Quite the contrary; for she would rather "live an unstain'd life." R. and J. iv. 1. Theobald read _unstain'd_, but I prefer _un_distain'd. The printer was more likely to omit _un_ (see on Cymb. i. 7) than to change it to _di_. There is also an agreeable effect on the ear produced by the accents falling on _un_ in both words. In all these plays lines frequently begin with an anapæst. * * * * * "I'll entertain the freed fallacy." For 'freed,' which can hardly be right, Pope read _favour'd_, Capell, much better, _offer'd_. * * * * * "We talk with goblins, owls, and sprites." To complete the measure, the editor of 2nd folio inserted _elves_, and before 'sprites'; from which Rowe made _elvish_ 'sprites.' For 'owls' Theobald read _ouphes_; but that term occurs only in The Merry Wives. I read-- "_For here_ we talk with goblins, elves, and sprites." * * * * * "I am transformed, master, am not I?" Theobald also made this obvious and necessary transposition of 'I not.' ACT III. SC. 1. "By the wrongs _that_ I suffer, and the blows _that_ I bear." * * * * * "Ay, to a niggardly host, and _a_ more sparing guest." * * * * * "I thought to have ask'd you * * * * * * * * * and you said, No." Malone also saw that something was lost. We might read-- "I thought to have ask'd you, _had you brought a rope.-- I ask'd you to let us in_, and you said, No." * * * * * "Once this. Your long experience of her wisdom." 'Her' is Rowe's correction of _your_ of the folio. * * * * * "And in despite of mirth mean to be merry." To be merry in spite of mirth is like laughing in spite of laughter, dying in spite of death, living in spite of life--pure nonsense. With great confidence I therefore made the correction _my wife_, and so gave it in my Edition. Meeting, however, in the Cambridge Edition with Theobald's correction _wrath_--for Editors had ignored it--I saw at once that the poet must have written _my wrath_ (see Introd. p. 67), which resembles 'mirth' both in form and sound, and I have therefore adopted it without hesitation. Like a similar correction in Twelfth Night, i. 1, I regard it as absolutely certain. * * * * * SC. 2. "Shall love in building grow so ruinous?" So Theobald, in accordance with the rime, read for _ruinate_ of the folio. * * * * * "Alas, poor women! make us but believe." Here again we have Theobald's correction of 'but' for _not_. * * * * * "Spread o'er the silver-waves thy golden hears, And as a bed I'll take them and there lie."