[3] Until recently, Heywood’s plays were only accessible piecemeal and in parts. Dodsley’s collection contained two; Dilke’s contained three, and Baldwyn’s two. Between 1842 and 1851, the Old Shakespeare Society produced altogether twelve; while Mr. Halliwell in 1853 printed the Lancashire Witches separately. At last, in 1874 Mr. John Pearson issued a complete edition in six volumes. Since that date another play in MS. by Heywood, The Captives, was discovered and printed by Mr. A. H. Bullen in the last volume of his Old Plays (1885).

[4] With this main-plot Heywood has interwoven a subordinate and independent story. To dwell upon this under-plot would be superfluous. Yet I may point out that it is borrowed from an Italian Novella by Illicini, the incidents of which Heywood carefully transferred to English scenes. In like manner The Captive, consists of a main-plot borrowed from the Mostellaria of Plautus and an under-plot adapted from a novella of the Neapolitan, Masuccio. See my Shakspere’s Predecessors (p. 462), and a letter written by me to the Academy (Dec. 12, 1885).

A WOMAN KILLED WITH KINDNESS FOOTNOTES.

THE FAIR MAID OF THE WEST FOOTNOTES.

THE ENGLISH TRAVELLER FOOTNOTES.

THE WISE-WOMAN OF HOGSDON FOOTNOTES.

THE RAPE OF LUCRECE FOOTNOTES.

Perpetuo risu pulmonem agitare solebat

Democritus.—Juvenal, x., 33-4.

Notes in this chapter

Note 1 · “The Shaking of the Sheets” a popular tune to which many ballads ware set. Here a double entente is intended.Note 2 · “In a good time that man both wins and woos, That takes his wife down in her wedding shoes.” a proverbial saying.Note 3 · frets the points at which a string is to be stopped in a lute or guitar.—Halliwell.Note 4 · hoigh out of all bounds.Note 5 · angels gold coins.Note 6 · be stirring early with the lark to-morrow did Heywood remember Shakespeare’s “Stir with the lark to-morrow, gentle Norfolk”?Note 7 · crash a merry bout.Note 8 · “Rogero”, “The Beginning of the World”, “John come kiss me now.”... the tunes here mentioned are all more or less familiar from other passag Note 9 · sowse we have here a number of not very intelligible terms borrowed from falconry. “At the sowse” was said of a bird when the hawk swooped s Note 10 · gets booty.Note 11 · jesses the short leather straps round the hawk’s legs.Note 12 · querre perhaps from the German quer=oblique.Note 13 · merlin a small species of hawk.Note 14 · attach arrest.Note 15 · seen versed.Note 16 · censured on to censure, in legal language, means to pass judgment on.Note 17 · enter over the stage they evidently pass through the gallery above and leave the stage to Wendoll.Note 18 · to bring him on his way i.e. to accompany him.Note 19 · beholding beholden.Note 20 · miching sneaking or stealing into.Note 21 · bed-roll i.e. bead roll.Note 22 · from the grate alluding obviously to the debtors’ prisons; the lines remind us at once of Pickwick.Note 23 · wooden knife with which the scraps were swept into the voider or basket.Note 24 · carpet i.e. table-cover.Note 25 · play the good husband i.e. be frugal.Note 26 · before your beard i.e. before you had a beard.Note 27 · make-bate promoter of quarrels.Note 28 · a pair of cards i.e. pack of cards.Note 29 · well said i.e. well done.Note 30 · noddy said to have been something like cribbage; of the other games mentioned accounts are easily accessible, while it would be superfluous Note 31 · quean in the now obsolete sense of a whore.Note 32 · cross piece of money.Note 33 · remember i.e. remind.Note 34 · leese or lese, i.e. lose.Note 35 · expectation “execution” in the early eds.Note 36 · disease inconvenience.Note 37 · two flight-shot i.e. two bow-shots.Note 38 · cast beyond the moon a proverbial expression for anything extravagant or out of reach.Note 39 · patience perforce “patience perforce,” a phrase when some evil must be endured.—Halliwell.Note 40 · like the angel’s hand, Hast stayed me from a bloody sacrifice alluding to Gen. xxii. 10, 11.Note 41 · uncivil kern “kern” signified in general any uncivilised person: used especially of the Irish.Note 42 · one denier a penny.Note 43 · resolve satisfy.Note 44 · rebato a species of ruff for the neck: the wire would be used to stiffen it.Note 45 · manors a quibble on “manners” and “manors.”Note 46 · During this and some following speeches Wendoll evidently remains unseen.Note 47 · kept this coil i.e. made this trouble.Note 48 · gotten those perfect tongues i.e. acquired those tongues perfectly (French, German and Italian).Note 49 · atoned reconciled.Note 50 · once more meaning probably ‘Kiss me once more.’Note 51 · filled ‘filled’ is equivalent perhaps to ‘filled in,’ i.e. on the tomb.Note 52 · my lord the Earl of Essex.Note 53 · the fleet’s bound for the Islands the so-called “Island Voyage” (1597) was against the Azores and Spanish East and West Indies.Note 54 · Cales Cadiz.Note 55 · carracks large vessels: the word is of Spanish etymology.Note 56 · bush i.e. the ivy-bush, hung up outside taverns.Note 57 · adamant magnet.Note 58 · Graves wine i.e. from the Graves district of Gascony, so called from the pebbly character of the soil, and to-day celebrated for its red, bu Note 59 · snick-up a term of contempt, as much as to say, “Go and be hanged.”Note 60 · roaring blustering.Note 61 · Bettrice the name, perhaps, of some ballad heroine.Note 62 · dumb show “intended to denote the departure of the General (the Earl of Essex) and his followers.”—Collier.Note 63 · your years i.e. term of apprenticeship.Note 64 · corn grew to be at a high rate we learn from Stow that in 1596 wheat was six, seven, and eight shillings per bushel; the dearth continued an Note 65 · the Mermaid a room in the tavern.Note 66 · ruddocks gold coins.Note 67 · be-tall a quibble on the German bezahlen, to pay.Note 68 · atone reconcile.Note 69 · Mary Ambree a famous English heroine, with whom Long Meg is sometimes associated.Note 70 · untruss that point untie that lace.Note 71 · Little Davy, Cutting Dick contemporary bravos of note.Note 72 · prick-song music noted down.Note 73 · capricious witty.Note 74 · jowl of ling the fish so-called, which had been served to the guests in the Portcullis.Note 75 · skillets small metal pots.Note 76 · sod boiled.Note 77 · pitch height: properly a hawking term.Note 78 · motion propose.Note 79 · king’s lieutenant more properly, queen’s lieutenant.Note 80 · dissolutely he means “resolutely.” Slender makes the same blunder (Mer. Wives, i., 1).Note 81 · craze burst.Note 82 · brave fine.Note 83 · Aragoosa query “Saragossa,” which produces a large quantity of common wine.Note 84 · peter-see-me a sweet Spanish wine from the Pedro Ximenes grape.Note 85 · charnico a sweet wine grown in the neighbourhood of Lisbon.Note 86 · bastard bastard was the name of a sweet Mediterranean wine: a time-honoured joke.Note 87 · punks prostitutes.Note 88 · table picture.Note 89 · ging the old form of “gang.”Note 90 · I sound it not i.e., I cannot fathom your meaning.Note 91 · engines all instruments of torture.Note 92 · bragging Thrasos i.e. boasters, Thraso being a braggart in one of Terence’s plays.Note 93 · censures sentences.Note 94 · taste test.Note 95 · changed my copy made a complete change.Note 96 · ging gang.Note 97 · conceit idea.Note 98 · poor-john salt-fish.Note 99 · hautboys long i.e. they are to play for some time so as to admit of fresh stage arrangements for the coming scenes.Note 100 · carvel or caravel, a small light ship.Note 101 · vail lower.Note 102 · ought owned.Note 103 · fights defences placed round a vessel to protect the combatants.Note 104 · you that made Paul’s to stink an allusion to the unsavoury exploit of a Spaniard, often referred to at this period.Note 105 · peruse examine.Note 106 · habited dressed.Note 107 · commerce intercourse.Note 108 · From Kyd’s oft-referred-to Spanish Tragedy.Note 109 · angels i.e. coins.Note 110 · cunning quiddit subtle point.Note 111 · generosity i.e. people well-born.Note 112 · moorian negro: perhaps a play on the word “murrain” is intended.Note 113 · Histrio-Mastix by William Prynne: published in 1633. The full title of this bitter Puritan treatise was Histrio-Mastix, the Player’s Scourge Note 114 · censure judgment.Note 115 · where i.e. whereas.Note 116 · jack which made the spit turn; it had been recently introduced.Note 117 · buttery hatch a term still used in the Universities.Note 118 · speck ... whig a species of inferior drink, made from whey, and drunk by the lower classes in place of small beer. The exact nature of “spec Note 119 · indenture bond.Note 120 · burnt wine burnt wine, it will be remembered, was much affected by Pepys.Note 121 · consort i.e., concert.Note 122 · reaks pranks.Note 123 · lanching i.e., lancing.Note 124 · soul the dark spongy substance inside a fowl’s back.—Halliwell.Note 125 · shrewd sharp or bitter.Note 126 · alfarez ensigns (Spanish).Note 127 · rebellings i.e. ravelins (Sp. rebellin).Note 128 · possess inform.Note 129 · novel i.e. novelty.Note 130 · “This piece of pleasant exaggeration gave rise to the title of Cowley’s Latin play, Naufragium Joculare, and furnished the idea of the best Note 131 · atone make up, appease.Note 132 · bill a kind of halbert, carried by the watchmen of the period.Note 133 · Bermoothes “Bermoothes” is the usual form of “Bermudas” in the old dramatists.Note 134 · durance confinement.Note 135 · prodigious i.e. portentous.Note 136 · countervail counterbalance.Note 137 · break their day fail to pay at the appointed time.Note 138 · use interest.Note 139 · grange the word seems to have implied “loneliness.”Note 140 · happiness good fortune.Note 141 · motion proposal.Note 142 · singularity singleness.Note 143 · mechal adulterous.Note 144 · private me no privates like Shakespeare’s “but me no buts.”Note 145 · attach charge with.Note 146 · bottle bundle; Cotgrave has: “boteler, to botle or bundle up, to make into botles or bundles.”Note 147 · Privy i.e. Privy Council.Note 148 · disable disparage.Note 149 · picked pitched.Note 150 · mainprize a technical term: a writ of mainprize was sent to the sheriff, directing him to take sureties for a prisoner.Note 151 · shrievalty it was customary for the sheriff to have posts in front of his house, to which notices were affixed.Note 152 · Chavelah? the clown’s form of the French phrase qui va là?Note 153 · banquet i.e. a dessert.Note 154 · whilst I find something to say to this he refers to the bottle.Note 155 · orators this must be taken as a verb.Note 156 · no quarrels to unkindness no quarrels are so bitter as those caused by unkindness.Note 157 · goes in at one door, and comes out at another the old stage was wanting in moveable scenery. The audience had to suppose that when Young Ger Note 158 · tester a sixpence.Note 159 · rot-gut cheap ale.Note 160 · fox you all make you all drunk.Note 161 · like brave Orlando alluding to “Orlando Furioso.”Note 162 · gullery trickery.Note 163 · withdraw the old edition adds “behind the arras.”Note 164 · windings and indents schemes, shifts.Note 165 · piece gun.Note 166 · Fortune play-house the first theatre of this name, built by Henslowe and Alleyn, was burnt down in 1621: another theatre was erected on the Note 167 · voted i.e. chosen.Note 168 · green rushes with which floors were usually covered by way of carpet.Note 169 · fear ? sin.Note 170 · presently immediately.Note 171 · bale pair.Note 172 · twenty marks a mark was worth 13s. 4d.Note 173 · cross coins bearing a cross on the reverse, hence various quibbles.Note 174 · Gracious Street i.e. Gracechurch Street.Note 175 · “&c.,” here and elsewhere, means that the actor may add more to the same effect, if he please.Note 176 · to intend i.e. attend to.Note 177 · fancy love.Note 178 · say nay, and take them “maids say nay, and take it,” was a proverbial saying.Note 179 · conceit idea.Note 180 · I’ll be with thee to bring... in this phrase—of which Dyce says that no satisfactory explanation has been given—“to bring,” has apparently t Note 181 · little whiting-mop young whiting.Note 182 · a Sir John a priest.Note 183 · queasy squeamish.Note 184 · fore-speaking bewitching; or, possibly, prophesying.—Halliwell.Note 185 · ’recting a figure the practice of astrology.Note 186 · Erra Pater usually the name of a certain mythical astrologer of the “Wandering Jew” type; sometimes, however, as here, applied to an almanac Note 187 · Statute of Winchester the celebrated Statute passed in 1285: to what clause in the Statute reference is made is not clear.Note 188 · cutting Dick a bully of the time: “cutting” often has the sense of “swaggering.”Note 189 · sad serious.Note 190 · be with you i.e. God be with you.Note 191 · the Counter there were two prisons of this name, one in Wood Street, the other in the Poultry.Note 192 · tasted her tested her disposition.Note 193 · Jack Drum’s entertainment “Tom or John Drum’s Entertainment, a phrase signifying ill-treatment, or turning an unwelcome guest out of doors.”Note 194 · Sir Boniface “sir” was applied to all University men who had taken their B.A. degree.Note 195 · nidgets idiots.Note 196 · no bones i.e. no difficulties.Note 197 · ready with a wet finger i.e. with as much ease as any light substance is caught up by moistening one’s finger.Note 198 · catched a clap met with a mischance.Note 199 · common gossips sponsors.Note 200 · tell count over.Note 201 · pocas palabras “few words.”Note 202 · murrey a dark red colour.—Halliwell.Note 203 · play at hoodman-blind blind man’s buff.Note 204 · in a woe sorrowful.Note 205 · bobbed tricked.Note 206 · fitters pieces.Note 207 · a toy whim.Note 208 · choke-pear ... popering a pear brought from Poperingues in Flanders; the choke-pear was a coarse variety.Note 209 · cope chop or exchange.Note 210 · the woman killed with kindness an obvious allusion to Heywood’s own masterpiece.Note 211 · Bristowe stone more usually called a “Bristol diamond.”Note 212 · branched figured.Note 213 · limit i.e. appoint.Note 214 · I was, sir, of Peterhouse there is a tradition that Heywood himself was a Fellow of Peterhouse, Cambridge.Note 215 · I proceeded in Oxford i.e. to his degree, his college, as he tells us, being Brazenose.Note 216 · Genes Genoese.Note 217 · Lusty Juventus there is an old interlude entitled Lusty Juventus, printed about the year 1560.Note 218 · St. George’s Fields ... Tuttle, Finsbury he mentions three well-known duelling resorts.Note 219 · Stafford law “he has had a trial in Stafford Court” was a way of saying “he has been beaten or ill-treated,” Cotgrave. Florio uses the expre Note 220 · apply thou defend yourself.Note 221 · i.e. much good may it do you!Note 222 · beso las manus kiss the hands.Note 223 · Sir Pandarus Pandarus was the prince of go-betweens; hence the word “pander.”Note 224 · colour excuse.Note 225 · brock a term of contempt; a brock is a badger.Note 226 · Cheap Cross at Cheapside, with a statue of the Virgin on it. It was removed in 1643, by Puritan influence, on account of the reverence which Note 227 · take me with you i.e. let me understand.Note 228 · jack crafty fellow.Note 229 · It is to be understood that the occupants of the various inner rooms see and hear all that transpires between Young Chartley and Luce withou Note 230 · Is not a speech lost here?Note 231 · i.e. on pain of losing his blessing.Note 232 · makes legs bows.Note 233 · balm the consecrated oil used at coronations. Shakespeare has the expression: “’Tis not the balm, the sceptre and the ball.”Note 234 · be countant i.e. held accountant.Note 235 · estates nobles.Note 236 · humorously oddly.Note 237 · mome blockhead.Note 238 · laugh, Democritus the laughing philosopher of Abdera:Note 239 · curst shrewish.Note 240 · “Rome” was pronounced like “room.”Note 241 · generously of such noble blood.Note 242 · he was: by power divine the old editions miss the point by reading “he was by power divine.”Note 243 · coach-naves wheels, properly part of the axle.Note 244 · timeless untimely. This passage is corrupt.Note 245 · sparkled scattered.Note 246 · trifurk three-forked.Note 247 · rubs obstacles: originally a term used at the game of bowls.Note 248 · ballater maker of ballads Note 249 · sansing bell i.e. sanctus bell.Note 250 · moe more; i.e. others.Note 251 · lose waste.Note 252 · the water that God Mercury makes i.e. a cosmetic lotion containing mercury.Note 253 · being taken with the manner caught in the act. Cowel says, “manner or mainour denotes the thing that a thief taketh or stealeth.”Note 254 · doom decree.Note 255 · prevent forestall.Note 256 · buckle contend.Note 257 · traversed thoroughly examined.Note 258 · attaint accusation.Note 259 · topping lopping off.Note 260 · where i.e. whereas.Note 261 · suburbians the suburbs of London were formerly the chief resort of loose women.Note 262 · holly holy.Note 263 · hatchel heckle or dress.Note 264 · with Duke Humphrey dine i.e. not dine at all. “This phrase is said to have arisen from part of the public walks in Old St. Paul’s called Duk Note 265 · hey ho a favourite ballad-burden.Note 266 · cocket pert.Note 267 · Attalia Heywood was probably thinking of Horace’s Attalicæ condiciones.Note 268 · pounded i.e. penned up.Note 269 · upse freeze strong beer, imported from Friesland: hence to drink upse freeze was to drink hard.Note 270 · tassaker from tasse? Hence a cup or goblet.Note 271 · manage management.Note 272 · lavoltoes a dance in the course of which the woman, after being turned round several times, sprang up as high as she could with her partner’Note 273 · wheel i.e. a spinning-wheel.Note 274 · rebatoes i.e. turn your ruffs into loose collars.Note 275 · frontlets forehead-bands.Note 276 · rails short mantles.Note 277 · billements head and neck ornaments.Note 278 · bongraces shades to preserve the complexion.Note 279 · There is no dash in the original; the singer evidently substituted the refrain for the omitted word.Note 280 · This song also occurs in Heywood’s Challenge for Beauty.Note 281 · cony-wool rabbit skin.Note 282 · shag rough hair.Note 283 · monmouth a kind of flat cap.Note 284 · chapine chapines were shoes with very high soles, worn by ladies to make them look tall.Note 285 · humorous damp.Note 286 · stars i.e. candles.Note 287 · tread not too hard for disturbing i.e. lest you should disturb.Note 288 · staves-acre a kind of larkspur used to kill lice.Note 289 · opinion reputation.Note 290 · defend forbid.Note 291 · uncrazed unbroken.Note 292 · mechal adulterous.Note 293 · stare starling.Note 294 · to my death to fall to let fall, as often to be found in Shakespeare.Note 295 · infinite i.e. infinite numbers.Note 296 · buckler defend.Note 297 · battle battalion.Note 298 · tire tear, like a beast or bird of prey.Note 299 · bulk body.Note 300 · constant resolute.Note 301 · snaky “snake” was often used as a term of contempt.Note 302 · single monomachy “single monomachy” is rather an absurd pleonasm.Note 303 · garboils tumults.Note 304 · with one scorns i.e. that scorns.Note 305 · rock-sampier samphire.