PRI. What noife? what shriek is this? TRO. 'Tis our mad sister, I do know her voice. Cas. [Within.] Cry, Trojans! HECT. It is Cassandra. Enter CASSANDRA, raving. Cas. Cry, Trojans, cry! lend me ten thousand eyes, And I will fill them with prophetick tears. HECT. Peace, sister, peace. Cas. Virgins and boys, mid-age and wrinkled elders, Soft infancy, that nothing can'st but cry, Cry, Trojans, cry! practise your eyes with tears! 9 Enter Cassandra, raving.] This circumstance also is from the third book of Lydgate's Auncient Historie &c. 1555: " This was the noise and the pyteous crye 2 "Of Caffandra that so dredefully "She gan to make aboute in euery strete " Through ye towne" &c. STEEVENS. - wrinkled elders,] So the quarto. Folio-wrinkled old. MALONE. Elders, the erroneous reading of the quarto, would feem to have been properly corrected in the copy whence the first folio was printed; but it is a rule with printers, whenever they meet with a strange word in a manufcript, to give the nearest word to it they are acquainted with; a liberty which has been not very sparingly exercised in all the old editions of our author's plays. There cannot be a question that he wrote: mid-age and wrinkled eld. So, in The Merry Wives of Windfor: "The superftitious idle-headed eld." "Doth beg the alms of palfied eld." RITSON. i Troy must not be, nor goodly Ilion stand; 3 [Exit. HECT. Now, youthful Troilus, do not these high strains Of divination in our fifter work Some touches of remorse? or is your blood Can qualify the same? TRO. Why, brother Hector, We may not think the justness of each act 6 3 Troy must not be, nor goodly Ilion ftand;) See p. 225, n. 6, and p. 231, n. 9. This line unavoidably reminds us of another in the fecond book of the Æneid: Trojaque nunc ftares, Priamique arx alta maneres." STEEVENS. 4 Our firebrand brother,] Hecuba, when pregnant with Paris, dreamed she should be delivered of a burning torch: et face prægnans Ciffeis regina Parin creat. Æneid X. 705. STEEVENS. 5 - distaste- Corrupt; change to a worse state. JOHNSON. 6 To make it gracious.] i. e. to set it off; to show it to advantage. So, in Marston's Malcontent, 1604: - he is most exquifite &c. in fleeking of skinnes, blushing of cheeks &c. that ever made an ould lady gracious by torch-light." STEEVENS. And Jove forbid, there should be done amongst us PAR. Else might the world convince of levity PRI. PAR. Sir, I propose not merely to myself 1 convince of levity-) This word, which our author frequently employs in the obfolete sense of to overpower, fubdue, seems in the present instance to fignify-convict, or subject to the charge of levity. STEEVENS. 8 - your full consent - Your unanimous approbation. See p. 286, n. 4. MALONE. 9 her fair rape-] Rape in our author's time commonly ignified the carrying away of a female. MALONE. It has always borne that, as one of its fignifications; raptus Helene (without any idea of perfonal violence) being conftantly rendered the rape of Helen. STEEVENS. : Disgrace to your great worths, and shame to me, HECT. Paris, and Troilus, you have both faid well; 2 viii. 14: 2 have gloz'd,] So, in Spenser's Faerie Queene, Book III. "could well his glozing speeches frame." To gloze, in this instance, means to infinuate; but in Shakspeare, to comment. So, in King Henry V : "Which Salique land the French unjustly gloze 3-Aristotle) Let it be remembered as often as Shakspeare's anachronisms occur, that errors in computing time were very frequent in those ancient romances which seem to have formed the greater part of his library. I may add, that even classick authors are not exempt from such mistakes. In the fifth book of Statius's Thebaid, Amphiaraus talks of the fates of Neftor and Priam, neither of whom died till long after him. If on this occafion, fomewhat should be attributed to his augural profession, yet if he could fo freely mention, nay, even quote as examples to the whole army, things that would not happen till the next age, they must all have been prophets as well as himself, or they could not have understood him. Hector's mention of Aristotle, however (during our ancient propenfity to quote the authorities of the learned on every occafion) is Unfit to hear moral philofophy: not more abfurd than the following circumstance in The Dialoges of Creatures Moralyfed, bl. 1. no date, (a book which Shakspeare might have seen,) where we find God Almighty quoting Cato. See Dial. IV. STEEVENS. STEEVENS. more deaf than adders -) See Vol. X. p. 97, n. 4. - of partial indulgence-] i. e. through partial indulgence. M. MASON. benumbed wills,] That is, inflexible, immoveable, no longer obedient to fuperior direction. JOHNSON. There is a law-) What the law does in every nation between individuals, justice ought to do between nations. JOHNSON. 8 Is this, in way of truth :) Though confidering truth and justice in this question, this is my opinion; yet as a question of honour, I think on it as you. JOHNSON. : 1 |