LANCELOT....If a Christian do not play the knave, and

53 nobist A

If a Christian did not play the knave, and get thee, I am much deceived.

And, notwithstanding, Mr. Malone charges the Editor so srongly with Ignorance, I have no doubt but this is the true reading, as it is clearly better sense than that which he has adopted. Launcelot does not mean to foretell the fate of Jessica, but judges, from her lovely disposition, that she must have been begotten by a christian, not by such a brute as Shylock; a christian might marry her without playing the knave, though he could not beget her.

ACT II. Sc. 5.

SHYLOCK..And the vile squeaking of the wry-neck'd fife.

It appears, from hence, that the fifes, in Shakspeare's time, were formed differently from those now in use, which are straight, not - wry-neck'd.

ACT III.-Sc. 2.

BASSANIO.

Viso How could he see to do them? having made one,

Methinks it should have power to steal both his,
And leave itself unfurnish'd.

In my former comments on this passage, I ventured to assert, that unfurnished meant, unfurnished with a fellow, or companion; and I am confirmed in this explanation, by the following passage in Fletcher's Lover's Progress, where Aleidon says to Clarangé, on delivering Lidian's challenge, which Clarangé accepts.

30

You are a noble Gentleman,

Wil't please you bring a friend; we are two of us, And pity, either of us should be unfurnish'd. PORTIA.

.But the full sum of me

Jong Is sum of something; which to term in gross,

Is an unlesson'd girl.

It appears that the reading of the folio,
Is sum of Nothing.

which I should prefer, as it is Portia's intention, in this speech, to undervalue herself.

ACT II.-Sc. 3.

AS YOU LIKE IT.

ADAM....This is no place, this house is but a butchery, Notwithstanding the ingenious explanations of Malone and Steevens, and the authorities they produce to prove that place means a seat or mansion, it appears to me that Adam means merely

to tell Orlando, that his brother's houfe was no place fit for him to repair to.

A fimilar expression occurs in Fletcher's Mad Lover, where Memnon says,

Why were there not fuch Women in the Camp
Then, prepared, to make me know them?

To which Eumenes replies,

'Twas no place, Sir.

Meaning that the camp was not a place fit for them.

ACT III. Sc. 2.

CELIA....(reading.)

Atalanta's better part,

Sad Lucretia's modesty.

The point in question is, what was meant by Atalanta's better part, and I shall not attempt to add to the conjectures of the editors: I fhall only observe that Jaques in the latter part of this very scene says to Orlando,

You have a nimble wit,

I think it was made of Atalanta's heels.

Which shews, that when Shakspeare wrote this scene, he had Atalanta's swiftness in mind. CELIA....How, now! look friends?

There should be no note of interrogation after the word friends; as Celia means only to desire that the shepherd and clown should retire.

ACT III. Sc. 5.5

ROSALIND....What tho' you have mo beauty,
(As by my faith I see no more in you,

Than without candle might go dark to bed)
Must you be, therefore, proud and pityless?

The old reading is,

What! though you have no beauty,

i

Which cannot be right, for the want of beauty could give her no claim to be proud or pityless.

For reading mo with Malone, or more with Steevens, there is no authority; We have therefore as just a right to introduce any other word, that will make the sense of the passage complete. I should, therefore, be inclined to read,

What tho' you have some beauty

If more is to stand, we must change the verb, and read,

What tho' you had more beauty,

instead of have, and the meaning would then be, supposing you had more beauty than you really possess, must you, therefore, be proud and pityless? But however the passage may be read, Mr. Malone's idea, that Rosalind means to say, that Phebe had more beauty than Sylvius, appears to me inadmissible.

ACT IV.-Sc. 3.

OLIVER........And to give this napkin,

Dy'd in this blood, unto the shepherd-youth,
That he, in sport, doth call his Rosalind.

The second folio reads, dy'd in his blood, which is clearly the better reading, and is one of inftances in which the second folio cormany rects the first.

It was needless for Oliver to inform them, that the napkin was dyed with the blood that stained it; but when he says that it was dyed with the blood of Orlando, he gives them very interesting information, which has an immediate effect upon Rosalind.

ACT V.-Sc. 4.

TOUCHSTONE....Faith, my Lord, we met; but found the Quarrel was upon the seventh cause→→→

Mr. Malone's elaborate argument to prove that the seventh cause, reckoning backward, from the lie direct, means the first cause, that is, the retort courteous, is fully confuted by what Touchstone says in the next page but one:

I durst not go further than the lie circumstantial, nor he durst not give me the lie direct, and so we measur'd swords, and parted.

Johnson, therefore, is clearly right in reading, we found the quarrel was not upon the seventh cause, unless we suppose that, through inadvertency, the seventh cause was inserted instead of the sixth.