To which Isabella replies (according to the reading of the same edition):
"O, 'tis the cunning livery of hell,
The damned'st body to invest and cover
In prenzie guards! Dost thou think, Claudio,
If I would yield him my virginity,
Thou might'st be freed?"
Claudio, still incredulous, rejoins:
"O, heavens! it cannot be."
The word prenzie has given rise to much annotation, and it seems to be universally agreed that the word is a misprint. The question is, what was the word actually written, or intended, by Shakspeare? Steevens and Malone suggested "princely;" Warburton, "priestly;" and Tieck, "precise." Mr. Knight adopts "precise," the reading of Tieck, and thinks "that, having to choose some word which would have the double merit of agreeing with the sense of the passage and be similar in the number and form of the letters, nothing can be more unfortunate than the correction of "princely;" Mr. Collier, on the other hand, follows Steevens and Malone, and reads "princely," observing the Tieck's reading ("precise") "sounds ill as regards the metre, the accent falling on the wrong syllable. Mr. Collier's choice is determined by the authority of the second folio, which he considers ought to have considerable weight, whilst Mr. Knight regards the authority of that edition as very trifling; and the only point of agreement between the two distinguished recent editors is with respect to Warburton's word "priestly," which they both seem to think nearly conveys the meaning of the poet.
I have over and over again considered the several emendations which have been suggested, and it seems to me that none of them answer all the necessary conditions; namely, that the word adopted shall be (1.) suitable to the reputed character of Angelo; (2.) an appropriate epithet to the word "guards," in the reply of Isabella above quoted; (3.) of the proper metre in both