Volume Viii Part 100 (1/2)

[121] Ovid's lines are these--

”Discite, qui sapitis, non quae nos scimus inertes, Sed trepidas acies, et fera castra sequi.”

--”Amorum,” lib. iii. el. 8.

[122] The author of ”The World's Folly,” 1615, uses _squitter-wit_ in the same sense that Nash employs _squitter-book_: ”The _primum mobile_, which gives motion to these over-turning wheels of wickedness, are those mercenary _squitter-wits_, miscalled poets.”

In ”The Two Italian Gentlemen,” the word _squitterbe-book_, or _squitter-book_, is found, and with precisely the same signification which Nash gives it--

”I would mete with the scalde _squitterbe-booke_ for this geare.”

[123] His _nown_, instead of his _own_, was not an uncommon corruption.

So Udall--”Holde by his yea and nay, be his _nowne_ white sonne.”

[124] [Old copy, _Fuilmerodach_.]

[125] _Regiment_ has been so frequently used in the course of these volumes, in the sense of government or rule, that it is hardly worth a note.

[126] This is, of course, spoken ironically, and of old, the expression _good fellow_ bore a double signification, which answered the purpose of Will Summer. Thus, in Lord Brooke's ”Caelica,” sonnet 30--

”_Good fellows_, whom men commonly doe call.

Those that do live at warre with truth and shame.”

Again, in Heywood's ”Edward IV. Part I.,” sig. E 4--

”KING EDWARD. Why, dost thou not love a _good fellow_?

”HOBS. No, _good fellows_ be _thieves_.”

[127] Henry Baker was therefore the name of the actor who performed the part of Vertumnus.

[128] The joke here consists in the similarity of sound between _despatch_ and _batch_, Will Summers mistaking, or pretending to mistake, in consequence.

[129] [Old copy, _Sybalites_.]

[130] This is still, as it was formerly, the mode of describing the awkward bowing of the lower cla.s.s. In the ”Death of Robert Earl of Huntington,” 1601, when Will Brand, a vulgar a.s.sa.s.sin, is introduced to the king, the stage direction to the actor in the margin is, ”_Make Legs_.”

[131] A proverb in [Heywood's ”Epigrams,” 1562. See Hazlitt's ”Proverbs,” 1869, p. 270. Old copy, _love me a little_.]

[132] [Old copy, _deny_.]

[133] The meaning of the word _snudge_ is easily guessed in this place, but it is completely explained by T. Wilson, in his ”Rhetoric,” 1553, when he is speaking of a figure he calls _diminution_, or moderating the censure applied to vices by a.s.similating them to the nearest virtues: thus he would call ”a _snudge_ or _pynche-penny_ a good husband, a thrifty man” (fo. 67). Elsewhere he remarks: ”Some riche _snudges_, having great wealth, go with their hose out at heels, their shoes out at toes, and their cotes out at both elbowes; for who can tell if such men are worth a grote when their apparel is so homely, and all their behavior so base?” (fo. 86.) The word is found in Todd's Johnson, where Coles is cited to show that _snudge_ means ”one who hides himself in a house to do mischief.” No examples of the employment of the word by any of our writers are subjoined.

[134] Mr Steevens, in a note to ”Hamlet,” act iv. sc. 5, says that he thinks Shakespeare took the expression of _hugger-mugger_ there used from North's Plutarch, but it was in such common use at the time that twenty authors could be easily quoted who employ it: it is found in Ascham, Sir J. Harington, Greene, Nash, Dekker, Tourneur, Ford, &c. In ”The Merry Devil of Edmonton” also is the following line--

”But you will to this gear in _hugger-mugger_.”

[135] It is not easy to guess why Nash employed this Italian word instead of an English one. _Lento_ means lazy, and though an adjective, it is used here substantively; the meaning, of course, is that the idle fellow who has no lands begs.

[136] i.e., Hates. See note to ”Merchant of Venice,” act v. sc. 1.

[137] [Old copy, _Hipporlatos_. The emendation was suggested by Collier.]