Note 6 — Scene V.—

At the meeting of the new Shakspere Society, Oct. 11, 1878, the chairman read a paper by Mr. Ruskin on the word fret in this passage. The following is from the report in the London Academy:—

"Fret means primarily the rippling of the cloud—as sea by wind; secondarily, the breaking it asunder for light to come through. It implies a certain degree of vexation, some dissolution, much order, and extreme beauty. The reader should have seen 'Daybreak,' and think what is broken and by what. The cloud of night is broken up, by Day, which breaks out, breaks in, as from heaven to earth, with a breach in the cloud wall of it. The thing that the day breaks up is partly a garment rent, the blanket of the dark torn to be peeped through...."