Chapter CXIX: Act V: SCENE 1. Page 351

AAR. An idiot holds his _bauble_ for a God,
And keeps the oath which by that God he swears.

Even though the bauble here mentioned had been actually of that kind which is alluded to in the course of a note in _All's well that ends well_, Act IV., his imagination would be deemed not a little fanciful, who would connect it with the object of the singular oath in _Genesis_ xxiv. 9. There cannot however be a doubt that Aaron refers to that sort of bauble or sceptre which was usually carried in the hand by natural idiots and allowed jesters, and by which, it may be supposed, they would sometimes swear. The resemblance which it bore to an image or idol suggested the poet's comparison.

SCENE 2. Page 363.

TIT. So, now bring them in, for I will play the cook.

This redundant line ought to be thus arranged and printed:

So,
Now bring them in, for I will play the cook.

SCENE 3. Page 364.

MAR. Rome's emperor, and nephew, _break_ the parle.

Dr. Johnson makes the sense "_begin_ the parley." Is it not rather "_break off_ this sort of discourse!"? for Lucius and Saturninus had already _begun_ the parley by sparring language: to prevent the continuance of it Marcus interferes, by declaring that their quarrels must be adjusted by gentle _words_.

Throughout this play the name _Andrŏnĭcus_ is improperly accented. It should have been _Andronīcus_.

THE CLOWN.

He is nothing more than a shrewd rustic, performing the office of a messenger.

PERICLES.

Page 388.

_Pentapolis._]

"This," says Mr. Steevens, "is an imaginary _city_, and its name might have been borrowed from some romance. We meet, indeed, in history with _Pentapolitana regio_, a country in Africa, and from thence perhaps some novelist furnished the sounding title of _Pentapolis_," &c. But there was no absolute reason for supposing it a _city_ in this play, as Gower in the _Confessio amantis_ had done, a circumstance which had probably misled Mr. Steevens. In the original Latin romance of Apollonius Tyrius, it is most accurately called _Pentapolis Cyrenorum_, and was, as both Strabo and Ptolemy inform us, a _district_ of Cyrenaica in Africa, comprising _five cities_, of which Cyrene was one.