In this sense,
_anoint thee, Witch_, will mean, _Away, Witch, to your infernal
assembly_. This reading I was inclined to favour, because I had met with
the word _aroint_ in no other authour till looking into Hearne's
Collections I found it in a very old drawing, that he has published, in
which St. Patrick is represented visiting hell, and putting the devils
into great confusion by his presence, of whom one that is driving the
damned before him with a prong, has a label issuing out of his mouth
with these words, OUT OUT ARONGT, of which the last is evidently the
same with _aroint_, and used in the same sense as in this passage.
I.iii.15 (405,8) And the very points they blew] As the word _very_ is
here of no other use than to fill up the verse, it is likely that
Shakespeare wrote _various_, which might be easily mistaken for _very_,
being either negligently read, hastily pronounced, or imperfectly heard.
I.iii.21 (405,9) He shall live a man forbid] Mr. Theobald has very
justly explained _forbid_ by _accursed_, but without giving any reason
of his interpretation. To _bid_ is originally _to pray_, as in this
Saxon fragment,
Ethe iy ?iy ? bit y bote
_He is wise that_ prays and makes amends.
As to forbid_ therefore implies to _prohibit_, in opposition to the word
_bid_ in its present sense, it signifies by the same kind of opposition
to _curse_, when it is derived from the same word in its primitive
meaning.
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