A LOVER'S COMPLAINT.

FROM off a hill whose concave womb re-worded
A plaintful story from a sistering vale,
My spirits to attend this double voice accorded,
And down I laid to list the sad-tun'd tale:
Ere long espied a fickle maid full pale,
Tearing of papers, breaking rings a-twain,
Storming her world with sorrow's wind and rain.

Upon her head a platted hive of straw,
Which fortified her visage from the sun,
Whereon the thought might think sometime it saw
The carcase of a beauty spent and done.
Time had not scythed all that youth begun,

Nor youth all quit; but, spite of Heaven's fell rage,
Some beauty peep'd through lattice of sear'd age.

c

Oft did she heave her napkin to her eyne,
Which on it had conceited characters,d
Laund'ring® the silken figures in the brine
That season'd woe had pelleted in tears,
And often reading what contents it bears;
As often shrieking undistinguish'd woe,
In clamours of all size, both high and low.

a Re-worded-echoed.

b Laid. So the original. But it is usually more correctly printed lay. The idiomatic grammar of Shakspere's age ought not to be removed.

C

Napkin-handkerchief. Iago says, of Desdemona's fatal handkerchief

"I am glad I have found this napkin."

d Conceited characters-fanciful figures worked on the handkerchief.

• Laund'ring-washing.

'Pelleted-formed into pellets, or small balls.

Sometimes her levell'd eyes their carriage ride,

a

As they did battery to the spheres intend; a
Sometime diverted their poor balls are tied
To th' orbed earth: sometimes they do extend
Their view right on; anon their gazes lend
To every place at once, and nowhere fix'd,
The mind and sight distractedly commix'd.

Her hair, nor loose, nor tied in formal plat,
Proclaim'd in her a careless hand of pride;
For some, untuck'd, descended her sheav'de hat,
Hanging her pale and pined cheek beside;
Some in her threaden fillet still did bide,
And, true to bondage, would not break from thence,
Though slackly braided in loose negligence.

A thousand favours from a maundd she drew
Of amber, crystal, and of bedded jet,*
Which one by one she in a river threw,
Upon whose weeping margent she was set;
Like usury, applying wet to wet,

Or monarch's hands, that let not bounty fall

Where want cries "some," but where excess begs all.

Of folded schedules had she many a one,

Which she perus'd, sigh'd, tore, and gave the flood;
Crack'd many a ring of posied gold and bone,
Bidding them find their sepulchres in mud;

Found yet mo' letters sadly penn'd in blood,

Shakspere often employs the metaphor of a piece of ordnance; but what in his plays is generally a slight allusion, here becomes a somewhat quaint conceit.

b Th' orbed. We retain orbed as a dissyllable, according to the original. Mr. Dyce has the orb'd.

• Sheav'd-made of straw, collected from sheaves.

& Maund-a basket. The word is used in the old translation of the Bible.

e Bedded. So the original, the word probably meaning jet imbedded, or set, in some other substance. Steevens has beaded jet,-jet formed into beads; which Mr. Dyce adopts.

f Mo-more.

This word is now invariably printed more. It occurs in subsequent stanzas. Why should we destroy this little archaic beauty by a rage for modernizing?

With sleided silk feat and affectedly
Enswath'd, and scal'd to curious secresy.

These often bath'd she in her fluxive eyes,
And often kiss'd, and often gave to tear;
Cried, "O false blood! thou register of lies,
What unapproved witness dost thou bear!

Ink would have seem'd more black and damned here!"
This said, in top of rage the lines she rents,
Big discontent so breaking their contents.

A reverend man that graz'd his cattle nigh,
Sometime a blusterer, that the ruffle knew
Of court, of city, and had let go by
The swiftest hours, observed as they flew,
Towards this afflicted fancy fastly drew;

Slided silk. The commentators explain this as "untwisted silk." In the chorus to the fourth act of Pericles,' Marina is pictured

"When she weav'd the sleided silk

With fingers long, small, white as milk."

Percy, in a note on this passage, says, "untwisted silk, prepared to be used in the weaver's sley." The first part of this description is certainly not correct. The silk is not untwisted, for it must be spun before it is woven; and a strong twisted silk is exactly what was required when letters were to be sealed "feat" (neatly) "to curious secresy." In Mr. Ramsay's Introduction to his valuable edition of the Paston Letters,' the old mode of sealing a letter is clearly described :-" It was carefully folded, and fastened at the end by a sort of paper strap, upon which the seal was affixed; and under the seal a string, a silk thread, or even a straw, was frequently placed running around the letter."

b Gave. So the original. Malone changes the word to 'gan. This appears to us, although it has the sanction of Mr. Dyce's adoption, an unnecessary change; gave is here used in the sense of gave the mind to, contemplated, made a movement towards, inclined to. Shakspere has several times "my mind gave me ;" and the word may therefore, we think, stand alone here, as expressing inclination.

© Malone, by making the sentence parenthetical which begins at "sometime a blusterer," and ends at "swiftest hours," causes the reverend man's attention to be drawn to the scattered fragments of letters as they flew-a very snow-storm of letters. Surely this is nonsense!

"The swiftest hours, observed as they flew,"

clearly show that the reverend man, although he had been engaged in the ruffle, in the turmoil, of the court and city, had not suffered the swiftest hours to pass unobserved. He was a man of experience, and was thus qualified to give advice.

d Fancy is often used by Shakspere in the sense of love; but here it means one that is possessed by fancy.