Sir And. An you love me, let's do't: I am dog at a catch. Clo. By'r lady, fir, and fome dogs will catch well. Sir And. Moft certain: let our catch be, Thou knave. Clo. Hold thy peace, thou knave, knight? I fhall be conftrain'd in't to call thee knave, knight.

Sir And. "Tis not the first time I have constrain'd one to call me knave. Begin, fool; it begins, Hold thy peace. Clo. I fhall never begin, if I hold my peace.

Sir And. Good, i'faith! Come, begin.

[They fing a Catch.

Enter

I have fhewn the cause of it elsewhere. This expreffion of the power of mufick is familiar with our author. Much ado about Nothing: "Now is bis foul ravished. Is it not strange that sheep's-guts should bale fouls out of men's bodies", -Why, he fays, three fouls, is because he is fpeaking of a catch of three parts; and the peripatetic philofophy, then in vogue, very liberally gave every man three fouls. The vegetative or plaftic, the animal, and the rational. To this, too, Jonfon alludes, in his Poetafter: "What, will I turn fhark upon my friends? or my friends' friends? I fcorn it with my three fouls." By the mention of these three, therefore, we may fuppofe it was Shakspeare's purpofe, to hint to us thofe furprizing effects of mufick, which the ancients fpeak of, when they tell us of Amphion, who moved ftones and trees; Orpheus and Arion, who tamed favage beafts; and Timotheus, who governed, as he pleased, the paffions of bis buman auditors. So noble an obfervation has our author conveyed in the ribaldry of this buffoon character. WARBURTON.

In a popular book of the time, Carew's tranflation of Huarte's Trial of Wits, 1594, there is a curious chapter concerning the three fouls, "". vege tative, fenfitive, and reafonable." FARMER.

I doubt whether our author intended any allufion to this divifion of fouls. Dr. Warburton's fuppofition that there is an allufion to the catch being in three parts, appears to me one of his unfounded refinements.

2

They fing a catch.] This catch is foft. JOHNSON.

MALONE.

A catch is a fpecies of vocal harmony to be fung by three or more perfons; and is fo contrived, that though each fings precifely the fame notes as his fellows, yet by beginning at ftated periods of time from each other, there refults from the performance a harmony of as many parts as there are fingers. Compofitions of this kind are, in ftri&tnefs, called Canons in the unifon; and as properly, Catches, when the words in the different parts are made to catch or answer each other. One of the most remarkable examples of a true catch is that of Purcel, Let's live good boneft lives, in which, immediately after one perfon has uttered thefe words, "What need we fear the Pope ?" another in the courfe of his finging fills up a reft which the firft makes, with the words, "The devil.”

The

Enter MARIA.

Mar. What a catterwauling do you keep here! If my lady have not call'd up her steward, Malvolio, and bid him turn you out of doors, never trust me.

Sir To. My lady's a Cataian,3 we are politicians;. Malvolio's a Peg-a-Ramsey,+ and Three merry men be we. Am not

I con.

The catch above-mentioned to be fung by fir Toby, fir Andrew, and the Clown, from the hints given of it, appears to be fo contrived as that each of the fingers calls the other knave in turn; and for this the clown means to apologize to the knight, when he fays, that he fhall be con strained to call him knave. I have here fubjoined the very catch, with the mufical notes to which it was fung in the time of Shakspeare, and at the original performance of this Comedy:

A 3 voc.

?

Hold thy peace and I pree thee hold thy peace

3d

Thou knave, thou knave: hold thy peace thou knave:

The evidence of its authenticity is as follows. There is extant a book entitled, "PAMMELIA, Mufickes Mifcellanie, or mixed Varietie of pleasant Roundelays and delightful catches of 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10 parts in one." Of this book there are at least two editions, the fecond printed in 1618. In 1609, a fecond part of this book was published with the title of DEUTEROMELIA, and in this book is contained the catch above given. SIR J. HAWKINS 3 It is in vain to feek the precife meaning of this term of reproach. I have already attempted to explain it in a note on The Merry Wives of Windfor. I find it used again in Love and Honour, by Sir W. D'Avenant, 1649:

"Hang him, bold Cataian." STEEVENS.

4 In Durfey's Pills to purge Melancholy is a very obfcene old fong, en titled Peg-a-Ramfey. See alfo Ward's Lives of the Profeffors of Grebam College, p. 207. PERCY.

Nash

I confanguineous? am I not of her blood? Tilly-valley lady! There dwelt a man in Babylon, lady, lady!"

[Singing.

Clo.

Nah mentions Peg of Ramfey among feveral other ballads, viz. Rogers, Bafiline, Turkelony, All the flowers of the Broom, Pepper is Black, Green Sleeves, Peggie Ramfie. It appears from the fame author, that it was likewife a dance performed to the mufic of a song of that name.

STEEVENS.

Peggy Ramfey, is the name of fome old fong; the following is the tune

to it:

Peggy Ramfy.

SIR J. HAWKINS.

STEEVENS.

5 Three merry men be we, is likewife a fragment of fome old fong.

This is a conclufion common to many old fongs. One of the most hu morous that I can recollect, is the following:

"The wife men were but feaven, nor more fhall be for me;
The mufes were but nine, the worthies three times three;
"And three merry boyes, and three merry boyes, and three
merry boyes are wee.

"The vertues they were feven, and three the greater bee;
"The Cæfars they were twelve, and the fatal fifters three.
"And three merry girles, and three merry girles, and three

merry girles are wee.'

There are ale-houfes in fome of the villages in this kingdom, that have the fign of The Three Merry Boys; there was one at Highgate in my memory. SIR J. HAWKINS.

Three merry men be we, may, perhaps, have been taken originally from the song of Robin Hood and the Tanner. TYRWHITT.

6 Tilly-valley was an interjection of contempt, which Sir Thomas More's lady is recorded to have had very often in her mouth. JOHNSON Tilly-valley is ufed as an interjection of contempt in the old play of Sir John Oldeafile; and is likewife a character in a comedy intituled Lady Alimony. Tillie vallie may be a corruption of the Roman word (without VOL. I.

2

precife

Clo. Befhrew me, the knight's in admirable fooling.

Sir And. Ay, he does well enough, if he be difpos'd, and fo do I too; he does it with a better grace, but I do it more natural.

Sir To. O, the twelfth Day of December,

Mar. For the love o'God, peace.

Enter MALVOLIO.

[Singing

Mal. My mafters, are you mad? or what are you? Have you no wit, manners, nor honesty, but to gabble like tinkers at this time of night? Do ye make an alehoufe of my lady's houfe, that ye fqueak out your coziers' catches without any mitigation or remorfe of voice? Is there no refpect of place, perfons, nor time, in you?

8

Sir To. We did keep time, fir, in our catches. Sneck up!9

Mal.

precife meaning, but indicative of contempt) Titivilitium. See the Cafina of Plautus, 2. 5. 39. STEEVENS.

Tilly-valley is a hunting phrafe borrowed from the French. In the Venerie de Jacques Fouilloux, 1585, 4to. fo. 12. the following cry is mentioned: Ty a hillaut & vallecy ;" and is fet to mufic in pp. 49 and 50.

DOUCE.

7 The ballad of Sufanna, whence this line is taken, was licensed by T. Colwell, in 1562, under the title of The goudly and conftant wyfe Susanna. There is likewife a play on this fubject. T. WARTON.

Maria's use of the word lady brings the ballad to fir Toby's remembrance: Lady, lady, is the burthen, and should be printed as fuch. My very ingenious friend, Dr. Percy, has given a ftanza of it in his Reliques of Ancient Poetry, Vol. I. p. 204. Juft the fame may be faid, where Mercu tio applies it, in Romeo and Juliet, A&t II fc. iv. FARMER.

This fong, or, at leaft, one with the fame burthen, is alluded to in B. Jonfon's Magnetic Lady, Vol. IV. p. 449. TYRWHITT.

The oldeft fong that I have feen with this burthen is in the old Mora. lity, entitled The Trial of Treafure, 4to. 1567. MALONE.

A cozier is a tailor, from coudre to few, part. coufu, Fr. JOHNSON. Our author has again alluded to their love of vocal harmony in King

Henry IV. P. I. A cozier, it appears from Minfhieu, fignified a botcher,

or mender of old clothes, and alfo a cobler.Here it means the former. MALONE.

Minfhieu tells us, that cozier is a cobler or fowter: and, in Northamptonshire, the waxed thread which a cobler ufes in mending shoes, we call a codger's end. WHALLEY.

A coziers' end is still used in Devonshire for a cobler's end. HENLEY, 9 Mr. Malone and others obferve, that from the manner in which this

cant

Mal. Sir Toby, I must be round with you. My lady bade me tell you, that, though the harbours you as her kinfman, fhe's nothing allied to your diforders. If you can separate yourself and your misdemeanors, you are welcome to the houfe; if not, an it would please you to take leave of her, fhe is very willing to bid you farewel.

Sir To. Farewel, dear beart, fince I muft needs be gone.
Mal. Nay, good fir Toby.

Clo. His eyes do fhew his days are almost done.

Mal. Is't even fo?

Sir To. But I will never die.

Clo. Sir Toby, there you lie.

Mal. This is much credit to you.

Sir To. Shall I bid him.

Clo. What an if you do?

Sir To. Shall I bid him go, and spare not ?
Clo. O no, no, no, no, you dare not.

[Singing.

Sir To. Out o'time? fir, ye lie.-Art any more than a fteward? Doft thou think, because thou art virtuous, there shall be no more cakes and ale ? +

Clo. Yes, by Saint Anne; and ginger fhall be hot i'the mouth too.

Sir To. Thou'rt i'the right.-Go, fir, rub your chain with crums: A stoop of wine, Maria!

Q 2

Mal. eant phrafe is employed in our ancient comedies, it seems to have been fynonymous to the modern expreffion-Go bang yourself. STEEVENS. 2 Farewel, dear beart, &c.] This entire fong, with fome variations, is published by Dr. Percy, in the first volume of his Reliques of Ancient English Poetry. STEEVENS.

The old copy has" out o'tune." We fhould read, "out of time," as his fpeech evidently refers to what Malvolio faid before.

In the Mfs. of our author's age, tune and time are often quite undistinguishable; the fecond ftroke of the a feeming to be the first stroke of the m, or vice versa. Hence, in Macbeth, A&t IV. fc. ult. edit. 1623, we have "This time, goes manly," instead of "This tune goes manly."

MALONE.

4 It was the custom on holidays and faints' days to make cakes in honour of the day. The Puritans called this, fuperftition; and in the next page Maria fays, that Malvolio is fometimes a kind of Puritan. See, QuarJous's Account of Rabbi Bufy, A&t I. fc. iii. in Ben Jonson's Bartholomew Fait. LETHERLAND.

5 That stewards anciently wore a chain, as a mark of fuperiority over ,other