observed, on Numbers xv. 32. See Ancient songs, p. 34. So far the tradition is still preserved among nurses and schoolboys; but how the culprit came to be imprisoned in the moon, has not yet been accounted for. It should seem that he had not merely gathered sticks on the sabbath, but that he had stolen what he gathered, as appears from the following lines in Chaucer's Testament of Creseid, where the poet, describing the moon, informs us that she had

"On her brest a chorle painted ful even,
Bearing a bush of thorns on his backe,

Which for his theft might clime no ner the heven."

We are to suppose that he was doomed to perpetual confinement in this planet, and precluded from every possibility of inhabiting the mansions of the just. With the Italians Cain appears to have been the offender, and he is alluded to in a very extraordinary manner by Dante in the twentieth canto of the Inferno, where the moon is described by the periphrasis Caino e le spine. One of the commentators on that poet says, that this alludes to the popular opinion of Cain loaded with the bundle of faggots, but how he procured them we are not informed. The Jews have some Talmudical story that Jacob is in the moon, and they believe that his face is visible. The natives of Ceylon, instead of a man, have placed a hare in the moon; and it is said to have got there in the following manner. Their great Deity Budha when a hermit on earth lost himself one day in a forest. After wandering about in great distress he met a hare, who thus addressed him: "It is in my power to extricate you from your difficulty; take the path on your right hand, and it will lead you out of the forest." "I am greatly obliged to you, Mr. Hare," said Budha, "but I am unfortunately very poor and very hungry, and have nothing to offer you in reward for your kindness." "If you are hungry," returned the hare, "I am again at your service; make a fire, kill me, roast me, and eat me." Budha made the fire, and the hare instantly jumped

into it. Budha now exerted his miraculous powers, snatched the animal from the flames, and threw him into the moon, where he has ever since remained. This is from the information of a learned and intelligent French gentleman recently arrived from Ceylon, who adds that the Cingalese would often request of him to permit them to look for the hare through his telescope, and exclaim in raptures, that they saw it. It is remarkable that the Chinese represent the moon by a rabbit pounding rice in a mortar. Their mythological moon Jut-ho is figured by a beautiful young woman with a double sphere behind her head, and a rabbit at her feet. The period of this animal's gestation is thirty days; may it not therefore typify the moon's revolution round the earth?

SCENE 2. Page 86.

CAL. Nor scrape-trenchering, nor wash-dish.

Scraping trenchers was likewise a scholastic employment at college, if we may believe the illiterate parson in the pleasant comedy of Cornelianum dolium, where speaking of his haughty treatment of the poor scholars whom he had distanced in getting possession of a fat living, he says, "Illi inquam, qui ut mihi narrârunt, quadras adipe illitas deglubere sunt coacti, quamdiu inter academicas ulnas manent, dapsili more à me nutriti sunt, saginati imò &c." It was the office too of apprentices. In The life of a satirical puppy called Nim, 1657, 12mo, a citizen describes how long "he bore the water tankard, scrap't trenchers, and made clean shoes."

ACT III.

SCENE 1. Page 91.

FER. This wooden slavery, than I would suffer.

The old copy reads than to suffer, which, however ungrammatical, is justly maintained by Mr. Malone to be Shakspeare's

language, and ought therefore to be restored. Mr. Steevens objects on the score of defective metre: but this is not the case; the metre, however rugged, is certainly perfect.

SCENE 1. Page 92.

MIRA. I am your wife, if you will marry me;

If not, I'll die your maid: to be your fellow
You may deny me; but I'll be your servant
Whether you will or no.

Mr. Malone has cited a very apposite passage from Catullus, but Shakspeare had probably on this occasion the pathetic old poem of The nut-brown maid in his recollection.

STE. Thy eyes are almost set in thy head.

TRIN. Where should they be set else? he were a brave monster indeed, if they were set in his tail.

The curious reader may nevertheless be gratified with a ludicrous instance of eyes set in the tail, if he can procure a sight of the first cut in Caxton's edition of Æsop's fables. In the mean time he is referred to the genuine chap. xx. of Planudes's life of that fabulist, which is generally omitted in the modern editions.

SCENE 2. Page 97.

CAL. What a py'd ninny's this? thou scurvy patch!

Dr. Johnson would transfer this speech to Stephano, on the ground that Caliban could know nothing of the costume of fools. This objection is fairly removed by Mr. Malone; besides which it may be remarked that at the end of the play Caliban specifically calls Trinculo a fool. The modern managers will perhaps be inclined for the future to dress this character in the proper habit.

SCENE 2. Page 100.

CAL. Will you troll the catch

Troll is from the French trôler, to lead, draw, or drag, and

this sense particularly applies to a catch, in which one part is sung after the other, one of the singers leading off. The term is sometimes used as Mr. Steevens has explained it. Littelton renders to troll along his words, by volubiliter loqui sive rotunde. Trolling for fish, is drawing the bait along in the water, to imitate the swimming of a real fish.

There is one tree, the Phoenix' throne, one phoenix
At this hour reigning there.

Bartholomæus De propriet. rerum, speaking of Arabia, says, "there breedeth a birde that is called Phoenix;" and from what has already been said of this book, it was probably one of Shakspeare's authorities on the occasion.

SCENE 2. Page 106.

GON. Who would believe that there were mountaineers,

Dewlapp'd like bulls, whose throats had hanging at them
Wallets of flesh? or that there were such men,
Whose heads stood in their breasts?

The "dewlapp'd mountaineers" are shown to have been borrowed from Maundeville's travels, and the same author doubtless supplied the other monsters. In the edition printed by Thomas Este, without date, is the following passage: "In another ile dwell men that have no heads, and their eyes are in their shoulders, and their mouth is on their breast." A cut however which occurs in this place is more to the purpose, and might have saved our poet the trouble of consulting the text, for it represents a complete head with eyes, nose, and mouth, placed on the breast and stomach.

ACT IV.

SCENE 1. Page 122.

CER. Hail many-coloured messenger, that ne'er
Dost disobey the wife of Jupiter;

Who with thy saffron wings upon my flowers
Diffusest honey-drops, refreshing showers;

And with each end of thy blue bow dost crown
My bosky acres-

An elegant expansion of these lines in Phaer's Virgil. Æn. end of book 4.

"Dame rainbow down therefore with safron wings of dropping
showres.

Whose face a thousand sundry hewes against the sunne devoures,
From heaven descending came-

That calf-like, they my lowing follow'd through

Tooth'd briers, sharp furzes, pricking goss and thorns

Which enter'd their frail skins.

Dr. Johnson has introduced a passage from Drayton's Nymphidia, as resembling the above description. It is still more like an incident in the well known story of the friar and the boy.

"Jacke toke his pype and began to blowe

Then the frere, as I trowe,

Began to daunce soone;

The breres scratched hym in the face

And in many another place

That the blode brast out,

He daunced among thornes thycke

In many places they dyde hym prycke, &c."

SCENE 1. Page 136.

CAL. And all be turn'd to barnacles, or apes.

Mr. Collins's note, it is presumed, will not be thought worth retaining in any future edition. His account of the barnacle is extremely confused and imperfect. He makes Gerarde responsible for an opinion not his own; he sub