and make foul the clearnefs of our defervings, when of ourfelves we publish them. Count. What does this knave here? get you gone, firrah: the complaints, I have heard of you, I do not all believe; 'tis my flowness that I do not, for, I know, you lack not folly to commit them, and have ability enough to make fuch knaveries yours. Clo. "Tis not unknown to you, Madam, I am poor fellow. Count. Well, Sir. Cla. No, Madam; 'tis not fo well that I am poor, tho' many of the rich are damn'd; but if I have your Ladyfhip's good will to go to the world, Ifeel the woman and I will do as we may. Count. Wilt thou needs be a beggar ? Clo. I do beg your good will in this cafe. Clo. In Ibel's cafe, and mine own; fervice is no heritage, and, I think, I fhall never have the bleffing of God, 'till I have iffue o' my body; for they say, bearns are bleffings. Count. Tell me thy reason why thou wilt marry. Clo. My poor body, Madam, requires it. I am driven on by the flesh; and he must needs go, that the devil drives. Count. Is this all your worship's reason 3 : Cb. Faith, Madam, I have other holy reafons, fuch as they are. Count. May the world know them?: Ch. I have been, Madam, a wicked creature, as you and all flesh and blood are; and, indeed, I do marry, that I may repent. Count. Thy marriage, fooner than thy wickedness. Clo. I am out of friends, Madam, and I hope to have friends for my wife's fake. Count. Such friends are thine enemies, knave. Clo. Y' are fhallow, Madam, in great friends; for the knaves come to do that for me, which I am weary of; he, that cares my land, fpares my team, and gives me leave to inne the crop; if I be his cuckold, he'st my drudge; he, that comforts my wife, is the che rifher of my flesh and blood; he, that cherisheth my flesh and blood, loves my flesh and blood; he, that loves my flesh and blood, is my friend; ergo, he, that kiffes my wife, is my friend. If men could be contented to be what they are, there were no fear in marriage; for young Charbon the puritan, and old Poyfam the papist, howfoe'er their hearts are sever'd in religion, their heads are both one; they may jout. horns together, like any deer i' th' herd. Count. Wilt thou ever be a foul-mouth'd and calumnious knave ? Clo. A prophet, I, Madam; and I speak the truth the next way; "For I the ballad will repeat, which men full trud "fhall find; Your marriage comes by deftiny, your cuckow fings "by kind." Count. Get you gone, Sir, I'll talk with you more anon.. Stew. May it please you, Madam, that he bid Helen come to you; of her I am to speak. Count. Sirrah, tell my gentlewoman I would fpeak with her, Helen I mean. Clo. "Was this fair face the cause, quoth the (6), (6) Was this fair face the caufe, quotb fbe Why the Grecians facked Troy? [Singing 64 Was this King Priam's joy?] As the fianza, that follows, isin alternate rhyme, and as a rhyme is here wanting to be in the ft verfe; 'tis evident, the 3d line is wanting. The old folio's give us a part of it, but how to fupply the loft part, was the queftion. Mr. Rowe has given us the fragment honeftly, as he found it but Mr. Pope, rather than to feem founder'd, has funk it upon us.-I communicated to my ingenious friend Mr. Warburton how I.found the paffage in the old books, [Fond done, done, fond, Was this King Priam's joy?] And: "Why the Grecians facked Troy ? “With that she fighed as the flood (7), "And And from him I received that fupplement, which I have given to the text, and the following juftification of it. "I will firft proceed "to juftify my fenfe and emendation, and then account for the cor ruption. In the first place, 'tis plain, the laft line should not "have been read with an interrogation: For was Helen King "Priam's joy? No, furely, fhe was not. Who then? why, the "hiftorians tell us it was Paris, who was his favourite fon. And "how natural was it, when this be (whoever he was,) had faid, "was this the face that ruin'd Trey to fall into a moral reflection, and fay, what a fond deed was this! Priam's mifery proceeded " from him, that was his only joy. This is exactly agreeable to "the fimplicity of thofe ancient fongs as the phrafe, For Paris be is to their mode of locution. So far we have the genius of "the Ballad, hiftory, and the context, to make it probable. An "obfervation upon the ensuing fianza may make it clear to demon• › "Atration." : I will only fubjoin, in confirmation of my friend's ingenious con jecture, that, in The Maid in the Mill by Beaumont and Fletcher, I find a fcrap of another old ballad upon the fame subject, most nearly correfponding with ours. And here fair Paris comes, And gave this fentence then Among nine bad if one be good, There's yet one good in ten.] This 2d stanza is a joke turn'd' upon the women: a confeffion that there was one good in ten. Upon which the Countefs fays, "What! ir one good in ten! you corrupt the song, firrah."-This fhews, that the fenfe of the fong was, one bad only in ten; or, nine good in ten; and this clears up the mystery. The ad ftanza was certainly thus in the old ballad. With that he figbed as she flood, There's but one bad in ten. A vifible continuation of the thought, as amended, in the latter part of the firft ftanza: and it relates to the ten fons of Priam, who all behaved themselves well except this Paris. But why Priam's ten fons, may it not be afk'd, when univerfal tradition has given him fifty & "And gave this fentence then; Count. What, one good in ten? You corrupt the fong, firrah. Clo. One good woman in ten, Madam, which is a purifying o' th' fong: would, God would ferve the world fo all the year! we'd find no fault with the tithe-woman, if I were the parfon; one in ten, quoth; a! an we might have a good woman born but every blazing ftar, or at an earthquake, 'twould mend the lottery well; a man may draw his heart out, ere he pluck one. Count. You'll be gone, Sir knave, and do as I command you. Clo. That man that fhould be at a woman's com mand, and yet no hurt done! tho' honesty be no. puritan, yet it will do no hurt; it will wear the furplis of humility over the black gown of a big heart: I am going, forfooth, the bufinefs is for Helen to come. [Exit, hither. Count. Well, now. Stew, I know, Madam, you love your gentlewoman intirely. Count. Faith, I do; her father bequeath'd her to me; and fhe herfelf, without other advantages, may lawfully make title to as much love as the finds; there is more owing her, than is paid; and more shall be paid her, than fhe'll demand, Stew. Madam, I was very late more near her, than, I think, the with'd me; alone fhe was, and did.com. municate to herfelf her own words to her own ears ;: The thought, I dare vow for her, they touch'd not any, fifty? To this I reply, that, at the time of this unfortunate part of franger 14 franger fenfe. Her matter was, fhe lov'd your fon Fortune,, fhe faid, was no goddefs (8), that had put fuch difference betwixt their two eftates; Love, no god, that would not extend his might, only where qualities were level; Diana no Queen of virgins, that would fuffer her poor Knight to be furpriz'd without refcue in the firft affault, or ranfom afterward. This the deliver'd in the most bitter touch of forrow, that e'er I heard a virgin exclaim in; which I held it my duty speedily to acquaint you withal; fithence, in the lofs that may happen, it concerns you fomething to know it. Count. You have difcharg'd this honeftly, keep it to. yourself; many likelihoods inform'd me of this before, which hung fo tottering in the balance, that I could neither believe nor mifdoubt; pray you, leave me ; ftall this in your bofom, and I thank you for your honest care; I will speak with you further anon. Enter Helena. [Exit Stewards Count. Ev'n fo it was with me, when I was young ; If we ate nature's, these are ours: this thorn Doth to our rofe of youth rightly belong; Our blood to us, this to our blood, is born; (8) Fortune, fhe faid, was no goddess, &c. Love, no god, &c. tomplain'd against the Queen of virgins, &c.] This passage stands thus in the old copies. Love, no god, that would not extend bis might only where qualities. were level, Queen of virgins, that would fuffer ber poor Knight, &c. "Tis evident to every fenfible reader that fomething must have slip'á. out here, by which the meaning of the context is render'd defective, There are no traces for the words, [complain'd against the] which I take to have been first conjecturally fupply'd by Mr. Rowe. But the form of the fentence is intirely alter'd by their infertion; and they, at best, make but a botch. The Beward is speaking in the very words he overheard of the young Lady; fortune was no goodefs, the said, for one reason; love no god, for another; what could the chen more naturally fubjoin, than as I have amended in the text? Diana no Queen of virgins, that would suffer ber poor Knight to be furpriz'd without refcue, &c. For in poetical history Diana was as well known to prefide over cbafity, as Cupid over love, or Fortune over the obange ut regulation of our circumftances. It |