The Dramatic Works of Shakespeare

Should in the furthest east begin to draw
The shady curtains from Aurora's bed,
Away from light steals home my heavy son,
And private in his chamber pens himself;
Shuts up his windows, locks fair daylight out,
And makes himself an artificial night:
Black and portentous must this humour prove,
Unless good counsel may the cause remove.
Ben. My noble uncle, do you know the
cause?
[him.
Mon. I neither know it, nor can learn of
Ben. Have you importuned him by any
[friends:
Mon. Both by myself and many other
But he, his own affections' counsellor,
Is to himself,-I will not say how true-
But to himself so secret and so close,
So far from sounding and discovery,
As is the bud bit with an envious worm,
Ere he can spread his sweet leaves to the air,
Or dedicate his beauty to the sun. [grow,
Could we but learn from whence his sorrows
We would as willingly give cure, as know.
Enter ROMEO, ut a distance.

means?

Ben. See, where he comes: So please you, step aside;

I'll know his grievance, or be much denied. Mon. I would thou wert so happy by thy stay,

To hear true shrift,-Come,madam, let's away.
[Exeunt MONTAGUE and Lady.
Ben. Good morrow, cousin.
Rom.
Is the day so young?
Ben. But new-struck nine.
Rom.
Ah me! sad hours seem long.
Was that my father that went thence so fast?
Ben. It was.-What sadness lengthens Ro-
meo's hours?
[them short.
Rom. Not having that, which having, makes
Ben. In love?
Rom. Out-
Ben. Of love?

Rom. Out of her favour, where I am in love. Ben. Alas, that love, so gentle in his view, Should be so tyrannous and rough in proof! Rom. Alas, that love, whose view is muffled still,

Should, without eyes, see pathways to his will! Where shall we dine?-O me!-What fray was here?

Yet tell me not, for I have heard it all. Here's much to do with hate, but more with love :

Why then, O brawling love! O loving hate!
O any thing, of nothing first create!
O heavy lightness! serions vanity!
Mis-shapen chaos of well-seeming forms!
Feather of lead, bright smoke, cold fire, sick
health!

Still-waking sleep, that is not what it is!-
This love feel I, that feel no love in this.
Dost thou not laugh?

Беп.

No, coz, I rather weep. Rom. Good beart, at what? Ben. At thy good heart's oppression. Rom. Why, such is love's transgression.

• In seriousness.

What is it else? a madness most discreet,
A choking gall, and a preserving sweet.
Farewell, my coz.
[Going,
Ben.
Soft, I will go along;
An if you leave me so, you do me wrong.
Rom. Tut, I have lost myself; I am not
here;

This is not Romeo, he's some other where. Ben. Tell me in sadness*, who she is you love.

Rom. What, shall I groan, and tell thee? Groan? why, no;

Ben.

But sadly tell me, who. [will:Rom. Bid a sick man in sadness make his Ah, word ill urged to one that is so ill !—. In sadness, consin, I do love a woman. Ben. I aim'd so near, when I supposed you loved. [fair I love.

Rom. A right good marksman !-And she?: Ben. A right fair mark, fair coz, is soonest hit.

[be hit

Rom. Well, in that hit, you miss : she'll not With Cupid's arrow, she hath Dian's wit; And, in strong proof of chastity well arm'd, From love's weak childish bow she lives anharm'd.

She will not stay the siege of loving terms,
Nor bide the encounter of assailing eyes,
Nor ope her lap to saint-seducing gold:
O, she is rich in beauty; only poor,
That, when she dies, with beauty dies her store.
Ben. Then she hath sworn, that she will

still live chaste?

Rom. She hath, and in that sparing makes huge waste;

For beauty, starved with her severity,
Cuts beauty off from all posterity.
She is too fair, too wise; wisely too fair,
To merit bliss by making me despair:
She hath forsworn to love; and, in that vow,
Do I live dead, that live to tell it now.

Ben. Be ruled by me, forget to think of her. Rom. O, teach me how I should forget to think.

Ben. By giving liberty unto thine eyes; Examine other beauties.

Rom. 'Tis the way To call her's, exquisite, in question more: These happy masks, that kiss fair ladies brows,

Being black, put us in mind they hide the fair;
He, that is strucken blind, cannot forget
The precious treasure of his eyesight lost:
Show me a mistress that is passing fair,
What doth her beauty servet, but as a note
Where I may read, who pass'd that passing
fair

ti. e., What end does it answer.

Farewell; thou canst not teach me to forget. Ben. I'll pay that doctrine, or else die in debt. [Exeunt.

SCENE II. A Street.

Enter CAPULET, PARIS, and Servant. Cap. And Montague is bound as well as I, In penalty alike; and 'tis not hard, I think, For men so old as we to keep the peace. [both; Par. Of honourable reckoning* are you And pity 'tis, you lived at odds so long. But now, my lord, what say you to my suit? Cap. But saying o'er what I have said before:

My child is yet a stranger in the world, She hath not seen the change of fourteen years;

Let two more summers wither in their pride, Ere we may think her ripe to be a bride.

Par. Younger than she are happy mothers made.

[made. Cap. And too soon marr'd are those so early The earth hath swallow'd all my hopes but She is the hopeful lady of my earth: [she, But woo her, gentle Paris, get her heart, My will to her consent is but a part; An she agree, within her scope of choice Lies my consent and fair according voice. This night I hold an old accustom'd feast, Whereto I have invited many a guest, Such as I love; and you, among the store, One more, most welcome, makes my number

more.

At my poor house, look to behold this night Earth-treading stars, 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,
And like her most, whose merit most shall be:
Such, amongst 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

Puper.] 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 here 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;

• Account, estimation,

Estimation.

Turn giddy, and be holp by backward turning; One desperate grief cures with another's languish :

Take thou some new infection to thy eye,
And the rank poison of the old will die.
Rom. Your plantain leaf is excellent for
Ben. For what, I pray thee? [that.
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 any thing you see? Rom. Ay, if I know the letters, and the language.

[Reads.

Serv. Ye say honestly; Rest you merry! Rom Stay, fellow; I can read. Signior Martino, and his wife, and daughters; County Anselme, and his beauteous sisters; The lady widow of Virtruvio; Signior Placentio, and his lovely nieces; Mercutio, and his brother Valentine, Mine uncle Capulet, his wife, and daughters; My fair niece Rosaline; Livia; Signior Valentio, and his cousin Tybalt; Lucio, and the lively Helena. A fair assembly; [Gives back the Note.] Whether should they come?

Serv. Up.

Rom. Whither?

Serv. To supper; to our house. Rom. Whose house?

Serv. My master's.

[before.

Rom. Indeed, I should have asked you that 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 wines. Rest you merry.

[Exit.

Ben. At this same ancient feast of Capulet's Sups the fair Rosaline, whom thou so lovest; 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. Rom. When the devout religion of mine

eye

[fires! Maintains such falsehood, then turn tears to 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
began.

[by,

Ben. Tut? you saw her fair, none else being Herself poised with herself in either eye: But in those crystal scales, let there be weigh'd Your lady's love against some other maid

+ To inherit, in the language of Shakspeare is to possess We still say in cant language-to crack a bottle.

| Weigh'd.

That I will show you, shining at this feast,

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

[Exeunt.
SCENE III. A Room in Capulet's House.
Enter Lady CAPULET and Nurse.
La. Cap. Nurse, where's my daughter?
call her fort to me.

Nurse. Now, by my maiden-head,at twelve year old,[bird!I bade her come.-What, lamb! what, lady: God forbid!-where's this girl?—what, Juliet!

Enter JULIET.

Jul. How now, who calls?

Nurse. Jul.

Your mother. Madam, I am here, What is your will? [leave awhile, La. Cap. This is the matter:- Nurse, give We must talk in secret.-Nurse, come back again; [counsel. I have remember'd me, thou shalt hear our Thou know'st, my daughter's of a pretty age. Nurse. 'Faith, I can tell her age unto an La. Cap. She's not fourteen. [hour. Nurse. I'll lay fourteen of my teeth, And yet, to my teen be it spoken, I have but four,

year,

She is not fourteen: How long is it now
To Lammas-tide?
La. Cap.
A fortnight, and odd days.
Nurse. Even or odd, of all days in the
[teen.
Come Lammas-eve at night, shall she be four-
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: 'twas no need,
To bid me trudge.
[I trow,

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 jull 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-4y:
To see now, how a jest shall come about!
I warrant, an I should live a thousand years,
I never should forget it; Wilt thou not, Jule?
qnoth he:

And, pretty fool, it stinted T, and said- Ay.
La. Cap. Enough of this; I pray thee, hold
thy peace.
[but laugh,
To think it should leave crying, and say-Ay
Nurse. Yes, madam; Yet I cannot choose
A bump as big as a young cockrel's stone;
yet, I warrant, it had upon it's brow
A parlous knock; and it cried bitterly.
Yea, quoth my husband, fall'st upon thy
jace?
[to age;

And

Thou wilt fall backward, when thou comest
Wilt thou not, Jule? it stinted, and said—AY.
Jul. And stint thou too, I pray thee, nurse,
1
say I.
[to his grace
Nurse. Peace, I have done. God mark thee
Thou wast the prettiest babe that e'er I nursed:
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,
[teat.
I'd say, thou hadst suck'd wisdom from thy
La. Cup. Well, think of marriage now;
younger than you,

Here in Verona, ladies of esteem,
Are made already mothers: by my count,
I was your mother much upon these years
That you are now a maid. Thus then, in brief;
The valiant Paris seeks you for his love.

Nurse. A mau, young lady! lady, such a

man,

a flower.

As all the world-Why, he's a man of wax #.
La. Cap. Verona's summer hath not such
[flower.
Nurse. Nay, he's a flower; in faith, a very
La. Cap. What say you? can you love the
gentleman?

This night you shall behold him at our feast:
Read o'er the volume of young Paris' face,
And find delight writ there with beauty's pen;
Examine every married lineament.
And see how one another lends content;
And what obscured in this fair volume lies,
Find written in the margin of his eyes #.
This precious book of love, this unbound
To beautify him, only lacks a cover: [lover,
The fish lives in the seas; and 'tis much pride,
For fair without the fair within to hide :
That book in many's eyes doth share the glory,
That in gold clasps locks in the golden story;

Scarce, hardly. To my sorrow. .e., I have a perfect remembrance or recollection.
§ The cross. Holy dame, i. e., the blessed virgin. It stopped crying.
** Favour.
++ Well made, as if he had been modelled in wax.
The comments on ancient books were always printed in the margin.
i. e., Is not yet caught, whose skin was wanted to bind him.

by men.

So shall you share all that he doth possess, By having him, making yourself no less. Nurse. No less? nay, bigger; women grow [Paris' love? La. Cap. Speak briefly, can you like of Jul. I'll look to like, if looking liking move: But no more deep will I endart mine eye, Than your consent gives strength to make it fly. Enter a Servant.

Serv. Madam, the guests are come, supper served up, you called, my young lady asked for, the nurse cursed in the pantry, and every thing in extremity. I must hence to wait; I beseech you, follow straight.

La. Cup. We follow thee.-Juliet, the
county stays.
[happy days.
Nurse. Go, girl, seek happy nights to
[Exeunt.

SCENE IV. A Street.
Enter ROMEO, MERCUTIO, BENVOLIO, with
five or six Maskers, Torch-Bearers, and
Others.

Rom. What, shall this speech be spoke for our excuse?

Or shall we on without apology?

Ben. The date is out of such prolixity * : We'll have no Cupid hood-wink'd with a

scarf,

Bearing a Tartar's painted bow of lath,
Scaring the ladies like a crow-keeper +;
Nor no without-book prologue, faintly spoke
After the prompter, for our entrance:
But, let them measure us by what they will,
We'll measure them a measure ‡, and be gone.
Rom. Give me a torch §,--I am not for this
ambling;

Being but heavy, I will bear the light.
Mer. Nay, gentle Romeo, we must have
you dance.
[shoes,
Rom. Not I, believe me: yon have dancing
With nimble soles: I have a soul of lead
So stakes me to the ground, I cannot move.
Mer. You are a lover; borrow Cupid's
wings,

And soar with them above a common bound. Rom. I am too sore enpierced with his shaft,

To soar with his light feathers; and so bound,
I cannot bound a pitch above dull woe:
Under love's heavy burden do I sink. [love;
Mer. And, to sink in it, should you burden
Too great oppression for a tender thing.
Rom. Is love a tender thing? it is too rough,
Too rude, too boist'rous; and it pricks like
[with love;
Mer. If love be rough with you, be rough
Prick love for pricking, and you beat love
Give me a case to put my visage in: [down.
[Putting on a Mask.

thorn.

A visor for a visor!-What care I,
What curious eye doth quote || deformities?

Up to the ears.-Come, we burn day-light, ho. Rom. Nay, that's not so.

Mer. I mean, sir, in delay We waste our lights in vain, like lamps by day. Take our good meaning; for our judgment sits Five times in that, ere once in our five wits. Rom. And we mean well, in going to this But 'tis no wit to go. [mask; Mer. Why, may one ask? Rom. I dreamt a dream to-night. Mer.

Rom. Well, what was yours?

And so did I.

Mer. That dreamers often lie. Rom. In bed, asleep, while they do dream things true. [with you. Mer. O, then I see queen Mab hath been She is the fairies' midwife; and she comes In shape no bigger than an agate-stone On the fore-finger of an alderman, Drawn with a team of little atomies f Athwart men's noses as they lie asleep: [legs Her waggon-spokes made of long spinners' The cover of the wings of grasshoppers; The traces, of the smallest spider's web; The collars, of the moonshine's wat'ry beams: Her whip, of cricket's bone; the lash, of filin: Her waggoner, a small grey-coated gnat, Not half so big as a round little worm Prick'd from the lazy finger of a maid: Her chariot is an empty hazel-nut, Made by the joiner squirrel, or old grub, Time out of mind the fairies' coach-makers. And in this state she gallops night by night Through lovers' brains, and then they dream of love: [straight:

On courtiers' knees, that dream on court'sies O'er lawyers' fingers, who straight dream on fees:

O'er ladies' lips, who straight on kisses dream; Which oft the angry Mab with blisters plagues, Because their breaths with sweetmeats tainted are,

Sometime the gallops o'er a courtier's nose, And then dreams he of smelling out a suit: And sometimes comes she with a tithe-pig's Tickling a parson's nose as 'a lies asleep, [tail, Then dreams he of another benefice:

i. e., Long speeches are out of fashion. + A scare-crow, a figure made up to frighten cows. A dance. § A torch-bearer was a constant appendage to every troop of maskers. Observe. It was anciently the custom to strew rooins with rushes. ** This is equivalent to phrases in common use-I am done for, it is over with me

++ Atoms.

It A place in court.

Sometime she driveth o'er a soldier's neck,
And then dreams he of cutting foreign throats,
Of breaches, ambuscadoes, Spanish blades,
Of healths five fathom deep; and then anon
Drums in his ear; at which he starts, and wakes;
And, being thus frighted, swears a prayer or
And sleeps again. This is that very Mab, [two,
That plats the manes of horses in the night;
And bakes the elf-locks in foul sluttish hairs,
Which, once untangled,much misfortune bodes.
This is the hag, when maids lie on their backs,
That presses them, and learns them first to
Making them women of good carriage. [bear,
This, this is she-

Rom.
Thou talk'st of nothing.
Mer.
True, I talk of dreams;
Which are the children of an idle brain,
Begot of nothing but vain fantasy;
Which is as thin of substance as the air;
And more inconstant than the wind, who wooes
Even now the frozen bosom of the north,
And, being anger'd, puffs away from thence,
Turning his face to the dew-dropping south.
Ben. This wind you talk of, blows us from
ourselves;

Peace, peace, Mercutio, peace;

Supper is done, and we shall come too late.
Rom. I fear, too early: for my mind misgives,
Some consequence, yet hanging in the stars,
Shall bitterly begin his fearful date
With this night's revels; and expire the term
Of a despised life, closed in my breast,
By some vile forfeit of untimely death:
But He, that hath the steerage of my course,
Direct iny sail!-On, lusty gentlemen.
Ben. Strike, drum.

[Exeunt.
SCENE V. A Hall in Capulet's House.
Musicians waiting. Enter Servants.
1 Serv. Where's Potpan, that he helps not
to take away? he shift a trencher! he scrape

a trencher!

2 Serv. When good manners shall lie all in one or two men's hands, and they unwashed too, 'tis a foul thing.

1 Serv. Away with the joint-stools, remove the court-cupboard +, look to the plate:-good thou, save me a piece of marchpane; and, as thou lovest me, let the porter let in Susan Grindstone, and Nell.-Antony! and Potpan! 2 Serv. Ay, boy; ready.

1 Serv. You are looked for, and called for, asked for, and sought for, in the great chamber. 2 Sery. We cannot be here and there too. Cheerly, boys; be brisk a while, and the longer liver take all. [They retire behind. Enter CAPULET, &c., with the Guests and the Maskers.

Cap. Gentlemen, welcome! ladies, that have their toes [you: Unplagued with corns, will have a bout with Ah ha, my mistresses! which of you all Will now deny to dance? she that inakes dainty, she,

I'll swear hath corns; Am I come near you now?
You are welcome, gentlemen! I have seen the
That I have worn a visor; and could tell [day,
A whispering tale in a fair lady's ear, [gone:
Such as would please ;-'tis gone, 'tis gone, 'tis
You are welcome, gentlemen!-Come, musi
cians play.
A hall! a hall! give room, and foot it, girls.
[Music plays, and they dance.
More light, ye knaves; and turn the tables up,
And quench the fire, the room is grown too hot.
Ah, sirrah, this unlook'd-for sport comes well.
Nay, sit, nay sit, good cousin Capulet;
For you and I are past our dancing days:
How long is't now, since last yourself and
Were in a mask?
2 Cap.
By'r lady, thirty years.
1 Cap. What, man! 'tis not so much, 'tis not
Tis since the nuptial of Lucentio, [so much:
Come pentecost as quickly as it will, [mask'd.
Some five and twenty years; and then we
2 Cap. 'Tis more, 'tis more: his son is elder,
His son is thirty.
1 Cap.
Will you tell me that?
His son was but a ward two years ago.
Rom. What lady's that, which doth enrich
Of yonder knight?

[sir:

[the hand
Serv. I know not, sir.
[bright!
Rom. O, she doth teach the torches to burn
Her beauty hangs upon the cheek f night
Like a rich jewel in an Ethiop's ear:
Beauty too rich for use, for earth too dear!
So shows a snowy dove trooping with crows,
As yonder lady o'er her fellows shows, [stand,
The measure done, I'll watch her place of
And,touching hers, make happy my rude hand.
Did my heart love till now? forswear it, sight!
For I ne'er saw true beauty till this night.

Tyb. This, by his voice, should be a Mon

tague:-
[slave
Fetch me my rapier, boy:-What! dares the
Come hither, cover'd with an antic face,
To fleer and scorn at our solemnity?
Now, by the stock and honour of my kin,
To strike him dead I hold it not a sin.
1 Cap. Why, how now, kinsman? wherefore
storm you so?

Tyb. Uncle, this is a Montague, our foe;
A villain, that is hither come in spite,
To scorn at our solemnity this night
1 Cap. Young Romeo is't?
Tyb.

'Tis he, that villain Romeo.
1 Cap. Content thee, gentle coz, let him
He bears him like a portly gentleman; [alone,
And, to say truth, Verona brags of him,
To be a virtuous and well-govern'd youth:
I would not for the wealth of all this town,
Here in my house, do him disparagement:
Therefore be patient, take no note of him,
It is my will; the which if thou respect,
Show a fair presence, and put off these frowns,
And ill-beseeming semblance for a feast.
Tyb. It fits, when such a villain is a guest;
I'll not endure him.

i. e., Fairy-locks, locks of hair clotted and tangled in the night.

A cupboard set in a corner like a beaufet on which the plate was placed. Almond-cake.

i. e., Make room.

An Ethiopian, a black.

The danae.

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