386 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[Xa 54. 



tlie see of Ossory from 1318 to 1360, and was 

 rendered famous by his proceedings against Dame 

 Alice Kyteller for heresy and witchcraft. (See a 

 contemporary account of the "proceedings" pub- 

 I lished by the Camden Society in 1843 ; a most 

 j valuable contribution to Irish history, and well de- 

 ' serving of still more editorial labour than has been 

 bestowed on it.) I have copied the old English 

 and Xorman-French word for word, preserving 

 the contractions -wherever they occurred. 



I shall conclude this " note" by proposing two 

 "Queries:" to such of your contributors as are 

 learned in old English and French song- lore, viz., 



1. Are the entire songs, of which the above lines 

 form the commencements, known or recoverable ? 



2. If so, is the music to which they were sung 

 handed down ? 



I shall feel much obliged by answers to both or 

 either of the above Queries, and 



" Bis dat, qui clto dat." 



James Gbaves. 

 Kilkemiy, Nov. 1. 1850. 



MISPLACED WOEDS IN SHAKSPEAKE S TEOIELS AND 

 CRESSIDA. 



In that immaculate volume, the first folio edition 

 of Shakspeare, of which Mr. Knight says : " Per- 

 haps, all things considered, there never was a book 

 so correctly printed"! a passage in Troilu.i and 

 Cressida, Act. v. Sc. 3., where Cassandra and An- 

 dromache are attempting to dissuade Hector from 

 going to battle, is thus given : 



" And. O be perswaded : doe not count it holy, 

 To hurt by being iust ; it is lawful : 

 Tor we would count giuennicli to as violent thefts, 

 And rob in the behalle of charitie." 



Deviating from his usual practice, Mr. Knitrht 

 makes an omission and a transposition, and reads 

 thus : 



" Do not count it holy 



To hurt by being just : it is as lawful, 



For we would give mucli, to count violent thefts, 



And rob in the behalf of charity." 

 witii the following note ; the ordinai-y reading is 



" ' For we would give much to use violent thefts.' " 

 To use thefts is clearly not Shakspearian. Perhaps 

 count or g ice might be omitted, su])posin!r that one 

 word had been substituted for another in the ma- 

 nuscript, without the erasure of the first written ; 

 but this omission will not give us a meaniu"-. We 

 have ventured to transpose count and omit'o*; 



" For we would give much, to count violent thefts." 



"We have now a clear meaning : it is as lawfid be- 



tau.e we desire to give much, to count violent 



thefts a,^ holy, " and rob in the behalf of charity." 



Mr. Collier also lays aside his aversion to vary 



from the old copy, and makes a bold innovation : 



he reads, — 



" Do not count it holy 

 To hurt by being just : it is as lawful, 

 For us to give much count to violent thefts, 

 And rob in the behalf of charity." 



Thus giving his reasons : " This line [the third] is 

 so corrupt in the folio 1623, as to afford no sense. 

 The words and their arrangement are the same in 

 the second and third folio, while the fourth only 

 alters would to will." Tyrwhitt read : 



" For we would give much to use violent thefts," 



which is objectionable, not merely because it 

 wanders from the text, but because it inserts a 

 phrase, "to use violent thefts," which is awkward 

 and unlike Shakspeare. The reading I have 

 adopted is that suggested by Mr. Amyot, who ob- 

 serves upon it : " Here, I think, with little more 

 than transposition (lis being substituted for we, 

 and woidd omitted), the meaning, as far as we can 

 collect it, is not departed from nor perverted, as in 

 Howe's strange interpolation : 

 " For us to count we give what's gain'd by thefts." 



The original is one of the few passages which, as it 



seems to me, must be left to the reader's sagacity, 



[ and of the difiiculties attending which we cannot 



arrive at any satisfactory solution." 



1 Mr. Collier's better judgment has here given 



' way to his deference for the opinion of his worthy 



friend ; the deviation from the old copy being 



! quite as violent as any that he has ever quarrelled 



with in others. 



Bearing in mind Mr. Hickson's valuable canoH 



! (which should be the guide of future editors), let 



' us see what is the state of the case. The line is a 



1 nonsensical jumble, and has probably been printed 



I from an interlineation in the manuscript copy, two 



! words being evidently transposed, and one of them, 



at the san\e time, glaringly mistaken. The poet 



would never have repeated the word count, which 



occurs in the first line, in the sense given to it 



either by Mr. Collier or by Mr. Knight. 



Preserving every word ui the old copy, I read 

 the passage thus : — 



" O ! be persuaded. Do not count it holy 

 To hurt by being just : it is as lawful as 

 (For we would give much) to commit violent thefts 

 And rob in the behalf of charity." 



" To count violent thefts " here would be sheer 

 nonsense; and when we recollect how easy it is to 

 mistake coinit for count, the former word being al- 

 most alw.ays thus written and often thus printeil, 

 we must, I think, be convinced that in copying an 

 interlineated MS., the printer misplaced and mis- 

 printed that word, and transposed as ;. if the re- 

 petition of it be not also an error. — "For,"' com- 

 mencing the parenthesis, " we would give much " 

 stands for cause. The emphasis should, I think, be 



