Act I.
Sc. 1.
"Pisa, renowned for grave citizens,
Gave me my being, and my father first,
A merchant of great traffic through the world,
Vincentio come of the Bentivoglii.
Vincentio's son, brought up in Florence,
It shall become to serve all hopes conceiv'd," etc.
In the first four lines I have, with previous editors, given the correct punctuation, and have omitted the superfluous s after Vincentio in the fourth. In the following line the metre shows that something is wrong, and it may be that 'Vincentio's' should be Lucentio his, for nothing is more common than this confusion of proper names. (See on King John, ii. 1.) Hanmer I find also made this correction. At the same time it is equally probable that something has been omitted, and that we should read 'only son,' or 'son and heir,' as in v. 1. It is one of those cases in which choice is difficult. I have given the first in my Edition of the plays; but I now greatly prefer the third.