Note 15 — CHARACTERS OF INTELLECT.
Reading edition
In Shakspeare's time, there were people In Ireland, (there may be so still, for aught I know,) who undertook to charm rats to death, by chanting certain verses which acted as a spell. "Rhyme them to death, as they do rats in Ireland," is a line in one of Ben Jonson's comedies; this will explain Rosalind's humorous allusion.