With Henry's death, the English circle ends; Now am I like that proud insulting ship, CHAR. Was Mahomet inspired with a dove?" in Ariofto's Orlando Furiofo, Book VIII. ft. 63, of Sir John Harrington's trauslation : "As circles in a water cleare are spread, "When funne doth shine by day, and moone by night, "Succeeding one another in a ranke, "Till all by one and one do touch the banke." I meet with it again in Chapman's Epiftle Dedicatorie, prefixed to his version of the Iliad: As in a spring, "The plyant water, mov'd with any thing "In perfect circles, that moue round about And the fame image is much expanded by Sylvefter, the tranflator of Du Bartas, 3d part of 2d day of ila week. ❝ like that proud infulting fhip, HOLT WHITE. Which Cafar and his fortune bare at once.] This alludes to a paffage in Plutarch's Life of Julius Cæfar, thus tranflated by Sir Thomas North: "Cæfar hearing that, ftraight discovered himselfe unto the maifter of the pynnafe, who at the first was amazed when he saw him; but Cæfar, &c. faid unto him, Good fellow, be of good cheere, &c. and fear not, for thou haft Cæfar and his fortune with thee." STEEVENS. ' Was Mahomet inspired with a dove?] Mahomet had a dove," which he used to feed with wheat out of his ear; which dove, when it was hungry, lighted on Mahomet's fhoulder, and thruft its bill in to find its breakfaft; Mahomet perfuading the rude and fimple Arabians, that it was the Holy Ghoft that gave him advice." See Sir Walter Raleigh's Hiftory of the World, Book I. P. I. ch. vi. Life of Mahomet, by Dr. Prideaux. GREY. Nor yet Saint Philip's daughters,] Meaning the four daughters of Philip mentioned in the Acts. HANMER. Bright ftar of Venus, fall'n down on the earth, How may I reverently worship thee enough?? ALEN. Leave off delays, and let us raise the fiege. REIG. Woman, do what thou canft to fave our honours ; Drive them from Orleans, and be immortaliz'd. CHAR. Presently we'll try :-Come, let's away about it: No prophet will I trust, if she prove falfe. [Exeunt. SCENE III. London. Hill before the Tower. Enter, at the Gates, the Duke of GLOSTER, with his Serving-men, in blue Coats. GLO. I am come to furvey the Tower this day; Since Henry's death, I fear, there is conveyance.'Where be these warders, that they wait not here? Open the gates; Glofter it is that calls. [Servants knock, 1 WARD. [Within.] Who is there that knocks fo imperiously? 1 SERV. It is the noble duke of Glofter, 9 How may Ireverently worship thee enough ?] Perhaps this unmetrical line originally ran thus: How may I reverence, worship thee enough? The climax rifes properly, from reverence, to worship. STEEVENS. I - there is conveyance.] Conveyance means theft. " HANMER. Convey the So Piftol, in The Merry Wives of Windfor: wife it call: Steal! foh; a fico for the phrafe." STEEVENS. 2 WARD. [Within.] Whoe'er he be, you may not be let in. 1 SERV. Answer you fo the lord protector, villains? 1 WARD. [Within.] The Lord protect him! so we anfwer him: We do no otherwise than we are will'd. GLO. Who willed you? or whose will stands, but mine? There's none protector of the realm, but I.- Servants rush at the Tower Gates. Enter, to the Gates, WOODVILLE, the Lieutenant. WOOD. [Within.] What noife is this? what traitors have we here? GLO. Lieutenant, is it you, whofe voice I hear? Open the gates; here's Glofter, that would enter. WOOD. [Within.] Have patience, noble duke; I may not open; 2 Break up the gates,] I fuppofe to break up the gate is to force up the portcullis, or by the application of petards to blow up the gates themselves. STEEVENS. 66 To break up in Shakspeare's age was the fame as to break open. Thus, in our tranflation of the Bible: They have broken up, and have paffed through the_gate.' Micah, ii. 13. So again, in St. Matthew, xxiv. 43: " He would have watched, and would not have fuffered his houfe to be broken up.” Some one has proposed to read- Break ope the gates, WHALLEY. but the old copy is right. So Hall, HENRY VI. folio 78, b: "The lufty Kentishmen hopyng on more friends, brake up the gaytes of the King's Bench and Marthalfea," &c. MALONE. The cardi, al of Winchester forbids: From him I have express commandement, Arrogant Winchester? that haughty prelate, brook? Thou art no friend to God, or to the king: 1 SERV. Open the gates unto the lord protector; Or we'll burst them open, if that you come not quickly. Enter WINCHESTER, attended by a Train of Servants in tawny Coats.3 3 WIN. How now, ambitious Humphry? what means this ?4 tawny coats.] It appears from the following paffage in a comedy called, A Maidenhead well loft, 1634, that a tawny coat was the dress of a fummoner, i. e. an apparitor, an officer whose business it was to fummon offenders to an ecclefiaftical court: "Tho I was never a tawny-coat, I have play'd the fummoner's part." These are the proper attendants therefore on the Bishop of Winchester. So, in Stowe's Chronicle, p. 822: ". and by the way the bishop of London met him, attended on by a goodly company of gentlemen in tawny-coats," &c. Tawny was likewife a colour worn for mourning, as well as black; and was therefore the fuitable and fober habit of any perfon employed in an ecclefiaftical court: "A croune of bayes shall that man weare "That triumphs over me; "For blacke and tawnie will I weare, "Whiche mournyng colours be.” The Complaint of a Lover wearyng blacke and tawnie ; by E. O. [i. e. the Earl of Oxford.] Paradife of Dainty Devifes, 1576. STEEVENS. • How now, ambitious Humphry? what means this?] The GLO. Piel'd prieft,5 doft thou command me to be fhut out? WIN. I do, thou moft ufurping proditor, And not protector of the king or realm. GLO. Stand back, thou manifeft confpirator; Thou, that contriv'dft to murder our dead lord; Thou, that giv'ft whores indulgences to fin:" firft folio has it-umpheir. The traces of the letters, and the word being printed in Italicks, convince me that the Duke's christian name lurked under this corruption. THEOBALD. 5 Piel'd priest,] Alluding to his fhaven crown. POPE. In Skinner (to whofe Dictionary I was directed by Mr, Edwards) I find that it means more: Pill'd or peel'd garlick, cui pellis, vel pili omnes ex morbo aliquo, præfertim è lue venerea, defluxerunt. In Ben Jonfon's Bartholomew Fair, the following inftance occurs: "I'll fee them p-'d firft, and pil'd and double pil'd." STEEVENS. In Weever's Funeral Monuments, p. 364, Robert Baldocke, bishop of London, is called a peel'd priest, pilide clerk, feemingly in allufion to his fhayen crown alone. So, bald-head was a term of fcorn and mockery. TOLLET. The old copy has-piel'd prieft. Piel'd and pil'd were only the old fpelling of peel'd. So, in our poet's Rape of Lucrece, 4to. 1594: "His leaves will wither, and his fap decay, "So muft my foul, her bark being pil'd away." See alfo Florio's Italian Dictionary, 1598: "Pelare. To pill or pluck, as they do the feathers of fowle; to pull off the hair or skin." MALONE. Thou, that givft whores indulgences to fin:] The public ftews were formerly under the diftrict of the bishop of Winchester. POPE. There is now extant an old manufcript (formerly the officebook of the court-leet held under the jurifdiction of the bishop of Winchester in Southwark,) in which are mentioned the feveral fees arifing from the brothel-houses allowed to be kept in the bifhop's manor, with the cuftoms and regulations of them. One of the articles is: "De his, qui cuftodiunt mulieres habentes nefandam infirmi tatem." |