Host. To see thee fight, to see thee foin, to see thee traverse, to see thee here, to see thee there; to see thee pass thy punto, thy stock, thy reverse, thy distance, thy montánt. Is he dead, my Ethiopian? is he dead, my Francisco? ha, bully! What says my Æsculapius? my Galen? my heart of elder? ha! is he dead, bully Stale? is he dead? CAIUS. By gar, he is de coward Jack priest of the vorld; he is not show his face. 6 to see thee foin,] To foin, I believe, was the ancient term for making a thrust in fencing, or tilting. So, in The Wise Woman of Hogsdon, 1638: " I had my wards, and foins, and quarter-blows." Again, in The Devil's Charter, 1607: 66 suppose my duellist " Should falsify the foine upon me thus, "Here will I take him." Spenser, in his Fairy Queen, often uses the word foin. So, in B. II. c. 8: " And strook and foyn'd, and lashed outrageously." Again, in Holinshed, p. 833: "First six foines with handspeares," &c. STEEVENS. 7thy stock,] Stock is a corruption of stocata, Ital. from which language the technical terms that follow are likewise adopted. STEEVENS. 8 my Francisco?] He means, my Frenchman. The quarto reads-my Francoyes. MALONE. 9 my heart of elder?] It should be remembered, to make this joke relish, that the elder tree has no heart. I suppose this expression was made use of in opposition to the common one, heart of oak. STEEVENS. 1 bully Stale?] The reason why Caius is called bully Stale, and afterwards Urinal, must be sufficiently obvious to every reader, and especially to those whose credulity and weakness have enrolled them among the patients of the present German empiric, who calls himself Doctor Alexander Mayersbach. STEEVENS. Host. Thou art a Castilian king, Urinal! Hector of Greece, my boy! Castilian - Sir T. Hanmer reads-Cardalian, as used corruptedly for Cœur de Lion. JOHNSON. Castilian and Ethiopian, like Cataian, appear in our author's time to have been cant terms. I have met with them in more than one of the old comedies. So, in a description of the Armada introduced in the Stately Moral of the Three Lords of London, 1590: "To carry, as it were, a careless regard of these Castilians, and their accustomed bravado." Again : "To parley with the proud Castilians." I suppose Castilian was the cant term for Spaniard in general. STEEVENS. I believe this was a popular slur upon the Spaniards, who were held in great contempt after the business of the Armada. Thus we have a Treatise Parænetical, wherein is shewed the right Way to resist the Castilian King; and a sonnet prefixed to Lea's Answer to the Untruths published in Spain, in glorie of their supposed Victory atchieved against our English Navie, begins: "Thou fond Castilian king!"-and so in other places. FARMER. Dr. Farmer's observation is just. Don Philip the Second affected the title of King of Spain; but the realms of Spain would not agree to it, and only styled him King of Castile and Leon, &c. and so he wrote himself. His cruelty and ambitious views upon other states rendered him universally detested. The Castilians, being descended chiefly from Jews and Moors, were deemed to be of a malign and perverse disposition; and hence, perhaps, the term Castilian became opprobious. I have extracted this note from an old pamphlet, called The Spanish Pilgrime, which I have reason to suppose is the same discourse with the Treatise Parænetical, mentioned by Dr. Farmer. TOLLET. Dr. Farmer, I believe, is right. The Host, who, availing himself of the poor Doctor's ignorance of English phraseology, applies to him all kinds of opprobrious terms, here means to call him a coward. So, in The Three Lords of London, 1590: "My lordes, what means these gallantes to performe? CAIUS. I pray you, bear vitness that me have stay six or seven, two, tree hours for him, and he is no come. SHAL. He is the wiser man, master doctor: he is a curer of souls, and you a curer of bodies; if you should fight, you go against the hair3 of your professions; is it not true, master Page? PAGE. Master Shallow, you have yourself been a great fighter, though now a man of peace. SHAL. Bodykins, master Page, though I now be old, and of the peace, if I see a sword out, my finger itches to make one: though we are justices, and doctors, and churchmen, master Page, we have some salt of our youth in us; we are the sons of women, master Page. PAGE. 'Tis true, master Shallow. SHAL. It will be found so, master Page. Master doctor Caius, I am come to fetch you home. I am sworn of the peace; you have showed yourself a wise physician, and sir Hugh hath shown himself a wise and patient churchman: you must go with me, master doctor. There may, however, be also an allusion to his profession, as a water-caster. I know not whether we should not rather point-Thou art a Castilian, king-urinal! &c. In K. Henry VIII. Wolsey is called count-cardinal. 3 MALONE. against the hair &c.] This phrase is proverbial, and is taken from stroking the hair of animals a contrary way to that in which it grows. So, in T. Churchyard's Discourse of Rebellion, &c. 1570: "You shoote amis when boe is drawen to eare, We now say against the grain. STEEVENS. Host. Pardon, guest justice:- A word, monsieur Muck-water.4 4 - Muck-water.] The old copy reads-mock-water. STEEVENS. The Host means, I believe, to reflect on the inspection of urine, which made a considerable part of practical physick in that time; yet I do not well see the meaning of mock-water. JOHNSON. Dr. Farmer judiciously proposes to read-muck-water, i. e. the drain of a dunghill. Henry Cornelius Agrippa, of the Vanitie and Uncertainty of Arts and Sciences, Englished by James Sanford, Gent. bl. l. 4to. 1569, might have furnished Shakspeare with a sufficient hint for the compound term muck-water, as applied to Dr. Caius. Dr. Farmer's emendation is completely countenanced by the same work, p. 145: "Furthermore, Phisitians oftentimes be contagious by reason of urine," &c. but the rest of the passage (in which the names of Esculapius, Hippocrates, &c. are ludicrously introduced) is too indelicate to be laid before the reader. STEEVENS. Muck-water, as explained by Dr. Farmer, is mentioned in Evelyn's Philosophical Discourse on Earth, 1676, p. 160. REED. A word, monsieur Muck-water.] The second of these words was recovered from the early quarto by Mr. Theobald. Some years ago I suspected that mock-water, which appears to me to afford no meaning, was corrupt, and that the author wroteMake-water. I have since observed that the words mock and make are often confounded in the old copies, and have therefore now more confidence in my conjecture. It is observable that the Host, availing himself of the Doctor's ignorance of English, annexes to the terms that he uses a sense directly opposite to their real import. Thus, the poor Frenchman is made to believe, that, "he will clapper-claw thee tightly," signifies, "he will make thee amends. Again, when he proposes to be his friend, he tells him, "for this I will be thy adversary toward Anne Page." So also, instead of "heart of oak," he calls him " heart of elder." In the same way, he informs him that Makewater means "valour." In the old play called The Life and Death of Lord Cromwell, 1602, a female of this name is mentioned. MALONE. I have inserted Dr. Farmer's emendation in my text. Where is the humour or propriety of calling a Physician-Make-water? It is surely a term of general application. STEEVENS. CAIUS. Muck-vater! vat is dat? Host. Muck-water, in our English tongue, is valour, bully. CAIUS. By gar, then I have as much muck-vater as de Englishman: - Scurvy jack-dog priest! by gar, me vill cut his ears. Host. He will clapper-claw thee tightly, bully. CAIUS. Clapper-de-claw! vat is dat ? Host. That is, he will make thee amends. CAIUS. By gar, me do look, he shall clapper-declaw me; for, by gar, me vill have it. Host. And I will provoke him to't, or let him wag. CAIUS. Me tank you for dat. Host. And moreover, bully,-But first, master guest, and master Page, and eke cavalero Slender, go you through the town to Frogmore. PAGE. Sir Hugh is there, is he? [Aside to them. Host. He is there: see what humour he is in; and I will bring the doctor about by the fields : will it do well? SHAL. We will do it. PAGE. SHAL. and SLEN. Adieu, good master doctor. [Exeunt PAGE, SHALLOW and SLENDER. CAIUS. By gar, me vill kill de priest; for he speak for a jack-an-ape to Anne Page. 5 Host. Let him die: but, first, sheath thy impa - clapper-claw] This word occurs also in Tom Tyler and his Wife, bl. l. "Wife. I would clapper-claw thy bones." STEEVENS. |