I. 2. 47. The termination ion is frequently pronounced as two syllables at the end of a line (Abbott, § 479).

In consultation | afore | the doore.

1. 3. I. 'Lines with four accents where there is a change of thought are not uncommon' (Abbott, § 507).

1.3.5. Hinc illae lachrymae. Horace. Epodes 1. 19. 41. I. 3.9. Madam may have the French accent (cf. Abbott, § 490).

He should be forc'd, | Madám, | to lay it down. 1. 3. II. The verse is metrically irregular.

Márry her marry her | Madam. | Get her | married.

1. 3. 13. Pursue your project reall. Pursue your project which is concerned with real property or money. real is a legal term meaning 'opposed to personal'; see Act. 27 Hen. VIII, c. 26. 4: All actions realles, hereafter shalbe conueied, perpetrated, or sued for any landes'; also tr. Littleton's Tenures 41: 'If the villaine be demaundant in an accion reall, or plaintife in an action personal.'—NED.

1. 3. 16. The metre requires contraction in pronunciation (cf. Abbott, § 462). For the extra syllable, see note to I. I. 28. a | fine wit | ty man; | I saw him | goe in, | now.

Ís

1.3. 17. a Fether. This may refer by way of synechdoche to the bravest' article of Ironside's attire; cf.

3.3.60:

Whereas Rud: Ironside,
Although he ha' got his head into a Beaver,
With a huge feather, 's but a Carriers sonne.

The term is also used derogatively to signify a nobody, a mere nothing. Cf. The New Inn (Wks. 5. 337):

What antiquated feather's that that talks?

The connection between these two meanings is illustrated by a passage in Middleton's Father Hubbard's Tales (ed. Dyce, 5.566): His head was dressed up in white feathers

I

like a shuttle-cock, which agreed so well with his brain, being nothing but cork, that two of the biggest of the guard might very easily have tossed him with battledores, and made good sport with him in his majesty's great hall.' See also Pope's Essay on Man 4. 247-8:

A wit's a feather, and a chief a rod;

An honest man's the noblest work of God.

1. 3. 28. For the rule governing the metre, see note on I. 2. 32.

He is by me assigned for | my Neice.

1. 3. 41. Any vowel unaccented in a polysyllable may be dropped (Abbott, § 468).

Her talking, sooth | ing, some time govern | ing Gos sip. I. 4. 5. As Doctor Ridley writ, and Doctor Barlow?

They both have wrote of you, and Mr. Compasse. Dr. Mark Ridley (1560–1624) was a noted physician. He published in 1613 A Short Treatise of Magneticall Bodies and Motions. In 1617 he published Animadversions on a late Work entitled Magnetical Advertisement, a work written by Dr. Barlow.-DNB.

William Barlow (d. 1625) was archdeacon of Salisbury, and a writer on scientific subjects. He discovered many uses of the magnet or loadstone, and invented the compass-box. In 1616 he published a book called Magnetical Advertisement, which was soon attacked by Dr. Ridley. Barlow rejoined in A Brief Discovery of the Idle Animadversions of Mark Ridley.-W. and DNB.

I. 4. II. This line is exceptional, since it contains but four

accents.

1. 4. 13. shoot at Buts. A butt was a mark or target for archery practice. There were usually two butts, one at each extremity of the range; hence the use of the plural. NED. cites the following from Earl Rivers (Caxton) Dictes 89: 'An archier to faile of a butte is no wonder, but to hytte the pryke is a great maistrie.'

...

No wonder the doctor exaggerated, when greater marvels could be found in the writings of worthy Philosophers and Physicians... and religious Professors in famous Universities, who are able to patronize that which they have said, and vindicate themselves from all cavillers and ignorant persons.' Burton, in The Anatomy of Melancholy (1. 2. 229-30) recites a story of demonic possession out of 'most approved Physicians': Cornelius Gemma . . . relates of a young maid . . that had such strange passions and convulsions, three men could not sometimes hold her; she purged a live eel, which he saw, a foot and a half long, and touched himself, but the eel afterwards vanished; she vomited some 24 pounds of fulsome stuff of all colours twice a day for 14 days; and after that she voided great balls of hair, pieces of wood, pigeons' dung, parchment, goose dung, coals; and after them two pounds of pure blood, and then again coals and stones, of which some had inscriptions, bigger than a walnut, some of them pieces of glass, brass, &c., besides paroxysms of laughing, weeping and ecstasies.' The doctor diagnoses the case as the green sickness, but it is discovered later to be a well advanced case of pregnancy. The symptoms of both conditions are, however, similar, as the appetite is at these times very capricious. NED. cites R. James, Introd. Moufet's Health's Improv. 21: The Mischief that young Girls do themselves, who are inclined to . . . the green Sickness, by taking great Quantities of Chalk, Lime, and other Absorbents.' The fact that pregnant women have strange appetites was well known. In Bartholomew Fair, Win. Littlewit's desire to eat roast pig in the fair induced Dame Purecraft and Zeal-of-the-land Busy to enter, and become involved in the day's escapades. I. 4. 16. a dainty spice

O' the greene sicknesse!

A rare specimen of the green sickness; for separate words, see the Glossary.

I. 4. 17. 'Od sheild! God forbid, or God protect.'

I. 4. 41.

she had the sweat

Both of my browes and brains.

Alluding to Gen. 3. 19.

I. 4. 48.

I sure thought

She had a Lease of talking, for nine lives.

A lease or grant was sometimes made for one, two, three or more lives. Cf. Milton, Ch. Govt, 2. Introd. Wks. (1847) 43. I: As men buy Leases, for three lives and downward.' -NED.

1. 4. 50. The line may be scanned as follows:

It may | be sh(e) has. | Sir six | teene thou | sand pound. 1. 4. 58. The line is irregular, the last foot being a trochee. With that vaine world, | till, as | 'twas prov'd, | after, I

I. 4. 59. I. 5. II. the Spitle Preachers! Spitle is an obsolete contraction of hospital. Wright mentions a place called Spittal Hill, near the site of the ancient hospital or infirmary.' Halliwell defines Spittle-sermons: Sermons preached formerly at the Spittle, in a pulpit erected for the purpose, and afterwards at Christchurch, City, on Easter Monday and Tuesday.' Nares cites Cleveland, 1651: 'I look upon your letter as a spittle sermon, where I perceive your ambition how you would prove yourself a clean beast, because you know how to chew the cud.'

to good uses. A Latinism: in pios usus.

I. 5. 12. The Arminians? Believers in the doctrines of James Arminius (Jacobus Harmensen), a Protestant divine of Leyden, (1560-1609). They separated from the Calvinists, objecting to their doctrine of predestination.-C.D. The Calvinistic controversy became general in England soon after the synod of Dort in 1618; see J. B. Marsden, The History of the Early Puritans, pp. 335–375. Calvinism was soon banished from the High Church party, but retained its place among the Puritans. The growth of Arminianism was another cause of anxiety to the Puritans (Marsden, p.359). They were now

rigid Calvinists; many of their leaders insisted with peremptory dogmatism upon points on which the reformers had spoken, if not with reserve, with caution and humility. A reaction of necessity took place. . . . We begin to find Arminianism, in the fears of the Puritans, curiously entwined with Popery; and in fact the house of commons, a few years afterwards, vehemently denounced the two, as the growing evil which threatened to overwhelm both liberty and religion.' 1. 5. 18. And then the Persians, were our Puritanes. This seems to be a pun or jingle on Persians and piercing (persing) wits in the next line. Pierce was pronounced perse or purse; cf. Nashe's Pierce Pennilesse.

1. 5. 22. Their branching sleeves, brancht cassocks, and brancht doctrine. The branching sleeves and brancht cassocks refer to the surplice and the cassock worn by the Anglican clergy. Brancht doctrine perhaps refers to Polish's view that the doctrines of the Anglican Church were divided from, or beside, their texts.

1. 5. 24. I respect no Persons. Persons was changed to parsons in 1692 and subsequent editions. The form parson, however, was in use when this play was written, as Jonson employs it in the same line, as well as in other places. I suspect that his use of the archaic form was intentional, as the phrase, to respect no persons,' has an element of Biblical connotation highly ludicrous under the circumstances, a connotation which is lost by the change of form. Cf. Rom. 2. 11; Eph. 6.9; Col. 3. 25; Jas. 2. 1. NED. gives parson at an obs. form of person; and there must have been much confusion in the pronunciation of these words.

1. 5. 25. The scansion of these two lines may be made regular by altering the divisions of the lines:

Chaplins | or Doc | tors I will speak. | Yes, so't

be reason lét | her Death, | she cannot | speake reason.

Or the verse may be scanned thus:

Let her.| Death, she | cannot | speake reason.