A Select Collection of Old English Plays Volume Viii Part 108

[417] [Then, probably, as it certainly was later on, a favourite haunt of footpads.]

[418] [Pancras.]

[419] [No edition except that of 1662 has yet come to light.]

[420] n.o.body who reads this play can doubt that it is much older than 1662, the date borne by the earliest known edition of it. It has every indication of antiquity, and the t.i.tle not the least of these. "Grim, the Collier of Croydon," is a person who plays a prominent character in the humorous portion of Edwards's "Damon and Pithias," which was printed in 1571, and acted several years earlier. The Grim of the present play is obviously the same person as the Grim of "Damon and Pithias," and in both he is said to be "Collier for the king's own Majesty's mouth."

Chetwood may therefore be right when he states that it was printed in 1599; but perhaps that was not the first edition, and the play was probably acted before "Damon and Pithias" had gone quite out of memory.

In the office-book of the Master of the Revels, under date of 1576, we find a dramatic entertainment entered, called "The Historie of the Colyer," acted by the Earl of Leicester's men; but it was doubtless Ulpian Fulwell's "Like will to Like, quod the Devil to the Colier,"

printed in 1568. The structure, phraseology, versification, and language of "Grim, the Collier of Croydon," are sufficient to show that it was written before 1600: another instance to prove how much the arrangement of the plays made by Mr Reed was calculated to mislead. Some slight separate proofs of the age of this piece are pointed out in the new notes; but the general evidence is much more convincing. The versification is interlarded with rhymes like nearly all our earlier plays, and the blank verse is such as was written before Marlowe's improvements had generally been adopted. When the play was reprinted in 1662, some parts of it were perhaps a little modernised. The introduction of Malbecco and Paridell into it, from Spenser's "Faerie Queene," may be some guide as to the period when the comedy was first produced.--_Collier_. [The play has now, for the first time, been placed in its true chronological rank.]

[421] See note to "Gammer Gurton's Needle" [iii. 245].

[422] The story of this play is taken in part from Machiavel's "Belphegor."--_Pegge_.

The excellent translation of this humorous old story by Mr T. Roscoe ("Italian Novelists," ii. 272) will enable the reader to compare the play with it. He will find that in many parts the original has been abandoned, and the catastrophe, if not entirely different, is brought about by different means. The "Biographia Dramatica" informs us that Dekker's "If it be not Good the Devil is in it" is also chiefly taken from the same novel; but this is an error arising out of a hint by Langbaine. Dekker's play is the famous history of Friar Rush in many of its incidents.--_Collier_.

[423] [He was _born_ at or near Glas...o...b..ry in 925. See Wright's "Biog.

Brit. Lit.," Anglo-Saxon period, p. 443, et seq.]

[424] "Legenda Aurea, or the Golden Legend," translated out of the French, and printed by Caxton in folio, 1483.

[425] In the old copy it is printed _Torta.s.s_, but it means _porta.s.s, portesse_, or _portace_, the breviary of the Roman Catholic Church.

Thus, in Greene's "Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay"--

"I'll take my _portace_ forth, and wed you here."

Spenser uses the word, "Faerie Queene," b. i. c. iv.--

"And in his hand his _portesse_ still he bare That much was worne," &c.

See also note to "New Custom" [iii. 24].--_Collier_.

[426] [Old copy and former edits., _Dunston's_.]

[427] See the story of Malbecco in Spenser's "Faerie Queene," b. iii. c.

ix., &c.

[428] The old copy has it _reap_, but probably we ought to read _heap_; to _reap an endless catalogue_ is hardly sense.--_Collier_.

[429] _Cleped_ is _called, named_. So in Milton's "L'Allegro," i. 11--

"But come, thou G.o.ddess fair and free, In heaven _yclep'd_ Euphrosyne."

[430] _Colling_ is embracing round the neck. _Dare Brachia cervici_, as Baret explains it in his "Alvearie," voce _colle_. The word is frequently to be found in ancient writers. So in Erasmus' "Praise of Follie," 1549, sig. B 2: "For els, what is it in younge babes that we dooe kysse go, we doe _colle_ so; we do cheryshe so, that a very enemie is moved to spare and succour this age." In "Wily Beguiled," 1606: "I'll clasp thee, and clip thee; _coll thee_, and kiss thee, till I be better than nought, and worse than nothing." In "The Witch," by Middleton--

"When hundred leagues in aire we feast and sing, Daunce, kysse, and _coll_, use everything."

And in Breton's "Woorkes of a Young Wit," 1577, p. 37--

"Then for G.o.d's sake, let young folkes _coll_ and kisse, When oldest folkes will thinke it not amisse."

[431] Old copy, _upon_.

[432] So in Ben Jonson's "Catiline," act iv. sc. 3--

"I have those eyes and ears shall still keep guard And _spial_ on thee, as they've ever done, And thou not feel it."

And in Ascham's "Report and Discourse of the State of Germany," p. 31: "He went into France secretly, and was there with Shirtly as a common launce knight, and named hymselfe Captaine Paul, lest the Emperours _spials_ should get out hys doynges."

[433] In the county of Ess.e.x, the mother-church of Harwich. "In the same yeare of our Lord 1582 there was an Idoll named _The Roode of Dovercourt_, whereunto was much and great resort of people. For at that time there was a great rumour blown abroad amongst the ignorant sort, that the power of _The Idoll of Dovercourt_ was so great that no man had power to shut the church doore where he stood, and therefore they let the church dore, both night and day, continually stand open, for the more credit unto the blinde rumour."--Fox's "Martyrs," ii. 302. This is the account given by Fox of this celebrated image; who adds that four men, determining to destroy it, travelled ten miles from Dedham, where they resided, took away the Rood and burnt it, for which act three of them afterwards suffered death.

[434] Old copy, _way_.--_Pegge_.

[435] A play on the double meaning of the word, an old game and the act of kissing.

[436] [Obtain.]

[437] [Old copy, and former edits., _bear_.]

[438] See note to "Gammer Gurton's Needle" [ii. 202].

[439] In 1662, when this play was either first printed or reprinted, it would have been absurd to talk of _America_ as _new_ or newly discovered.--_Collier_.

[440] [This pa.s.sage reminds us of No. 60 in "A C. Mery Talys," Hazlitt's "Jest Books," i. 87.]

[441] See note to "Damon and Pithias" [iv. 21].

[442] Old copy, _work_.--_Pegge_.

[443] i.e., O Lord.

[444] i.e., So happen in the issue. So in Ben Jonson's "New Inn," act iv. sc. 4--

"You knew well It could not _sort_ with any reputation Of mine."

And in Ma.s.singer's "Maid of Honour," act ii. sc. 1--

"All _sorts_ to my wishes."

[445] Old copy, _for_.--_Pegge_.

[446] i.e., _As lief they as I_. So in "Eastward Hoe:" "I'd as _live_ as anything I could see his farewell."--_Collier_.

[447] It is observed by Dr Warburton (note on "Romeo and Juliet," act i.

sc. 1), that to _carry coals_ was a phrase formerly in use to signify _bearing of injuries_; and Dr Percy has given several instances in proof of it. To those may be added the following from Ben Jonson's "Every Man out of his Humour," act v. sc. 3: "Take heed, Sir Puntarvolo, what you do; _he'll bear no coals_, I can tell you, o' my word."

[448] i.e., Akerc.o.c.k, as he is called in the preceding scenes. See a later note to this play [p. 442 _infra_].--_Collier_.

[449] _Suppose_ is here used in the sense of _conjecture_ or _apprehension_. Gascoigne translated a comedy of Ariosto, and called it "The Supposes." The employment of the verb for the substantive in the present instance is an evidence of the antiquity of this play. The following parallel is from Gascoigne's Prologue: "The verye name wherof may peraduenture driue into euerie of your heades, a sundrie _Suppose_, to _suppose_ the meaning of our _supposes_."--_Collier_.