eye or fo*, but not to the purpose.-Signior Romeo, bon jour! there's a French falutation to your French flops. You gave us the counterfeit fairly last night.

Rom. Good morrow to you both. What counterfeit did I give you?

Mer. The flip, fir, the flip; Can you not conceive? Rom.

4 Thifbé a grey eye or fo,] He means to allow that Thisbé had a wery fine eye; for from various paffages it appears that a grey eye was in our authour's time thought eminently beautiful. This may feem strange to those who are not converfant with ancient phrafeology; but a grey eye undoubtedly meant what we now denominate a blue eye Thus, in Venus and Adonis:

"Her two blue windows faintly the upheaveth,"

i. e. the windows or lids of her blue eyes. In the very fame poem the eyes of Venus are termed grey:

"Mine eyes are grey and bright, and quick in turning.”

Again, in Cymbeline:

"To fee the inclosed lights, now canopy'd

"Under these windows: white and azure lac'd;

"With blue of heaven's own tinct."

In Twelfth Night, Olivia fays, "I will give out divers schedules of my beauty-as item, two lips, indifferent red; item, two grey eyes, with lids to them," &c. So Julia, in the Two Gentlemen of Verona, fpeaking of her rival's eyes, as eminently beautiful, fays,

"Her eyes are grey as glafs, and fo are mine."

And Chaucer has the fame comparison:

"-hire eyes gray as glas."

This comparison proves decifively what I have afferted; for clear and tranfparent glafs is not what we now call grey, but blue, or azure.

MALONE. 5-your French flop.] Slops are large loose breeches or trowfers, worn at prefent only by failors.

STEEVENS.

See Vol. II. n. 376, n. 9. MALONE.

6-What counterfeit, &c.

Mer. The flip, fir, the flip;] To understand this play upon the words counterfeit and flip, it should be obferved that in our author's time there was a counterfeit piece of money diftinguished by the name of a flip. This will appear in the following inftances: "And therefore he went and got him certain flips, which are counterfeit pieces of money, being braffe, and covered over with filver, which the common people call flips." Thieves falling out, true men come by their goods; by Robert Greene.

Again:

66 -I had like t' have been

« Abus'd

Rom. Pardon, good Mercutio, my business was great; and, in fuch a cafe as mine, a man may strain courtesy. Mer. That's as much as to fay-such a cafe as yours constrains a man to bow in the hams.

Rom. Meaning-to court'fy.

Mer. Thou haft moft kindly hit it.

Rom. A moft courteous expofition.

Mer. Nay, I am the very pink of courtesy.
Rom. Pink for flower.

Mer. Right.

Rom. Why, then is my pump well flower'd'.

Mer. Well faid: follow me this jeft now, till thou haft worn out thy pump; that, when the fingle fole of it is worn, the jest may remain, after the wearing, folely fingular.

Rom. O fingle-foled jeft, folely fingular for the fingle

nefs!

"Abus'd i' the business, had the flip flurr'd on me;

"A counterfeit." Magnetick Lady, A. III. S. vi. REED. The flip is again ufed equivocally in No Wit like a Woman's, a come. dy, by Middleton, 1657: "Clown. Because you shall be sure on't you have given me a nine-pence here, and I'll give you the flip for it." [Exit. MALONE.

7-ben is my pump well flower'd.] Here is a vein of wit too thin to be easily found. The fundamental idea is, that Romeo wore pinked pumps, that is, punched with holes in figures. JOHNSON.

See the shoes of the morris-dancers in the plate at the conclufion of the first part of K. Henry IV. with Mr. Tollet's remarks annexed to it.

It was the custom to wear ribbons in the fhoes formed into the shape of roles, or of any other flowers. So, in the Mafque by the gent. of Gray's-Inn, 1614: "Every mafker's pump was faften'd with a flower fuitable to his cap." STEEVENS.

8 Well faid:] So the original copy. The quarto of 1599, and the other ancient copies, have-Sure wit, follow, &c. What was meant, I fuppofe, was-Sheer wit! follow, &c. and this corruption may serve to justify an emendation that I have proposed in a paffage in Antony and Cleopatra, where I am confident fure was a printer's blunder. See Vol. VII. p 483, n. 5. MALONE.

90 fingle-foled jeft,] This epithet is here ufed equivocally. It formerly fignified mean or contemptible; and that is one of the fenfes in which it is ufed here. So, in Holinched's Defcription of Ireland, P. 23:-"which was not unlikely, confidering that a meane tower might ferve fuch fingle-foale kings as were at thofe daies in Ireland.”

MALONE.

Mer.

Mer. Come between us, good Benvolio; my wits fail. Rom. Switch and fpurs, iwitch and fpurs; or I'll cry a match.

Mer. Nay, if thy wits run the wild-goofe chafe, I have done; for thou haft more of the wild-goofe in one of thy wits, than, I am fure, I have in my whole five: Was I with you there for the goofe?

Rom. Thou waft never with me for any thing, when thou waft not there for the goose.

Mer. I will bite thee by the ear' for that jeft.
Rom. Nay, good goofe, bite not 2.

Mer. Thy wit is a very bitter sweeting 3; it is a most fharp fauce.

Rem. And is it not well ferved in to a sweet goofe?

Mer. O, here's a wit of cheverel, that stretches from an inch narrow to an ell broad!

Rom. I ftretch it out for that word-broad: which added to the goofe, proves thee far and wide a broad goofe.

Mer. Why, is not this better now than groaning for love? now art thou fociable, now art thou Romeo; now art thou what thou art, by art as well as by

1 I will bite thee by the ear-] So Sir Epicure Mammon to Face in Jonfon's Alchymift:

"Slave, I could bite thine ear." STEEVENS.

2 good goofe, bite not.] is a proverbial expression, to be found in Ray's Collection; and is used in The Two Angry Women of Abington, 1599. STEEVENS.

name.

a very bitter fweeting ;] A bitter fweeting, is an apple of that So, in Summer's laft Will and Teftament, 1600:

-as well crabs as facetings for his fummer fruits."

Again, in Fair Em, 1631:

"what, in difpleasure gone!

"And left me fuch a bitter feet to gnaw upon?" STEEV. 4a wit of cheverel,] Cheverel is foft leather for gloves. JoHNS. So, in the Two Maids of More-clack, 1609:

"Drawing on love's white hand a glove of warmth,

"Not cheveril ftretching to fuch prophanation."

Again, in The Owl, by Drayton :

"A cheverell confcience, and a fearching wit." STEEVENS. Cheveril is from Chevreuil, roebuck. MUSGRAVE.

nature:

nature: for this driveling love is like a great natural, that runs lolling up and down to hide his bauble in a hole3. Ben. Stop there, ftop there.

Mer. Thou defireft me to ftop in my tale against the hair".

Ben. Thou would'ft elfe have made thy tale large.

Mer. O, thou art deceived, I would have made it fhort: for I was come to the whole depth of my tale: and meant, indeed, to occupy the argument no longer 7. Rom. Here's goodly geer!

Enter Narfe, and PETER.

Mer. A fail, a fail, a fails!

Ben. Two, two; a fhirt, and a fmock.

Nurse. Peter!

Peter. Anon?

Nurfe. My fan, Peter 9.

Mer. Pr'ythee, do, good Peter, to hide her face; for her fan's the fairer of the two.

5 -to bide bis bauble in a bole.] It has been already obferved by Sir 7. Hawkins, in a note on All's Well, &c. that a bauble was one of the accoutrements of a licenfed fool or jefter. So again, in Sir W. D'Avenant's Albovine, 1629: "For fuch rich widows there love court fools, and ufe to play with their baubles."

See the plate at the end of K. Henry IV. P. I. with Mr. Tollet's obfervations on it. STEEVENS.

6-against the hair.] A contrepoil: Fr. An expreffion equivalent to one which we now ufe," against the grain." STEEVENS.

7 to occupy the argument no longer.] Here we have another wanton allufion. See Vol. V. p. 331, n. 5. MALONE.

8 Mer. A fail, a fail, &c.] Thus the quarto, 1597. In the subfe quent ancient copies these words are erroneously given to Romeo.

MALONE.

9 My fan, Peter.] The bufinefs of Peter carrying the Nurje'e fan, feems ridiculous according to modern manners; but I find fuch was formerly the practice. In an old pamphlet, called "The Servingman's Comfort," 1598, we are informed, "The mistress must have one to carry her cloake and hood, another her fanne." FARMER. Again, in Love's Labour's Loft:

To fee him walk before a lady, and to bear a fan. Again, in Every Man out of bis Humour: "If any lady, &c. wants an upright gentleman in the nature of a gentleman-ulher, &c. who can hide his face with her fan," &c. STEEVENS.

Nurse.

Nurse. God ye good morrow, gentlemen.

Mer. God ye good den', fair gentlewoman.
Nurfe. Is it good den ?

Mer. Tis no lefs, I tell you; for the bawdy hand of the dial is now upon the prick of noon.

Nurfe. Out upon you! what a man are you?

Rom. One, gentlewoman, that God hath made himfelf to mar.

Nurse. By my troth, it is well faid;-For himself to mar, quoth'a?-Gentlemen, can any of you tell me where I may find the young Romeo?

Rom. 1 can tell you; but young Romeo will be older when you have found him, than he was when you fought him: I am the youngest of that name, for 'fault of a worfe.

Nurfe You fay well.

Mer. Yea, is the worft well? very well took, i'faith; wifely, wifely.

Nurfe. If you be he, fir, I defire fome confidence with you.

Ben. She will indite him to fome fupper.

Mer. A bawd, a bawd, a bawd! So ho!

Rom. What haft thou found?

Mer. No hare, fir3; unless a hare, fir, in a lenten pye, that is fomething ftale and hoar ere it be fpent.

1 God ye good den,] i. e. God give you a good even. The fitft of these contractions is common among the ancient comic writers. So, in R. Brome's Northern Lafs, 1633:

"God you good even, fir." STEEVENS.

the band of the dial-] In the Puritan Widow, 1607, which has been attributed to our author, is a fimilar expreffion: "the fes kewe of the diall is upon the chriffe-croffe of noon." STEEVENS.

3 No bare, fir;] Mercutio having roared out, So, bo! the cry of the fportfmen when they start a hare, Romeo asks what he has found. And Mercutio anfwers, No bare, &c. The reft is a series of quibbles. unworthy of explanation, which he who does not understand, needs not lament his ignorance. JOHNSON.

So bo! is the term made ule of in the field when the hare is found in her feat, and not when he is farted. A. C.

An