Love's Cure (V., 3), Bobadillo to Lucio, speaking about Clara:
I put the longest weapon in your sister's hand, my lord, because she was the shortest lady.
The Sea Voyage (IV., 3): Morillat: “This little gentlewoman that was taken with us,” referring to Aminta. As Cleopatra in The False One (II., 3) arrives in a parcel, she must have been small. Margarita in Rule a Wife (III., 4) is “of a low stature.” Ismenia in The Maid of the Mill “was of the lowest stature” (I., 2); cf. also V., 2, 7. Evanthe in A Wife for a Month, IV., 3 is “this little fort.” Cf. also The Noble Gentleman, IV., 3.
Appendix II
Did Massinger know Greek? It is perhaps worth while collecting the scanty evidence on the subject. We find a pun on the name Philanax in The Emperor of the East,[510] and Mathias plays on the name of his wife Sophia.[511] The phrase κατ᾽ ἐξοήν is used in The Guardian.[512] We find a Greek construction in The Emperor of the East:[513]
And that before he gives he would consider
The what, to whom, and wherefore.
On the other hand, we notice Theseus scanned as a trisyllable.[514]
There are one or two passages where the unexpected turn [pg 149] of the thought rather suggests a Greek original. Thus, in The Renegado[515] we are reminded of The Acharnians:[516]