I need not say a word about the various suggestions of _primzie_, _priestly_, _princely_, _precise_, &c., which have appeared from time to time; my business is solely with the original word in the first folio. I have always felt sure that this is none other than the poet's own word, and no error of the printer; for how could it be possible to make a gross mistake in a word which occurs twice within four lines, and one, moreover, so unusual; the printer must surely have been able to decipher the letters from _one_ of the two written specimens. It will be observed that there is a comma after _prenzie_ in the original, indicating that the word is a substantive, not an adjective. Now what is the Italian for a prince? Not only _principe_, but also _prenze_; and in like manner we find _principessa_ and _prenzessa_. I have no doubt that what Shakspeare _did_ write was-- "The prenzie, Angelo?" while a little lower down he converted the word into an adjective: "To inuest and couer In prenzie gardes." It is obvious to remark that this meaning of _prenzie_ exactly fits the sense: Angelo was a prince, and he was clad in robes of office, adorned with princely "gardes," or trappings. Shakspeare, no doubt, was very well acquainted with Italian tales and poems; the word may have become quite familiar to him. His intention here, in putting the term in question into Claudio's mouth, may have been to give an Italian character to the scene, introducing thus the _local term of dignity_ of the deputy; thus recalling the audience, by the occurrence of a single word, to the scene of the plot; for though this is said to be in Vienna, yet it is to be observed that not a name throughout the play is German, _everything is Italian_. And let it not be objected that the use of this word involves an obscurity which Shakspeare would have avoided; we are hardly able to judge, now-a-days, whether a particular word was obscure or not in his time: at all events, there would be no difficulty in adducing instances of what we should call more obscure allusions, and I think there can be little doubt that the well-educated in those days well understood the Italian _prenze_ to mean a prince. H. C. K. ---- Rectory, Hereford. _"Hamlet" and G. Steevens._--In Act I. Sc. 4., Horatio asks Hamlet "_What does this_ mean, my Lord?" (The noise of music within). Hamlet replies: "The king doth wake to-night, and takes his rouse, Keeps wassel, and _the swaggering up-spring reels_." G. Steevens, in a note of this passage, says: "The _swaggering up-spring_ was _a German dance_." Is not the allusion directed to the king, whom Hamlet describes as "a swaggering _up-spring_," or "_upstart_?" Should not the line-- _"O horrible, O horrible, most horrible!"_ in the Ghost's narrative in the _fifth scene_, be given to Hamlet? JAMES CORNISH. Falmouth. * * * * * Minor Notes.