flew from a broken window of the building, with the solemn message, that considerable treasures lay hid in certain fields of the barton; that if they would carefully dig there, and diligently attend the labourers, to prevent purloining, they would undoubtedly find them. The farmers attended to the important notice, instantly employed many workmen in the fields described, and I was lately informed had discovered the valuable deposit." The folly and superstition which so strongly mark this story should have passed unnoticed, had not the author affected, in other parts of the work, to possess a mind superior to the prejudices which influence the great bulk of mankind.'

Shakespeare also satirized the belief that a human soul could inhabit a bird (Twelfth Night 4. 2. 52-62):

Clo. What is the opinion of Pythagoras concerning Wilde-fowle?

Mal. That the soule of our grandam, might happily inhabite a bird.

Clo. What thinkst thou of his opinion?

Mal. I think nobly of the soule, and no way aprove his opinion.

Clo. Fare thee well: remaine thou still in darknesse, thou shalt hold th' opinion of Pythagoras, ere I will allow of thy wits, and feare to kill a Woodcocke, lest thou dispossesse the soule of thy grandam.

For popular superstitions respecting the magpie, see Brand's Popular Antiquities 3. 214-6. The three chief birds of omen are the owl, the raven, and the magpie. There is a superstition that the chattering of magpies betokens the approach of guests or strangers to one's house. Of the belief that human souls could inhabit magpies, there is an example in Ovid's Metamorphoses 5. 293: The Pierides, the nine daughters of Pierus, King of Emathia, having challenged the Muses to a contest of song and suffered defeat, were changed by them into magpies.' Also, a recent literary use of the same tradition is found in John Galsworthy's allegory of Sacred and Profane Love.

5. 5. 17. i' the Clothing, or the Bevy. Mrs. Parrot was a member of one of the Livery Companies or guilds of London.

For accounts of the clothing of the companies and other facts of interest, see Stow's Survey of London (Kingsford's ed., 2, 188-95); Herbert's History of the Twelve Livery Companies; and Heath's Some Account of the Grocer's Company.

5. 5. 21. Doo-little Lane. Now called Knightrider Court, City, a passage of half a dozen houses between Carter Lane and Knightrider Street.'-Wheatley and Cunningham 1. 510. 5. 5. 26. For the metre, see note on I. I. 61.

You are a foule mouth'd, purg | ing, ab | surd Doctor; 5.5.30. your plaister of Oathes. Medicine was involved in those days with alchemy, astrology, magic, and all sort of superstitious practices; cf. 3. 2. 32:

Com. The doctor is an ass then, if he say so,
And cannot with his conjuring names

Cure a poor wench's falling in a swoon.

According to Compass, the physicians still had faith in charms, incantations, and oaths. For the relation of medicine to various superstitions, see Hathaway, edition of The Alchemist, Introduction, pp. 49-60; and W. G. Black's Folk Medicine. 5.5. 36. Bet'lem. Betlem or Bedlem is a corruption of Bethlehem. The hospital of St. Mary of Bethlehem was founded in 1246 by Simon Fitz Mary, one of the sheriffs of London, a refuge for the insane.

as

5.7. There is a similarity between this scene and The Puritane Widdow; in both the pretended conjurers discover treasure which they themselves have concealed.

5.7.5-11. It . . . rest. The old anatomists divided the brain into three ventricles; the third ventricle, the cerebellum, connected the brain with the spinal marrow and the rest of the body. Intoxication or frenzy was caused by fumes rising from the stomach and collecting in the brain; cf. Macbeth I. 7. 64:

When Duncan is asleep,
his two chamberlains

Will I with wine and wassail so convince,
That memory, the warder of the brain,
Shall be a fume, and the receipt of reason
A limbec only.

Also the following passages from Burton's Anat. Mel. 1. 252-4: 'Amongest herbs to be eaten, I find gourds, cowcumbers, coleworts, melons disallowed, but especially cabbage. It causeth troublesome dreams, ans sends up black vapours to the brain. . . . Crato, lib. 2, consil II, disallows all roots.... Magninus is of Crato's opinion, they trouble the mind, sending gross fumes to the brain, make men mad. . . . All pulse are naught, beans, pease, . . . they fill the brain ... with gross fumes.' Anat. Mel. 1. 474: 'And from these crudities windy vapours ascend up to the brain, which trouble the imagination, and cause fear, sorrow, dullness, heaviness, many terrible conceits and chimæras . . . If it (head-melancholy) proceed from dryness of the brain, then their heads will be light, vertiginous, and they apt to wake, & to continue whole months together without sleep.'

5.7.7. For the metre, see note on 3. 3. 43.

That are melan | cholicke, | to worke | at first,

5.7. 13. telling mysteries, that must be heard. Somnambulists were believed to possess prophetic or magical power. The following passage is taken from Ennemoser's History of Magic 1.71: In inflammatory diseases, particularly those of the brain, prophetic delirium often takes place. De Seze considers it an undisputed fact that in apoplexy and inflammation of the brain ecstatic states manifest themselves, and that not only new ideas are formed but a new power of looking into the future. Fernel tells us of a patient who in sleep spoke Latin and Greek, which he was unable to do when awake; he also told the physicians their thoughts, and laughed at their ignorance.' This book contains a considerable list of similar cases recorded by physicians.

5. 7. 14. sewing pillows. Cf. Ezekiel 13. 18, and NED., s. v. pillow, I. d. It is interpreted: 'to give a sense of false security.'

5.7.32. For the metre, see note on 1. 3. 16.

My Neice is on my Lá | dies side: | they'll find | her there.

5. 7. 36. This line can hardly be forced into metrical form.

Here, he

is come! | sooth; and | have all | out of him. | 5.7.37. How doe you Lady-bird? Cf. Romeo and Juliet 1.3. 3: 'What, lamb! what, lady-bird!'

5.7.42. Almond for Parrat. This is an allusion to one of the latest of the Martin Mar-Prelate pamphlets, which has been attributed to Nash, Lyly, and others. See the Cambridge History of English Literature 3. 450-1.

5.7.51. a Citie Lady too, o' the streight waste ? Corsets were then in fashion. Cf. Gosson, Pleasant Quippes for Upstart New-fangled Gentlewomen (1595):

These privie coates, by art made strong
with bones, and past, with such like ware,
Whereby their backe and sides grow long,
and now they harnest gallants are;
Were they for use against the foe

Our dames for Amazones might goe.

Also The Poetaster (Wks. 2. 440): This strait-bodied city attire, I can tell you, will stir a courtier's blood, more than the finest loose sacks the ladies use to be put in.'

5. 7. 58. Пle clense him with a pill. For Jonson's satire of the physician's pretended power of exorcising spirits, see note on 5.5.8.

5.7.67. Machaon, Podalirius, Esculapius. 'Machaon, a celebrated Greek physician, a son of Esculapius. He is said to have served as surgeon at the siege of Troy, and, according to some authors, was one of the Greek heroes inclosed in the wooden horse. See Virgil's Æneid, book ii, I. 263.'-Lippincott's Pron. Biog. Dict. Vol. 2.

'Podaleirius, a son of Asclepius and Epione or Arsinoe, and a brother of Machaon, along with whom he led the Thessalians of Tricca against Troy (Hom. II. II. 729, &c.; Apollod. iii. 10. 8; Paus. iv. 31.9). He was, like his brother, skilled in the medical art.'-Smith, Dict. Gr. & Rom. Biog. & Myth. Vol. 3.

' Æsculapius, . . . the god of medicine, supposed to have been the son of Apollo and Coronis. He is said to have raised men from the dead, so that Jupiter, fearing lest the realms of

Pluto should become depopulated, struck him with thunder. After his death he was translated to heaven. He is usually represented as a venerable old man with a flowing beard. Hygieia (i. e." Health ") is said to have been a daughter of Esculapius.'-Lippincott. Vol. I.

5.7.68. a golden beard, . . . as he had. Esculapius was represented in sculpture, generally with a beard. See PaulyWissowa, Real-Encyclopädie, Asklepios. Vol. 2, p. 1690.

5. 7. 82. Twill purchase the whole Bench of Aldermanity. Cf. The Staple of News (Wks. 5. 246):

Tat. He has rich ingredients in him, I warrant you, if they were extracted; a true receipt to make an alderman, an he were well wrought upon, according to art.

Expect. I would fain see an alderman in chimia,
that is, a treatise of aldermanity truly written!

Cen. To shew how much it differs from urbanity.
Mirth. Ay, or humanity.

Jonson's poor opinion of the London aldermen may have been due in part to differences of political view; see 3.5.158-66, and note.

5. 7. 86. Merchants-Taylors-hall. 'Merchant Taylors' Hall in Threadneedle Street, a little beyond Finch Lane, . . . designed in 1844 by Samuel Beechcroft, the Hall of the Merchant Taylors, the seventh of the Twelve Great Livery Companies of London.... The banquets have maintained their fame down to the present day. The Merchant Taylors' is the great Conservative, as the Fishmongers' is the great Whig, Company, and in our own day its banquets have afforded to the leaders of the party the opportunities for important political statements and explanations.'-Wheatley and Cunningham, London Past and Present, Vol. 2.

5.8.9. For the metre, see notes on 1. 2. 9; I. I. 28. He drives another | way, now, | as I would have him. 5. 8. 13-16. That...night! Sir Moth's anticipated gratification of his avarice has so inflamed his imagination that he attributes as real experiences to Needle such escapades as the doctor enumerated in 5. 7. 15-18 as incident to frenzied people.