Erecting figures in your rows of houses, planets, with respect to the several constellations. House, in astrology, is the twelfth part of the zodiac. 7 And taking in of shadows with a glass,] This mode of divination was very common in Jonson's time, and indeed long before and after it. What he calls the glass, was a globular crystal or berryl, into which the angels Uriel, Gabriel, &c. entered, and gave responses, as Lilly says, "in a voice, like the Irish, much in the throat." This, if it proves nothing else, will serve to shew that the Irish was the primitive language! Of all the various modes of imposture, this was at once, the most artful and the most impudent. It was usually conducted by confederacy, for the possessor of the glass seldom pretended to see the angels, or hear their answers. His part was to mumble over some incomprehensible prayers: after which a speculatrix, a virgin of a pure life, (for the angels were very delicate on this point,) was called in to inspect the crystal. "I was very familiar," Lilly says, "with one Sarah Skelhorn, who had been speculatrix to Arthur Gauntlet. This Sarah had a perfect sight, and indeed the best eyes for that purpose I ever yet did see. Sir Robert Holborn," he continues," brought me one Gladwell, of Suffolk, who had formerly had conference with Uriel and Raphael, but lost them both by carelessness. He would have given me two hundred pounds to have assisted him for their recovery, but I am no such man !"-Gladwell's berryl 66 was of the largeness of a good big orange, set in silver, with a cross on the top, and another on the handle, and round about engraved the names of these angels, Raphael, Gabriel, Uriel," &c. Lilly's Life, p. 150. 3 * Told in red letters,] i. e. says Upton, letters written in blood, —but he mistakes the whole sense of the passage. Instead of turning to Aristophanes, as he does upon the present occasion, he should have looked at some of our old song books, where he would have seen that those red letters were, as Whalley truly observes, the material parts of them tricked out in this manner to catch the eye of passengers. Rubric titles to ballads, stories, &c. were then to be seen upon every post. It is the knavery of Subtle, which Face threatens to put into red letters, with his figure (as the mauner was), printed at the top of the ballad, to put the subject of it out of all doubt. and a face cut for thee Worse than Gamaliel Ratsey's.] Gamaliel Ratsey was a Dol. Are you sound? Have you your senses, masters ? Face. I will have A book, but barely reckoning thy impostures, ters. Sub. Away, you trencher-rascal ! The vomit of all prisons- notorious highwayman, who always robbed in a mask, which In Ratseum, furem famosissimum. Tu brevibus Gyaris, Ratsee, dignus eras. O tu qui superes, si bacchanalia vivas, Ejusdem Sermo ad Socios, O Socii, (neque enim nos hi latuere dolores) Your own destructions, gentlemen? For lying too heavy on the basket.' Face. Bawd! Sub. Cow-herd! We are ruin'd, lost! have you no more regard To your reputations? where's your judgment? 'slight, Have yet some care of me, of your republic Face. Away, this brach! I'll bring thee, rogue, within 3 The statute of sorcery, tricesimo tertio Of Harry the eighth: ay, and perhaps, thy neck Within a noose, for laundring gold and barbing it.* Still spew'd out For lying too heavy on the basket.] i. e. for eating more than his share of the broken provisions collected, and sent in for the prisoners. This is mentioned by Shirley: "you shall howl all day at the grate for a meal at night from the basket." Bird in a Cage. WHAL. 2 Away, this brach !] "A mannerly name for a b—h,” as the old book on sports says. See Massinger, vol. i. 210. 3 I'll bring thee, rogue, within The statute of sorcery, &c.] By this statute, which Face has very accurately dated, all witchcraft and sorcery was declared to be felony without benefit of clergy. This was confirmed by the famous statute 1 Jac. I. c. 12. 4 For laundring gold and barbing it.] To launder gold is, probably, to wash it in aqua regia; a practice, it is to be feared, (while gold was,) not uncommon. This verb is not found in our dictionaries; though it is as regularly formed as the substantive, (laundress,) and seems altogether as necessary. Dol. [Snatches Face's sword.] You'll bring your head within a cockscomb, will you? And you, sir,with your menstrue-[dashes Subtle's vial out of his hand.]-gather it up.'Sdeath, you abominable pair of stinkards, Leave off your barking, and grow one again, Or, by the light that shines, I'll cut your throats. I'll not be made a prey unto the marshal, For ne'er a snarling dog-bolt of you both. Have you together cozen'd all this while, And all the world, and shall it now be said, You've made most courteous shift to cozen your selves? You will accuse him! you will bring him in [to Face. Within the statute! Who shall take your word? A whoreson, upstart, apocryphal captain, Whom not a Puritan in Blackfriers will trust So much as for a feather: and you, too, [to Subtle. Will give the cause, forsooth! you will insult, The venture tripartite? all things in common? Laundring occurs in Shakspeare; or in "one deformed that goes up and down under his name." "Laundring the silken figures in the brine That season'd woe had pelletted in tears!" A Lover's Complaint. Barbing is clipping. This is sufficiently obvious. This also was felony without benefit of clergy; so that Subtle was really in danger. 5 Whom not a Puritan in Blackfriers will trust So much as for a feather:] Blackfriers was celebrated for the residence of Puritans at this time; the principal dealers in feathers and other vanities of the age! This is noted by many of our old dramatists; but see vol. ii. p. 466. Without priority? 'Sdeath! you perpetual curs, Face. 'Tis his fault; He ever murmurs, and objects his pains, Dol. How does it? do not we Sustain our parts? Sub. Yes, but they are not equal. Dol. Why, if your part exceed to-day, I hope Ours may, to-morrow, match it. Sub. Ay, they may. Dol. May, murmuring mastiff! ay, and do. Death on me! Help me to throttle him. [Seizes Sub. by the throat. Sub. Dorothy! mistress Dorothy! 'Ods precious, I'll do any thing. What do you mean? Dol. Because o' your fermentation and cibation? Sub. Not I, by heaven Dol. Your Sol and Luna--help me. [to Face. 6 Because of your fermentation and cibation?] I trust tha the reader will not expect me to explain all the technical terms of this art. An adept himself, perhaps, would be puzzled by some of them; and I am a mere tyro. Fermentation is the sixth process in alchemy, and means the mutation of any substance into the nature of the ferment, after its primary qualities have been destroyed. Cibation (the seventh process) is feeding the matter in preparation, with fresh substances, to supply the waste of evaporation, &c. Sol and Luna, with which mistress Dorothea reproaches Subtle just below, are gold and silver; for in the cant of alchemy, nothing goes by its right name. |