[255] [A _jeu d'esprit_ allusive to the old Bilboa sword-blades.] [256] In astronomy, seven stars in the constellation Ursa Minor. [257] [Old copies, _I will_.] [258] A quibble alluding to Thomas Cooper's "Thesaurus Linguæ Latinæ," printed in 1548. [259] Their entrance is not noticed in the quartos, and Mr Reed omitted Millicent.--_Collier._ [260] [Old copies, _by_.] [261] [Old copies, _We'll--Envil_.] [262] That is, as Mr Steevens supposes, blind man's buff. See note on "Hamlet," act iii. sc. 4, edit. 1778. [263] See note to "The Revenger's Tragedy," _suprá_, p. 90. [264] So the quartos: Mr Dodsley read _pursy_. [265] See note to "The First Part of Jeronimo," [iv. 374.] [266] The quartos, without exception, erroneously read _Now_.--_Collier_. [267] _i.e._, Horses. [268] _i.e._, Panniers. [269] Let me understand you. So Falstaff says, "I would your grace _would take me with you_; whom means your grace?"--"First Part of King Henry IV.," act ii. sc. 2, and Dr Johnson's and Dr Farmer's notes. [270] This is one of the many instances which might be given where a parson is called _Sir_. "Upon which," says Sir John Hawkins, "it may be observed, that anciently it was the common designation both of one in holy orders and a knight." Fuller somewhere in his "Church History" says, that anciently there were in England more _sirs_ than _knights;_ and so lately as temp. William and Mary, in a deposition in the Exchequer, in a case of tithes, the witness, speaking of the curate, whom he remembers, styles him _Sir Gyles_. Vide Gibson's "View of the State of the Churches of Door, Home-Lacey," &c., p. 36. Note to "The Merry Wives of Windsor," act i. sc. 1, edit. 1778. So in the "New Trick to Cheat the Devil," 1639: "_Sir_ me no _Sirs_; I am no knight nor _Churchman."--Collier_. [271] This expression is used by Falstaff, in the "Second Part of King Henry IV.," act ii. sc. 1. [272] Go. [273] The Host's conversation is wholly made up of puns and quibbles. He means here his hungry guests. [See p. 244.] His address to the smith before, on reading the _little Geneva print_, was [an equivoque on the redness of his eyes from having drunk too much, and the small type in which the Scriptures were printed in the common Genevan version.] [274] The 4o of 1617 reads _bosonians_; that of 1631, _bonasosis_. [275] [A play on _shall_ and _shale_ (or shell).] Churchyard, in his "Challenge," 1593, says-- "Thus all with _shall; or shalles ye shal be fed_." The old editions spell it _shales_, and it is not a very forced construction to suppose that Mounchensey, complaining of Clare's want of faith, uses the word _shalls_ in the sense of _promises_; and this seems to be the real meaning of the quotation from Churchyard.--_Collier._ [276] [Old copies, _the_.] [277] [Old copies, _shouldst_.] [278] Knives or daggers. _Skein_ is the [Erse or Highland] word for a knife. [See a long note in Nares, edit. 1859, art. Skain.]