[263] [A reference to the belief in prodigies reported from Africa. "Africa semper aliquid oportet novi."—S. Gosson's "School of Abuse," 1579. See also Rich's "My Ladies Looking-glass," 1616, sig. B 3.]
[264] [Edits. give this speech to the Herald.]
[265] [The head.]
[266] A celebrated puppet-show often mentioned by writers of the times by the name of the Motion of Nineveh. See Ben Jonson's "Bartholomew Fair," act v. sc. 1; "Wit at Several Weapons," act i.; "Every Woman in her Humour," 1609, sig. H, and "The Cutter of Coleman Street," act v. sc. 9.
[267] So in "Twelfth Night," act i. sc. 1.
"That strain again; it had a dying fall."—Steevens.
[268] [Edits., bitter.]
[269] [See Dyce's "Beaumont and Fletcher," ii. 225, note.] Theobald observes in his edition of "Beaumont and Fletcher," that this ballad is mentioned again in "The Knight of the Burning Pestle," and likewise in a comedy by John Tatham, 1660, called "The Rump, or Mirrour of the Times," wherein a Frenchman is introduced at the bonfires made for the burning of the Rump, and catching hold of Priscilla, will oblige her to dance, and orders the music to play Fortune my foe. Again, in "Tom Essence," 1677, p. 37.
[270] A dance. Sir John Davies, in his poem called "Orchestra," 1596, stanza 70, thus describes it—
"Yet is there one, the most delightfull kind,
A loftie jumping, or a leaping round,
Where arme and arme two dauncers are entwind,
And whirle themselues with strict embracements bound,
And still their feet an anapest do sound:
An anapest is all their musicks song,
Whose first two feet are short, and third is long."