PIST. Didst thou not share? hadst thou not fifteen pence? sisted of ostrich feathers (or others of equal length and flexibility,) which were stuck into handles. The richer sort of these were composed of gold, silver, or ivory of curious workmanship. One of them is mentioned in The Fleire, Com. 1610: "she hath a fan with a short silver handle, about the length of a barber's syringe." Again, in Love and Honour, by Sir W. D'Avenant, 1649: "All your plate, Vasco, is the silver handle of your old prisoner's fan." Again, in Marston's III. Satyre, edit. 1598: "How can he keepe a lazie waiting man, "And buy a hoode and silver-handled fan In the frontispiece to a play, called Englishmen for my Money, or A pleasant Comedy of a Woman will have her Will, 1616, is a portrait of a lady with one of these fans, which, after all, may prove the best commentary on the passage. The three other specimens are taken from the Habiti Antichi et Moderni di tutto il Mondo, published at Venice, 1598, from the drawings of Titian, and Cesare Vecelli, his brother. This fashion was perhaps imported from Italy, together with many others, in the reign of King Henry VIII. if not in that of King Richard II. FAL. Reason, you rogue, reason: Think'st thou, I'll endanger my soul gratis? At a word, hang no more about me, I am no gibbet for you :-go.-A short knife and a throng; 3-to your manor of Pickt-hatch, go. You'll not bear a letter for me, you rogue !—you stand upon your honour !-Why, 4 Thus also Marston, in The Scourge of Villanie, Lib. III. sat. 8: "Her silver-handled fan would gladly be." And in other places. And Bishop Hall, in his Satires, published 1597, Lib. V. sat. iv: "Whiles one piece pays her idle waiting manne, "Or buys a hoode, or silver-handled fanne." In the Sidney papers, published by Collins, a fan is presented to Queen Elizabeth for a new year's gift, the handle of which was studded with diamonds. T. WARton. 3 - A short knife and a throng;] So, Lear: "When cutpurses come not to throngs." Warburton. Part of the employment given by Drayton, in The Mooncalf, to the Baboon, seems the same with this recommended by Falstaff: "He like a gypsey oftentimes would go, "All kinds of gibberish he hath learn'd to know: "And with a stick, a short string, and a noose, "Would show the people tricks at fast and loose.' Theobald has throng instead of thong. The latter seems right. LANGTON. Greene, in his Life of Ned Browne, 1592, says: "I had no other fence but my short knife, and a paire of purse-strings." STEEVENS. Mr. Dennis reads-thong; which has been followed, I think, improperly, by some of the modern editors. Sir Thomas Overbury's Characters, 1616, furnish us with a confirmation of the reading of the old copies: "The eye of this wolf is as quick in his head as a cutpurse in a throng." MALONE. Pickt-hatch,] Is frequently mentioned by contemSo, in Ben Jonson's Every Man in his Hu porary writers. mour: "From the Bordello it might come as well, VOL. V. G thou unconfinable baseness, it is as much as I can do, to keep the terms of my honour precise. I, I, Again, in Randolph's Muses Looking-glass, 1638: the Lordship of Turnbull, "Which with my Pict-hatch Grange, and Shore-ditch farm," &c. Pict-hatch was in Turnbull-street: your whore doth live "In Pict-hatch, Turnbull-street." Amends for Ladies, a Comedy, by N. Field, 1618. The derivation of the word Pict-hatch may perhaps be discovered from the following passage in Cupid's Whirligig, 1607: "-Set some picks upon your hatch, and, I pray, profess to keep a bawdy-house.' Perhaps the unseasonable and obstreperous irruptions of the gallants of that age, might render such a precaution necessary. So, in Pericles Prince of Tyre, 1609: - if in our youths we could pick up some pretty estate, 'twere not amiss to keep our door hatch'd." STEEVENS. Pict-hatch was a cant name of some part of the town noted for bawdy-houses; as appears from the following passage in Marston's Scourge for Villanie, Lib. III. sat. x: 66 Looke, who yon doth go; "The meager letcher lewd Luxurio. "But seen and allow'd by Luxurio's snout. "But of Pick-hatch, or of some Shoreditch baulke, Sir T. Hanmer says, that this was a noted harbour for thieves and pickpockets," who certainly were proper companions for a man of Pistol's profession. But Falstaff here more immediately means to ridicule another of his friend's vices; and there is some humour in calling Pistol's favourite brothel, his manor of Pickt-hatch. Marston has another allusion to Pickt-hatch or Pick-hatch, which confirms this illustration: 66 His old cynick dad "Hath forc'd him cleane forsake his Pick-hatch drab." Lib. I, sat. iii. T. WARTON. Again, in Ben Jonson's Epig. XII. on Lieutenant Shift: "Shift, here in town, not meanest among squires "That haunt Pickt-hatch, Mersh Lambeth, and White fryers." Again, in The Blacke Booke, 1604, 4to. Lucifer says: "I I myself sometimes, leaving the fear of heaven on the left hand, and hiding mine honour in my necessity, am fain to shuffle, to hedge, and to lurch; and yet you, rogue, will ensconce your rags, your cat-a-mountain looks, your red-lattice phrases, and 5 proceeded towards Pickt-hatch, intending to beginne their first, which (as I may fitly name it) is the very skirts of all Brothel houses." DOUCE. 5 ensconce your rags, &c.] A sconce is a petty fortification. To ensconce, therefore, is to protect as with a fort. The word occurs again in K. Henry IV. P. I. STEEVENS. 6 ·red-lattice phrases,] Your ale-house conversation. Red lattice at the doors and windows, were formerly the external denotements of an ale-house. So, in A Fine Companion, one of Shackerley Marmion's plays: "A waterman's widow at the sign of the red lattice in Southwark." Again, in Arden of Feversham, 1592: -his sign pulled down, and his lattice born away." Again, in The Miseries of inforc'd Marriage, 1607 :., tis treason to the red lattice, enemy to the signpost." 66 Hence the present chequers. Perhaps the reader will express some surprize, when he is told that shops, with the sign of the chequers, were common among the Romans. See a view of the left-hand street of Pompeii, (No. 9,) presented by Sir William Hamilton, (together with several others, equally curious,) to the Antiquary Society. STEEVENS. The following passage in Braithwaite's Strapado for the Divell, 1615, confirms Mr. Steevens's observation: "To the true discoverer of secrets, Monsieur Bacchus, master-gunner of the pottle-pot ordnance, prime-founder of red lattices," &c. In King Henry IV. P. II. Falstaff's page, speaking of Bardolph, says," he called me even now, my lord, through a red lattice, and I could see no part of his face from the window." MALONE. This designation of an ale-house is not altogether lost, though the original meaning of the word is, the sign being converted into a green lettuce; of which an instance occurs in Brownlow Street, Holborn In The Last Will and Testament of Lawrence Lucifer, the old Batchiler of Limbo, at the end of the "Blacke Booke," 1604, 4to. is the following passage: "- watched your bold-beating oaths, under the shelter of your honour! You will not do it, you? PIST. I do relent; What would'st thou more of man? Enter ROBIN. ROB. Sir, here's a woman would speak with you. FAL. Let her approach. Enter Mistress QUICKLY. QUICK. Give your worship good-morrow. QUICK. Not so, an't please your worship. FAL. Good maid, then. QUICK. I'll be sworn; as my mother was, the first hour I was born. FAL. I do believe the swearer: What with me? QUICK. Shall I vouchsafe your worship a word or two? FAL. Two thousand, fair woman; and I'll vouchfafe thee the hearing. QUICK. There is one mistress Ford, sir ;-I pray, come a little nearer this ways:-I myself dwell with master doctor Caius. FAL. Well, on: Mistress Ford, you say, QUICK. Your worship says very true: I pray your worship, come a little nearer this ways. FAL. I warrant thee, nobody hears ;-mine own people, mine own people. sometimes ten houres together in an ale-house, ever and anon peeping forth, and sampling thy nose with the red Lattis." |