2'>'1S. N<>92., Oct. 3. '57.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



263 



Collier, simply telling us that "the folio has 

 wast." Now what I maintain is, that the folio is 

 right, and that the critics give a wrong sense to 

 the words of Titania, whose meaning is that 

 Oberon did so once, while they would make her 

 say that such was his habit. They really seem to 

 think that u-ast stolen away could only be taken in 

 a passive sense, whereas it is a principle of not 

 only the English, but the German, French, and 

 Italian languages, that the substantive verb is to 

 be used with most verbs of motion, as come, go, 

 depart, return, &c., and to steal away is simply "to 

 depart secretly." Would any of them scruple to 

 say, " You were gone when I came " ? And if 

 they were in the habit of frequenting the hunting- 

 field they would learn that the verb to be is still 

 used in conjunction with stolen away. I trust now 

 that some future editor will take wast into favour, 

 " print it and shame the rogues ; " for I do not 

 despair of even "From seventy years till now 

 almost fourscore " in As You Like It resuming 

 possession of the text, as " the sweet sound that 

 breathes upon a bank of violets " has recently 

 done in Twelfth Night. 



In Love's Labour s Lost, Act I. Sc. 1., the folio 

 reads, — 



" So you to study now it is too late, — 

 That were to climb o'er the house to unlock the gate ; " 



while the editors prefer to read with the 4to, — 



" So you, to study now it is too late, 

 Climb o'er the house to unlock the little gate : " 



— as " the folio," Mr. Collier says, " spoils the sense 

 and injures the line." By this last he means of 

 course the metre, which it most certainly does not 

 injure, while it most assuredly gives a far better 

 sense. I must add that, with the exception of the 

 dash, the above is the punctuation of the folio ; 

 the latter is that of the modern editions, and I 

 presume of the quarto also. 



To prove the correctness of the folio we are to 

 observe that Biron had just been giving instances 

 of unreasonable and preposterous desires, as want- 

 ing snow in May and roses at Christmas, while he 

 professes to like every thing in its due season. 

 Youth is the season for study and learning, and it 

 was just as preposterous in them who were past 

 that season, being full-grown men, to take to 

 study, as it would be for a man who wanted to 

 unlock his gate, to climb over the house to get 

 at it. Surely nothing can be simpler than this, 

 and what is the meaning of " little gate," when no 

 other has been spoken of? 



" When he himself might his quietus make 

 With a bare bodkin. Who would these fardels bear," &c. 

 Hamlet, Act III. Sc. 1. 



The editors here reject these as " clearly wrong 

 on every account." I think otherwise. Hamlet 

 had just spoken of bearing sundry afflictions or 

 burdens, i.e. fardels, and he as it were naturally 



harps again on the same string, instead of using 

 fardels for we know not what miseries. 



In " N. & Q." (2°'^ S. iii. 225.) I gave the ori- 

 gin of Romeo and Juliet as an original discovery. 

 It was such, but I had been anticipated in the 

 Boswell-Malone edition, which I unluckily ne- 

 glected to consult, contenting myself with those of 

 Knight and Collier, and the Shakspeare's Library 

 of the latter, in which there is not even a hint of 

 it ; I find there is a mere hint, and no more, in 

 Mr. Singer's. It is a remarkable proof of how 

 little the philosophy of fiction is attended to in 

 this country ; for to anyone versed in that philo- 

 sophy it must be clear as the light that it was 

 next to impossible that the story of Romeo and 

 Juliet — if not a reality, of which there is not the 

 slightest proof — was not founded on that of Py- 

 ramus and Thisbe. Thos. Keightley. 



Shakspeare's asserted " Indifference " to Fame. — 

 In the last-published number of the Westminster 

 Review, in an article on the " Sonnets " of Shak- 

 speare, the reviewer incidentally says : 



" Shakspeare seems never in any way to have cared 

 for his writings. His grand indifference to fame is one 

 of the striking traits in his character," &c., &c. 



What, is this so ? Do the dedications to the Veyius 

 and Adonis and The Rape of Lucrece show any 

 apathy to honours ? In the very Sonnets them- 

 selves, do such lines as these — 

 " But thy eternal summer shall not fade, 

 Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest ; 

 Nor shall death brag thou wander'st in his shade, 

 When in eternal lines to time thou growest: 

 So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see, 

 So long lives this, and this gives life to thee." — 18th. 



Or this — 

 " My love shall in my verse ever live young." — 19th. 



Or the whole grand fourteener (the 55th), be- 

 ginning — 



" Not marble, nor the gilded monuments 

 Of princes, shall outlive this powerful rhyme." 



Do these shadow forth any "grand indifference" 

 (save the mark !) to posthumous repute ? Why, 

 the 



" Exegi monumentum sera perennius, 

 Regalique situ pyramidum altius," etc. 

 Or the 



" Jamque opus exegi, quod neo Jovis ira, nee ignes, 

 Nee poterit ferrum, nee edax abolere vetustas," etc. 



may as well be said to indicate a similar " grand 

 indifference" in Horace and Ovid. The poet of 

 that 55th Sonnet could not possibly be regardless of 

 fame. A Desultobt Readek. 



" Haggard^' — 



" If I do prove her haggard. 

 Though that her jesses were my dear heart strings, 

 I'd whistle her off, and let her down the wind, 

 To prey at fortune." Othello, Act III. Sc. 3. 



