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(g) Mill him.

To mill is to whack, or, to thump. See the Slang Dictionary. St. Giles's Edition.

JOHNSON.

The Billingsgate edition of the Slang Dictionary, which, in point of accuracy, I conceive to be the least exceptionable, explains it, to knuckle, or, to lather.

STEEVENS.

(h) We're bewitch'd, 'tis plain.

Hamlet's meaning appears to me to be this: I know not how to account for the succession of calamities which has befallen us, unless by supposing that we are labouring under the influence of witchcraft.

(i) Towzer.

JOHNSON.

Probably the name of the royal watch-dog.

JOHNSON.

(k) Anon, he's patient as a hungry mouser.

This passage is unintelligible.

I cannot believe

that patience is the characteristic of a hungry animal.

POPE.

The difficulty of this passage will be solved by supplying an apostrophe, which, doubtless, was intended to mark the elision of the a in hungry; and by substituting a capital H for a small one.

We must understand a Hungary (for Hungarian)

mouser.

WARBURTON.

This emendation is so ingenious that I am sorry it is not just for the passage, in its present state, is, not only correct, but eminently beautiful. The Queen compares the patience of Hamlet to that which, after a long privation from food, is exhibited by a mouser whilst watching for its prey.

JOHNSON.

There is yet a beauty which Dr. Johnson has passed without notice. The Queen not only compares Hamlet's occasional patience to that of a hungry mouser; but, at the same time, contrasts it with his paroxysms of ferocity, resembling the growlings of a watch-dog: whence it is common to say of two persons who live discordantly that they agree like cat and dog."

It may not be, altogether, uninteresting to the curious reader, to know that a mouser is a cat which is trained up for the purpose of killing RATS as well as mice. So in Chaucer's Romaunt de la rose, ver. 6204:

66

Gibbe our cat,

"That waiteth mice and RATS to killen."

STEEVENS.

:

(1) Bread-basket.

This is poetical. Hamlet strikes Laertes in the stomach the stomach being the depository for food (the pantry, as it were, of the human frame), it is metaphorically termed the bread-basket.

(m) Dash my wig.

WARBURTON.

If I might hazard a conjecture upon this, I should suppose that the Queen of Denmark wore a wig.

POPE.

Saxo-Grammaticus, Olaus Wormius, and all the old Danish writers, concur in stating that the Queen of Denmark wore a wig. As to its colour they are

all silent; but they are at considerable variance respecting its shape: for whilst some declare it to have been a Brutus, others as confidently assert that it was a Perruque à la Greque. I have consulted one hundred and fourteen controversial tracts, (bl. let.) expressly upon the subject, and am still at a loss which side of the question to espouse. I shall, however, resume the inquiry, and communicate the result of my laborious researches to the literary world.

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STEEVENS.

the Queen of Denmark wore a Brutus, or a Perruque à la Greque, is a question which, at this distance of time, to determine were difficult, and which, if determined, would tend only to the gratification of an idle and impertinent curiosity: while the time bestowed upon the inquiry might be more usefully, more advantageously, and more beneficially employed in improving the wigs which are worn by co-temporaneous heads; or, in anticipating improvements for those which may be, hereafter, displayed on the heads of posterity.

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(n) 'tis all Dickey with us both.

The meaning of this is, the game is up with us; or, we have gone the length of our tether.

JOHNSON.

So in a old ballad called Gabriel Gubbyns hys Lamentation, bl. let. 1602:

"No more Larke I trowe,

"Tis all Dyckye nowe,

"For I shall bee hangyt for coynynge."

STEEVENS.

(0) I'm dead—at least I shall be in a minute.

Thus the folio. The quarto reads,

I'm dead at last—or shall be in a minute.

POPE.

We might, without much violence, read and point thus:

I'm dead at rest I shall be in a minute.

By at rest is meant buried.

WARBURTON.

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