Whereon Hyperion's quickening fire doth fhine; Never prefented! O, a root, Dear thanks; Dry up thy marrows, vines, and plough-torn leas; 8 Perhaps Shakspeare means curl'd, from the appearance of the clouds. In The Tempest, Ariel talks of riding "On the curl'd clouds." Chaucer, in his House of Fame, fays, Her bere that was oundie and crips." i. e. wavy and curled. Again, in The Philofopher's Satires, by Robert Anton: "Her face as beauteous as the crifped morn. who ́all thy human fons doth hate,] STEEVENS. Old copy — the hu man fons do hate. The former word was corrected by Mr. Pope; Enfear thy fertile and conceptious womb, ] So, in King Lear: Dry up in het the organs of encrease 6 Let it no more bring out ingrateful man!] It is plain that bring out is bring forth. STEEVENS. Neither Warburton nor Dr. Johnson seem to have been aware of the import of this paffage. It was the great boast of the Athenians that they were avoy boves; Sprung from the foil on which they lived; and it is in allufion to this, that the terms mother and bring out, are applied to the ground. HENLEY. common Though Mr. Henley, as a fcholar, could not be unacquainted with this Athenian boaft, I fear that Shakspeare knew no morc of it than of the many-breafted Diana of Ephefus, brought forward by Dr. Warburton in a preceding note. STEEVFNS. the marbled manfion] So, Milton, Book III. 1. 564: "Through the pure marble air Virgil beftows the fame epithet on the fea. Steevens. MALONE. "Now by yon marble heaven, ? Dry up thy marrows, vines, and plough-torn leas; ] The fenfe is Whereof ingrateful man, with liquorifh draughts, And morfels unctuous, greafes his pure mind, That from it all confideration flips! 1 Enter APEMANTUS. More man? Plague! plague! APEM. I was directed hither: Men report, Thou doft affect my manners, and doft use them. TIM. 'Tis then, because thou doft not keep a dog Whom I would imitate: Confumption catch thee! place? Why this fpade? this This flave-like habit? and thefe looks of care? Thy flatterers yet wear filk, drink wine, lie foft; Hug their difeas'd perfumes, and have forgot That ever Timon was. Shame not these woods, 2 this: nature! cease to produce men, enfear thy womb; but if thou wilt continue to produce them, at least ceafe to pamper them; dry up thy marrows, on which they fatten with unctuous morfels, thy vines, which give them liquorish draughts, and thy plough-torn leas. Here are affects correfponding with caufes, liquorish draughts, with vines, and unctuous morfels with marrows, and the old reading literally preferved. JOHNSON. This is in thee a nature but affected; A poor unmanly melancholy, Sprung From change of fortune. ] The old copy reads infected, and shange of future. Mr. Rowe made the emendation. MALONE. Hug their difeas'd perfumes,] i. e. their difeas'd perfumed miftreffes. MALONE. 2 So, in Othello: "Tis fuch another fitchew; marry, a perfum"d one." STEEVENS By putting on the cunning of a carper. 3 Be thou a flatterer now, and feek to thrive To knaves, and all approachers: 'Tis most just, That thou turn rafcal; had'ft thou wealth again, Rafcals fhould have't. Do not affume my likeness. TIM. Were I like thee, I'd throw away myself. APEM. Thou haft caft away thyself,' being like thyfelf; A madman fo long, now a fool: What, think'st That the bleak air, thy boifterous chamberlain, 3 the cunning of a carper.] For the philofophy of a Cynic, of which feat Apemantus was; and therefore he concludes: Do not affume my likenefs. WARBURTON. Cunning here feems to fignify counterfeit appearance. JOHNSON. The cunning of a carper, is the infidious art of a critick. Shame not these woods, fays Apemantus, by coming here to find fault. Maurice Kyffin in the preface to his Tranflation of Terence's Andria, 1588, fays: "Of the curious carper I look not to be favoured. Again, Ursula speaking of the sarcasm of Beatrice, obferves, Why fure, fuch carping is not commendable. There is no apparent reason why Apemantus (according to Dr. Warburton's explanation ) should ridicule his own sec. hinge thy knee, Thus, in Hamlet: STEEVENS. "To crook the pregnant hinges of the knee." STEEVENS. like tapfers, that bid welcome,] So, in our author's Venus and Adonis: "Like fhrill-tongu'd tapfters answering every call, The old copy bas-bad welcome. Corre&ed in the fecond folio. MALONE. Will put thy fhirt on warm? Will these mofs'd trees,5 That have outliv'd the eagle, page thy heels, 6 And skip when thou point'ft out? will the cold brook, Candied with ice, caudle thy morning taste, To cure thy o'er-night's furfeit? call the crea tures, Whofe naked natures live in all the fpite Of wreak ful heaven; whofe bare unhoused trunks, Anfwer mere nature, 7 -bid them flatter thee; TIM. A fool of thee: Depart. APEM. I love thee better now than e'er I did. Shakspeare uses the fame epithet in As you like it, A& IV: So alfo Drayton, in his Mortimeriados, no date: "And with his furie teyrs their mofy loaks." Mofs'd is, I believe, the true reading. MALONE. STEEVENS. I have inferted this reading in the text, because there is lefs propriety in the epithet moift; it being a known truth that trees become more and more dry, as they encre fe in age. Thus, our author, in his Rape of Lucrece, obferves, that it is one of the properties of time 6 outliv'd the eagle, Aquila Senectus is a proverb. I learn from Turberville's Book of Falconry, 1575, that the great age of this bird has been ascertained from the circumftance of its always building its eyrie, or ueft, in the fame place. STEEVENS. 7 Answer mere nature, ] So, in King Lear, A& II. fc. iii : And with prefented nakedness outface The winds," &c. STEEVENS, APEM. TIM. Why? Thou flatter'ft mifery. APEM. I flatter not; but fay, thou art a caitiff. TIM. Why doft thou feek me out? APEM. To vex thee. Z TIM. Always a villain's office, or a fool's. Doft please thyself in't? APEM. If thou didst put this four-cold habit on To caftigate thy pride, 'twere well: but thou Doft it enforcedly; thou'dft courtier be again, Wert thou not beggar. Willing mifery Outlives incertain pomp, is crown'd before:" The one is filling ftill, never complete; The other, at high wish; Beft ftate, contentless, 7 To vex thee.] As the measure it bere imperfe&, we may suppose, with Sir Thomas Hanmer, our author to have written, STEEVENS. Only to vex thee. • What! a knave too?] Timon had juft called Apemantus fool, in confequence of what he had known of him by former acquaintance; but when Apemantus tells him, that he comes to vex him, Timon determines that to vex is either the office of a villain or a fool; that to vex by defign is villainy, to vex without defign is folly. He then properly afks Apemantus whether he takes delight in vexing, and when he answers, yes, Timon replies, What! a knave too? I before only knew thee to be a fool, but now I find thee likewife a knave. JOHNSON. 9 is crown'd before: ] Arrives fooner at high wish; that is, at the completion of its wishes. JOHNSON. So, in a former scene of this play: And in fome fort thefe wants of mine are crown'd, "That I account them bleffings. Again, more appofitely, in Cymbeline: 66 my fupreme crown of grief." MALONE. |