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WOR. Nay, if you have not, to't again; We'll stay your leisure.

Hor.

I have done, i'faith.
WOR. Then once more to your Scottish prifoners.
Deliver them up without their ransom straight,
And make the Douglas' fon your only mean
For powers in Scotland; which,-for divers rea-
fons,

Which I fhall fend you written,—be affur'd,
Will eafily be granted.-You, my lord,-

[TO NORTHUMBERLAND.
Your fon in Scotland being thus employ'd,-
Shall fecretly into the bofom creep

Of that fame noble prelate, well belov'd,
The archbishop.

Hor. Of York, is't not?

WOR. True; who bears hard

His brother's death at Briftol, the lord Scroop.
I speak not this in estimation,"

As what I think might be, but what I know
Is ruminated, plotted, and fet down;
And only stays but to behold the face
Of that occafion that shall bring it on.

Hor. I smell it; upon my life, it will do well.
NORTH. Before the game's afoot, thou ftill let'ft
flip.8

Hor. Why, it cannot choose but be a noble plot :And then the power of Scotland, and of York,To join with Mortimer, ha?

7 I fpeak not this in eftimation,] Eftimation for conjecture.

WARBURTON.

"let'ft flip.] To let flip, is to loofe the greyhound.

So, in The Taming of a Shrew:

JOHNSON.

"Lucentio flipp'd me, like his greyhound." STEEVENS.

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WOR.

And fo they fhall.

8

Hor. In faith, it is exceedingly well aim'd.
WOR. And 'tis no little reafon bids us speed,
To fave our heads by raifing of a head:
For, bear ourselves as even as we can,
The king will always think him in our debt;"
And think we think ourselves unfatisfied,
Till he hath found a time to pay us home.
And fee already, how he doth begin

To make us ftrangers to his looks of love.
Hor. He does, he does; we'll be reveng'd on
him.

2

WOR. Coufin, farewell:-No further go in this, Than I by letters fhall direct your course. When time is ripe, (which will be fuddenly,) I'll fteal to Glendower, and lord Mortimer; Where you and Douglas, and our powers at once, (As I will fashion it,) fhall happily meet, To bear our fortunes in our own ftrong arms, Which now we hold at much uncertainty.

NORTH. Farewell, good brother: We shall thrive, I trust.

Hor. Uncle, adieu :-O, let the hours be short, Till fields, and blows, and groans applaud our sport!

[Exeunt.

by raifing of a head:] A head is a body of forces.

So, in King Henry VI, P. III:

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JOHNSON,

Making another head, to fight again." STEEVENS.

9 The king will always &c.] This is a natural description of the ftate of mind between thofe that have conferred, and those that have received obligations too great to be fatisfied.

That this would be the event of Northumberland's disloyalty, was predicted by King Richard in the former play. JOHNSON.

2

Coufin,] This was a common address in our author's time to nephews, nieces, and grandchildren. See Holinfhed's Chronicle, paffim. Hotspur was Worcester's nephew. MALONE.

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Enter a Carrier, with a lantern in his hand.

I CAR. Heigh ho! An't be not four by the day, I'll be hang'd: Charles' wain' is over the new chimney, and yet our horse not pack'd. What, oftler! Osr. [Within.] Anon, anon.

I CAR. I pry'thee, Tom, beat Cut's faddle, put a few flocks in the point; the poor jade is wrung in the withers out of all cefs."

Enter another Carrier.

6

2 CAR. Peafe and beans are as dank here as a

3 Charles' wain-] Charles's wain is the vulgar name given to the conftellation called the Bear. It is a corruption of the Chorles or Churls wain (Sax. ceonl, a countryman.) RITSON.

See alfo Thorefby's Leeds, p. 268. REED.

Chorl is frequently ufed for a countryman in old books. "Here begynneth the chorle and the byrde," printed for Wynkyn de Worde. See also the Gloffaries of Skinner and Junius, v. Churl. DOUCE

-Cut's faddle,] Cut is the name of a horse in The Witches of Lancashire, 1634, and, I fuppofe, was a common one.

See Vol. IV. p. 67, n. 3. MALONE.

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STEEVENS.

out of all cefs.] i. e. out of all measure: the phrafe being taken from a cefs, tax, or fubfidy; which being by regular and moderate rates, when any thing was exorbitant, or out of measure, it was faid to be, out of all cefs. WARBURTON.

6 ——as dank-] i. e. wet, rotten. POPE.

In the directions given by Sir Thomas Bodley, for the prefervation of his library, he orders that the cleanfer thereof fhould,

dog, and that is the next way to give poor jades the bots: this houfe is turn'd upfide down, fince Robin oftler died.

I CAR. Poor fellow! never joy'd fince the price of oats rofe; it was the death of him.

2 CAR. I think, this be the most villainous houfe in all London road for fleas : I am ftung like a tench.8

I CAR. Like a tench? by the mass, there is ne'er a king in Chriftendom could be better bit than I have been fince the first cock.

"at least twice a quarter, with clean cloths, ftrike away the duft and moulding of the books, which will not then continue long with it; now it proceedeth chiefly of the newness of the forrels, which in time will be lefs and lefs dankish." Reliquiæ Bodleianæ, p. 111.

7 bots:] Are worms in the ftomach of a horse.

REED.

JOHNSON.

"The bottes is an yll disease, and they lye in a horse mawe; and they be an inche long, white coloured, and a reed heed, and as moche as a fyngers ende; and they be quycke and stycke fafte in the mawe fyde: it apperethe by ftampynge of the horse or tomblynge; and in the beginninge there is remedy ynoughe; and if they be not cured betyme, they wyll eate thorough his mawe and kvil hvm. Fits her

Reen

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2 CAR. Why, they will allow us ne'er a jorden, and then we leak in your chimney; and your chamber-lie breeds fleas like a loach.

CAR. What, oftler! come away, and be hang’d,

come away.

2 CAR. I have a gammon of bacon, and two razes of ginger,2 to be delivered as far as Charingcrofs.

9 -breeds fleas like a loach.] The loach is a very small
fish, but fo exceedingly prolifick that it is feldom found without
fpawn in it; and it was formerly a practice of the young gal
lants to fwallow loaches in wine, because they were confidered
as invigorating, and as apt to communicate their prolifick qua-
lity. The carrier therefore means to fay that "
your cham-
ber-lie breeds fleas as faft as a loach" breeds, not fleas, but
loaches.

In As you like it, Jaques fays that he "can fuck melancholy out
of a fong, as a weafel fucks eggs;" but he does not mean that a
weafel fucks eggs "out of a fong."—And in Troilus and Cresfida,
where Neftor fays that Therfites is

"A flave whofe gall coins flanders like a mint,"

he means, that his gall coined flanders as fait as a mint coins
Inoney. M. MASON.

A paffage in Coriolanus likewife may be produced in fupport of
the interpretation here given: "" and he no more remembers
his mother, than an eight-year-old horse;" i. e. than an eight-year-
old horse remembers his dam.

I entirely agree with Mr. M. Mafon in his explanation of this
paffage, and, before I had feen his COMMENTS, had in the fame
manner interpreted a paffage in As you like it. See Vol. VI. p. 77,
n. 7. One principal fource of error in the interpretation of many
paflages in our author's plays has been the fuppofing that his fimiles.
were intended to correspond exactly on both fides. MALONE. X
2 and two razes of ginger,] As our author in feveral paffages
mentions a race of ginger, I thought proper to diftinguish it from
the raze mentioned here. The former fignifies no more than a
fingle root of it; but a raze is the Indian term for a bale of it.

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THEOBALD.

and two razes of ginger,] So, in the old anonymous play of Henry V: he hath taken the great raze of ginger, that bouncing Befs, &c. was to have had." A dainty race of ginger

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XX I fear the foregoing ingenious explanation we must give way to a circumstance

recorded in

the ninth book of Pring's Nalmol History (47

to

on

this

XX

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referred bed by myth by mesireens
of 1735 Last of all some fishes
fishes there

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are given to breed fleas and live; among f hind of Tingot is one "

wch The Chaless

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Reed

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