Act III Sc. 2
“Here comes young master Ganymede, my new mistress[’s] brother.”
Though it stands thus in the folio, metre and the usage of the time reject the s.
“But the fair of Rosalind.”
We might read ‘fair face,’ or, with Rowe, face for ‘fair’; which last, however, is the same as fairness; so no change is needed.
“Winter’d garments must be lined.”
The 3rd folio properly reads Winter.
“Why should this desert be?”
Rowe read ‘a desert’; Tyrwhitt ‘silent be.’ I rather prefer the latter; but it is against it that, excepting in one of the following and the six last lines, the first foot is always monosyllabic. I have therefore followed Rowe.
“Or at every sentence end.”
For ‘Or’ I read And. (See Note at end of Samson Agonistes in my Edition of Milton’s Poems.)
“It may well be called Jove’s tree when it drops forth fruit.”
The 2nd folio reads ‘forth such; Capell read such for ‘forth.’ Perhaps the first is to be preferred; yet I find I have followed Capell in my Edition.
“Make me believe it! You may as soon make her.”
Surely the passage thus gains not only in metre, but in spirit.
Sc. 3
“By so much is a horn more precious than to want.”
There is apparently an aposiopesis here.
“Leave me not behind thee, prythee.”
Both rime and metre require this addition; yet none of the critics has made it.
Sc. 4
“Breaks his staff like a noble goose.”
Singer, very unnecessarily and most tamely, reads notable for ‘noble.’ Printing from his edition, I have heedlessly followed him in mine.
“Bring us unto this sight, and you shall say.”
Sc. 5
“Than he that dies and lives by bloody drops.”
It is quite impossible that this line in its present form could have come from the pen of the poet. He must have seen the absurdity of dying before living, and he could have had no motive for departing from the universal form “live and die,” as in “I could live and die in the eyes of Troilus” (Tr. and Cr. i. 2). If we then transpose, and take ‘by’ in the sense of beside, near, in contact with (Index s. v.), we get excellent sense. ‘Dies,’ however, may be a printer’s error for some other verb—sheds perhaps; and then ‘by’ may be taken in its ordinary sense. I had also, like Heath, conjectured ‘daily lives.’
“The cicatrice and capable impression.”
For ‘capable’ Singer’s and Collier’s folio read palpable; I have followed them.
“Nor I am sure there is no force in eyes
That can do hurt to any one.—O! dear Phebe.”
For ‘Nor’ we might perhaps better read And. (See my note on Sam. Agon., 1692.) Still no change is needed.
“That you insult and exult all at once
Over the wretched? What! though you have no beauty.”
The transposition in the first line removes all necessity for correction. Strange that the critics should not have thought of it! In my Edition the transposition is, “That you insult and all at once exult,” which is wrong; but it is there corrected. By reading ‘What!’ the difficulty found here by critics is removed.
“That the old Carlot once was master of.”
In the folio ‘Carlot’ is printed as a proper name, and it may be the Spanish Carloto. No such substantive as ‘carlot’ is known.
“He is fallen in love with your foulness, and she’ll.”
For ‘she’ we should, I think, read, as I have done, you.
“I have more cause to hate him than to love him.”
The I was supplied in the 2nd folio.