So I, being young, till now ripe not to reason; And leads me to your eyes, where I o'erlook Hel. Wherefore was I to this keen mockery born? eye, Good troth, you do me wrong, good sooth you do, But fare you well: perforce I must confess I thought you lord of more true gentleness. Hermia, sleep thou there: And never mayst thou come Lysander near! Are hated most of those they did deceive, So thou, my surfeit and my heresy, Of all be hated, but the most of me! 120 130 [Exit. 140 And, all my powers, address your love and might To honour Helen and to be her knight. [Exit. To pluck this crawling serpent from my breast! Her. [Awaking.] Help me, Lysander, help me! do thy best Ay me, for pity! what a dream was here! Lysander, look how I do quake with fear: 150 Lysander! what, remov'd? Lysander! lord! [Exit 132 gentleness gentility, good breeding. ACT III. SCENE I. The wood. Titania lying asleep. Enter QUINCE, SNUG, BOTTOM, FLUTE, SNOUT, and STARVELING. Bot. Are we all met? Quin. Pat, pat; and here's a marvellous convenient place for our rehearsal. This green plot shall be our stage, this hawthorn-brake our tiring-house; and we will do it in action as we will do it before the Duke. Bot. Peter Quince, Quin. What say'st thou, bully Bottom? Bot. There are things in this comedy of Pyramus and Thisby that will never please. First, Pyramus must draw a sword to kill himself; which the ladies cannot abide. How answer you that? Snout. By 'r lakin, a parlous fear. II Star. I believe we must have the killing out, when all is done, Bot. Not a whit: I have a device to make all well. Write me a prologue; and let the prologue seem to say, we will do no harm with our swords and that Pyramus is not kill'd indeed; and, for the more better assurance, tell them that I Pyramus am not Pyramus, but Bottom the weaver: this will put them out of fear. 20 Quin. Well, we will have such a prologue; and it shall be written in eight and six. Bot. No, make it two more; let it be written in eight and eight. Snout. Will not the ladies be afeard of the lion? Bot. Masters, you ought to consider with yourselves to bring in - God shield us!- a lion among ladies, is a most dreadful thing; for there is not a more fearful wild-fowl than your lion living; and we ought to look to 't. 30 Snout. Therefore another prologue must tell he is not a lion. Bot. Nay, you must name his name, and half his face must be seen through the lion's neck: and he himself must speak through, saying thus, or to the same defect, - Ladies, -or Fair ladies, I would wish you, - or I would request you, or I would entreat you, not to fear, not to tremble: my life 12 lakin ladykin, or little lady the Virgin Mary, parlous perilous, a phonetic spelling of the word as it was commonly pronounced in S.'s day. 22 eight and six: that is, lines of eight and six syllables alternately. for yours. If you think I come hither as a lion, it were pity of my life no, I am no such thing; I am a man as other men are; and there indeed let him name his name, and tell them plainly he is Snug the joiner. 40 Quin. Well, it shall be so. But there is two hard things; that is, to bring the moonlight into a chamber; for, you know, Pyramus and Thisby meet by moonlight. Snout. Doth the moon shine that night we play our play? Bot. A calendar, a calendar! look in the almanac; find out moonshine, find out moonshine. Quin. Yes, it doth shine that night. Bot. Why, then may you leave a casement of the great chamber window, where we play, open, and the moon may shine in at the casement. 50 Quin. Ay; or else one must come in with a bush of thorns and a lanthorn, and say he comes to disfigure, or to present, the person of Moonshine. Then, there is another thing: we must have a wall in the great chamber; for Pyramus and Thisby, says the story, did talk through the chink of a wall. Snout. You can never bring in a wall. What say you, Bottom? Bot. Some man or other must present Wall: and let him have some plaster, or some loam, or some rough-cast about him, to signify wall; and let him hold his fingers thus, and through that cranny shall Pyramus and Thisby whisper. 61 Quin. If that may be, then all is well. Come, sit down, every mother's son, and rehearse your parts. Pyramus, you begin: when you have spoken your speech, enter into that brake: and so every one according to his cue. Enter PUCK behind. Puck. What hempen home-spuns have we swaggering here, So near the cradle of the fairy queen? What, a play toward! I'll be an auditor; An actor too perhaps, if I see cause. Quin. Speak, Pyramus. Thisby, stand forth. Bot. "Thisby, the flowers of odious savours sweet," So hath thy breath, my dearest Thisby dear. But hark, a voice! stay thou but here awhile, Puck. A stranger Pyramus than e'er play'd here. 70 [Exit. [Exit. Quin. Ay, marry, must you; for you must understand he goes but to see a noise that he heard, and is to come again. 80 Enter Puck. Here and elsewhere, the stage directions of the old copies have Robin, or Robin Goodfellow, instead of Puck. Flu. "Most radiant Pyramus, most lily-white of hue, As true as truest horse that yet would never tire, Quin. "Ninus' tomb," man: why, you must not speak that yet; that you answer to Pyramus: you speak all your part at once, cues and all. Pyramus enter: your cue is past; it is, 66 never tire." Flu. O,-"As true as truest horse, that yet would never tire." Re-enter PUCK, and BOTTOM with an ass's head. Bot. "If I were fair, Thisby, I were only thine." masters! fly, masters! 91 O strange! we are haunted. Pray, Help! [Exeunt Quince, Snug, Flute, Snout, and Starveling. Puck. I'll follow you, I'll lead you about a round, Through bog, through bush, through brake, through brier: Sometime a horse I'll be, sometime a hound, A hog, a headless bear, sometime a fire; And neigh, and bark, and grunt, and roar, and burn, 99 [Exit. Bot. Why do they run away? this is a knavery of them to make me afeard. Re-enter SNOUT. Snout. O Bottom, thou art chang'd! what do I see on thee? Bot. What do you see? you see an ass-head of your own, do you? Re-enter QUINCE. [Exit Snout. Quin. Bless thee, Bottom! bless thee! thou art translated. [Exit. Bot. I see their knavery: this is to make an ass of me; to fright me, if they could. But I will not stir from this place, do what they can I will walk up and down here, and I will sing, that they shall hear I am not afraid. The ousel cock so black of hue, With orange-tawny bill, The throstle with his note so true, The wren with little quill, [Sings. IIJ Tita. [Awaking.] What angel wakes me from my flow'ry bed? Bot. [Sings.] The finch, the sparrow and the lark, The plain-song cuckoo gray, Whose note full many a man doth mark, And dares not answer nay; 111 ousel blackbird. 113 throstle song thrush. 119 never so? for, indeed, who would set his wit to so foolish a bird? who And thy fair virtue's force perforce doth move me Bot. Methinks, mistress, you should have little reason for that and yet, to say the truth, reason and love keep little company together now-a-days; the more the pity that some honest neighbours will not make them friends. Nay, I can gleek upon occasion. Tita. Thou art as wise as thou art beautiful. 131 Bot. Not so, neither: but if I had wit enough to get out of this wood, I have enough to serve mine own turn. Tita. Out of this wood do not desire to go: Thou shalt remain here, whether thou wilt or no. I am a spirit of no common rate: The summer still doth tend upon my state; And I do love thee: therefore, go with me; And they shall fetch thee jewels from the deep, And sing while thou on pressed flowers dost sleep: Peaseblossom! Cobweb! Mote! and Mustardseed! 140 Where shall we go? Tita. Be kind and courteous to this gentleman; 130 gleekjeer. 140 apricocks apricots: the sounds of k and t are often interchanged. 150 |