Volume Ix Part 128 (1/2)

[299] While he is speaking, c.r.a.pula, from the effects of over-eating, is continually coughing, which is expressed in the old copies by the words _tiff toff, tiff toff_, within brackets. Though it might not be necessary to insert them, their omission ought to be mentioned.

--_Collier_.

[300] i.e., Glutton; one whose paunch is distended by food. See a note on ”King Henry IV., Part I,” v. 304, edit. 1778.--_Steevens_.

[301] i.e., Whisper.

[302] [Visus fancies himself Polyphemus searching for Outis--i.e., Ulysses, who had blinded him.]

[303] [Edits., _Both_.]

[304] [Row.]

[305] [Nearest.]

[306] [Edits., _ambrosian_.]

[307 [Fiddle.]

[308] A voiding knife was a long one used by our indelicate ancestors to sweep bones, &c., from the table into the _voider_ or basket, in which broken meat was carried from the table.--_Steevens_.

[309] Reward.

[310] [Edits., _him_.]

[311] [Edits., _sprites_.]

[312] The edition of 1657 reads--

”A greater soldier than the G.o.d of _Mars_.”

--_Collier_. [The edition of 1607 also has _Mars_.]

[313] i.e., Hamstring him.--_Steevens_.

[314] ”_Gulchin, q.d_. a _Gulckin_, i.e., parvus Gulo; _kin_ enim minuit. Alludit It. _Guccio_, Stultus, hoc autem procul dubio a Teut.

_Geck_, Stultus, ortum ducit.”--_Skinner_. Florio explains _Guccio_, a gull, a sot, a ninnie, a meac.o.c.k. Ben Jonson uses the word in ”The Poetaster,” act iii. sc. 4: ”Come, we must have you turn fiddler again, slave; get a base violin at your back, and march in a tawny coat, with one sleeve, to Goose-fair; then you'll know us, you'll see us then, you will _gulch_, you will.”

[315] _Bawsin_, in some counties, signifies a _badger_. I think I have heard the vulgar Irish use it to express bulkiness. Mr Chatterton, in the ”Poems of the Pseudo-Rowley,” has it more than once in this sense.

As, _bawsyn olyphantes_, i.e., bulky elephants.--_Steevens_.

[316] [Edits., _weary_. I wish that I could be more confident that _weird_ is the true word. _Weary_ appears to be wrong, at any rate.]

[317] [Edits., _bedewy_.]

[318] [This and Chanter are the names of dogs. Auditus fancies himself a huntsman.]

[319] _Counter_ is a term belonging to the chase. [Gascoigne,] in his ”Book of Hunting,” 1575, p. 243, says, ”When a hounde hunteth backwardes the same way that the chase is come, then we say he hunteth _counter_.

And if he hunt any other chase than that which he first undertooke, we say he hunteth _change_.” So in ”Hamlet,” act iv. sc. 5--