Act II Sc. 1
“Will you come home? quoth I.”
Hanmer properly added home, which was plainly omitted.
“I see the jewel best enamelled
Will lose his beauty, yet the gold bides still,
That others touch.—And often touching will
Where gold; and no man that hath a name
By falsehood and corruption doth it shame.”
To give sense to this passage I read in the second line bide; in the fourth, with Warburton, wear, with Heath so a for ‘no’; in which two I had thus been anticipated. The punctuation given here is my own. I am dubious of ‘others’ in the third line, for which we might read fingers, or some other word.
Sc. 2
“Your sauciness will jest upon.”
For ‘jest’ Mr. Dyce reads jet, referring to Rich. III. ii. 4, Tit. Andron. ii. 1; and “It is hard when Englishmen’s patience must be thus jetted upon by strangers.”—Play of Sir T. More, p. 2.
“And what he hath scanted them in hair he hath given them in wit.”
For the first ‘them’ Theobald properly read men.
“The one to save the money that he spends in trying.”
For ‘trying’ Pope read tyring by simply transposing, Rowe trimming. I rather prefer the former, as tyring is attiring, and ‘attire’ is head-dress; but whether used of a man or not I am not certain.—See my note on Milton’s On Time, v. 21.
“I live distain’d, thou undishonoured.”
Quite the contrary; for she would rather “live an unstain’d life.” R. and J. iv. 1. Theobald read unstain’d, but I prefer undistain’d. The printer was more likely to omit un (see on Cymb. i. 7) than to change it to di. There is also an agreeable effect on the ear produced by the accents falling on un in both words. In all these plays lines frequently begin with an anapæst.
“I’ll entertain the freed fallacy.”
For ‘freed,’ which can hardly be right, Pope read favour’d, Capell, much better, offer’d.
“We talk with goblins, owls, and sprites.”
To complete the measure, the editor of 2nd folio inserted elves, and before ‘sprites’; from which Rowe made elvish ‘sprites.’ For ‘owls’ Theobald read ouphes; but that term occurs only in The Merry Wives. I read—
“For here we talk with goblins, elves, and sprites.”
“I am transformed, master, am not I?”
Theobald also made this obvious and necessary transposition of ‘I not.’