Note I.

Ind. The Folios and the Quarto have here Actus Primus. ScÆna Prima, making no separation between the play and the Induction. The play is divided into Acts, but not into Scenes. The second Act, however, is not marked in any of the old copies. The arrangement which we have followed is that of Steevens, which all subsequent editors have adopted, and which is therefore the most convenient for purposes of reference.

Note II.

Ind. 1. 7. The phrase 'Go by, Jeronimy,' quoted from Kyd's 'Spanish Tragedy,' was used in popular 'slang,' derisively. It occurs frequently in the dramatic literature of the time, for example, in Beaumont and Fletcher's Captain, Act iii. Sc. 5. The 'S' of the Folios may have been derived from a note of exclamation in the MS., written, as it is usually printed, like a note of interrogation.

Note III.

Ind. 1. 62. Mr Lettsom's suggestion that a line has been lost between 61 and 62 seems the most probable solution of the difficulties presented by this passage in its present form.

Note IV.

Ind. 1. 86. 'Sincklo,' the stage direction of the first Folio, was the name of an actor in Shakespeare's company, not mentioned in the list of 'Principall Actors' at the beginning of the first Folio. He was one of the actors in the Second Part of Henry IV., as appears from the 4to. edition of that play, published in 1600, where the stage direction to Act v. Scene 4 is, "Enter Sincklo and three or foure officers," and the part taken by Sincklo is that usually assigned to the 'Officer.' In the Third Part of Henry VI. Act iii. Scene 1, the stage direction in the first Folio is, 'Enter Sinklo, and Humfrey, with crosse-bowes in their hands.' Sinklo also appears as an actor in the Induction to Marston's play of The Malcontent. In the present play he probably took the part of Lucentio.

In iii. 1. 80, 'Nicke.' is supposed by Steevens to mean Nicholas Tooley, who at a later period became one of the 'Principall Actors.'

Note V.

Ind. 1. 99. Pope inserts here the following speech from the old play:

'2 Player [to the other]. Go get a dishclout to make clean your shoes, and I'll speak for the properties. [Exit Player.] My lord, we must have a shoulder of mutton for a property, and a little vinegar to make our devil roar.'

This insertion is repeated by all subsequent editors, till Capell struck it out of the text and Steevens placed it in a note.

Note VI.

Ind. 2. 96. The following speeches are here inserted by Pope from the same source:

Capell was the first to strike it out of the text.

Note VII.

Ind. 2. 110. Pope prefixed to Sly's speech the following words from the old play, without giving any indication that they were not Shakespeare's: 'Come sit down on my knee. Sim, drink to her.' They are repeated in all subsequent editions, till Capell restored the true text. After line 115, Pope again added, 'Sim, drink to her.'

Note VIII.

i. 1. 32. The old play (Q) after the Induction, commences thus:

but this affords us no hint as to the true reading of the passage in question, whether 'checks' or 'ethics.' When Mr Halliwell conjectured that we should read 'works' for 'walks,' he had not observed that the allusion was to the gardens of the Lyceum, the favourite haunt of the Peripatetics.

Note IX.

i. 1. 57. We have often observed that as in this line and in iii. 1. 4, and Ind. 2. 110, the metre may be completed by pronouncing the name of the speaker at the beginning. This is one indication among many, of the haste with which parts of Shakespeare's plays were thrown off.

Note X.

i. 2. 145. Considering the carelessness with which a plural demonstrative pronoun was used with reference to a singular noun and vice versa, we have not altered the reading of the old editions in order to accommodate the construction to modern rule. See note (iv) to Love's Labour's Lost.

Note XI.

i. 2. 259. The misprint in Rowe's second edition remained uncorrected by Pope, Theobald, Hanmer, Warburton, and Johnson. Capell in correcting the error made another by writing 'her' for 'the.' He printed his edition not from any former text, but from a manuscript of his own writing.

Another instance of the facility with which a misprint which makes sense escapes correction is found in ii. 1. 4, where 'put,' a misprint for 'pull' in the Variorum of 1821, was retained by many subsequent editors, Mr Collier, Mr Singer, &c.

Note XII.

i. 2. 278. Mr Grant White believes the whole of the foregoing scene to be by some other hand than Shakespeare's. Coleridge and Sidney Walker also held that large portions of the play were not from the master's hand. It appears to us impossible to discriminate, as in Henry the Eighth and The Two Noble Kinsmen, what parts were due to Shakespeare and what to another hand. The feeblest scenes of this play seem to have been touched by him. The probability is that he worked, in this case, not with, but after, another.

Note XIII.

ii. 1. 403. Pope inserts from the old play:

These lines were repeated by all subsequent editors down to Capell, who inserted them at a different place. See note (xvi).

Note XIV.

iii. 2. 63. Mr Collier says that the Quarto reads 'the humor or fourty fancies...' If so, his copy differs from ours, which reads 'the humor of fourty fancies...'

Note XV.

iii. 2. 81-84. It is not always clear from the way in which Capell's text is printed whether he meant a passage where there is a rapid change of speakers to be read as prose or verse. In the Edition before us, this is always explained by certain conventional symbols inserted with his own hand in red ink. This he probably did with a view to a second edition, which he never lived to bring out. 'Tulit alter honores.'

Note XVI.

iii. 2. 245. Capell here inserted the lines which Pope put after ii. 1. 403. See note (xiii).

Note XVII.

iv. 1. 124. Theobald first printed 'Where is the life that late I led?' as part of a song. He printed also the following words, 'Where are those—' in italics, as if they were a continuation of the song. He was followed by Hanmer, Warburton, and Johnson, but not by Capell. As the song is lost, the question must remain doubtful.

Note XVIII.

iv. 2. Pope made a bold transposition, and placed here the scene which in our Edition stands as the third scene of the fourth Act, beginning:

and ending:

The scene thus in Pope's edition counted as the 4th, 5th, and 6th scenes of Act iv.

Our Scene 2 of Act iv. is in Pope's edition Scenes 1 and 2 of Act v.

Theobald restored the old arrangement, which, as he proves in a note, is indisputably the right one.

Note XIX.

iv. 2. 120. Hanmer inserts from the old play the following lines, which are placed by Pope after iv. 3. 192, and by Capell after v. 1. 132.