fhall have my pocket pick'd? I have loft a feal-ring of my grandfather's, worth forty mark.

Hoft. O Jefu! I have heard the prince tell him, I know not how oft, that that ring was copper.

Fal. How! the prince is a Jack', a fneak-cup; and,

9-fhall I not take mine eafe in mine inn, but I fhall have my pocket pick'd] There is a peculiar force in thefe words. To take mine eafe in mine inne, was an ancient proverb, not very different in its application from that maxim, "Every man's houfe is his caftle;" for inne originally fignified a boufe or kabitation. [Sax. inne, domus, domicilium.] When the word inne began to change its meaning, and to be ufed to fignify a boufe of entertainment, the proverb, ftill continuing in force, was applied in the latter fenfe, as it is here used by Shakspeare: or perhaps Falstaff here humouroufly puns upon the word inne, in order to reprefent the wrong done him more strongly.

In John Heywood's Works, 1598, quarto, bl. l. is "a dialogue wherein are pleasantly contrived the number of all the effectual proverbs in our English tongue, &c. together with three hundred epigrams on three hundred proverbs." In ch. 6. is the following:

Refly welth willeth me the widow to winne,

"To let the world wag, and take my cafe in mine inne." And among the epigrams is: [26. Of Ease in an Inne.] "Thou takeft thine ease in thine inne fo nye thee, "That no man in his inne can take eafe by thee." Otherwise :

"Thou take thine eafe in thine inne, but I fee,

"Thine inne taketh neither eafe nor profit by thee."

Now in the first of these diftichs the word inne is ufed in its ancient meaning, being spoken by a person who is about to marry a widow for the fake of a home, &c. In the two laft places, inne feems to be used in the fenfe it bears at prefent. PERCY.

Gabriel Hervey, in a MS. note to Speght's Chaucer, fays, "Some of Heywood's epigrams are fuppofed to be the conceits and devices of pleafant fir Thomas More."

Inne, for a habitation, or recefs, is frequently ufed by Spenfer and other ancient writers. Again, in Greene's Farewell to Follie, 1617: "The beggar Irus that haunted the palace of Penelope, would take bis eafe in bis inne as well as the peeres of Ithaca." STEEVENS.

I believe inns differed from caftles, in not being of fo much confequence and extent, and more particularly in not being fortified.-So Inns of court, and in the univerfities before the endowment of colleges. Thus Trinity College, Cambridge, was made out of, and built on the fite of, feveral inns. L

1-the prince is a Jack,] This term of contempt occurs frequently in our authour. In the Taming of the Shrew, Catharine calls her mufick-mafter, in derifion, a twangling Jack. See Vol. I. p. 217, n.", and Vol. II. p. 214, n. 5. MALONE.

if he were here, I would cudgel him like a dog, if he would fay fo.

Enter Prince HENRY, and POINS, marching. FALSTAFF meets the prince, playing on his truncheon, like a fife. Fal. How now, lad? is the wind in that door, i'faith? muft we all march?

Bard. Yea, two and two, Newgate-fashion.

Hoft. My lord, I pray you, hear me.

P. Hen. What fay't thou, miftrefs Quickly? How does thy husband? I love him well, he is an honeft

man.

Hoft. Good my lord, hear me.

Fal. Pr'ythee, let her alone, and lift to me.

P. Hen. What fay'ft thou, Jack?

Fal. The other night I fell asleep here behind the arras, and had my pocket pick'd: this house is turn'd bawdy-house, they pick pockets.

P. Hen, What didft thou lofe, Jack?

Fal. Wilt thou believe me, Hal? three or four bonds of forty pound a-piece, and a feal-ring of my grand-father's.

P. Hen. A trifle, fome eight-penny matter.

Hoft. So I told him, my lord; and I faid, I heard your grace fay fo: And, my lord, he speaks most vilely of you, like a foul-mouth'd man as he is; and faid, he would cudgel you.

P. Hen. What! he did not ?

Hoft. There's neither faith, truth, nor woman-hood in me else.

Fal. There's no more faith in thee than in a ftew'd prune 3; nor no more truth in thee, than in a drawn

2

fox;

-Newgate-fashion.] As prifoners are conveyed to Newgate, faftened two and two together. JOHNSON.

So in Decker's Satiromaflix, 1602: "Why then, come; we'll walk arm in arm, as though we were leading one another to Newgate." REED.

3 There's no more faith in thee than in a few'd prune; &c.] The propriety of these fimiles I am not fure that I fully understand.

A few'd

fox*; and for woman-hood, maid Marian may be the deputy's wife of the ward to thee. Go, you thing, go. Hoft.

A few'd prune has the appearance of a prune, but has no tafte. A drawn fox, that is, an exenterated fox, has the form of a fox without his powers. I think Dr. Warburton's explication wrong, which makes a drawn fox to mean, a fox often bunted; though to draw is a hunter's term for purfuit by the track. My interpretation makes the fox fuit better to the prune. These are very flender difquifitions, but fuch is the task of a commentator. JOHNSON.

Dr. Lodge, in his pamphlet called Wit's Mferie, or the World's Madneffe, 1596, defcribes a bawd thus: "This is thee that laies wait at all the carriers for wenches new come up to London; and you fhall know her dwelling by a dish of stew'd prunes in the window; and two or three fleering wenches fit knitting or fowing in her fhop."

In Measure for Measure, act II. the male bawd excufes himself for having admitted Elbow's wife into his houfe, by faying, "that she came in great with child, and longing for fiew'd prunes, which stood in a difh," &c.

Slender, in the Merry Wives of Windfor, who apparently wishes to recommend himself to his miftrefs by a feeming propenfity to love as well as war, talks of having measured weapons with a fencing-mafter for a difb of few'd prunes.

In The Knave of Harts, a collection of fatyrical poems, 1612, a wanton knave is mentioned, as taking

"Burnt wine, few'd prunes, a punk to folace him." Again, in The Noble Stranger, 1640: "to be drunk with cream and fewed prunes!-Pox on't, bawdy-house fare."

The paffages already quoted are fufficient to fhew that a difb of few'd prunes was not only the ancient defignation of a brothel, but the conftant appendage to it.

From A Treatife on the Lues Venerea, written by W. Clowes, one of his majesty's furgeons, 1596, and other books of the fame kind, it appears that prunes were directed to be boiled in broth for those perfons already infected; and that both few'd prunes and roafted apples were commonly, though unfuccefsfully, taken by way of prevention. So much for the infidelity of few'd prunes. STEEVENS.

Mr. Steevens has fo fully difcuffed the fubject of few'd prunes, that one can add nothing but the price. In a piece called Banks's Bay Horfe in a Trance, 1595, we have "A ftock of wenches, fet up with their few'd prunes, nine for a tefter." FARMER.

4-a drawn fox ;] A drawn fox is a fox drawn over the ground to exercise the hounds. I am not, however, confident that this explanation is right. It was formerly fuppofed that a fox, when drawn out of his hole, had the fagacity to counterfeit death, that he might thereby obtain an opportunity to efcape. For this information I am indebted to Mr. Tollet, who quotes Olaus Magnus, lib. xviii. cap. 39:

Infuper

Hoft. Say, what thing? what thing?

Fal. What thing? why, a thing to thank God on. Hoft. I am no thing to thank God on, I would thou fhould't know it; I am an honeft man's wife and, fetting thy knighthood afide, thou art a knave to call me fo.

Fal. Setting thy womanhood afide, thou art a beaft to fay otherwife.

Hoft. Say, what beaft, thou knave thou?

Fal. What beat? why, an otter.

P. Hen. An otter, fir John! why an otter?

Fal. Why? fhe's neither fish, nor flesh; a man knows not where to have her.

Hoft. Thou art an unjust man in faying fo; thou of any man knows where to have me, thou knave thou! P. Hen. Thou fay'ft true, hoftefs; and he flanders thee moft grofsly.

Hoft. So he doth you, my lord; and said this other day, you ought him a thousand pound.

P. Hen. Sirrah, do I owe you a thoufand pound?

fingit fe mortuam," &c. This particular and many others relative to the fubtilty of the fox, have been tranflated by feveral ancient English writers. STEEVENS.

Mr. Heath obferves, that "a fox drawn over the ground to leave a fcent, and exercise the hounds, may be faid to have no truth in it, becaufe it deceives the hounds, who run with the fame eagerness as if they were in purfuit of a real fox." MALONE.

5-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 fongs of Robin Hood frequent mention is made of maid Marian, who appears to have been his concubine. 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. This lady was afterwards poifoned by king John at Dunmow Priory, after he had made feveral fruitiefs attempts on her chastity. Drayton has written her Legend.

Shakspeare fpeaks of maid Marian in her degraded ftate, when he 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. STEEV. 6 neither fish nor flesh;] So, the proverb; "Neither fish nor fief, nor good red herring." STEEVENS.

Fal.

Fal. A thoufand pound, Hal? a million: thy love is worth a million; thou oweft me thy love.

Hoft. Nay, my lord, he call'd you Jack', and

he would cudgel you.

Fal. Did I, Bardolph ?

Bard. Indeed, fir John, you

faid fo.

Fal. Yea; if he said, my ring was copper.`

faid,

P. Hen. I fay, 'tis copper: Dareft thou be as good as thy word now?

Fal. Why, Hal, thou know'ft, as thou art but man, I dare: but, as thou art prince, I fear thee, as I fear the roaring of the lion's whelp.

P. Hen. And why not, as the lion ?

Fal. The king himself is to be fear'd as the lion: Doft thou think, I'll fear thee as I fear thy father? nay, an I do, I pray God my girdle break!

P. Hen. O, if it fhould, how would thy guts fall about thy knees! But, firrah, there's no room for faith, truth, nor honefty, in this bofom of thine; it is all fill'd Charge an honeft woman up with guts, and midriff. with picking thy pocket! Why, thou whorefon, impudent, imbols'd rafcal, if there were any thing in thy pocket but tavern-reckonings, memorandums of bawdyhoufes, and one poor penny-worth of fugar-candy to

7-be call'd you Jack,] See p. 217, n. 1.

MALONE.

8 I pray God my girdle break!] This with had more force formerly than at prefent, it being once the custom to wear the purfe hanging by the girdle; fo that its breaking, if not observed by the wearer, was a ferious matter. MALONE.

my girdle break,] Alluding to the old adage, "ungirt, unbleft." Thus in the Phantastick Age, bl. 1. an ancient ballad:

"Ungirt, unbleft, the proverbe says,

And they, to prove it right,

"Have got a fashion now a days,

"That's odious to the fight;

"Like Frenchmen, all on points they ftand,

"No girdles now they wear," &c.

Perhaps this ludicrous imprecation is proverbial. So, in 'Tis Merry ben Goffips meet, a poem, quarto, 1609:

How fay't thou, Beffe? fhall it be fo, girle? speake: "If I make one, pray God my girdle break!" STEEVENS. - imbofs'd rafcal,—] Imbofs'd is fwoln, puffy. JOHNSON.

make