1

Enter Shepherd, with POLIXENES and CAMILLO, difguifed; Clown, MOPSA, DORCAS, and others.

FLO.

See, your guests approach Addrefs yourself to entertain them fprightly, And let's be red with mirth.

SHEP. Fye, daughter! when my old wife liv'd,,

up on

This day, fhe was both pantler, butler, cook;
Both dame and fervant: welcom'd all; ferv'd all :
Would fing her fong, and dance her turn: now here,
At upper end o'the table, now, i'the middle;
On his fhoulder, and his: her face o'fire
With labour; and the thing, fhe took to quench it,
She would to each one fip: You are retir'd,
As if you were a feafted one, and not
The hoftefs of the meeting: Pray you, bid
Thefe unknown friends to us welcome: for it is
A way to make us better friends, more known.
Come, quench your blufhes; and prefent yourself
That which you are, mistress o'the feaft: Come

on,

And bid us welcome to your fheep-fhearing,
As your good flock fhall profper."

PER.
Welcome, fir! [To POL.
It is my father's will, I fhould take on me
The hoftefsfhip o'the day:-You're welcome, fir!
[To CAMILLO.
Give me thofe flowers there, Dorcas.-Reverend

firs,

For you there's rofemary, and rue; these keep

That which you are, miftrefs o' the feaf:] From the novel: "It happened not long after this, that there was a meeting of all the farmers' daughters of Sicilia, whither Fawnia was alfo bidden as mistress of the feast." MALONE.

Seeming, and favour, all the winter long:
Grace, and remembrance, be to you both, "
And welcome to our fhearing!

POL.

Shepherdess, (A fair one are you,) well you fit our ages

With flowers of winter.

PER.

Sir, the year growing ancient,

Not yet on fummer's death, nor on the birth
Of trembling winter, the faireft flowers o'the

season

Are our carnations, and ftreak'd gillyflowers,
Which fome call, nature's baftards: of that kind
Our ruftick garden's barren; and I care not
To get flips of them.

POL.

Wherefore, gentle maiden,

Do you neglect them?

PER.

For I have heard it faid,

For you there's rofemary, and rue; thefe keep Seeming, and favour, all the winter long: Grace, and remembrance, be to you both,] Ophelia diftributes the fame plants, and accompanies them with the fame documents. There's rofemary, that's for remembrance. There's rue for you: we may call it herb of grace. The qualities of retaining feeming and favour, appear to be the reason why these plants were confidered as emblematical of grace and remembrance. The nofegay diftributed by Perdita with the fignifications annexed to each flower, reminds one of the ænigmatical letter from a Turkish lover, defcribed by lady M. W. Montagu. HENLEY.

Grace, and remembrance,] Rue was called herb of Grace. Rofemary was the emblem of remembrance; I know not why, unless because it was carried at funerals. JOHNSON.

Rosemary was anciently fuppofed to ftrengthen the memory, and is prescribed for that purpose in the books of ancient phyfick. STEEVENS.

that.

For I have heard it faid,] For, in this place, fignifies because
So, in Claucer's Clerkes Tale, Mr. Tyrwhitt's edit. v. 8092:
"She dranke, and for the wolde vertue plefe.
"She knew wel labour, but non idel efe. STEEVENS.

There is an art, which, in their piedness, shares With great creating nature.

POL.

3

2

Say, there be;

Yet nature is made better by no mean,

But nature makes that mean: fo, o'er that art,
Which, you'fay, adds to nature, is an art

That nature makes. You fee, fweet maid, we marry A gentler fcion to the wildeft ftock;

And make conceive a bark of bafer kind

By bud of nobler race: This is an art

Which does mend nature, change it rather: but The art itfelf is nature.

POL. Then make your garden rich in gillyflowers,4 And do not call them baftards.

3 There is an art, which, in their piednefs, fhares

With great creating nature. ] That is, as Mr. T. Warton obferves, There is an art which can produce flowers, with as great a variety of colours as nature herself."

This art is pretended to be taught at the ends of fome of the old books that treat of cookery, &c. but, being utterly impra&icable, is not worth exemplification. STEEVENS.

4.

in gillyflowers, ] There is fome further conceit relative to gillyflowers than has yet been discovered. The old copy, (in both inftances where this word occurs,) reads-Gilly'vors, a term ftill ufed by low people in Suffex, to denote a harlot. In A Wonder, or a Woman never vex'd, 1632, is the following paffage : A lover is behaving with freedom to his miftrefs as they are going into a garden, and after she has alluded to the quality of many herbs, he adds: "You have fair rofes, have you not?" " YES, fir, (fays fhe,) but no gillyflowers. Meaning, perhaps, that the would not be treated like a gill-flirt, i. e. wanton, a word often met with in the old plays, but written flirt-gill in Romeo and Juliet. I suppose gill-flirt to be derived, or rather corrupted, from gillyflower or carnation, which, though beautiful in its appearance, is apt, in the gardener's phrafe, to run from its colours, and change as often as a licentious female.

Prior, in his Solomon, has taken notice of the fame variability in this fpecies of flowers;

I'll not put

PER. The dibble 5 in earth to fet one flip of them: No more than, were I painted, I would wish This youth fhould fay, 'twere well; and only there

fore

Defire to breed by me.-Here's flowers for
you;
Hot lavender, mints, favory, marjoram;
The marigold, that goes to bed with the fun,
And with him rifes weeping: these are flowers
Of middle summer, and, I think, they are given
To men of middle age: You are very welcome.
CAM. I fhould leave grazing, were I of your flock,
And only live by gazing.

PER.
Out, alas!
You'd be fo lean, that blafts of January

Would blow you through and through.-Now, my faireft friend,

would, I had fome flowers o'the spring that might Become your time of day; and yours, and yours; That wear upon your virgin branches, yet Your maidenheads growing:-O Proferpina, For the flowers now, that, frighted, thou let'st fall

..

the fond carnation loves to fhoot

"Two various colours from one parent root."

In Lyte's Herbal, 1578, fome forts of gilliflowers are called small honefties, cuckoo gillofers, &c. And in A. W's. Commendation of Gafcoigne and his Pofies, is the following remark on this fpecies of flower:

"Some thinke that gilliflowers do yield a gelous fmeil." See Gafcoigne's Works, 1387. STEEVENS.

The following line in The Paradife of Daintie Devijes, 1578, may add fome fupport to the firft part of Mr. Steevens's note: "Some jolly youth the gilly-flower efteemeth for his joy."

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dibble.

MALONE.

An inftrument ufed by gardeners to make holes in the earth for the reception of young plants. See it in Minfheu. STEEVENS.

That come before the fwallow dares, and take The winds of March with beauty; violets, dim, But fweeter than the lids of Juno's eyes,

6

O Proferpina,

7

For the flowers now, that, frighted, thou let'ff fall
From Dis's waggon!] So, in Ovid's Metam. B. V:
ut fumma veftem laxavit ab ora,

"Collecti flores tunicis cecidere remiffis." STEEVens.

The whole paffage is thus tranflated by Golding, 1587: "While in this garden Proferpine was taking her paftime, “In gathering either violets blew, or lillies white as limé,— "Dis fpide her, lou'd her, caught hir up, and all at once well

neere.

"The ladie with a wailing voice afright did often call

"Hir mother

"And as the from the upper part hir garment would have rent, "By chance the let her lap flip downe, and out her flowers went.'

RITSON.

But fweeter than the lids of Juno's eyes, I fufpect that our author miflakes Juno for Pallas, who was the goddess of blue eyes. Sweeter than an eye-lid is an odd image: but perhaps he uses sweet in the general fenfe, for delightful. JOHNSON.

It was formerly the fashion to kifs the eyes, as a mark of extraordinary tenderness. I have fomewhere met with an account of the firft reception one of our kings gave to his new queen, where he is faid to have kissed her fayre eyes. So, in Chaucer's Troilus and Creffeide, v. 1358:

This Troilus full oft her eyin two

"Gan for to kiffe," &c.

Again, in an ancient MS. play of Timon of Athens, in the posfeffion of Mr. Strutt the engraver:

"O Juno, be not angry with thy Jove,

"But let me kiffe thine eyes, my fweete delight." p. 6. b. The eyes of Juno were as remarkable as thofe of Pallas. -βοώπις πότνια Ἤρη, Homer.

But (as Mr. M. Mason obferves)" we are not told that Pallas was the goddess of blue eye-lids; befides, as Shakspeare joins in the comparison, the breath of Cytherea with the eye-lids of Juno, it is evident that he does not allude to the colour, but to the fragrance of violets." STEEVENS.