cation, I cannot fcratch mine ear.-Pr'ythee, tell her but a worky-day fortune. Sooth. Your fortunes are alike. Iras. But how, but how? give me particulars. Sooth. I have faid. Iras. Am I not an inch of fortune better than fhe? Char. Well, if you were but an inch of fortune better than I, where would you choose it? Iras. Not in my husband's nose. Char. Our worfer thoughts heavens mend! Alexas,come, his fortune 3, his fortune.-O, let him marry a woman that cannot go, fweet Ifis, I beseech thee! And let her die too, and give him a worfe! and let worse follow worse, till the worst of all follow him laughing to his grave, fifty-fold a cuckold! Good Ifis, hear me this prayer, though thou deny me a matter of more weight; good Ifis, I beseech thee! Iras. Amen. Dear goddefs, hear that prayer of the people! for, as it is a heart-breaking to fee a handfome man loofe. wiv'd, fo it is a deadly forrow to behold a foul knave uncuckolded; Therefore, dear Ifis, keep decorum, and fortune him accordingly! Char. Amen. Alex. Lo, now w! if it lay in their hands to make me a cuckold, they would make themselves whores, but they'd do't. Eno. Hufh! here comes Antony. Char. Not he, the queen. Enter CLEOPATRA. Cleo. Saw you my lord+? 2 Nay, if an oily palm be not a fruitful prognoftication, &c.] So, in Orbello: 66 -This band is moist, my lady: "This argues fruitfulness and liberal heart." MALONE. 3 Alexas,-come, bis fortune,] In the old copy, to the speeches of Alexas, Alex. is regularly prefixed. The word here, though written at length, happening to be the firft word of a line, two of the modern editors fuppofed that the remainder of this fpeeech belonged to him, as probably the editor of the folio did, having placed a full point after Alexas. The proper regulation was made by Mr. Theobald. MALONE. 4 Saw you my lord?] Old Copy-Save you. Corrected by the editor of the lecond folio. Saw was formerly written fawe. MALONE. Eno. Eno. No, lady. Cleo. Was he not here? Char. No, madam. Cleo. He was difpos'd to mirth; but on the fudden Cleo. Seek him, and bring him hither. Where's Alexas? Mef. Ay: But foon that war had end, and the time's state Made friends of them, jointing their force 'gainst Cæfar; Whofe better iffue in the war, from Italy, Upon the first encounter, drave them. Ant. Well, what worst ? Mef. The nature of bad news infects the teller. Ant. When it concerns the fool, or coward. - On : Things, that are paft, are done, with me.-'Tis thus ; Who tells me true, though in his tale lie death, I hear him as he flatter'd. Mef. Labienus (this is ftiff news) 5 Hath, with his Parthian force, extended Afia, 5-this is stiff news,] So, in the Rape of Lucrece: From "Fearing fome bard news from the warlike band." MALONE. 6-extended Afia ;] To extend, is a term used for to feize; I know not whether that be not the fenfe here. JOHNSON. I believe Dr. Johnson's explanation right. So, in Twelfth Night: this uncivil and unjust extent 111 "Against thy peace." Again, in Maffinger's New Way to pay old Debts, the Extortioner fays: "This manor is extended to my ufe." Mr. Tollet has likewife no doubt but that Dr. Johnson's explanation is juft; "for (fays he) Plutarch informs us that Labienus was by the Parthian king made general of his troops, and had over-run Afia from Euphrates and Syria to Lydia and Ionia." To extend is a law term VOL. VII. Ff ufed From Euphrates his conquering banner shook, Whilft Ant. Antony, thou wouldst fay,- Ant. Speak to me home, mince not the general tongue; Name Cleopatra as fhe's call'd in Rome: Rail thou in Fulvia's phrafe; and taunt my faults Have power to utter. O, then we bring forth weeds, Is ufed for to feize lands and tenements. In fupport of his affertion he adds the following inftance: "Those wafteful companions had neither lands to extend nor goods to be feized. Savile's Tranflation of Tacitus, dedicated to 2 Elizabeth" and then obferves, that "Shakspeare knew the legal fignification of the term, as appears from a paffage in As you like it: "And let my officers of fuch a nature "Make an extent upon his house and lands." STEEVENS. See Vol. III. p. 167, n. 5. MALONE. 7 When our quick minds lie fill;] The old copy reads-when our quick winds lie still; which Dr. Johnson thus explains: “The sense is, that man, not agitated by cenfure, like foil not vertilated by quick winds, produces more evil than good." This certainly is true of foil, but where did Dr. Johnfon find the word foil in this paffage? He found only winds, and was forced to fubstitute foil ventilated by winds in the room of the word in the old copy; as Mr. Steevens, in order to extract a meaning from it, fuppofes winds to mean fallows, because "the ridges left in lands turned up by the plough, are termed wind-rows;" though furely the obvious explication of the latter word, rows expofed to the wind, is the true one. Hence the rows of new-mown grafs laid in heaps to dry, are alfo called wind-rows. The emendation which I have adopted, and which was made by Dr. Warburton, makes all perfectly clear; for if in Dr. Johnson's note we fubftitute, not cultivated, instead of -" not ventilated by quick winds," we have a true interpretation of Antony's words as now exhibited. Our quick minds, means, our lively, apprehenfive minds. So, in King Henry IV. P. II. "It afcends me into the brain;-makes it apprehenfive, quick, forgetive. Again, in this play: The quick comedians."-&c. It is however proper to add Dr. Warburton's own interpretation, "While the active principle within us lies immerged in floth and luxury, we bring forth vices, instead of virtues, weeds instead of flowers and fruits; but the laying before us our ill condition plainly and honeftly, is, as it were, the first culture of the mind, which gives hope of a future harvest." Is as our earing. Fare thee well a while. Mef. At your noble pleasure. Ant. From Sicyon how the news? Speak there. [Exit. 1. Att. The man from Sicyon.-Is there such an one? 2. Att. He stays upon your will. Ant. Let him appear. These strong Egyptian fetters I muft break, Enter another Messenger. Or lofe myself in dotage.-What are you? 2. Mef. Fulvia thy wife is dead. Ant. Where died the ? Being at all times very unwilling to depart from the old copy, I fhould not have done it in this inftance, but that the word winds in the only fenfe in which it has yet been proved to be used, affords no meaning and I had the lefs fcruple on the prefent occafion, because the same error is found in King John, A& V. fc. vii. where we have in the only authentick copy "Death, having prey'd upon the outward parts, The words lie ftill are opposed to caring; quick means pregnant; and the fenfe of the paffage is: When our pregnant minds lie idle and untilled, they bring forth weeds; but the telling us of our faults is a kind of culture to them." The pronoun our before quick, fhews that the fubftantive to which it refers must be fomething belonging to us, not merely an external object, as the wind is. To talk of quick winds lying fill, is little better than nonfenfe. MASON. I fufpect that quick winds is, or is a corruption of, fome provincial word fignifying either arable lands, or the inftruments of busbandry used in tilling them. Earing fignifies plowing both here and in fc. iv. So, in Genefis, c. 45. "Yet there are five years, in the which there fhall neither be caring nor harveft." BLACKSTONE. This conjecture is well founded. The ridges left in lands turned up by the plough, that they may fweeten during their fallow ftate, are ftill called wind-rows. Quick winds, I fuppofe to be the fame as teeming fallows; for fuch fallows are always fruitful in weeds. Wind-rows likewife fignify heaps of manure, confifting of dung or lime mixed up with virgin earth, and diftributed in long rows under hedges. If thefe wind-rows are fuffered to lie fill, in two fenfes, the farmer muft fare the worfe for his want of activity. First, if this compost be not frequently turned over, it will bring forth weeds fpontaneoufly; fecondly, if it be fuffered to continue where it is made, the fields receive no benefit from it, being fit only in their turn to produce a crop of useless and obnoxious herbage. STEEVENS. Ff2 2. Mef. 2. Mef. In Sicyon: Her length of fickness, with what else more serious Ant. Forbear me. [gives a Letter. [Exit Meflenger. There's a great spirit gone! Thus did I defire it: The oppofite of itfelfs: fhe's good, being gone; Eno. What's your pleasure, fir? Ant. I muft with hafte from hence. Eno. Why, then, we kill all our women: We see how -the prefent pleasure, By revolution lowering, does become The oppofite of itself:-] The allufion is to the fun's diurnal courfe; which rifing in the eaff, and by revolution lowering, or setting in the weft, becomes the oppofite of itself. WARBURTON. This is an obfcure paffage. The explanation which Dr. Warburton has offered is fuch, that I can add nothing to it; yet, perhaps Shakfpeare, who was lefs learned than his commentator, meant only, that our pleasures, as they are revolved in the mind, turn to pain. JOHNS. I rather understand the patlage thus: "What we often caft from us in contempt we wish again for, and what is at prefent our greatest pleasure, lowers in our eftimation by the revolution of time; or, by a frequent return of poffeffion becomes undesirable and disagreeable. TOLLET. . I believe revolution means change of circumstances. This fenfe appears to remove every difficulty from the pallage. The pleasure of today, by revolution of events and change of circumflances, often lofes all its value to us, and becomes to-morrow a pain. STEEVENS. 9 The band could pluck her back, &c.] The verb could has a peculiar fignification in this place; it does not denote power but inclination. The fenfe is, the band that drove ber off would now willingly pluck ber back again. HEATH. Could, would and should, are a thousand times indifcriminately used in the old plays, and yet appear to have been fo employed rather by choice than by chance. STEEVENS. mortal |