such fiery numbers (i. e. such verses of fire and spirit) as the sight of your fair mistress's eyes have inspired you with?" This, dear Sir, at present, I take to be the whole meaning of our Poet, and the whole obscurity of the passage vanishes at once. And now, Sir, a word to your emendation upon another passage in the same Play, Act V. Sc. 2: P. 278. A huge Translation of Hypocrisie, Vilely compil'd, profound simplicity. You propose Apocrypha. But, I imagine, you did not observe that for four couplets backward, and thence to the close of the Scene by the entrance of Boyet, all the lines are strictly in rhyme, which your emendation would interrupt. A Translation of Hypocrisy, I agree with you, is a very poor phrase, and nearly approaching, at least, upon nonsense. This, however, I take to be the sense of the passage: "Dumaine," says Katherine, " has sent me some thousands of verses as from a faithful lover;" that is, he has translated a huge quantity of hypocrisy into verse; but the verse so vilely composed, that it is at best but profound simplicity." To confirm your emendation on Antony, p. 5, a strumpet's stool, you propose adding this authority from Troilus, Act II. Sc. 1, "Thou stool for a witch." I think I have met with a much stronger from Macbeth, p. 230: but now they rise again, With twenty mortal murders on their crowns, Inclosed I submit to your consideration some Queries and Conjectures on Cymbeline, not contained in yours *: * Mr. POPE's Second Edition, 1728. P. 11. P. 12. reek as a sacrifice as offer'd mercy is I have no perfect idea what these passages mean. P. 13. Make me with his eye or ear. How could posthumus with his ear make himself distinguished by Pisanio? Should it not be, with my eye or ear? P. 21. I cannot conclude without begging my respects and thanks to Mr. Taylor*; and wishing you both a number of happy new years. P. 21. To any shape of thy preferment, such As thou 'll desire· Should not this be, deserve? Note, desert and merit in the context of this very sentence. P. 22. But most miserable Is the desire that 's glorious. Here I am as blind as a mole. I cannot tell how it connects with the rest. P. 23. None a stranger there. You have slipped the ridiculousness of this full stop. Read, none a stranger there So merry, &c. i. e. of all the travellers upon the spot the merriest. P. 29. And you crow cock with your comb on. What is the conceit here; with your cock's comb? Or does he mean, you are a mere dunghill; your comb is not cut, and trimmed for the fight, as I think game-cocks are served. P. 33. unpav'd Eunuch. Does he mean, unstoned (sine testiculis), from the metaphor of paving with stones? This is ex Cathedra Popiand. Do you like it? The old Edi tions have it, "" a German one." And this, in my opinion, makes a climax. Are any boars better fed, or more likely to be rank, than those of Westphalia? P. 44. With oaks unscaleable. Certainly this should be rocks. I think the whole speech warrants it. Poor ignorant baubles! - Pray, have you observed, our Poet frequently uses ignorant in the sense of weak, impotent ? P. 45. Behoves me keep at variance. What does Mr. Pope mean here? Mr. Rowe reads, with the old copies," at utterance;" i. e. at the utmost extremities. So, in Macbeth, p. 222: Come Fate into the list, And champion me to th' utterance. P. 53. Some jay of Italy (Whose mother was her painting) &c. * Afterwards Dr. Robert Taylor; of whom see before, p. 46. Sure I am, my dearest Friend, your truly affectionate and obliged humble servant, LEW. THEOBALD. this Sure I am dull beyond the knowledge of myself; or how could escape you? Or, do you understand it? Mr. Rowe's Edition (I hope not by chance) reads, as I think right, Whose Wother was her painting. Wother, in Saxon, signifies beauty, merit, ornament. -So Imogen means, I conceive, that all the harlot's beauty was her being painted, as all the jay's consists in the gaiety of its feathers. P. 54. Dis-edg'd by her. Is this a term in Hawking? Does it signify, have the edge of thy stomach taken off? P. 64. 'mongst friends? If brothers, would it had been so, The pointing here, I think, is entirely mistaken. I read it, 'mongst friends, If brothers; This is warranted from what she says, p. 107: You call'd me brother when I was but your I, you brothers, when ye were so indeed. Ibid. Then had my prize been less. sister: Should not this be price, or rather poize, as better answering to ballasting, or balancing? P. 66. It strikes me past the hope of comfort. Does not the sense require, holpe, or help? P. 68. I dare speak it to myself, for it is vain-glory, &c. Is it so? I do not think that was Cloten's opinion. I would restore, for it is not vain-glory, &c. Ibid. Imperseverant thing. Is the im here, as the grammarians call it, epitattic; otherwise, I think, it does not answer the Poet's meaning. P. 74. Though his honour was nothing but mutation. I do not understand this, according to the present reading. Should it not be, "6 Though his humour, &c." P. 81. Who was he that, otherwise than noble Nature did, Hath alter'd that good picture? I can understand this; yet did, in my opinion, is little more than a dragging expletive. Ought it not to be, noble Nature bid, &c. the laws of Nature being against murder. P. 87. But to look back in front. This odd reading is from our modern Editors. I know indeed Shakespeare somewhere talks of dragging headlong by the heels, which must be owned as preposterous. But the old copies read here, as it is certain it ought to be restored, But to look back in frown; i. e. if you do but frown, and threaten to make opposition. LETTER LETTER LXXII. To Mr. JOHN WATTS*, Printer. SIR, Dec. 16, 1732. Understanding that Mr. Theobald is going to publish an Edition of Shakespeare, I send you herewith a few remarks which I made in reading that Author in Mr. Pope's small Edition. As I am very well satisfied with Mr. Theobald's capacity for the *Who was then employed on Mr. Theobald's Shakespeare, and of whom see the "Literary Anecdotes, vol. I. pp. 62, 292. + SHAKESPEARE'S PLAYS; Mr. Pope's Second Edition, 1728. Vol. I. Tempest, p. 57: Prosp. shall dissolve And like this unsubstantial pageant faded Leave not a rack behind. Probably track or trace. Midsummer Night's Dream, p. 79 : Lys. either it was different in blood Hermia. O cross! too high, to be enthrall'd to love. From the like opposition in the following lines, I should conjecture that it should be read, too high to be enthrall'd to low. Two Gentlemen of Verona, Act I. Scene 1, p. 142: What is there degraded (as Mr. Pope calls it) to the bottom of the page, though bad enough, cannot, I think, be left out without making the following lines nonsense. Merry Wives of Windsor, Act I. Scene 1, p. 216: Falst. What say you, Scarlet and John? These epithets seem to be used in allusion to Robin Hood's two companions Will Scarlet and Little John. See 2 Henry IV. Act V. Scene 5, p. 231: O that my husband Read, O if my husband Vol. II. Comedy of Errors, Act II. Scene 2, p. 15: Read blunts. province he has undertaken, perhaps there may be none of these observations new to him, which have any justice in them; though I have put none in that I remember to have seen of his. Love's Labour Lost. P. 269. Biron. No face is fair that is not full as black. The hue of dungeons, and the school of night. P. 274. Hol. Quis thou consonant ? Some N. The last of the five vowels, if you repeat them, or the fifth if I. Read, third. I wonder what difference Mr. Pope can find between the last and the fifth of the five vowels, whoever repeats them. VOLUME II. P. 20. 1. penult. Keep them fair league and truce with thine own bed, I live distain'd, thou undishonour'd. Read, unstain'd. Much Ado About Nothing. P. 69. Ben. I cannot be secret as a dumb man. P. 104. in the reechy hangings. n.] Read, can. Mr. Pope renders rechy, valuable; but Mr. Theobald has shewn, from several quotations, that it must signify sweaty. I shall only add, in confirmation of this, that it comes from the Saxon word recan, to steam, or exhale. P. 322. Read, As You Like It, Sc. 10. Rosalind then lacks the love Which teacheth thee that thou and I am one. Which teacheth me, &c. P. 329. Sc. 4. Ross. O Jupiter, how merry are my spirits? P. 12. As Stephen Sly and old John Naps of Greece. Sly says he is the son of old Sly of Burton Heath, and talks of the fat ale-wife of Wincot; with what propriety then can he have any acquaintance in Greece? Would not any one believe that Shakespeare wrote it, Old John Naps o' th' Green. All's |