half.

This speech is much the same as that of Mother Cole, In The Minor: "Tip him an old trader! Mercy sd on us, where do you expect to go when you die, Mr. Loader?" STEEVENS.

P. 57, 4. 22. Boult, Ay, to eleven, and brought them down again. ] I have brought up (i. e. bas educated) says the Bawd, some eleven. Yes, (answers Boult) to eleven, (i. e. as far as eleven age) and then brought them down again, 19 years of The *** latter clause of the sentence requires no explanation. STEEVENS. P. 57, 1. 27. 28. they're too unwholesome o'conscience.] The old copies read- there's two unwholesome o' conscience. The preceding dialogue shows that they are erroneous. The complaint had not been made of two, but of all the stuff they had. According to the present regulation, the pander merely assents to o what his wife had said. The words two and too are perpetually confounded in the old copies. MALONE,

And by foreigners, I have seen in MS. an elegant English letter of Voltaire, addressed to Mr. Cradule in his tragedy of Zobeide, in which to is written for two. NICHOLS.

P. 58, 1. 6. nor the commodity wages not with the danger:] i, e. is not equal to it. Several examples of this expression are given in former notes on our author. STEEVENS.

P. 58, 1.8.9. to keep our door hatch'd.] The doors or hatches of brothels, in the time of our author, seem to have had some distinguishing mark. So in Cupid's Whirligig, 1607: "Set some picks upon your hatch, and, I pray, profess to keep a bawdy-house."

Prefixed to an old pamphlet entitled Holland's Leaguer, 4to. 1632, is a representation of a celebrated brothel on the Bank-side near the Globe playhouse from which the above cut has been iw made. We have bere the hatch exactly delineated.s The man with the pole-ax was called the Ruffian. MALONE.

The precept from Cupid's Whirligig, and the passage in Pericles to which it refers, were originally applied by me to the illustration of the a term Picthatch in The Merry Wives of Windsor.

A hatch is a half-door, usually placed within a atreet-door admitting people into the entry of

house, but preventing their access to its lower apartments, or its stair case. Thus, says the Sy racusan Dromio in The Comedy of Errors, to the Dromio of Ephesus:

Too Lither get thee from the door, or sit da sdgilt vd de grond down at the hatch." When the top of a hatch was guarded by a row of pointed iron spikes, no person could reach over, and undo sits fastening, which was always within side, and near its bottom.lk

This domestick portcullis perhaps was necessary to our ancient brothels. Secured within such a barrier, Mrs. Overdone could parley with her cus tomers; refuse admittance to the shabby visitor, bargain with the rich gallant, defy the beadle, or keep the constable at bay.

From having been therefore her usual defence, the hatch at last became an unequivocal denoterment of her trade; for though the hatch with a flat top was a constant attendant on butteries in great families, colleges, &c. the hatch with spikes on it was peculiar to our early houses of amorous entertain→ ment. Nay as I am assured by Mr. Walsh, (a native of Ireland, and one of the compositors engaged on the last edition of Shakspeare, the ens tries to the Royal, Halifax, and Dublin bagnios vin the city of Dublin, still derive convenience or (ses curity from hatches, the spikes of which are uns surmountable.

This long explanations (tos many readershunnes cessary) is imputable to the preceding wooden outy from the repetition of which I might have excused myself. As it is possible, however, that I may stand in the predicament of poor Sancho, who could not discern the enchanted castles that were so distinctly visible to his master's opticks, I have

where L

left our picture of an ancient brothel, wh found it. It certainly exhibits a house, a lofty door, a wicket with a grate in it, a row of garden rails, and a drawbridge. As for hatch let my

readers try if they can find one.

I must suppose, that my ingenious fellow-labourer on future consideration, will class his hatch with the air-drawn dagger, and join with me in Macbeth's exclamation"There's no such thing.

Let me add, that if the Ruffian (as here represented) was an ostensible appendage to brothels, they must have been regulated on very uncommon principles; for instead of holding out al allurements, they must have exhibited terrors. Surely, the Ruffian could never have appeared I nisi dignus vindice nodus inciderat, till his presence became necessary to extort the wages of prostitution, or secure some other advantave to his employer.

The representation prefixed to Holland's Leaguer, has therefore, in my opinion, no more authenticity to boast of, than the contemporary wooden cuts illustrative of the Siege of Troy. STEEVENS, P. 58, 1. 12. other sorts offend as well as we.I From her husband's answer, I suspect the poet wrote Other trades, &c. MALONE.

Malone suspects t that we should read other trades, but that is unnecessary; the word sorts has the same sense, and means professions or conditions of life, M MASON!İW

P. 58, 129. I have gone thorough for this iece have bid a high price for her, gone piece, far in my attempt purchase her. STEEVENS. T. 58, 1, 29, Boult. I cannot be bated one doit of a thousand pieces.] Pieces. This speech shou should seem to suit the Pirate. However, it may belong to