LI 



meaning? — the "tackle" or cordage, loosened by the flower-soft 

 hands, swelled with the swelling of the sails which the " tackle " con- 

 fined and regulated ? Mr. White, with a proper sense of the absurd- 

 ity of ''smell," remarks : " Though it may be a very pretty compli- 

 ment to suppose that the tackle would 'smell' (sweetly, of course,) 

 with the touches of the hands of Cleopatra's ladies, the world will 

 thrust upon me the profoundly true observation, mulier rede olet ubi 

 nihil old." 



Another passage over which has arisen a perfect blaze of idiocy is 

 this from Timon of Athens, in which Flavius is lamenting his master's 

 prodigality : 



" When our vaults have wept 

 With drunken spUth of wine ; when every room 

 Hath blazed with lights, and bray'd with minstrelsy ; 

 I have retired me to a wasteful cock, 



Of course this is very obscure. Hanmer interprets " wasteful cock " 

 as a cockloft or garret ! Warburton coincides. Pope changes it to 

 "lonely room." Knight reads "from a wasteful cock." Chalmers 

 thinks it means a cistern waste-pipe. Now, why not " improvident 

 rooster? "and "retir'd"in the sense of "gone to bed ?" meaning 

 that having been up all night, he had not gone to bed until an un- 

 necessarily vocal chanticleer was announcing the too-evident approach 

 of day. There is nothing like a little common sense in interpreting 

 such passages; and what can Mr. White be thinking of when he says 

 that the words in question mean wine-cask cock, or faucet ? 



Mr. White takes Johnson severely to task for his interpretation of 

 Lear's words, " Age is unnecessary;" and if Mr. White is right, it 

 ought to be embraced in the present collection of the absurdities of 

 Shakespearian criticism. Johnson thinks the words mean, "Age has 

 fewwants;" Mr. White thinks they were used ironically to mean, 

 "Age is superfluous." With great deference, we submit that for once 

 Johnson is right, and for once Mr. White is wrong. Let us look at 

 the context. Lear has been complaining to Regan of the treatment 

 which he has received at the hands of her sister, Goneril, who has dis- 

 missed some of his followers — " She hath abated me of half my 

 train." Regan replies that he is old, and " should be ruled, and led 

 by some discretion that discerns your state better than yourself;" 



Hereupon Lear Hies into a passion, and kneeling down, rehearses the 

 speech which he imagines himself to deliver to Goner il, askiug Regan 

 to " mark how it becomes the house : " 



