Then up he rose, and don'd his clothes, And dupp'd the chamber door ;5 Let in the maid, that out a maid Never departed more. King. Pretty Ophelia ! ph. Indeed, without an oath, I'll make an end on 't; By Gis, and by Saint Charity,7 Alack, and fy for shame! Young men will do 't, if they come to 't; 5 And dupp'd the chamber door;] To dup, is to do up; to lift the latch. It were easy to write-And op'd. Johnson. To dup, was a common contraction of to do up. So, in Damon and Pythias, 1582: "— the porters are drunk; will they not dup the gate to-day?" Lord Surrey, in his translation of the second Æneid, renders Panduntur portæ &c. "The gates cast up, we issued out to play." The phrase seems to have been adopted either from doing up the latch, or drawing up the portcullis. So, in the ancient MS. romance of The Sowdon of Babyloyne, p. 40: "To the prison she hyed hir swyth, "The prison dore up she doth." Again, in The Cooke's Play, in the Chester collection of mysteries, MS. Harl. 1013, p. 140: "Open up hell-gates anon." It appears from Martin Mark-all's Apologie to the Bel-man of London, 1610, that in the cant of gypsies, &c. Dup the gigger, signified to open the doore. Steevens. By Gis,] I rather imagine it should be read: That is, by St. Cecily. Johnson. See the second paragraph of the next note. 7 Steevens. -by Saint Charity,] Saint Charity is a known saint among the Roman Catholicks. Spenser mentions her, Eclog. V, 255: "Ah dear lord, and sweet Saint Charity!" Again, in The Downfall of Robert Earl of Huntington, 1601: "Therefore, sweet master, for Saint Charity." Again, in A lytell Geste of Robyn Hode: "Lete me go, then sayd the sheryf, "For saint Charytè, Again, ibid: "Gyve us some of your spendynge, I find, by Gisse, used as an adjuration, both by Gascoigne in his Poems, by Preston in his Cambyses, and in the comedy of See me and see me not, 1618: Quoth she, before you tumbled me, So would I ha' done, by yonder sun, An thou hadst not come to my bed. King. How long hath she been thus? Oph. I hope, all will be well. We must be patient: but I cannot choose but weep, to think, they should lay him i' the cold ground: My brother shall know of it, and so I thank you for your good counsel. Come, my coach! Good night, ladies;1 good night, sweet ladies: good night, good night. [Exit. "By Gisse I swear, were I so fairly wed," &c. Again, in King Edward III, 1599: "By Gis, fair lords, ere many daies be past," &c. Again, in Heywood's 23d Epigram, Fourth Hundred: Nay, by Gis, he looketh on you maister, quoth he." Steevens. Mr. Steevens's first assertion, though disputed by a catholick friend, can be supported by infallible authority. "We read," says Dr. Douglas, "in the martyrology on the first of AugustRoma passio sanctarum virginum, Fidei, Spei, et CHARITATIS, quæ sub Hadriano principe martyriæ coronam adeptæ sunt." Criterion, p. 68. Ritson. In the scene between the Bastard Faulconbridge and the friars and nunne, in the First Part of The troublesome Raigne of King John, (edit. 1779, p. 256, &c.) "the nunne swears by Gis, and the friers pray to Saint Withold (another obsolete saint mentioned in King Lear, Vol. XIV,) and adjure him by Saint Charitie to hear them." Blackstone. By Gis,] There is not the least mention of any saint whose name corresponds with this, either in the Roman Calendar, the service in Usum Sarum, or in the Benedictionary of Bishop Athelwold. I believe the word to be only a corrupted abbreviation of Jesus, the letters J. H. S. being anciently all that was set down to denote that sacred name, on altars, the covers of books, &c. Ridley. Though Gis may be, and I believe is, only a contraction of Jesus, there is certainly a Saint Gislen, with whose name it correstonds. Ritson. 8 By cock,] This is likewise a corruption of the sacred name. Many instances of it are given in a note at the beginning of the fifth Act of The Second Part of King Henry IV. Steevens. 9 He answers.] These words I have added from the quartos. Steevens. 1 Come, my coach! Good night, ladies; &c.] In Marlowe's Tamburlaine, 1590, Zabina in her frenzy uses the same expres King. Follow her close; give her good watch, I pray you. [Exit HOR. O! this is the poison of deep grief; it springs When sorrows come,2 they come not single spies, Next, your son gone; and he most violent author sion: "Hell, make ready my coach, my chair, my jewels, I come, I come." Malone. 2 When sorrows come, &c.] In Ray's Proverbs we find, “ Misfortunes seldom come alone," as a proverbial phrase. Reed. 3 but greenly,] But unskilfully; with greenness; that is, without maturity of judgment. Johnson. 4 In hugger-mugger to inter him:] All the modern editions that I have consulted, give it: In private to inter him: That the words now replaced are better, I do not undertake to prove; it is sufficient that they are Shakspeare's: if phraseology is to be changed as words grow uncouth by disuse, or gross by vulgarity, the history of every language will be lost; we shall no longer have the words of any author; and, as these alterations will be often unskilfully made, we shall in time have very little of his meaning. Johnson. On this just observation I ground the restoration of a gross and unpleasing word in a preceding passage, for which Mr. Pope substituted groan. See p. 131, n. 9. The alteration in the present instance was made by the same editor. Malone. This expression is used in The Revenger's Tragedy, 1609: he died like a politician, "In hugger-mugger." Again, in Harrington's Ariosto: "So that it might be done in hugger-mugger." Shakspeare probably took the expression from the following passage in Sir Thomas North's translation of Plutarch:-" Antonius thinking that his body should be honourably buried, and not in hugger-mugger." It appears from Greene's Groundwork of Coneycatching, 1592, that to hugger was to lurk about. Steevens. The meaning of the expression is ascertained by Florio's Italian Dictionary, 1598: "Dinascoso, Secretly, hiddenly, in huggermugger." Malone, Without the which we are pictures, or mere beasts. 5 Feeds on his wonder,] The folio readsKeeps on his wonder, The quarto Feeds on this wonder, Thus the true reading is picked out from between them. Sir T. Hanmer reads unnecessarily— Feeds on his anger, Johnson. • Wherein necessity, &c.] Sir T. Hanmer reads: Whence animosity of matter beggar'd. He seems not to have understood the connection. Wherein, that is, in which pestilent speeches, necessity, or the obligation of an accuser to support his charge, will nothing stick, &c. Johnson. 7 Like to a murdering piece,] Such a piece as assassins use, with many barrels. It is necessary to apprehend this, to see the justness of the similitude. Warburton. The same term occurs in a passage in The Double Marriage of Beaumont and Fletcher: "And like a murdering piece, aims not at one, "But all that stand within the dangerous level." Again, in All's Lost by Lust, a tragedy by Rowley, 1633: "If thou fail'st too, the king comes with a murdering piece, "In the rear." Again, in A Fair Quarrel, by Midddleton and Rowley, 1622: "There is not such another murdering picce "In all the stock of calumny." It appears from a passage in Smith's Sea Grammer, 1627, that it was a piece of ordnance used in ships of war: "A case-shot is any kinde of small bullets, nailes, old iron, or the like, to put into the case, to shoot out of the ordnances or murderers; these will doe much mischiefe." &c. Steevens. A murdering-piece was the specifick term in Shakspeare's time for a piece of ordnance, or small cannon. The word is found in Cole's Latin Dictionary, 1679, and rendered, "tormentum murale." The small cannon, which are, or were used in the forecastle, half-deck, or steerage of a ship of war, were within this century, called murdering-pieces. Malone. Perhaps what is now, from the manner of it, called a swivel. Gives me superfluous death! [A Noise within. Queen. Alack! what noise is this?8 Enter a Gentleman. King. Attend. Where are my Switzers? Let them guard the door: Gent. Save yourself, my lord; The ocean, overpeering of his list,' Eats not the flats with more impetuous haste, Than young Laertes, in a riotous head, O'erbears your officers! The rabble call him, lord; Antiquity forgot, custom not known, It is mentioned in Sir T. Roes Voiage to the E. Indies, at the end of Della Valle's Travels, 1665: “ the East India company had a very little pinnace...mann'd she was with ten men, and had only one small murdering-piece within her." Probably it was never charged with a single ball, but always with shot, pieces of old iron, &c. Ritson. 8 Alack! &c.] This speech of the Queen is omitted in the quartos. Steevens. 9 my Switzers?] I have observed in many of our old plays, that the guards attendant on Kings are called Switzers, and that without any regard to the country where the scene lies. Thus, in Beaumont and Fletcher's Noble Gentleman, Act III, sc. i: was it not 66 "Some place of gain, as clerk to the great band "Of marrow-bones, that the people call the Switzers? "Men made of beef and sarcenet?" Reed. 66 The reason is, because the Swiss in the time of our poet, as at present, were hired to fight the battles of other nations. So, in Nashe's Christ's Teares over Jerusalem, 4to. 1594: Law, logicke, and the Switzers, may be hired to fight for any body." Malone. 1 The ocean, overpeering of his list,] The lists are the barriers which the spectators of a tournament must not pass. Johnson. See note on Othello, Act IV, sc. i. Steevens. List, in this place, only signifies boundary, i. e. the shore. So, in King Henry IV, P. II: "The very list, the very utmost bound "Of all our fortunes." The selvage of cloth was in both places, I believe, in our author's thoughts. Malone. 2 The ratifiers and props of every word,] By word is here meant a declaration, or proposal. It is determined to this sense, by the inference it hath to what had just preceded: |
