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rue for you;-and here's fome for me :-we may call it, herb of grace o'fundays:-you may wear your rue with a difference.-There's a daify :-I would give you fome

Gerard, however, and other herbalifts, impute few, if any, virtues to them; and they may therefore be ftiled thankless, because they appear to make no grateful return for their creation.

Again, in the 15th Song of Drayton's Polyolbion:

"The columbine amongft, they fparingly do fet."

From the Caltha Poetarum, 1599, it should seem as if this flower was the emblem of cuckoldom:

"the blew cornuted columbine,

"Like to the crooked horns of Acheloy." STEEVENS.

Columbine was an emblem of cuckoldom on account of the horns of its nectaria, which are remarkable in this plant. See Aquilegia in Linnæus's Genera, 684. S. W.

Ophelia gives her fennel and columbines to the king. In the colection of Sonnets quoted above, the former is thus mentioned: "Fennel is for flatterers,

"An evil thing 'tis fure;

"But I have alwaies meant truely,

"With conftant heart moft pure."

See alfo Florio's Italian Dictionary, 1598: "Dare finocchio, to give fennel,to flatter, to diffemble." MALONE.

There's rue for you ;-and here's fome for me :-we may call it herb of grace o' fundays:] I believe there is a quibble meant in this paffage; rue anciently fignifying the fame as ruth, i. e. forrow. Ophelia gives the queen fome, and keeps a proportion of it for herfelf. There is the fame kind of play with the fame word in King Richard the Second. Herb of grace is one of the titles which Tucca gives to William Rufus, in Decker's Satiromaftix. I fuppofe the first fyllable of the furname Rufus introduced the quibble. STEEVENS.

:

You may wear your rue with a difference.] This feems to refer to the rules of heraldry, where the younger brothers of a family bear the fame arms with a difference, or mark of diftinction. So, in Holinfhed's Reign of King Richard II. p. 443: " because he was the youngest of the Spenfers, he bare a border gules for a difference."

There may, however, be fomewhat more implied here, than is expreted. roa, madam, (fays Ophelia to the Queen,) may call your RUE by its Sunday name, HERB OF GRACE, and fo wear it with a difference to diftinguish it from mine, which can never be any thing but merely RUE, i. e. forrow. STEEVENS.

rue.

Herb of grace was not the funday name, but the every day name of In the common dictionaries of Shakspeare's time it is called berb of grace. See Florio's Italian Dictionary, 1598, in v. ruta, and Cotgrave's French Dictionary, 1611, in v. rue. There is no ground therefore for fuppofing, with Dr. Warburton, that we was called herb

of

fome violets; but they wither'd all, when my father died 3-They fay, he made a good end,

For bonny fweet Robin is all my joy,-

Laer. Thought and affliction 5, paffion, hell itself,

She turns to favour, and to prettiness.

Oph. And will be not come again?

[fings.

[fings.

And will he not come again?
No, no, he is dead,

Go to thy death-bed,

He never will come again.

of grace, from its being used in exorcifms performed in churches on fundays.

Ophelia only means, I think, that the queen may with peculiar propriety on fundays, when the folicits pardon for that crime which The has fo much occafion to rue and repent of, call her rue, berb of grace. So, in King Richard II,

"Here did the drop a tear; here in this place
"I'll fet a bank of rue, four kerb of grace.
"Ruc, even for ruth, here shortly fhall be feen,
"In the remembrance of a weeping queen."

Ophelia, after having given the queen rue, to remind her of the forrow and contrition fhe ought to feel for her incestuous marriage, tells her, the may wear it with a difference, to distinguish it from that worn by Ophelia herfelf; because her tears flowed from the lofs of a father, thofe of the queen ought to flow for her guilt. MALONE.

2 There's a daily:] Greene in his Quip for an upftart Courtier, has explained the fignificance of this flower: "Next them grew the DISSEMBLING DAISIE, to warne fuch light-of-love wenches not to truft every faire promife that fuch amorous bachelors make them."

HENLEY.

3 I would give you fome violets, but they wither'd all, when my father died:] The violet is thus characterized in the old collection of Sonnets above quoted, printed in 1584:

Violet is for faithfulneffe,
"Which in me thall abide;

"Hoping likewife that from your heart

"You will not let it flide." MALONE.

4 For bonny fweet Robin is all my joy,-] This is part of an old fong, mentioned likewife by Beaumont and Fletcher. Two Noble Kinfmen, A& IV. fc. i:

66- I can fing the broom,

"And Bonny Robin."

In the books of the Stationers' Company, 26 April, 1594, is entered "A ballad, intituled, A doleful adewe to the lait Erle of Darbie, to the tune of Bonny feet Robin." STEEVENS.

B b 2

His

His beard was as white as snow,
All flaxen was his poll:
He is gone, he is gone,

And we caft away moan;
God'a mercy on his foul!

And of all chriftian fouls!I pray God. God be wi'you?

Laer. Do you fee this, O God?

[Exit OPHELIAS

King. Laertes, I must commune with your grief,

Or you deny me right.

Go but apart,

Make choice of whom your wifeft friends you will,
And they fhall hear and judge 'twixt you and me :
If by direct or by collateral hand

They find us touch'd, we will our kingdom give,
Our crown, our life, and all that we call ours,
To you in fatisfaction; but, if not,

Be you content to lend your patience to us,
And we shall jointly labour with your foul
To give it due content.

Laer. Let this be so;

His means of death, his obfcure funeral,

5 Thought and affliction,-] Thought here, as in many other places; fignifies melancholy. See Vol. VII. p. 528, n. 2. MALONE.

6 His beard was as white as snow, &c.] This, and several circumftances in the character of Ophelia, feem to have been ridiculed in Eastward Hoe, a comedy written by Ben Jonfon, Chapman, and Marton, printed 1605, A& III.:

"His bead as white as milk,
"All flaxen was his hair

"But now he's dead,

"And laid in his bed,

"And never will come again.

"God be at your labour !

7 God 'a mercy on his foul!

STEEVENS.

And of all chriftian fouls!] This is the common conclufion to many of the ancient monumental infcriptions. See Weever's Funeral Monuments, p. 657, 658. Barthelette, the publisher of Gower's Confeffio Amantis, 1554, speaking first of the funeral of Chaucer, and then of Gower, fays, "- he lieth buried in the monafterie of Seynt Peter's at Westminster, &c. on whofe foules and all chriften, Jefu bave mercie." STEEVENS,

No

No trophy, fword, nor hatchment, o'er his bones,
No noble rite, nor formal oftentation,-

Cry to be heard, as 'twere from heaven to earth,
That I must call't in queftion.

King. So you fhall;

And, where the offence is, let the great axe fall.
I pray you, go with me.

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[Exeunt.

Hor. What are they, that would speak with me?

Serv. Sailors, fir;

They say, they have letters for you.

Hor. Let them come in.

[Exit Servant.

I do not know from what part of the world
I fhould be greeted, if not from lord Hamlet.

Enter Sailors.

1. Sail. God bless you, fir.

Hor. Let him blefs thee too.

1. Sail. He fhall, fir, an't please him. There's a letter for you, fir; it comes from the ambaffador that was bound for England; if your name be Horatio, as I am let to know it is.

Hor. [reads.] Horatio, when thou shalt have overlook'd this, give thefe fellows fome means to the king; they have letters for him. Ere we were two days old at fea, a pirate of very warlike appointment gave us chace: Finding ourfelves too flow of jail, we put on a compell'd valour; and in the grapple I boarded them: on the inftant, they got clear of our ship; So I alone became their prifoner. They

8 No trophy, fword, nor batchment, o'er his bones,] It was the cuftom, in the times of our author, to hang a sword over the grave of a knight. JOHNSON.

This practice is uniformly kept up to this day. Not only the fword, but the helmet, gauntlet, fpurs, and tabard, (i. e. a coat whereon the armorial enfigns were anciently depicted, from whence the term coat of armour) are hung over the grave of every knight.

Bb3

Sir J. HAWKINS.

bave

have dealt with me, like thieves of mercy; but they knew what they did; I am to do a good turn for them. Let the king have the letters I have fent; and repair thou to me with as much hafte as thou would't fly death. I have words to speak in thine ear, will make thee dumb; yet are they much too light for the bore of the matter?. These good fellows will bring thee where I am. Rofencrantz and Guildenstern hold their courfe for England: of them I have much to tell thee. Farewel

He that thou knoweft thine, Hamlet. Come, I will give you way for thefe your letters; And do't the speedier, that you may direct me To him from whom you brought them.

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[Exeunt.

King. Now muft your confcience my acquittance feal, And you must put me in your heart for friend; Sith you have heard, and with a knowing ear,

That he, which hath your noble father slain,

Purfu'd my life.

Laer. It well appears :-But tell me,
Why you proceeded not against these feats,
So crimeful and io capital in nature,

As by your fafety, greatnefs, wifdom, all things elfe,
You mainly were ftirr'd up?

King. O, for two fpecial reafons;

Which may to you, perhaps, feem much unfinew'd,
But yet to me they are ftrong. The queen, his mother,
Lives almoft by his looks; and for myself,

(My virtue, or my plague, be it either which,)
She is fo conjunctive to my life and foul,
That, as the ftar moves not but in his fphere,
I could not but by her. The other motive,

9-for the bore of the matter.] The bore is the caliber of a gun, or the capacity of the barrel. The matter (fays Hamlet) would carry beavier words. JOHNSON.

Why

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