Page 253 - Hamlet: The Cambridge Dover Wilson Shakespeare

H6 NOTES r.i.
mod. edd. read. Malone followed Q2 and explained:
'a joint bargain, a word perhaps of our poet's coinage';
and Warburton notes that since 'the article designed'
means 'the covenant entered into to confirm that
bargain' the F i reading 'makes a tautology.'
94. carriage.. .designed^process or tenour of the
clause in the 'sealed compact' drawn up covering the
point.
98. Sharked up—Swept up speedily and indiscrimi-
nately, v. Introd. pp. xxxvi-xxxvii.
lawless (Q2, £)i) Fi 'Landlesse.' MSH. pp. 150,
268.
100. stomach v. G.
108-25. / think.. .eclipse. F i omits these lines.
MSH. pp. 25, 168.
112. mote (Q5) Qz 'moth'—a common sp., cf.
L.L.L. 4. 3.158. Hor., recovering his balance, belittles
the Ghost; the apparition, he says, is nothing to what
happened before Caesar's death or to more recent
portents.
113-16. In the most.,. Roman streets Cf. Jul. Caes.
2. 2. 18-24. One of the indications of the close con-
nexion between the two plays. Both owe something to
North's Plutarch ('Julius Caesar').
117-21. And even... countrymen. 122-25. ^ s siars
.. . eclipse. Q 2 prints these passages in the reverse order,
and edd. at a loss to interpret have supposed something
lost. My rearrangement, following a suggestion by
Gerald Massey {Secret Drama of Shakespeare's Sonnets,
1872, Sup. p. 46), who notes that lunar eclipses are not
mentioned in Plutarch, restores the sense. The Q2
inversion would be explained if Sh. crowded additional
matter into the foot of a MS. page. Cf.notell. 122-25,
and MSH. pp. 222-25.
122-25. As stars...eclipse. Sh. is referring to
contemporary events. Solar eclipses were visible in
England on Feb. 25,1598, July 10,1600, and Dec. 24,