No More Learning

4. 164. In _Underwoods_ 62 the same expression is used
as in this passage:

What a strong fort old Pimlico had been!
How it held out! how, last, 'twas taken in! --

_Take in_ in the sense of 'capture' is used again in _Every Man
in_, _Wks. _ 1. 64, and frequently in Shakespeare (see Schmidt).
The reference here, as Cunningham suggests, is to the Finsbury
sham fights. Hogsden was in the neighborhood of Finsbury, and
the battles were doubtless carried into its territory.

=3. 3. 173 Some Bristo-stone or Cornish counterfeit. = Cf.
Heywood, _Wks. _ 5. 317: 'This jewell, a plaine _Bristowe_ stone,
a counterfeit. ' See Gloss.

=3. 3. 184, 5 I know your Equiuocks:=
=You'are growne the better Fathers of 'hem o' late. = 'Satirically
reflecting on the Jesuits, the great patrons of _equivocation_. '--W.

'Or rather on the Puritans, I think; who were sufficiently obnoxious
to this charge. The Jesuits would be out of place here. '--G.

Why the Puritans are any more appropriate Gifford does not vouchsafe
to tell us. So far as I have been able to discover the Puritans
were never called 'Fathers,' their regular appellation being 'the
brethren' (cf. _Alch. _ and _Bart. Fair_). The Puritans were accused
of a distortion of Scriptural texts to suit their own purposes,
instances of which occur in the dramas mentioned above. On the whole,
however, equivocation is more characteristic of the Jesuits. They
were completely out of favor at this time. Under the generalship
of Claudio Acquaviva, 1581-1615, they first began to have a
preponderatingly evil reputation. In 1581 they were banished from
England, and in 1601 the decree of banishment was repeated, this time
for their suspected share in the Gunpowder Plot.

=3. 3. 206, 7 Come, gi' me Ten pieces more. = The transaction with
Guilthead is perhaps somewhat confusing. Fitzdottrel has offered to
give his bond for two hundred pieces, if necessary. Merecraft's 'old
debt of forty' (3. 3. 149), the fifty pieces for the ring, and the
hundred for Everill's new office (3. 3. 60 and 83) 'all but make two
hundred. ' Fitzdottrel furnishes a hundred of this in cash, with the
understanding that he receive it again of the gold-smith when he
signs the bond (3. 3. 194). He returns, however, without the gold,
though he seals the bond (3. 5. 1-3). Of the hundred pieces received
in cash, twenty go to Guilthead as commission (3. 3. 155).
This leaves forty each for Merecraft and Everill.

=3. 3. 213 how th' Asse made his diuisions. = See _Fab. _ cix,
_Fabulae Aesopicae_, Leipzig, 1810, _Leo, Asinus et Vulpes_. Harsnet
(_Declaration_, p. 110) refers to this fable, and Dekker made a
similar application in _Match me in London_, 1631, _Wks. _ 4. 145:

_King. _ Father Ile tell you a Tale, vpon a time
The Lyon Foxe and silly Asse did jarre.
Grew friends and what they got, agreed to share:
A prey was tane, the bold Asse did diuide it
Into three equall parts, the Lyon spy'd it.
And scorning two such sharers, moody grew,
And pawing the Asse, shooke him as I shake you . . .
And in rage tore him peece meale, the Asse thus dead,
The prey was by the Foxe distributed
Into three parts agen; of which the Lyon
Had two for his share, and the Foxe but one:
The Lyon (smiling) of the Foxe would know
Where he had this wit, he the dead Asse did show.
_Valasc. _ An excellent Tale.
_King. _ Thou art that Asse.

=3. 3. 214 Much good do you. = So in _Sil. Wom. _, _Wks. _ 3.
398: 'Much good do him. '

=3. 3. 217 And coozen i' your bullions. = Massinger's _Fatal
Dowry_, _Wks. _, p. 272, contains the following passage:
'The other is his dressing-block, upon whom my lord lays all his
clothes and fashions ere he vouchsafes them his own person:
you shall see him . . . at noon in the Bullion,' etc. In a note
on this passage (_Wks. _ 3. 390, ed. 1813) Gifford advanced the
theory that the _bullion_ was 'a piece of finery, which derived
its denomination from the large globular gilt buttons, still in
use on the continent. ' In his note on the present passage, he
adds that it was probably 'adopted by gamblers and others, as a
mark of wealth, to entrap the unwary. '

Nares was the next man to take up the word. He connected it with
'_bullion_; Copper-plates set on the Breast-leathers and Bridles
of Horses for ornament' (Phillips 1706). 'I suspect that it also
meant, in colloquial use, copper lace, tassels, and ornaments in
imitation of gold. Hence contemptuously attributed to those who
affected a finery above their station. '

Dyce (B. & Fl. , _Wks. _ 7. 291) was the first to disconnect the
word from _bullion_ meaning uncoined gold or silver. He says:
'_Bullions_, I apprehend, mean some sort of hose or breeches,
which were _bolled_ or _bulled_, i. e. swelled, puffed out
(cf. _Sad. Shep. _, Act 1. Sc. 2, _bulled_ nosegays'). '

The _NED. _ gives 'prob. a. F. _bouillon_ in senses derived from
that of "bubble. "'

Besides the passages already given, the word occurs in B. & Fl. ,
_The Chances_, _Wks. _ 7. 291:

Why should not bilbo raise him, or a pair of bullions?

_Beggar's Bush_, _Wks. _ 9. 81:

In his French doublet, with his blister'd
(1st fol. _baster'd_) bullions.

Brome, _Sparagus Garden_, _Wks. _ 3. 152:

--shaking your
Old Bullion Tronkes over my Trucklebed.

_Gesta Gray_ in Nichols' _Prog. Q. Eliz. _ 3. 341 A, 1594:
'A bullion-hose is best to go a woeing in; for tis full of
promising promontories. '

=3. 3. 231 too-too-vnsupportable! = This reduplicated
form is common in Shakespeare. See _Merch. of Ven. _ 2. 6.
42; _Hamlet_ 1. 2. 129; and Schmidt, _Dict. _ Jonson uses it
in _Sejanus_, _Wks. _ 3. 54, and elsewhere. It is merely a
strengthened form of _too_. (See Halliwell in _Sh. Soc. Papers_,
1884, 1. 39, and _Hamlet_, ed. Furness, 11th ed. , 1. 41. ) Jonson
regularly uses the hyphen.

=3. 4. 13 Cioppinos. = Jonson spells the word as if it were
Italian, though he says in the same sentence that the custom of
wearing chopines is Spanish. The _NED. _, referring to Skeat,
_Trans. Phil. Soc. _, 1885-7, p. 79, derives it from Sp. _chapa_,
a plate of metal, etc. 'The Eng. writers c 1600 persistently
treated the word as Italian, even spelling it _cioppino_, pl.
_cioppini_, and expressly associated it with Venice, so that,
although not recorded in Italian Dicts. it was app. temporarily
fashionable there. ' The statement of the _NED. _ that 'there is
little or no evidence of their use in England (except on the
stage)' seems to be contradicted by the quotation from Stephen
Gosson's _Pleasant Quippes_ (note 1. 1. 128). References to the
chopine are common in the literature of the period (see Nares
and _NED. _). I have found no instances of the Italianated form
earlier than Jonson, and it may be original with him. He uses
the plural _cioppini_ in _Cynthia's Revels_, _Wks. _ 2. 241.
See note 4. 4. 69.

=3. 4. 32 your purchase. = Cf. _Alch. _, _Wks. _ 4. 150, and
_Fox_, _Wks. _ 3. 168: 'the cunning purchase of my wealth. '
Cunningham (_Wks. _ 3.
498) says: 'Purchase, as readers of
Shakespeare know, was a cant term among thieves for the plunder
they acquired, also the act of acquiring it. It is frequently
used by Jonson. '

=3. 4. 35 Pro'uedor. = Gifford's change to provedore
is without authority. The word is _provedor_, Port. , or
_proveedor_, Sp. , and is found in Hakluyt, _Voyages_, 3. 701;
G. Sandys, _Trav. _, p. 6 (1632); and elsewhere, with various
orthography, but apparently never with the accent.

=3. 4. 43 Gentleman huisher. = For the gentleman-usher see
note 4. 4. 134. The forms _usher_ and _huisher_ seem to be used
without distinction. The editors' treatment of the form is
inconsistent. See variants, and compare 2. 7. 33.

=3. 4. 45-8 wee poore Gentlemen . . . piece. = Cf. Webster,
_Devil's Law Case_, _Wks. _ 2. 38: 'You have certain rich city
chuffs, that when they have no acres of their own, they will go
and plough up fools, and turn them into excellent meadow. ' Also
_The Fox_ 2. 1:

--if Italy
Have any glebe more fruitful than these fellows,
I am deceived.

As source of the latter Dr. L. H. Holt (_Mod. Lang. Notes_,
June, 1905) gives Plautus, _Epidicus_ 2. 3. 306-7:

nullum esse opinor ego agrum in agro Attico
aeque feracem quam hic est noster Periphanes.

=3. 5. 2 the row. = Stow (_Survey_, ed. 1633, p. 391) says that
Goldsmith's Row, 'betwixt _Breadstreete_ end and the Crosse in
_Cheap_,' is 'the most beautifull Frame of faire houses and shops,
that be within the Wals of _London_, or elsewhere in England. ' It
contained 'ten faire dwelling houses, and fourteene shops' beautified
with elaborate ornamentation. Howes (ed. 1631, p. 1045) says that
at his time (1630) Goldsmith's Row 'was much abated of her wonted
store of Goldsmiths, which was the beauty of that famous streete. '
A similar complaint is made in the _Calendar of State Papers_,
1619-23, p. 457, where Goldsmith's Row is characterized as the 'glory
and beauty of Cheapside. ' Paul Hentzner (p. 45) speaks of it as
surpassing all the other London streets. He mentions the presence
there of a 'gilt tower, with a fountain that plays. '

=3. 5. 29, 30 answering=
=With the French-time, in flexure of your body. = This may mean
bowing in the deliberate and measured fashion of the French, or
perhaps it refers to French musical measure. See Gloss.

=3. 5. 33 the very Academies. = See note 2. 8. 20.

=3. 5. 35 play-time. = Collier says that the usual hour of dining in
the city was twelve o'clock, though the passage in _Case is Altered_,
_Wks. _ 6. 331, seems to indicate an earlier hour:

Eat when your stomach serves, saith the physician,
Not at eleven and six.

The performance of plays began at three o'clock.
Cf. _Histriomastix_, 1610:

Come to the Town-house, and see a play:
At three a'clock it shall begin.

See Collier, _Annals_ 3. 377. Sir Humphrey Mildmay, in his Ms.
Diary (quoted _Annals_ 2. 70), speaks several times of going to
the play-house after dinner.

=3. 5. 39 his Damme. = _NED. _ gives a use of the phrase 'the
devil and his dam' as early as Piers Plowman, 1393. The 'devil's
dam' was later applied opprobriously to a woman. It is used thus
in Shakespeare, _Com. Err. _ 4. 3. 51. The expression is common
throughout the literature of the period.

=3. 5. 43 But to be seene to rise, and goe away. = Cf.
Dekker, _Guls Horne-booke_, _Non-dram. Wks. _ 2. 253: 'Now sir,
if the writer be a fellow that hath either epigrammd you, or
hath had a flirt at your mistris, . . . you shall disgrace him
worse then by tossing him in a blancket . . . if, in the middle of
his play, . . . you rise with a screwd and discontented face from
your stoole to be gone: no matter whether the Scenes be good or
no; the better they are the worse do you distast them. '

=3. 5. 45, 6 But say, that he be one=,
Wi' not be aw'd! but laugh at you=. In the Prologue to Massinger's
_Guardian_ we find:

--nor dares he profess that when
The critics laugh, he'll laugh at them agen.
(Strange self-love in a writer! )

Gifford says of this passage: 'This Prologue contains many sarcastick
allusions to Old Ben, who produced, about this time, his _Tale of a
Tub_, and his _Magnetic Lady_, pieces which failed of success, and
which, with his usual arrogance, (_strange self-love in a writer! _)
he attributed to a want of taste in the audience. '--Massinger's
(_Wks. _, ed. 1805, 4. 121. )

The _Guardian_ appeared in 1633, two years after the printing of
_The Devil is an Ass_. It seems certain that the reference is to the
present passage.

=3. 5. 47 pay for his dinner himselfe. = The custom of inviting the
poet to dinner or supper seems to have been a common one. Dekker
refers to it in the _Guls Horne-booke_, _Non-dram. Wks. _ 2. 249. Cf.
also the Epilogue to the present play.

=3. 5. 47 Perhaps, He would doe that twice, rather then thanke you. =
'This ill-timed compliment to himself, Jonson might have spared, with
some advantage to his judgment, at least, if not his modesty. '--G.

=3. 5. 53. = See variants. Gifford's change destroys the
meaning and is palpably ridiculous.

=3. 5. 77 your double cloakes. = 'I. e. , a cloake adapted
for disguises, which might be worn on either side. It was of
different colours, and fashions. This turned cloke with a false
beard (of which the cut and colour varied) and a black or yellow
peruke, furnished a ready and effectual mode of concealment,
which is now lost to the stage. '--G.

=3. 6. 2 canst thou get ne'r a bird? = Throughout this page
Merecraft and Pug ring the changes on Pitfall's name.

=3. 6. 15, 16 TRA. You must send, Sir. =
=The Gentleman the ring. = Traines, of course,
is merely carrying out Merecraft's plot to 'achieve the ring' (3. 5.
67). Later (4. 4. 60) Merecraft is obliged to give it up to Wittipol.

=3. 6. 34-6 What'll you do, Sir? = . . .
=Run from my flesh, if I could. = For a similar construction
cf. 1. 3. 21 and note.

=3. 6. 38, 9 Woe to the seuerall cudgells,=
=Must suffer on this backe! = Adapted from Plautus,
_Captivi_ 3. 4. 650:

Vae illis uirgis miseris, quae hodie in tergo morientur meo.

(Gifford mentions the fact that this is adapted from the classics. I
am indebted for the precise reference to Dr. Lucius H. Holt. )

=3. 6. 40 the vse of it is so present. = For other Latinisms cf.
_resume_, 1. 6. 149; _salts_, 2. 6. 75; _confute_, 5.