In these it is said, "no stewholder shall keep any woman that hath the perilous infirmity of burning."

Sc. 4. p. 160.

EDG. Pillicock sat on pillicock's hill.

In the metrical romance of Sir Gawain and Sir Galaron, there is this line,

"His polemous with pelicocus were poudred to pay." Pinkerton's Scotish poems, vol. iii. 214.

In the comedy of Ignoramus by Ruggles, Act iii. Sc. 6, Cupes talks of "quimbiblos, indenturas, pilicoccos, calimancas;" where it is perhaps a new-fangled term for any kind of stuff or cloth. There is an attempt to explain the word in Warner's Letter to Garrick, p. 30; but whoever would be certain of finding the exact meaning, may consult, besides the article in Minsheu, 9299, the following books-Durfey's Pills to purge melancholy, iv. 311-The Nightingale, (a collection of songs) 1738, p. 380Lyndsay's Works, as edited by Mr. Chalmers, ii. 145, and the excellent glossary.Florio's Italian dictionary, 1611, under the articles piviolo, and rozzone.

Sc. 4. p. 162.

EDG. Keep thy pen from lenders books.

When spendthrifts and distressed persons resorted to usurers or tradesmen for the purpose of raising money by means of shop-goods or brown paper commodities, they usually entered their promissory notes or other similar obligations in books kept for that purpose. It is to this practice that Edgar alludes.

In Lodge's Looking-glasse for London and Englande, 1598, 4to, a usurer says to a gentleman, "I have thy hand set to my book, that thou received'st fortie pounds of me in money." To which the other answers, "It was your device, to colour the statute, but your conscience knowes what I had." Parke, in his Curtaine-drawer of the world, speaking of a country gentleman, alludes to the extravagance of his back, which had got him into the mercer's book.

This was the burden of many old songs. One of these, being connected with Mr. Henley's cu

rious note, is here presented to the reader. It is taken from a scarce collection, entitled Melismata. Musicall phansies, fitting the court, citie and countrey humours, To 3, 4, and 5 voyces, 1611, 4to. In Playford's Musical companion, p. 55, the words are set to a different tune.

E that will an Ale-house keepe must have three things in store,

舞

a Chamber and a feather Bed, a Chimney and a hey no-ny no-ny

hay no-ny no-ny, hey nony no, hey nony no, hey nony no.

LEAR.

Sc. 4. p. 164.

unaccommodated man is no more but such a poor, bare, forked animal as thou art.

Forked is a very strange epithet, but must be taken literally. See a note by Mr. Steevens in Act iv. Sc. 6, of this play. The Chinese in their

written language represent a man by the fol lowing character.

Sc. 6. p. 176.

FOOL. He's mad that trusts in the tameness of a wolf, a horse's health, a boy's love, or a whore's oath.

Though health will certainly do, it has probably been substituted for heels, by some person who regarded it as an improved reading. There are several proverbs of this kind. That in the text has not been found elsewhere, and may be the invention of Shakspeare. The Italians say, Of a woman beware before, of a mule beware behind, and of a monk beware on all sides; the French, Beware of a bull's front, of a mule's hinder parts, and of all sides of a woman. Samuel Rowland's excellent and amusing work, entitled The choice of change, containing the triplicity of divinitie, philosophie, and poetrie, 1585, 4to, we meet with this proverbial saying, "Trust not 3 thinges, dogs teeth, horses feete, womens protestations."

In

Sc. 6. p. 184.

EDG. Poor Tom, thy horn is dry.

On this speech Dr. Johnson has remarked that men who begged under pretence of lunacy, used formerly to carry a horn and blow it through the streets. To account for Edgar's horn being dry, we must likewise suppose that the lunatics in question made use of this utensil to drink out of, which seems preferable to the opinion of Mr. Steevens, that these words are "a proverbial expression, introduced when a man has nothing further to offer, when he has said all he has to say," the learned commentator not having adduced any example of its use. An opportunity here presents itself of suggesting a more correct mode of exhibiting the theatrical dress of Poor Tom than we usually see, on the authority of Randle Holme in his most curious and useful work The academy of armory, book III. ch. iii. p. 161, where he says that the Bedlam has "a long staff and a cow or ox-horn by his side; his cloathing fantastic and ridiculous; for being a madman, he is madly decked and dressed all over with rubins, feathers, cuttings of cloth, and what not, to make him seem a madman or one