And he will make the face of heaven so fine, To an impatient child that hath new robes, Enter Nurse, with Cords'. And she brings news; and ev'ry tongue, that speaks 7 "The glorious parts of faire Lucilia, "Take them and joine them in the heavenly spheres ; "For lovers to adore and wonder at." Steevens. the GARISH Sun.] Milton had this speech in his thoughts when he wrote Il Penseroso : 66 Civil night, "Thou sober-suited matron." Shakspeare. "Till civil-suited morn appear." Milton. 66 Pay no worship to the garish sun." Shakspeare. Hide me from day's garish eye." Milton. JOHNSON. Garish is gaudy, showy. So, in King Richard III. : "A dream of what thou wast, a garish flag." Again, in Marlowe's Edward II. 1598: 66 march'd like players "With garish robes." It sometimes signifies wild, flighty. So, in the following instance: "starting up and garishly staring about, especially on the face of Eliosto." Hinde's Eliosto Libidinoso, 1606. STEEVENS. 8 I have bought THE MANSION OF A LOVE,] So, in Antony and Cleopatra: 66 the strong base and building of my love "Is as the very center to the earth, "Drawing all things to it." MALONE. 9 This whole scene, as Mr. Steevens observed, is materially altered from the first quarto, where it is thus given: "Enter Nurse wringing her hands, with the ladder of cords in her lap. "Jul. But how now, nurse? O lord, why look'st thou sad? "What hast thou there? the cords? But Romeo's name, speaks heavenly eloquence.Now, nurse, what news? What hast thou there, the cords, "Nurse. Aye, aye, the cords: alack, we are undone ! "We are undone, lady, we are undone !— "Jul. What devil art thou that torments me thus ? "Nurse. Romeo can, if heavens cannot. "Ah! why should Heaven so much conspire with woe, "So soon to sunder us by timeless death? "Nurse. O Tybalt, Tybalt, the best friend I had! "Jul. What storm is this, that blows so contrary? "Jul. Ah heavens!-did Romeo's hand shed Tybalt's blood? "Jul. O serpent's hate, hid with a flow'ring face! "O painted sepulchre, including filth! "Was never book, containing so foul matter, "So fairly bound. Ah, what meant Romeo? "Nurse. There is no truth, no faith, no honesty in men ; "All false, all faithless, perjur'd, all forsworn: "Shame come to Romeo! "Jul. A blister on that tongue! he was not born to shame : "Upon his face, shame is asham'd to sit. "But wherefore, villain, didst thou kill my cousin? "Worse than his death, which fain I would forget: "Romeo is banished; ah! that word-banished, That Romeo bade thee fetch ? NURSE. JUL. Ah me! what news! thy hands? Ay, ay, the cords. [Throws them down. why dost thou wring NURSE. Ah well-a-day! he's dead, he's dead, he's dead! We are undone, lady, we are undone ! Alack the day!-he's gone, he's kill'd, he's dead! Romeo can, Though heaven cannot:-O Romeo! Romeo !— Who ever would have thought it ?-Romeo! JUL. What devil art thou, that dost torment me thus ? This torture should be roar'd in dismal hell. 9 "Is worse than death-Romeo is banished, "All kill'd, all slain, all dead, all banished;— « Jul. Aye, aye; when theirs are spent, "Mine shall be shed for Romeo's banishment. "Nurse. Lady, your Romeo will be here to-night; "I'll to him; he is hid at Laurence' cell. "Jul. Do so; and bear this ring to my true knight, "And bid him come to take his last farewell. [Exit." BOSWELL. - say thou but I,] In Shakspeare's time (as Theobald has observed) the affirmative particle ay was usually written I, and here it is necessary to retain the old spelling. MALONE. I death-darting eye of cockatrice :] See what is said of the basilisk, Henry VI. Part II. Act III. Sc. II. in two places. MALONE. The strange lines that follow here in the common books, are not in the old edition. Pope. The strange lines are these: I am not I, if there be such an I; Or those eyes shut, that make thee answer, I. Brief sounds determine of my weal, or woe. NURSE. I saw the wound, I saw it with mine eyes,God save the mark 2 !-here on his manly breast: A piteous corse, a bloody piteous corse; Pale, pale as ashes, all bedawb'd in blood, All in gore blood;-I swoonded at the sight. JUL. O break, my heart!-poor bankrupt, break at once! To prison, eyes! ne'er look on liberty! Vile earth, to earth resign; end motion here; JUL. What storm is this that blows so contrary? Is Romeo slaughter'd; and is Tybalt dead? “I am not I, if there be such an I, "Or these eyes shot, that make thee answer I. "Brief sounds determine of my weal or woe." These lines hardly deserve emendation; yet it may be proper to observe, that their meanness has not placed them below the malice of fortune, the first two of them being evidently transposed; we should read: that bare vowel I shall poison more, "Than the death-darting eye of cockatrice, "Or those eyes shot, that make thee answer, I. "I am not I," &c. JOHNSON. I think the transposition recommended may be spared. The second line is corrupted. Read shut instead of shot, and then the meaning will be sufficiently intelligible. Shot, however, may be the same as shut. So, in Chaucer's Miller's Tale, Mr. Tyrwhitt's edit. ver. 3358: "And dressed him up by a shot window." STEEVENS. 2 God save the mark !] This proverbial exclamation occurs again, with equal obscurity, in Othello, Act I. Sc. I. See note on that passage. STEEVENS, My dear-lov'd cousin, and my dearer lord3 ?— Then, dreadful trumpet, sound the general doom! For who is living, if those two are gone? NURSE. Tybalt is gone, and Romeo banished; Romeo, that kill'd him, he is banished. JUL. O God!-did Romeo's hand shed Tybalt's blood? NURSE. It did, it did; alas the day! it did. JUL. O serpent heart, hid with a flow'ring face *! Did ever dragon keep so fair a cave? Beautiful tyrant! fiend angelical ! Dove-feather'd raven3! wolvish-ravening lamb! 3 MY DEAR-LOV'D cousin, and my dearer lord ?] The quarto 1599, and the folio, read 'My dearest cousin, and my dearer lord? Mr. Pope introduced the present reading from the original copy of 1597. MALONE. 4 O SERPENT heart, hid with a FLOW'RING face!] The same images occur in Macbeth : 66 look like the innocent flower, "But be the serpent under it." HENLEY. This line in the folio is given to the Nurse, and the one preceding is thrown into Juliet's speech. The text is from the quarto 1597, except that that copy reads hate instead of heart. Boswell. "O serpent heart, hid with a flow'ring face! "Did ever dragon keep so fair a cave?" So, in King John : "Rash, inconsiderate, firy voluntaries, "With ladies' faces and fierce dragons' spleens." Again, in King Henry VIII.: "You have angels' faces, but Heaven knows your hearts." The line, Did ever dragon, &c. and the following eight lines, are not in the quarto 1597. MALONE. 5 Dove-feather'd raven! &c.] In old editions— &c. "Ravenous dove! feather'd raven ! The four following lines are not in the first edition, as well as some others which I have omitted. POPE. "Ravenous dove, feather'd raven, 66 Wolfish-ravening lamb!" This passage Mr. Pope has thrown out of the text, because these two noble hemistichs are inharmonious but is there no such thing as a crutch for a labouring, halting verse? I'll venture to restore to the poet a line that is in his own mode of thinking, and truly worthy of him. Ravenous |
