[104] [Edits., see.]
[105] [Edits., their.]
[106] [Edits., not.]
[107] The 4o reads, Buy.—Steevens.
[108] Michaelmas term now has but four returns. By the Statute 16 Car. I. c. vi. it was abridged of two; and again, by 24 Geo. II. c. xlviii. of the like number.
[109] In secret. This uncouth expression occurs in "Hamlet," act iv. sc. 5, which many modern editors have altered to the more modern phrase of in private; but as Dr Johnson observes, "if phraseology is to be changed as words grow uncouth by disuse, or gross by vulgarity, the history of every language will be lost; we shall no longer have the words of any author; and as these alterations will often be unskilfully made, we shall in time have very little of his meaning." Mr Steevens, by several instances, has shown that the terms were in common use, and conveyed no low or vulgar ideas, and several others might be added: as in Ascham's "Toxophilus," 1571: "If shootinge fault at anye time, it hydes it not, it lurkes not in corners and budder mother."
[110] The 4o reads breast.—Steevens.
[111] Hands.
[112] i.e., unsheathe them, let them be naked swords.—Steevens.
[113] [Edits., spread.]