Is rounded with a sleep.-Sir, I am vex'd; called a rack-rider, because it appears in winter or bad weather; Rack, in the English of our author's days, signifying the driving of the clouds by tempests. Sir Thomas Hanmer, instead of rack, reads track, which may be countenanced by the following passage in the first scene of Timon of Athens: 66 66 But flies an eagle flight, bold, and forth on, Again, in the Captain, by Beaumont and Fletcher, Act II. Sc. I.: 66 166 run quietly, Leaving no trace of what they were behind them." STEEVENS. Rack is generally used for a body of clouds or rather for the course of clouds in motion. So, in Antony and Cleopatra : "That which is now a horse, even with a thought, "The rack dislimns." But no instance has yet been produced where it is used to signify a single small fleeting cloud, in which sense only it can be figuratively applied here. I incline to think that rack is a mis-spelling for wrack, i. e. wreck, which Fletcher likewise bas used for a minute broken fragment. See his Wife for a Month, where we find the word mis-spelt as it is in The Tempest: "He will bulge so subtilly and suddenly, 66 But You may snatch him up by parcels, like a sea-rack.” It has been urged, that "objects which have only a visionary and insubstantial existence, can, when the vision is faded, leave nothing real, and consequently no wreck behind them." the objection is founded on misapprehension. The wordsLeave not a rack (or wreck) behind," relate not to "the baseless fabrick of this vision," but to the final destruction of the world, of which the towers, temples, and palaces, shall (like a vision, or a pageant) be dissolved, and leave no vestige behind. MALONE. 66 Yet see Mr. Horne Tooke's observations on this passage, EПEA ПITEPOENTA, vol. ii. p. 388. Boswell. AS DREAMS are made of,] The old copy reads-on. But this is a mere colloquial vitiation; of, among the vulgar, being still pronounced-on. STEEVENS. The stanza which immediately precedes the lines quoted by Mr. Steevens from Lord Sterline's Darius, may serve still further to confirm the conjecture that one of these poets imitated the other. Our author was, I believe, the imitator : Be not disturb'd with my infirmity : FER. MIRA. We wish your peace. Exeunt. PRO. Come with a thought:-I thank you :- Enter ARIEL. ARI. Thy thoughts I cleave to: What's thy PRO. pleasure ? Spirit, We must prepare to meet with Caliban *. ARI. Ay, my commander: when I presented Ceres, "And when the eclipse comes of our glory's light, 66 Then what avails the adoring of a name? "A meer illusion made to mock the sight, "Whose best was but the shadow of a dream." 2 Fer. Mir. We wish your peace. MALONE. Pro. Come with a thought :-I thank You:-Ariel, come.] The old copy reads "I thank thee." But these thanks being in reply to the joint wish of Ferdinand and Miranda, I have substituted you for thee, by the advice of Mr. Ritson. STEEVEns. 3 Thy thoughts I CLEAVE TO:] To cleave to, is to unite with closely. So, in Macbeth: "Like our strange garments, cleave not to their mould.” Again: 66 If you shall cleave to my consent." STEEVENS. 4 —TO MEET WITH Caliban.] To meet with is to counteract; to play stratagem against stratagem.-" The parson knows the temper of every one in his house, and accordingly either meets with their vices, or advances their virtues." Herbert's Country Parson. JOHNSON. So, in Cynthia's Revenge, 1613: 66 You may meet "With her abusive malice, and exempt "Yourself from the suspicion of revenge." STEEVENS. I thought to have told thee of it; but I fear'd, PRO. Say again, where didst thou leave these varlets? ARI. I told you, sir, they were red-hot with drinking; So full of valour, that they smote the air ears, Advanc'd their eye-lids, lifted up their noses, 5 Advanc'd their eyelids, &c.] Thus Drayton, in his Nymphidia, or Court of Fairie : "But once the circle got within, The charms to work do straight begin, "And he was caught as in a gin; "For as he thus was busy, "A pain he in his head-piece feels, 66 Against a stubbed tree he reels, "And up went poor Hobgoblin's heels: Alas, his brain was dizzy. "At length upon his feet he gets, "And through the bushes scrambles, "A stump doth hit him in his pace, "And lamentably tore his case 66 Among the briers and brambles." JOHNSON. As they smelt musick;] As is here, as in many other places, used for as if. So in Cymbeline: he spoke of her “As Dion had hot dreams, and she," &c. MALONE. 7pricking Goss,] I know not how Shakspeare distin 8 Which enter'd their frail shins: at last I left them PRO. This was well done, my bird: Thy shape invisible retain thou still: The trumpery in my house, go, bring it hither, ARI. guished goss from furze; for what he calls furze is called goss or gorse in the midland counties. This word is used in the first chorus to Kyd's Cornelia, 1594 : "With worthless gorse that, yearly, fruitless dies." STEEVENS. By the latter, Shakspeare means the low sort of gorse that only grows upon wet ground, and which is well described by the name of whins in Markham's Farewell to Husbandry. It has prickles like those of a rose-tree or a gooseberry. Furze and whins occur together in Dr. Farmer's quotation from Holinshed. TOLLETT. 8 I' the FILTHY mantled pool-] Perhaps we should readfilth-ymantled. A similar idea occurs in King Lear: "Drinks the green mantle of the standing pool." STEEVENS. 86 9 For STALE to catch these thieves.] Stale is a word in fowling, and is used to mean a bait or decoy to catch birds. So, in A Looking-glass for London and England, 1617: "Hence tools of wrath, stales of temptation!" that she might not strike at the stale, lest she were canvassed in the nets." I NURTURE can never stick ;] Nurture is education. volume entitled The Boke of Nurture, or Schoole of good Maners, &c. was published in the reign of King Edward VI. 4to. bl. 1. Again, in Green's Mamilia, 1595: 2 A little STEEVENS. We ALL, all lost,] The first of these words was probably introduced by the carelessness of the transcriber or compositor. might safely read-are all lost. MALONE. So his mind cankers?: I will plague them all, 3 Hear a foot fall 3: we now are near his cell. STE. Monster, your fairy, which, you say, is a harmless fairy, has done little better than played the Jack with us 4. TRIN. Monster, I do smell all horse-piss; at which my nose is in great indignation. STE. So is mine. Do you hear, monster? If I should take a displeasure against you; look you,TRIN. Thou wert but a lost monster. 2 And as with age, his body uglier grows, So his mind cankers:] Shakspeare, when he wrote this description, perhaps recollected what his patron's most intimate friend the great Lord Essex, in an hour of discontent, said of Queen Elizabeth :- "that she grew old and canker'd, and that her mind was become as crooked as her carcase :"- -a speech, which, according to Sir Walter Raleigh, cost him his head, and which we may therefore suppose was at that time much talked of. This play being written in the time of King James, these obnoxious words might be safely repeated. MALONE. I trust that Shakspeare did not aim a reproach at his queen and patroness in her grave. Boswell. 3 -the blind mole may not Hear a foot fall:] This quality of hearing, which the mole is supposed to possess in so high a degree, is mentioned in Euphues, 4to. 1581, p. 64: "Doth not the lion for strength, the turtle for love, the ant for labour, excel man? Doth not the eagle see clearer, the vulture smell better, the moale hear lightlyer?" REED. 4 has done little better than played the JACK with us.] i. e. He has played Jack with a lantern; has led us about like an ignis faluus, by which travellers are decoyed into the mire. JOHNSON. |
