Note 3 — Chapter III
Reading edition
"Conjugal Rights." Notes and Queries. May 16, 1891, p. 383. "S. writes from the Probate Registry, Somerset House: 'Previous to 1733 legal proceedings were recorded in Latin and the word then used where we now speak of rights was obsequies. For some time after the substitution of English for Latin the term rites was usually, if not invariably adopted; rights would appear to be a comparatively modern error.'"
"Mr. T. E. Paget writes ('Romeo and Juliet,' Act V., Scene III.):
"What cursed foot wanders this way to-night To cross my obsequies, and true lovers rite?"
"Well may Lord Esher say he has never been able to make out what the phrase 'conjugal rights' means. The origin of the term is now clear, and a blunder, which was first made, perhaps, by a type-setter in the early part of the last century, and never exposed until now, has led to a vast amount of misapprehension. Here, too, is another proof that Shakespeare was exceedingly familiar with 'legal language.'"