Her. You shall hear me sing another. Now will I begin.* Gal. We shall do this gentleman's banquet too much wrong, that stays for us, ladies. Jul. 'Tis true; and well thought on, Cornelius Gallus. Her. Why, 'tis but a short air, 'twill be done presently, pray stay: strike, music. Ovid. No, good Hermogenes; we'll end this difference within. Jul. 'Tis the common disease of all your musicians, that they know no mean, to be entreated either to begin or end. Alb. Please you lead the way, gentles. [Exeunt all but Albius. Alb. O, what a charm of thanks was here put upon me! O Jove, what a setting forth it is to a man to have many courtiers come to his house! Sweetly was it said of a good old house-keeper, I had rather want meat, than want guests; especially if they be courtly guests. For, never trust me, if one of their good legs made in a house be not worth all the good cheer a man can make them. He that would have fine guests, let him have a fine wife; he that would have a fine wife, let him come to me. 2 Now will I begin.) The character of Hermogenes is drawn with great pleasantry by Horace, and Jonson has embodied his description very successfully: his insolence, vanity, affectation, and capriciousness are distinctly placed before the reader. The outlines, and merely the outlines, of the elegant song in the text, Ben found in Martial, as Whalley observes; the filling up is his own. "Qualem, Flacce, velim quæris, nolimve puellam? L. 1. ep. 58. 3 'Tis the common disease, &c.] With this observation Horace introduces his character of Hermogenes: " Omnibus hoc vitium est cantoribus, inter amicos Re-enter CRISPINUS. Cris. By your kind leave, master Albius. Alb. What, you are not gone, master Crispinus? Cris. Yes, faith, I have a design draws me hence: pray, sir, fashion me an excuse to the ladies. Alb. Will you not stay and see the jewels, sir? I pray you stay. Cris. Not for a million, sir, now. Let it suffice, I must relinquish; and so, in a word, please you to expiate this compliment. Alb. Mum. [Exit. Cris. I'll presently go and enghle some broker for a poet's gown, and bespeak a garland: and then, jeweller, look to your best jewel, i'faith. [Exit. + I'll presently go and enghle some broker for a poet's gown,」 This word, the modern angle, is used with some latitude by our old poets; in general, however, it means to cheat, to impose upon, to draw in, as here-the substantive is always taken in a bad sense, sometimes for a bait thrown out, and sometimes for a person deceived by it; simply, for a dupe, a gull, a master Stephen. Hanmer derives enghle from the Fr. engluer, and Steevens, from inveigle: both are mistaken, however: it comes from a Saxon, or, if the reader likes it better, an old English word, signifying to suspend or hang, which is but another mode of spelling it. Now I am advanced thus far, I will just observe that the commentators have made strange work of a passage in Shakspeare, for want of understanding the import of this term: ACT III. SCENE I. 5 The Via Sacra, (or Holy Street.) Enter HORACE, CRISPINUS following. Hor. Umph! yes, I will begin an ode so; and it shall be to Mecænas. Cris. 'Slid, yonder's Horace! they say he's an excellent poet: Mecenas loves him. I'll fall "O, master, master, I have watch'd so long, Angel can have no sense here, for, if a messenger be meant by it, as the critics say, this ancient personage could never be mistaken for one, by any body. Theobald and Warburton read Engle, meaning, perhaps, a native of the north of Europe; Steevens writes about it, and about it, and says nothing; and Malone leaves the passage in obscurity. Hanmer however, reads enghle, and this, I have no doubt, was the very word which Shakspeare, amidst all the uncertainty of his orthography, meant to use. What Tranio wanted, was a simpleton, a man fit to be imposed upon by a seigned tale; and such a one, Biondello, after a tedious search, presumes that he has discovered. But why does he form this conclusion? This is not even guessed at by the critics. It is pretty clearly hinted at, however, in the old comedy of the Supposes, from which Shakspeare took this part of his plot. There Erostrato, the Biondello of Shakspeare, looks out for a person to gull by an ille story, judges from appearances, that he has found him, and is not deceived: "At the foot of the hill I met a gentleman, and, as methought, by his habits and his looks, he should be none of the wisest." Again, " this gentleman being, as I guessed at the first, a man of small sapientia." And Dulippo, (the Lucentio of Shakspeare,) as soon as he spies him coming, exclaims, " Is this he? go meet him: by my troth, he looks like a good soul, he that fisheth for him might be sure to catch a codshead." A. II. S. 1. into his acquaintance, if I can; I think he be composing as he goes in the street! ha! 'tis a good humour, if he be: I'll compose too. Hor. Swell me a bowl with lusty wine, Till I may see the plump Lyæus swim I drink as I would write, 6 In flowing measure fill'd with flame and sprite. Cris. Sweet Horace, Minerva and the Muses stand auspicious to thy designs! How farest thou, sweet man? frolic? rich? gallant? ha! Hor. Not greatly gallant, sir; like my fortunes, well: I am bold to take my leave, sir; you'll nought else, sir, would you? Cris. Troth, no, but I could wish thou didst know us, Horace; we are a scholar, I assure thee. Hor. A scholar, sir! I shall be covetous of your fair knowledge. Cris. Gramercy, good Horace. Nay, we are new turn'd poet too, which is more; and a satirist too, which is more than that: I write just in thy vein, I. I am for your odes, or your sermons,' or any thing indeed; we are a gentleman besides; our name is Rufus Laberius Crispinus; we are a pretty Stoic too. These are the passages which our great poet had in view; and these, I trust, are more than sufficient to explain why Biondello concludes at first sight, that this " ancient piece of formality" will serve his turn. From his being constantly termed a pedant, it is probable that he was dressed in a long stuff gown, which is the invariable costume of a schoolmaster; the object of incessant ridicule in the old Italian comedy, from whom we borrowed him. "I was often," says Montaigne, "when a boy, wonderfully concerned to see, in the Italian farce, a pedant always brought in as the fool of the play." Vol. I. p. 190. 5 The Via Sacra, &c. This scene is little more than a translation of Hor. Lib. 1. Sat. ix. It is far from ill done; and yet, methinks, Jonson might have found a happier method of introducing himself.. 6 Swell me a bowl with lusty wine, Decker attempts to ridicule this little ode, but without success: It is easy to parody any thing into nonsense; but to make the public believe that it comes from such men as Jonson, when it is done, exceeds the powers of a hundred Deckers. This is some consolation. Hor. To the proportion of your beard, I think it, sir. Cris. By Phœbus, here's a most neat, fine street, is't not? I protest to thee, I am enamoured of this street now, more than of half the streets of Rome again; 'tis so polite, and terse! there's the front of a building now! I study architecture too: if ever I should build, I'd have a house just of that prospective. Hor. Doubtless, this gallant's tongue has a good turn, when he sleeps. [Aside. Cris. I do make verses, when I come in such a street as this: O, your city ladies, you shall have them sit in every shop like the Muses-offering you the Castalian dews, and the Thespian liquors, to as many as have but the sweet grace and audacity to-sip of their lips. Did you never hear any of my verses? now. Hor. No, sir; -but I am in some fear I must [Aside. Cris. I'll tell thee some, if I can but recover them, I composed even now of a dressing I saw a jeweller's wife wear, who indeed was a jewel herself: I prefer that kind of tire now; what's thy opinion, Horace? Hor. With your silver bodkin, it does well, sir. 7 I am for your odes, or your sermons,] This is a barbarous version of sermones, which, Horace modestly applies to his Satires, on account of the approaches which the diction of them makes to familiar discourse. * I prefer that kind of tire now ;] i. e. head-dress. Crispinus shews his taste here: the hair neatly twisted and confined at |