[260] [Old copy, house; but Simplicity is enumerating the new articles of attire he proposed to purchase.]
[261] [He addresses the audience.]
[262] [Old copy, auditorie.]
[263] [Old copy, proofe it fits of.]
[264] [Old copy, a.]
[265] [Old copy, in the preceding line, ever.] This and the following lines afford a note of time, and show that the drama was written and acted during the preparation of the great Armada, and perhaps before its total defeat.
[266] [The old copy reads, peerlesse, of the rarest price, which destroys the metre. The writer probably wrote peerless, and then, finding it inconvenient as regarded the measure, substituted the other phrase, without striking out the first word, so that the printer inserted both.]
[267] [Old copy, when.]
[268] See "Henry IV.," Part I., act ii. sc 1, respecting "burning cressets." In a note, Steevens quotes the above line in explanation of Shakespeare.
[269] [The concluding portion of the speech is supposed to be overheard by Fraud and the others.]