. sc. 6. Speech of Cethegus:--

"Can these or such be any aids to us," &c.

What a strange notion Ben must have formed of a determined, remorseless,
all-daring, foolhardiness, to have represented it in such a mouthing
Tamburlane, and bombastic tonguebully as this Cethegus of his!

"Bartholomew Fair."

Induction. Scrivener's speech:--

"If there be never a _servant-monster_ in the Fair, who can help it
he says, nor a nest of antiques?"

The best excuse that can be made for Jonson, and in a somewhat less degree
for Beaumont and Fletcher, in respect of these base and silly sneers at
Shakespeare is, that his plays were present to men's minds chiefly as
acted. They had not a neat edition of them, as we have, so as, by
comparing the one with the other, to form a just notion of the mighty mind
that produced the whole. At all events, and in every point of view, Jonson
stands far higher in a moral light than Beaumont and Fletcher. He was a
fair contemporary, and in his way, and as far as Shakespeare is concerned,
an original. But Beaumont and Fletcher were always imitators of, and often
borrowers from him, and yet sneer at him with a spite far more malignant
than Jonson, who, besides, has made noble compensation by his praises.

Act ii. sc. 3.--

"_Just._ I mean a child of the horn-thumb, a babe _of booty_, boy, a
cut purse."

Does not this confirm, what the passage itself cannot but suggest, the
propriety of substituting "booty" for "beauty" in Falstaff's speech,
_Henry IV._ part i. act i. sc. 2. "Let not us, &c.?"

It is not often that old Ben condescends to imitate a modern author; but
Master Dan. Knockhum Jordan, and his vapours are manifest reflexes of Nym
and Pistol.

_Ib._ sc. 5.--

"_Quarl._ She'll make excellent geer for the coachmakers here in
Smithfield, to anoint wheels and axletrees with."

Good! but yet it falls short of the speech of a Mr. Johnes, M.P., in the
Common Council, on the invasion intended by Buonaparte:--"Houses
plundered--then burnt;--sons conscribed--wives and daughters ravished," &c.,
&c.--"But as for you, you luxurious Aldermen! with your fat will he grease
the wheels of his triumphant chariot!"

_Ib._ sc. 6.--

"_Cok._ Avoid in your satin doublet, Numps."

This reminds me of Shakespeare's "Aroint thee, witch!" I find in several
books of that age the words _aloigne_ and _eloigne_--that is,--"keep your
distance!" or "off with you!" Perhaps "aroint" was a corruption of
"a