[40] Owes,] i. e. owns.
[41] Parted,] i. e. endowed with a part.
[42] Bandog!] A bandog, as the name imports, was a dog so fierce, as to require to be chained up. Bandogs are frequently mentioned by our old writers (indeed the word occurs three times in this play) and always with a reference to their savage nature. If the term was appropriated to a species, it probably meant a large dog, of the mastiff kind, which, though no longer met with here, is still common in many parts of Germany: it was familiar to Snyders, and is found in most of his hunting-pieces.
In this country the bandog was kept to bait bears: with the decline of that sport, perhaps, the animal fell into disuse, as he was too ferocious for any domestic purpose. Mr. Gilchrist has furnished me with a curious passage from Laneham, which renders any further details on the subject unnecessary. "On the syxth day of her Majestyes cumming, a great sort of bandogs whear thear tyed in the utter coourt, and thyrteen bears in the inner. Whoosoever made the pannel, thear wear enoow for a queast, and one for a challenge and need wear. A wight of great wisdoom and gravitie seemed their foreman to be, had it cum to a jury: but it fell oout that they wear causd to appeer thear upon no such matter, but onlie too onswear too an auncient quarrele between them and the bandogs," &c. Queen Elizabeth's Entertainment at Killingwoorth Castle, in 1575.—Gifford.
[43] Your son and that.] Macrinus, whom before she had called a pander. M. Mason.
[44] ——I'll tell you a short tale, &c.] I once thought that I had read this short tale in Arnobius, from whom, and from Augustin, much of the preceding speech is taken; but, upon looking him over again, I can scarcely find a trace of it. Herodotus has, indeed, a story of a king of Egypt (Amasis), which bears a distant resemblance to it; but the application is altogether different:—there is a bason of gold in which he and his guests were accustomed to spit, wash their feet, &c. which is formed into a god; but whether this furnished the poet with any hints I cannot undertake to say.—Gifford.
[45] The pillars of our faith, &c.] Here, as in many other places, the language of Christianity and paganism is confounded: faith was always the distinctive term for the former, in opposition to heathenism.—Gifford.
[46] Lamia,] i. e. sorceress, hag. The word is pure Latin.
[47] Speaking of the remainder of this act, Gifford says, "there may be (and probably are) finer passages in our dramatic poets, but I am not acquainted with them."
[48] Mac. Strange affection!
Cupid once more hath changed his shafts with Death, And kills, instead of giving life.] This is a beautiful allusion to a little poem among the Elegies of Secundus. Cupid and Death unite in the destruction of a lover, and in endeavouring to recover their weapons from the body of the victim, commit a mutual mistake, each plucking out the "shafts" of the other. The consequences of this are prettily described: