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Ajax. Thersites,

Ther. And those boils did run?-Say so,-did not the general run then? were not that a botchy core?

Ajax. Dog,

Ther. Then would come some matter from him; I

see none now.

Ajax. Thou bitch-wolf's son, canst thou not hear? Feel then. [Strikes him. Ther. The plague of Greece upon thee, thou mongrel beef-witted lord!7

Ajax. Speak then, thou "unsalted 'leaven, speak: I will beat thee into handsomeness.

The plague of Greece upon thee,] Alluding perhaps to the plague sent by Apollo on the Grecian army. Johnson.

The following lines of Lydgate's Auncient Historie of the Warres between the Trojans and the Grecians, 1555, were probably here in our author's thoughts:

"And in this whyle a great mortalyte,
"Both of sworde and of pestilence,

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Among Greekes, by fatal influence

"Of noyous hete and of corrupt eyre, "Engendred was, that tho in great dispayre "Of theyr life in the fyelde they leye, "For day by day sodaynly they deye, "Whereby theyr nombre fast gan dyscrece; "And whan they sawe that it ne wolde sece, "By theyr advyse the kyng Agamemnowne "For a trewse sent unto the towne, "For thirty dayes, and Priamus the kinge "Without abode graunted his axynge." Our author may as well be supposed to have caught this circumstance, relative to the plague, from the first Book of Hall's or Chapman's version of the Iliad. Steevens.

Malone.

7 thou mongrel beef-witted lord!] So, in Twelfth Night: "I am a great eater of beef, and I believe that does harm to my wit." Steevens.

He calls Ajax mongrel on account of his father's being a Grecian and his mother a Trojan. See Hector's speech to Ajax, in Act IV, sc. v:

"Thou art, great lord, my father's sister's son," &c.

Malone.

Unsalted leaven means Shakspeare wrote first

8 Speak then, thou unsalted leaven, speak: sour without salt, malignity without wit. unsalted; but recollecting that want of salt was no fault in leaven, changed it to vinew'd. Johnson.

The want of salt is no fault in leaven; but leaven without the addition of salt will not make good bread: hence Shakspeare used it as a term of reproach. Malone.

renewd'st. i.c mouldy

Ther. I shall sooner rail thee into wit and holiness: but, I think, thy horse will sooner con an oration, than thou learn a prayer without book. Thou canst strike, canst thou? a red murrain o' thy jade's trick's!9

Ajax. Toads-stool, learn me the proclamation. Ther. Dost thou think, I have no sense, thou strikest me thus?

Ajax. The proclamation,

Ther. Thou art proclaimed a fool, I think.

Ajax. Do not, porcupine, do not; my fingers itch. Ther. I would, thou didst itch from head to foot, and I had the scratching of thee; I would make thee the loathsomest scab in Greece. When thou art forth in the incursions, thou strikest as slow as another.

Ajax. I say, the proclamation,

Ther. Thou grumblest and railest every hour on Achilles; and thou art as full of envy at his greatness, as Cerberus is at Proserpina's beauty, ay, that thou barkest at him.e

Ajax. Mistress Thersites!

Ther. Thou should'st strike him.
Ajax. Cobloaf!

Unsalted is the reading of both the quartos. Francis Beaumont, in his letter to Speght on his edition of Chaucer's works, 1602, says: Many of Chaucer's words are become as it were vinew'd and hoarie with over long lying.".

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Again, in Tho. Newton's Herbal to the Bible, 8vo. 1587:

"For being long kept they grow hore and vinewed." Steevens. In the Preface to James the First's Bible, the translators speak of fenowed (i. e. vinewed or mouldy) traditions. Blackstone.

The folio has-thou whinid'st leaven; a corruption undoubtedly of vinnewedst, or vinniedst: that is, thou most mouldy leaven. In Dorsetshire they at this day call cheese that is become mouldy vinny cheese. Malone.

9 a red murrain &c.] A similar imprecation is found in The Tempest: ". The red plague rid you!" Steevens.

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in Greece.] [Thus far the folio.] The quarto adds—when thou art forth in the incursions, thou strikest as slow as another.

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Johnson.

ay, that thou barkest at him.] I read,-O that thou barkedst at him. Johnson.

The old reading is I, which, if changed at all, should have been changed into ay. Tyrwhitt.

3 Cobloaf! A crusty, uneven, gibbous loaf, is in some counties called by this name. Steevens.

Ther. He would pun thee into shivers with his fist, as a sailor breaks a biscuit.

Ajax. You whoreson cur!

Ther. Do, do.

Ajax. Thou stool for a witch !5

[Beating him.

Ther. Ay, do, do; thou sodden-witted lord! thou hast no more brain than I have in mine elbows; an assinego

A cob-loaf, says Minsheu, in his Dictionary, 1617, is "a bunne. It is a little loaf made with a round head, such as cob-irons which support the fire. G. Bignet, a bigne, a knob or lump risen after a knock or blow." The word Bignets Cotgrave, in his Dictionary, 1611, renders thus: " Little round loaves or lumps, made of fine meale, oyle, or butter, and reasons: bunnes, lenten loaves."

Cob-loaf ought, perhaps, to be rather written cop-loaf. Malone. 4 ·pun thee into shivers -] Pun is in the midland counties the vulgar and colloquial word for-pound. Johnson.

It is used by P. Holland, in his translation of Pliny's Natural History, Book XXVIII, ch. xii: "-punned altogether and reduced into a liniment." Again, Book XXIX, ch. iv: "The gall of these lizards punned and dissolved in water." Steevens.

Cole, in his Dictionary, renders it by the Latin words contero, contundo. Mr. Pope, who altered whatever he did not understand, reads-pound, and was followed by three subsequent editors.

Malone.

5 Thou stool for a witch!] In one way of trying a witch they used to place her on a chair or stool, with her legs tied across, that all the weight of her body might rest upon her seat; and by that means, after some time, the circulation of the blood would be much stopped, and her sitting would be as painful as the wooden horse. Grey.

6 an assinego] I am not very certain what the idea conveyed by this word was meant to be. Asinaio is Italian, says Sir T. Hanmer, for an ass-driver: but, in Mirza, a tragedy, by Rob. Baron, Act III, the following passage occurs, with a note annexed to it:

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the stout trusty blade,

"That at one blow has cut an asinego

"Asunder like a thread.

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"This (says the author) is the usual trial of the Persian shamsheers, or cemiters, which are crooked like a crescent, of so good metal, that they prefer them before any other, and so sharp as any razor."

I hope, for the credit of the prince, that the experiment was rather made on an ass than an ass-driver. From the following passage I should suppose asinego to be merely a cant term for a foolish fellow, an idiot: "They apparelled me as you see, made a fool or an asinego of me." See The Antiquary, a comedy, by S. Marmion, 1641. Again, in Beaumont and Fletcher's Scornful Lady; “ - all

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may tutor thee: Thou'scurvy valiant ass! thou art here put to thrash Trojans; and thou art bought and sold? among those of any wit, like a Barbarian slave. If thou use to beat me, I will begin at thy heel, and tell what thou art by inches, thou thing of no bowels, thou!

Ajax. You dog!

Ther. You scurvy lord!

Ajax. You cur!

[Beating him.

Ther. Mars his idiot! do, rudeness; do, camel; do, do,

Enter ACHILLES and PATROCLUS.

Achil. Why, how now, Ajax? wherefore do you thus? How now, Thersites? what's the matter, man?

Ther. You see him there, do you?

Achil. Ay; what's the matter?

Ther. Nay, look upon him.

Achil. So I do; What's the matter?

Ther. Nay, but regard him well.

Achil. Well, why I do so.

Ther. But yet you look not well upon him: for, whosoever you take him to be, he is Ajax.

Achil. I know that, fool.

Ther. Ay, but that fool knows not himself.
Ajax. Therefore I beat thee.

Ther. Lo, lo, lo, lo, what modicums of wit he utters! his evasions have ears thus long. I have bobb'd his brain, more than he has beat my bones: I will buy nine sparrows for a penny, and his pia mater is not worth the

this would be forsworn, and I again an asinego, as your sister left me." Steevens.

Asinego is Portuguese for a little ass. Musgrave.

And Dr. Musgrave might have added, that, in his native county, it is the vulgar name for an ass at present. Henley.

The same term, as I am informed, is also current among the lower rank of people in Norfolk. Steevens.

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sion.

thou art bought and sold —] This was a proverbial expresMalone.

So, in King Richard III:

"For Dickon thy master is bought and sold."

Again, in King Henry VI, Part I:

"From bought and sold lord Talbot." Steevens.

8 If thou use to beat me,] i. e. if thou continue to beat me, or make a practice of beating me. Steevens.

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his pia mater &c.] So, in Twelfth Night: "
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VOL. XII.

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ninth part of a sparrow. This lord, Achilles, Ajax,who wears his wit in his belly, and his guts in his head, -I'll tell you what I say of him.

Achil. What?

Ther. I say, this Ajax

Achil. Nay, good Ajax.

[AJAX offers to strike him, ACHIL. interposes.

Ther. Has not so much wit.

Achil. Nay, I must hold you.

Ther. As will stop the eye of Helen's needle, for whom he comes to fight.

Achil. Peace, fool!

Ther. I would have peace and quietness, but the fool will not he there; that he; look you there.

Ajax. O thou damned cur! I shall

Achil. Will you set your wit to a fool's?

Ther. No, I warrant you; for a fool's will shame it. Patr. Good words, Thersites.

Achi. What's the quarrel?

Ajax. I bade the vile owl, go learn me the tenour of the proclamation, and he rails upon me.

Ther. I serve thee not.

Ajax. Well, go to, go to.

Ther. I serve here voluntary.

Achil. Your last service was sufferance, 'twas not voluntary; no man is beaten voluntary;1 Ajax was here the voluntary, and you as under an impress.

Ther. Even so?-a great deal of your wit too lies in your sinews, or else there be liars. Hector shall have a great catch, if he knock out either of your brains;2 'a were as good crack a fusty nut with no kernel.

Achil. What, with me too, Thersites?

Ther. There 's Ulysses, and old Nestor,-whose wit was mouldy ere your grandsires had nails3 on their

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comes one of thy kin has a most weak pia mater." The pia mater is a membrane that protects the substance of the brain. Steevens. - is beaten voluntary:] i. e. voluntarily. Shakspeare often uses adjectives adverbially. See Vol. VIII, p. 302, n. 6. Malone. 2 Hector shall have a great catch, if he knock out either of your brains; &c.] The same thought occurs in Cymbeline:

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"Could have knock'd out his brains, for he had none."

Steevens.

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