unquestionably established.

I have, however, met with a passage in Sir Philip Sidney's _Arcadia_
(ed. 1598, p. 294.) which might lead to a different interpretation of
_delighted_ in these passages, and which would not, perhaps, be less
startling than that of Mr. Hickson.

"All this night (in despite of darknesse) he held his eyes open;
and in the morning, when the _delight_ began to restore to each
body his colour, then with curtains bar'd he himselfe from the
enjoying of it; neither willing to feele the comfort of the day,
nor the ease of the night."

Here, _delight_ is apparently used for _the return of light_, and the
prefix _de_ is probably only intensive. Now, presuming that Shakspeare
also used _delighted_ for _lighted_, _illuminated_ the passage in
_Measure for Measure_ would bear this interpretation: "the delighted
spirit, i.e., the spirit _restored to light_," freed from "that dark
house in which it long was pent." In _Othello_, "if virtue lack no
delighted beauty," i.e. "_want not the light of beauty_, your son-in-law
shows far more fair than black." Here the opposition between _light_ and
_black_ is much in its favour. In _Cymbeline_, I must confess it is not
quite so clear: "to make my gifts, by the dark uncertainty attendant
upon delay, more lustrous (delighted), more radiant when given," is not
more satisfactory than Mr. {201} HICKSON'S interpretation of this
passage. But is it necessary that _delighted_ should have the same
signification in all the three passages? I think not.

These are only suggestions, of course, but the passage from Sidney is
certainly curious, and, from the correct and careful manner in which the