For houres but dayes; for weekes, that passed were,
She told but moneths 1596, 1609.
Church would transpose ‘houres’ and ‘dayes’, ‘weekes’ and ‘moneths’. Spenser may have meant that she reckoned in months instead of weeks to make the time look shorter; e.g. said three months instead of twelve weeks, dwelling on the numeral and wilfully ignoring the noun. But this is one of those subtleties in which we feel the difference between Spenser and Shakespeare. See Introduction, p. ix.
V. vi. 16 l. 7. That this is things compacte] thing conj. Church. Others defend ‘things’ as genitive. Church’s conjecture is preferable to that. But there is no real objection to taking ‘things’ as nom. pl.
V. vi. 19 l. 3. the euen-tide] th’euen-tide 1596. See note on V. iii. 11.
V. vi. 25 l. 9. nights] Knight’s conj. Church. This conjecture, like others of Church’s, is rather plausible to common sense than convincingly Spenserian.
V. vi. 26 l. 5. Ne lesse] Sense requires ‘Ne more’; but see note on II. v. 12.
V. vi. 29 l. 2. armed] arm’d 1596. See note on V. iii. 11.
V. vi. 33 l. 7. auenge] reuenge 16(11)-12-13. Morris and Grosart report ‘reuenge 1609’: not so in genuine copies examined.
V. vii. 6 l. 9. her] From stanza 15 it appears that ‘her’ should have been ‘his’. But the mistake may be Spenser’s.