In giving him his right.

TIM.

Mine honeft friend,

Contain thyself, good friend.

I pr'ythee, but repair to me next morning.

CAPH. Nay, good my lord,

TIM.

VAR. SERV. One Varro's fervant, my good lord,

ISID. SERV.

From Ifidore; He humbly prays your speedy payment,'

CAPH. If you did know, my lord, my master's

wants,

VAR. SERV. 'Twas due on forfeiture, my lord, fix weeks,

And paft,

ISID. SERV. Your steward puts me off, my lord; And I am fent expressly to your lordship.

TIM. Give me breath:

I do beseech you, good my lords, keep on;

[Exeunt ALCIBIADES and Lords. I'll wait on you inftantly.-Come hither, pray you. [To FLAVIUS. How goes the world, that I am thus encounter'd With clamorous demands of date-broke bonds,

5 He humbly prays your speedy payment,] As our author does not appear to have meant that the fervant of Ifidore should be less civil than those of the other lords, it is natural to conceive that this line, at prefent imperfect, originally ftood thus:

6

He humbly prays your lordship's Speedy payment. STEEVENS.

of date-broke bonds,] The old copy has:

of debt, broken bonds.

Mr. Malone very judiciously reads-date-broken.

For the fake of measure I have omitted the laft letter of the fecond word. So, in Much Ado about Nothing: "I have broke [i. e. broken] with her father." STEEVENS.

To the prefent emendation I should not have ventured to give a place in the text, but that fome change is abfolutely neceffary,

And the detention of long-fince-due debts,
Against my honour?

FLAV.
Please you, gentlemen,
The time is unagreeable to this business:
Your importunacy ceafe, till after dinner;
That I may make his lordship understand
Wherefore you are not paid.

CAPH. Stay, ftay, here comes the fool with Apemantus; let's have some sport with 'em. VAR. SERV. Hang him, he'll abuse us. ISID. SERV. A plague upon him, dog!

VAR. SERV. How doft, fool?

APEM. Doft dialogue with thy fhadow?
VAR. SERV. I fpeak not to thee.

APEM. No, 'tis to thyfelf.-Come away.

[To the Fool.

and this appears to be established beyond a doubt by a former line in the preceding scene:

"And my reliances on his fracted dates."

The tranfcriber's ear deceived him here as in many other places. Sir Thomas Hanmer and the fubfequent editors evaded the difficulty by omitting the corrupted word,-debt. MALONE.

7 Enter Apemantus and a Fool.] I fufpect fome fcene to be loft, In which the entrance of the fool, and the page that follows him, was prepared by fome introductory dialogue, in which the audience was informed that they were the fool and page of Phrynia, Timandra, or fome other courtefan, upon the knowledge of which depends the greater part of the enfuing jocularity. JOHNSON.

ISID. SERV. [To Var. Serv.] There's the fool hangs on your back already.

APEM. No, thou ftand'ft fingle, thou art not on him yet.

CAPH. Where's the fool now?

APEM. He laft afk'd the question.-Poor rogues, and ufurers' men! bawds between gold and want!' ALL. What are we, Apemantus?

APEM. Affes.

ALL. SERV. Why?

APEM. That you afk me, what you are, and do not know yourselves.-Speak to 'em, fool. FOOL. How do you, gentlemen?

ALL SERV. Gramercies, good fool: How does your mistress?

FOOL. She's e'en fetting on water to fcald fuch

& Poor rogues, and ufurers' men! bawds &c.] This is faid fo abruptly, that I am inclined to think it mifplaced, and would regulate the paffage thus:

Caph. Where's the fool now?
Apem. He laft afk'd the question.
All. What are we, Apemantus?
Apem. Afles.

All. Why?

Apem. That you ask me what you are, and do not know yourfelves. Poor rogues, and ufurers' men! barwds between gold and want! Speak &c.

Thus every word will have its proper place. it is likely that the paffage tranfpofed was forgot in the copy, and inferted in the margin, perhaps a little befide the proper place, which the tranfcriber wanting either fkill or care to obferve, wrote it where it now ftands. JOHNSON.

The tranfpofition proposed by Johnson is unneceffary. Apemantus does not addrefs thefe words to any of the others, but mutters them to himself; fo that they do not enter into the dialogue, or compofe a part of it. M. MASON.

8

chickens as you are. Would, we could fee you at Corinth."

APEM. Good! gramercy.

1

FOOL. Look you,

Enter Page.

here comes my mistress' page.'

8 She's e'en fetting on water to fcald &c.] The old name for the disease got at Corinth was the brenning, and a sense of scalding is one of its firft fymptoms. JOHNSON.

The fame thought occurs in The Old Law, by Maflinger:

look parboil'd,

"As if they came from Cupid's fcalding houfe."

STEEVENS.

It was anciently the practice, and in inns perhaps ftill continues, to fcald off the feathers of poultry, inftead of plucking them. Chaucer hath referred to it in his Romaunt of the Rofe, 6820:

"Without fcalding they hem pulle." HENLEY.

9 'Would, we could fee you at Corinth.] A cant name for a bawdyhoufe, I fuppofe, from the diffolutenefs of that ancient Greek city; of which Alexander ab Alexandro has thefe words: "Et CoRINTHI fupra mille proftitutas in templo Veneris affidue degere, & inflammata libidine quæftui meretricio operam dare, & velut facrorum miniftras De famulari." Milton, in his Apology for Smeciymnuus, fays: "Or fearching for me at the Bordellos, where, it may be, he has loft himself, and raps up, without pity, the fage and rheu matick old prelatefs, with all her young Corinthian laity, to enquire for fuch a one." WARBURTON.

See Vol. VIII. p. 442, n. 4. MALONE.

2my miftrefs' page.] In the firft paffage this Fool fpeaks of his master, in the fecond [as exhibited in the modern editions] of his mistress. In the old copy it is mafter in both places. It fhould rather, perhaps, be miftrefs in both, as it is in a following and a preceding paffage :

All. How does your mistress?"

"Fool. My miftrefs is one, and I am her fool."

STEEVENS.

I have not hesitated to print miftrefs in both places. Mafter was frequently printed in the old copy instead of mistress, and vice versa, from the ancient mode of writing an M only, which stood in the MSS. of Shakspeare's time either for the one or the other; and the

PAGE. [To the Fool.] Why, how now, captain? what do you in this wife company?-How doft thou, Apemantus?

APEM. 'Would I had a rod in my mouth, that I might answer thee profitably.

PAGE. Pr'ythee, Apemantus, read me the superfcription of these letters; I know not which is which.

APEM. Canft not read?

PAGE. No.

APEM. There will little learning die then, that day thou art hang'd. This is to lord Timon; this to Alcibiades. Go; thou waft born a baftard, and thou'lt die a bawd.

PAGE. Thou waft whelp'd a dog; and thou fhalt famish, a dog's death. Anfwer not, I am gone. [Exit Page.

APEM. Even fo thou out-run'ft grace. Fool, I will go with you to lord Timon's. FOOL. Will you leave me there?

APEM. If Timon stay at home.-You three serve three ufurers?

ALL SERV. Ay; 'would they served us!

APEM. So would I,-as good a trick as ever hangman ferved thief.

copyift or printer completed the word without attending to the context. This abbreviation is found in Coriolanus, folio, 1623, p. 21:

"Where's Cotus? My M. calls for him?"

Again, more appofitely, in The Merchant of Venice, 1623:

"What ho, M. [Mafter] Lorenzo, and M. [Miftrefs] Lo

renzo,

In Vol, VI. p. 425, n, 9, and Vol. X. p. 24, n. 5, are found corruptions fimilar to the prefent, in confequence of the printer's completing the abbreviated word of the MS. improperly, MALONE,