The New Hudson Shakespeare: Julius Cæsar

by William Shakespeare

[III.70] wisdom F₃F₄ | Wisedome F₁F₂.

[III.71] conceit: conceive of, think of. So in [I, iii, 162].

[III.72] dearer: more intensely. This emphatic or intensive use of 'dear' is very common in Shakespeare, and is used in the expression of strong emotion, either of pleasure or of pain.

[III.73] bay'd: brought to bay. The expression connotes being barked at and worried as a deer by hounds. Cf. A Midsummer Nights Dream, IV, i, 118. "Cæsar turned him no where but he was stricken at by some ... and was hackled and mangled among them, as a wild beast taken of hunters."—Plutarch, Julius Cæsar.

[III.74] hart F₁ | Heart F₂F₃F₄.

[III.75] Sign'd in thy spoil. This may have reference to the custom still prevalent in England and Europe of hunters smearing their hands and faces with the blood of the slain deer.

[III.76] lethe | Lethe F₂F₃F₄ | Lethee F₁ | death Pope.

[III.77] lethe. This puzzling term is certainly the reading of the Folios, and may mean either 'violent death' (Lat. letum), as 'lethal' means 'deadly,' or, as White interprets the passage, 'the stream which bears to oblivion.'

[III.78] heart Theobald | hart Ff.

[III.79] strucken Steevens | stroken F₁ | stricken F₂F₃F₄.