[226:A] Folio edit. p. 44. Act iv. sc. 2.
[226:B] No Wit, no Help like a Womans, 8vo. 1657. Middleton was contemporary with Shakspeare, and commenced a dramatic writer in 1602.
[226:C] Insatiate Countess, 4to. 1603.
[226:D] Douce's Illustrations, vol. i. p. 199.
[226:E] Reed's Shakspeare, vol. iv. p. 459. note, by Steevens.
[226:F] Midsummer-Night's Dream, act v. sc. 2. Vide Reed's Shakspeare, vol. iv. p. 459.
[228:A] Woorts; of this word I know not the precise meaning; but suppose it is meant to imply plodded or stumbled on.
[229:A] Nichols's Queen Elizabeth's Progresses, vol. i.—Laneham's Letter, p. 18, 19, 20.
[229:B] Jonson's Works, fol. edit. of 1640, vol. ii. A Tale of a Tub, p. 72.—Much of the spirit and costume of the rural wedding of the sixteenth century continued to survive until within these eighty years. "I have received," says Mr. Brand, who wrote in 1776, "from those who have been present at them, the following account of the customs used at vulgar Northern Weddings, about half a century ago:—
"The young women in the neighbourhood, with bride-favours (knots of ribbands) at their breasts, and nosegays in their hands, attended the Bride on her wedding-day in the morning.—Fore-Riders announced with shouts the arrival of the Bridegroom; after a kind of breakfast, at which the bride-cakes were set on and the barrels broached, they walked out towards the church.—The Bride was led by two young men; the Bridegroom by two young women: Pipers preceded them, while the crowd tossed up their hats, shouted and clapped their hands. An indecent custom prevailed after the ceremony, and that too before the altar:—Young men strove who could first unloose, or rather pluck off the Bride's garters: Ribbands supplied their place on this occasion; whosoever was so fortunate as to tear them thus off from her leggs, bore them about the church in triumph.