At my poor house, look to behold this night
Earth-treading stars,a that make dark heaven light:
Such comfort, as do lusty young men feel
When well-apparell❜d April on the heel
Of limping winter treads," even such delight
Among fresh female buds shall you this night
Inherit at my house; hear all, all see,

b

And like her most, whose merit most shall be:
Which on more view of many, mine, being one,
May stand in number, though in reckoning none.
Come, go with me;-Go, sirrah, trudge about
Through fair Verona; find those persons out,

Whose names are written there, [gives a paper] and to them

say,

My house and welcome on their pleasure stay.

[Exeunt CAPULET and PARIS. Serv. Find them out, whose names are written here? It is written—that the shoemaker should meddle with his yard, and the tailor with his last, the fisher with his pencil, and the painter with his nets; but I am sent to find those persons whose names are writ, and can never find what names the writing person hath here writ. I must to the learned :In good time.

Enter BENVOLIO and ROMEO.

Ben. Tut, man! one fire burns out another's burning,
One pain is lessen'd by another's anguish;

Turn giddy, and be holp by backward turning;

One desperate grief cures with another's languish:

Take thou some new infection to the eye,

And the rank poison of the old will die.

a

Earth-treading stars, &c.

Warburton calls this line nonsense, and would

'read,

"Earth-treading stars that make dark even light."

Monck Mason would read,

"Earth-treading stars that make dark, heaven's light;"

that is, stars that make the light of heaven appear dark in comparison with them. It appears to us unnecessary to alter the original reading, and especially as passages in the masquerade scene would seem to indicate that the banqueting-room opened into a garden-as,

"Her beauty hangs upon the cheek of night."

b So the folio and (C), with the exception of one for on. (A), Such, amongst view of many.

Rom. Your plantain-leaf is excellent for that."
Ben. For what, I pray thee?

Rom.

For your broken shin.

Ben. Why, Romeo, art thou mad?

Rom. Not mad, but bound more than a madman is:
Shut up in prison, kept without my food,
Whipp'd, and tormented, and-Good e'en, good fellow.
Serv. God gi' good e'en.-I pray, sir, can you read?
Rom. Ay, mine own fortune in my misery.
Serv. Perhaps you have learn'd it without book:
But I pray, can you read anything you see?
Rom. Ay, if I know the letters, and the language.
Serv. Ye say honestly; Rest you merry!
Rom. Stay, fellow : I can read.

[Reads.

"Signor Martino,'and his wife and daughter; County Anselme, and his beauteous sisters; the lady widow of Vitruvio; Signor Placentio, and his lovely nieces; Mercutio, and his brother Valentine; Mine uncle Capulet, his wife, and daughters; My fair niece Rosaline; Livia; Signor Valentio, and his cousin Tybalt; Lucio, and the lively Helena."

A fair assembly; [gives back the note] Whither should they

Rom. Indeed, I should have ask'd you that before.

Serv. Now I'll tell you without asking: My master is the great rich Capulet; and if you be not of the house of Montagues, I pray, come and crush a cup of wine. Rest you

merry.

Ben. At this same ancient feast of Capulet's
Sups the fair Rosaline, whom thou so lov'st;
With all the admired beauties of Verona:
Go thither; and, with unattainted eye,
Compare her face with some that I shall show,
And I will make thee think thy swan a crow.

[Exit.

a So all the early editions. Theobald gives "To supper" to the Servant.

Rom. When the devout religion of mine eye

Maintains such falsehood, then turn tears to fires!
And these, who, often drown'd, could never die,-
Transparent heretics, be burnt for liars!

One fairer than my love! the all-seeing sun
Ne'er saw her match, since first the world begun.
Ben. Tut! you saw her fair, none else being by,
Herself pois'd with herself in either eye:

But in that crystal scales, let there be weigh'd
Your lady's love against some other maid

That I will show you, shining at this feast,

And she shall scant show well, that now shows best.
Rom. I'll go along, no such sight to be shown,
But to rejoice in splendour of mine own.

SCENE III-A Room in Capulet's House.

Enter LADY CAPULET and Nurse.

[Exeunt.

La. Cap. Nurse, where 's my daughter? call her forth to

me.

Nurse. Now by my maidenhead, at twelve year old,— I bade her come.-What, lamb! what, ladybird!—

God forbid !-where 's this girl?—what, Juliet!

La. Cap. This is the matter:-Nurse, give leave awhile, We must talk in secret.-Nurse, come back again; I have remember'd me, thou shalt hear our counsel. Thou know'st, my daughter 's of a pretty age. Nurse. 'Faith, I can tell her age unto an hour. La. Cap. She's not fourteen. Nurse.

I'll lay fourteen of my teeth,

a Scales-used as a singular noun.

And yet, to my teen
She is not fourteen.
To Lammas-tide?
La. Cap.

A fortnight, and odd days.
Nurse. Even or odd, of all days in the year,
Come Lammas-eve at night, shall she be fourteen.
Susan and she,-God rest all christian souls!-
Were of an age.-Well, Susan is with God;
She was too good for me: But, as I said,
On Lammas-eve at night shall she be fourteen;
That shall she, marry; I remember it well.
'Tis since the earthquake now eleven years;"
And she was wean'd,—I never shall forget it,—
Of all the days of the year, upon that day:
For I had then laid wormwood to my dug,
Sitting in the sun under the dove-house wall,
My lord and you were then at Mantua :-
Nay, I do bear a brain :—but, as I said,
When it did taste the wormwood on the nipple

:

Of my dug, and felt it bitter, pretty fool!

To see it tetchy, and fall out with the dug.

Shake, quoth the dove-house: 't was no need, I trow,
To bid me trudge.

And since that time it is eleven years:

For then she could stand alone; nay, by the rood,

She could have run and waddled all about.

For even the day before, she broke her brow:
And then my husband-God be with his soul!
'A was a merry man!—took up the child:
Yea, quoth he, dost thou fall upon thy face?
Thou wilt fall backward, when thou hast more wit;
Wilt thou not, Jule? and, by my holy dam,
The pretty wretch left crying, and said—Ay:
To see now, how a jest shall come about!

a Teen-sorrow.

b The speeches of the Nurse, from hence, are given as prose in all the early editions. Capell had the great merit of first printing them as verse; and not 66 erroneously,” as Boswell appears to think, for there is not in all Shakspere a passage in which the rhythm is more happily characteristic.

c Bear a brain-have a memory—a common expression.

I warrant, an I should live a thousand years,

I never should forget it; Wilt thou not, Jule? quoth he: And, pretty fool, it stinted,a and said--Ay.

La. Cap. Enough of this; I pray thee, hold thy peace. Nurse. Yes, madam; yet I cannot choose but laugh, To think it should leave crying, and say—Ay: And yet, I warrant, it had upon its brow A bump as big as a young cockrel's stone; A parlous knock; and it cried bitterly. Yea, quoth my husband, fall'st upon thy face? Thou wilt fall backward, when thou com'st to age; Wilt thou not, Jule? it stinted, and said-Ay.

Jul. And stint thou too, I pray thee, nurse, say I.

Nurse. Peace, I have done. God mark thee to his grace! Thou wast the prettiest babe that e'er I nurs'd: An I might live to see thee married once, I have my wish.

La. Cap. Marry, that marry is the very theme I came to talk of :-Tell me, daughter Juliet, How stands your disposition to be married?

Jul. It is an honour that I dream not of.

Nurse. An honour! were not I thine only nurse,

I'd say, thou hadst suck'd wisdom from thy teat.

La. Cap. Well, think of marriage now; younger than you, Here in Verona, ladies of esteem,

Are made already mothers: by my count,

I was a mother much upon these years

a It stinted-it stopped. Thus Gascoigne,—

"Then stinted she as if her song were done."

To stint is used in an active signification for to stop. Thus in those fine lines in Titus Andronicus,' which it is difficult to believe any other than Shakspere wrote,

"The eagle suffers little birds to sing,

And is not careful what they mean thereby,
Knowing that with the shadow of his wing
He can at pleasure stint their melody."

What a picture of a despot in his intervals of self-satisfying forbearance!

b Parlous. A corruption of the word perilous, which word is given in the folio. The parlous of the earlier copies is more in the Nurse's manner.

So (4). The folio and (C) have hour, both in Juliet's and the Nurse's speeches.