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diff --git a/testdata/compression/decompressed/midsummer-nights-dream.txt.decomp b/testdata/compression/decompressed/midsummer-nights-dream.txt.decomp new file mode 100644 index 0000000..99e98ad --- /dev/null +++ b/testdata/compression/decompressed/midsummer-nights-dream.txt.decomp @@ -0,0 +1,3980 @@ +A Midsummer Night's Dream
+
+
+ ACT I
+
+
+ SCENE I. Athens. The palace of THESEUS.
+
+ /Enter THESEUS, HIPPOLYTA, PHILOSTRATE, and Attendants/
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ Now, fair Hippolyta, our nuptial hour
+ Draws on apace; four happy days bring in
+ Another moon: but, O, methinks, how slow
+ This old moon wanes! she lingers my desires,
+ Like to a step-dame or a dowager
+ Long withering out a young man revenue.
+
+*HIPPOLYTA*
+
+ Four days will quickly steep themselves in night;
+ Four nights will quickly dream away the time;
+ And then the moon, like to a silver bow
+ New-bent in heaven, shall behold the night
+ Of our solemnities.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ Go, Philostrate,
+ Stir up the Athenian youth to merriments;
+ Awake the pert and nimble spirit of mirth;
+ Turn melancholy forth to funerals;
+ The pale companion is not for our pomp.
+
+ /Exit PHILOSTRATE/
+
+ Hippolyta, I woo'd thee with my sword,
+ And won thy love, doing thee injuries;
+ But I will wed thee in another key,
+ With pomp, with triumph and with revelling.
+
+ /Enter EGEUS, HERMIA, LYSANDER, and DEMETRIUS/
+
+*EGEUS*
+
+ Happy be Theseus, our renowned duke!
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ Thanks, good Egeus: what's the news with thee?
+
+*EGEUS*
+
+ Full of vexation come I, with complaint
+ Against my child, my daughter Hermia.
+ Stand forth, Demetrius. My noble lord,
+ This man hath my consent to marry her.
+ Stand forth, Lysander: and my gracious duke,
+ This man hath bewitch'd the bosom of my child;
+ Thou, thou, Lysander, thou hast given her rhymes,
+ And interchanged love-tokens with my child:
+ Thou hast by moonlight at her window sung,
+ With feigning voice verses of feigning love,
+ And stolen the impression of her fantasy
+ With bracelets of thy hair, rings, gawds, conceits,
+ Knacks, trifles, nosegays, sweetmeats, messengers
+ Of strong prevailment in unharden'd youth:
+ With cunning hast thou filch'd my daughter's heart,
+ Turn'd her obedience, which is due to me,
+ To stubborn harshness: and, my gracious duke,
+ Be it so she; will not here before your grace
+ Consent to marry with Demetrius,
+ I beg the ancient privilege of Athens,
+ As she is mine, I may dispose of her:
+ Which shall be either to this gentleman
+ Or to her death, according to our law
+ Immediately provided in that case.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ What say you, Hermia? be advised fair maid:
+ To you your father should be as a god;
+ One that composed your beauties, yea, and one
+ To whom you are but as a form in wax
+ By him imprinted and within his power
+ To leave the figure or disfigure it.
+ Demetrius is a worthy gentleman.
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ So is Lysander.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ In himself he is;
+ But in this kind, wanting your father's voice,
+ The other must be held the worthier.
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ I would my father look'd but with my eyes.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ Rather your eyes must with his judgment look.
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ I do entreat your grace to pardon me.
+ I know not by what power I am made bold,
+ Nor how it may concern my modesty,
+ In such a presence here to plead my thoughts;
+ But I beseech your grace that I may know
+ The worst that may befall me in this case,
+ If I refuse to wed Demetrius.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ Either to die the death or to abjure
+ For ever the society of men.
+ Therefore, fair Hermia, question your desires;
+ Know of your youth, examine well your blood,
+ Whether, if you yield not to your father's choice,
+ You can endure the livery of a nun,
+ For aye to be in shady cloister mew'd,
+ To live a barren sister all your life,
+ Chanting faint hymns to the cold fruitless moon.
+ Thrice-blessed they that master so their blood,
+ To undergo such maiden pilgrimage;
+ But earthlier happy is the rose distill'd,
+ Than that which withering on the virgin thorn
+ Grows, lives and dies in single blessedness.
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ So will I grow, so live, so die, my lord,
+ Ere I will my virgin patent up
+ Unto his lordship, whose unwished yoke
+ My soul consents not to give sovereignty.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ Take time to pause; and, by the next new moon--
+ The sealing-day betwixt my love and me,
+ For everlasting bond of fellowship--
+ Upon that day either prepare to die
+ For disobedience to your father's will,
+ Or else to wed Demetrius, as he would;
+ Or on Diana's altar to protest
+ For aye austerity and single life.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ Relent, sweet Hermia: and, Lysander, yield
+ Thy crazed title to my certain right.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ You have her father's love, Demetrius;
+ Let me have Hermia's: do you marry him.
+
+*EGEUS*
+
+ Scornful Lysander! true, he hath my love,
+ And what is mine my love shall render him.
+ And she is mine, and all my right of her
+ I do estate unto Demetrius.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ I am, my lord, as well derived as he,
+ As well possess'd; my love is more than his;
+ My fortunes every way as fairly rank'd,
+ If not with vantage, as Demetrius';
+ And, which is more than all these boasts can be,
+ I am beloved of beauteous Hermia:
+ Why should not I then prosecute my right?
+ Demetrius, I'll avouch it to his head,
+ Made love to Nedar's daughter, Helena,
+ And won her soul; and she, sweet lady, dotes,
+ Devoutly dotes, dotes in idolatry,
+ Upon this spotted and inconstant man.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ I must confess that I have heard so much,
+ And with Demetrius thought to have spoke thereof;
+ But, being over-full of self-affairs,
+ My mind did lose it. But, Demetrius, come;
+ And come, Egeus; you shall go with me,
+ I have some private schooling for you both.
+ For you, fair Hermia, look you arm yourself
+ To fit your fancies to your father's will;
+ Or else the law of Athens yields you up--
+ Which by no means we may extenuate--
+ To death, or to a vow of single life.
+ Come, my Hippolyta: what cheer, my love?
+ Demetrius and Egeus, go along:
+ I must employ you in some business
+ Against our nuptial and confer with you
+ Of something nearly that concerns yourselves.
+
+*EGEUS*
+
+ With duty and desire we follow you.
+
+ /Exeunt all but LYSANDER and HERMIA/
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ How now, my love! why is your cheek so pale?
+ How chance the roses there do fade so fast?
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ Belike for want of rain, which I could well
+ Beteem them from the tempest of my eyes.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ Ay me! for aught that I could ever read,
+ Could ever hear by tale or history,
+ The course of true love never did run smooth;
+ But, either it was different in blood,--
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ O cross! too high to be enthrall'd to low.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ Or else misgraffed in respect of years,--
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ O spite! too old to be engaged to young.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ Or else it stood upon the choice of friends,--
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ O hell! to choose love by another's eyes.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ Or, if there were a sympathy in choice,
+ War, death, or sickness did lay siege to it,
+ Making it momentany as a sound,
+ Swift as a shadow, short as any dream;
+ Brief as the lightning in the collied night,
+ That, in a spleen, unfolds both heaven and earth,
+ And ere a man hath power to say 'Behold!'
+ The jaws of darkness do devour it up:
+ So quick bright things come to confusion.
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ If then true lovers have been ever cross'd,
+ It stands as an edict in destiny:
+ Then let us teach our trial patience,
+ Because it is a customary cross,
+ As due to love as thoughts and dreams and sighs,
+ Wishes and tears, poor fancy's followers.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ A good persuasion: therefore, hear me, Hermia.
+ I have a widow aunt, a dowager
+ Of great revenue, and she hath no child:
+ From Athens is her house remote seven leagues;
+ And she respects me as her only son.
+ There, gentle Hermia, may I marry thee;
+ And to that place the sharp Athenian law
+ Cannot pursue us. If thou lovest me then,
+ Steal forth thy father's house to-morrow night;
+ And in the wood, a league without the town,
+ Where I did meet thee once with Helena,
+ To do observance to a morn of May,
+ There will I stay for thee.
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ My good Lysander!
+ I swear to thee, by Cupid's strongest bow,
+ By his best arrow with the golden head,
+ By the simplicity of Venus' doves,
+ By that which knitteth souls and prospers loves,
+ And by that fire which burn'd the Carthage queen,
+ When the false Troyan under sail was seen,
+ By all the vows that ever men have broke,
+ In number more than ever women spoke,
+ In that same place thou hast appointed me,
+ To-morrow truly will I meet with thee.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ Keep promise, love. Look, here comes Helena.
+
+ /Enter HELENA/
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ God speed fair Helena! whither away?
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ Call you me fair? that fair again unsay.
+ Demetrius loves your fair: O happy fair!
+ Your eyes are lode-stars; and your tongue's sweet air
+ More tuneable than lark to shepherd's ear,
+ When wheat is green, when hawthorn buds appear.
+ Sickness is catching: O, were favour so,
+ Yours would I catch, fair Hermia, ere I go;
+ My ear should catch your voice, my eye your eye,
+ My tongue should catch your tongue's sweet melody.
+ Were the world mine, Demetrius being bated,
+ The rest I'd give to be to you translated.
+ O, teach me how you look, and with what art
+ You sway the motion of Demetrius' heart.
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ I frown upon him, yet he loves me still.
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ O that your frowns would teach my smiles such skill!
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ I give him curses, yet he gives me love.
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ O that my prayers could such affection move!
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ The more I hate, the more he follows me.
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ The more I love, the more he hateth me.
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ His folly, Helena, is no fault of mine.
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ None, but your beauty: would that fault were mine!
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ Take comfort: he no more shall see my face;
+ Lysander and myself will fly this place.
+ Before the time I did Lysander see,
+ Seem'd Athens as a paradise to me:
+ O, then, what graces in my love do dwell,
+ That he hath turn'd a heaven unto a hell!
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ Helen, to you our minds we will unfold:
+ To-morrow night, when Phoebe doth behold
+ Her silver visage in the watery glass,
+ Decking with liquid pearl the bladed grass,
+ A time that lovers' flights doth still conceal,
+ Through Athens' gates have we devised to steal.
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ And in the wood, where often you and I
+ Upon faint primrose-beds were wont to lie,
+ Emptying our bosoms of their counsel sweet,
+ There my Lysander and myself shall meet;
+ And thence from Athens turn away our eyes,
+ To seek new friends and stranger companies.
+ Farewell, sweet playfellow: pray thou for us;
+ And good luck grant thee thy Demetrius!
+ Keep word, Lysander: we must starve our sight
+ From lovers' food till morrow deep midnight.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ I will, my Hermia.
+
+ /Exit HERMIA/
+
+ Helena, adieu:
+ As you on him, Demetrius dote on you!
+
+ /Exit/
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ How happy some o'er other some can be!
+ Through Athens I am thought as fair as she.
+ But what of that? Demetrius thinks not so;
+ He will not know what all but he do know:
+ And as he errs, doting on Hermia's eyes,
+ So I, admiring of his qualities:
+ Things base and vile, folding no quantity,
+ Love can transpose to form and dignity:
+ Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind;
+ And therefore is wing'd Cupid painted blind:
+ Nor hath Love's mind of any judgement taste;
+ Wings and no eyes figure unheedy haste:
+ And therefore is Love said to be a child,
+ Because in choice he is so oft beguiled.
+ As waggish boys in game themselves forswear,
+ So the boy Love is perjured every where:
+ For ere Demetrius look'd on Hermia's eyne,
+ He hail'd down oaths that he was only mine;
+ And when this hail some heat from Hermia felt,
+ So he dissolved, and showers of oaths did melt.
+ I will go tell him of fair Hermia's flight:
+ Then to the wood will he to-morrow night
+ Pursue her; and for this intelligence
+ If I have thanks, it is a dear expense:
+ But herein mean I to enrich my pain,
+ To have his sight thither and back again.
+
+ /Exit/
+
+
+ SCENE II. Athens. QUINCE'S house.
+
+ /Enter QUINCE, SNUG, BOTTOM, FLUTE, SNOUT, and STARVELING/
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ Is all our company here?
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ You were best to call them generally, man by man,
+ according to the scrip.
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ Here is the scroll of every man's name, which is
+ thought fit, through all Athens, to play in our
+ interlude before the duke and the duchess, on his
+ wedding-day at night.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ First, good Peter Quince, say what the play treats
+ on, then read the names of the actors, and so grow
+ to a point.
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ Marry, our play is, The most lamentable comedy, and
+ most cruel death of Pyramus and Thisby.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ 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.
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ Answer as I call you. Nick Bottom, the weaver.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ Ready. Name what part I am for, and proceed.
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ You, Nick Bottom, are set down for Pyramus.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ What is Pyramus? a lover, or a tyrant?
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ A lover, that kills himself most gallant for love.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ 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
+ And 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.
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ Francis Flute, the bellows-mender.
+
+*FLUTE*
+
+ Here, Peter Quince.
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ Flute, you must take Thisby on you.
+
+*FLUTE*
+
+ What is Thisby? a wandering knight?
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ It is the lady that Pyramus must love.
+
+*FLUTE*
+
+ Nay, faith, let me not play a woman; I have a beard coming.
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ That's all one: you shall play it in a mask, and
+ you may speak as small as you will.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ An I may hide my face, let me play Thisby too, I'll
+ speak in a monstrous little voice. 'Thisne,
+ Thisne;' 'Ah, Pyramus, lover dear! thy Thisby dear,
+ and lady dear!'
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ No, no; you must play Pyramus: and, Flute, you Thisby.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ Well, proceed.
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ Robin Starveling, the tailor.
+
+*STARVELING*
+
+ Here, Peter Quince.
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ Robin Starveling, you must play Thisby's mother.
+ Tom Snout, the tinker.
+
+*SNOUT*
+
+ Here, Peter Quince.
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ You, Pyramus' father: myself, Thisby'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.
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ You may do it extempore, for it is nothing but roaring.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ 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 roar again.'
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ An you should do it too terribly, you would fright
+ the duchess and the ladies, that they would shriek;
+ and that were enough to hang us all.
+
+*ALL*
+
+ That would hang us, every mother's son.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ I grant you, friends, if that you should fright the
+ ladies out of their wits, they would have no more
+ discretion but to hang us: but I will aggravate my
+ voice so that I will roar you as gently as any
+ sucking dove; I will roar you an 'twere any
+ nightingale.
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ You can play no part but Pyramus; for Pyramus is a
+ sweet-faced man; a proper man, as one shall see in a
+ summer's day; a most lovely gentleman-like man:
+ therefore you must needs play Pyramus.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ Well, I will undertake it. What beard were I best
+ to play it in?
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ Why, what you will.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ I will discharge it in either your straw-colour
+ beard, your orange-tawny beard, your purple-in-grain
+ beard, or your French-crown-colour beard, your
+ perfect yellow.
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ 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 the palace wood, a mile without the
+ town, by moonlight; there will we rehearse, for if
+ we meet in the city, we shall be dogged with
+ company, and our devices known. In the meantime I
+ will draw a bill of properties, such as our play
+ wants. I pray you, fail me not.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ We will meet; and there we may rehearse most
+ obscenely and courageously. Take pains; be perfect: adieu.
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ At the duke's oak we meet.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ Enough; hold or cut bow-strings.
+
+ /Exeunt/
+
+
+ ACT II
+
+
+ SCENE I. A wood near Athens.
+
+ /Enter, from opposite sides, a Fairy, and PUCK/
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ How now, spirit! whither wander you?
+
+*Fairy*
+
+ Over hill, over dale,
+ Thorough bush, thorough brier,
+ Over park, over pale,
+ Thorough flood, thorough fire,
+ I do wander everywhere,
+ Swifter than the moon's 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 dewdrops here
+ And hang a pearl in every cowslip's ear.
+ Farewell, thou lob of spirits; I'll be gone:
+ Our queen and all our elves come here anon.
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ The king doth keep his revels 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, stolen 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 him all her joy:
+ And now they never meet in grove or green,
+ By fountain clear, or spangled starlight sheen,
+ But, they do square, that all their elves for fear
+ Creep into acorn-cups and hide them there.
+
+*Fairy*
+
+ Either I mistake your shape and making quite,
+ Or else you are that shrewd and knavish sprite
+ Call'd Robin Goodfellow: are not you he
+ That frights the maidens of the villagery;
+ Skim milk, and sometimes labour in the quern
+ And bootless make the breathless housewife churn;
+ And sometime make the drink to bear no barm;
+ Mislead night-wanderers, laughing at their harm?
+ Those that Hobgoblin call you and sweet Puck,
+ You do their work, and they shall have good luck:
+ Are not you he?
+
+*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 sometime lurk I 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 dewlap 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 hold their hips and laugh,
+ And waxen in their mirth and neeze and swear
+ A merrier hour was never wasted there.
+ But, room, fairy! here comes Oberon.
+
+*Fairy*
+
+ And here my mistress. Would that he were gone!
+
+ /Enter, from one side, OBERON, with his train; from the other,
+ TITANIA, with hers/
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ Ill met by moonlight, proud Titania.
+
+*TITANIA*
+
+ What, jealous Oberon! Fairies, skip hence:
+ I have forsworn his bed and company.
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ Tarry, rash wanton: am not I thy lord?
+
+*TITANIA*
+
+ Then I must be thy lady: but I know
+ When thou hast stolen 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 Steppe 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.
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ How canst thou thus for shame, Titania,
+ Glance at my credit with Hippolyta,
+ Knowing I know thy love to Theseus?
+ Didst thou not lead him through the glimmering night
+ From Perigenia, whom he ravished?
+ And make him with fair AEgle break his faith,
+ With Ariadne and Antiopa?
+
+*TITANIA*
+
+ 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 in the beached margent of the sea,
+ To dance our ringlets to the whistling wind,
+ But with thy brawls thou hast disturb'd our sport.
+ 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:
+ 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 murrion 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 rheumatic diseases do abound:
+ And thorough this distemperature we see
+ The seasons alter: hoary-headed frosts
+ Far in the fresh lap of the crimson rose,
+ And on old Hiems' thin and icy crown
+ An odorous chaplet of sweet summer buds
+ 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 dissension;
+ We are their parents and original.
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ 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.
+
+*TITANIA*
+
+ Set your heart at rest:
+ The fairy land buys not the child of me.
+ His mother was a votaress 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,
+ Marking the embarked traders on the flood,
+ When we have laugh'd to see the sails conceive
+ And grow big-bellied with the wanton wind;
+ Which she, with pretty and with swimming gait
+ 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 do I rear up her boy,
+ And for her sake I will not part with him.
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ How long within this wood intend you stay?
+
+*TITANIA*
+
+ Perchance till after Theseus' wedding-day.
+ If you will patiently dance in our round
+ And see our moonlight revels, go with us;
+ If not, shun me, and I will spare your haunts.
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ Give me that boy, and I will go with thee.
+
+*TITANIA*
+
+ Not for thy fairy kingdom. Fairies, away!
+ We shall chide downright, if I longer stay.
+
+ /Exit TITANIA with her train/
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ Well, go thy way: thou shalt not from this grove
+ Till I torment thee for this injury.
+ My gentle Puck, come hither. Thou rememberest
+ 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.
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ I remember.
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ That very time I saw, but thou couldst not,
+ Flying between the cold moon and the earth,
+ Cupid all arm'd: a certain aim he took
+ At a fair vestal throned by the west,
+ And loosed his love-shaft smartly from his bow,
+ As it should pierce a hundred thousand hearts;
+ But I might see young Cupid's fiery shaft
+ Quench'd in the chaste beams of the watery moon,
+ And the imperial votaress passed on,
+ In maiden meditation, fancy-free.
+ Yet mark'd I where the bolt of Cupid fell:
+ It fell upon a little western flower,
+ Before milk-white, now purple with love's wound,
+ And maidens call it love-in-idleness.
+ Fetch me that flower; the herb I shew'd thee once:
+ The juice of it on sleeping eye-lids laid
+ Will make or man or woman madly dote
+ Upon the next live creature that it sees.
+ Fetch me this herb; and be thou here again
+ Ere the leviathan can swim a league.
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ I'll put a girdle round about the earth
+ In forty minutes.
+
+ /Exit/
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ Having once this juice,
+ 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 from off 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 overhear their conference.
+
+ /Enter DEMETRIUS, HELENA, following him/
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ 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 stolen unto this wood;
+ And here am I, and wode within this wood,
+ Because I cannot meet my Hermia.
+ Hence, get thee gone, and follow me no more.
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ You draw me, you hard-hearted adamant;
+ But yet you draw not iron, for my heart
+ Is true as steel: leave you your power to draw,
+ And I shall have no power to follow you.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ Do I entice you? do I speak you fair?
+ Or, rather, do I not in plainest truth
+ Tell you, I do not, nor I cannot love you?
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ 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?
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ Tempt not too much the hatred of my spirit;
+ For I am sick when I do look on thee.
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ And I am sick when I look not on you.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ 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.
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ 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?
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ I'll run from thee and hide me in the brakes,
+ And leave thee to the mercy of wild beasts.
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ The wildest hath not such a heart as you.
+ Run when you will, the story shall be changed:
+ 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.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ 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.
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ 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 wood and were not made to woo.
+
+ /Exit DEMETRIUS/
+
+ I'll follow thee and make a heaven of hell,
+ To die upon the hand I love so well.
+
+ /Exit/
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ 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, wanderer.
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ Ay, there it is.
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ I pray thee, give it me.
+ I know a bank where the wild thyme blows,
+ Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows,
+ Quite over-canopied with luscious woodbine,
+ With sweet musk-roses and with eglantine:
+ There sleeps Titania sometime of the night,
+ Lull'd in these flowers with dances and delight;
+ 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 fantasies.
+ Take thou some of it, and seek through this grove:
+ A sweet Athenian lady is in love
+ 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 he hath 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, my lord, your servant shall do so.
+
+ /Exeunt/
+
+
+ SCENE II. Another part of the wood.
+
+ /Enter TITANIA, with her train/
+
+*TITANIA*
+
+ Come, now a roundel and a fairy song;
+ Then, for the third part of a minute, hence;
+ Some to kill cankers in the musk-rose buds,
+ Some war with rere-mice for their leathern wings,
+ To make my small elves coats, and some keep back
+ The clamorous owl that nightly hoots and wonders
+ At our quaint spirits. Sing me now asleep;
+ Then to your offices and let me rest.
+
+ /The Fairies sing/
+
+ You spotted snakes with double tongue,
+ Thorny hedgehogs, be not seen;
+ Newts and blind-worms, do no wrong,
+ Come not near our fairy queen.
+ Philomel, with melody
+ Sing in our sweet lullaby;
+ Lulla, lulla, lullaby, lulla, lulla, lullaby:
+ Never harm,
+ Nor spell nor charm,
+ Come our lovely lady nigh;
+ So, good night, with lullaby.
+ Weaving spiders, come not here;
+ Hence, you long-legg'd spinners, hence!
+ Beetles black, approach not near;
+ Worm nor snail, do no offence.
+ Philomel, with melody, & c.
+
+*Fairy*
+
+ Hence, away! now all is well:
+ One aloof stand sentinel.
+
+ /Exeunt Fairies. TITANIA sleeps/
+
+ /Enter OBERON and squeezes the flower on TITANIA's eyelids/
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ What thou seest when thou dost wake,
+ Do it for thy true-love take,
+ Love and languish for his sake:
+ Be it ounce, or cat, or bear,
+ Pard, or boar with bristled hair,
+ In thy eye that shall appear
+ When thou wakest, it is thy dear:
+ Wake when some vile thing is near.
+
+ /Exit/
+
+ /Enter LYSANDER and HERMIA/
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ 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.
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ Be it so, Lysander: find you out a bed;
+ For I upon this bank will rest my head.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ One turf shall serve as pillow for us both;
+ One heart, one bed, two bosoms and one troth.
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ Nay, good Lysander; for my sake, my dear,
+ Lie further off yet, do not lie so near.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ O, take the sense, sweet, of my innocence!
+ Love takes the meaning in love's conference.
+ I mean, that my heart unto yours is knit
+ So that but one heart we can make of it;
+ Two bosoms interchained with an oath;
+ So then two bosoms and a single troth.
+ Then by your side no bed-room me deny;
+ For lying so, Hermia, I do not lie.
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ Lysander riddles very prettily:
+ Now much beshrew my manners and my pride,
+ If Hermia meant to say Lysander lied.
+ But, gentle friend, for love and courtesy
+ Lie further off; in human 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!
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ Amen, amen, to that fair prayer, say I;
+ And then end life when I end loyalty!
+ Here is my bed: sleep give thee all his rest!
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ With half 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 he 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, this kill-courtesy.
+ Churl, upon thy eyes I throw
+ All the power this charm doth owe.
+ When thou wakest, let love forbid
+ Sleep his seat on thy eyelid:
+ So awake when I am gone;
+ For I must now to Oberon.
+
+ /Exit/
+
+ /Enter DEMETRIUS and HELENA, running/
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ Stay, though thou kill me, sweet Demetrius.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ I charge thee, hence, and do not haunt me thus.
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ O, wilt thou darkling leave me? do not so.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ Stay, on thy peril: I alone will go.
+
+ /Exit/
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ O, 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 hers.
+ 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.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ [Awaking] And run through fire I will for thy sweet sake.
+ Transparent Helena! Nature shows art,
+ That through thy bosom makes me see thy heart.
+ Where is Demetrius? O, how fit a word
+ Is that vile name to perish on my sword!
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ 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.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ Content with Hermia! No; I do repent
+ 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 season
+ So I, being young, till now ripe not to reason;
+ And touching now the point of human skill,
+ Reason becomes the marshal to my will
+ And leads me to your eyes, where I o'erlook
+ Love's stories written in love's richest book.
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ Wherefore was I to this keen mockery 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 Demetrius' eye,
+ But you must flout my insufficiency?
+ 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.
+ O, that a lady, of one man refused.
+ Should of another therefore be abused!
+
+ /Exit/
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ She sees not Hermia. Hermia, sleep thou there:
+ And never mayst thou come Lysander near!
+ For as a surfeit of the sweetest things
+ The deepest loathing to the stomach brings,
+ Or as tie heresies that men 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!
+
+ /Exit/
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ [Awaking] Help me, Lysander, help me! do thy best
+ To pluck this crawling serpent from my breast!
+ Ay me, for pity! what a dream was here!
+ Lysander, look how I do quake with fear:
+ Methought a serpent eat my heart away,
+ And you sat smiling at his cruel pray.
+ Lysander! what, removed? Lysander! lord!
+ What, out of hearing? gone? no sound, no word?
+ Alack, where are you speak, an if you hear;
+ Speak, of all loves! I swoon almost with fear.
+ No? then I well perceive you all not nigh
+ Either death or you I'll find immediately.
+
+ /Exit/
+
+
+ ACT III
+
+
+ SCENE I. The wood. TITANIA lying asleep.
+
+ /Enter QUINCE, SNUG, BOTTOM, FLUTE, SNOUT, and STARVELING/
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ Are we all met?
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ 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.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ Peter Quince,--
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ What sayest thou, bully Bottom?
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ 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.
+
+*STARVELING*
+
+ I believe we must leave the killing out, when all is done.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ 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.
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ Well, we will have such a prologue; and it shall be
+ written in eight and six.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ No, make it two more; let it be written in eight and eight.
+
+*SNOUT*
+
+ Will not the ladies be afeard of the lion?
+
+*STARVELING*
+
+ I fear it, I promise you.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ 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.
+
+*SNOUT*
+
+ Therefore another prologue must tell he is not a lion.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ 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
+ 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.
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ 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?
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ A calendar, a calendar! look in the almanac; find
+ out moonshine, find out moonshine.
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ Yes, it doth shine that night.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ 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.
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ 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?
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ 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.
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ 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.
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ Speak, Pyramus. Thisby, stand forth.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ Thisby, the flowers of odious savours sweet,--
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ Odours, odours.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ --odours savours sweet:
+ So hath thy breath, my dearest Thisby dear.
+ But hark, a voice! stay thou but here awhile,
+ And by and by I will to thee appear.
+
+ /Exit/
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ A stranger Pyramus than e'er played here.
+
+ /Exit/
+
+*FLUTE*
+
+ Must I speak now?
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ Ay, marry, must you; for you must understand he goes
+ but to see a noise that he heard, and is to come again.
+
+*FLUTE*
+
+ 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,
+ I'll meet thee, Pyramus, at Ninny's tomb.
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ '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.'
+
+*FLUTE*
+
+ O,--As true as truest horse, that yet would
+ never tire.
+
+ /Re-enter PUCK, and BOTTOM with an ass's head/
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ If I were fair, Thisby, I were only thine.
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ O monstrous! O strange! we are haunted. Pray,
+ masters! fly, masters! 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,
+ Like horse, hound, hog, bear, fire, at every turn.
+
+ /Exit/
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ Why do they run away? this is a knavery of them to
+ make me afeard.
+
+ /Re-enter SNOUT/
+
+*SNOUT*
+
+ O Bottom, thou art changed! what do I see on thee?
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ What do you see? you see an asshead of your own, do
+ you?
+
+ /Exit SNOUT/
+
+ /Re-enter QUINCE/
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ Bless thee, Bottom! bless thee! thou art
+ translated.
+
+ /Exit/
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ 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.
+
+ /Sings/
+
+ The ousel cock so black of hue,
+ With orange-tawny bill,
+ The throstle with his note so true,
+ The wren with little quill,--
+
+*TITANIA*
+
+ [Awaking] What angel wakes me from my flowery bed?
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ [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;--
+ for, indeed, who would set his wit to so foolish
+ a bird? who would give a bird the lie, though he cry
+ 'cuckoo' never so?
+
+*TITANIA*
+
+ I pray thee, gentle mortal, sing again:
+ Mine ear is much enamour'd of thy note;
+ So is mine eye enthralled to thy shape;
+ And thy fair virtue's force perforce doth move me
+ On the first view to say, to swear, I love thee.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ 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.
+
+*TITANIA*
+
+ Thou art as wise as thou art beautiful.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ Not so, neither: but if I had wit enough to get out
+ of this wood, I have enough to serve mine own turn.
+
+*TITANIA*
+
+ 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;
+ I'll give thee fairies to attend on thee,
+ And they shall fetch thee jewels from the deep,
+ And sing while thou on pressed flowers dost sleep;
+ And I will purge thy mortal grossness so
+ That thou shalt like an airy spirit go.
+ Peaseblossom! Cobweb! Moth! and Mustardseed!
+
+ /Enter PEASEBLOSSOM, COBWEB, MOTH, and MUSTARDSEED/
+
+*PEASEBLOSSOM*
+
+ Ready.
+
+*COBWEB*
+
+ And I.
+
+*MOTH*
+
+ And I.
+
+*MUSTARDSEED*
+
+ And I.
+
+*ALL*
+
+ Where shall we go?
+
+*TITANIA*
+
+ Be kind and courteous to this gentleman;
+ Hop in his walks and gambol in his eyes;
+ Feed him with apricocks and dewberries,
+ With purple grapes, green figs, and mulberries;
+ The honey-bags steal from the humble-bees,
+ And for night-tapers crop their waxen thighs
+ And light them at the fiery glow-worm's eyes,
+ To have my love to bed and to arise;
+ And pluck the wings from Painted butterflies
+ To fan the moonbeams from his sleeping eyes:
+ Nod to him, elves, and do him courtesies.
+
+*PEASEBLOSSOM*
+
+ Hail, mortal!
+
+*COBWEB*
+
+ Hail!
+
+*MOTH*
+
+ Hail!
+
+*MUSTARDSEED*
+
+ Hail!
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ I cry your worship's mercy, heartily: I beseech your
+ worship's name.
+
+*COBWEB*
+
+ Cobweb.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ I shall desire you of more acquaintance, good Master
+ Cobweb: if I cut my finger, I shall make bold with
+ you. Your name, honest gentleman?
+
+*PEASEBLOSSOM*
+
+ Peaseblossom.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ I pray you, commend me to Mistress Squash, your
+ mother, and to Master Peascod, your father. Good
+ Master Peaseblossom, I shall desire you of more
+ acquaintance too. Your name, I beseech you, sir?
+
+*MUSTARDSEED*
+
+ Mustardseed.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ Good Master Mustardseed, I know your patience well:
+ that same cowardly, giant-like ox-beef hath
+ devoured many a gentleman of your house: I promise
+ you your kindred had made my eyes water ere now. I
+ desire your more acquaintance, good Master
+ Mustardseed.
+
+*TITANIA*
+
+ Come, wait upon him; lead him to my bower.
+ The moon methinks looks with a watery eye;
+ And when she weeps, weeps every little flower,
+ Lamenting some enforced chastity.
+ Tie up my love's tongue bring him silently.
+
+ /Exeunt/
+
+
+ SCENE II. Another part of the wood.
+
+ /Enter OBERON/
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ I wonder if Titania be awaked;
+ Then, what it was that next came in her eye,
+ Which she must dote on in extremity.
+
+ /Enter PUCK/
+
+ Here comes my messenger.
+ How now, mad spirit!
+ What night-rule now about this haunted grove?
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ My mistress with a monster is in love.
+ Near to her close and consecrated bower,
+ While she was in her dull and sleeping hour,
+ A crew of patches, rude mechanicals,
+ That work for bread upon Athenian stalls,
+ Were met together to rehearse a play
+ Intended for great Theseus' nuptial-day.
+ The shallowest thick-skin of that barren sort,
+ Who Pyramus presented, in their sport
+ Forsook his scene and enter'd in a brake
+ When I did him at this advantage take,
+ An ass's nole I fixed on his head:
+ Anon his Thisbe must be answered,
+ And forth my mimic comes. When they him spy,
+ As wild geese that the creeping fowler eye,
+ Or russet-pated choughs, many in sort,
+ Rising and cawing at the gun's report,
+ Sever themselves and madly sweep the sky,
+ So, at his sight, away his fellows fly;
+ And, at our stamp, here o'er and o'er one falls;
+ He murder cries and help from Athens calls.
+ Their sense thus weak, lost with their fears
+ thus strong,
+ Made senseless things begin to do them wrong;
+ For briers and thorns at their apparel snatch;
+ Some sleeves, some hats, from yielders all
+ things catch.
+ I led them on in this distracted fear,
+ And left sweet Pyramus translated there:
+ When in that moment, so it came to pass,
+ Titania waked and straightway loved an ass.
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ This falls out better than I could devise.
+ But hast thou yet latch'd the Athenian's eyes
+ With the love-juice, as I did bid thee do?
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ I took him sleeping,--that is finish'd too,--
+ And the Athenian woman by his side:
+ That, when he waked, of force she must be eyed.
+
+ /Enter HERMIA and DEMETRIUS/
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ Stand close: this is the same Athenian.
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ This is the woman, but not this the man.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ O, why rebuke you him that loves you so?
+ Lay breath so bitter on your bitter foe.
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ Now I but chide; but I should use thee worse,
+ For thou, I fear, hast given me cause to curse,
+ If thou hast slain Lysander in his sleep,
+ Being o'er shoes in blood, plunge in the deep,
+ And kill me too.
+ The sun was not so true unto the day
+ As he to me: would he have stolen away
+ From sleeping Hermia? I'll believe as soon
+ This whole earth may be bored and that the moon
+ May through the centre creep and so displease
+ Her brother's noontide with Antipodes.
+ It cannot be but thou hast murder'd him;
+ So should a murderer look, so dead, so grim.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ So should the murder'd look, and so should I,
+ Pierced through the heart with your stern cruelty:
+ Yet you, the murderer, look as bright, as clear,
+ As yonder Venus in her glimmering sphere.
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ What's this to my Lysander? where is he?
+ Ah, good Demetrius, wilt thou give him me?
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ I had rather give his carcass to my hounds.
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ Out, dog! out, cur! thou drivest me past the bounds
+ Of maiden's patience. Hast thou slain him, then?
+ Henceforth be never number'd among men!
+ O, once tell true, tell true, even for my sake!
+ Durst thou have look'd upon him being awake,
+ And hast thou kill'd him sleeping? O brave touch!
+ Could not a worm, an adder, do so much?
+ An adder did it; for with doubler tongue
+ Than thine, thou serpent, never adder stung.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ You spend your passion on a misprised mood:
+ I am not guilty of Lysander's blood;
+ Nor is he dead, for aught that I can tell.
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ I pray thee, tell me then that he is well.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ An if I could, what should I get therefore?
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ A privilege never to see me more.
+ And from thy hated presence part I so:
+ See me no more, whether he be dead or no.
+
+ /Exit/
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ There is no following her in this fierce vein:
+ Here therefore for a while I will remain.
+ So sorrow's heaviness doth heavier grow
+ For debt that bankrupt sleep doth sorrow owe:
+ Which now in some slight measure it will pay,
+ If for his tender here I make some stay.
+
+ /Lies down and sleeps/
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ What hast thou done? thou hast mistaken quite
+ And laid the love-juice on some true-love's sight:
+ Of thy misprision must perforce ensue
+ Some true love turn'd and not a false turn'd true.
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ Then fate o'er-rules, that, one man holding troth,
+ A million fail, confounding oath on oath.
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ About the wood go swifter than the wind,
+ And Helena of Athens look thou find:
+ All fancy-sick she is and pale of cheer,
+ With sighs of love, that costs the fresh blood dear:
+ By some illusion see thou bring her here:
+ I'll charm his eyes against she do appear.
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ I go, I go; look how I go,
+ Swifter than arrow from the Tartar's bow.
+
+ /Exit/
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ Flower of this purple dye,
+ Hit with Cupid's archery,
+ Sink in apple of his eye.
+ When his love he doth espy,
+ Let her shine as gloriously
+ As the Venus of the sky.
+ When thou wakest, if she be by,
+ Beg of her for remedy.
+
+ /Re-enter PUCK/
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ Captain of our fairy band,
+ Helena is here at hand;
+ And the youth, mistook by me,
+ Pleading for a lover's fee.
+ Shall we their fond pageant see?
+ Lord, what fools these mortals be!
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ Stand aside: the noise they make
+ Will cause Demetrius to awake.
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ Then will two at once woo one;
+ That must needs be sport alone;
+ And those things do best please me
+ That befal preposterously.
+
+ /Enter LYSANDER and HELENA/
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ Why should you think that I should woo in scorn?
+ Scorn and derision never come in tears:
+ Look, when I vow, I weep; and vows so born,
+ In their nativity all truth appears.
+ How can these things in me seem scorn to you,
+ Bearing the badge of faith, to prove them true?
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ You do advance your cunning more and more.
+ When truth kills truth, O devilish-holy fray!
+ These vows are Hermia's: will you give her o'er?
+ Weigh oath with oath, and you will nothing weigh:
+ Your vows to her and me, put in two scales,
+ Will even weigh, and both as light as tales.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ I had no judgment when to her I swore.
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ Nor none, in my mind, now you give her o'er.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ Demetrius loves her, and he loves not you.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ [Awaking] O Helena, goddess, nymph, perfect, divine!
+ To what, my love, shall I compare thine eyne?
+ Crystal is muddy. O, how ripe in show
+ Thy lips, those kissing cherries, tempting grow!
+ That pure congealed white, high Taurus snow,
+ Fann'd with the eastern wind, turns to a crow
+ When thou hold'st up thy hand: O, let me kiss
+ This princess of pure white, this seal of bliss!
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ O spite! O hell! I see you all are bent
+ To set against me for your merriment:
+ If you we re civil and knew courtesy,
+ You would not do me thus much injury.
+ Can you not hate me, as I know you do,
+ But you must join in souls to mock me too?
+ If you were men, as men you are in show,
+ You would not use a gentle lady so;
+ To vow, and swear, and superpraise my parts,
+ When I am sure you hate me with your hearts.
+ You both are rivals, and love Hermia;
+ And now both rivals, to mock Helena:
+ A trim exploit, a manly enterprise,
+ To conjure tears up in a poor maid's eyes
+ With your derision! none of noble sort
+ Would so offend a virgin, and extort
+ A poor soul's patience, all to make you sport.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ You are unkind, Demetrius; be not so;
+ For you love Hermia; this you know I know:
+ And here, with all good will, with all my heart,
+ In Hermia's love I yield you up my part;
+ And yours of Helena to me bequeath,
+ Whom I do love and will do till my death.
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ Never did mockers waste more idle breath.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ Lysander, keep thy Hermia; I will none:
+ If e'er I loved her, all that love is gone.
+ My heart to her but as guest-wise sojourn'd,
+ And now to Helen is it home return'd,
+ There to remain.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ Helen, it is not so.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ Disparage not the faith thou dost not know,
+ Lest, to thy peril, thou aby it dear.
+ Look, where thy love comes; yonder is thy dear.
+
+ /Re-enter HERMIA/
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ Dark night, that from the eye his function takes,
+ The ear more quick of apprehension makes;
+ Wherein it doth impair the seeing sense,
+ It pays the hearing double recompense.
+ Thou art not by mine eye, Lysander, found;
+ Mine ear, I thank it, brought me to thy sound
+ But why unkindly didst thou leave me so?
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ Why should he stay, whom love doth press to go?
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ What love could press Lysander from my side?
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ Lysander's love, that would not let him bide,
+ Fair Helena, who more engilds the night
+ Than all you fiery oes and eyes of light.
+ Why seek'st thou me? could not this make thee know,
+ The hate I bear thee made me leave thee so?
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ You speak not as you think: it cannot be.
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ Lo, she is one of this confederacy!
+ Now I perceive they have conjoin'd all three
+ To fashion this false sport, in spite of me.
+ Injurious Hermia! most ungrateful maid!
+ Have you conspired, have you with these contrived
+ To bait me with this foul derision?
+ Is all the counsel that we two have shared,
+ The sisters' vows, the hours that we have spent,
+ When we have chid the hasty-footed time
+ For parting us,--O, is it all forgot?
+ All school-days' friendship, childhood innocence?
+ We, Hermia, like two artificial gods,
+ Have with our needles created both one flower,
+ Both on one sampler, sitting on one cushion,
+ Both warbling of one song, both in one key,
+ As if our hands, our sides, voices and minds,
+ Had been incorporate. So we grow together,
+ Like to a double cherry, seeming parted,
+ But yet an union in partition;
+ Two lovely berries moulded on one stem;
+ So, with two seeming bodies, but one heart;
+ Two of the first, like coats in heraldry,
+ Due but to one and crowned with one crest.
+ And will you rent our ancient love asunder,
+ To join with men in scorning your poor friend?
+ It is not friendly, 'tis not maidenly:
+ Our sex, as well as I, may chide you for it,
+ Though I alone do feel the injury.
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ I am amazed at your passionate words.
+ I scorn you not: it seems that you scorn me.
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ Have you not set Lysander, as in scorn,
+ To follow me and praise my eyes and face?
+ And made your other love, Demetrius,
+ Who even but now did spurn me with his foot,
+ To call me goddess, nymph, divine and rare,
+ Precious, celestial? Wherefore speaks he this
+ To her he hates? and wherefore doth Lysander
+ Deny your love, so rich within his soul,
+ And tender me, forsooth, affection,
+ But by your setting on, by your consent?
+ What thought I be not so in grace as you,
+ So hung upon with love, so fortunate,
+ But miserable most, to love unloved?
+ This you should pity rather than despise.
+
+*HERNIA*
+
+ I understand not what you mean by this.
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ Ay, do, persever, counterfeit sad looks,
+ Make mouths upon me when I turn my back;
+ Wink each at other; hold the sweet jest up:
+ This sport, well carried, shall be chronicled.
+ If you have any pity, grace, or manners,
+ You would not make me such an argument.
+ But fare ye well: 'tis partly my own fault;
+ Which death or absence soon shall remedy.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ Stay, gentle Helena; hear my excuse:
+ My love, my life my soul, fair Helena!
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ O excellent!
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ Sweet, do not scorn her so.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ If she cannot entreat, I can compel.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ Thou canst compel no more than she entreat:
+ Thy threats have no more strength than her weak prayers.
+ Helen, I love thee; by my life, I do:
+ I swear by that which I will lose for thee,
+ To prove him false that says I love thee not.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ I say I love thee more than he can do.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ If thou say so, withdraw, and prove it too.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ Quick, come!
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ Lysander, whereto tends all this?
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ Away, you Ethiope!
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ No, no; he'll [ ]
+ Seem to break loose; take on as you would follow,
+ But yet come not: you are a tame man, go!
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ Hang off, thou cat, thou burr! vile thing, let loose,
+ Or I will shake thee from me like a serpent!
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ Why are you grown so rude? what change is this?
+ Sweet love,--
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ Thy love! out, tawny Tartar, out!
+ Out, loathed medicine! hated potion, hence!
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ Do you not jest?
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ Yes, sooth; and so do you.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ Demetrius, I will keep my word with thee.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ I would I had your bond, for I perceive
+ A weak bond holds you: I'll not trust your word.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ What, should I hurt her, strike her, kill her dead?
+ Although I hate her, I'll not harm her so.
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ What, can you do me greater harm than hate?
+ Hate me! wherefore? O me! what news, my love!
+ Am not I Hermia? are not you Lysander?
+ I am as fair now as I was erewhile.
+ Since night you loved me; yet since night you left
+ me:
+ Why, then you left me--O, the gods forbid!--
+ In earnest, shall I say?
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ Ay, by my life;
+ And never did desire to see thee more.
+ Therefore be out of hope, of question, of doubt;
+ Be certain, nothing truer; 'tis no jest
+ That I do hate thee and love Helena.
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ O me! you juggler! you canker-blossom!
+ You thief of love! what, have you come by night
+ And stolen my love's heart from him?
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ Fine, i'faith!
+ Have you no modesty, no maiden shame,
+ No touch of bashfulness? What, will you tear
+ Impatient answers from my gentle tongue?
+ Fie, fie! you counterfeit, you puppet, you!
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ Puppet? why so? ay, that way goes the game.
+ Now I perceive that she hath made compare
+ Between our statures; she hath urged her height;
+ And with her personage, her tall personage,
+ Her height, forsooth, she hath prevail'd with him.
+ And are you grown so high in his esteem;
+ Because I am so dwarfish and so low?
+ How low am I, thou painted maypole? speak;
+ How low am I? I am not yet so low
+ But that my nails can reach unto thine eyes.
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ I pray you, though you mock me, gentlemen,
+ Let her not hurt me: I was never curst;
+ I have no gift at all in shrewishness;
+ I am a right maid for my cowardice:
+ Let her not strike me. You perhaps may think,
+ Because she is something lower than myself,
+ That I can match her.
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ Lower! hark, again.
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ Good Hermia, do not be so bitter with me.
+ I evermore did love you, Hermia,
+ Did ever keep your counsels, never wrong'd you;
+ Save that, in love unto Demetrius,
+ I told him of your stealth unto this wood.
+ He follow'd you; for love I follow'd him;
+ But he hath chid me hence and threaten'd me
+ To strike me, spurn me, nay, to kill me too:
+ And now, so you will let me quiet go,
+ To Athens will I bear my folly back
+ And follow you no further: let me go:
+ You see how simple and how fond I am.
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ Why, get you gone: who is't that hinders you?
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ A foolish heart, that I leave here behind.
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ What, with Lysander?
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ With Demetrius.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ Be not afraid; she shall not harm thee, Helena.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ No, sir, she shall not, though you take her part.
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ O, when she's angry, she is keen and shrewd!
+ She was a vixen when she went to school;
+ And though she be but little, she is fierce.
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ 'Little' again! nothing but 'low' and 'little'!
+ Why will you suffer her to flout me thus?
+ Let me come to her.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ Get you gone, you dwarf;
+ You minimus, of hindering knot-grass made;
+ You bead, you acorn.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ You are too officious
+ In her behalf that scorns your services.
+ Let her alone: speak not of Helena;
+ Take not her part; for, if thou dost intend
+ Never so little show of love to her,
+ Thou shalt aby it.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ Now she holds me not;
+ Now follow, if thou darest, to try whose right,
+ Of thine or mine, is most in Helena.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ Follow! nay, I'll go with thee, cheek by jole.
+
+ /Exeunt LYSANDER and DEMETRIUS/
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ You, mistress, all this coil is 'long of you:
+ Nay, go not back.
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ I will not trust you, I,
+ Nor longer stay in your curst company.
+ Your hands than mine are quicker for a fray,
+ My legs are longer though, to run away.
+
+ /Exit/
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ I am amazed, and know not what to say.
+
+ /Exit/
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ This is thy negligence: still thou mistakest,
+ Or else committ'st thy knaveries wilfully.
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ Believe me, king of shadows, I mistook.
+ Did not you tell me I should know the man
+ By the Athenian garment be had on?
+ And so far blameless proves my enterprise,
+ That I have 'nointed an Athenian's eyes;
+ And so far am I glad it so did sort
+ As this their jangling I esteem a sport.
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ Thou see'st these lovers seek a place to fight:
+ Hie therefore, Robin, overcast the night;
+ The starry welkin cover thou anon
+ With drooping fog as black as Acheron,
+ And lead these testy rivals so astray
+ As one come not within another's way.
+ Like to Lysander sometime frame thy tongue,
+ Then stir Demetrius up with bitter wrong;
+ And sometime rail thou like Demetrius;
+ And from each other look thou lead them thus,
+ Till o'er their brows death-counterfeiting sleep
+ With leaden legs and batty wings doth creep:
+ Then crush this herb into Lysander's eye;
+ Whose liquor hath this virtuous property,
+ To take from thence all error with his might,
+ And make his eyeballs roll with wonted sight.
+ When they next wake, all this derision
+ Shall seem a dream and fruitless vision,
+ And back to Athens shall the lovers wend,
+ With league whose date till death shall never end.
+ Whiles I in this affair do thee employ,
+ I'll to my queen and beg her Indian boy;
+ And then I will her charmed eye release
+ From monster's view, and all things shall be peace.
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ My fairy lord, this must be done with haste,
+ For night's swift dragons cut the clouds full fast,
+ And yonder shines Aurora's harbinger;
+ At whose approach, ghosts, wandering here and there,
+ Troop home to churchyards: damned spirits all,
+ That in crossways and floods have burial,
+ Already to their wormy beds are gone;
+ For fear lest day should look their shames upon,
+ They willfully themselves exile from light
+ And must for aye consort with black-brow'd night.
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ But we are spirits of another sort:
+ I with the morning's love have oft made sport,
+ And, like a forester, the groves may tread,
+ Even till the eastern gate, all fiery-red,
+ Opening on Neptune with fair blessed beams,
+ Turns into yellow gold his salt green streams.
+ But, notwithstanding, haste; make no delay:
+ We may effect this business yet ere day.
+
+ /Exit/
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ Up and down, up and down,
+ I will lead them up and down:
+ I am fear'd in field and town:
+ Goblin, lead them up and down.
+ Here comes one.
+
+ /Re-enter LYSANDER/
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ Where art thou, proud Demetrius? speak thou now.
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ Here, villain; drawn and ready. Where art thou?
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ I will be with thee straight.
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ Follow me, then,
+ To plainer ground.
+
+ /Exit LYSANDER, as following the voice/
+
+ /Re-enter DEMETRIUS/
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ Lysander! speak again:
+ Thou runaway, thou coward, art thou fled?
+ Speak! In some bush? Where dost thou hide thy head?
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ Thou coward, art thou bragging to the stars,
+ Telling the bushes that thou look'st for wars,
+ And wilt not come? Come, recreant; come, thou child;
+ I'll whip thee with a rod: he is defiled
+ That draws a sword on thee.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ Yea, art thou there?
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ Follow my voice: we'll try no manhood here.
+
+ /Exeunt/
+
+ /Re-enter LYSANDER/
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ He goes before me and still dares me on:
+ When I come where he calls, then he is gone.
+ The villain is much lighter-heel'd than I:
+ I follow'd fast, but faster he did fly;
+ That fallen am I in dark uneven way,
+ And here will rest me.
+
+ /Lies down/
+
+ Come, thou gentle day!
+ For if but once thou show me thy grey light,
+ I'll find Demetrius and revenge this spite.
+
+ /Sleeps/
+
+ /Re-enter PUCK and DEMETRIUS/
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ Ho, ho, ho! Coward, why comest thou not?
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ Abide me, if thou darest; for well I wot
+ Thou runn'st before me, shifting every place,
+ And darest not stand, nor look me in the face.
+ Where art thou now?
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ Come hither: I am here.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ Nay, then, thou mock'st me. Thou shalt buy this dear,
+ If ever I thy face by daylight see:
+ Now, go thy way. Faintness constraineth me
+ To measure out my length on this cold bed.
+ By day's approach look to be visited.
+
+ /Lies down and sleeps/
+
+ /Re-enter HELENA/
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ O weary night, O long and tedious night,
+ Abate thy hour! Shine comforts from the east,
+ That I may back to Athens by daylight,
+ From these that my poor company detest:
+ And sleep, that sometimes shuts up sorrow's eye,
+ Steal me awhile from mine own company.
+
+ /Lies down and sleeps/
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ Yet but three? Come one more;
+ Two of both kinds make up four.
+ Here she comes, curst and sad:
+ Cupid is a knavish lad,
+ Thus to make poor females mad.
+
+ /Re-enter HERMIA/
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ Never so weary, never so in woe,
+ Bedabbled with the dew and torn with briers,
+ I can no further crawl, no further go;
+ My legs can keep no pace with my desires.
+ Here will I rest me till the break of day.
+ Heavens shield Lysander, if they mean a fray!
+
+ /Lies down and sleeps/
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ On the ground
+ Sleep sound:
+ I'll apply
+ To your eye,
+ Gentle lover, remedy.
+
+ /Squeezing the juice on LYSANDER's eyes/
+
+ When thou wakest,
+ Thou takest
+ True delight
+ In the sight
+ Of thy former lady's eye:
+ And the country proverb known,
+ That every man should take his own,
+ In your waking shall be shown:
+ Jack shall have Jill;
+ Nought shall go ill;
+ The man shall have his mare again, and all shall be well.
+
+ /Exit/
+
+
+ ACT IV
+
+
+ SCENE I. The same. LYSANDER, DEMETRIUS, HELENA, and HERMIA
+
+ lying asleep.
+
+ /Enter TITANIA and BOTTOM; PEASEBLOSSOM, COBWEB, MOTH, MUSTARDSEED,
+ and other Fairies attending; OBERON behind unseen/
+
+*TITANIA*
+
+ Come, sit thee down upon this flowery bed,
+ While I thy amiable cheeks do coy,
+ And stick musk-roses in thy sleek smooth head,
+ And kiss thy fair large ears, my gentle joy.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ Where's Peaseblossom?
+
+*PEASEBLOSSOM*
+
+ Ready.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ Scratch my head Peaseblossom. Where's Mounsieur Cobweb?
+
+*COBWEB*
+
+ Ready.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ Mounsieur Cobweb, good mounsieur, get you your
+ weapons in your hand, and kill me a red-hipped
+ humble-bee on the top of a thistle; and, good
+ mounsieur, bring me the honey-bag. Do not fret
+ yourself too much in the action, mounsieur; and,
+ good mounsieur, have a care the honey-bag break not;
+ I would be loath to have you overflown with a
+ honey-bag, signior. Where's Mounsieur Mustardseed?
+
+*MUSTARDSEED*
+
+ Ready.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ Give me your neaf, Mounsieur Mustardseed. Pray you,
+ leave your courtesy, good mounsieur.
+
+*MUSTARDSEED*
+
+ What's your Will?
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ Nothing, good mounsieur, but to help Cavalery Cobweb
+ to scratch. I must to the barber's, monsieur; for
+ methinks I am marvellous hairy about the face; and I
+ am such a tender ass, if my hair do but tickle me,
+ I must scratch.
+
+*TITANIA*
+
+ What, wilt thou hear some music,
+ my sweet love?
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ I have a reasonable good ear in music. Let's have
+ the tongs and the bones.
+
+*TITANIA*
+
+ Or say, sweet love, what thou desirest to eat.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ Truly, a peck of provender: I could munch your good
+ dry oats. Methinks I have a great desire to a bottle
+ of hay: good hay, sweet hay, hath no fellow.
+
+*TITANIA*
+
+ I have a venturous fairy that shall seek
+ The squirrel's hoard, and fetch thee new nuts.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ I had rather have a handful or two of dried peas.
+ But, I pray you, let none of your people stir me: I
+ have an exposition of sleep come upon me.
+
+*TITANIA*
+
+ Sleep thou, and I will wind thee in my arms.
+ Fairies, begone, and be all ways away.
+
+ /Exeunt fairies/
+
+ So doth the woodbine the sweet honeysuckle
+ Gently entwist; the female ivy so
+ Enrings the barky fingers of the elm.
+ O, how I love thee! how I dote on thee!
+
+ /They sleep/
+
+ /Enter PUCK/
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ [Advancing] Welcome, good Robin.
+ See'st thou this sweet sight?
+ Her dotage now I do begin to pity:
+ For, meeting her of late behind the wood,
+ Seeking sweet favours from this hateful fool,
+ I did upbraid her and fall out with her;
+ For she his hairy temples then had rounded
+ With a coronet of fresh and fragrant flowers;
+ And that same dew, which sometime on the buds
+ Was wont to swell like round and orient pearls,
+ Stood now within the pretty flowerets' eyes
+ Like tears that did their own disgrace bewail.
+ When I had at my pleasure taunted her
+ And she in mild terms begg'd my patience,
+ I then did ask of her her changeling child;
+ Which straight she gave me, and her fairy sent
+ To bear him to my bower in fairy land.
+ And now I have the boy, I will undo
+ This hateful imperfection of her eyes:
+ And, gentle Puck, take this transformed scalp
+ From off the head of this Athenian swain;
+ That, he awaking when the other do,
+ May all to Athens back again repair
+ And think no more of this night's accidents
+ But as the fierce vexation of a dream.
+ But first I will release the fairy queen.
+ Be as thou wast wont to be;
+ See as thou wast wont to see:
+ Dian's bud o'er Cupid's flower
+ Hath such force and blessed power.
+ Now, my Titania; wake you, my sweet queen.
+
+*TITANIA*
+
+ My Oberon! what visions have I seen!
+ Methought I was enamour'd of an ass.
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ There lies your love.
+
+*TITANIA*
+
+ How came these things to pass?
+ O, how mine eyes do loathe his visage now!
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ Silence awhile. Robin, take off this head.
+ Titania, music call; and strike more dead
+ Than common sleep of all these five the sense.
+
+*TITANIA*
+
+ Music, ho! music, such as charmeth sleep!
+
+ /Music, still/
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ Now, when thou wakest, with thine
+ own fool's eyes peep.
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ Sound, music! Come, my queen, take hands with me,
+ And rock the ground whereon these sleepers be.
+ Now thou and I are new in amity,
+ And will to-morrow midnight solemnly
+ Dance in Duke Theseus' house triumphantly,
+ And bless it to all fair prosperity:
+ There shall the pairs of faithful lovers be
+ Wedded, with Theseus, all in jollity.
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ Fairy king, attend, and mark:
+ I do hear the morning lark.
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ Then, my queen, in silence sad,
+ Trip we after the night's shade:
+ We the globe can compass soon,
+ Swifter than the wandering moon.
+
+*TITANIA*
+
+ Come, my lord, and in our flight
+ Tell me how it came this night
+ That I sleeping here was found
+ With these mortals on the ground.
+
+ /Exeunt/
+
+ /Horns winded within/
+
+ /Enter THESEUS, HIPPOLYTA, EGEUS, and train/
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ Go, one of you, find out the forester;
+ For now our observation is perform'd;
+ And since we have the vaward of the day,
+ My love shall hear the music of my hounds.
+ Uncouple in the western valley; let them go:
+ Dispatch, I say, and find the forester.
+
+ /Exit an Attendant/
+
+ We will, fair queen, up to the mountain's top,
+ And mark the musical confusion
+ Of hounds and echo in conjunction.
+
+*HIPPOLYTA*
+
+ I was with Hercules and Cadmus once,
+ When in a wood of Crete they bay'd the bear
+ With hounds of Sparta: never did I hear
+ Such gallant chiding: for, besides the groves,
+ The skies, the fountains, every region near
+ Seem'd all one mutual cry: I never heard
+ So musical a discord, such sweet thunder.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ My hounds are bred out of the Spartan kind,
+ So flew'd, so sanded, and their heads are hung
+ With ears that sweep away the morning dew;
+ Crook-knee'd, and dew-lapp'd like Thessalian bulls;
+ Slow in pursuit, but match'd in mouth like bells,
+ Each under each. A cry more tuneable
+ Was never holla'd to, nor cheer'd with horn,
+ In Crete, in Sparta, nor in Thessaly:
+ Judge when you hear. But, soft! what nymphs are these?
+
+*EGEUS*
+
+ My lord, this is my daughter here asleep;
+ And this, Lysander; this Demetrius is;
+ This Helena, old Nedar's Helena:
+ I wonder of their being here together.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ No doubt they rose up early to observe
+ The rite of May, and hearing our intent,
+ Came here in grace our solemnity.
+ But speak, Egeus; is not this the day
+ That Hermia should give answer of her choice?
+
+*EGEUS*
+
+ It is, my lord.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ Go, bid the huntsmen wake them with their horns.
+
+ /Horns and shout within. LYSANDER, DEMETRIUS, HELENA, and HERMIA
+ wake and start up/
+
+ Good morrow, friends. Saint Valentine is past:
+ Begin these wood-birds but to couple now?
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ Pardon, my lord.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ I pray you all, stand up.
+ I know you two are rival enemies:
+ How comes this gentle concord in the world,
+ That hatred is so far from jealousy,
+ To sleep by hate, and fear no enmity?
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ My lord, I shall reply amazedly,
+ Half sleep, half waking: but as yet, I swear,
+ I cannot truly say how I came here;
+ But, as I think,--for truly would I speak,
+ And now do I bethink me, so it is,--
+ I came with Hermia hither: our intent
+ Was to be gone from Athens, where we might,
+ Without the peril of the Athenian law.
+
+*EGEUS*
+
+ Enough, enough, my lord; you have enough:
+ I beg the law, the law, upon his head.
+ They would have stolen away; they would, Demetrius,
+ Thereby to have defeated you and me,
+ You of your wife and me of my consent,
+ Of my consent that she should be your wife.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ My lord, fair Helen told me of their stealth,
+ Of this their purpose hither to this wood;
+ And I in fury hither follow'd them,
+ Fair Helena in fancy following me.
+ But, my good lord, I wot not by what power,--
+ But by some power it is,--my love to Hermia,
+ Melted as the snow, seems to me now
+ As the remembrance of an idle gaud
+ Which in my childhood I did dote upon;
+ And all the faith, the virtue of my heart,
+ The object and the pleasure of mine eye,
+ Is only Helena. To her, my lord,
+ Was I betroth'd ere I saw Hermia:
+ But, like in sickness, did I loathe this food;
+ But, as in health, come to my natural taste,
+ Now I do wish it, love it, long for it,
+ And will for evermore be true to it.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ Fair lovers, you are fortunately met:
+ Of this discourse we more will hear anon.
+ Egeus, I will overbear your will;
+ For in the temple by and by with us
+ These couples shall eternally be knit:
+ And, for the morning now is something worn,
+ Our purposed hunting shall be set aside.
+ Away with us to Athens; three and three,
+ We'll hold a feast in great solemnity.
+ Come, Hippolyta.
+
+ /Exeunt THESEUS, HIPPOLYTA, EGEUS, and train/
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ These things seem small and undistinguishable,
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ Methinks I see these things with parted eye,
+ When every thing seems double.
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ So methinks:
+ And I have found Demetrius like a jewel,
+ Mine own, and not mine own.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ Are you sure
+ That we are awake? It seems to me
+ That yet we sleep, we dream. Do not you think
+ The duke was here, and bid us follow him?
+
+*HERMIA*
+
+ Yea; and my father.
+
+*HELENA*
+
+ And Hippolyta.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ And he did bid us follow to the temple.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ Why, then, we are awake: let's follow him
+ And by the way let us recount our dreams.
+
+ /Exeunt/
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ [Awaking] When my cue comes, call me, and I will
+ answer: my next is, 'Most fair Pyramus.' Heigh-ho!
+ Peter Quince! Flute, the bellows-mender! Snout,
+ the tinker! Starveling! God's my life, stolen
+ hence, and left me asleep! I have had a most rare
+ vision. I have had a dream, past the wit of man to
+ say what dream it was: man is but an ass, if he go
+ about to expound this dream. Methought I was--there
+ is no man can tell what. Methought I was,--and
+ methought I had,--but man is but a patched fool, if
+ he will offer to say what methought I had. The eye
+ of man hath not heard, the ear of man hath not
+ seen, man's hand is not able to taste, his tongue
+ to conceive, nor his heart to report, what my dream
+ was. I will get Peter Quince to write a ballad of
+ this dream: it shall be called Bottom's Dream,
+ because it hath no bottom; and I will sing it in the
+ latter end of a play, before the duke:
+ peradventure, to make it the more gracious, I shall
+ sing it at her death.
+
+ /Exit/
+
+
+ SCENE II. Athens. QUINCE'S house.
+
+ /Enter QUINCE, FLUTE, SNOUT, and STARVELING/
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ Have you sent to Bottom's house ? is he come home yet?
+
+*STARVELING*
+
+ He cannot be heard of. Out of doubt he is
+ transported.
+
+*FLUTE*
+
+ If he come not, then the play is marred: it goes
+ not forward, doth it?
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ It is not possible: you have not a man in all
+ Athens able to discharge Pyramus but he.
+
+*FLUTE*
+
+ No, he hath simply the best wit of any handicraft
+ man in Athens.
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ Yea and the best person too; and he is a very
+ paramour for a sweet voice.
+
+*FLUTE*
+
+ You must say 'paragon:' a paramour is, God bless us,
+ a thing of naught.
+
+ /Enter SNUG/
+
+*SNUG*
+
+ Masters, the duke is coming from the temple, and
+ there is two or three lords and ladies more married:
+ if our sport had gone forward, we had all been made
+ men.
+
+*FLUTE*
+
+ O sweet bully Bottom! Thus hath he lost sixpence a
+ day during his life; he could not have 'scaped
+ sixpence a day: an the duke had not given him
+ sixpence a day for playing Pyramus, I'll be hanged;
+ he would have deserved it: sixpence a day in
+ Pyramus, or nothing.
+
+ /Enter BOTTOM/
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ Where are these lads? where are these hearts?
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ Bottom! O most courageous day! O most happy hour!
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ Masters, I am to discourse wonders: but ask me not
+ what; for if I tell you, I am no true Athenian. I
+ will tell you every thing, right as it fell out.
+
+*QUINCE*
+
+ Let us hear, sweet Bottom.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ Not a word of me. All that I will tell you is, that
+ the duke hath dined. Get your apparel together,
+ good strings to your beards, new ribbons to your
+ pumps; meet presently at the palace; every man look
+ o'er his part; for the short and the long is, our
+ play is preferred. In any case, let Thisby have
+ clean linen; and let not him that plays the lion
+ pair his nails, for they shall hang out for the
+ lion's claws. And, most dear actors, eat no onions
+ nor garlic, for we are to utter sweet breath; and I
+ do not doubt but to hear them say, it is a sweet
+ comedy. No more words: away! go, away!
+
+ /Exeunt/
+
+
+ ACT V
+
+
+ SCENE I. Athens. The palace of THESEUS.
+
+ /Enter THESEUS, HIPPOLYTA, PHILOSTRATE, Lords and Attendants/
+
+*HIPPOLYTA*
+
+ 'Tis strange my Theseus, that these
+ lovers speak of.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ More strange than true: I never may believe
+ These antique fables, nor these fairy toys.
+ Lovers and madmen have such seething brains,
+ Such shaping fantasies, that apprehend
+ More than cool reason ever comprehends.
+ The lunatic, the lover and the poet
+ Are of imagination all compact:
+ One sees more devils than vast hell can hold,
+ That is, the madman: the lover, all as frantic,
+ Sees Helen's beauty in a brow of Egypt:
+ The poet's eye, in fine frenzy rolling,
+ Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven;
+ And as imagination bodies forth
+ The forms of things unknown, the poet's pen
+ Turns them to shapes and gives to airy nothing
+ A local habitation and a name.
+ Such tricks hath strong imagination,
+ That if it would but apprehend some joy,
+ It comprehends some bringer of that joy;
+ Or in the night, imagining some fear,
+ How easy is a bush supposed a bear!
+
+*HIPPOLYTA*
+
+ But all the story of the night told over,
+ And all their minds transfigured so together,
+ More witnesseth than fancy's images
+ And grows to something of great constancy;
+ But, howsoever, strange and admirable.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ Here come the lovers, full of joy and mirth.
+
+ /Enter LYSANDER, DEMETRIUS, HERMIA, and HELENA/
+
+ Joy, gentle friends! joy and fresh days of love
+ Accompany your hearts!
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ More than to us
+ Wait in your royal walks, your board, your bed!
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ Come now; what masques, what dances shall we have,
+ To wear away this long age of three hours
+ Between our after-supper and bed-time?
+ Where is our usual manager of mirth?
+ What revels are in hand? Is there no play,
+ To ease the anguish of a torturing hour?
+ Call Philostrate.
+
+*PHILOSTRATE*
+
+ Here, mighty Theseus.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ Say, what abridgement have you for this evening?
+ What masque? what music? How shall we beguile
+ The lazy time, if not with some delight?
+
+*PHILOSTRATE*
+
+ There is a brief how many sports are ripe:
+ Make choice of which your highness will see first.
+
+ /Giving a paper/
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ [Reads] 'The battle with the Centaurs, to be sung
+ By an Athenian eunuch to the harp.'
+ We'll none of that: that have I told my love,
+ In glory of my kinsman Hercules.
+
+ /Reads/
+
+ 'The riot of the tipsy Bacchanals,
+ Tearing the Thracian singer in their rage.'
+ That is an old device; and it was play'd
+ When I from Thebes came last a conqueror.
+
+ /Reads/
+
+ 'The thrice three Muses mourning for the death
+ Of Learning, late deceased in beggary.'
+ That is some satire, keen and critical,
+ Not sorting with a nuptial ceremony.
+
+ /Reads/
+
+ 'A tedious brief scene of young Pyramus
+ And his love Thisbe; very tragical mirth.'
+ Merry and tragical! tedious and brief!
+ That is, hot ice and wondrous strange snow.
+ How shall we find the concord of this discord?
+
+*PHILOSTRATE*
+
+ A play there is, my lord, some ten words long,
+ Which is as brief as I have known a play;
+ But by ten words, my lord, it is too long,
+ Which makes it tedious; for in all the play
+ There is not one word apt, one player fitted:
+ And tragical, my noble lord, it is;
+ For Pyramus therein doth kill himself.
+ Which, when I saw rehearsed, I must confess,
+ Made mine eyes water; but more merry tears
+ The passion of loud laughter never shed.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ What are they that do play it?
+
+*PHILOSTRATE*
+
+ Hard-handed men that work in Athens here,
+ Which never labour'd in their minds till now,
+ And now have toil'd their unbreathed memories
+ With this same play, against your nuptial.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ And we will hear it.
+
+*PHILOSTRATE*
+
+ No, my noble lord;
+ It is not for you: I have heard it over,
+ And it is nothing, nothing in the world;
+ Unless you can find sport in their intents,
+ Extremely stretch'd and conn'd with cruel pain,
+ To do you service.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ I will hear that play;
+ For never anything can be amiss,
+ When simpleness and duty tender it.
+ Go, bring them in: and take your places, ladies.
+
+ /Exit PHILOSTRATE/
+
+*HIPPOLYTA*
+
+ I love not to see wretchedness o'er charged
+ And duty in his service perishing.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ Why, gentle sweet, you shall see no such thing.
+
+*HIPPOLYTA*
+
+ He says they can do nothing in this kind.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ The kinder we, to give them thanks for nothing.
+ Our sport shall be to take what they mistake:
+ And what poor duty cannot do, noble respect
+ Takes it in might, not merit.
+ Where I have come, great clerks have purposed
+ To greet me with premeditated welcomes;
+ Where I have seen them shiver and look pale,
+ Make periods in the midst of sentences,
+ Throttle their practised accent in their fears
+ And in conclusion dumbly have broke off,
+ Not paying me a welcome. Trust me, sweet,
+ Out of this silence yet I pick'd a welcome;
+ And in the modesty of fearful duty
+ I read as much as from the rattling tongue
+ Of saucy and audacious eloquence.
+ Love, therefore, and tongue-tied simplicity
+ In least speak most, to my capacity.
+
+ /Re-enter PHILOSTRATE/
+
+*PHILOSTRATE*
+
+ So please your grace, the Prologue is address'd.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ Let him approach.
+
+ /Flourish of trumpets/
+
+ /Enter QUINCE for the Prologue/
+
+*Prologue*
+
+ If we offend, it is with our good will.
+ That you should think, we come not to offend,
+ But with good will. To show our simple skill,
+ That is the true beginning of our end.
+ Consider then we come but in despite.
+ We do not come as minding to contest you,
+ Our true intent is. All for your delight
+ We are not here. That you should here repent you,
+ The actors are at hand and by their show
+ You shall know all that you are like to know.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ This fellow doth not stand upon points.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ He hath rid his prologue like a rough colt; he knows
+ not the stop. A good moral, my lord: it is not
+ enough to speak, but to speak true.
+
+*HIPPOLYTA*
+
+ Indeed he hath played on his prologue like a child
+ on a recorder; a sound, but not in government.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ His speech, was like a tangled chain; nothing
+ impaired, but all disordered. Who is next?
+
+ /Enter Pyramus and Thisbe, Wall, Moonshine, and Lion/
+
+*Prologue*
+
+ Gentles, perchance you wonder at this show;
+ But wonder on, till truth make all things plain.
+ This man is Pyramus, if you would know;
+ This beauteous lady Thisby is certain.
+ This man, with lime and rough-cast, doth present
+ Wall, that vile Wall which did these lovers sunder;
+ And through Wall's chink, poor souls, they are content
+ To whisper. At the which let no man wonder.
+ This man, with lanthorn, dog, and bush of thorn,
+ Presenteth Moonshine; for, if you will know,
+ By moonshine did these lovers think no scorn
+ To meet at Ninus' tomb, there, there to woo.
+ This grisly beast, which Lion hight by name,
+ The trusty Thisby, coming first by night,
+ Did scare away, or rather did affright;
+ And, as she fled, her mantle she did fall,
+ Which Lion vile with bloody mouth did stain.
+ Anon comes Pyramus, sweet youth and tall,
+ And finds his trusty Thisby's mantle slain:
+ Whereat, with blade, with bloody blameful blade,
+ He bravely broach'd is boiling bloody breast;
+ And Thisby, tarrying in mulberry shade,
+ His dagger drew, and died. For all the rest,
+ Let Lion, Moonshine, Wall, and lovers twain
+ At large discourse, while here they do remain.
+
+ /Exeunt Prologue, Thisbe, Lion, and Moonshine/
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ I wonder if the lion be to speak.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ No wonder, my lord: one lion may, when many asses do.
+
+*Wall*
+
+ In this same interlude it doth befall
+ That I, one Snout by name, present a wall;
+ And such a wall, as I would have you think,
+ That had in it a crannied hole or chink,
+ Through which the lovers, Pyramus and Thisby,
+ Did whisper often very secretly.
+ This loam, this rough-cast and this stone doth show
+ That I am that same wall; the truth is so:
+ And this the cranny is, right and sinister,
+ Through which the fearful lovers are to whisper.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ Would you desire lime and hair to speak better?
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ It is the wittiest partition that ever I heard
+ discourse, my lord.
+
+ /Enter Pyramus/
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ Pyramus draws near the wall: silence!
+
+*Pyramus*
+
+ O grim-look'd night! O night with hue so black!
+ O night, which ever art when day is not!
+ O night, O night! alack, alack, alack,
+ I fear my Thisby's promise is forgot!
+ And thou, O wall, O sweet, O lovely wall,
+ That stand'st between her father's ground and mine!
+ Thou wall, O wall, O sweet and lovely wall,
+ Show me thy chink, to blink through with mine eyne!
+
+ /Wall holds up his fingers/
+
+ Thanks, courteous wall: Jove shield thee well for this!
+ But what see I? No Thisby do I see.
+ O wicked wall, through whom I see no bliss!
+ Cursed be thy stones for thus deceiving me!
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ The wall, methinks, being sensible, should curse again.
+
+*Pyramus*
+
+ No, in truth, sir, he should not. 'Deceiving me'
+ is Thisby's cue: she is to enter now, and I am to
+ spy her through the wall. You shall see, it will
+ fall pat as I told you. Yonder she comes.
+
+ /Enter Thisbe/
+
+*Thisbe*
+
+ O wall, full often hast thou heard my moans,
+ For parting my fair Pyramus and me!
+ My cherry lips have often kiss'd thy stones,
+ Thy stones with lime and hair knit up in thee.
+
+*Pyramus*
+
+ I see a voice: now will I to the chink,
+ To spy an I can hear my Thisby's face. Thisby!
+
+*Thisbe*
+
+ My love thou art, my love I think.
+
+*Pyramus*
+
+ Think what thou wilt, I am thy lover's grace;
+ And, like Limander, am I trusty still.
+
+*Thisbe*
+
+ And I like Helen, till the Fates me kill.
+
+*Pyramus*
+
+ Not Shafalus to Procrus was so true.
+
+*Thisbe*
+
+ As Shafalus to Procrus, I to you.
+
+*Pyramus*
+
+ O kiss me through the hole of this vile wall!
+
+*Thisbe*
+
+ I kiss the wall's hole, not your lips at all.
+
+*Pyramus*
+
+ Wilt thou at Ninny's tomb meet me straightway?
+
+*Thisbe*
+
+ 'Tide life, 'tide death, I come without delay.
+
+ /Exeunt Pyramus and Thisbe/
+
+*Wall*
+
+ Thus have I, Wall, my part discharged so;
+ And, being done, thus Wall away doth go.
+
+ /Exit/
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ Now is the mural down between the two neighbours.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ No remedy, my lord, when walls are so wilful to hear
+ without warning.
+
+*HIPPOLYTA*
+
+ This is the silliest stuff that ever I heard.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ The best in this kind are but shadows; and the worst
+ are no worse, if imagination amend them.
+
+*HIPPOLYTA*
+
+ It must be your imagination then, and not theirs.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ If we imagine no worse of them than they of
+ themselves, they may pass for excellent men. Here
+ come two noble beasts in, a man and a lion.
+
+ /Enter Lion and Moonshine/
+
+*Lion*
+
+ You, ladies, you, whose gentle hearts do fear
+ The smallest monstrous mouse that creeps on floor,
+ May now perchance both quake and tremble here,
+ When lion rough in wildest rage doth roar.
+ Then know that I, one Snug the joiner, am
+ A lion-fell, nor else no lion's dam;
+ For, if I should as lion come in strife
+ Into this place, 'twere pity on my life.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ A very gentle beast, of a good conscience.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ The very best at a beast, my lord, that e'er I saw.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ This lion is a very fox for his valour.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ True; and a goose for his discretion.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ Not so, my lord; for his valour cannot carry his
+ discretion; and the fox carries the goose.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ His discretion, I am sure, cannot carry his valour;
+ for the goose carries not the fox. It is well:
+ leave it to his discretion, and let us listen to the moon.
+
+*Moonshine*
+
+ This lanthorn doth the horned moon present;--
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ He should have worn the horns on his head.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ He is no crescent, and his horns are
+ invisible within the circumference.
+
+*Moonshine*
+
+ This lanthorn doth the horned moon present;
+ Myself the man i' the moon do seem to be.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ This is the greatest error of all the rest: the man
+ should be put into the lanthorn. How is it else the
+ man i' the moon?
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ He dares not come there for the candle; for, you
+ see, it is already in snuff.
+
+*HIPPOLYTA*
+
+ I am aweary of this moon: would he would change!
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ It appears, by his small light of discretion, that
+ he is in the wane; but yet, in courtesy, in all
+ reason, we must stay the time.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ Proceed, Moon.
+
+*Moonshine*
+
+ All that I have to say, is, to tell you that the
+ lanthorn is the moon; I, the man in the moon; this
+ thorn-bush, my thorn-bush; and this dog, my dog.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ Why, all these should be in the lanthorn; for all
+ these are in the moon. But, silence! here comes Thisbe.
+
+ /Enter Thisbe/
+
+*Thisbe*
+
+ This is old Ninny's tomb. Where is my love?
+
+*Lion*
+
+ [Roaring] Oh--
+
+ /Thisbe runs off/
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ Well roared, Lion.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ Well run, Thisbe.
+
+*HIPPOLYTA*
+
+ Well shone, Moon. Truly, the moon shines with a
+ good grace.
+
+ /The Lion shakes Thisbe's mantle, and exit/
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ Well moused, Lion.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ And so the lion vanished.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ And then came Pyramus.
+
+ /Enter Pyramus/
+
+*Pyramus*
+
+ Sweet Moon, I thank thee for thy sunny beams;
+ I thank thee, Moon, for shining now so bright;
+ For, by thy gracious, golden, glittering gleams,
+ I trust to take of truest Thisby sight.
+ But stay, O spite!
+ But mark, poor knight,
+ What dreadful dole is here!
+ Eyes, do you see?
+ How can it be?
+ O dainty duck! O dear!
+ Thy mantle good,
+ What, stain'd with blood!
+ Approach, ye Furies fell!
+ O Fates, come, come,
+ Cut thread and thrum;
+ Quail, crush, conclude, and quell!
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ This passion, and the death of a dear friend, would
+ go near to make a man look sad.
+
+*HIPPOLYTA*
+
+ Beshrew my heart, but I pity the man.
+
+*Pyramus*
+
+ O wherefore, Nature, didst thou lions frame?
+ Since lion vile hath here deflower'd my dear:
+ Which is--no, no--which was the fairest dame
+ That lived, that loved, that liked, that look'd
+ with cheer.
+ Come, tears, confound;
+ Out, sword, and wound
+ The pap of Pyramus;
+ Ay, that left pap,
+ Where heart doth hop:
+
+ /Stabs himself/
+
+ Thus die I, thus, thus, thus.
+ Now am I dead,
+ Now am I fled;
+ My soul is in the sky:
+ Tongue, lose thy light;
+ Moon take thy flight:
+
+ /Exit Moonshine/
+
+ Now die, die, die, die, die.
+
+ /Dies/
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ No die, but an ace, for him; for he is but one.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ Less than an ace, man; for he is dead; he is nothing.
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ With the help of a surgeon he might yet recover, and
+ prove an ass.
+
+*HIPPOLYTA*
+
+ How chance Moonshine is gone before Thisbe comes
+ back and finds her lover?
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ She will find him by starlight. Here she comes; and
+ her passion ends the play.
+
+ /Re-enter Thisbe/
+
+*HIPPOLYTA*
+
+ Methinks she should not use a long one for such a
+ Pyramus: I hope she will be brief.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ A mote will turn the balance, which Pyramus, which
+ Thisbe, is the better; he for a man, God warrant us;
+ she for a woman, God bless us.
+
+*LYSANDER*
+
+ She hath spied him already with those sweet eyes.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ And thus she means, videlicet:--
+
+*Thisbe*
+
+ Asleep, my love?
+ What, dead, my dove?
+ O Pyramus, arise!
+ Speak, speak. Quite dumb?
+ Dead, dead? A tomb
+ Must cover thy sweet eyes.
+ These My lips,
+ This cherry nose,
+ These yellow cowslip cheeks,
+ Are gone, are gone:
+ Lovers, make moan:
+ His eyes were green as leeks.
+ O Sisters Three,
+ Come, come to me,
+ With hands as pale as milk;
+ Lay them in gore,
+ Since you have shore
+ With shears his thread of silk.
+ Tongue, not a word:
+ Come, trusty sword;
+ Come, blade, my breast imbrue:
+
+ /Stabs herself/
+
+ And, farewell, friends;
+ Thus Thisby ends:
+ Adieu, adieu, adieu.
+
+ /Dies/
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ Moonshine and Lion are left to bury the dead.
+
+*DEMETRIUS*
+
+ Ay, and Wall too.
+
+*BOTTOM*
+
+ [Starting up] No assure you; the wall is down that
+ parted their fathers. Will it please you to see the
+ epilogue, or to hear a Bergomask dance between two
+ of our company?
+
+*THESEUS*
+
+ No epilogue, I pray you; for your play needs no
+ excuse. Never excuse; for when the players are all
+ dead, there needs none to be blamed. Marry, if he
+ that writ it had played Pyramus and hanged himself
+ in Thisbe's garter, it would have been a fine
+ tragedy: and so it is, truly; and very notably
+ discharged. But come, your Bergomask: let your
+ epilogue alone.
+
+ /A dance/
+
+ The iron tongue of midnight hath told twelve:
+ Lovers, to bed; 'tis almost fairy time.
+ I fear we shall out-sleep the coming morn
+ As much as we this night have overwatch'd.
+ This palpable-gross play hath well beguiled
+ The heavy gait of night. Sweet friends, to bed.
+ A fortnight hold we this solemnity,
+ In nightly revels and new jollity.
+
+ /Exeunt/
+
+ /Enter PUCK/
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ Now the hungry lion roars,
+ And the wolf behowls the moon;
+ Whilst the heavy ploughman snores,
+ All with weary task fordone.
+ Now the wasted brands do glow,
+ Whilst the screech-owl, screeching loud,
+ Puts the wretch that lies in woe
+ In remembrance of a shroud.
+ Now it is the time of night
+ That the graves all gaping wide,
+ Every one lets forth his sprite,
+ In the church-way paths to glide:
+ And we fairies, that do run
+ By the triple Hecate's team,
+ From the presence of the sun,
+ Following darkness like a dream,
+ Now are frolic: not a mouse
+ Shall disturb this hallow'd house:
+ I am sent with broom before,
+ To sweep the dust behind the door.
+
+ /Enter OBERON and TITANIA with their train/
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ Through the house give gathering light,
+ By the dead and drowsy fire:
+ Every elf and fairy sprite
+ Hop as light as bird from brier;
+ And this ditty, after me,
+ Sing, and dance it trippingly.
+
+*TITANIA*
+
+ First, rehearse your song by rote
+ To each word a warbling note:
+ Hand in hand, with fairy grace,
+ Will we sing, and bless this place.
+
+ /Song and dance/
+
+*OBERON*
+
+ Now, until the break of day,
+ Through this house each fairy stray.
+ To the best bride-bed will we,
+ Which by us shall blessed be;
+ And the issue there create
+ Ever shall be fortunate.
+ So shall all the couples three
+ Ever true in loving be;
+ And the blots of Nature's hand
+ Shall not in their issue stand;
+ Never mole, hare lip, nor scar,
+ Nor mark prodigious, such as are
+ Despised in nativity,
+ Shall upon their children be.
+ With this field-dew consecrate,
+ Every fairy take his gait;
+ And each several chamber bless,
+ Through this palace, with sweet peace;
+ And the owner of it blest
+ Ever shall in safety rest.
+ Trip away; make no stay;
+ Meet me all by break of day.
+
+ /Exeunt OBERON, TITANIA, and train/
+
+*PUCK*
+
+ If we shadows have offended,
+ Think but this, and all is mended,
+ That you have but slumber'd here
+ While these visions did appear.
+ And this weak and idle theme,
+ No more yielding but a dream,
+ Gentles, do not reprehend:
+ if you pardon, we will mend:
+ And, as I am an honest Puck,
+ If we have unearned luck
+ Now to 'scape the serpent's tongue,
+ We will make amends ere long;
+ Else the Puck a liar call;
+ So, good night unto you all.
+ Give me your hands, if we be friends,
+ And Robin shall restore amends.
|