NOTES.

NOTE I.

I. 2. 45. It may be questioned whether the true reading is not 'thisne, thisne;' that is, 'in this manner,' a meaning which 'thissen' has in several dialects. See Halliwell's Arch. Dict.

in the same way in Suffolk.

'So-ne' is used

NOTE II.

III. I. 2. Capell appears to have considered the reading 'marvailes' of Q, as representing the vulgar pronunciation of 'marvellous,' andhe therefore printed it 'marvels,' as in IV. I. 23.

NOTE III.

III. 2. 257, 258. In this obscure passage we have thought it best to retain substantially the reading of the Quartos. The Folios, though they alter it, do not remove the difficulty, and we must conclude that some words, perhaps a whole line, have fallen out of the text.

NOTE IV.

III. 2. 337. We retain the reading of the old copies in preference to Theobald's plausible conjecture. A similar construction occurs in The Tempest, II. I. 27, which, of he or Adrian, for a good wager, first begins to crow?'

NOTE V.

III. 2. 204. Although Pope's reading of this line was followed by all editors down to Capell it is rendered extremely improbable by the occurrence of the word 'Have' at the beginning of the line in all the old copies, and could only have been suggested by what Pope considered the exigencies of the metre. 'Needles' may have been pronounced, as Steevens writes it, 'neelds;' but, if not, the line is harmonious enough.

VOL. II.

T

NOTE VI.

IV. 1. 1. Johnson says, 'I see no good reason why the fourth Act should begin here when there seems no interruption of the action;' but he does not alter the arrangement of the Folios, which, in the absence of any good reason to the contrary, we also follow.

NOTE VII.

IV. I. 8, &c. We have retained throughout this scene the spelling of the old copies 'Mounsieur,' as representing a pronunciation more appropriate to Bottom, like 'Cavalery' a few lines lower down. We are aware, however, that the word was generally so spelt.

NOTE VIII.

V. 1. In the Folios the stage direction is 'Enter Theseus, Hippolita, Egeus and his Lords,' and the speeches which properly belong to Philostrate as master of the revels are assigned to Egeus, with the exception of that beginning 'No, my noble lord, &c.' In line 38 the Quartos correctly read 'Philostrate' where the Folios have 'Egeus.' The confusion may have arisen, as Mr Grant White suggests, from the two parts having been originally played by the same actor.

NOTE IX.

v. 1. 44–60. We have followed the Quartos in assigning this speech to Theseus alone. In the Folios Lysander is represented as reading the 'brief' and Theseus as commenting upon it. Theobald first restored the arrangement of the Quartos.

NOTE X.

V. I. 125. The stage direction of the Folios is 'Tawyer with a trumpet before them,' Tawyer being generally understood to be the name of the trumpeter; but Mr Collier, on the strength of a note in the corrected Folio 'Enter Presenter,' interprets' Tawyer' as the name of the actor who filled the part of Presenter and introduced the characters of the play.

NOTE XI.

V. I. 160. In the Variorum edition of 1821 ‘lime' is given as the reading of the Folios, and 'lome' of the Quartos, the fact being that F, F, read 'loame,' and F3 F4 'loam.'

NOTE XII.

V. I. 390-411. This speech, which in the Folios is made 'The Song,' was restored by Johnson to Oberon, following the Quartos. He adds, ‘But where then is the song ?—I am afraid it is gone after many other things of greater value. The truth is that two songs are lost. The series of the scene is this: after the speech of Puck, Oberon enters, and calls his fairies to a song, which song is apparently wanting in all the copies. Next Titania leads another song which is indeed lost like the former, though the editors have endeavoured to find it. Then Oberon dismisses his fairies to the despatch of the ceremonies. The songs, I suppose, were lost, because they were not inserted in the players' parts, from which the drama was printed.'

NOTE XIII.

V. I. 406, 407. The difficulty in these two lines is at once removed by transposing them, as was suggested by C. R. W. a correspondent in the Illustrated London News. Mr Staunton was at one time inclined to think that 'Ever shall' was a corruption of 'Every hall,' but he now adheres to the solution above given. Malone incorrectly attributes to Pope the reading which he himself adopts, 'E'er shall it in safety rest,' Pope's reading being 'Ever shall in safety rest' as in Rowe's second edition.