whom can we trust, and what passage, how plain soever, is safe from perversion!

"Oli. -Out of question, 'tis Maria's hand,

And now I do bethink me, it was she

First told me thou wast mad; then cam'st in smiling,
And in such forms which here were presupposed
Upon thee in the letter."

What does "then cam'st in smiling" mean? Out of question we should read "thou cam'st in smiling." [I find that Zachary Jackson has made this suggestion. As he well points out, the ou in manuscript might be easily mistaken for en. Indeed, in reading the best manuscript of Shakespeare's day, the closest examination can with difficulty distinguish one from the other. Then, the bow of e, usually very small, was turned to the left instead of the right.

THE WINTER'S TALE.

ACT I. SCENE 2.

"Her. I love thee not a jar o' the clock behind What lady, she her lord.

Mr. Collier's folio has, "What lady should her lord," which is plausible and has found defenders. But I confess that the old reading is far more pleasing to me. I have always read it as 'I love thee not a jar o' the clock behind what [ever] lady she [may be who loves] her lord.' The elision is great; but it seems to me to make the sentence neither obscure nor inelegant. I find, by experiment, that the sympathetic and intelligent readers of Shakespeare of my acquaintance, learned and unlearned, are with me; though all could not supply the elided words. But he who would rightly read Shakespeare, or any poet of high grade, must, in Shakespeare's words, be able to "apprehend more than cool reason comprehends."

I cannot pass by the tame and ridiculous literalism of adding to Hermione's observation, in this Scene,

"You look

As if you held a brow of much distraction,"

the stage direction, "Holding his forehead," which appears in Mr. Collier's folio,-than which nothing could be more absurd and prosaic. This alone would be all-sufficient to show that that volume had passed through annotating hands utterly incompetent to express even an ordinary appreciation of Shakespeare's phraseology,—to say nothing of his poetry.

Good Expedition be my friend, and comfort

The gracious Queene, part of his Theame; but nothing
Of his ill-ta'en suspicion."

This is one of the three or four passages in Shakespeare's works which seem to me to be almost, if not quite, hopelessly obscured by the carelessness of the first printers, or their inability to read the manuscript which was furnished them. It appears as above in the original folio; the whole speech being singularly well punctuated. All sorts of changes have been proposed for it, and all sorts of senses tortured from it. But the best that has been done is the allowing it to remain untouched, and the extracting a sense which Mr. Collier thus expresses:

"The absence of Polixenes, the object of the jealousy of Leontes, was to comfort the Queen, who was part of the theme on which the King dwelt (Polixenes being the other part), but who being innocent, may be said to be 'nothing' of the ill-ta'en suspicion' against her."

Yet, let me ask any intelligent but unpretending reader of Shakespeare, is that the way in which Shakespeare wrote, in which he thought? Could any construction be

more barbarous, any expression cruder or more confused? To call the Queen part of the theme of Leontes but no part of his suspicion! His theme was his jealousy; and his suspicion was, that she was false! It is natural that Polixenes should express a hope that his flight might comfort the Queen; but what can be flatter or tamer than that he should then go on to say that she was part of the King's theme but no part of his suspicion,-even if it were true. But in every sense in which she could be said to be a part of the suspicion of Leontes, she was a part of it. Her actual innocence could not make her seem to Polixenes any the less a part of the suspicion of Leontes-if we must use such an uncouth phrase. Innocent or guilty, her husband's suspicion of her was an existing fact. The lines had better be stricken from the volume than so interpreted.

In this perplexity I bring forward for consideration an emendation which has been suggested to me, premising that the difficulty can exist only in the words "and comfort" and "part of his Theame," as the other parts of the passage are not only clear in themselves, but entirely consistent with each other and the situation of the speaker; and also adding that the punctuation of the passage in the original is so careful and judicious, that it was evidently printed with unusual attention, and that the error must therefore have arisen from obscurity in the manuscript. It must also be remembered that the most obvious consequence of the suspicions of Leontes was the loss to Hermione of her position as his wife; and that the precipitate flight of Polixenes, though necessary to his safety, might possibly, and not unnaturally, increase those suspicions. Polixenes, therefore, according to the reading which I suggest for consideration, expresses his hope that expedition may be his friend, and also preserve or perpetuate for the Queen her share in her husband's confidence and throne, but no part

of the suspicion with which he unjustly visited her. The correction of two very possible typographical errors gives us,

"Good Expedition be my friend, and conserve

The gracious Queen part of his Throne; but nothing

Of his ill-ta'en suspicion."

Shakespeare uses the verb 'conserve' in exactly this sense in Measure for Measure, Act III. Sc. 1.

Indeed

He uses the word as a verb in no other instance. it was generally used in his day, as we find it defined in Phillips' New World of Words, in the sense, "to defend or maintain, to preserve or keep." As to the irregularity of the line produced by this word, it is to be remarked that the Scene is one of the least musically written that we have from Shakespeare's pen.

I bring forward this reading at the suggestion of a very devoted and no less conservative student of Shakespeare's text, who says that the more he considers it the more it satisfies him, and that he has such confidence in it as to believe, that if the play existed in an early quarto form in which this reading appeared, it would have been adopted without a dissenting voice, to the entire disregard of that in the folio.

I am inclined to think that the best course is to abandon all attempt to amend the lines; but nothing can make me believe that Shakespeare produced such a chaotic little puddle of words and thoughts as results from the most favorable construction of the existing text.