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Enter Clown.

CLOWN. Hilloa, loa!

SHEP. What, art fo near? If thou'lt fee a thing to talk on when thou art dead and rotten, come hither. What ail'ft thou, man?

CLOWN. I have feen two fuch fights, by fea, and by land;--but I am not to fay, it is a fea, for it is now the sky; betwixt the firmament and it, you cannot thruft a bodkin's point.

SHEP. Why, boy, how is it?

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CLOWN. I would, you did but see how it chafes, how it rages, how it takes up the fhore! but that's not to the point: O, the most piteous cry of the poor fouls! fometimes to fee 'em, and not to fee 'em: now the fhip boring the moon with her mainmaft; and anon swallow'd with yeft and froth, as you'd thruft a cork into a hogfhead. And then for the land fervice,To fee how the bear tore out his shoulder-bone; how he cried to me for help, and faid, his name was Antigonus, a nobleman:-But to make an end of the fhip:-to fee how the fea flap-dragon'd it:-but, firft, how the poor fouls roar'd, and the fea mock'd them;-and how the poor gentleman roar'd, and the bear mock'd him, both roaring louder than the fea, or weather.

SHEP. 'Name of mercy, when was this, boy? CLOWN. Now, now; I have not winked fince I faw thefe fights: the men are not yet cold under

3 now the hip boring the moon with her main-maft;] So, in Pericles: "But fea-room, and the brine and cloudy billow kifs the moon, I care not. MALONE.

4 flap-dragon'd it:] i. e. fwallowed it, as our ancient topers fwallowed flap-dragons. So, in Love'- Labour's Loft: "Thou art easier fwallowed than a flap-dragon. See note on K. Henry IV.

P. II. A& II. fc. iv. STEEVENS.

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water, nor the bear half dined on the gentleman; he's at it now.

SHEP. Would I had been by, to have help'd the old man! 5

CLOWN. I Would you had been by the ship fide, to have help'd her; there your charity would have lack'd footing. [Afide. SHEP. Heavy matters! heavy matters! but look thee here, boy. Now blefs thyfelf; thou met'st with things dying, I with things new born. Here's a fight for thee; look thee, a bearing-cloth for a fquire's child! Look thee here; take up, take up, boy; open't. So, let's fee;-It was told me, I fhould be rich by the fairies: this is fome changeling: 'open't: What's within, boy?

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5 Shep. Would I had been by, to have help'd the old man. ] Though. all the printed copies concur in this reading, I am perfuaded, we ought to restore, nobleman. The Shepherd knew nothing of Antigonus's age; befides, the Clown hath juft told his father, that he faid his name was Antigonus, a nobleman; and no less than three times in this fhort fcene, the Clown, fpeaking of him, calls him the gentleman. THEOBALD.

I fuppofe the Shepherd infers the age of Antigonus from his inability to defend himself; or perhaps Shakspeare, who was conscious that he himself defigned Antigonus for an old man, has inadvertently given this knowledge to the Shepherd who had never

feen him. STEEVENS.

Perhaps the word old was inadvertently omitted in the preceding speech: "nor the bear half dined on the old gentleman; Mr. Steevens's fecond conjecture, however, is, I believe, the true one. MALONE.

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a bearing-cloth] A bearing-cloth is the fine mantle or cloth with which a child is ufually coveted, when it is carried to the church to be baptized. PERCY.

- fome changeling: ] i. e. fome child left behind by the fairies, in the room of one which they had stolen.

So, in A Midfummer-Night's Dream:

"A lovely boy, ftol'n from an Indian king;
"She never had fo fweet a changeling." STEEVENS.

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CLOWN. You're a made old man; if the fins of your youth are forgiven you, you're well to live. Gold! all gold!

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SHEP. This is fairy gold, boy, and 'twell prove fo: up with it, keep it clofe; home, home, the next way. We are lucky, boy; and to be fo ftill, requires nothing but fecrecy.-Let my fheep go:Come, good boy, the next way home.

CLOWN. Go you the next way with your findings; I'll go fee if the bear be gone from the gentleman, and how much he hath eaten: they are never curft, but when they are hungry:9 if there be any of him left, I'll bury it.

SHEP. That's a good deed: If thou may'ft difcern by that which is left of him, what he is, fetch me to the fight of him.

CLOWN. Marry, will.I; and you fhall help to put him i'the ground.

SHEP. 'Tis a lucky day, boy; and we'll do good deeds on't.

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[Exeunt.

-You're a mad old you're well to live,

You're a made old man;] In former copies: man; if the fins of your youth are forgiven you, Gold! all gold:· This the Clown says upon his opening his fardel, and difcovering the wealth in it. But this is no reason why he fhould call his father a mad old man. I have ventured to corre& in the text--You're a made old man; i. e. your fortune's made by this adventitious treasure. So our poet, in a number of other pasfages. THEOBALD.

Dr. Warburton did not accept this emendation, but it is certainly right. The word is borrowed from the novel: "The good man defired his wife to be quiet! if he would hold peace, they were made for ever. FARMER.

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8 -the next way.] i. c. the nearest way. So, in King Henry IV. P. I: 'Tis the next way to turn tailor, or be redbreaft teacher." STEEVENS.

9 They are never curft, but when they are hungry : ] Curft, figni fies mischievous. Thus the adage: Curft cows have fhort horns.

HENLEY.

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TIME. I, that please fome, try all; both joy, and

terror,

Of good and bad; that make, and unfold error,
Now take upon me, in the name of Time,
To ufe my wings. Impute it not a crime,
To me, or my fwift paffage, that I flide

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O'er fixteen years, and leave the growth untried

that make, and unfold error,] This does not, in my opinion, take in the poet's thought. Time does not make mistakes, and difcover them, at different conjun&tures; but the poet means, that Time often for a feafon covers errors, which he afterwards difplays and brings to light. I chufe therefore to read:

that maik and unfold error,

THEOBALD.

Theobald's emendation is furely unneceffary. Departed time renders many fa&s obfcure, and in that fenfe is the cause of error. Time to come brings difcoveries with it.

"Thefe very comments on Shakspeare (fays Mr. M. Mason) prove that time can both make and unfold error. STEEVENS. 3 - that I fide

O'er fixteen years,] This trefpafs, in refpect of dramatic unity, will appear venial to thofe who have read the once famous Lyly's Endymion, or (as he himself calls it in the prologue) his Man in the Moon. This author was applauded and very liberally paid by queen Elizabeth. Two acts of his piece comprize the space of forty years, Endymion lying down to fleep at the end of the fecond, and waking in the first scene of the fifth, after a nap of that unconscionable length. Lyly has likewife been guilty of much greater abfurdities than ever Shakspeare committed; for he fuppofes that Endymion's hair, features, and person, were changed by age during his fleep, while all the other perfonages of the drama remained without alte

ration.

George Whetstone, in the epifle dedicatory, before his Promes and Caffandra, 1578, (on the plan of which Meafure for Measure is formed) had pointed out many of thefe abfurdities and offences

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Of that wide gap; fince it is in my power
To o'erthrow law, and in one self-born hour

against the laws of the Drama. It must be owned therefore that Shakspeare has not fallen into them through ignorance of what they were. "For at this daye, the Italian is fo lafcivious in his comedies, that honeft hearts are grieved at his a&ions. The Frenchman and Spaniard follow the Italian's humour. The German is too holy; for he prefents on everye common ftage, what preachers fhould pronounce in pulpits. The Englishman in this qualitie, is moft vaine, indifcreete, and out of order. He first grounds his Worke on impoffibilities: then in three houres ronnes he throwe the worlde: marryes, gets children, makes children men, men to conquer kingdomes, muider monfters, and bringeth goddes from heaven, and fetcheth devils from hell," &c. This quotation will ferve to show that our poet might have enjoyed the benefit of literary laws, but, like Achilles, denied that laws were defigned to operate on beings confident of their own powers, and fecure of graces beyond the reach of art. STEEVENS.

In The Pleasant Comedie of Patient Griffel, 1603, written by Thomas Dekker, Henry Chettle, and William Haughton, Griffel is in the firft a&t married, and foon afterwards brought to bed of twins, a fon and a daughter; and the daughter in the fifth ad is produced on the feene as a woman old enough to be married. MALONE.

4 and leave the growth untried

Of that wide gap:] Our author attends more to his ideas than to his words. The growth of the wide gap, is fomewhat irregular; but he means, the growth, or progreffion of the time which filled up the gap of the story between Perdita's birth and her fixteenth year. To leave this growth untried, is to intermediate years unnoted and unexamined. the word which he would have chofen, quired. JOHNSON.

leave the paffages of the Untried is not, perhaps, but which his rhyme re

Dr. Johnson's explanation of growth is confirmed by a subsequent paffage:

"I turn my glass; and give my fcene fuch growing,

"As you had lept between."

Again, in Pericles, Prince of Tyre:

"Whom our faft growing fcene must find

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Gap, the reading of the original copy, which Dr. Warburton changed to gulph, is likewife fupported by the fame play, in which old Gower, who appears as Chorus, fays,

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