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Douglas on the 24th of May, 1329, in confequence, as Mr. Hume fuppofes, of the treaty of Northampton. Now, Robert Bruce died on the 7th of June, 1329, just nine days after the date of the grant by Edward III. to Douglas; and thus the deJay afcribed to Bruce, when opposed to the regular performance by Edward III. could not have been a delay of more than nine days. 3. The claimants under the treaty of Northampton were not many; they were only two, Thomas lord Wake and Henry de Beaumont. 4. There is no probability that the lands which they claimed had been bestowed on the followers of Bruce; on the contrary, there is every reafon for fuppofing, that, in 1332, the lordship of Ledel, claimed by lord Wake, and the lands in Buchan, claimed by Henry de Beaumont, were ftill enjoyed by the crown for, in 1342, David II. made a grant of the former to fir William Douglas, [fee the charter in Douglas, Peerage, P. 489.] And Robert II. made a grant of the latter, as is univerfally acknowledged, to Alexander Stewart, his fourth fon. But of any previous royal grant of either there is no veftige.'

Our author afterwards explains, at confiderable length, and in a fatisfactory manner, the delays of the Scottish regency on the fubject of thofe reftitutions.

Subjoined to the Annals, and comprifing the fame period, viz. from 1306, to 1370, is a detail of mifcellaneous occurrences, many of which are defcriptive of the manners and cuftoms of those times. This part is fucceeded by an Appendix, confifting of the following articles :-Of the Manner of the Death of Marjory, daughter of Robert the Firft; Journal of the Campaign of Edward the Third; of the Genealogy of the Family of Seton; lift of the Scottish Army at the Battle of Halidon; whether Edward the Third put to Death the Son of Sir Alexander Seton; Lift of the Perfons of Diftin&tion in the Scottish Army killed or made Prifoners at the Battle of Durham; Corrections and Additions to the firft Volume of the Annals; the fame to the fecond volume; a chronological abridgement of events from the year 1306, to 1370.

The prefent volume of Annals, with the preceding, contain an accurate detail of the tranfactions of Scotland, during more than three hundred years, after the hiftory of that nation emerged from the obfcurity which involves its more early periods. The whole narrative is no lefs faithful than perfpicuous, and is fcrupulously fupported either by the evidence of the best hiftorians, or that of public records of the moft refpectable authority. The work abounds with annotations, which evince at the fame time the great extent of the learned author's historical and antiquarian researches; and excite our regret that he has terminated a fubject, in the profecution of which he might, by his judicious inveftigations, have thrown a ftronger light on fome later periods of history.

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The Plays of William Shakspeare. In Ten Volumes. With the Corrections and Illuftrations of various Commentators; to which are added Notes by Samuel Johnfon and George Steevens. The Second Edition, Revised and Augmented. 8vo. 31. 10s. bound. Bathurst. [Concluded from p. 135.]

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N tracing the many valuable illuftrations in this edition of Shakspeare, we feem as if almoft rendered contemporary with the poet; fo clearly are the manners, the cuftoms, and the language of thofe times delineated by the investigation of the editor who has been repeatedly mentioned in our laft Re view. Paffages which had baffled the efforts of every former commentator appear now to be divested of all obfcurity; and we have already feen their fuppofed meaning, in a variety of inftances, confirmed by collating them with parallel examples in other writers, who lived in or about the age of Shakspeare, We shall proceed to lay before our readers a note from each of our author's plays which we have not hitherto mentioned and have the pleafure to anticipate, on this fubject, the total extin&tion of thofe chimeras, which learning or ingenuity had fubftituted in the room of more certain evidence.

The following explanation in All's Well that Ends Well, is happily fupported by authority.

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Enter a gentle Afringer.] Perhaps a gentle firanger, i. e. a stranger of gentle condition, a gentleman. The error of this conjecture which I have learned (fince our edition first made its appearance, from an old book of Falconry, 1633,) fhould teach diffidence to thofe who conceive the words which they do not understand, to be corruptions. An offringer or aftringer is a falconer, and fuch a character was probable to be met with about a count which was famous for the love of that diverfion. So, in Hamlet;

"We'll e'en to it like French falconers." A gentle afringer is a gentleman falconer. The word is derived from oftercus or auftercus, a gofhawk; and thus, fays Cowell in his Law Dictionary: We ulually call a falconer who keeps that kind of hawks, an auftringer." Again, in the Book of Hawking, &c. b. l. no date: "Now bicaufe I spoke of offregiers. ye fhall understand that the ben called offregiers that keep golshaukes or tercels," &c, Steevens.

The information contained in the next note is of an uncommon nature.

--mistress Mall's picture ?--] The real name of the woman whom I luppole to have been meant by Sir Toby was Mary Frith. The appellation by which he was generally known, was Mall Cut

fe. She was at once an hermaphrodite, a prostitute, a bawd, a bully, a thief, a receiver of stolen goods, &c. &c. On the books of the Stationers' Company, Auguit 1610, is entered- -"A Booke called the Madde Prancks of Merry Mall of the Bankfide, with her walks in man's apparel, and to what purpofe. Written by John Day." Middleton and Decker wrote a comedy, of which he is

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the heroine. In this, they have given a very ftattering reprefentation of her, as they obferve in their preface, that "it is the excellency of a writer to leave things better than he finds them." The title of this piece is-The Roaring Girl, or, Moll Cut-purfe; as it hath been lately acted on the Fortune Stage, by the Prince his Players, 1611. The frontispiece to it contains a full length of her in man's clothes, fmoaking tobacco. Nath. Field, in his Amends for Ladies, another comedy, 1639, gives the following character of her :

"" -Hence lewd impudent

"I know not what to term thee, man or woman,
"For nature, fhaming to acknowledg thee
"For either, hath produc'd thee to the world
"Without a fex: Some fay that thou art woman,
"Others, a man; to many thou art both

"Woman and man; but I think rather neither;
"Or man, or horfe, as Centaurs old was feign'd."

A life of this woman was likewife published, 12mo, in 1662, with her portrait before it in a male habit; an ape, a lion, and an eagle by her. As this extraordinary perfonage appears to have partook of both fexes, the curtain which Sir Toby mentions, would not have been unneceffarily drawn before fuch a picture of her as might have been exhibited in an age, of which neither too much delicacy or decency was the characteristick.' Steevens.

The meaning formerly expreffed by the appellative in a paffage of the Winter's Tale, is afcertained beyond all question.

-my aunts,]

Aunt appears to have been at this time a cant word for a bawd. In Middleton's comedy, called, A Trick to catch the Old One, 1616, is the following confirmation of its being used in that fenfe:-It was better beftow'd upon his uncle than one of his aunts, I need not fay bawd, for every one knows what aunt ftands for in the laft tranflation." Again, in Ram-alley, or Merry Tricks,

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"What fleeking, glazing, or what preffing meant,
"Till you preferr'd me to your aunt the lady:
"I knew no ivory teeth, no caps of hair,
"No mercury, water, fucus, or perfumes
"To help a lady's breath, until your aunt
"Learn'd me the common trick."

• Again, in Decker's Honest Whore, 1635 " I'll call you one of my aunts, fifter, that were as good as to call you arrant whore."

Steevens."

The authority of the text is also fatisfactorily established in the following note in Macbeth.

-eaten of the infane root,]

Mr. Theobald has a long and learned note on these words; and, after much puzzling, he at length proves from Hector Boethius, that this root was a berry. Warburton.

--eaten of the infane root,]

Shakespeare alludes to the qualities anciently afcribed to hemlock. So, in Greene's Never too Late, 1616" You gaz'd against the fun, and fo blemished your fight; or elfe you have eaten of the roots

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of hemlock, that makes mens' eyes conceit unfeen objects." Again, in Ben Jonson's Sejanus :

66 they lay that hold upon thy fenfes,

"As thou had fnuft up hemlock." Steevens.

The collateral examples cited by the editor, in explanation of the following paffage in the play of King John, affords additional proof of what extraordinary light he has thrown on the text of Shakspeare, by his unwearied refearches into the writings of thofe authors who were either contemporary with the poet, or lived at no great distance from that period. It lies as fightly on the back of him,

As great Alcides' shoes upon an ass :-]

But why his hoes in the name of propriety? For let Hercules and his boes have been really as big as they were ever fuppofed to be, yet they (I mean the fhoes) would not have been an overload for an afs. I am perfuaded, I have retrieved the true reading; and let us obferve the juftnefs of the comparifon now. Faulconbridge in his refentment would fay this to Auftria. "That lion's skin, which my great father king Richard once wore, looks as uncouthly on thy back, as that other noble hide, which was borne by Hercules, would look on the back of an afs." A double allufion was intended; first, to the fable of the afs in the lion's fkin; then Richard I. is finely fet in competition with Alcides, as Auftria is fatirically coupled with the afs. Theobald.

• Mr. Theobald had the art of making the most of his discoveries. Johnson.

The shoes of Hercules are more than once introduced in the old comedies on much the fame occafions. So, in The Ifle of Gulls, by J. Day, 1606 :

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-are as fit, as Hercules's boe for the foot of a pigmy." Again, in Greene's Epiftle Dedicatory to Perimedes the Blackfmith, 1588"-and fo least I should shape Hercules' fhoe for a child's foot, I commend your worship to the Almighty." Again, in Green's Penelope's Web, 1601: I will not make a long harvest for a fmall crop, nor go about to pull a Hercules' fhoe on Achilles' foot." Again, ibid. "Hercules boe will never ferve a child's foot." Again, in Stephen Goffon's School of Abufe, 1579: -to draw the lyon's fkin upon Æfop's affe, or Hercules' fhoes on a child's feete." Steevens.

Philological authority and examples are combined in the fubfequent annotation on a paffage in King Richard II.

and baffled here;] Baffled in this place means treated with the greatest ignominy imaginable. So, Holinfhed, vol. III. p. 827, and 1218, or annis 1513, and 1570, explains it "Bafulling, fays he, is a difgrace among the Scots, and it is ufed when a man is openlie perjured, and then they make of him an image painted, reverfed, with his heels upward, with his name, woondering, crieing, and blowing out of him with horns." Spenfer's Faery Queen, b. v. c. 3. ft. 37; and b. vi. c. 7. ft. 27. has the word in the fame fignification. Tollet.

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The fame expreffion occurs again in Twelfth Night, fc. ult. "Alas, poor fool! how have they baffled thee?" Again, in K. Hen, IV. P. I. act I. fc. ii:

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Again, in The London Prodigal, 1605,"chil be abaffelled up and down the town, for a meffel." i. e. for a beggar, or rather a leper. Steevens.

A fuppofed general denomination is evinced, in the following note, in the First Part of K. Henry IV. to be restrictively applied to a particular person.

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-maid Marian may be &c.] Maid Marian is a man dreffed like a woman, who attends the dancers of the morris. Johnson.

In the ancient Songs of Robin Hood frequent mention is made of maid Marian, who appears to have been his concubine. I could quote many passages in my old MS. to this purpose, but shall produce only one : "Good Robin Hood was living then,

"Which now is quite forgot,

"And fo was fayre maid Marian, &c." Percy.

It appears from the old play of the Downfall of Robert Earl of Huntingdon, 1601, that maid Marian was originally a name affumed by Matilda the daughter of Robert lord Fitzwater, while Robin Hood remained in a state of outlawry:

"Next 'tis agreed (if thereto fhee agree)

"That fair Matilda henceforth change her name;
"And while it is the chance of Robin Hoode
"To live in Sherewodde a poor outlawes life,
"She by maide Marian's name be only call'd.
"Mat. I am contented; read on, little John:
"Henceforth let me be nam'd maide Marian."

This lady was afterwards poifon'd by king John at Dunmow Priory, after he had made feveral fruitless attempts on her chastity. Drayton has written her Legend.

Shakespeare fpeaks of maid Marian in her degraded state, when fhe was reprefented by a ftrumpet or a clown.

See Figure 2 in the plate at the end of this play, with Mr. Tollet's obfervations on it.' Steevens.

The authority of the old copy of Shakspeare is reftored by the prefent editor, in the fubfequent paffage in the Second Part of K. Henry IV.

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--flippery clouds,] The modern editors read browds. The old copyin the flippery clouds; but I know not what advantage is gained by the alteration, for browds had anciently the fame meaning as clouds. I could bring many inftances of this ufe of the word from Drayton. So, in his Miracles of Mofes :

"And the ftern thunder from the airy browds,
"To the fad world, in fear and horror fpake."

Again, in Ben Jonfon's Poem on Inigo Jones:

"And peering forth of Iris in the browds."

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A moderate tempelt would hang the waves in the shrouds of a ship; a great one might poetically be faid to fufpend them on the clouds, which were too flippery to retain them.

So, in Julius Cæfar

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-I have feen

"Th`ambitious ocean fwell, and range and foam
"To be exalted with the threatning clouds."

Drayton's airy fbrowds are the airy covertures of heaven; which

in plain language are the clouds. Steevens,

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