If thou account'ft it fhame, lay it on me: KATH. I dare affure you, fir, 'tis almost two; It shall be what o'clock I fay it is. HOR. Why, fo! this gallant will command the fun. [Exeunt.? • Exeunt.] After this exeunt, the characters before whom the play is fuppofed to be exhibited, have been hitherto introduced from the original so often mentioned in the former notes. "Lord. Who's within there? "Enter Servants. "Afleep again! go take him eafily up, and-put him in his own apparel again. But fee you wake him not in any cafe. "Serv. It fhall be done, my lord; come help to bear him hence." [They bear off Sly. STEEVENS. SCENE IV.1 Padua. Before Baptifta's House. Enter TRANIO, and the Pedant dressed like TRA. Sir, this is the houfe; Please it you, that PED. Ay, what else? and, but I be deceived,3 1 I cannot but think that the direction about the Tinker, who is always introduced at the end of the Acts, together with the change of the scene, and the proportion of each Act to the reft, make it probable that the fifth Act begins here. JOHNSON. 2 Sir, this is the houfe ;] The old copy has-Sirs. Corrected by Mr. Theobald. MALONE. 3 but I be deceived,] But, in the present inftance, fignifies, without, unless. So, in Antony and Cleopatra : "But being charg'd, we will be ftill by land." STEEVENS. We were lodgers at the Pegafus.] This line has in all the editions hitherto been given to Tranio. But Tranio could with no propriety speak this, either in his affumed or real character. Lucentio was too young to know any thing of lodging with his father, twenty years before at Genoa and Tranio must be as much too young, or very unfit to represent and perfonate Lucentio. I have ventured to place the line to the Pedant, to whom it muft certainly belong, and is a fequel of what he was before faying. THEOBALD. Shakspeare has taken a fign out of London, and hung it up in Padua: "Meet me an hour hence at the fign of the Pegafus in Cheapfide." Return from Parnaffus, 1606. Again, in The Jealous Lovers, by Randolph, 1632: TRA. "Tis well; And hold your own, in any cafe, with such Enter BIONDello. PED. I warrant you: But, fir, here comes your boy; "Twere good, he were school'd. TRA. Fear you not him. Sirrah, Biondello, Now do your duty throughly, I advise you; Imagine 'twere the right Vincentio. BION. Tut! fear not me. TRA. But haft thou done thy errand to Baptifta? BION. I told him, that your father was at Venice; And that you look'd for him this day in Padua. TRA. Thou'rt a tall fellow; hold thee that to drink. Here comes Baptifta :-set your countenance, fir. Enter BAPTISTA and LUCENTIO.5 Signior Baptifta, you are happily met :- This is the gentleman I told you of; I pray you, ftand good father to me now, Give me Bianca for my patrimony. PED. Soft, fon !— "A pottle of elixir at the Pegafus, Bravely carous'd, is more restorative." The Pegafus is the arms of the Middle-Temple; and, from that circumstance, became a popular fign. STEEVENS. RITSON, 5 Enter Baptifta and Lucentio.] and (according to the old copy,) Pedant, booted and bareheaded. Sir, by your leave; having come to Padua To have him match'd; and,-if you please to like BAP. Sir, pardon me in what I have to say ;- Me fhall you find most ready and most willing-] The repeated word moft, is not in the old copy, but was fupplied by Sir T. Hanmer, to complete the measure. STEEVENS. 7 For curious I cannot be with you,] Curious is fcrupulous. Sò, in Holinfhed, p.888: "The emperor obeying more compaffion than the reason of things, was not curious to condefcend to performe fo good an office. Again, p. 890:- and was " not curious to call him to eat with him at his table." STEEVENS. And pafs my daughter a fufficient dower,] To pass is, in this place, fynonymous to affure or convey; as it fometimes occurs in the covenant of a purchase deed, that the granter has power to bargain, fell, &c. " and thereby to pass and convey" the premises to the grantee. RITSON. "The match is fully made, and all is done :] The word— Your fon fhall have my daughter with consent. TRA. I thank you, fir. Where then do you know beft, We be affied; and fuch affurance ta'en, As fhall with either part's agreement stand ? BAP. Not in my houfe, Lucentio; for, you know, Pitchers have ears, and I have many fervants : Befides, old Gremio is heark'ning ftill; And, happily, we might be interrupted." TRA. Then at my lodging, an it like you, fir:3 There doth my father lie; and there, this night, We'll pafs the business privately and well: Send for your daughter by your fervant here, My boy fhall fetch the fcrivener presently. The worst is this,-that, at fo flender warning, You're like to have a thin and flender pittance. BAP. It likes me well :-Cambio, hie you home, And bid Bianca make her ready straight; fully (to complete the verfe) was inferted by Sir Thomas Hanmer, who might have juftified his emendation by a foregoing paffage in this comedy: "Nathaniel's coat, fir, was not fully made." STEEVENS. We be affied ;] i. e. betrothed. So, in King Henry VI. P. II: 2 "For daring to affy a mighty lord "Unto the daughter of a worthlefs king." STEEVENS. And, happily, we might be interrupted.] Thus the old copy. Mr. Pope reads: And haply then we might be interrupted. STEEVENS. Happily, in Shakspeare's time, fignified accidentally, as well as fortunately. It is rather furprising, that an editor fhould be guilty of fo grofs a corruption of his author's language, for the fake of modernizing his orthography. TYRWHITT. 3 an it like you, fir:] The latter word, which is not in the old copy, was added by the editor of the fecond folio. MALONE. |