in his own greafe.'-Did you ever hear the like? MRS. PAGE. Letter for letter; but that the name of Page and Ford differs!-To thy great comfort in this mystery of ill opinions, here's the twinbrother of thy letter: but let thine inherit first; for, I proteft, mine never fhall. I warrant, he hath a thousand of thefe letters, writ with blank space for different names, (fure more,) and these are of the fecond edition: He will print them out of doubt; for he cares not what he puts into the prefs,* when he would put us two. I had rather be a giantefs, and lie under mount Pelion. Well, I will find you twenty lafcivious turtles, ere one chafte man. MRS. FORD. Why, this is the very fame; the very hand, the very words: What doth he think of us? MRS. PAGE. Nay, I know not: It makes me almost ready to wrangle with mine own honefty. I'll entertain myfelf like one that I am not acquainted withal; for, fure, unless he knew fome ftrain in. me, that I know not myself, he would never have boarded me in this fury. 6 3 melted him in his own greafe.] So Chaucer, in his Wif of Bathes Prologue, 6069: "That in his owen grefe I made him frie." STEEVENS. 4 prefs,] Prefs is used ambiguously, for a press to print, and a press to fqueeze. JOHNSON. 5 I had rather be a giantess, and lie under mount Pelion.] Mr. Warton judiciously obferves, that in confequence of English verfions from Greek and Roman authors, an inundation of claffical pedantry very foon infeâed our poetry, and that perpetual allufions to ancient fable were introduced, as in the prefent inftance, without the leaft regard to propriety; for Mrs. Page was not intended, in any degree, to be a learned or an affeded lady. STEEVENS. 6 fome train in me,] Thus the old copies. The modern editors read—" some fain in me," but, I think, unneceffarily. A fimilar expreffion occurs in The Winter's Tale: MRS. FORD. Boarding, call you it? I'll be fure to keep him above deck. MRS. PAGE. So will I; if he come under my hatches, I'll never to fea again. Let's be revenged on him: let's appoint him a meeting; give him a show of comfort in his fuit; and lead him on with a fine-baited delay, till he hath pawn'd his horses to mine Hoft of the Garter. MRS. FORD. Nay, I will confent to act any villainy against him, that may not fully the charinefs of our honefty.' O, that my hufband faw this letter! it would give eternal food to his jealoufy. MRS. PAGE. Why, look, where he comes; and my good man too: he's as far from jealoufy, as I am from giving him cause; and that, I hope, is an unmeasurable distance. MRS. FORD. You are the happier woman. MRS. PAGE. Let's confult together against this greafy knight: Come hither. [they retire. Enter FORD, PISTOL, PAGE, and NYм. FORD. Well, I hope, it be not fo. PIST. Hope is a curtail dog in fome affairs: With what encounter fo uncurrent have I And again, in Timon: a noble nature May catch a wrench." STEEVENS. 7 the charinefs of our honesty.] i. e. the caution which ought to attend on it. STEEVENS. 8 O, that my husband faw this letter!] Surely Mrs. Ford does not wish to excite the jealoufy of which fhe complains. I think we should read-0, if my husband, &c. and thus the copy, 1619: "O lord, if my husband fhould fee the letter! i' faith, this would even give edge to his jealoufie." STEEVENS. 9 curtail dog-j That is, a dog that miffes his game. The tail is counted neceffary to the agility of a greyhound. JOHNSON. Sir John affects thy wife. FORD. Why, fir, my wife is not young. 3 Both young and old, one with another, Ford; PIST. With liver burning hot: Prevent, or go curtail-dog-] that is, a dog of fmall value;-what we now call a cur. MALONE. 3 gally-mawfry; ] i. e. A medley. So, in The Winter's Tale: They have a dance, which the wenches fay is a gallimaufry of gambols." Piftol ludicrously uses it for a woman. Thus, in A Woman never vex'd, 1632: "Let us fhow ourselves gallants or galli-maufries." STEEVENS. The firft folio has-the gallymaufry. Thy was introduced by the editor of the fecond. The gallymawfry may be right: He loves a medley; all forts of women, high and low, &c. Ford's reply, "Love my wife!" may refer to what Piftol had faid before: "Sir John affects thy wife." Thy gallymawfry founds however more like Piftol's language than the other; and therefore I have followed the modern editors in preferring it. MALONE. -Ford, perpend. ] This is perhaps a ridicule on a pompous word too often ufed in the old play of Cambyfes: Again': My fapient words I fay perpend.” "My queen perpend what I pronounce." Shakspeare has put the fame word into the mouth of Polonius. STEEVENS Pistol again uses it in K. Henry V.; fo does the Clown in Twelfth Night: I do not believe therefore that any ridicule was here aimed at Prefton, the author of Cambyfes. MALone. 5 With liver burning hot:] So, in Much ado about Nothing: "If ever love had intereft in his liver." The liver was anciently fuppofed to be the infpirer of amorous paffions. Thus in an old Laun diftich: Cor ardet, pulmo loquitur, fel commovet iras; Splen ridere facit, cogit amare jecur. STEEVENS. Like Sir A&tæon he, with Ring-wood at thy heels:--O, odious is the name! FORD. What name, fir? PIST. The horn, I fay: Farewel. Take heed; have open eye; for thieves do foot by night: Take heed, ere fummer comes, or cuckoo-birds do fing.. Away, fir corporal Nym. Believe it, Page; he fpeaks fenfe.' [Exit PISTOL. FORD. I will be patient; I will find out this. cuckoo-birds do fing.] Such is the reading of the folio. The quartos, 1602, and 1619, read-when cuckoo-birds appear. The modern editors-when cuckoo-birds affright. For this laft reading I find no authority. STEEVENS. Away for corporal Nym. Believe it, Page; he speaks fenfe.] Nym, I believe, is out of place, and we should read thus : Away, fir corporal. Nym. Believe it, Page; he speaks fenfe. JOHNSON. Perhaps Dr. Johnson is mistaken in his conje&ure. He seems not to have been aware of the manner in which the author meant this scene should be reprefented. Ford and Piftol, Page and Nym, enter in pairs, each pair in feparate converfation; and while Pistol is informing Ford of Falftaff's defign upon his wife, Nym is, during that time, talking afide to Page, and giving information of the like plot against him.-When Pistol has finifhed, he calls out to Nym to come away; but feeing that he and Page are ftill in clofe debate, he goes off alone, firft affuring Page, he may depend on the truth of Nym's ftory. Believe it, Page, &c. Nym then proceeds to tell the remainder of his tale out aloud. And this is true, &c. A little further on in this fcene, Ford fays to Page, You heard what this knave (i. e. Piftol) told me, &c. Page replies, Yes; And you heard what the other (i. e. Nym.) told me. STEEVENS. Believe it, Page; he speaks fenfe. Thus has the paffage been hitherto printed, fays Dr. Farmer; but furely we fhould readBelieve it, Page, he speaks; which means no more than-Page, believe what he fays. This fenfe is expreffed not only in the manner peculiar to Pifol, but to the grammar of the times. VOL. V. F STEEVENS NYM. And this is true; [to Page.] I like not the humour of lying. He hath wrong'd me in fome humours: I fhould have borne the humour'd letter to her; but I have a fword, and it fhall bite upon my neceflity. He loves your wife; there's the fhort and the long. My name is corporal Nym; Ispeak, and I avouch. 'Tis true: my name is Nym, and Falstaff loves your wife.-Adieu! I love not the humour of bread and cheese; and there's the humour of it. [Exit NYM. PAGE. The humour of it quoth 'a! here's a fellow frights humour out of his wits. Adieu. 9 8 I have a fword, and it shall bite upon my neceffity. He loves your wife; &c.] Nym, to gain credit, fays, that he is above the mean office of carrying love-letters; he has nobler means of living; he has a sword, and upon his neceffity, that is, when his need drives him to unlawful expedients his fword Jhall bite. JOHNSON. 9 The humor of it,] The following epigram, taken from Hu mor's Ordinarie, where a man may bee verie merrie and exceeding well fed for his fixpence, quarto, 1607, will beft account for Nym's frequent repetition of the word humour. Epig. 27: "Afk HUMORS what a feather he doth weare, It is his humour (by the Lord) he'll fweare; Why in the top-throte fashion he doth goe, "What cause his purfe is fo extreame diftreft 66 Object why bootes and fpurres are ftill in season, |