The margins read—
"Of life, of crown, of queen, at once despoiled,"
which may be more strictly grammatical than the other. But "despatched" is more forcible, and indicates a more summary mode of procedure. "Despatched," says Mr Dyce, "expresses the suddenness of the bereavement." The quartos read "deprived," which is quite as good as despoiled.
Act II. Scene 2.—Hamlet says—
"For it cannot be
But I am pigeon-livered, and lack gall
To make oppression better, or ere this
I should have fatted all the region kites
With this slave's offal."
The margins have the weakness to propose "to make transgression bitter!" We are glad to perceive that the mild Mr Dyce "lacks not gall to make senseless criticism bitter." He says, "This alteration is nothing less than villanous. Could the MS. corrector be so obtuse as not to perceive that 'lack gall to make oppression bitter,' means lack gall to make me feel the bitterness of oppression?" Mr Singer proposes aggression, which is just one half as bad as transgression. Why cannot the commentators leave well alone?
Act III. Scene 3.—To change "prize" into purse in the expression,
"the wicked prize itself
Buys out the law,"
simply shows a dogged determination on the part of the old corrector to be more perversely idiotical than we can believe that his stars doomed even him to be. The king is speaking of his usurped crown and dominion as his "wicked prize." Mr Collier having put on livery in the old corrector's service, has, of course, nothing for it but to assent. He says, "We need no great persuasion to make us believe that we ought to read purse." Do not suppose, Mr Collier, that we are going to be galled by that remark—you yourself, we are convinced, never swallowed so bitter a pill as that new reading, in all your born days.
Act III. Scene 4.—The MS. correction, "I'll sconce me even here," says Polonius, is to be preferred to the ordinary reading, "I'll silence me even here." This reading was also proposed not long ago by Mr Hunter.
Act IV. Scene 3.—In the next, Mr Collier is not quite so sure of his ground, and well may he distrust it. He says, "The next emendation is well worthy of consideration, and perhaps of adoption. The king asks Hamlet where Polonius is at supper, and the answer is this in the quartos—
"Not where he eats, but where he is eaten; a certain convocation of politic worms are even at him. Your worm is the only emperor for diet," &c.
The corrector treats us to "a convocation of palated worms," which is a view of the subject we cannot at all stomach. If there is any one word in all Shakespeare which we can be more certain of than another as having been written by himself, the term "politic," as used in this place, is that word. The context, "convocation," proves this. A convocation is a kind of parliament, and does not a parliament imply policy? "Politic" here means polite, social, and discriminating. Mr Collier advances a very singular argument in behalf of palated. "If the text had always stood 'painted worms,' and if it had been proposed to change it to 'politic worms,' few readers would for an instant have consented to relinquish an expression so peculiarly Shakespearian." That is to say, if we had the best possible reasons for thinking that Shakespeare wrote "palated," we should not be disposed to alter it.
True: but in that case we can assure Mr Collier that our forbearance would be occasioned only by our respect for the authentic text, and not by our opinion that "palated" is the better word of the two. Palated is, in every respect, inferior to "politic"—so inferior, that had palated been the text, we should strongly have suspected a misprint, and had "politic" stood on the margin we should certainly have recommended it for favourable consideration, as we have done several of the MS. corrections which have not nearly so strong claims on our approval. The corrector must have been very old (or very young) when he set down this new reading.
King Lear.— Act I. Scene 1.—Regan remarks that in comparison with her father's welfare—
