able comedy, and most cruel death of Pyramus |
and Thisby.

Bot. A very good piece of work, I assure you,
and a merry.-Now, good Peter Quince, call
forth your actors by the scroll: Masters, spread
yourselves.

Quin. Answer as I call you.-Nick Bottom,

the weaver.

:

Bot. Ready Name what part I am for, proceed.

and Quin. You, Nick Bottom are set down for Pyramus.

Bot. Well, I will undertake it. What beard were I best to play it in?

Quin. Why, what you will.

Bot. I will discharge it in either your strawcoloured beard, your orange-tawny beard, your purple-iu-grain beard, or your Frenchcrown-colour beard, your perfect yellow.

Quin. Some of your French crowns have no hair at all, and then you will play bare-faced. -But, masters, here are your parts and I am to entreat you, request you, and desire you, to con them by to-morrow night; and meet me in Bot. What is Pyramus? a lover, or a tyrant? the palace wood, a mile without the town, by Quin. A lover, that kills himself most gallant-moon-light; there will we rehearse for if we ly for love. meet in the city, we shall be dog'd with company, and our devices known. In the mean time I will draw a bill of properties, such as our play wants. I pray you, fail me not. Bot. We will meet; and there we may rehearse more obscenely, and courageously. Take pains; be perfect; adieu.

Bot. That will ask some tears in the true performing of it: If I do it, let the audience look to their eyes: I will move storms, I will condole in some measure. To the rest :-Yet my chief humour is for a tyrant: I could play Ercles rarely, or a part to tear a cat in, to make all split.

"The raging rocks,
"With shivering shocks,
"Shall break the locks

"Of prison-gates:

"And Phibbus' car

"Shall shine from far,

"And make and mar

"The foolish fates."

This was lofty!-Now, name the rest of the players.-This is Ercles' vein, a tyrant's vein;

a lover is more condoling.

Quin. Francis Flute, the bellows-mender.
Flu. Here, Peter Quince.

Quin. You must take Thisby on you.
Flu. What is Thisby ? a wandering knight?
Quin. It is the lady that Pyramus must love.
Plu. Nay, faith let me not play a woman;
I have a beard coming.

Quin. That's all one; you shall play it in a mask, and you may speak as small as you will.

Bot. An I may hide my face, let me play Thisby too: I'll speak in a monstrous little Toice ;-Thisne, Thisne,-Ah! Pyramus, my lorer dear; thy Thisby dear! and lady dear! Quin. No, no; you must play Pyramus, and, Flute, you Thisby.

Bot. Well, proceed.

Quin. You, Pyramus' father; myself, This. by's father;-Snug, the joiner, you, the lion's part :-and, I hope, here is a play fitted.

Snug. Have you the lion's part written? pray you, if it be, give it me, for I am slow of study.

Quin. You may do it extempore, for it is nothing but roaring.

Bot. Let me play the lion too: I will roar, that I will do any man's heart good to hear me; I will roar, that I will make the duke say, Let him roar again, Let him rour again.

Quin. An you should do it too terribly, you would fright the duchess and the ladies, that they would shriek: and that were enough to bang us all.

Quin. At the duke's oak we meet.
Bot. Enough; Hold, or cut bow-strings. +
[Exeunt.

ACT II.

SCENE 1.-A Wood near Athens.

Enter a FAIRY at one door, and Pvc at

another.

Puck. How now, spirit! whither wander you?
Fai. Over hill, over dale,

Thorough bush, thorough brier,
Over park, over pale,

Thorough flood, thorough fire,
I do wander every where,

Swifter than the moones sphere;
And I serve the fairy queen,

To dew her orbs upon the green:
The cowslips tall her pensioners be;
In their gold coats spots you see ;
Those be rubies, fairy favours,
In those freckles live their savours:
I must go seek some dew-drops here,
And hang a pearl in every cowslip's ear.
Farewell, thou lobý of spirits, I'll be gone;
Our queen and all our elves come here anon.
Puck. The king doth keep his reveis here
to-night;

Take heed, the queen come not within his sight,
For Oberon is passing fell and wrath,
Because that she, as her attendant, hath
A lovely boy, stol'n from an Indian king;
She never had so sweet a changeling:
And jealous Oberon would have the child
Knight of his train, to trace the forests wild:
But she, perforce, withholds the loved boy,
Crowns him with flowers, and makes hi1n all
her joy;

And now they never meet in grove, or greu,
By fountain clear, or spangled star-light sheen, [
But they do square; that all their elves, for
fear,

Creep into acorn cups, and hide them there.
Fei. Either mistake your shape and making

quite,

Or else you are that shrewd and knavish sprite,
Call'd Robin Good-fellow are you not he,
That fright the maidens of the villagery;
Skim milk; and sometimes labour in the quern, **
And bootless make the breathless bousewife
churn;

All. That would hang us every mother's son. Bot. I grant you, friends, if that you should fright the ladies out of their wits, they would have no more discretion but to haug us: but I will aggravate my voice so, that I will roar And sometime make the drink to bear no you as gently as any sucking dove; I will rear you an 'twere any nightingale.

barm; ++

[harm? Mislead night-wanderers, laughing at their Quin. You can play no part but Pyramus: Those that Hobgoblin call you, and sweet Puck, for Pyramus is a sweet-faced man; a proper You do their work, and they shall have good 30, as one shall see in a summer's day; a most lovely, gentleman-like man; therefore Are not you he? jou must needs play Pyramus.

• As if.

luck :

• Articles required in performing a play.
+ Arall event. 1 Circles. A teru of castempl

Quarrel.

Puck. Thou speak'st aright;

I am that merry wanderer of the night.
I jest to Oberon, and make him smile,
When I a fat and bean-fed horse beguile,
Neighing in likeness of a filly foal:
And sometimes lurk f in a gossip's bowl,
In very likeness of a roasted crab; •
And, when she drinks, against her lips I bob,
And on her wither'd dew-lap pour the ale.
The wisest aunt, telling the saddest tale,
Sometime for three-foot stool mistaketh me;
Then slip I from her bum, down topples she,
And tailor cries, and falls into a cough;
And then the whole quire bold their hips, and
loffe ;

Is, as in mockery, set: The spring, the summer,
The childing autumn, angry winter change
Their wonted liveries; and the 'mazed world,
By their increase, now knows not which is
which:

And this same progeny of evils comes
From our debate, from our dissention;
We are their parents and original.

Obe. Do you amend it then; it lies in you:
Why should Titania cross her Oberon ?
I do but beg a little changeling boy,
To be my henchman. 1

Tita. Set your heart at rest,
The fairy land buys not the child of me.
His mother was a vot'ress of my order:
And, in the spiced Indian air, by night,
Full often hath she gossip'd by my side;
And sat with me on Neptune's yellow sands,
that Marking the embarked traders on the flood;
When we have laugh'u to see the sails conceive,
And grow big-bellied, with the wanton wind:
Which she, with pretty and with swimming
gait,

And waxen in their mirth, and neeze, and swear
A merrier hour was never wasted there.-
But room, Fairy here comes Oberon.
Fai. And here my mistress :-'Would
he were gone!

SCENE II.

Enter OBERON, at one door, with his train,
and TITANIA, at another, with her's.
Obe. Il met by moon-light, proud Titania.
Tita. What, jealous Oberon? Fairy, skip

hence;

I have forsworn his bed and company.

Obe. Tarry, rash wanton: Am not I thy lord?
Tita. Then I must be thy lady: But I know
When thou hast stol'n away from fairy land,
And in the shape of Corin sat all day,
Playing on pipes of corn, and versing love
To amorous Phillida. Why art thou here,
Come from the farthest steep of India?
But that, forsooth, the bouncing Amazon,
Your buskin'd mistress, and your warrior love,
To Theseus must be wedded and you come
To give their bed joy and prosperity.

Obe. How canst thou thus, for shame, Tita-
nia,

Glance at my credit with Hyppolyta,
Knowing I know thy love to Theseus?

Didst thou not lead him through the glimmer-
ing night

From Perigenia, whom he ravish'd?

And make him with fair Eglé break his faith,
With Ariadne, and Antiopa?

Tita. These are the forgeries of jealousy:
And never, since the middle summer's spring,
Met we on hill, in dale, forest, or mead,
By paved fountain or by rushy brook,
Or on the beached margent of the sea,
To dance our ringlets to the whistling wind,
But with thy brawls thou hast disturb'd
sport.

our

Therefore the winds piping to us in vain,
As in revenge, have suck'd up from the sea
Contagious fogs; which falling in the land,
Have every pelting + river made so proud,
That they have overborne their continents: t
The ox hath therefore stretch'd his yoke in vain,
The ploughman lost his sweat; and the green

corn

Hath rotted, ere his youth attain'd a beard:
The fold stands empty in the drowned field,
And crows are fatted with the murrain flock;
The nine men's morris is fill'd up with mud;
And the quaint mazes in the wanton green,
For lack of tread are undistinguishable:
The human mortals want their winter here;
No night is now with hymn or carol blest :-
Therefore the moon, the governess of floods,
Pale in her anger, washes all the air,
That theumatic diseases do abound:
And thorough this distemperature, we see
The seasons alter: hoary headed frosts
Fall in the fresh lap of the crimson rose;
Aud on old Hyems' chin, and icy crown,
An oderous chaplet of sweet summer buds
+ Petty.
1 Banks which contain them.
A game played by boys.

• Wild apple.

(Following her womb, then rich with my young
'squire,)

Would imitate; and sail upon the land,
To fetch me trifles, and return again,
As from a voyage, rich with merchandise.
But she, being mortal, of that boy did die;
And, for her sake, I do rear up her boy :
And for her sake, I will not part with him.
Obe. How long within this wood intend you
stay?

Tita. Perchance, till after Theseus' wedding-
day.

If you will patiently dance in our round,
And see our moon-light revels, go with as;
If not shun me, and I will spare your haunts.
Obe. Give me that boy, and I will go with

thee.

Tita. Not for thy kingdom.-Fairies, away: We shall chide down-right, if I longer stay. [Exeunt TITANIA, and her trein. Obe. Well, go thy way: thou shalt not from this grove,

Till I torment thee for this injury.

My gentle Puck, come hither: Thou remember's
Since once I sat upon a promontory,
And heard a mermaid, on a dolphin's back,
Uttering such dulcet and harmonious breath,
That the rude sea grew civil at her song;
And certain stars shot madly from their spheres,
To hear the sea-maid's music.

DREAM

I'll watch Titania when she is asleep,
And drop the liquor of it in her eyes:
The next thing then she waking looks upon,
(Be it on lion, bear, or wolf, or bull,
On meddling monkey, or on busy ape,)
She shall pursue it with the soul of love.

And ere I take this charm off from her sight,
(As I can take it, with another herb,)
I'll make her render up her page to me.
But who comes here ? I am invisible;
And I will over-hear their conference.

Enter DEMETRIUS, HELENA following him.
Dem. I love thee not, therefore pursue me

not.

Where is Lysander, and fair Hermia?
The one I'll slay, the other slayeth me.
Thou told'st me, they were stol'n into this
wood,

And here am I, and wood within this wood,
Because I cannot meet with Hermia.

Hence, get thee gone, and follow me no more.
Hel. You draw me, you hard-hearted ada-
mant;

But yet you draw not iron, for my heart

, and make a heaven of bell, To die upon the hand I love so well.

[Exeunt DEM. and HEL.
Obe. Fare thee well, nymph: ere he do leave
this grove,

Thou shalt fly him, and he shall seek thy love.-
Re-enter PUCK.

Hast thou the flower there? Welcome, wan-
derer.

Puck. Ay, there it is.

Obe. I pray thee, give it me.

I know a bank whereon the wild thyme blows,
Where ox-lips and the nodding violet grows;
Quite over-canopied with lush woodbine,
With sweet musk-roses, and with eglantine:
There sleeps Titania, some time of the night,
Lull'd in these flowers with dances and de
light;

And there the snake throws her enamell'd skin,
Weed wide enough to wrap a fairy in:
And with the juice of this I'll streak her eyes,
And make her full of hateful fautasies.
Take thou some of it, and seek through this

grove :

is true as steel: Leave you your power to A sweet Athenian lady is in love

draw,

And I shall have no power to follow you.

Dem. Do I entice you? Do I speak you fair?
Or, rather, do 1 not in plainest truth
Tell you-I do not, nor I cannot love you?
Hel. And even for that do I love you the

more,

I am your spaniel; and, Demetrius,

The more you beat me, I will fawn on you:
Use me but as your spaniel, spurn me, strike

me,

Neglect me, lose me; only give me leave,
Unworthy as I am, to follow you.

What worser place can I beg in your love,
(And yet a place of high respect with me,
Than to be used as you use your dog?

With a disdainful youth: anoint his eyes;
But do it, when the next thing he espies,
May be the lady: Thou shalt know the man
By the Athenian garments be bath on.
Effect it with some care; that he may prove
More fond on her, than she upon her love:
And look thou meet me ere the first cock crow.
Puck. Fear not, any lord, your servant shall
[Exeunt.

do so.

SCENE III.

'Another part of the Wood.

Enter TITANIA, with her train.
Tita. Come, now a roundel, and a fairy

song;

Dem. Tempt not too much the hatred of my Then, for the third part of a minute, hence;

spirit;

For I am sick, when I do look on thee.

Hel. And I am sick, when I look not on

you.

Dem. You do impeach your modesty too
much,

To leave the city, and commit yourself
Into the hands of one that loves you not;
To trust the opportunity of night,
And the ill counsel of a desert place,
With the rich worth of your virginity.

Hel. Your virtue is my privilege for that.
It is not night, when I do see your face,
Therefore I think I am not in the night:
Nor doth this wood lack worlds of company;
For you, in my respect, are all the world:
Then how can it be said, I am alone,
When all the world is here to look on me?
Dem. I'll run from thee, and hide me in the

brakes,

And leave thee to the mercy of wild beasts.

Hel. The wildest hath not such a beart as
you.

Ron when you will the story shall be chang'd;
Apollo flies, and Daphne holds the chase;
The dove pursues the griffin; the mild hind
Makes speed to catch the tiger: Bootless speed!
When cowardice pursues, and valour flies.

Dem. I will not stay thy questions; let me

go:

Or, if thou follow me, do not believe
But I shall do thee mischief in the wood.

Hel. Ay, in the temple, in the town, the
field,

You do me mischief. Fie, Demetrius !
Your wrongs do set a scandal on my sex :
We cannot fight for love, as men may do ;

We should be woo'd, and were not made to

Woo.

• Mad, raving:
+ Bring in question.

Philomel, with melody,

Sing in our sweet lullaby;

Lulla, lulla, lullaby; lulla, lulla, lul

laby:

Never harm, nor spell nor charm,
Come our lovely lady nigh:

So, good night, with lullaby.

Lys. Fair love, you faint with wandering in
the wood;

And to speak troth, I have forgot our way;
We'll rest us, Hermia, if you think it good,
And tarry for the comfort of the day.

Hel. Oh! I am out of breath in this fond
chase!

The more my prayer, the lesser is my grace
Happy is Hermia, wheresoe'er she lies;
For she hath blessed and attractive eyes.
How came her eyes so bright! Not with salt

tears:

If so, my eyes are oftener wash'd than ber's.
No, no, I am as ugly as a bear;
For beasts that meet me, run away for fear:
Therefore, no marvel, though Demetrius
Do, as a monster, fly my presence thus.
What wicked and dissembling glass of mine
Made me compare with Hermia's sphery eyne !
But who is here ?-Lysander! on the ground!
Dead or asleep? I see no blood, no wound :—
Lysander, if you live, good Sir, awake.
Lys. And run through fire I will, for thy sweet
[Waking.

sake.

Her. Be it so, Lysander: find you out a Transparent Helena! Nature here show's art,
That through thy bosom makes me see thy
bed,
heart.

For I upon this bank will rest my head.

Lys. One turf shall serve as pillow for us
both;

One heart, one bed, two bosoms, and one troth.
Her. Nay, good Lysander; for my sake, my
dear,

Lie further off yet, do not lie so near.

Lys. O take the sense, sweet, of my inno

pride,

and

my

If Hermia meant to say, Lysander lied.
But, gentle friend, for love and courtesy
Lie further off; in hunan modesty
Such separation, as, may well be said,
Becomes a virtuous bachelor and a maid:
So far be distant; and good night, sweet friend:
Thy love ne'er alter, till thy sweet life end!
Lys. Amen, amen, to that fair prayer, say I;
And then end life, when I end loyalty!
Here is my bed: Sleep give thee all bis rest!
Her. With balf that wish the wisher's eyes be
press'd!
[They sleep.

Enter Puck.

Puck. Through the forest have I gone,
But Athenian found I none,
On whose eyes I might approve
This flower's force in stirring love.
Night and silence! who is here ?
Weeds of Athens be doth wear:
This is he, my master said,
Despised the Athenian maid:
And here the maiden, sleeping sound,
On the dank and dirty ground.
Pretty soul! she durst not lie
Near this lack-love, kill-courtesy.
Churl, upon thy eyes I throw

All the power this charm doth owe: +
When thou wak'st, let love forbid
Sleep his seat on thy eye-lid.

So awake, when I am gone;
For 1 must now to Oberon.

[Exit.

Enter DEMETRIUS and HELENA, running.

Where is Demetrius? Oh! how fit a word
Is that vile name, to perish ou my sword!

Hel. Do not say so, Lysander; say not so:
What though he love your Hermia? Lord, what
though?
Yet Hermia still loves you: then be content.
Lys. Content with Hermia? No: I do re-
pent

The tedious minutes I with her have spent.
Not Hermia, but Helena I love :

Who will not change a raven for a dove?
The will of man is by his reason sway'd;
And reason says you are the worthier maid.
Things growing are not ripe until their sea-

born?

When, at your hands, did I deserve this scorn?
Is't not enough, is't not enough, young man,
That I did never, no, nor never can,
Deserve a sweet look from Demetrias' eye,
But you must flout my insuffic ency?

Good troth, you do me wrong, good sooth, you
do.

In such disdainful manner me to woo.
But fare you well: perforce I must confess,
I thought you lord of more true gentleness.
Oh! that a lady, of one man refus'd,
Should, of another, therefore be abus'd!

(Erit.

Lys. She sees not Hermia:-Hermia,” sleep

thon there;

And never may'st thou come Lysander near!
For, as a surfeit of the sweetest things
The deepest loathing to the stomach brings ;
Or, as the heresies, that Dien do leave,
Are hated most of those they did deceive;
So thou, my surfeit, and my heresy,
Of all be hated; but the most of me!
And all my powers, address your love and
might,

To honour Helen, and to be her knight!

| Frit. Her. [starting.] Help me, Lysander, help me! do thy best,

To pluck this crawling serpent from my breast!
Ah! me, for pity!-what a dream was here I

Hel. Stay, though thou kill me, sweet Deme-Lysander, look, how I do quake with fear:

Pyramus and Thisby, says the story, did talk through the chinks of a wall.

Snug. You never can bring in a wall. What say you, Bottom?

Bot. Some man or other must present wall: and let him have some plaster, or some lome, or some rough-cast about him, to signify wall; or let him hold his fingers thus, and through

SCENE I-The same.-The Queen of Fairies that cranny shall Pyramus and Thisby whisper.

lying asleep.

Quin. If that may be, then all is well. Come, sit down, every mother's son, and rehearse your

Enter QUINCE, SNUG, BOTTOM, FLUTE, SNOUT, parts. Pyramus, you begin: when you have

awd 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 tyringbouse; 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 Py. Tamus and Thisby, that will never please. First, Pyramus must draw his sword to kill himself; which the ladies cannot abide. How answer you that ?

Snout. By'rlakin, ⚫ a parlous + fear.

spoken your speech, enter into that brake and so every one according to his cue.

Star. I believe, we must leave the killing out, But, hark, a voice! stay thou but here a 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 killed 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.

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 ?

Star. I fear it, I promise you.

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 it.

Snout. Therefore, another prologue must tell, he is not a lion.

Rot. Nay, you must name his name, and half his face must be seen through the lion's neck; and be 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 for your's. 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 bim name his name; and tell them plainly, he is Snug the joiner.

Quin. Well, it shall be so. But there is two hard things; that is, to bring the moon-light into a chamber: for you know, Pyramus and Thisby meet by moon-light.

Snug. Doth the moon shine, that night we play our play?

Bot. A calendar, a calendar! look in the almanack; find out moon-shine, find out moon. shine.

Quin. Yes, it doth shine that night.

Bot. Why, then you may leave a casement of the great chamber window, where we play, open; and the moon may shine in at the casement.

Quin. Ay; or else one must come in with a bash of thorns and a lanthorn, and say, be comes to disfigure, or to present, the person of moon-shine. Then, there is another thing: we must have a wall in the great chamber; for

while.

And by and by I will to thee appear.

[Exit.

Puck. A strauger Pyramus than e'er play'd
here !
[Aside.-Exit.

This. Must I speak now?
Quin. Ay, marry, must you for you must
understand, he goes but to see a noise that he
heard, and is to come again.

This. Most radiant Pyramus, most lily

white of hue,

Of colour like the red rose on triumphant
brier,

Most brisky juvenal, † and eke most lovely
Jew,

As true as truest horse, that yet would never

tire,

Pll meet thee, Pyramus, at Ninny's tomb.

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, never tire.

Re-enter PUCK, and BOTTOM with an ass' head.

This. O-As true as truest horse, that yet would never tire.

Pyr. If I were fair, Thisby, I were only thine :

Quin. O monstrous ! O strange ! we are haunted.

Pray, masters! fly, masters! help!

[Exeunt Clowns. Puck. I'll follow you, I'll lead you about a round,

Through bog, through bush, through brake,
through briar;

Sometime a horse I'll be, sometimes a hound,
A hog, a headless bear, sometime a fire;
And neigh, and bark, and grunt, and roar, and
buru,

Like horse, hound, hog, bear, fire, at every turn.
[Exit.

Bot. Why do they run away? this is a klavery of them, to make me afeard. §

Re-enter SNOUT.