Page images
PDF
EPUB

Where thou shalt live, till we can find a time
To blaze your marriage, reconcile your friends,
Beg pardon of the prince, and call thee back
With twenty hundred thousand times more joy
Than thou went'st forth in lamentation.-
Go before, nurse: commend me to thy lady;
And bid her hasten all the house to bed,
Which heavy sorrow makes them apt unto:
Romeo is coming.

Nurse. O Lord, I could have staid here all the night,

To hear good counsel: O, what learning is!-
My lord, I'll tell my lady you will come.

Hie

Rom. Do so, and bid my sweet prepare to chide.
Nurse. Here, sir, a ring she bid me give you, sir:
you, make haste, for it grows very late.
[Exit Nurse.
Rom. How well my comfort is reviv'd by this!
Fri. Go hence: Good night; and here stands all
your state;"

Either be gone before the watch be set,
Or by the break of day disguis'd from hence:
Sojourn in Mantua; I'll find out your man,
And he shall signify from time to time
Every good hap to you, that chances here:
Give me thy hand; 'tis late: farewell; good night.
Rom. But that a joy past joy calls out on me,
It were a grief, so brief to part with thee:
Farewell.

[Exeunt.

6 here stands all your state;] The whole of your fortune depends on this.

SCENE IV.

A Room in Capulet's House.

Enter CAPULET, Lady CAPULET, and PARIS. Cap. Things have fallen out, sir, so unluckily, That we have had no time to move our daughter: Look you, she lov'd her kinsman Tybalt dearly, And so did I;-Well, we were born to die.— 'Tis very late, she'll not come down to night: I promise you, but for your company,

I would have been a-bed an hour ago.

Par. These times of woe afford no time to woo: Madam, good night: commend me to your daughter.. La. Cap. I will, and know her mind early to

Of

morrow;

To-night she's mew'd up' to her heaviness.
Cap. Sir Paris, I will make a desperate tender®
my child's love: I think, she will be rul'd
In all respects by me; nay more, I doubt it not.
Wife, go you to her ere you go to bed;
Acquaint her here of my son Paris' love;

And bid her, mark you me, on Wednesday next-
But, soft; What day is this?

Par.

Monday, my lord.

Cap. Monday? ha! ha' Well, Wednesday is too

soon,

O' Thursday let it be;-o' Thursday, tell her,
She shall be married to this noble earl:-
Will you be ready? do you like this haste?

7 mew'd up-] This is a phrase from falconry. A mew was a place of confinement for hawks.

8 Sir Paris, I will make a desperate tender-] Desperate means only bold, adventurous, as if he had said in the vulgar phrase, I will speak a bold word, and venture to promise you my daughter.

We'll keep no great ado;—a friend, or two:-
For hark you, Tybalt being slain so late,
It may be thought we held him carelessly,
Being our kinsman, if we revel much:

Therefore we'll have some half a dozen friends,
And there an end. But what say you to Thursday?
Par. My lord, I would that Thursday were to-

morrow.

Cap. Well, get you gone:-O' Thursday be it

then :

Go you to Juliet ere you go to bed,

Prepare her, wife, against this wedding-day.-
Farewell, my lord.-Light to my chamber, ho!
Afore me, it is so very late, that we

May call it early by and by:-Good night.

[Exeunt.

SCENE V.

Juliet's Chamber.

Enter ROMEO and JULIET.

Jul. Wilt thou be gone? it is not yet near day: It was the nightingale, and not the lark, That pierc'd the fearful hollow of thine ear; Nightly she sings on yon pomegranate tree:9 Believe me, love, it was the nightingale.

Rom. It was the lark, the herald of the morn, No nightingale: look, love, what envious streaks Do lace the severing clouds in yonder east: Night's candles are burnt out, and jocund day Stands tiptoe on the misty mountain tops;

Nightly she sings on yon pomegranate tree:] This is not merely a poetical supposition. It is observed of the nightingale, that, if undisturbed, she sits and sings upon the same tree for many weeks together.

I must be gone and live, or stay and die.
Jul. Yon light is not day-light, I know it, I:
It is some meteor that the sun exhales,
To be to thee this night a torch-bearer,
And light thee on thy way to Mantua:
Therefore stay yet, thou need'st not to be gone.
Rom. Let me be ta'en, let me be put to death;
I am content, so thou wilt have it so.
I'll say, yon grey is not the morning's eye,
'Tis but the pale reflex' of Cynthia's brow;
Nor that is not the lark, whose notes do beat
The vaulty heaven so high above our heads:
I have more care to stay than will to go;-
Come, death, and welcome! Juliet wills it so.-
How is't, my soul? let's talk, it is not day.

Jul. It is, it is, hie hence, be gone, away;
It is the lark that sings so out of tune,
Straining harsh discords, and unpleasing sharps.
Some say, the lark makes sweet division;3
This doth not so, for she divideth us:
Some say, the lark and loathed toad change eyes;
O, now I would they had chang'd voices too!
Since arm from arm that voice doth us affray,
Hunting thee hence with hunts-up to the day.*
O, now be gone; more light and light it grows.
Rom. More light and light?-more dark and
dark our woes.

1

the pale reflex-] The appearance of a cloud opposed to the moon.

? I have more care to stay,-] Care for inclination.

3

sweet division;] Division seems to have been the technical phrase for the pauses or parts of a musical composition.

4 Hunting thee hence with hunts-up to the day.] The hunts-up was the name of the tune anciently played to wake the hunters, and collect them together. But a huntsup also signified a morning song to a new-married woman, the day after her marriage, and is used here in that sense.

Nurse. Madam!

Jul. Nurse?

Enter Nurse.

Nurse. Your lady mother's coming to your

chamber:

The day is broke; be wary, look about.

[Exit Nurse. Jul. Then, window, let day in, and let life out. Rom. Farewell, farewell! one kiss, and I'll de

scend.

Jul. Art thou friend!

[ROMEO descends. lord! my

my love! gone so?

my

I must hear from thee every day i'the hour,
For in a minute there are many days:
O! by this count I shall be much in years,
Ere I again behold my Romeo.

Rom. Farewell! I will omit no opportunity
That may convey my greetings, love, to thee.

Jul. O, think'st thou, we shall ever meet again? Rom. I doubt it not; and all these woes shall serve For sweet discourses in our time to come.

Jul. O God! I have an ill-divining soul: Methinks, I see thee, now thou art below, As one dead in the bottom of a tomb: Either my eyesight fails, or thou look'st pale. Rom. And trust me, love, in my eye so do you: Dry sorrow drinks our blood. Adieu! adieu! Exit ROMEO.

Jul. O fortune, fortune! all men call thee fickle: If thou art fickle, what dost thou with him That is renown'd for faith? Be fickle, fortune;

$ That is renown'd for faith?] This Romeo, so renown'd for faith, was but the day before dying for love of another woman: yet this is natural. Romeo was the darling object of Juliet's love, and Romeo was, of course, to have every excellence.

« PreviousContinue »