A Select Collection of Old English Plays Volume Xi Part 82

[234] [Edits., _profit_.]

[235] Edits., _smoothest_. The versification of this play in general is regular and without hemistiches, were the measure properly attended to.

[236] [Steevens's emendation. Edits, have--

"My life h'as learnt out all, I know't by's music."

[237] The quartos read, _by the height of stars_, but the rhyme requires the alteration.--_Collier._

[238] _Closely_ is _privately_, as in act iii. sc. 1--

"I'll entertain him here, meanwhile steal you _Closely_ into the room."

Again, in "The Spanish Tragedy"--

"Boy, go, convoy this purse to Pedringano; Thou knowest the prison, _closely_ give it him."

And again, _ibid._--

"Wise men will take their opportunity _Closely_ and safely, fitting things to time."

--_Pegge._

[239] [Blushing.]

[240] Alluding to the custom of the harbingers, who in the royal progresses were wont to mark the lodgings of the several officers of the Court. _For Flavia_ should therefore be in italics. We now commonly write harbinger with the first vowel; but the ancients applied the second, which is more agreeable to the etymology. See Junius _v._ Harbour.--_Pegge._

To this explanation I shall only add that the office of harbinger remains to this day, and that the part of his duty above alluded to was performed in the latter part of the 17th century. Serjeant Hawkins, in his life of Bishop Ken, observes that when, on the removal of the Court to pa.s.s the summer at Winchester, that prelate's house, which he held in the right of his prebend, _was marked by the harbinger_ for the use of Mrs Eleanor Gwyn, he refused to grant her admittance; and she was forced to seek for lodgings in another place.--_Reed._

[241] The 4 of 1615 reads--

"Spight of a _last_ of Lelios."

[242] [Edits., _two_.]

[243] A term of astrology.--_Pegge._

"_Ascendant_ in astrology denotes the horoscope, or the degree of the ecliptic which rises upon the horizon at the time of the birth of any one. This is supposed to have an influence on his life and fortune, by giving him a bent to one thing more than another."--_Chambers's Dictionary._

[244] [Entrance to a house.]

[245] Cornelius Agrippa, on "The Vanitie and Uncertaintie of Artes and Sciences," 4, 1569, p. 55, mentions _Apollonius:_ "They saie that Hierome made mention thereof, writinge to Paulinus, where he saithe, that _Apollonius Tianeus_ was a magitien, or a philosopher, as the Pithagoreans were." He is also noticed among those who have written on the subject of magic. Apollonius was born at Tyana about the time our Saviour appeared in the world. He died at the age of near or quite 100 years, in the reign of Nerva. By the enemies of Christianity he was reported to have worked miracles in the same manner as the Founder of our religion, and in the works of Dr Henry More is inserted a parallel between them. The degree of credit which the pagan miracles are ent.i.tled to is very clearly shown in Dr Douglas's learned work, ent.i.tled, "The Criterion, or Miracles Examined," 8, 1757, p. 53. See a further account of Apollonius in Blount's translation of "The Two First Books of Philostratus, concerning the Life of Apollonius Tyaneus," fol., 1680, and Tillemont's "Account of the Life of Apollonius Tyaneus," translated by Dr Jenkin, 8, 1702.

[246] Telescope.

[247] A stroke of satire in regard to cuckoldom: there are others afterwards in this act.--_Pegge._

[248] Coriat the traveller.

[249] Before the rebuilding of St Paul's Cathedral, the wall at Gloucester, here alluded to, was much more celebrated than it is at present. Camden, in his "Britannia," i. 275, edit. 1722, speaking of it, says: "Beyond the quire, in an arch of the church, there is a _wall_, built with so great artifice, in the form of a semicircle with corners, that if any one whisper very low at one end, and another lay his ear to the other end, he may easily hear every syllable distinct."

[250] [In the edits, this direction is made part of the text.]

[251] Alluding to the following pa.s.sage in the Amphitruo of Plautus, where the night is lengthened, that Jupiter may continue the longer with Alcmena. Mercury says--

"Et meus pater nunc intus hie c.u.m ilia cubat; Et haec ob eam rem nox est facta longior, Dum ille, quaquam volt, voluptatem capit."

--"Prolog. Amphitr." 112.--_Pegge._

[252] An instrument to aid and improve the sense of hearing.

[253] [Edits., _A cousticon. Autocousticon_ is] a repet.i.tion, by way of admiration, of the word in the preceding line; for it is plain it was not intended by the poet that Pandolfo should blunder through ignorance, because he has it right in the next scene, and Ronca has never repeated the word in the interim.--_Pegge._

[254] The flap or cover of the windpipe.--_Steevens._ Ronca here blunders _comice_, and on purpose; for the _epiglottis_ is the cover or lid of the larynx, and has no connection with the ear.--_Pegge._

[255] _i.e._, In spite of his head.--_Steevens._

[256] Galileo, the inventor of the telescope, was born February 19, 1564, according to some writers, at Pisa, but more probably at Florence. While professor of mathematics at Padua, he was invited by Cosmo the Second, Duke of Tuscany, to Pisa, and afterwards removed to Florence. During his residence at the latter place, he ventured to a.s.sert the truth of the Copernican system; which gave so much offence to the Jesuits that, by their procurement, he was ever after hara.s.sed by the Inquisition. He suffered very frequent and long imprisonments on account of his adherence to the opinions he had formed, and never obtained his liberty without renouncing his sentiments, and undertaking not to defend them either by word or writing. His a.s.siduity in making discoveries at length proved fatal to him. It first impaired his sight, and at length totally deprived him of it. He died at Arcetre, near Florence, January 8, 1642, N.S., in the 78th year of his age, having been for the last three years of his life quite blind. See a comparison between him and Bacon in Hume's "History of England," vi. 133, 8, edit. 1763.

[257] [A horn.]

[258] To the great Mogul's country, who was then called _Maghoore_.--Howes' "Continuation of Stowe's Chronicle," p. 1003, where he esteems it a corruption to call him _Mogul_.

[259] [Edits, give this and next two lines, down to _return_, to Ronca.]

[260: There was an opinion pretty current among Christians that the Mahometans were in expectation of their prophet's return; and what gave occasion to that was the 16th sign of the resurrection, the coming of the Mohdi or director; concerning whom Mahomet prophesied that the world should not have an end till one of his own family should govern the Arabians, whose name should be the same with his own name, and whose father's name should also be the same with his father's name, and who should fill the earth with righteousness.

Sale's "Preliminary Discourse to the Koran," 4, edit. 82.

[261] [Edits., _gorgon_.]

[262] [Edits., _Upon_.]

[263] Terms of astrology meaning, be they inhabited by the best and most fortunate planets.--_Pegge._

[264] A book of astronomy, in use among such as erect figures to cast men's nativities, by which is shown how all the planets are placed every day and hour of the year.

[265] _i.e._, Juggling or deceiving.

[266] So in Jeffrey of Monmouth's History, 1718, p. 264, Merlin changes _Uther, Ulfin_, and _himself_, into the shapes of _Gorlois_, _Jordan of Tintagel_, and _Bricet_, by which means _Uther_ obtains the possession of _Igerna_, the wife of Gorlois.--_Pegge._

[267] People of rank and condition generally wore chains of gold at this time. Hence Trincalo says that, when he was a gentleman, he would

"Wear a gold chain at every quarter sessions."

--_Pegge._ Many instances of this fashion are to be met with in these volumes. The Lord Mayor and Aldermen of London wear chains of gold on public days at this time.

[268] Belonging to a sundial.--_Johnson's Dictionary._

[269] Azimuths, called also vertical circles, are great circles intersecting each other in the zenith and nadir, and cutting the horizon at right angles, in all the points thereof.--_Chambers's Dictionary._