An she agree, within her scope of choice
Lies my consent and fair according voice.
This night I hold an old accustom'd feast,
Whereto I have invited many a guest,

Such as I love; and you, among the store,
One more, most welcome, makes my number more.
At my poor house, look to behold this night
Earth-treading stars, that make dark heaven light:

signifies in comparison with, in proportion to. So, in King Henry VIII: "These are but switches to them." STEEVENS. • Earth-treading stars, that made dark heaven light :] This nonsense should be reformed thus:

Earth-treading stars that make dark even light:

i. e. When the evening is dark, and without stars, these earthly stars supply their place, and light it up. So again, in this play : "Her beauty hangs upon the cheek of night,

"Like a rich jewel in an Ethiop's ear." WARBURTON. But why nonsense? is any thing more commonly said, than that beauties eclipse the sun? Has not Pope the thought and the word?

"Sol through white curtains shot a tim❜rous ray, "And op'd those eyes that must eclipse the day.' Both the old and the new reading are philosophical nonsense; but they are both, and both equally, poetical sense. JOHNSON. I will not say that this passage, as it stands, is absolute nonsense; but I think it very absurd, and am certain that it is not capable of the meaning that Johnson attributes to it, without the alteration I mean to propose, which is, to read:

Earth-treading stars that make dark, heaven's light.

That is, earthly stars that outshine the stars of heaven, and make them appear dark by their own superior brightness. But according to the present reading, they are earthly stars that enlighten the gloom of heaven. M. MASON.

The old reading is sufficiently supported by a parallel passage in Churchyard's Shore's Wife, 1593:

"My beautie blasd like torch or twinckling starre,

"A liuely lamp that lends darke world some light." Mr. M. Mason's explanation, however, may receive countenance from Sidney's Arcadia, Book III:

"Did light those beamy stars which greater light did dark." STEEVENS.

Such comfort, as do lusty young men feel'
When well-apparell'd April on the heel

7

do lusty young men feel-] To say, and to say in pompous words, that a young man shall feel as much in an assembly of beauties, as young men feel in the month of April, is surely to waste sound upon a very poor sentiment. I read:

Such comfort as do lusty yeomen feel.

You shall feel from the sight and conversation of these ladies, such hopes of happiness and such pleasure, as the farmer receives from the spring, when the plenty of the year begins, and the prospect of the harvest fills him with delight. JOHNSON.

Young men are certainly yeomen. So, in A lytell Geste of Robyn Hode, printed by Wynken de Worde:

Robyn commaunded his wight yong men.

"Of lii. wyght yonge men.

"Seuen score of wyght yonge men.

"Buske you my mery yonge men?'

In all these instances Copland's edition, printed not many years after, reads-yeomen.

So again, in the ancient legend of Adam Bel, printed by Cop

land:

"There met he these wight yonge men.

"Now go we hence sayed these wight yong men.
"Here is a set of these wyght yong men."

But I have no doubt that he printed from a more antiquated edition, and that these passages have accidentally escaped alteration, as we generally meet with " wyght yemen." See also Spelman's Glossary; voce JUNIores. It is no less singular that in a subsequent act of this very play the old copies should, in

two places, read " "young trees" and " young tree," instead of yew-trees, and yew-tree. RITSON.

The following passages from Chaucer's Romaunt of the Rose, and Virgil's third Georgick, will support the present reading, and show the propriety of Shakspeare's comparison: for to tell Paris that he should feel the same sort of pleasure in an assembly of beauties, which young folk feel in that season when they are most gay and amorous, was surely as much as the old man ought to say:

ubi subdita flamma medullis,

"Vere magis (quia vere calor redit ossibus).”
"That it was May, thus dremid me,
"In time of love and jolite,

Of limping winter treads, even such delight
Among fresh female buds shall you this night
Inherit at my house; hear all, all see,

8

And like her most, whose merit most shall be: Such, amongst view of many, mine, being one, May stand in number, though in reckoning none. "That al thing ginnith waxin gay, &c."Then yong folke entendin aye, "For to ben gaie and amorous, "The time is then so savorous.' 29

Romaunt of the Rose, v. 51, &c.

Again, in The Romaunce of the Sowdon of Babyloyne &c. MS. Penes Dr. Farmer:

"Hit bifelle by twyxte marche and maye,
"Whan kynde corage begynneth to pryke;
"Whan frith and felde wexen gaye,
"And every wight desirith his like;

"When lovers slepen with opyn yee,

"As nightingalis on grene tre,

"And sore desire that thai cowde flye

"That thay myghte with there love be" &c. p. 2.

STEEVENS.

Our author's 99th Sonnet may also serve to confirm the reading of the text:

"From you I have been absent in the spring, "When proud-pied April dress'd in all his trim, "Hath put a spirit of youth in ev'ry thing." Again, in Tancred and Gismund, a tragedy, 1592;

"Tell me not of the date of Nature's days,

"Then in the April of her springing age." MALOne. • Inherit at my house;] To inherit, in the language of Shakspeare's age, is to possess. See Vol. XI. p. 3, n. 7. MALONE.

Such, amongst view of many, mine, being one,

May stand in number, though in reckoning none.] The first of these lines I do not understand. The old folio gives no help; the passage is there, Which one more view. I can offer nothing better than this:

Within your view of many, mine, being one,

May stand in number, &c. JOHNSON.

Such, amongst view of many, &c.] Thus the quarto, 1597. In the subsequent quarto of 1599, that of 1609, and the folio, the line was printed thus:

Which one [on] more view of many, &c. MALONE,

Come, go with me;-Go, sirrah, trudge about
Through fair Verona; find those persons out,

A very slight alteration will restore the clearest sense to this passage. Shakspeare might have written the lines thus:

Search among view of many: mine, being one,

May stand in number, though in reckoning none. i. e. Amongst the many you will view there, search for one that will please you. Choose out of the multitude. This agrees exactly with what he had already said to him:

66

Hear all, all see,

"And like her most, whose merit most shall be."

My daughter (he proceeds) will, it is true, be one of the num ber, but her beauty can be of no reckoning (i. e. estimation) among those whom you will see here. Reckoning for estimation, is used before in this very scene:

“Of honourable reckoning are you both." STEEvens. This interpretation is fully supported by a passage in Measure for Measure:

66

- our compell'd sins

"Stand more for number, than accompt."

i.e. estimation. There is here an allusion to an old proverbial expression, that one is no number. So, in Decker's Honest Whore, Part II:

66

to fall to one,

is to fall to none,

"For one no number is."

Again, in Marlowe's Hero and Leander:

"One is no number."

Again, in Shakspeare's 136th Sonnet:

"Among a number one is reckon'd none,

"Then in the number let me pass untold."

The following lines in the poem on which the tragedy is founded, may add some support to Mr. Steevens's conjecture: "To his approved friend a solemn oath he plight,

66 every where he would resort where ladies wont
to meet;

"Eke should his savage heart like all indifferently,
"For he would view and judge them all with unallured

"No knight or gentleman of high or low renown
"But Capulet himself had bid unto his feast, &c.
"Young damsels thither flock, of bachelors a rout;
"Not so much for the banquet's sake, as beauties to
search out." MALONE.

Whose names are written there,' [Gives a Paper.] and to them say,

My house and welcome on their pleasure stay.

[Exeunt CAPULET and PARIS.

SERV. Find them out, whose names are written here? It is written-that the shoemaker should meddle with his yard, and the tailor with his last, the fisher with his pencil, and the painter with his nets; but I am sent to find those persons, whose names are here writ, and can never find what names the writing person hath here writ. I must to the learned:-In good time.

This passage is neither intelligible as it stands, nor do I think it will be rendered so by Steevens's amendment." To search amongst view of many, "is neither sense nor English. The old folio, as Johnson tell us, reads

Which one more view of many

And this leads us to the right reading, which I should suppose

to have been this:

Whilst on more view of many, mine being one, &c.

With this alteration the sense is clear, and the deviation from the folio very trifling. M. MASON.

1

—find those persons out,

Whose names are written there,] Shakspeare has here closely followed the poem already mentioned:

"No lady fair or foul was in Verona town,

"No knight or gentleman of high or low renown,
"But Capilet himself hath bid unto his feast,

"Or by his name, in paper sent, appointed as a guest."

MALONE.

• Find them out, whose names are written here?] The quarto, 1597, adds: “And yet I know not who are written here: I must to the learned to learn of them: that's as much as to say, the tailor," &c. STEEVENS.