[302] [Old copy, muddy.]

[303] [A very unusual phrase, which seems to be used here in the sense of masculine passions or properties.]

[304] In the old copy it stands thus—­

    “Yes, but I do:  I think not Isabel, Lord,
    The worse for any writing of Brunes.”

[In the MS. both Lord and Le were probably abbreviated into L., and hence the misprint, as well as misplacement, in the first line.]

[305] [i.e., You may count on her wealth as yours.  We now say to build on, but to build of was formerly not unusual.]

[306] See the notes of Dr Johnson, Steevens, and other commentators on the words in the “Comedy of Errors,” act ii. sc. 1—­“Poor I am but his stale.” [See also Dyce’s “Shakespeare Glossary,” 1868, in v.]

[307] The stage directions are often given very confusedly, and (taken by themselves) unintelligibly, in the old copy, of which this instance may serve as a specimen:  it stands thus in the 4to—­“Enter Fitzwater and his son Bruce, and call forth his daughter.”

[308] [A feeder of the Wye.  Lewis’s “Book of English Rivers,” 1855, p. 212.]

[309] Alluding most likely to the “Andria” of Terence, which had been translated [thrice] before this play was acted; the first time [in 1497, again about 1510, and the third time] by Maurice Kiffin in 1588. [The former two versions were anonymous.  See Hazlitt’s “Handbook,” p. 605.]

[310] Holidom or halidom, according to Minsheu (Dict. 1617), is “an old word used by old country-women, by manner of swearing by my halidome; of the Saxon word haligdome, ex halig, sanctum, and dome, dominium aut judicium.”  Shakespeare puts it into the mouth of the host in the “Two Gentlemen of Verona,” act iv. sc. 2.

[311] The entrance of Richmond clearly takes place here, but in the 4to he is said to come in with Leicester.

[312] [See Hazlitt’s “Proverbs,” p. 22.]

[313] [In the 4to and former editions this and the following nine words are given to Richmond.]

[314] Meaning that her father Fitzwater [takes her, she having declined to pair off with the king.] The whole account of the mask is confused in the old copy, and it is not easy to make it much more intelligible in the reprint.

[315] [The proverb is:  “There are more maids than Malkin.”  See Hazlitt’s “Proverbs,” p. 392.]

[316] [Old copy, Had.]

[317] This line will remind the reader of Shakespeare’s “multitudinous seas incarnardine,” in “Macbeth,” act ii. sc. 1.

[318] This answer unquestionably belongs to the king, and is not, as the 4to gives it, a part of what Leicester says.  It opens with an allusion to the crest of Leicester, similar to that noticed in the “Downfall of Robert Earl of Huntington.”

[319] [Old copy, by God’s.]

[320] [Old copy, armed men.]