Wish me partaker in thy happinefs,
Wher thou doft meet good hap; and, in thy danger,
If ever danger do environ thee,
Commend thy grievance to my holy prayers,
For I will be thy bead's-man, Valentine.
VAL. And on a love-book

pray
for
my

fuccefs. Pro. Upon some book I love, I'll pray for thee.

Val. That's on some shallow story of deep love, How young

Leander crofs'd the Hellefpont.* Pro. That's a deep story of a deeper love; For he was more than over shoes in love.

VAL. 'Tis true; for you are over boots in love, And yet you never swam the Hellespont.

Pro. Over the boots ? nay, give me not the boots.'

a

- Some Mallow story of deep love, How young Leander cross it the Hellefpont.] The poem of Musæus, entitled HERO AND LEANDER, is meant. Marlowe's translation of this piece was entered on the Stationers' books, Sept. 18, 1793, and the first two Sestiads of it, with a small part of the third, (which was all that he had finished,) were printed, I imagine, in that, or the following year. Sce Blount's dedication to the edition of 1637, by which it appears that it was originally published in an imperfe& ftate. It was extremely popular, and deservedly so, many of Marlowe's lines being as smooth as those of Dryden. Our author has quoted one of them in As you like it. He had probably read this poem recently before he wrote the present play; for he again alludes to it in the third adı:

" Why then a ladder, quaintly made of cords,
" Would serve to scale another Hero's tower,

!! So bold Leander would adventure it." Since this note was written, I have seen the edition of Marlowe's Hero and Leander, printed in 1598.

It contains the first two Sestiads only. The remainder was added by Chapman. MALONE.

s -- nay, give me not the boots. ] A proverbial expression though now disused, figuifying don't make a laughing stock of me; don't play with me. The French have a phrase, Bailler foin.

corne; which Cotgrave thus interprets, to give one the boots; 10, sell him a bargain. THEOBALD.

en

VAL. No, I'll not, for it boots thee not.
PRO.

What?
VAL.

To be In love, where scorn is bought with groans: coy

looks, With lícart-fore sighs; one fading moment's mirth, With twenty watchful, weary, tedious nights: If haply won, perhaps, a hapless gain; If lost, why then a grievous labour won; However, but a foliy bought with 'wit, Or elfe a wit by folly vanquished.

Perhaps this expression took its origin from a sport the countrypeople in Warwick/hire use at their harvest-home, where one fits as judge to try misdemeanors committed in harveit, and the punishment for the men is to be laid on a bench, and flapped on the breech with a pair of boots. This they call giving them the boots. I meet with the same exprefíion in the old comedy called Mother Bombic, by Lylly :

" What do you give me the boots ? " Again, in The Weakest goes to the Wall, a comedy, 1618 :

Nor your fat bacon can carry it away, if you offer

us the boots. The boots, however, were an ancient engine of torture. In MS. Harl. 6999 -48, Mr. T. Randolph writes to lord Hunsdon, &c. and mentions, in the P. S. to his letter, that Geo. Flecke hade yesterday uiglit the boots, and is said to have confessed that the E. of Morion was privy to the poisoning the E. of Athol. 16 March, 1580 : and in another letter, March 18, 1580,66 -that the laird of Whittingham had the books, but without torment confess'd, " &c.

STEEVENS, The boot was an inítrument of torture used ouly in Scotland. Bishop Burnet in The hiflory of his own. Times, Vol. I. p. 332, edit. 1754, mentions one Maccael, a preacher, who, being suspected of treasonable pradices, underwent the punishment so late as 1666 :

He was put to the torture, which, in Scotland, they call the boots ; for they put a pair of irou boots close on the log, and drive wedges between these and the leg. The common torture was only to drive these in the calf of the leg: but I have been told they were sometimes driven upon the shin bone.” REFD.

6 However, but a folly, &. ) This love will end in a foolish alion, to produce which you are long to spend your wit, or it will end

Pro. So, by your circumstance, you call me fool.
Val. So, by your circumstance, I fear, you'll prove.
Pro. 'Tis love you civil at; I an not love.

VAL. Love is your master, for he masters you ;
And he that is so yoked by a fool,
Methioks should not be chronicled for wife.

Pro. Yet writers say, As in the sweetest bud
The eating canker dwells, ' so eating love
Inhabits in the finest wits of all.

VAL. And writers say, As the most forward bud
Is eaten by the canker ere it blow,
Even so by love the young and tender wit
Is turn'd to folly ; blasting in the bud,
Lofing his verdure even in the prime,
And all the fair effects of future hopes.
But wherefore waste I time to counsel thee,
That art a votary to fond defire ?
Once more adieu : my father at the road
Expects my coming, there to see me shipp'd.

Pro. And thither will I bring thee, Valentine.
VAL. Sweet Proteus, no; now let us take our

leave.
At Milan, 'let me hear from thee by letters,

in the loss of your wit, which will be overpowered by the folly of
love. JOHNSON.
17 As in the sweetest bud
The eating canker dwells, ) So, in our author's 70th Sonnet :
« For canker vice the sweetest buds doth love."

MALONE, 8 At Milan, ) The old copy has

To Milan. The emendation was made by the editor of the second folio. The first copy how. ever may be right. " To Milan, may here be intended as an imperfect sentence. I am now bound for Milan,

Or the conftru&ion intended may have been -- Let me hear from theç by letters to Milan, i. e. addressed to me there.

MALONE,

Of thy success in love, and what news else
Betideth here in absence of thy friend ;
And I likewise will visit thee with mine.

Pro. All happiness bechance to thee in Milan !
Val. As much to you at home! and so, farewell!

(Exit VALENTINE.
Pro. He after honour hunts, I after love :
He leaves his friends, to dignify them more ;
I leave myself, my friends, and all for love.
Thou, Julia, thou hast metamorphos'd me;
Made me neglect my studies, lose my time,
War with good counsel, fet the world at nought;
Made wit, with musing weak, 9 heart fick with
thought.

Enter SPEED. ?
Speed. Sir Proteus, save you: Saw you my ma-

fter ?
Pro. But now he parted hence to embark for

Milan.

war

9 Made wit with musing weak, ) For made read make. Thou Julia, hast made me with good counsel, and make wit weak with mufing. JOHNSON.

Surely there is no need of emendation. It is Julia, who " has already made wit weak with musing," &c. STEEVENS.

2 This whole scene, like many others in these plays (some of which I believe written by Shakspeare, and others interpolated by the players ) is composed of the lowest and most trifling conceits, to be accounted for only from the gross taste of the age he lived in ; Populo ut placerent. I wish I had authority to leave them out ; but I have done all I could, set a mark of reprobation upon them throughout this edition. Pope.

That this, like many other scenes, is mean and vulgar, will be universally allowed ; but that it was interpolated by the players seems advanced without any proof, only to give a greater licence to criticism. JOHNSON.

a

SPEED. Twenty to one then, he is shipp'd al

ready ;
And I have play'd the sheep, in losing him.

Pro. Indeed a sheep doth very often stray,
An if the shepherd be awhile away.
SPEED. You conclude, that my master is a

fheps herd then, and I a sheep ?? PRO. I do. Speed. Why then my horns are his horns, whe

ther I wake or fleep. Pro. A filly answer, and fitting well a sheep. SPEED. This proves me slill a sheep. Pro. True ; and thy master a shepherd. SPEED. Nay, that I can deny by a circumstance. Pro. It shall go hard, but I'll proveit by another.

Speed. The shepherd seeks the sheep, and not the fhcep the shepherd; but I seek my master, and my master seeks not me: therefore, I am no sheep.

Pro. The sheep for forider follow the shepherd, the shepherd for food follows not the sheep ; thou for wages followest thy master, thy maker for wages follows not thee: therefore, thou art a sheep. SPEED. Such another proof will make me cry

baa. Pro. But dost thou hear ? gav'st thou my letter

to Julia ? Spern. Av, fir: I, a loft mutton, gave your letter to her, a laced mutton ; 4 and she, a laced mut

- a sheep ? ) The article, which is wanting in the original copy, was fupplied by the editor of the second folio. Malone.

4 1, a lost mutton, gave your leiter toler, a laced mutton ; ) Speed calls himself a lojt muiton, because he had lost his master, and

3