: In fortune's love for then, the bold and coward, NEST. With due observance of thy godlike seat, Great Agamemnon, Nestor shall apply 9 Thy latest words o. In the reproof of chance Upon her patient breast', making their way 6 - -affin'd] i. e. joined by affinity. The same adjective occurs in Othello: "If partially affin'd, or leagu'd in office." STEEVENS. 7 broad-] So the quarto. The folio reads-loud. JOHNSON. 8 With due observance of thy GODLIKE seat,] Goodly [the reading of the folio] is an epithet that carries no very great compliment with it; and Nestor seems here to be paying deference to Agamemnon's state and pre-eminence. The old books [the quartos] have it-to thy godly seat: godlike, as I have reformed the text, seems to me the epithet designed; and is very conformable to what Æneas afterwards says of Agamemnon : "Which is that god in office, guiding men?" So godlike seat is here, 'state supreme above all other commanders.' THEOBALD. This emendation Theobald might have found in the quarto, which has the godlike seat. JOHNSON. 66 - thy godlike seat." The throne in which thou sittest, "like a descended god." MALone. 9 - Nestor shall APPLY Thy latest words.] Nestor applies the words to another instance. JOHNSON. Perhaps Nestor means, that he will attend particularly to, and consider, Agamemnon's latest words. So, in an ancient interlude, entitled, The Nice Wanton, 1560: I breast. 66 0 ye children, let your time be well spent ; Applye your learning, and your elders obey." MALONE. PATIENT breast,] The quarto, not JOHNSON. so well-ancient With those of nobler bulk 2? But let the ruffian Boreas once enrage 3 The strong-ribb'd bark through liquid mountains cut, Bounding between the two moist elements, Like Perseus' horse: Where's then the saucy boat, 2 With those of nobler bulk ?] Statius has the same thought, though more diffusively expressed: Sic ubi magna novum Phario de littore puppis Invasitque vias; it eodem angusta phaselus Cymba minor, cum sævit hyems— et eodem volvitur austro. Mr. Pope has imitated the passage. STEEVENS. 3 But let the ruffian Boreas once enrage The gentle Thetis,] So, in Lord Cromwell, 1602: "When I have seen Boreas begin to play the ruffian with us, then would I down on my knees." MALONE. 4 Bounding between the two moist elements, Like Perseus' horse:] Mercury, according to the fable, presented Perseus with talaria, but we no where hear of his horse. The only flying horse of antiquity was Pegasus; and he was the property, not of Perseus, but Bellerophon. But our poet followed a more modern fabulist, the author of The Destruction of Troy, a book which furnished him with some other circumstances of this play. Of the horse alluded to in the text he found in that book the following account : 66 Of the blood that issued out [from Medusa's head] there engendered Pegasus, or the flying horse. By the flying horse that was engendered of the blood issued from her head, is understood, that of her riches issuing of that realme he [Perseus] founded and made a ship named Pegase,—and this ship was likened unto an horse flying," &c. 66 Again : By this fashion Perseus conquered the head of Medusa, and did make Pegase, the most swift ship that was in all the world." In another place the same writer assures us, that this ship, which he always calls Perseus' flying horse, "flew on the sea like unto a bird." Dest. of Troy, 4to. 1617, p. 155–164. MALONE. Whose weak untimber'd sides but even now And flies fled under shade, Why, then, the thing of courage", As rous'd with rage, rage, with rage doth sympathize, And with an accent turn'd in self-same key, Returns to chiding fortune. The foregoing note is a very curious one; and yet our author perhaps would not have contented himself with merely comparing one ship to another. Unallegorized Pegasus might be fairly styled Perseus' horse, because the heroism of Perseus had given him existence. So, in the fable of The Hors, the Shepe, and the Ghoos, printed by Caxton : "The stede of perseus was cleped pigase Whereas, ibid. a ship is called “ - an hors of tre." See University Library, Cambridge, D. 5. 42. STEEVENS. 5 by the BRIZE,] The brize is the gad or horse-fly. So, in Monsieur Thomas, 1639: 66 Have ye got the brize there? "Give me the holy sprinkle." Again, in Vittoria Corombona, or The White Devil, 1612: “I will put brize in his tail, set him a gadding presently." See note on Antony and Cleopatra, Act III. Sc. VIII. STEEVENS. 6 And flies fled under shade,] i. e. And flies are fled under shade. I have observed similar omissions in the works of many of our author's contemporaries. MALONE. 7 the thing of courage,] It is said of the tiger, that in storms and high winds he rages and roars most furiously. HANMER. 8 RETURNS to CHIDING fortune.] For returns, Hanmer reads replies, unnecessarily, the sense being the same. The folio and quarto have retires, corruptly. JOHNSON. So, in King Richard II.: "Northumberland, say--thus the king returns ———.” STEEVENS. ULYSS. Agamemnon, Thou great commander, nerve and bone of Greece, The which,-most mighty for thy place and sway,[To AGAMEMNON. And thou most reverend for thy stretch'd-out life,— Should with a bond of air (strong as the axletree' The emendation was made by Mr. Pope. Chiding is noisy, clamorous. So, in King Henry VIII. Act III. Sc. II. : "As doth a rock against the chiding flood." MAlone. See also vol. v. p. 297. STEEVENS. 9 - axletree-] This word was anciently contracted into a dissyllable. Thus in Beaumont and Fletcher's Bonduca : I 66 66 when the mountain "Melts under their hot wheels, and from their ax'trees speeches, which were such, As Agamemnon and the hand of Greece Should hold up high in brass; and such again, As venerable Nestor, HATCH'D IN SILVER, Should WITH A BOND OF AIR knit all the Greekish ears To his experienc'd tongue,] Ulysses begins his oration with praising those who had spoken before him, and marks the characteristick excellencies of their different eloquence,-strength, and sweetness, which he expresses by the different metals on which he recommends them to be engraven for the instruction of posterity. The speech of Agamemnon is such that it ought to be engraven in Thou great, and wise 2,-to hear Ulysses speak. brass, and the tablet held up by him on the one side, and Greece on the other, to show the union of their opinion. And Nestor ought to be exhibited in silver, uniting all his audience in one mind by his soft and gentle elocution. Brass is the common emblem of strength, and silver of gentleness. We call a soft voice a silver voice, and a persuasive tongue a silver tongue. I once read for hand, the band of Greece, but I think the text right. To hatch is a term of art for a particular method of engraving. Hacher, to cut, Fr. JOHNSON. In the description of Agamemnon's speech, there is a plain allusion to the old custom of engraving laws and publick records in brass, and hanging up the tables in temples, and other places of general resort. Our author has the same allusion in Measure for Measure, Act V. Sc. I. The Duke, speaking of the merit of Angelo and Escalus, says, that έσ it deserves with characters of brass A forted residence, 'gainst the tooth of time "And razure of oblivion So far therefore is clear. Why Nestor is said to be hatch'd in silver, is much more obscure. I once thought that we ought to read,-thatch'd in silver, alluding to his silver hair; the same metaphor being used by Timon, Act IV. Sc. IV. to Phryne and Timandra: "With burthens of the dead But know not whether the present reading may not be understood to convey the same allusion; as I find, that the species of engraving, called hatching, was particularly used in the hilts of swords. See Cotgrave in v. Haché; hacked, &c. also, Hatched, as the hilt of a sword; and in v. Hacher; to hacke, &c. also to hatch a hilt. Beaumont and Fletcher's Custom of the Country, vol. ii. p. 90: "When thine own bloody sword cried out against thee, As to what follows, if the reader should have no more conception than I have, of 66 a bond of air, strong as the axle-tree "On which heaven rides he will perhaps excuse me for hazarding a conjecture, that the true reading may possibly be : 66 a bond of awe--" The expression is used by Fairfax, in his 4th Eclogue, Muses Library, p. 368: 66 Unty these bonds of awe and cords of duty." After all, the construction of this passage is very harsh and irreVOL. VIII. S |