Page 278 - Hamlet: The Cambridge Dover Wilson Shakespeare

9.9. NOTES 171

fishe for every man [i.e. harlots].' Cf. also B. Jonson's
Masque of Christmas, in which Venus plays a 'tire-
woman' and 'a fishmonger's daughter,' and Middleton's
Anything for a £>jfiet Life, in which Margarita, the
French bawd, is likewise the daughter of a fishmonger.
A 'fishmonger's daughter' therefore = a prostitute, and
a 'fishmonger' = 'a seller of woman's chastity' (Her-
ford). Cf. note 1. 159 S.D. The epithet has an added
point as applied to one fishing for secrets.
181—82. For if the sun.. .daughter Such is Ham.'s
first direct reference to Oph. in the text. (Cf. Cymb.
1.4.147—48 'If you buy ladies'flesh at a million a dram,
you cannot preserve it from tainting.') Ham. is playing
upon 'loose' and 'fishmonger'; the usual word of the
time for 'flesh' in the carnal sense being 'carrion'; cf.
N.E.D.'carrion,' 3; Trot/. 4. .yijandM./^. 1. 32-4
i
'Shy. My own flesh and blood to rebel! Sol. Out upon
it, old carrion, rebels it at these years ?' For the general
idea of the sun breeding from corruption, very prevalent
at this time and going back to Diogenes Laertius and
Tertullian, v. Tilley, 604 and an article by the same
writer in M.L.R. xi. Cf. also note 2. 2. 252-53;
M.W.W. 1. 3.62 'Thsn did the sun on dunghill shine';
A. & C. 1. 3. 68-9 'By the fire That quickens Nilus'
slime'; Meas. 2. 2. 165-68:
...it is I
That, lying by the violet in the sun,
Do as the carrion does, not as the flower,
Corrupt with virtuous season;
and Edward III (1596, Sh. Apocrypha, ed. Tucker
Brooke), 2. 1. 438-39:
The freshest summers day doth soonest taint
The lothed carrion that it seemes to kisse.
182. a good kissing carrion (Q 2, F1) i.e. flesh good
enough for kissing purposes. Warburton read 'a god,
kissing carrion,' and many edd. follow, quoting Cymb.