Chapter CIII: Act I: SCENE 1. Page 223

TRO. Thou lay'st in every gash that love hath given me
The _knife_ that made it.

When poets speak of the wounds inflicted by love, they generally make the instrument to be an _arrow_; how a _knife_ came here to be introduced is not easy to account for. Is it possible that our author has transposed the old saying that _a knife cuts love_?

SCENE 3. Page 245.

NEST. ... and, anon, behold
The strong-ribb'd bark through liquid mountains cut,
Bounding between the two moist elements,
Like _Perseus' horse_.

Mr. Steevens, admitting the curiosity of his colleague's note on this passage, is unwilling to allow that its design to prove the horse of Perseus a ship, and not an animal, has been accomplished. The learned editor observes, that "Shakspeare would not have contented himself with merely comparing one ship to another;" and that "unallegorized _Pegasus_ might be fairly stiled _Perseus'_ horse, because the heroism of _Perseus_ had given him existence." That one thing is compared to another which resembles it, can surely be no solid objection to the justice of a comparison; and though the birth of the unallegorized Pegasus was doubtless the result of Perseus's bravery in conquering Medusa, it was incumbent on the objector to have demonstrated how this _horse of Perseus_ had "bounded between two moist elements," to have made good the poet's comparison. There can be no doubt that the author of the simile has alluded to the fact concerning the _ship_ Pegasus adduced by Mr. Malone; and every thing leads to the supposition that he used the _authority_ of Caxton's Troy book, though, as will be seen presently, _that_ was not the most ancient of the kind.

It is undoubtedly a well justified poetical license to compare a ship to a horse, on account of its speed. In the translation of an old Celtic ballad called _The maid's tragedy_, the monarch who pursues the flying damsel is sometimes said to traverse the waves on _an enchanted steed_; "which," say the Edinburgh reviewers, "probably arises from some equivocal expression in the original, as the Scalds term a ship the rider, and sometimes the horse of the ocean."--_Edinb. review_, 1805, p. 439.

Mr. Malone has stated in the beginning of his valuable note, that "we nowhere hear of Perseus's horse;" and that "Pegasus was the property not of Perseus but of Bellerophon." This is not quite accurate. It is certain that _Ovid_ has _not_ mounted Perseus on any horse in his combat with the monster which was to devour Andromeda; and therefore it is matter of wonder that the mythological dictionary of Chompré, and particularly that most excellent one by Lempriere, should positively affirm that he has. This error has been likewise adopted by other writers. But though classic authority be wanting that Perseus made use of a horse, Boccaccio, in his _Genealogia Deorum_, lib. xii. c. 25, has quoted Lactantius as saying, that when Perseus undertook his expedition against Gorgon, at the instance of king Polydectus, he was accompanied by the winged horse Pegasus, but not that he used him in delivering Andromeda. Boccaccio adds that others were of opinion that he had a _ship_ called Pegasus. The liberties which the old French translators of Ovid's Metamorphoses have taken, and their interpolations, are unaccountable. Some have caused Perseus at the instant of his birth, to bestride Pegasus, and travel away to Helicon. In the cuts to many of the early editions of Ovid, the designers have not only placed him on Pegasus in the adventure with Andromeda, but even in his attack upon Atlas. These facts may serve to account for the multiplied errors of artists, who, neglecting to consult proper authorities, have trusted to the erroneous examples of their predecessors. Achilles Tatius, in his third book of _The loves of Clitophon and Leucippe_, has described a picture of Perseus delivering Andromeda, in which he is made to descend by means of wings to his feet; and another on the same subject is spoken of by Lucian in his description of a house. In neither of these is there any mention of a horse.