That has to-day escap'd. I thank you all; Enter CLEOPATRA, attended. To this great fairy' I'll commend thy acts, world, Chain mine arm'd neck; leap thou, attire and all, Through proof of harness to my heart, and there Ride on the pants triumphing'. 4 - CLIP your wives,] To clip is to embrace. STEEVENS. 5 To this great FAIRY - ] Mr. Upton has well observed, that fairy, which Dr. Warburton and Sir T. Hanmer explain by Inchantress, comprises the idea of power and beauty. JOHNSON. Fairy, in former times, did not signify only a diminutive imaginary being, but an inchanter, in which last sense, as has been observed, it is used here. But Mr. Upton's assertion, that it comprizes the idea of beauty as well as power, seems questionable; for Sir W. D'Avenant employs the word in describing the weird sisters, (who certainly were not beautiful,) in the argument prefixed to his alteration of Macbeth, 4to. 1674: "These two, travelling together through a forest, were met by three fairie witches, (weirds the Scotch call them,)" &c. See also vol. iv. p. 224, n. 4. MALONE. Surely, Mr. Upton's remark is not indefensible. Beauty united with power, was the popular characteristick of Fairies generally considered. Such was that of The Fairy Queen of Spenser, and Titania, in A Midsummer-Night's Dream. Sir W. D'Avenant's particular use of any word is by no means decisive. That the language of Shakspeare was unfamiliar to him, his own contemptible alterations of it have sufficiently demonstrated. STEEVENS. 6-proof of HARNESS - ] i. e. armour of proof. Harnois, Fr. Arnese, Ital. STEEVENS. See vol. xi. p. 267, n. 6. MALONE. CLEO. Lord of lords! O infinite virtue! com'st thou smiling from The world's great snare uncaught ? A brain that nourishes our nerves, and can Get goal for goal of youth. Behold this man; Commend unto his lips thy favouring hand ;Kiss it, my warrior: -He hath fought to-day, As if a god, in hate of mankind, had Destroy'd in such a shape. CLEO. I'll give thee, friend, An armour all of gold; it was a king's2. - triumphing.] This word is so accented by Chapman, in his version of the eleventh Iliad: Crept from his covert and triumph'd: Now thou art maim'd, said he." STEEVENS. 8 The world's great SNARE -) i. e. the war. So, in the 116th Psalm: "The snares of death compassed me round about." Thus also Statius : 9 circum undique lethi Vallavere plagæ. STEEVENS. with our brown;) Old copy-younger brown: but as this epithet, without improving the idea, spoils the measure, I have not scrupled, with Sir Thomas Hanmer and others, to omit it as an interpolation. See p. 367, n. 7. STEEVENS. 1 Get goal for goal of youth.] At all plays of barriers, the boundary is called a goal; to win a goal, is to be a superior in a contest of activity. JOHNSON. 2- it was a king's.] So, in Sir T. North's translation of Plutarch: "Then came Antony again to the palace greatly boasting of this victory, and sweetly kissed Cleopatra, armed as he was when he came from the fight, recommending one of his men of arms unto her, that had valiantly fought in this skirmish. Cleopatra, to reward his manliness, gave him an armour and head-piece of clean gold." STEEVENS. Through Alexandria make a jolly march; them: Had our great palace the capacity To camp this host, we all would sup together; Which promises royal peril.-Trumpeters, 1 SOLD. If we be not reliev'd within this hour, We must return to the court of guard: The night Is shiny; and, they say, we shall embattle By the second hour i' the morn. 2 SOLD. A shrewd one to us. This last day was O, bear me witness, night, 3 Bear our hack'd targets like the men that owE them:] i. e. hack'd as much as the men to whom they belong. WARBURTON. Why not rather, Bear our hack'd targets with spirit and exultation, such as becomes the brave warriors that own them? 4 JOHNSON. tabourines;] A tabourin was a small drum. It is often mentioned in our ancient romances. So, in The History of Helyas Knight of the Swanne, bl. 1. no date: "Trumpetes, clerons, tabourins, and other minstrelsy." STEEVENS. 5 - the court of guard:] i. e. the guard-room, the place where he guard musters. The same expression occurs again in Othello, vol. ix. p. 331, n. 1. STEEVENS. 3 SOLD. What man is this? 2 SOLD. Stand close, and list him. ENO. Be witness to me, O thou blessed moon, When men revolted shall upon record Before thy face repent ! 1 SOLD. 3 SOLD. Hark further. Enobarbus! Peace; ENO. O sovereign mistress of true melancholy, The poisonous damp of night disponge upon me'; That life, a very rebel to my will, May hang no longer on me: Throw my heart Which, being dried with grief, will break to pow der, And finish all foul thoughts. O Antony, But let the world rank me in register 6 - list то him.] I am answerable for the insertion of the preposition-to. Thus, in King Henry IV. Part I.: Pr'ythee, let her alone, and list to me." STEEVENS. Yet see Hamlet, vol. vii. p. 216: "If with too credent ear you list his songs." BOSWELL. 7-DISPONGE upon me;] i. e. discharge, as a sponge, when squeezed, discharges the moisture it had imbibed. So, in Hamlet: - it is but squeezing you, and, sponge, you shall be dry again." This word is not found in Dr. Johnson's Dictionary. STEEVENS. 8 - Throw my heart-] The pathetick of Shakspeare too often ends in the ridiculous. It is painful to find the gloomy dignity of this noble scene destroyed by the intrusion of a conceit so farfetched and unaffecting. JOHNSON. Shakspeare, in most of his conceits, is kept in countenance by his contemporaries. Thus, Daniel, in his 18th Sonnet, 1594, somewhat indeed less harshly, says "Still must I whet my young desires abated, Upon the flint of such a heart rebelling." MALONE. 1 SOLD. Let's hear him, for the things he speaks May concern Cæsar. 3 SOLD. Let's do so. But he sleeps. 1 SOLD. Swoons rather; for so bad a prayer as his Was never yet for sleep 9. 2 SOLD. Go we to him. 3 SOLD. Awake, awake, sir; speak to us. 2 SOLD. 1 SOLD. The hand of death Hark, the drums Demurely wake the sleepers. Hear you, sir? hath raught him. [Drums afar off. Let us bear him note: our hour [Exeunt with the Body. 3 SOLD. Come on, then; He may recover yet. SCENE X. Between the two Camps. Enter Antony and SCARUS, with Forces, marching. ANT. Their preparation is to-day by sea; We please them not by land. SCAR. For both, my lord. 9- for SLEEPING.] Old copy-sleep. I am responsible for the substitution of the participle in the room of the substantive, for the sake of measure. STEEVENS. The hand of death hath RAUGHT him.] Raught is the an cient preterite of the verb to reach. STEEVENS. 2 - Hark, the drums DEMURELY-] Demurely, for solemnly. WARBURTON. |