3682. On 'itching omens,' see Miss Burne's Shropshire Folk-Lore, p. 269. 'If your right hand itches, you will receive money; ... if your nose itches, you will be kissed, cursed, or vexed.'
3684. Cf. 'If [in a dream] you see many loaves, it portends joy'; A. S. Leechdoms, iii. 215.
3689. at point-devys, with all exactness, precisely, very neatly; cf. As You Like It, iii. 2. 401. O. F. devis, 'ordre, beauté; a devis, par devis, en bel ordre, d'une manière bien ordonnée, à gré, à souhait'; Godefroy. See F. 560; Rom. of the Rose, 1215.
3690. greyn, evidently some sweet or aromatic seed or spice; apparently cardamoms, otherwise called grains of Paradise (New E. Dict.) 'Greynys, spyce, Granum Paradisi'; Prompt. Parv.; see Way's note. Cf. Rom. of the Rose, 1369, and the note (vol. i. p. 428).
3692. trewe-love, (probably) a leaf of herb-paris; in the efficacy of which he had some superstitious belief. True-love is sometimes used as an abbreviation of true-love knot, as in the last stanza of the Court of Love; and such is the case here. True-love knots were of various shapes; see pictures of four such in Ogilvie's Dictionary. Some had four loops, which gave rise to the name true-love as applied to herb-paris. Gerarde's Herball, 1597, p. 328, thus describes herb-paris (Paris quadrifolia):—At the top of the stalk 'come foorth fower leaves directly set one against another, in manner of a Burgonnion crosse or a true love knot; for which cause among the auncients it hath beene called herbe Truelove.' It is still called True Love's Knot in Cumberland.
3700. Note the rime of tó me with cinam-ó-me.
3708. Iakke, Jack, here an epithet of a fool, like Iankin (B. 1172); and see note to B. 4000. Cf. E. zany.
3709. 'It wilt not be (a case of) come-kiss-me.' Chaucer has ba, to kiss, D. 433; and come-ba-me, i. e. come kiss me, is here used as a phrase; so that the line simply means 'you certainly will not get a kiss!' Observe the rime with bla-me. Bas also meant to kiss, and Skelton uses the words together (ed. Dyce, i. 22):—
'With ba, ba, ba, and bas, bas, bas,
She cheryshed hym, both cheke and chyn';