Jul. Her eyes are grey as glass.
This was in old times the favourite colour of the eyes in both sexes:
"His eyen are gray as any glasse."
Romance of Sir Isenbras.
"Her eyen gray as glas."
Romance of Libeaus desconus.
"Les iex vairs et rians com un faucon."
Roman de Guerin de Montglaive. MS.
And to come nearer to Shakspeare's time:—In the interlude of Marie Magdalene, a song in praise of her says, "your eyes as gray as glasse and right amiable." The French term ver or vair has induced some of their antiquaries to suppose that it meant green; but it has been very satisfactorily shown to signify in general the colour still called by heralds vair. It is certain however that the French romances and other authorities allude occasionally to green eyes.
Scene 4. Page 274.
Jul. My substance should be statue in thy stead.
In confirmation of Mr. M. Mason's note, it may be observed that in the comedy of Cornelianum dolium, Act I. Scene 5, statua is twice used for a picture. They were synonymous terms, and sometimes a statue was called a picture. Thus Stowe, speaking of Elizabeth's funeral, says that when the people beheld "her statue or picture lying upon the coffin" there was a general sighing, &c. Annals, p. 815, edit. 1631. In the glossary to Speght's Chaucer, 1598, statue is explained picture; and in one of the inventories of King Henry the Eighth's furniture at Greenwich, several pictures of earth are mentioned. These were busts in terra cotta like those still remaining in Wolsey's palace at Hampton Court.