And if your wife be not a mad woman, 465 Exeunt. 470 we can find two other examples of 'scuse.' On p. 210 of Mamillia, Pharicles, 'to cloake the cause of his care, coyned this pretie scuse;' and as this coyning of scuses appears to have been a foible of Pharicles, I am inclined to think that Halliwell is correct in the former instance and Grosart wrong. Again in Greene's Defence of Conny-Catching, 1592, He thought it good to visit some other of his wiues (for at that instant hee had sixteene aliue), and made a scuse to his wife .... to go into Yorkshire,' p. 89.-ED.]. 465. And if] Needlessly changed, since the days of Capell, to An if. MURRAY, in the New Eng. Dict., under And, as a Conditional Conjunction, says: "This conditional use of and may have originated from ellipsis, as in the analogous use of so, e. g. "I'll cross the sea, so it please my lord" (Shaks.); cf. "and it please;" or it may be connected with the introductory and in, “And you are going?" A direct development from the original prepositional sense, though à priori plausible, is on historical grounds improbable. Modern writers, chiefly since Horne Tooke, have treated this as a distinct word, writing it an, a spelling occasionally found circa 1600, especially in an' 't= and it.' Again, under An= if, the same excellent authority says: "In this sense an, an', is rare before 1600, when it appears occasionally in the dramatists, especially before it, as an' 't please you, an' 't were, &c. As the preceding sense was not at this time written an, modern writers have made a conventional distinction between the two forms, an' for and, Latin et, being dialectal or illiterate, but an' or an for and, Latin, si, archaic, or even literary. Except in an' 't, an is found only once in F, of Shakespeare ['Nay then two treyes, an if you grow so nice,'—Love's Lab. Lost, V, ii, 232]; but modern editors substitute it for the full and usual in Shakespeare and his contemporaries. Dialectally, the two senses are alike an'; the intensified and if, an if, common in the 17th Century, remains in the South-western dialect as nif.'-ED. 467. enemy] STEEVENS: So in Much Ado, I, i, 91: 'I will hold friends with you, lady.' 471. commandement] WALKER (Vers. p. 126): In commandment, payment, entertainment, and some other words in -ment, the e, which, originally, in all such words, preceded the final syllable (and which was still in certain instances retained,) was sometimes pronounced, and sometimes omitted. In the Folio (and probably in all other books of that time) the word which we now write commandment, is, when used as a trisyllable, printed command' ment; [herein Walker is in error; see Dyce, post] Baff. Goe Gratiano, run and ouer-take him, Flie toward Belmont, come Anthonio. [Scene II.] Enter Portia and Nerrissa. 472 Exit Grati. 475 Exeunt. Por. Enquire the lewes house out, giue him this deed, And let him figne it, wee'll away to night, And be a day before our husbands home: 474. Exit...] Exeunt... Q.. [Scene II. Street before the Court. Cap. et seq. 4 1. Enter...] Enter Neriffa. Qq. Re. enter... Theob. the entire word being a quadrisyllable, commandement. So it was pronounced as late, apparently, as 1672. Wallis, the grammarian, lived 1616-1703; the first edition of his grammar was published in 1653; the third in 1672; from which latter I quote, p. 52: — non dubito fuisse quondam pronuntiatam [the e in miles, finely, advancement, &c.] non minus quam in voce commandement mandatum, ubi adhuc pronunciari solet.' A writer in The Saturday Magazine, Aug. 17, 1844, 'On the Language of Uneducated People,' says that many cockneys still pronounce it thus. DYCE (ed. iii): Here 'commandment' is to be read as a quadrisyllable; and so again in a line in 1 Hen. VI: I, iii, which the Folio gives thus, 'From him I haue expresse commandement,' &c. (In all the other passages in Shakespeare where it occurs in his blank verse it is a trisyllable.) But the spelling of this word in the old copies goes for nothing; e. g. in King John, IV, ii, the Folio has: 'Haue I commandement on the pulse of life?' though 'commandement' there is a trisyllable. And I cannot understand why several of the modern Editors should print commandement' here and in the above-mentioned line of Hen. VI, while in a great number of other words, which, if the orthography is to be suited to the metre, require the addition of a syllable, they content themselves with the usual spelling; for instance, they print 'dazzled,' ' children,' ‘England,' ‘remembrance,' 'juggler,' ' handling,' ' enfeebled,' &c. &c., when, to be consistent, they ought to have printed 'dazzeled,' 'childeren,' 'Engéland,' 'rememberance,' 'juggeler,' 'handeling,' 'enfeebeled,' &c. &c. 475. presently] At once. 6 2. COWDEN-CLARKE: It is worth noting how Shakespeare, in his short and apparently insignificant Scenes, makes them serve fullest dramatic purpose. Here, the very first thing, Portia fulfils in careful, practical, professional way, the duty of conveying the deed to Shylock for signature; and afterwards, by her desiring Gratiano to show her clerk the way to the Jew's house, the opportunity for Nerissa to obtain her husband's ring is naturally brought about. This deed will be well welcome to Lorenzo. 5 Enter Gratiano. Gra. Faire fir, you are well ore-tane : My L. Baffanio vpon more aduice, Hath fent you heere this ring, and doth intreat His ring I doe accept most thankfully, And so I pray you tell him : furthermore, I pray you shew my youth old Shylockes house. Gra. That will I doe. Ner. Sir, I would speake with you: Ile fee if I can get my husbands ring 10 15 Which I did make him fweare to keepe for euer. Por. Thou maist I warrant, we shal haue old fwearing That they did giue the rings away to men; 20 But weele out-face them, and out-sweare them to: Away, make hafte, thou know'ft where I will tarry. 8. aduice] STEEVENS: That is, upon more reflection or deliberation. [See I, i, 152.] 19. old] DYCE (Gloss.): Used as an augmentative in colloquial language, meaning 'plentiful, abundant, great.' I believe I was the first to remark that the Italians use (or at least formerly used) ' vecchio' in the same sense: 'Perchè Corante abbandonava il freno, E dette un vecchio colpo in sul terreno,'-Pulci, Morg. Mag., C. xv, st. 54; 'E so ch'egli ebbe di vecchie paure.'-Id. C. xix, st. 30. It is rather remarkable that Florio, in his Dict., has not given this meaning of 'vecchio.' COLLIER: Shakespeare is full of instances of this augmentative 'old' applied to words of almost every description; it is needless to cite instances. ROLFE: Compare the slang phrase of our day, a high old time.' Actus Quintus. [Scene I.] Enter Lorenzo and Ieffica. Lor. The moone fhines bright. In fuch a night as this, Actus Quintus] Om. Qq. [Belmont. Rowe. A Grove or Green place before Portia's House. Theob. Avenue to Portia's House. Cap. 2. Two lines, Q, 4. nnyse] noyse Q1. 4 HAZLITT (p. 275): The graceful winding up of this play in the Fifth Act, after the tragic business is despatched, is one of the happiest instances of Shakespeare's know. ledge of the principles of the drama. OECHELHAEUSER, whose eminence among German critics as one who has given especial attention to Scenic arrangement entitles him to a respectful hearing, in the Fourth Vol. of the Sh. Jahrbuch, p. 348, reviews a work called Das Burgtheater, by Heinrich Laube. This work, written, as Oechelhaeuser says, by a well-known dramatist, with a thorough knowledge of stage management, of independent character, and of keen critical judgement, is of enduring value, and from it the reviewer quotes the following, to which, as he says, he gives his unreserved assent: The Mer. of Ven. was given with an entirely new arrangement of the Acts and Scenes. [Laube is speaking of the production of the play under his management on the Vienna stage in 1851.] The Scenes before Shylock's house constituted one Act, and the scattered wooing Scenes were likewise brought together. Thereby the progress of the whole was rendered smoother and more connected. The chief change, however, was in the last Act. The great Trial Scene evidently concludes the Fourth Act; and the Fifth Act merrily finishes, at Belmont, the love-affairs of the play, which have long been ripe. The commentators, making a virtue of necessity, even applaud this finale. The real need lies in the demand for a final Act wherewith to conclude the piece after the chief interest of the play is over. They pronounce a musical, lyric ending a virtue, because it sets on a bright piece a bright, beautiful crown. The public thinks differently. As soon as Shylock's fate is sealed in the Fourth Act, the public usually begins to arise and prepare to leave. To it Shylock's case is the main interest of the play. In vain do the commentators cry that the Shylock business is only a great episode. The public heeds them not, but follows its own impression. And this impression rests on indisputable, æsthetic laws. The discord between the tone of the comedy and the tragic tone of Shylock's fate cannot be denied. It cannot be denied that the deadly agony of that part of the play is not in accord with a Comedy; or that the Trial Scene, with its question of life or death, makes a far deeper impression than all the rest, and that a whole Act following thereon is, to the audience, intrusive and superfluous. In no æs [Scene I. Enter Lorenzo and Iessica.] thetic sense are last Acts to be used to clear up a play; the weaker cannot effectively follow the stronger. In a drama the strict law of an ever-increasing interest is not to be ignored, and commentators had much better acknowledge it instead of making a virtue of necessity. No one denies that this last Act, with its beautiful language, is valuable; but with all its value as a final Act, it is a fault in composition. To render this defect as little conspicuous as possible is the work of Scenic arrangement. We begin, therefore, on our stage, the last Act with the Trial Scene, which occupies threequarters of it. It is followed by the short Scene of the giving of the rings, and then, while music plays, the Scene changes to the Garden of Belmont. Thus we are prepared to resign ourselves to the repose of the music and the sweet words of the lovers; we see, after some free excisions of the text,-the whole company approach from Venice by torchlight; in a few minutes the jesting puzzle of the rings is solved, and the end is reached without our being conscious of any jarring influence from the weaker theme on the previous interest in the play. Thus, without any intervals between Acts and by a quick evolution of the Scenes, we carry home the impression of a joyous play, and are not struck by any dissonance in the notes of the chord. Whoever has seen the play as thus arranged at our Burgtheater,—and during sixteen years I have questioned, I know not how many,-has acknowledged that the awkwardness of the last Act is quite concealed, and that in spite of Shylock's tragic fate, the impression is that of a pleasant comedy. The text is not changed, merely shortened, and the aim of our mode of representation is attained merely by a change of Scenes and Acts. HUNTER (New Ill., i, 309): The 'poet's pen' has nowhere given more striking proof of its power than in the Scene of the Garden of Belmont. We find ourselves transported into the grounds of an Italian palazzo of the very first class, and we soon perceive them to be of surpassing beauty and of almost boundless extent. It is not a garden of parterres and flowers, but more like Milton's Paradise,' full of tall shrubs and lofty trees,—the tulip tree, the poplar, and the cedar. But it is not, like Milton's, a garden in which the hand of Nature is alone visible. There are terraces and flights of steps, cascades and fountains, broad walks, avenues, and ridings, with alcoves and banqueting-houses in the rich architecture of Venice. It is evening; a fine evening of summer, which tempts the masters of the scene to walk abroad and enjoy the breezes which ruffle gently the foliage. The moon is in the heavens, full orbed and shining with a steady lustre; no light clouds disturbing the deep serene. On the green sward fall the ever-changing shadows of the lofty trees, which may be mistaken for fairies sporting by the moonlight; where trees are not, the moonbeams sleep upon the bank The distant horn is heard; and even sweeter music floats upon the breeze. . . . . For the four moonlights in classical or quasi-classical story the poet did not draw on his imagination, but his memory. It is not that Troilus, Thisbe, Dido, and Medea might have done what they did when the moon was shining in full splendour, as on that night in the Garden of Belmont, but the poet had read that they did what they are described as having done, in the moonlight. This, at least, is the fact in respect of three out of the four, and with respect to the fourth an explanation may be given which will bring it within the same category. The first is Troilus. [Steevens was the first, I believe, to note, which he did without further remark, that the image' of Troilus mounting the Trojan walls is from Chaucer's Troilus and Cresseide, Book v, 666.ED.] Though this is a classical name, and the story is a tale of Troy, yet cannot the story be traced to any of the ancient poets. [See Clarendon's note, post.] It seems to have been to Chaucer that Shakespeare was indebted for his knowledge of it. The |