Ant. Fye, what a spendthrift is he of his tongue! Gon. Well, I have done: But yet— Seb. He will be talking. Ant. Which of them, he, or Adrian, for a good wager, first begins to crow? Seb. The old cock. Ant. The cockrel. Seb. Done: the wager Ant. A laughter. Seb. A match. ? Adr. Though this island seem to be desert,- Ant. So, you've pay'd.' Adr. Uninhabitable, and almost inaccessible,- Adr. Yet Ant. He could not miss it. Adr. It must needs be of subtle, tender, and delicate temperance. 8 Ant. Temperance was a delicate wench. Seb. Ay, and a subtle; as he most learnedly delivered. Adr. The air breathes upon us here most sweetly. Gon. Here is every thing advantageous to life. 7-you've pay'd.] This passage scarcely deserves explanation; but the meaning is this: Antonio lays a wager with Sebastian, that Adrian would crow before Gonzalo, and the wager was a laughter. Adrian speaks first, so Antonio is the winner. Sebastian laughs at what Adrian had said, and Antonio immediately acknowledges that by his laughing he has paid the bet. 8 and delicate temperance.] or temperature. 9 Temperance was a delicate wench.] In the puritanical times it was usual to christen children from the titles of religious and moral virtues. Seb. Of that there's none, or little. Gon. How lush' and lusty the grass looks? how green? Ant. The ground, indeed, is tawny. Ant. He misses not much. Seb. No; he doth but mistake the truth totally. Gon. But the rarity of it is (which is indeed almost beyond credit) Seb. As many vouch'd rarities are. Gon. That our garments, being, as they were, drenched in the sea, hold, notwithstanding, their freshness, and glosses; being rather new dy'd, than stain'd with salt water. Ant. If but one of his pockets could speak, would it not say, he lies? Seb. Ay, or very falsely pocket up his report. Gon. Methinks, our garments are now as freshı as when we put them on first in Africk, at the marriage of the king's fair daughter Claribel,' to the king of Tunis. Seb. "Twas a sweet marriage, and we prosper well in our return. Adr. Tunis was never graced before with such a paragon to their queen. Gon. Not since widow Dido's time. Ant. Widow? a pox o'that! How came that widow in? Widow Dido!* 'How lush, &c.] Lush here signifies rank; but it appears to have sometimes signified juicy, succulent. Spenser in his Shepheard's Calender, (Feb.) applies the epithet lusty to green. 2 With an eye of green in't.] An eye is a small shade of colour. 3 Claribel] This name is probably taken from the bl. 1. History of George Lord Faukonbridge. CLARIBEL is there the concubine of king Richard I. and the mother of Lord Falconbridge. 4 Widow Dido!] The name of a widow brings to their minds their own shipwreck, which they consider as having made many widows in Naples. JOHNSON. Seb. What if he had said, widower Æneas too? good lord, how you take it! Adr. Widow Dido, said you? you make me study of that: She was of Carthage, not of Tunis. Gon. This Tunis, sir, was Carthage. Adr. Carthage? Gon. I assure you, Carthage. Ant. His word is more than the miraculous harp." Seb. He hath rais'd the wall, and houses too. Ant. What impossible matter will he make easy next? Seb. I think he will carry this island home in his pocket, and give it his son for an apple. Ant. And, sowing the kernels of it in the sea, bring forth more islands. Gon. Ay? Ant. Why, in good time. Gon. Sir, we were talking, that our garments seem now as fresh, as when we were at Tunis at the marriage of your daughter, who is now queen. Ant. And the rarest that e'er came there. Seb. 'Bate, I beseech you, widow Dido. Ant. O, widow Dido; ay, widow Dido. Gon. Is not, sir, my doublet as fresh as the first day I wore it? I mean, in a sort. Ant. That sort was well fish'd for. Gon. When I wore it at your daughter's marriage? Alon. You cram these words into mine ears, against 6 The stomach of my sense: 'Would I had never Married my daughter there! for, coming thence, the miraculous harp.] phion's music. STEEVENS. Alluding to the wonders of Am The stomach of my sense:] By sense, is meant both reason and natural affection. Mr. M. Mason, however, supposes, 66 sense, in this place, means feeling." STEEVENS. My son is lost; and, in my rate, she too? I ne'er again shall see her. O thou mine heir Fran. Sir, he may live; I saw him beat the surges under him, The surge most swoln that met him; his bold head 'Bove the contentious waves he kept, and oar'd Himself with his good arms in lusty stroke To the shore, that o'er his wave-worn basis bow'd, As stooping to relieve him; I not doubt, He came alive to land. Alon. No, no, he's gone. Seb. Sir, you may thank yourself for this great loss; That would not bless our Europe with your daughter, But rather lose her to an African; Where she, at least, is banish'd from your eye, Alon. Pr'ythee, peace. Seb. You were kneel'd to, and importun❜d other wise By all of us; and the fair soul herself Weigh'd' between lothness and obedience, at your son, We have lost I fear, for ever: Milan and Naples have More widows in them of this business' making, Than we bring men to comfort them: the fault's Your own. 7 Weigh'd,] Weigh'd means deliberated. 5 Than we bring men to comfort them:] It does not clearly appear whether the king and these lords thought the ship lost. This passage seems to imply, that they were themselves confident Alon. So is the dearest of the loss. Gon. My lord Sebastian, The truth you speak doth lack some gentleness, And time to speak it in; you rub the sore, When you should bring the plaster. Seb. Ant. And most chirurgeonly. Very well. Gon. It is foul weather in us all, good sir, When you are cloudy. Seb. Ant. Foul weather? Very foul. Gon. Had I plantation of this isle, my lord,— Seb. traries Execute all things: for no kind of traffick And women too; but innocent and No sovereignty:— Seb. pure: And yet he would be king on't. Ant. The latter end of his commonwealth forgets the beginning.9 of returning, but imagined part of the fleet destroyed. Why, indeed, should Sebastian plot against his brother in the following scene, unless he knew how to find the kingdom which he was to inherit? JOHNSON. 9 The latter end of his commonwealth forgets the beginning.] All this dialogue is a fine satire on the Utopian treatises of government, and the impracticable inconsistent schemes therein recommended. WARBURTON. |