Perfons Represented.

Orfino, Duke of Illyria.

Sebaftian, a young gentleman, brother to Viola.
Antonio, a fea-captain, friend to Sebastian.
A fea-captain, friend to Viola.

Valentine,

Curio,

Gentlemen attending on the Duke.

Sir Toby Belch, uncle to Olivia.
Sir Andrew Ague-cheek.

Malvolio, fterward to Olivia.
Fabian,

Clown,} Servants to Olivia.

Olivia, a rich countess.

Viola, in love with the Duke.

Maria, Olivia's woman.

Lords, Prieft, Sailors, Officers, Muficians, and other

Attendants.

SCENE, a city in Illyria; and the fea-coaft near it.

4

TWELFTH NIGHT:

OR,

WHAT YOU WILL'

ACT

I.

SCENE I.

A Room in the Duke's Palace.

Enter Duke, CURIO, and Lords; Muficians attending.

Duke. If mufick be the food of love, play on,
Give me excess of it; that, furfeiting,
The appetite may ficken, and fo die.-
That train again;-it had a dying fall:

There is great reafon to believe, that the ferious part of this comedy is founded on fome old tranflation of the feventh hiftory in the fourth volume of Belleforeft's Hiftoires Tragiques. It appears from the books of the Stationers' Company, July 15, 1596, that there was a version of "Epitomes des cent Hiftoires Tragiques, partie extraictes des actes des Romains, et autres, &c." Belleforest took the ftory, as ufual, from Bandello. The comick scenes appear to have been entirely the production of Shakspeare. Ben Jonson, who takes every opportunity to find fault with Shakspeare, feems to ridicule the conduct of Twelfth-Night in his Every Man out of bis Humour, at the end of A& III. fc. vi. where he makes Mitis fay, "That the argument of his comedy might have been of fome other nature, as of a duke to be in love with a counters, and that countess to be in love with the duke's fon, and the fon in love with the lady's waiting-maid: fome fucb cross wooing, with a clown to their ferving-man, better than be thus near and familiarly allied to the time." STEEVENS.

I fuppofe this comedy to have been written in 1614. If however the foregoing paffage was levelled at Twelfth-Night, my fpeculation falls to the ground. See An Attempt to ascertain the order of Shakspeare's plays, Vol. I. MALONE.

B 2

O, it

no more;

O, it came o'er my ear like the sweet fouth,
That breathes upon a bank of violets,
Stealing, and giving odour 2.-Enough;
'Tis not fo fweet now, as it was before.
O fpirit of love, how quick and fresh art thou!
That, notwithstanding thy capacity
Receiveth as the fea, nought enters there,
Of what validity and pitch foever3,
But falls into abatement and low price,
Even in a minute! fo full of fhapes is fancy,
That it alone is high-fantastical +.

Cur. Will you go hunt, my lord?
Duke. What, Curio?

Cur. The hart.

Duke. Why, fo I do, the nobleft that I have: O, when my eyes did fee Olivia first, Methought, fhe purg'd the air of pestilence; That inftant was I turn'd into a hart 5;

20, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south, That breathes upon a bank of violets,

And

Stealing, and giving odour.] Milton, in his Paradife Loft, b. iv. bas very fuccessfully introduced the fame image:

"Fanning their odoriferous wings, difpenfe

"Native perfumes, and whisper whence they ftole
"Those balmy spoils."

The old copy reads-weet found, which Mr. Rowe changed into swind, and Mr. Pope into fouth. STEEVENS.

Here Shakspeare makes the fouth fteal odour from the violst. In his 99th Sonnet, the violet is made the thief:

"The forward violet thus did I chide :

"Sweet thief, whence didst thou steal thy fweet that smells, "If not from my love's breath?" MALONE.

3 Of what validity and pitch foever,] Validity is here ufed for value. See Vol. III. p. 471, n. 3. MALONE.

4 That it alone is high fantastical.] High-fantastical, means no more than fantaftical to the beight. So, in All's Well that ends Well:

"My bigh-repented blames

"Dear fovereign, pardon me." STEEVENS.

5 That inftant was I turn'd into a bart ;] This image evidently alludes to the ftory of Acteon, by which Shakspeare feems to think men cau tioned against too great familiarity with forbidden beauty. Acteon,

whe