Illustrations of Shakspeare, and of Ancient Manners: / with Dissertations on the Clowns and Fools of Shakspeare; on a Collection of Popular Tales Entitled Gesta Romanorum; and on the English Morris dance.

by Francis Douce

ACT III.

Scene 1. Page 97.

Vio. Dost thou live by thy tabor?

This instrument is found in the hands of fools long before the time of Shakspeare. With respect to the sign of the tabor mentioned in the notes, it might, as stated, have been the designation of a musick shop; but that it was the sign of an eating-house kept by Tarleton is a mistake into which a learned commentator has been inadvertently betrayed. It appears from Tarleton's Jests, 1611, 4to, that he kept a tavern in Gracious [Gracechurch] street, at the sign of the Saba. This is the person who in our modern bibles is called the queen of Sheba, and the sign has been corrupted into that of the bell-savage, as may be gathered from the inedited metrical romance of Alexander, supposed to have been written at the beginning of the fourteenth century by Adam Davie, who, in describing the countries visited by his hero, mentions that of Macropy (the Macropii of Pliny), and adds,

"In heore[4] lond is a cité
On of the noblest in Christianté[5];
Hit hotith[6] Sabba in langage.
Thennes cam Sibely savage,
Of al theo world theo fairest quene,
To Jerusalem, Salamon to seone[7]
For hire fairhed[8], and for hire love,
Salamon forsok his God above."

Sibely savage, as a proper name, is another perversion of si belle sauvage; and though the lady was supposed to have come from the remotest parts of Africa, and might have been as black as a Negro, we are not now to dispute the superlative beauty of the mistress of Salomon, here converted into a Savage. It must be admitted that the queen of Sheba was as well adapted to a sign as the wise men of the East, afterwards metamorphosed into the three kings of Cologne.

Mr. Pegge, in his Anecdotes of the English language, p. 291, informs us that a friend had seen a lease of the Bell Savage inn to Isabella Savage; "which," says he, "overthrows the conjectures about a bell and a savage, la belle sauvage, &c." It is probable that the learned writer's friend was in some way or other deceived. The date of the instrument is not mentioned; and if the above name really appeared in the lease, it might have been an accidental circumstance at a period not very distant. Mr. Pegge was likewise not aware that the same sign, corrupted in like manner, was used on the continent.

Scene 2. Page 109.

Sir To. Go write it in a martial hand; be curst and brief.

Of the latter sentence Dr. Johnson has not given the exact explanation. It alludes to the proverb, "A curst cur must be tied short."

Scene 4. Page 120.

Sir To. What, man! defy the Devil: consider, he's an enemy to mankind.

It was very much the practice with old writers, both French and English, to call the Devil, the enemy, by way of pre-eminence, founded perhaps on the words of Christ in Luke x. 19. Thus at the beginning of the Roman de Merlin, MS. "Mult fu iriez li anemis quant nre sires ot este en anfer;" and see other examples in Barbasan's glossary to the Ordene de chevalerie, 1759, 12mo, in v. Anemi. The cause of the Devil's wrath in the above instance, was the liberation of Adam, Noah, and many other saints and patriarchs from the purgatorial torments which they had endured. In a most curious description of hell in Examples howe mortall synne maketh the synners inobedyentes to have many paynes and doloures within the fyre of hell, b. l. no date, 12mo, the Devil is thus referred to: "Come than after me, and I shal shewe unto the the ryght cursed enemye of humayne lygnage." And again, "About the enemy there were so many devyls and of cursed and myserable soules that no man myght beleve that of all the worlde from the begynnynge myght be yssued and brought forth so many soules." Sometimes he was called the enemy of hell, as in Larke's Boke of wisdome, b. l. no date, 12mo, where it is said that "the enemye of hell ought to be doubted of every wise man." This note may serve also in further explanation of the line in Macbeth, Act III. Scene 1,

"Given to the common enemy of man."

It is remarkable that the Devil should be likewise called the enemy of mankind in the East. See Gladwin's Persian moon-shee, part ii. p. 23.

Scene 4. Page 120.

Fab. Carry his water to the wise woman.

Here may be a direct allusion to one of the two ladies of this description mentioned in the following passage from Heywood's play of The wise woman of Hogsdon; "You have heard of Mother Notingham, who for her time was prettily well skill'd in casting of waters: and after her, Mother Bombye." The latter is sometimes alluded to by Gerarde the Herbalist, who, speaking of the properties of vervain, says, "you must observe mother Bumbies rules to take just so many knots or sprigs, and no more, least it fall out so that it do you no good, if you catch no harme by it." Historie of plants, p. 581.

Lilly's comedy of Mother Bombie is well known. The several occupations of these impostors are thus described in the above play by Heywood: "Let me see how many trades have I to live by: First, I am a wise-woman, and a fortuneteller, and under that I deale in physicke and forespeaking, in palmistry, and recovering of things lost. Next, I undertake to cure madd folkes. Then I keepe gentlewomen lodgers, to furnish such chambers as I let out by the night: Then I am provided for bringing young wenches to bed; and, for a need, you see I can play the match-maker. Shee that is but one, and professeth so many, may well be tearmed a wise-woman, if there bee any." Such another character was Julian of Brentford, mentioned in the Merry wives of Windsor. These persons were sometimes called cunning and looming women.

Scene 4. Page 121.

Sir To. Come, we'll have him in a dark room, and bound. My niece is already in the belief that he is mad.

The reason for putting Malvolio into a dark room was to make him believe that he was mad; for a madhouse seems formerly to have been called a dark-house. In the next act Malvolio says, "Good Sir Topas, do not think I am mad, they have laid me here in hideous darkness." And again, "I say this house is dark." In Act V. he asks, "Why have you suffer'd me to be imprison'd, kept in a dark-house?" In As you like it, Act III. Scene 1, Rosalind says that "love is a madness, and deserves as well a dark-house and a whip, as madmen do." Edward Blount, in the second dedication to his Hospitall of incurable fooles, 1600, 4to, a translation from the Italian, requests of the person whom he addresses to take on him the office of patron or treasurer to the hospital; and that if any desperate censurer shall stab him for assigning his office or place, he presently take him into the dark ward: and in the same work, certain idle fools are consigned to the darksome guesthouse of their madness.

Scene 4. Page 124.

Oli. I have said too much unto a heart of stone, and laid mine honour too unchary on't.

This is the reading of the old copy, which has been unnecessarily disturbed at Theobald's suggestion by substituting out. It might be urged that laying honour out is but an awkward phrase. The old text simply means, I have placed my honour too incautiously upon a heart of stone. The preceding note had shown that adjectives are often used adverbially by Shakspeare.

Scene 4. Page 127.

Sir To. He is a knight, dubb'd with unhack'd rapier, and on carpet consideration.

The original word is unhatch'd, and if any alteration be admitted it should be an hatch'd, for the first reason assigned in Mr. Malone's ingenious note. Sir Toby says that his brother knight was no hero dubbed in the field of battle, but a carpet knight made at home in time of peace with a sword of ceremony richly gilt or engraved. In Don Quixote, the damsel whom Sancho finds wandering in the streets of Barataria disguised as a man, is furnished with "a very faire hatched dagger," chap. 49 of Shelton's translation. In The tragical history of Jetzer, 1683, 18mo, mention is made of "a sword richly hatcht with silver." Thus much in support of the above slight alteration of the old reading. The second conjecture of Mr. Malone, that unhatcht might have been used in the sense of unhack'd, deserves much attention; but there was no necessity for introducing the latter word into the text. To hatch a sword has been thought to signify to engrave it; but it appears from Holme's Academy of armory, B. iii. p. 91, that "hatching, is to silver or gild the hilt and pomell of a sword or hanger."

With respect to carpet knights, they were sometimes called knights of the green cloth. For this information we are also indebted to Holme, who, in his above cited work, B. iii. p. 57, informs us that "all such as have studied law, physic, or any other arts and sciences whereby they have become famous and serviceable to the court, city, or state, and thereby have merited honour, worship, or dignity, from the sovereign and fountain of honour; if it be the King's pleasure to knight any such persons, seeing they are not knighted as soldiers, they are not therefore to use the horseman's title or spurs; they are only termed simply miles et milites, knights of the carpet or knights of the green cloth, to distinguish them from knights that are dubbed as soldiers in the field; though in these our days they are created or dubbed with the like ceremony as the others are, by the stroak of a naked sword upon their shoulder, with the words, Rise up Sir T. A. knight."