Gifford’s theory that ladies had some mode of displaying their garters is contradicted by the following:
Cf. also Cynthia’s Revels, Wks. 2. 296.
2. 5. 14 her owne deare reflection, in her glasse. ‘They must haue their looking glasses caryed with them wheresoeuer they go, ... no doubt they are the deuils spectacles to allure vs to pride, and consequently to distruction for euer.’—Stubbes, Anat., Part 1, P. 79.
2. 6. 21 and done the worst defeate vpon my selfe. Defeat is often used by Shakespeare in this sense. See Schmidt, and compare Hamlet 2. 2. 598:
2. 6. 32 a body intire. Cf. 5. 6. 48.
2. 6. 35 You make me paint. Gifford quotes from the Two Noble Kinsmen:
2. 6. 37 SN. ‘Whoever has noticed the narrow streets or rather lanes of our ancestors, and observed how story projected beyond story, till the windows of the upper rooms almost touched on different sides, will easily conceive the feasibility of everything which takes place between Wittipol and his mistress, though they make their appearance in different houses.’—G.
I cannot believe that Jonson wished to represent the two houses as on opposite sides of the street. He speaks of them as ‘contiguous’, which would naturally mean side by side. Further than this, one can hardly imagine even in the ‘narrow lanes of our ancestors’ so close a meeting that the liberties mentioned in 2. 6. 76 SN. could be taken.
2. 6. 53 A strange woman. In Bart. Fair, Wks. 4. 395, Justice Overdo says: ‘Rescue this youth here out of the hands of the lewd man and the strange woman.’ Gifford explains in a note: ‘The scripture phrase for an immodest woman, a prostitute. Indeed this acceptation of the word is familiar to many languages. It is found in the Greek; and we have in Terence—pro uxore habere hanc peregrinam: upon which Donatus remarks, hoc nomine etiam meretrices nominabantur.’
2. 6. 57-113 WIT. No, my tune-full Mistresse? etc. This very important passage is the basis of Fleay’s theory of identification discussed in section D. IV. of the Introduction. The chief passages necessary for comparison are quoted below.
A CELEBRATION OF CHARIS:
In Ten Lyric Pieces.
V.
His Discourse with Cupid.
UNDERWOODS XXXVI.
AN ELEGY.
THE GIPSIES METAMORPHOSED
The Lady Purbeck’s Fortune, by the
From
A CHALLENGE AT TILT,
At a Marriage.
In the above passages the chief correspondences to be noted are as follows:
1. Ch. 5. 17; U. 36. 3-4; Challenge 6. Cf. also Ch. 9. 17:
2. Ch. 5. 25-6; U. 36. 9-10; DA. 2. 6. 86-7; Gipsies 17-8; Challenge 8.
3. Ch. 5. 21-2; U. 36. 7-8; DA. 2. 6. 82-3; Gipsies 15-6; Challenge 5-6.
4. Ch. 5. 41; Challenge 9-10.
5. U. 36. 5-6; DA. 2. 6. 77-82; Challenge 17-8. Cf. also Ch. 9. 9-12:
6. U. 36. 21; DA. 1. 6. 132.
7· U. 36. 1-2; Gipsies 13-4; Challenge 5.
8. U. 36. 22-3; DA. 2. 6. 64-5
9. DA. 2. 6. 84-5; Ch. 9. 19-20:
10. Gipsies 19-20; Ch. 1. 23-4:
2. 6. 72 These sister-swelling brests. ‘This is an elegant and poetical rendering of the sororiantes mammae of the Latins, which Festus thus explains: Sororiare puellarum mammae dicuntur, cum primum tumescunt.’—G.
2. 6. 76 SN. ‘Liberties very similar to these were, in the poet’s time, permitted by ladies, who would have started at being told that they had foregone all pretensions to delicacy.’—G.
The same sort of familiarity is hinted at in Stubbes, Anatomy of Abuses (Part 1, p. 78). Furnivall quotes Histriomastix (Simpson’s School of Shak. 2. 50) and Vindication of Top Knots, Bagford Collection, 1. 124, in illustration of the subject. Gosson’s Pleasant Quippes (1595) speaks of ‘these naked paps, the Devils ginnes.’ Cf. also Cyn. Rev., Wks. 2. 266, and Case is A., Wks. 6. 330. It seems to have been a favorite subject of attack at the hands of both Puritans and dramatists.
2. 6. 76 Downe to this valley. Jonson uses a similar figure in Cyn. Rev., Wks. 2. 240 and in Charis (see note 2. 6. 57).
2. 6. 78 these crisped groues. So Milton, Comus, 984: ‘Along the crisped shades and bowers.’ Herrick, Hesper., Cerem. Candlemas-Eve: ‘The crisped yew.’
2. 6. 85 well torn’d. Jonson’s usual spelling. See Timber, ed. Schelling, 64. 33; 76. 22. etc.
2. 6. 85 Billyard ball. Billiards appears to have been an out-of-door game until the sixteenth century. It was probably introduced into England from France. See J. A. Picton, N. & Q.. 5. 5. 283. Jonson uses this figure again in Celeb. Charis 9. 19-20.
2. 6. 92 when I said, a glasse could speake, etc. Cf. 1. 6. 80 f.
2. 6. 100 And from her arched browes, etc. Swinburne says of this line: ‘The wheeziest of barrel-organs, the most broken-winded of bagpipes, grinds or snorts out sweeter music than that.’—Study of Ben Jonson, p. 104.
2. 6. 104 Have you seene. Sir John Suckling (ed. 1874, p. 79) imitates this stanza:
2. 6. 104 a bright Lilly grow. The figures of the lily, the snow, and the swan’s down have already been used in The Fox, Wks. 3. 195. The source of that passage is evidently Martial, Epig. 1. 115:
In this place Jonson seems to have more particularly in mind Epig. 5. 37:
2. 7. 2, 3 that Wit of man will doe’t. There is evidently an ellipsis of some sort before that (cf. Abbott, §284). Perhaps ‘provided’ is to be understood.
2. 7. 4 She shall no more be buz’d at. The metaphor is carried out in the words that follow, sweet meates 5, hum 6, flye-blowne 7. ‘Fly-blown’ was a rather common term of opprobrium. Cf. Dekker, Satiromastix, Wks. 1. 195: ‘Shal distaste euery vnsalted line, in their fly-blowne Comedies.’ Jonson is very fond of this metaphor, and presses it beyond all endurance in New Inn, Act 2. Sc. 2, Wks. 5. 344, 5, etc.
2. 7. 13 I am resolu’d on’t, Sir. See variants. Gifford points out the quibble on the word resolved. See Gloss.
2. 7. 17 O! I could shoote mine eyes at him. Cf. Fox, Wks. 3. 305: ‘That I could shoot mine eyes at him, like gun-stones!’
2. 7. 22. See variants. The the is probably absorbed by the preceding dental. Cf. 5. 7. 9.
2. 7. 33 fine pac’d huishers. See note 4. 4. 201.
2. 7. 38 turn’d my good affection. ‘Not diverted or changed its course; but, as appears from what follows, soured it. The word is used in a similar sense by Shakespeare:
2. 8. 9, 10 That was your bed-fellow. Ingine, perhaps in anticipation of Fitzdottrel’s advancement, employs a term usually applied to the nobility. Cf. K. Henry V. 2. 2. 8:
Steevens in a note on the passage points out that the familiar appellation of bedfellow, which appears strange to us, was common among the ancient nobility.’ He quotes from A Knack to know a Knave, 1594; Look about you, 1600; Cynthia’s Revenge, 1613; etc., where the expression is used in the sense of ‘intimate companion’ and applied to nobles. Jonson uses the term chamberfellow in Underwoods, Wks. 8. 353.
2. 8. 20 An Academy. With this passage compare U. 62, Wks. 8. 412:
Jonson again refers to ‘the Academies’ (apparently schools of deportment or dancing schools) in 3. 5. 33.
2. 8. 33 Oracle-Foreman. See note 1. 2. 2.
2. 8. 59 any thing takes this dottrel. See note 2. 2. 49-50.
2. 8. 64 Dicke Robinson. Collier says: ‘This player may have been an original actor in some of Shakespeare’s later dramas, and he just outlived the complete and final suppression of the stage.’ His death and the date at which it occurred have been matters of dispute.
His earliest appearance in any list of actors is at the end of Jonson’s Catiline, 1611, with the King’s Majesty’s Servants. He was probably the youngest member of the company, and doubtless sustained a female part. Gifford believes that he took the part of Wittipol in the present play, though this is merely a conjecture. ‘The only female character he is known to have filled is the lady of Giovanus in The Second Maiden’s Tragedy, but at what date is uncertain; neither do we know at what period he began to represent male characters.’ Of the plays in which he acted, Collier mentions Beaumont and Fletcher’s Bonduca, Double Marriage, Wife for a Month, and Wild Goose Chase (1621); and Webster’s Duchess of Malfi, 1622.
His name is found in the patent granted by James I. in 1619 and in that granted by Charles I. in 1625. Between 1629 and 1647 no notice of him occurs, and this is the last date at which we hear of him. ‘His name follows that of Lowin in the dedication to the folio of Beaumont and Fletcher’s works, published at that time.’—Collier, Memoirs, p. 268.
Jonson not infrequently refers to contemporary actors. Compare the Epitaph on Salathiel Pavy, Ep. 120; the speech of Venus in The Masque of Christmas, Wks. 7. 263; and the reference to Field and Burbage in Bart. Fair 5. 3.
2. 8. 73 send frolicks! ‘Frolics are couplets, commonly of an amatory or satirical nature, written on small slips of paper, and wrapt round a sweetmeat. A dish of them is usually placed on the table after supper, and the guests amuse themselves with sending them to one another, as circumstances seem to render them appropriate: this is occasionally productive of much mirth. I do not believe that the game is to be found in England; though the drawing on Twelfth Night may be thought to bear some kind of coarse resemblance to it. On the continent I have frequently been present at it.’—G.
The NED. gives only one more example, from R. H. Arraignm. Whole Creature XIV. § 2. 244 (1631) ‘Moveable as Shittlecockes ... or as Frolicks at Feasts, sent from man to man, returning againe at last, to the first man.’
2. 8. 74, 5 burst your buttons, or not left you seame. Cf. Bart. Fair, Wks. 4. 359: ‘he breaks his buttons, and cracks seams at every saying he sobs out.’
2. 8. 95, 103. See variants.
2. 8. 100 A Forrest moues not. ‘I suppose Trains means, “It is in vain to tell him of venison and pheasant, the right to the bucks in a whole forest will not move him.”’—C.
2. 8. 100 that forty pound. See 3. 3. 148.
2. 8. 102 your bond Of Sixe; and Statute of eight hundred! I. e., of six, and eight hundred pounds. ‘Statutes merchant, statutes staple, and recognizances in the nature of a statute staple were acknowledgements of debt made in writing before officers appointed for that purpose, and enrolled of record. They bound the lands of the debtor; and execution was awarded upon them upon default in payment without the ordinary process of an action. These securities were originally introduced for the encouragement of trade, by providing a sure and speedy remedy for the recovery of debts between merchants, and afterwards became common assurances, but have now become obsolete.’—S. M. Leake, Law of Contracts, p. 95.
Two of Pecunia’s attendants in The Staple of News are Statute and Band (i. e. Bond, see U. 34). The two words are often mentioned together. In Dekker’s Bankrouts Banquet (Non-dram. Wks. 3. 371) statutes are served up to the bankrupts.
Trains is evidently trying to impress Fitzdottrel with the importance of Merecraft’s transactions.
ACT III.
3. 1. 8 Innes of Court. ‘The four Inns of Court, Gray’s Inn, Lincoln’s Inn, the Inner, and the Middle Temple, have alone the right of admitting persons to practise as barristers, and that rank can only be attained by keeping the requisite number of terms as a student at one of those Inns.’—Wh-C.
Jonson dedicates Every Man out of his Humor ‘To the Noblest Nurseries of Humanity and Liberty in the Kingdom, the Inns of Court.’
3. 1. 10 a good man. Gifford quotes Merch. of Ven. 1. 3. 15: ‘My meaning in saying he is a good man, is, to have you understand me, that he is sufficient.’ Marston, Dutch Courtesan, Wks. 2. 57. uses the word in the same sense.
3. 1. 20 our two Pounds, the Compters. The London Compters or Counters were two sheriff’s prisons for debtors, etc., mentioned as early as the 15th century. In Jonson’s day they were the Poultry Counter and the Wood Street Counter. They were long a standing joke with the dramatists, who seem to speak from a personal acquaintance with them. Dekker (Roaring Girle, Wks. 3. 189) speaks of ‘Wood Street College,’ and Middleton (Phoenix, Wks. 1. 192) calls them ‘two most famous universities’ and in another place ‘the two city hazards, Poultry and Wood Street.’ Jonson in Every Man in (Wks. 1. 42) speaks of them again as ‘your city pounds, the counters’, and in Every man out refers to the ‘Master’s side’ (Wks. 2. 181) and the ‘two-penny ward,’ the designations for the cheaper quarters of the prison.
3. 1. 35 out of rerum natura. In rerum natura is a phrase used by Lucretius 1. 25. It means, according to the Stanford Dictionary, ‘in the nature of things, in the physical universe.’ In some cases it is practically equivalent to ‘in existence.’ Cf. Sil. Wom., Wks. 3. 382: ‘Is the bull, bear, and horse, in rerum natura still?’
3. 2. 12 a long vacation. The long vacation in the Inns of Court, which Jonson had in mind, lasts from Aug. 13 to Oct. 23. In Staple of News, Wks. 5. 170, he makes a similar thrust at the shop-keepers:
3. 2. 22 I bought Plutarch’s liues. T. North’s famous translation first appeared in 1579. New editions followed in 1595, 1603, 1610-12, and 1631.
3. 2. 33 Buy him a Captaines place. The City Train Bands were a constant subject of ridicule for the dramatists. They are especially well caricatured by Fletcher in The Knight of the Burning Pestle, Act 5. In addition to the City Train Bands, the Fraternity of Artillery, now called The Honorable Artillery Company, formed a separate organization. The place of practice was the Artillery Garden in Bunhill Fields (see note 3. 2. 41). In spite of ridicule the Train Bands proved a source of strength during the Civil War (see Clarendon, Hist. of the Rebellion, ed. 1826, 4. 236 and Wh-C., Artillery Ground).
Jonson was fond of poking fun at the Train Bands. Cf. U. 62, Wks. 8. 409; Ev. Man in, Wks. 1. 88; and Alchemist, Wks. 4. 13. Face, it will be remembered, had been ‘translated suburb-captain’ through Subtle’s influence.
The immediate occasion of Jonson’s satire was doubtless the revival of military enthusiasm in 1614, of which Entick (Survey 2. 115) gives the following account:
‘The military genius of the Londoners met with an opportunity, about this time, to convince the world that they still retained the spirit of their forefathers, should they be called out in the cause of their king and country. His majesty having commanded a general muster of the militia throughout the kingdom, the city of London not only mustered 6000 citizens completely armed, who performed their several evolutions with surprizing dexterity; but a martial spirit appeared amongst the rising generation. The children endeavoured to imitate their parents; chose officers, formed themselves into companies, marched often into the fields with colours flying and beat of drums, and there, by frequent practice, grew up expert in the military exercises.’
3. 2. 35 Cheapside. Originally Cheap, or West Cheap, a street between the Poultry and St. Paul’s, a portion of the line from Charing Cross to the Royal Exchange, and from Holborn to the Bank of England.
‘At the west end of this Poultrie and also of Buckles bury, beginneth the large street of West Cheaping, a market-place so called, which street stretcheth west till ye come to the little conduit by Paule’s Gate.’—Stow, ed. Thoms, p. 99.
The glory of Cheapside was Goldsmith’s Row (see note 3. 5. 2). It was also famous in early times for its ‘Ridings,’ and during Jonson’s period for its ‘Cross,’ its ‘Conduit,’ and its ‘Standard’ (see note 1. 1. 56 and Wh—C.).
3. 2. 35 Scarfes. ‘Much worn by knights and military officers in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.’—Planché.
3. 2. 35 Cornehill. Cornhill, between the Poultry and Leadenhall Street, an important portion of the greatest thoroughfare in the world, was, says Stow, ‘so called of a corn market time out of mind there holden.’ In later years it was provided with a pillory and stocks, a prison, called the Tun, for street offenders, a conduit of ‘sweet water’, and a standard. See Wh-C.
3. 2. 38 the posture booke. A book descriptive of military evolutions, etc. H. Peacham’s Compleat Gentleman, 1627 (p. 300, quoted by Wheatley, Ev. Mall in), gives a long list of ‘Postures of the Musquet’ and G. Markham’s Souldier’s Accidence gives another. Cf. Tale Tub, Wks. 6. 218:
3. 2. 41 Finsbury. In 1498, ‘certain grounds, consisting of gardens, orchards, &c. on the north side of Chiswell-street, and called Bunhill or Bunhill-fields, within the manor of Finsbury, were by the mayor and commonalty of London, converted into a large field, containing 11 acres, and 11 perches, now known by the name of the Artillery-ground, for their train-bands, archers, and other military citizens, to exercise in.’—Entick, Survey 1. 441.
In 1610 the place had become neglected, whereupon commissioners were appointed to reduce it ‘into such order and state for the archers as they were in the beginning of the reign of King Henry VIII.’ (Ibid. 2. 109). See also Stow, Survey, ed. Thoms, p. 159.
Dekker (Shomaker’s Holiday, Wks. 1. 29) speaks of being ‘turnd to a Turk, and set in Finsburie for boyes to shoot at’, and Nash (Pierce Pennilesse, Wks. 2. 128) and Jonson (Bart. Fair, Wks. 4. 507) make precisely similar references. Master Stephen in Every Man in (Wks. 1. 10) objects to keeping company with the ‘archers of Finsbury.’ Cf. also the elaborate satire in U. 62, (Wks. 8. 409).
3. 2. 45 to traine the youth
Of London, in the military truth. Cf. Underwoods 62:
Gifford believes these lines to be taken from a contemporary posture-book, but there is no evidence of quotation in the case of Underwoods.
3. 3. 22, 3 This comes of wearing
Scarlet, gold lace, and cut-works! etc.
Webster has a passage very similar to this in the
Devil’s Law Case, Wks. 2. 37 f.:
For ‘cut-works’ see note 1. 1. 128.
3. 3. 24 With your blowne roses. Compare 1. 1. 127, and B. & Fl., Cupid’s Revenge:
and Jonson, Ep. 97, Wks. 8. 201:
3. 3. 25 Godwit. The godwit was formerly in great repute as a table delicacy. Thomas Muffett in Health’s Improvement, p. 99, says: ‘A fat godwit is so fine and light meat, that noblemen (yea, and merchants too, by your leave) stick not to buy them at four nobles a dozen.’
Cf. also Sir T. Browne, Norf. Birds, Wks., 1835, 4. 319: God-wyts ... accounted the daintiest dish in England; and, I think, for the bigness of the biggest price.’ Jonson mentions the godwit in this connection twice in the Sil. Wom. (Wks. 3. 350 and 388), and in Horace, Praises of a Country Life (Wks. 9. 121) translates ‘attagen Ionicus’ by ‘Ionian godwit.’
3. 3. 26 The Globes, and Mermaides! Theatres and taverns. Mr. Halliwell-Phillipps has proved that the Globe Theatre on the Bankside, Southwark, the summer theatre of Shakespeare and his fellows, was built in 1599. It was erected from materials brought by Richard Burbage and Peter Street from the theatre in Shoreditch. On June 29, 1613, it was destroyed by fire, but was rebuilt without delay in a superior style, and this time with a roof of tile, King James contributing to the cost. Chamberlaine, writing to Alice Carleton (June 30, 1614), calls the Globe Playhouse ‘the fairest in England.’ It was pulled down Apr. 15, 1644.
Only the Lord Chamberlain’s Company (the King’s Men) seems to have acted here. It was the scene of several of Shakespeare’s plays and two of Jonson’s, Every Man out and Every Man in (Halliwell-Phillips, Illustrations, p. 43). The term ‘summer theatre’ is applicable only to the rebuilt theatre (ibid., p. 44). In Ev. Man out (quarto, Wks. 2. 196) Johnson refers to ‘this fair-fitted Globe’, and in the Execration upon Vulcan (Wks. 8. 404) to the burning of the ‘Globe, the glory of the Bank.’ In Poetaster (Wks. 2. 430) he uses the word again as a generic term: ‘your Globes, and your Triumphs.’
There seem to have been two Mermaid Taverns, one of which stood in Bread Street with passage entrances from Cheapside and Friday Street, and the other in Cornhill. They are often referred to by the dramatists. Cf. the famous lines written by Francis Beaumont to Ben Jonson, B. & Fl., Wks., ed. 1883, 2. 708; City Match, O. Pl. 9. 334, etc. Jonson often mentions the Mermaid. Cf. Inviting a Friend, Wks. 8. 205:
On the famous Voyage, Wks. 8. 234:
Bart. Fair, Wks. 4. 356-7: ‘your Three Cranes, Mitre, and Mermaid-men!’
3. 3. 28 In veluet! Velvet was introduced into England in the fifteenth century, and soon became popular as an article of luxury (see Hill’s Hist. of Eng. Dress 1. 145 f.).
3. 3. 30 I’ the Low-countries. ‘Then went he to the Low Countries; but returning soone he betook himself to his wonted studies. In his service in the Low Countries, he had, in the face of both the campes, killed ane enemie and taken opima spolia from him.’—Conversations with William Drummond, Wks. 9. 388.
In the Epigram To True Soldiers Jonson says:
3. 3. 32 a wench of a stoter! See variants. The word is not perfectly legible in the folios, which I have consulted, but is undoubtedly as printed. Cunningham believes ‘stoter’ to be a cheap coin current in the camps. This supplies a satisfactory sense, corresponding to the ‘Sutlers wife, ... of two blanks’ in the following line.
3. 3. 33 of two blanks! ‘Jonson had Horace in his thoughts, and has, not without some ingenuity, parodied several loose passages of one of his satires.’—G. Gifford is apparently referring to the close of Bk. 2. Sat. 3.
3. 3. 51 vn-to-be-melted. Cf. Every Man in, Wks. 1. 36: ‘and in un-in-one-breath-utterable skill, sir.’ New Inn, Wks. 5. 404: you shewed a neglect Un-to-be-pardon’d.’
3. 3. 62 Master of the Dependances! See Introduction. pp. lvi, lvii.
3. 3. 69 the roaring manner. Gifford defines it as the ‘language of bullies affecting a quarrel’ (Wks. 4. 483). The ‘Roaring Boy’ continued under various designations to infest the streets of London from the reign of Elizabeth until the beginning of the eighteenth century. Spark (Somer’s Tracts 2. 266) says that they were persons prodigall and of great expence, who having runne themselves into debt, were constrained to run into factions to defend themselves from danger of the law.’ He adds that divers of the nobility afforded them maintenance, in return for which ‘they entered into many desperate enterprises.’
Arthur Wilson (Life of King James I., p. 28), writing of the disorderly state of the city in 1604, says: ‘Divers Sects of vitious Persons going under the Title of Roaring Boyes, Bravadoes, Roysters, &c. commit many insolences; the Streets swarm night and day with bloody quarrels, private Duels fomented,’ etc.
Kastril, the ‘angry boy’ in the Alchemist, and Val Cutting and Knockem in Bartholomew Fair are roarers, and we hear of them under the title of ‘terrible boys’ in the Silent Woman (Wks. 3. 349). Cf. also Sir Thomas Overbury’s Character of a Roaring Boy (ed. Morley, p. 72): ‘He sleeps with a tobacco-pipe in his mouth; and his first prayer in the morning is he may remember whom he fell out with over night.’
3. 3. 71 the vapours. This ridiculous practise is satirized in Bart. Fair, Wks. 4. 3 (see also stage directions).
3. 3. 77 a distast. The quarrel with Wittipol.
3. 3. 79 the hand-gout. Jonson explains the expression in Magnetic Lady, Wks. 6. 61.
Cf. also Overbury’s Characters, ed. Morley, p. 63: ‘his liberality can never be said to be gouty-handed.’
3. 3. 81 Mint. Until its removal to the Royal Mint on Tower Hill in 1810, the work of coinage was carried on in the Tower of London. Up to 1640, when banking arose, merchants were in the habit of depositing their bullion and cash in the Tower Mint, under guardianship of the Crown (see Wh-C. under Royal Mint, and History of Banking in all the Leading Nations, London, 1896, 2. 1).
3. 3. 86-8 let ... hazard. Merecraft seems to mean: ‘You are in no hurry. Pray therefore allow me to defer your business until I have brought opportune aid to this gentleman’s distresses at a time when his fortunes are in a hazardous condition.’ The pregnant use of the verb timing and the unusual use of the word terms for a period of time render the meaning peculiarly difficult.
3. 3. 106 a Businesse. This was recognized as the technical expression. Sir Thomas Overbury ridicules it in his Characters, ed. Morley, p. 72: ‘If any private quarrel happen among our great courtiers, he (the Roaring Boy) proclaims the business—that’s the word, the business—as if the united force of the Roman Catholics were making up for Germany.’ Jonson ridicules the use of the word in similar fashion in the Masque of Mercury Vindicated from the Alchemists.
3. 3. 133 hauings. Jonson uses the expression again in Ev. Man in, Wks. 1. 29, and Gipsies Met., Wks. 7. 364. It is also used in Muse’s Looking Glasse, O. Pl. 9. 175.
3. 3. 147 such sharks! Shift in Ev. Man in is described as a ‘threadbare shark.’ Cf. also Earle, Microcosmography, ed. Morley, p. 173.
3. 3. 148 an old debt of forty. See 2. 8. 100.
3. 3. 149 the Bermudas. See note 2. 1. 144. Nares thinks that the real Bermudas are referred to here.
3. 3. 155 You shall ha’ twenty pound on’t. As Commission on the two hundred. ‘Ten in the hundred’ was the customary rate at this period (see Staple of News, Wks. 5. 189).
3. 3. 165 St. Georges-tide? From a very early period the 23d of April was dedicated to St. George. From the time of Henry V. The festival had been observed with great splendor at Windsor and other towns, and bonfires were built (see Shak, 1 Henry VI. 1. 1). The festival continued to be celebrated until 1567, when Elizabeth ordered its discontinuance. James I., however, kept the 23d of April to some extent, and the revival of the feast in all its glories was only prevented by the Civil War. So late as 1614 it was the custom for fashionable gentlemen to wear blue coats on St. George’s Day, probably in imitation of the blue mantle worn by the Knights of the Garter, an order created at the feast of St. George in 1344 (see Chambers’ Book of Days 1. 540).
The passages relating to this custom are Ram Alley, O. Pl., 2d ed., 5. 486: