Church and State, leave things much worse than they were before. But it must surely be known to the general reader, that the 'crow' is the common appellation of the 'rook,' the latter word being used only when we would speak with precision, and never by the country people, as the word 'crow-keeper' will serve to show, which means the boy who keeps the rooks (not carrion crows) off the seed-corn. The carrion crow, which is the crow proper, being almost extinct, the necessity of distinguishing it from the rook has passed away in common usage. The passage therefore simply means, the rook hastens its evening flight to the wood where its fellows are already assembled;' and to our mind the term 'rooky wood' is a lively and natural picture: the generic term 'crow' is used for the specific 'rook.'" The preceding remarks (which decisively establish, and satisfactorily explain, the reading "rooky,") are by the Rev. J. Mitford (Gentleman's Magazine for August 1844, p. 129).

P. 414. (4) "Enter BANQUO, and FLEANCE with a torch."

·

"Here again [see note (24)] Fleance carries the torch to light his father; and in the old stage-direction nothing is said about a servant, who would obviously be in the way when his master was to be murdered. The servant is a merely modern interpolation." COLLIER.

P. 418. (42)

"If trembling I inhabit then, protest me
The baby of a girl."

This is the reading of the folio; and, though Henley, Horne Tooke, and Mr. Singer have pronounced it to be right, I nevertheless consider it as very doubtful; and so, I find, does Dr. Richardson, Dict. sub "Inhabit." (See the notes ad l. in the Varior. Shakespeare, my Remarks on Mr. Collier's and Mr. Knight's eds. of Shakespeare, p. 199, and Mr. Singer's Shakespeare Vindicated, &c. p. 255.)-The editor of the second folio changed the punctuation of the line thus,

"If trembling I inhabit, then protest me,” &c.—

The modern alterations are,

"If trembling I inhibit then, protest me," &c.

and

"If trembling I inhibit thee, protest me," &c.

(The alteration of Mr. Collier's Ms. Corrector is almost too ridiculous to be mentioned;

P. 418. (43) "And keep the natural ruby of your cheeks,

When mine are blanch'd with fear."

"The old copy reads 'is blanch'd.' Sir T. Hanmer corrected this passage in the wrong place, by reading 'cheek;' in which he has been followed by the subsequent editors. His correction gives, perhaps, a more elegant text, but

not the text of Shakespeare. The alteration now made is only that which every editor has been obliged to make in almost every page of these plays.— In this very scene the old copy has the times has been,' &c. Perhaps it may be said that 'mine' refers to 'ruby,' and that therefore no change is necessary. But this seems very harsh." MALONE.-Assuredly "mine" does not refer to "ruby."

P. 420. (4)

["Music and song within, 'Come away, come away,' &c.”

Compare, in Middleton's Witch, act iii. sc. 3,- Works, iii. 303, ed. Dyce;

On the question whether Shakespeare borrowed from Middleton, or Middleton from Shakespeare, see the "Account of Middleton" prefixed to his Works, i. 1. sqq., and Malone's Life of Shakespeare, p. 420 sqq. ed. 1821.

P. 420. (45)

"Enter LENNOX and another Lord."

Here, in my copy of the folio, "another Lord" is altered, in old handwriting, to "Ross,”—and rightly perhaps.

P. 421. (46)

"And the right-valiant Banquo walk'd too late;
Whom, you may say, if't please you, Fleance kill'd,
For Fleance fled: men must not walk too late.
Who cannot want the thought, how monstrous
It was for Malcolm and for Donalbain
To kill their gracious father?"

Mr. Grant White observes: "It is to Banquo that Lennox, in his ironical vein, applies the second time, as well as the first, the phrase 'walk'd too late.' Now, Macbeth seized the opportunity of Banquo's late walking, to put him out of the way, chiefly because Banquo more than suspected who was the real perpetrator of the crime, which Lennox, ironically conforming to general report, ascribes to Malcolm and Donalbain. This suspicion was obviously the reason for the murder of Banquo by the order of Macbeth. May we not then remove the point after the last 'late,' and read thus, making the passage declarative instead of interrogative?

'And the right-valiant Banquo walk'd too late;

Whom you may say, if't please you, Fleance kill'd;
For Fleance fled. Men must not walk too late

Who cannot want the thought, how monstrous

It was for Malcolm and for Donalbain

To kill their gracious father.'

That is, Men, who will think that the alleged murder of Duncan by his sons

is a crime too monstrous for belief, must be careful not to walk too late."" Shakespeare's Scholar, &c. p. 403.-My kind friend, Mr. Grant White, must allow me to say that I think his change of the punctuation in this passage quite wrong, and his explanation over-subtle:-surely, Macbeth's chief reason for getting rid of Banquo was,-not "because Banquo more than suspected who was the real perpetrator of the crime [of Duncan's murder]," but,-because the Witches had declared that Banquo was to be "father to a line of kings:" hence Macbeth's injunction to the Murderers (p. 411);

"and with him

(To leave no rubs nor botches in the work)
Fleance his son, that keeps him company,

Whose absence is no less material to me
Than is his father's, must embrace the fate
Of that dark hour."

(Compare Holinshed: "The woords also of the three weird sisters would not out of his mind, which as they promised him the kingdome, so likewise did they promise it at the same time vnto the posteritie of Banquho. He willed therefore the same Banquho, with his sonne named Fleance, to come to a supper that he had prepared for them, which was indeed, as he had deuised, present death at the hands of certeine murderers," &c. Hist. of Scotland, p. 271, ed. 1808.)

On the line "Who cannot want the thought," &c. Malone remarks; "The sense requires, 'Who can want the thought,' &c. Yet, I believe, the text is not corrupt. Shakespeare is sometimes incorrect in these minutiæ."

Has been altered to "Harper,"-whether rightly or wrongly, I am not demonologist enough to determine.

P. 422. (50) "Toad, that under cold stone," &c. A defective line. Shakespeare, in all probability, wrote " stone," &c.,-Pope's emendation.

under the cold

Here the stage-direction of the folio is "Enter Hecat, and the other three Witches:" but, beyond all doubt, it means nothing more than that Hecate joins the three Witches already on the stage.-Various dramas, written long after Macbeth, afford examples of stage-directions worded in the same unintel

ligible style. E.g. Cowley's Cutter of Coleman Street opens with a soliloquy by Trueman Junior: his father presently joins him, and the stage-direction is, “Enter Trueman Senior, AND TRUEMAN JUN." Again, the second act of that play commences with a soliloquy by Aurelia; and, when Jane joins her, we find, "Enter AURELIA, Jane."

P. 423. (52)

"[Music and song, 'Black spirits,' &c."

This song is found entire in Middleton's Witch, act v. sc. 2,-Works, iii. 328, ed. Dyce. The two first lines of it (and whether or not more was introduced into Macbeth on our old stage is uncertain) are,

"Black spirits and white, red spirits and gray,

Mingle, mingle, mingle, you that mingle may!"—

According to Steevens, "the song was, in all probability, a traditional one;" and Mr. Collier, more confidently, says, "Doubtless, it does not belong to Middleton more than to Shakespeare; but it was inserted in both dramas because it was appropriate to the occasion:" but qy ?-See note (44).

Is changed by Mr. Collier's Ms. Corrector to "Though bleaded corn,” &c.; very improperly: see Mr. Singer's Shakespeare Vindicated, &c. p. 255.

So Theobald.-The folio has "Of Natures Germaine," &c.

P. 425. (55)

"Rebellion's head, rise never," &c.

The folio has "Rebellious dead, rise neuer," &c.—Theobald printed "Rebellious head," &c.; "i.e." he says, "let Rebellion never make head against me till," &c.—But Hanmer's reading, "Rebellion's head," &c. (which Mr. Collier's Ms. Corrector also gives), is evidently the right one; though Capell (Notes, &c. vol. ii. 22) gravely assures us that it "impairs harmony, and ruins poetry," &c. (In Richard II. act iii. sc. 2, the old eds., with the exception of the two earliest quartos, have the misprint, "Shall falter vnder foule rebellious armes.")

Has been altered to “and thy air," &c.,—wrongly, I believe.

Here the two Ms. Correctors,-Mr. Collier's and Mr. Singer's,-alter "sights" to "flights;" and the same alteration occurred to Mr. Grant White (Shakespeare's Scholar, &c. p. 105)." The Ms. Corrector proposes flights; and not without some show of reason. Macbeth has just been informed that Macduff

has fled to England, and the escape has evidently discomposed him, as placing beyond his reach his most deadly enemy. Accordingly he is supposed by the Ms. Corrector to exclaim, 'No more flights! I must take care that no more of that party escape me.' But, on the other hand, Macbeth, a minute before, has been inveighing against the witches. He says:

'Infected be the air whereon they ride,

And damn'd all those that trust them!'

So that 'But no more sights' may mean, I will have no more dealings with these infernal hags [who have just been showing him a succession of sights,apparitions; the last of which drew from him the exclamation, "Horrible sight!"]. The word ' But' seems to be out of place in connection with 'flights' -and therefore we pronounce in favour of the old reading." Blackwood's Magazine for Oct. 1853, p. 461. In my opinion, the word "But" makes not a little against the new lection.

The folio has “thou shagge-ear'd Villaine” (“ear'd” being a corruption of "hear'd," which is an old spelling of “hair'd").

So Theobald.-The folio has "You may discerne of him," &c.

The folio has "The title," &c.: but Malone's alteration of "The" to " Thy" is hardly to be doubted. (Mr. Collier's Ms. Corrector makes the same change; see Mr. Collier's one-volume Shakespeare.)

P. 433. (62)

"Died every day she liv'd. Fare thee well!"

In this line the "liu'd" of the folio is usually altered to "lived.” — Sidney Walker (Shakespeare's Versification, &c. p. 139), who considers (and rightly, I believe)" Fare" to be used here as a dissyllable, observes: "Certainly not lived; Shakespeare would as soon have made died a dissyllable."

The first folio has "they heere approach," &c.-Corrected in the second folio.

Has been altered to "All ready at," &c.,-wrongly: see Notes and Queries, vol. viii. p. 359.