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By Root 20197 0

he that follows his nose is led or guided by his eyes, he wants no information from his nose. I persuade myself, but know not whether I can persuade others, that our author wrote thus:—"All men are led by their eyes, but blind men, and they follow their noses; and there's not a nose among twenty but can smell him that's stinking."—Here is a succession of reasoning. You ask, why the king has no more in his train? why, because men who are led by their eyes see that he is ruined; and if there were any blind among them, who, for want of eyes, followed their noses, they might by their noses discover that it was no longer fit to follow the king.

II.iv.83 (382,2)

But I will tarry; the fool will stay,

And let the wise man fly;

The knave turns fool, that runs away;

The fool no knave, perdy]

I think this passage erroneous, though both the copies concur. The sense mill be mended if we read,

But I will tarry; the fool will stay,

And let the wise man fly;

The fool turns knave, that runs away;

The knave no fool,—

That I stay with the king is a proof that I am a fool, the wise men are deserting him. There is knavery in this desertion, but there is no folly.

II.iv.116 (383,3) Is practice only] Practice is in Shakespeare, and other old writers, used commonly in an ill sense for unlawful artifice.

II.iv.122 (384,4) Cry to it, nuncle, as the cockney did to the eels, when she put them i' the paste alive] Hinting that the eel and Lear are in the same danger.

II.iv.142 (384,7) Than she to scant her duty] The word scant is directly contrary to the sense intended. The quarto reads,

—slack her duty,

which is no better. May we not change it thus:

You less know bow to value her desert,

Than she to scan her duty.

To scan may be to measure or proportion. Yet our author uses his negatives with such licentiousness, that it is hardly safe to make any alteration.—Scant may mean to adapt, to fit, to proportion; which sense seems still to be retained in the mechanical term scantling. (see 1765, VI, 67, 4)

II.iv.155 (385,1) Do you but mark how this becomes the house?] [T: the use?] [Warburton called "becomes the house" "a most expressive phrase"] with this most expressive phrase I believe no reader is satisfied. I suspect that it has been written originally,

Ask her forgiveness?

Do you but mark how this becometh—thus.

Dear daughter, I confess, &c.

Becomes the house, and becometh thus, might be easily confounded by readers so unskilful as the original printers.

II.iv.157 (386,2) Age is unnecessary] i.e. Old age has few wants.

II.iv.162 (386,3) Look'd black upon me] To look black, may easily be explained to look cloudy or gloomy. See Milton:

"So frown'd the mighty combatants, that hell

Grew darker at their frown."—

II.iv.170 (386,4) To fall, and blast her pride!] Thus the quarto: the folio reads not so well, to fall and blister. I think there is still a fault, which may be easily mended by changing a letter:

—Infect her beauty,

Ye fen-suck'd fogs, drawn by the powerful sun,

Do, fall, and blast her pride!

II.iv.174 (387.6) Thy tender-hested nature shall not give/Thee o'er to harshness] This word, though its general meaning be plain, I do not critically understand.

II.iv.178 (387,7) to scant my sizes] To contract my allowances or proportions settled.

II.iv.203 (388,9) much less advancement] The word advancement is ironically used here for conspicuousness of punishment; as we now say, a man is advanced to the pillory. We should read,

—but his own disorders

Deserv'd much more advancement.

II.iv.204 (388,1) I pray you, father, being weak, seem so] [W: deem't so] The meaning is, since you are weak, be content to think yourself weak. No change is needed.

II.iv.218 (389,3) base life] i.e. In a servile state.

II.iv.227 (390,5) embossed carbuncle] Embossed is swelling, protuberant.

II.iv.259 (391,6) Those wicked creatures yet do look well-favour'd:/ When others are more wicked] Dr. Warburton would exchange the repeated epithet wicked into wrinkled in both places. The commentator's only objection to the lines as they now stand,