York. ... I have seen him
Caper upright like a wild Mórisco,
Shaking the bloody darts as he his bells.
However just Dr. Johnson's explanation of Morisco may be in an etymological point of view, it is at least doubtful whether it mean in this place a real or even personated Moor. Nothing more may be intended than simply a performer in a morris dance. It may be likewise doubted whether in the English morris dance, a single Moorish character was ever introduced. The quotation from Junius is extremely perplexing; yet it must be remembered that he was a foreigner, and speaking perhaps conjecturally.
Scene 2. Page 96.
K. Hen. ... Come, basilisk,
And kill the innocent gazer with thy sight.
Bartholomæus, with whom it has been shown that Shakspeare was well acquainted, speaking of the basilisk or cockatrice, says, "In his sight no fowle nor birde passeth harmelesse, and though he be farre from the foule, yet it is burnt and devoured by his mouth.... Plinius also sayth there is a wilde beast called Catobletas [which is] great noyeng to mankinde: for all that see his eyen should dye anone, and the same kinde hath the cockatrice."—De propriet. rer. lib. xviii. c. 16. The same property is also mentioned by Pliny of the basilisk, but Holland's translation was not printed till after this play was written. It is true that if Shakspeare did not write the lines in question, the original author might have used a Latin Pliny.
Scene 2. Page 103.
War. Oft have I seen a timely-parted ghost.
It has been very plausibly suggested that timely-parted signifies in proper time, as opposed to timeless; yet in this place it seems to mean early, recently, newly. Thus in Macbeth, Act II. Scene 3,
"He did command me to call timely on him."
Again, in The unfaithful lover's garland,