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Enter FALSTAFF, finging.

FAL. When Arthur first in court - Empty the jordan. And was a worthy king: [Exit Drawer.] How now, mistress Doll?

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Host. Sick of a calm : yea, good footh. FAL. So is all her sect; an they be once in a calm, they are sick.

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When Arthur first in court- The entire ballad is published in

the first volume of Dr. Percy's Reliques of ancient English Poetry.

The words in the ballad are

"When Arthur first in court began,

" And was approved king." MALONE.

STEEVENS.

9 Sick of a calm: ) I suppose she means to say of a qualm.

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STEEVENS.

So is all her fet; ) I know not why felt is printed in all the copies; I believe fox is meant. JOHNSON.

Set is, I believe, right. Falstaff may mean all of her profession. In Mother Bombie, a comedy, 1594, the word is frequently used:

" Sil. I am none of that feat.

"Can. Thy loving fect is an ancient feit, and an honourable," &c.

Since the foregoing quotation was given, I have found fell fo often printed for fex in the old plays, that I suppose these words were anciently synonymous. Thus, in Marston's Insatiate Countess, 1613: "Deceives our fell of fame and chaftity."

Again, in Beaumont and Fletcher's Valentinian: _ _ _ _ Modefty was inade

"When she was firft intended: when she blushes

"It is the holiest thing to look upon,
"The pureft temple of her feet, that ever
"Made nature a blest founder."

Again, in Whetstone's Arbour of Vertue, 1576:

"Who, for that these barons so wrought a flaunder to her felt, "Their foolish, rash, and judgment false, she sharplie did

deted."

See Vol. X. p. 86, n. 7. STEEVENS.

In Middleton's Mad World my Masters, 1608, (as Dr. Farmer has elfewhere observed,) a courtezan fays, " it is the cafieft art and

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DOL. You muddy rascal, is that all the comfort you give me?

FAL. You make fat rascals, mistress Doll. DOL. I make them! gluttony and diseases make them; I make them not.

FAL. If the cook help to make the gluttony, you help to make the diseases, Doll: we catch of you, Doll, we catch of you; grant that, my poor virtue, grant that.

DOL. Ay, marry; our chains, and our jewels. FAL. Your brooches, pearls, and owches; 4_ for to

cunning for our fell to counterfeit fick, that are always full of fits, when we are well." I have therefore no doubt that felt was licentioufly used by our author, and his contemporaries, for fex.

MALONE.

I believe felt is here used in its usual sense, and not for fex. Falstaff means to say, that all courtezans, when their trade is at a stand, are apt to be fick. DOUCE.

3 You make fat rascals, Falstaff alludes to a phrase of the foreft. Lean deer are called rafcal deer. He tells her she calls him wrong, being fat he cannot be a rafcal. JOHNSON.

So, in Beaumont and Fletcher's Knight of the Burning Peftle: "The heavy hart, the blowing buck, the rascal, and the pricket." Again, in The Two Angry Women of Abington, 1599:

"What take you? - Deer. - You'll ne'er ftrike rascal?" Again, in Quarles's Virgin Widow, 1656:

" --and have known a rascal from a fat deer." Rafcall, (fays Puttenham, p. 150,) is properly the hunting térme given to young deere, leane and out of season, and not to people." STEEVENS.

To grow fat and bloated, is one of the consequences of the venereal disease; and to that Falstaff probably alludes. There are other allusions in the following speeches, to the fame disorder.

M. MASON.

4 Your brooches, pearls, and owches; Brooches were chains of gold that women wore formerly about their necks. Owches were boffes of gold set with diamonds. POPE.

I believe Falstaff gives these splendid names as we give that of carbuncle, to something very different from gems and ornaments: but the paffage deserves not a laborious research. JOHNSON.

serve bravely, is to come halting off, you know: To come off the breach with his pike bent bravely, and to furgery bravely; to venture upon the charg'd chambers bravely;

Brooches were, literally, clasps, or buckles, ornamented with gems. See note on Antony and Cleopatra, A&. IV. fc. xiii.

Mr. Pope has rightly interpreted owches in their original sense. So, in Nash's Lenten Stuff, &c. 1599: " --three scarfs, bracelets, chains, and ouches." It appears likewise from a passage in the ancient fatire called Cocke Lorelles Bote, printed by Wynkyn de Worde, that the makers of these ornaments were called owchers:

"Owchers, skynners, and cutlers."

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his

Dugdale, p. 234, in his account of the will of T. de Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick, in the time of King Edward III. says: jewels be thus disposed: to his daughter Stafford, an ouche called the eagle, which the prince gave him; to his daughter Alice, his next beft ouche."

Your brooches, pearls, and owches, is, however, a line in an old fong, but I forget where I met with it. Dr. Johnson's conjecture may be supported by a passage in The Widow's Tears, a comedy, by Chapman, 1612:

As many aches in his bones, as there are puches in his skin." Again, in The Duke's Mistress, by Shirley, 1638, Valerio speaking of a lady's nose, fays:

"It has a comely length, and is well studded
"With gems of price; the goldsmith would give money for't."
STEEVENS.

It appears from Stubbe's Anatomie of Abuses, 1595, that owches were worn by women in their hair, in Shakspeare's time. Dr. Johnson's conje&ure, however, may be supported by the following paffage in Maroccus Exftaticus, 1595: "Let him pass for a churle, and wear his mistress's favours, viz. rubies and precious stones, on his nose, &c.; and this & cetera shall, if you will, be the perfecteft p-that ever grew in Shoreditch or Southwarke." MALONE. the

charg'd chambers - ) To understand this quibble, it is necessary to say, that a chamber fignifies not only an apartment, but a piece of ordnance.

So, in The Fleire, a comedy, 1610:

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he has taught my ladies to make fireworks; they can deal in chambers already, as well as all the gunners that make them fly off with a train at Lambeth, when the mayor and alderman land at Westminster."

Again, in The Puritan, 1605:

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--only your chambers are licensed to play upon you, and drabs enow to give fire to them."

DOL. Hang yourself, you muddy conger, hang yourself!

Host. By my troth, this is the old fashion; you two never meet, but you fall to fome discord: you are both, in good troth, as rheumatick as two dry toafts; you cannot one bear with another's confirmities. What the good-year!' one must bear, and that must be you: [To Doll.] you are the weaker veffel, as they say, the emptier vessel.

DOL. Can a weak empty vessel bear fuch a huge full hogshead? there's a whole merchant's venture of Bourdeaux stuff in him; you have not seen a

A chamber is likewife that part in a mine where the powder is lodged. STEEVENS.

Chambers are very small pieces of ordnance which are yet used in London, on what are called rejoicing days, and were sometimes used in our author's theatre on particular occasions. See King Henry VIII. A. I. fc. iii. MALONE.

5-rheumatick - ) She would say splenetic. HANMER.

I believe the means what she says. So, in Ben Johnson's Every Man in his Humour:

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Cob. Why I have my rewme, and can be angry." Again, in our author's King Henry V:

"He did in some fort handle women; but then he wasrheumatick." &c.

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Rheumatic, in the cant language of the times, fignified capricious, humoursome. In this sense it appears to be used in many other old plays. STEEVENS.

The word fcorbutico (as an ingenious friend observes to me) is ufed in the fame manner in Italian, to fignify a peevish ill-tempered

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Dr. Farmer observes, that Sir Tho. Elyott in his Castell of Helth, 1572, speaking of different complexions has the following remark: "Where cold with moisture prevaileth, that body is called fleumatick." STEEVENS.

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--as two dry toasts;]

one another. JOHNSON.

7 --good-year!] Mrs.

Which cannot meet but they grate

Quickly's blunder for goujere, i. e.

morbus Gallicus. See Vol V. p. 52, n. 7. STEEVENS.

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hulk better stuff'd in the hold. - Come, I'll be friends with thee, Jack: thou art going to the wars; and whether I shall ever fee thee again, or no, there is nobody cares.

Re-enter Drawer.

DRAW. Sir, ancient Pistol's below, and would speak with you.

DOL. Hang him, swaggering rafcal! let him not come hither: it is the foul-mouth'dst rogue in England,

Host. If he swagger, let him not come here: no, by my faith; I must live amongst my neighbours; I'll no swaggerers: I am in good name and fame with the very beft: - Shut the door; - there comes no swaggerers here: I have not lived all this while, to have swaggering now: - shut the door, I pray you.

FAL. Doft thou hear, hostess?

Host. Pray you, pacify yourself, fir John; there comes no swaggerers here.

FAL. Doft thou hear? it is mine ancient.

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Host. Tilly-fally, fir John, never tell me; your ancient swaggerer comes not in my doors. I was before master Tifick, the deputy, the other day;

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ancient Pistol - ) is the fame as ensign Pistol. Falstaff

was captain, Peto lieutenant, and Pistol enfign, or ancient.

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JOHNSON.

there comes no fwaggerers here.) A Swaggerer was a roaring, bullying, blustering, fighting fellow. So, in Greene's Tu Quoque, a comedy, by Cooke, 1614: " I will game with a gamster, drinke with a drunkard, be ciuill with a citizen, fight with a fwaggerer, and drabb with a whoore mafter." RITSON.

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Tilly-fally, See Vol. V. p. 276, n. 4. MALONE.

VOL. XIII.

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