the ladies who are wearing them. There is perhaps in these plague mentions a suggestion of the great London plague of 1592–1598, but Mr. Charlton argues that such jesting would not be natural while the actual plague was raging.
V. ii. 491. You cannot beg us. This slangy way of saying, 'We are no idiots,' seems to have arisen from the practice of suing for the guardianship of wealthy incompetents.
V. ii. 517, 518. Where zeal strives to content, and the contents Dies in the zeal of that which it presents. Where the unintelligent zeal of the actors strives to content the audience, and the gist (contents) of the entertainment is destroyed by this very zeal in performance.
V. ii. 545. Abate throw at novum. Alluding to a game called novem quinque, in which the two principal throws were nine and five. The Cambridge editors explain the words as 'referring to the presentation of nine worthies by five players.'
V. ii. 549. With libbard's head on knee. Theobald explained this by quoting Cotgrave's definition of the French word masquine: 'The representation of a lion's head, etc., upon the elbow or knee of some old-fashioned garments.'
V. ii. 566. it stands too right. The point seems to be that Alexander's head sat crookedly on his shoulders. Shakespeare can have got this fact from North's Plutarch. Boyet may, however, simply mean that Nathaniel's nose is not aquiline enough for that of a worthy.
V. ii. 576. You will be scraped out of the painted cloth for this. That is, you will lose your place as one of the worthies. Painted cloths were a more humble substitute for tapestry in wall-coverings, and the nine worthies were a common subject of their decoration.
