[264] i.e. drunk.

[265] An allusion to Webster's "Vittoria Coromborea, or the White Devil."

[266] Not marked in MS. We have, instead, a note:—

"And then begin as was intended."

[267] Old authors constantly allude to the riotous conduct of the 'prentices on Shrove Tuesday.

[268] This is a correction (in the MS.) for "to a Beggars tune."

[269] So in Dekker & Middleton's First Part of the Honest Whore (IV. 3):—

"A sister's thread i' faith had been enough."

Dyce was no doubt right in thinking that the expression is a corruption of sewster's thread. In Ford's Lady's Trial, Gifford altered "sister's thread" to "silver thread." Shirley has "sister's thread" in Hyde Park (V. 1).

[270] With this abuse cf. a very similar passage in Shirley's Duke's Mistress (IV. 1).