Moreover, this dummy
is surmounted by a hideous staring mask, furnished with an imaginary
ear, utterly unlike anything human, because, instead of being hollowed
in, it is rounded out something like the rounded outside of a shoe-horn,
in order to form a cup which would cover and conceal any real ear that
might be behind it.
Perhaps the reader will more fully understand the full meaning of B.I.'s
lines if I paraphrase them as follows:--
To the Reader.
The dummy that thou seest set here,
Was put instead of Shake-a-speare;
Wherein the Graver had a strife
To extinguish all of Nature's life;
O, could he but have drawn his mind
As well as he's concealed behind
His face; the Print would then surpasse
All, that was ever writ in brasse.
But since he cannot, do not looke
On his mas'd Picture, but his Booke.
Do out appears in the name of the little instrument something like a
pair of snuffer which was formerly used to extinguish the candles and
called a "Doute." Therefore I have correctly substituted "extinguished"
for "out-doo.
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