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

Scene 5. Page 383.

Ulyss. ... set them down
For sluttish spoils of opportunity,
And daughters of the game.

This expression seems borrowed from the maister of the game, the ancient title of the king's game-keeper. There was also a treatise on hunting, so called, which Shakspeare had often read of, or might perhaps have seen.

ACT V.

Scene 3. Page 425.

Tro. Brother, you have a vice of mercy in you
Which better fits a lion than a man.

See a preceding note pp. [189], [190].

Scene 9. Page 444.

Hect. I am unarm'd; forego this vantage, Greek.

The author of this play, in his account of the death of Hector, has undoubtedly departed from his original; and, as it should seem, without necessity. Mr. Steevens, on this occasion, takes notice of Lydgate's vehement reprehension of Homer's praise of Achilles, and of his gross violation of the characters drawn by the Grecian poet; but he has censured the wrong person. Lydgate has only followed his predecessor Guido of Colonna, who, (or perhaps the original writer Benoit de Saint More,) adopting the statement in the prologue to Dares Phrygius, appears to regard the latter as a more correct and veracious historian than Homer.