Note 27:B — Chapter II
Reading edition
It is more than possible that the Eclogues of Mantuanus the Carmelite may have been one of the school-books of Shakspeare. He is familiarly quoted and praised in the following passage from Love's Labour's Lost:—
"Hol. Fauste, precor gelidâ quando pecus omne sub umbrâ Ruminat,—and so forth. Ah, good old Mantua! I may speak of thee as the traveller doth of Venice:
——— Vinegia, Vinegia, Chi non te rede, ci non te pregia.
Old Mantuan! old Mantuan! who understandeth thee not, loves thee not." Act iv. sc. 2. And his Eclogues, be it remembered, were translated and printed, together with the Latin on the opposite page, for the use of schools, before the commencement of our author's education; and from a passage quoted by Mr. Malone, from Nashe's Apologie of Pierce Penniless, 1593, appear to have continued in use long after its termination. "With the first and second leafe, he plaies very prettilie, and, in ordinarie terms of extenuating, verdits Pierce Pennilesse for a grammar-school wit; saies, his margine is as deeply learned as, Fauste, precor gelidâ." Mantuanus was translated by George Turberville in 1567, and reprinted in 1591.—Vide Reed's Shakspeare, vol. vii. p. 95.