[207] ["This is a most spirited and clever scene, and would act capitally."—MS. note in one of the former edits.]
[208] [Edits., are.]
[209] [Edits., and.]
[210] A Jack o' Lent was a puppet which was thrown at in Lent, like Shrovetide cocks. See Mr Steevens's notes on "The Merry Wives of Windsor," act iii. sc. 3, and act v. sc. 5.
[211] The whole of this scene seems levelled at Coriat.—Gilchrist.
[212] Opportunely.—Steevens.
[213] Meeting. So in "Hamlet," act iii. sc. 1—
"That he, as 'twere by accident, may here
Affront Ophelia."
[214] An allusion, probably, to some old ballad. "Hamlet," act iii. sc. 2, refers to the same, and appears to repeat the identical line, which is also introduced in "Love's Labour's Lost," act iii. sc. 1. Bishop Warburton observes that "amongst the country May-games there was an hobby-horse which, when the puritanical humour of those times opposed and discredited these games, was brought by the poets and ballad-makers, as an instance of the ridiculous zeal of the sectaries" (Note to "Hamlet.") See also Mr Steevens's note on the same passage.
Again, in Massinger's "Very Woman," act iii. sc. 1—