emotions, are as follows.-Titus lies down in the dirt.-Aaron chops off his hand.—Saturninus sends him the heads of his two sons, and his own hand again, for a present.—His heroick brother Marcus kills a fly. r. Capell may likewife claim the honour of having produced the sew argument which Dr. Farmer mentions in a preceding note.

MALONE

THE

TRAGICALL HYSTORY

O F

ROMEUS AND JULIET:

Contayning in it a rare Example of true CONSTANCIE With the fubtill Counfels and Practices of an old Fryer; and their ill Event.

Res eft folliciti plena timoris amor、

Amid the defert rockes the mountaine beare
Bringes forth unformd, unlyke herfelfe, her yonge,
Nought els but lumpes of fleshe, withouten heare;
In tract of time, her often lycking tong

Geves them fuch shape, as doth, ere long, delight
The lookers on; or, when one dogge doth fhake
With moofled mouth the joyntes too weake to fight,
Or, when upright he ftandeth by his ftake,
(A noble creaft!) or wylde in favage wood
A dofyn dogges one holdeth at a baye,

With gaping mouth and stayned jawes with blood;
Or els, when from the farthest heavens, they
The lode-ftarres are, the wery pilates marke,
In stormes to gyde to haven the tofled barke;-
Right fo my mufe
Hath now, at length, with travell long, brought forth
Her tender whelpes, her divers kindes of ftyle,
Such as they are, or nought, or little woorth,
Which carefull travell and a longer whyle
May better shape. The eldest of them loe
I offer to the take; my youthfull woorke,
Which one reprochefull mouth might overthrowe:
The reft, unlickt as yet, a whyle shall lurke,

Tyll Tyme geve strength, to meete and match in fight,
With Slaunder's whelpes. Then fhall they tell of ftryfe,

Of noble trymphes, and deedes of martial might;
And fhall geve rules of chaft and honeft lyfe.

The whyle, I pray, that ye with favour blame,

Or rather not reprove the laughing game

Of this my mufe.

Love hath inflamed twayne by fodayn fight,
And both do graunt the thing that both defyre;
They wed in thrift, by counfell of a frier;

Yong Romeus clymes fayre Juliets bower by night.
Three monthes he doth enjoy his cheefe delight:
By Tybalt's rage provoked unto yre,

He payeth death to Tybalt for his hyre.

A banisht man, he fcapes by fecret flight:

New mariage is offred to his wyfe;

She drinkes a drinke that feemes to reve her breath;
They bury her, that fleping yet hath lyfe.
Her husband heares the tydinges of her death;

He drinkes his bane; and the, with Romeus' knyfe.
When the awakes, her felfe, alas! the fleath.

ROMEUS

HERE is beyond the Alps a towne of ancient fame,

TH Where bright renoune yet fhineth cleare, Verona men it name;

Bylt in an happy time, bylt on a fertyle foyle,

Maynteined by the heavenly fates, and by the townish toyle.

The

In the preliminary note on Romeo and Juliet I obferved that it was founded on the Tragicall Hyftory of Romeus and Juliet, printed in 1562. That piece being almoft as rare as a manufcript, I reprinted it a few years ago, and fhall give it a place here as a proper fupplement to the commentaries on this tragedy.

From the following lines in An Epitaph on the death of Maifter Arthur Brooke drownde in paffing to New-Haven, by George Tuberville, [Epitaphes, Epigrammes, &c. 1567,] we learn that the former was the authour of this poem:

"Apollo lent him lute, for folace fake,

"To found his verfe by touch of stately ftring, "And of the never-fading baye did make

"A lawrell crowne, about his browes to cling.
"In proufe that he for myter did excell,

"As may be judge by Julyet and ber mate;
"For there he fhewde his cunning paffing well,
"When he the tale to English did translate.
But what? as he to forraigne realm was bound,
"With others moe his foveraigne queene to ferve,
"Amid the feas unluckie youth was drownd,

"More speedie death than fuch one did deferve."

The original relater of this story was Luigi da Porto, a gentleman of Vicenza, who died in 1529. His novel did not appear till fome years after his death; being first printed at Venice, in octavo, in 1535, under the title of La Giulietta. In an epiftle prefixed to this work, which is addreffed Alla belliffima e leggiadra Madonna Lucina Savorgnana, the authour gives the following account (probably a fictitious one) of the manner in which he became acquainted with this story:

"As you yourself have feen, when heaven had not as yet levelled against me its whole wrath, in the fair spring of my youth I devoted myself to the profeffion of arms, and, following therein many brave and valiant men, for fome years I ferved in your delightful country, Frioli, through every part of which, in the courfe of my private fervice, it was my duty to roam. I was ever accustomed, when upon any expedition on horseback, to bring with me an archer of mine, whose name was Peregrino, a man about fifty years old, well prac tifed in the military art, a pleasant companion, and, like almost all his countrymen of Verona, à great talker. This man was not only Hh.4 a brave

The fruitefull hilles above, the pleasant vales belowe,

The filver ftreame with chanel depe, that through the towne doth flow;
The ftore of fpringes that ferve for ufe, and eke for ease,

And other moe commodities, which profit may and please;
Eke many certayne fignes of thinges betyde of olde,

To fyll the houngry eyes of those that curiously beholde;
Doe make this towne to be preferde above the rest

OfLombard townes, or, at the leaft, compared with the best.
In which whyle Efcalus as prince alone did raygne,

To reache rewarde unto the good, to paye the lewde with payne,
Alas! I rewe to thinke, an heavy happe befell,

Which Boccace fkant, not my rude tonge, were able foorth to tell.
Within my trembling hande my penne doth shake for teare,
And, on my colde amazed head, upright doth stand my heare.

But

a brave and experienced soldier, but of a gay and lively difpofition, and, more perhaps than became his age, was for ever in love; a quality which gave a double value to his valour. Hence it was that be delighted in relating the moft amufing novels, especially such as treated of love, and this he did with more grace and with better arrangement than any I have ever heard. It therefore chanced that, departing from Gradifca, where I was quartered, and, with this archer and two other of my fervants, travelling, perhaps impell'd by love, towards Udino, which route was then extremely folitary, and entirely ruined and burned up by the war, wholly abforbed in thought, and riding at a distance from the others, this Peregrino drawing near me, as one who gueffed my thoughts, thus addreffed me: "Will you then for ever live this melancholy life, becaufe a cruel and difdainful fair one does not love you? though I now speak against myself, yet, fince advice is eafier to give than to follow, I must tell you, mafter of mine, that, befides its being difgraceful in a man of your profeffion to remain long in the chains of love, almost all the ends to which he conducts us are fo replete with mifery, that it is dangerous to follow him. And in testimony of what I say, if it so please you, I could relate a transaction that happened in my native city, the recounting of which will render the way lefs folitary and lefs difagreeable to us; and in this relation you would perceive how two noble lovers were conducted to a miferable and piteous death.-And now, upon my making him a fign of my willingness to liften, he thus began."

The phrafe, in the beginning of this paffage, when heaven bad not as yet levelled against me its whole wrath, will be beft explained by fome account of the authour, extracted from Crefcimbeni, Iftoria della Volgar Poefia, T. v. p. 91: Luigi da Porto, a Vicentine, was, in his youth, on account of his valour, made a leader in the Venetian army; but, fighting against the Germans in Friuli, was fo wound. ed, that he remained for a time wholly difabled, and afterwards lame and weak during his life; on which account, quitting the profeffion of arms, he betook himself to letters," &c. MALONE.