Chapter LXXXIII: Act IV

SC. 1. "He writes me hëre that _an_ inward sickness."

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"It were not good; for therein should we read
The very bottom and the soul of hope."

I can make no sense of 'read'; we might read _reach_.

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"All plum'd like estriches that with the wind _are fann'd_."

It is plain that something has been lost here; it may be a line, but I think the slight addition I have made, and in the very place where the loss was most likely to occur, removes all difficulty. "The air of Paradise did _fan_ the house" (All's Well, iii. 2). The poet had in his mind the Prince's plume, which he supposes to have been worn by his companions also; and it is quite evident--or else there is no force in the comparison--that he also supposed that it was on his head the ostrich carried his long bending feathers. So Drayton also: "The Mountfords all in plumes, like ostriches were seen" (Polyolb. xxii.). The following line of Tasso gives us the exact image:--"E _ventolar_ sui gran cimier le penne" (Ger. Lib. xx. 28). Hanmer read '_and_ with the wind.' Rowe, who has been generally followed, read _wing_ for 'with'; but the verb _wing_ has but one sense in the poets, to fly, and the ostrich no more flies than the greyhound. Mr. Dyce, however, adopts this reading, which, he says, "affords a clear and good meaning," and he quotes in support of it these lines of Claudian, who, he thinks may, as a native of Egypt, be speaking as an eye-witness:--

"Vasta velut Libyæ venantum vocibus ales
Cum premitur calidas cursu transmittit arenas,
Inque modum veli sinuatis flamine pennis
Pulverulenta volat."
In Eutrop. ii. 310.

But surely this is sailing with, not winging the wind; and what has it to do with 'plum'd'? I very much doubt if Claudian ever saw an ostrich running; for that was only to be seen in the desert, which Egyptians rarely visited at any period.

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"Baited like eagles having lately bath'd."

I know no sense of the verb _bait_ that will give any tolerable meaning here. To read 'Bated,' as is usually done, from _bate_, to flap the wings, gives merely a ridiculous sense. I have a strong persuasion that the poet's word was _Beated_, a term which he also uses in Son. lxii., where, by the way, the critics seem not to have understood it. _Bete_, _beat_, _beath_, is to kindle, heat, dry; and the idea in the poet's mind seems to have been that of eagles, after refreshing themselves by bathing, sitting on rocks for the sun to dry their plumage. To these he likens the young knights, fresh and vigorous, sitting on their war-steeds, under the beams of the sun. Hence he goes on to say "Glittering," etc.

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SC. 2. "There's not a shirt and a half in all my company."

For 'not,' Rowe, who is usually followed, read _but_. In my Edition I have given here and in v. 3 'not _but_' as more forceable. See Index, But.

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SC. 3. "Into his title, which we find _to be_
Too indirect for long continuance."