1 Gent. What? in metre?

Lucio. In any proportion, or in any lauguage. 1 Gent. I think, or in any religion.

Lucio. Ay! why not? Grace is grace, defpight of all controverfy: As for example; Thou thyfelf art a wicked villain, defpight of all grace.

1 Gent. Well, there went but a pair of fheers between us 4.

Lucio. I grant; as there may between the lifts and the velvet: Thou art the lift.

1 Gent. And thou the velvet: thou art good velvet; thou art a three-pil'd piece, I warrant thee: I had as lief be a lift of an English kerfey, as be pil'd,

as

-in metre?] In the primers, there are metrical graces, fuch as, I fuppofe, were used in Shakspeare's time. JOHN ON. 2 In any proportion, &c.] The Oxford editor gives us a dialogue of his own instead of this: and all for want of knowing the meaning of the word proportion, which fignifies measure: and refers to the question, What? in metre? WARBURTON.

3 defpight of all controverfy: Satirically infinuating that the controverfies about grace were fo intricate and endless, that the difputants unfettled every thing but this, that grace was grace; which, however, in fpite of controverfy, ftill remained certain. WARBURTON.

I am in doubt whether Shakspeare's thoughts reached fo far into ecclefiaftical difputes. Every commentator is warped a little by the tract of his own profeffion. The question is, whether the fecond gentleman has ever heard grace. The first gentleman limits the question to grace in metre. Lucio enlarges it to grace in any form or language. The first gentleman, to go beyond him, fays, or in any religion, which Lucio allows, because the nature of things is unalterable; grace is as immutably grace, as his merry antagonist is a wicked villain. Difference in religion cannot make a grace not to be grace, a prayer not to be holy; as nothing can make a villain not to be a villain. This feems to be the meaning, fuch as it is. JOHNSON.

4 there went but a pair of sheers between us.] We are both of the fame piece. JOHNSON.

So in the Maid of the Mill, by Beaumont and Fletcher. "There went but a pair of fheers and a bodkin between them."

STEEVENS.

The

as thou art pil'd, for a French velvet. Do I fpeak feelingly now?

Lucio. I think thou doft; and, indeed, with most painful feeling of thy fpeech: I will, out of thine own confeffion, learn to begin thy health; but, whilft I live, forget to drink after thee.

1 Gent. I think, I have done myself wrong; have I not?

2 Gent. Yes, that thou haft; whether thou art tainted, or free.

Lucio. Behold, behold, where madam Mitigation comes! I have purchas'd as many diseases under her roof, as come to

2 Gent. To what, I pray?

1 Gent. Judge.

2 Gent. To three thousand dollars a year.

1 Gent. Ay, and more.

Lucio. A French crown more".

1 Gent.

The fame expreffion is likewife found in Marston's Malecontent, 1604: "There goes but a pair of heers betwixt an emperor and "the fon of a bagpiper; only the dying, dreffing, preffing, and "gloffing, makes the difference." MALONE.

spil'd, as thou art pil'd, for a French velvet.] The jeft about the pile of a French velvet alludes to the lofs of hair in the French difeafe, a very frequent topick of our author's jocularity. Lucio finding that the gentleman understands the distemper fo well, and mentions it fo feelingly, promises to remember to drink his health, but to forget to drink after bim. It was the opinion of Shakfpeare's time, that the cup of an infected perfon was contagious. JOHNSON.

The jeft lies between the fimilar found of the words pill'd and pil'd. This I have elsewhere explained, under a paffage in Henry VIII.

" Pill'd prieft thou left." STEEVENS.

6 To three thousand dollars a year.] A quibble intended between dollars and dolours. HANMER. The fame jest occurred before in the Tempeft. Vol. I. p. 45.) JOHNSON.

A French crown more.] Lucio means here not the piece of money fo called, but that venereal fcab, which among the furgeons is ftyled corona Veneris. To this, I think, our author like wife makes Quince allude in Midfummer-Night's Dream.

"Some

1 Gent. Thou art always figuring diseases in me : but thou art full of error; I am found.

Lucio. Nay, not as one would fay, healthy; but fo found, as things that are hollow: thy bones are hollow; impiety has made a feast of thee.

Enter Bawd.

1 Gent. How now? Which of your hips has the moft profound fciatica?

Bawd. Well, well; there's one yonder arrested, and carry'd to prifon, was worth five thousand of you all.

1 Gent. And who is that, I pr'ythee?

Bard. Marry, fir, that's Claudio, fignior Claudio. 1 Gent. Claudio to prifon! 'tis not fo.

Bawd. Nay, but I know, 'tis fo: I saw him arrested; faw him carry'd away; and, which is more, within these three days his head is to be chopp'd off.

Lucio. But, after all this fooling, I would not have it fo; Art thou fure of this?

Bawd. I am too fure of it: and it is for getting madam Julietta with child.

Lucio. Believe me, this may be: he promised to meet me two hours fince; and he was ever precife in promife-keeping.

2 Gent. Befides, you know, it draws fomething near to the speech we had to fuch a purpose.

I Gent. But most of all agreeing with the procla

mation.

"Some of your French crowns have no hair at all, and then you will play bare-faced."

For where thefe eruptions are, the skull is carious, and the party becomes bald. THEOBALD.

So in the Return from Parnaffus, 1606:

"I may chance indeed to give the world a bloody nofe, but "it fhall hardly give me a crack'd crown, though it gives other "poets French crowns."

Again in the Dedication to Gabriel Harvey's Hunt is up, 1598;

never metft with any requital, except it were fome few "French crownes, pil'd friers crownes, &c." STEEVENS.

Lucio. Away; let's go learn the truth of it.

Manet Bawd.

[Exeunt.

Bawd. Thus, what with the war, what with the fweats, what with the gallows, and what with poverty, I am cuftom-fhrunk. How now? what's the news with you.

Enter Clown.

Clown. Yonder man is carry'd to prifon.
Bawd. Well; what has he done'?

Clown. A woman.

Bawd. But what's his offence?

Clown. Groping for trouts in a peculiar river. Bawd. What, is there a maid with child by him?

s what with the faveat,] This may allude to the Sweating ficknefs, of which the memory was very fresh in the time of Shakfpeare: but more probably to the method of cure then used for the diseases contracted in brothels. JOHNSON.

So in the comedy of Doctor Dodypoll, 1600:

"You are very moift, fir; did you fweat all this, I pray? "You have not the difeafe, I hope. STEEVENS.

• Enter Clown.] As this is the first clown who makes his appearance in the plays of our author, it may not be amifs, from a paffage in Tarlton's News out of Purgatory, to point out one of the ancient dreffes appropriated to the character.

"I fawe one attired in ruffet, with a button'd cap on his "head, a great bag by his fide, and a strong bat in his hand; fo "artificially attired for a clown, as I began to call Tarlton's "woonted shape to remembrance." STEEVENS.

1 What has he done?

Clown. A woman.]

The ancient meaning of the verb to do, (though now obfolete) may be guess'd at from the following paffages.

Chiron. Thou haft undone our mother.

"Aaron. Villain, I've done thy mother," Titus Andronicus. Again in the Maid's Tragedy, a& II. Evadne, while undreffing, fays

"I am foon undone.

Dula answers, "And as foon done."

Hence the name of Over-done, which Shakspeare has appropriated

to his baud. COLLINS.

-in a peculiar river] i. e. a river belonging to an individual; not public property. MALONE.

Clown.

Clown. No; but there's a woman with maid by him: You have not heard of the proclamation, have you?

Bawd. What proclamation, man?

Clown. All houses in the fuburbs of Vienna muft be pluck'd down.

Bawd. And what fhall become of thofe in the city? Clown. They fhall ftand for feed: they had gone down too, but that a wife burgher put in for them. Bard. But fhall all our houfes of refort in the fuburbs be pull'd down??

Clown. To the ground, miftrefs?

Bawd. Why, here's a change, indeed, in the commonwealth! What fhall become of me?

Clown. Come; fear not you; good counsellors lack no clients: though you change your place, you need not change your trade; I'll be your tapfter ftill. Courage; there will be pity taken on you: you that have

hall all our boufes of refort in the fuburbs be pull'd down?] This will be understood from the Scotch law of James's time, concerning buires (whores): "that comoun women be put at "the utmoft endes of torunes, quiere least perril of fire is." Hence Urfula the pig-woman, in Bartholomew-Fair: "I, I, gameiters, "mock a plain, plump, foft wench of the fuburbs, do!" FARMER. So in the Malcontent 1604, when Altofront difmiffes the vari ous characters at the end of the play to different destinations, he fays to Macquerelle the bawd:

thou unto the suburbs.”

Again in Ram-Alley, or Merry Tricks, 1611:

"Some fourteen bawds, he kept her in the fuburbs." See Martial, where fummaniana and suburbana are applied to prostitutes. STEEVENS.

All boufes in the fuburbs.] This is furely too general in expreffion, unless we fuppofe that all the houses in the fuburbs were bawdy-boufes. It appears too, from what the bawd fays below, "But fhall all our houses of refort in the fuburbs be pulled down? that the clown had been particular in his defcription of the houfes which were to be pulled down. I am therefore inclined to believe that we should read here, all bawdy-houses, or all houses of refort in the fuburbs. TYRWHITT.

The licensed houses of refort at Vienna are at this time all in the fuburbs, under the permiffion of the Committee of Chastity. S. W.