Ib. Speech of Younger Loveless:—
Fill him some wine. Thou dost not see me mov'd, &c.
These Editors ought to have learnt, that scarce an instance occurs in B. and F. of a long speech not in metre. This is plain staring blank verse.
THE CUSTOM OF THE COUNTRY.
I cannot but think that in a country conquered by a nobler race than the natives, and in which the latter became villeins and bondsmen, this custom, 'lex merchetae', may have been introduced for wise purposes,—as of improving the breed, lessening the antipathy of different races, and producing a new bond of relationship between the lord and the tenant, who, as the eldest born, would, at least, have a chance of being, and a probability of being thought, the lord's child. In the West Indies it cannot have these effects, because the mulatto is marked by nature different from the father, and because there is no bond, no law, no custom, but of mere debauchery. 1815.
Act i. sc. 1. Rutilio's speech:—
Yet if you play not fair play, &c.
Evidently to be transposed and read thus:—