<html> <head> <meta content="text/html; charset=utf-8" http-equiv="Content-Type"> <title>A Midsummer Night's Dream</title> </head> <body> <h1>A Midsummer Night's Dream</h1> <i> ASCII text placed in the public domain by Moby Lexical Tools, 1992. SGML markup by Jon Bosak, 1992-1994. XML version by Jon Bosak, 1996-1999. The XML markup in this version is Copyright © 1999 Jon Bosak. This work may freely be distributed on condition that it not be modified or altered in any way. </i><h2>Parts - Dramatis Personae</h2> <p><b><i>THESEUS, Duke of Athens.</i></b></p> <p><b><i>EGEUS, father to Hermia.</i></b></p> <p><b><i>LYSANDER</i></b></p> <p><b><i>DEMETRIUS</i></b></p> <p><b><i>PHILOSTRATE, master of the revels to Theseus.</i></b></p> <p><b><i>QUINCE, a carpenter.</i></b></p> <p><b><i>SNUG, a joiner.</i></b></p> <p><b><i>BOTTOM, a weaver.</i></b></p> <p><b><i>FLUTE, a bellows-mender.</i></b></p> <p><b><i>SNOUT, a tinker.</i></b></p> <p><b><i>STARVELING, a tailor.</i></b></p> <p><b><i>HIPPOLYTA, queen of the Amazons, betrothed to Theseus.</i></b></p> <p><b><i>HERMIA, daughter to Egeus, in love with Lysander.</i></b></p> <p><b><i>HELENA, in love with Demetrius.</i></b></p> <p><b><i>OBERON, king of the fairies.</i></b></p> <p><b><i>TITANIA, queen of the fairies.</i></b></p> <p><b><i>PUCK, or Robin Goodfellow.</i></b></p> <p><b><i>PEASEBLOSSOM</i></b></p> <p><b><i>COBWEB</i></b></p> <p><b><i>MOTH</i></b></p> <p><b><i>MUSTARDSEED</i></b></p> <p><b><i>Other fairies attending their King and Queen.</i></b></p> <p><b><i>Attendants on Theseus and Hippolyta.</i></b></p> <h3>ACT I</h3> <h3>SCENE I. Athens. The palace of THESEUS.</h3> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> Now, fair Hippolyta, our nuptial hour<br> Draws on apace; four happy days bring in<br> Another moon: but, O, methinks, how slow<br> This old moon wanes! she lingers my desires,<br> Like to a step-dame or a dowager<br> Long withering out a young man revenue.<br> <p><b>HIPPOLYTA</b></p> Four days will quickly steep themselves in night;<br> Four nights will quickly dream away the time;<br> And then the moon, like to a silver bow<br> New-bent in heaven, shall behold the night<br> Of our solemnities.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> Go, Philostrate,<br> Stir up the Athenian youth to merriments;<br> Awake the pert and nimble spirit of mirth;<br> Turn melancholy forth to funerals;<br> The pale companion is not for our pomp.<br> Exit PHILOSTRATE Hippolyta, I woo'd thee with my sword,<br> And won thy love, doing thee injuries;<br> But I will wed thee in another key,<br> With pomp, with triumph and with revelling.<br> <p><b>EGEUS</b></p> Happy be Theseus, our renowned duke!<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> Thanks, good Egeus: what's the news with thee?<br> <p><b>EGEUS</b></p> Full of vexation come I, with complaint<br> Against my child, my daughter Hermia.<br> Stand forth, Demetrius. My noble lord,<br> This man hath my consent to marry her.<br> Stand forth, Lysander: and my gracious duke,<br> This man hath bewitch'd the bosom of my child;<br> Thou, thou, Lysander, thou hast given her rhymes,<br> And interchanged love-tokens with my child:<br> Thou hast by moonlight at her window sung,<br> With feigning voice verses of feigning love,<br> And stolen the impression of her fantasy<br> With bracelets of thy hair, rings, gawds, conceits,<br> Knacks, trifles, nosegays, sweetmeats, messengers<br> Of strong prevailment in unharden'd youth:<br> With cunning hast thou filch'd my daughter's heart,<br> Turn'd her obedience, which is due to me,<br> To stubborn harshness: and, my gracious duke,<br> Be it so she; will not here before your grace<br> Consent to marry with Demetrius,<br> I beg the ancient privilege of Athens,<br> As she is mine, I may dispose of her:<br> Which shall be either to this gentleman<br> Or to her death, according to our law<br> Immediately provided in that case.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> What say you, Hermia? be advised fair maid:<br> To you your father should be as a god;<br> One that composed your beauties, yea, and one<br> To whom you are but as a form in wax<br> By him imprinted and within his power<br> To leave the figure or disfigure it.<br> Demetrius is a worthy gentleman.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> So is Lysander.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> In himself he is;<br> But in this kind, wanting your father's voice,<br> The other must be held the worthier.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> I would my father look'd but with my eyes.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> Rather your eyes must with his judgment look.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> I do entreat your grace to pardon me.<br> I know not by what power I am made bold,<br> Nor how it may concern my modesty,<br> In such a presence here to plead my thoughts;<br> But I beseech your grace that I may know<br> The worst that may befall me in this case,<br> If I refuse to wed Demetrius.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> Either to die the death or to abjure<br> For ever the society of men.<br> Therefore, fair Hermia, question your desires;<br> Know of your youth, examine well your blood,<br> Whether, if you yield not to your father's choice,<br> You can endure the livery of a nun,<br> For aye to be in shady cloister mew'd,<br> To live a barren sister all your life,<br> Chanting faint hymns to the cold fruitless moon.<br> Thrice-blessed they that master so their blood,<br> To undergo such maiden pilgrimage;<br> But earthlier happy is the rose distill'd,<br> Than that which withering on the virgin thorn<br> Grows, lives and dies in single blessedness.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> So will I grow, so live, so die, my lord,<br> Ere I will my virgin patent up<br> Unto his lordship, whose unwished yoke<br> My soul consents not to give sovereignty.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> Take time to pause; and, by the nest new moon--<br> The sealing-day betwixt my love and me,<br> For everlasting bond of fellowship--<br> Upon that day either prepare to die<br> For disobedience to your father's will,<br> Or else to wed Demetrius, as he would;<br> Or on Diana's altar to protest<br> For aye austerity and single life.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> Relent, sweet Hermia: and, Lysander, yield<br> Thy crazed title to my certain right.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> You have her father's love, Demetrius;<br> Let me have Hermia's: do you marry him.<br> <p><b>EGEUS</b></p> Scornful Lysander! true, he hath my love,<br> And what is mine my love shall render him.<br> And she is mine, and all my right of her<br> I do estate unto Demetrius.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> I am, my lord, as well derived as he,<br> As well possess'd; my love is more than his;<br> My fortunes every way as fairly rank'd,<br> If not with vantage, as Demetrius';<br> And, which is more than all these boasts can be,<br> I am beloved of beauteous Hermia:<br> Why should not I then prosecute my right?<br> Demetrius, I'll avouch it to his head,<br> Made love to Nedar's daughter, Helena,<br> And won her soul; and she, sweet lady, dotes,<br> Devoutly dotes, dotes in idolatry,<br> Upon this spotted and inconstant man.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> I must confess that I have heard so much,<br> And with Demetrius thought to have spoke thereof;<br> But, being over-full of self-affairs,<br> My mind did lose it. But, Demetrius, come;<br> And come, Egeus; you shall go with me,<br> I have some private schooling for you both.<br> For you, fair Hermia, look you arm yourself<br> To fit your fancies to your father's will;<br> Or else the law of Athens yields you up--<br> Which by no means we may extenuate--<br> To death, or to a vow of single life.<br> Come, my Hippolyta: what cheer, my love?<br> Demetrius and Egeus, go along:<br> I must employ you in some business<br> Against our nuptial and confer with you<br> Of something nearly that concerns yourselves.<br> <p><b>EGEUS</b></p> With duty and desire we follow you.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> How now, my love! why is your cheek so pale?<br> How chance the roses there do fade so fast?<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> Belike for want of rain, which I could well<br> Beteem them from the tempest of my eyes.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Ay me! for aught that I could ever read,<br> Could ever hear by tale or history,<br> The course of true love never did run smooth;<br> But, either it was different in blood,--<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> O cross! too high to be enthrall'd to low.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Or else misgraffed in respect of years,--<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> O spite! too old to be engaged to young.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Or else it stood upon the choice of friends,--<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> O hell! to choose love by another's eyes.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Or, if there were a sympathy in choice,<br> War, death, or sickness did lay siege to it,<br> Making it momentany as a sound,<br> Swift as a shadow, short as any dream;<br> Brief as the lightning in the collied night,<br> That, in a spleen, unfolds both heaven and earth,<br> And ere a man hath power to say 'Behold!'<br> The jaws of darkness do devour it up:<br> So quick bright things come to confusion.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> If then true lovers have been ever cross'd,<br> It stands as an edict in destiny:<br> Then let us teach our trial patience,<br> Because it is a customary cross,<br> As due to love as thoughts and dreams and sighs,<br> Wishes and tears, poor fancy's followers.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> A good persuasion: therefore, hear me, Hermia.<br> I have a widow aunt, a dowager<br> Of great revenue, and she hath no child:<br> From Athens is her house remote seven leagues;<br> And she respects me as her only son.<br> There, gentle Hermia, may I marry thee;<br> And to that place the sharp Athenian law<br> Cannot pursue us. If thou lovest me then,<br> Steal forth thy father's house to-morrow night;<br> And in the wood, a league without the town,<br> Where I did meet thee once with Helena,<br> To do observance to a morn of May,<br> There will I stay for thee.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> My good Lysander!<br> I swear to thee, by Cupid's strongest bow,<br> By his best arrow with the golden head,<br> By the simplicity of Venus' doves,<br> By that which knitteth souls and prospers loves,<br> And by that fire which burn'd the Carthage queen,<br> When the false Troyan under sail was seen,<br> By all the vows that ever men have broke,<br> In number more than ever women spoke,<br> In that same place thou hast appointed me,<br> To-morrow truly will I meet with thee.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Keep promise, love. Look, here comes Helena.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> God speed fair Helena! whither away?<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> Call you me fair? that fair again unsay.<br> Demetrius loves your fair: O happy fair!<br> Your eyes are lode-stars; and your tongue's sweet air<br> More tuneable than lark to shepherd's ear,<br> When wheat is green, when hawthorn buds appear.<br> Sickness is catching: O, were favour so,<br> Yours would I catch, fair Hermia, ere I go;<br> My ear should catch your voice, my eye your eye,<br> My tongue should catch your tongue's sweet melody.<br> Were the world mine, Demetrius being bated,<br> The rest I'd give to be to you translated.<br> O, teach me how you look, and with what art<br> You sway the motion of Demetrius' heart.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> I frown upon him, yet he loves me still.<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> O that your frowns would teach my smiles such skill!<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> I give him curses, yet he gives me love.<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> O that my prayers could such affection move!<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> The more I hate, the more he follows me.<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> The more I love, the more he hateth me.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> His folly, Helena, is no fault of mine.<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> None, but your beauty: would that fault were mine!<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> Take comfort: he no more shall see my face;<br> Lysander and myself will fly this place.<br> Before the time I did Lysander see,<br> Seem'd Athens as a paradise to me:<br> O, then, what graces in my love do dwell,<br> That he hath turn'd a heaven unto a hell!<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Helen, to you our minds we will unfold:<br> To-morrow night, when Phoebe doth behold<br> Her silver visage in the watery glass,<br> Decking with liquid pearl the bladed grass,<br> A time that lovers' flights doth still conceal,<br> Through Athens' gates have we devised to steal.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> And in the wood, where often you and I<br> Upon faint primrose-beds were wont to lie,<br> Emptying our bosoms of their counsel sweet,<br> There my Lysander and myself shall meet;<br> And thence from Athens turn away our eyes,<br> To seek new friends and stranger companies.<br> Farewell, sweet playfellow: pray thou for us;<br> And good luck grant thee thy Demetrius!<br> Keep word, Lysander: we must starve our sight<br> From lovers' food till morrow deep midnight.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> I will, my Hermia.<br> Exit HERMIA Helena, adieu:<br> As you on him, Demetrius dote on you!<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> How happy some o'er other some can be!<br> Through Athens I am thought as fair as she.<br> But what of that? Demetrius thinks not so;<br> He will not know what all but he do know:<br> And as he errs, doting on Hermia's eyes,<br> So I, admiring of his qualities:<br> Things base and vile, folding no quantity,<br> Love can transpose to form and dignity:<br> Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind;<br> And therefore is wing'd Cupid painted blind:<br> Nor hath Love's mind of any judgement taste;<br> Wings and no eyes figure unheedy haste:<br> And therefore is Love said to be a child,<br> Because in choice he is so oft beguiled.<br> As waggish boys in game themselves forswear,<br> So the boy Love is perjured every where:<br> For ere Demetrius look'd on Hermia's eyne,<br> He hail'd down oaths that he was only mine;<br> And when this hail some heat from Hermia felt,<br> So he dissolved, and showers of oaths did melt.<br> I will go tell him of fair Hermia's flight:<br> Then to the wood will he to-morrow night<br> Pursue her; and for this intelligence<br> If I have thanks, it is a dear expense:<br> But herein mean I to enrich my pain,<br> To have his sight thither and back again.<br> <h3>SCENE II. Athens. QUINCE'S house.</h3> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> Is all our company here?<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> You were best to call them generally, man by man,<br> according to the scrip.<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> Here is the scroll of every man's name, which is<br> thought fit, through all Athens, to play in our<br> interlude before the duke and the duchess, on his<br> wedding-day at night.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> First, good Peter Quince, say what the play treats<br> on, then read the names of the actors, and so grow<br> to a point.<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> Marry, our play is, The most lamentable comedy, and<br> most cruel death of Pyramus and Thisby.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> A very good piece of work, I assure you, and a<br> merry. Now, good Peter Quince, call forth your<br> actors by the scroll. Masters, spread yourselves.<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> Answer as I call you. Nick Bottom, the weaver.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Ready. Name what part I am for, and proceed.<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> You, Nick Bottom, are set down for Pyramus.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> What is Pyramus? a lover, or a tyrant?<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> A lover, that kills himself most gallant for love.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> That will ask some tears in the true performing of<br> it: if I do it, let the audience look to their<br> eyes; I will move storms, I will condole in some<br> measure. To the rest: yet my chief humour is for a<br> tyrant: I could play Ercles rarely, or a part to<br> tear a cat in, to make all split.<br> The raging rocks<br> And shivering shocks<br> Shall break the locks<br> Of prison gates;<br> And Phibbus' car<br> Shall shine from far<br> And make and mar<br> The foolish Fates.<br> This was lofty! Now name the rest of the players.<br> This is Ercles' vein, a tyrant's vein; a lover is<br> more condoling.<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> Francis Flute, the bellows-mender.<br> <p><b>FLUTE</b></p> Here, Peter Quince.<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> Flute, you must take Thisby on you.<br> <p><b>FLUTE</b></p> What is Thisby? a wandering knight?<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> It is the lady that Pyramus must love.<br> <p><b>FLUTE</b></p> Nay, faith, let me not play a woman; I have a beard coming.<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> That's all one: you shall play it in a mask, and<br> you may speak as small as you will.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> An I may hide my face, let me play Thisby too, I'll<br> speak in a monstrous little voice. 'Thisne,<br> Thisne;' 'Ah, Pyramus, lover dear! thy Thisby dear,<br> and lady dear!'<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> No, no; you must play Pyramus: and, Flute, you Thisby.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Well, proceed.<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> Robin Starveling, the tailor.<br> <p><b>STARVELING</b></p> Here, Peter Quince.<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> Robin Starveling, you must play Thisby's mother.<br> Tom Snout, the tinker.<br> <p><b>SNOUT</b></p> Here, Peter Quince.<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> You, Pyramus' father: myself, Thisby's father:<br> Snug, the joiner; you, the lion's part: and, I<br> hope, here is a play fitted.<br> <p><b>SNUG</b></p> Have you the lion's part written? pray you, if it<br> be, give it me, for I am slow of study.<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> You may do it extempore, for it is nothing but roaring.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Let me play the lion too: I will roar, that I will<br> do any man's heart good to hear me; I will roar,<br> that I will make the duke say 'Let him roar again,<br> let him roar again.'<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> An you should do it too terribly, you would fright<br> the duchess and the ladies, that they would shriek;<br> and that were enough to hang us all.<br> <p><b>ALL</b></p> That would hang us, every mother's son.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> I grant you, friends, if that you should fright the<br> ladies out of their wits, they would have no more<br> discretion but to hang us: but I will aggravate my<br> voice so that I will roar you as gently as any<br> sucking dove; I will roar you an 'twere any<br> nightingale.<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> You can play no part but Pyramus; for Pyramus is a<br> sweet-faced man; a proper man, as one shall see in a<br> summer's day; a most lovely gentleman-like man:<br> therefore you must needs play Pyramus.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Well, I will undertake it. What beard were I best<br> to play it in?<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> Why, what you will.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> I will discharge it in either your straw-colour<br> beard, your orange-tawny beard, your purple-in-grain<br> beard, or your French-crown-colour beard, your<br> perfect yellow.<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> Some of your French crowns have no hair at all, and<br> then you will play bare-faced. But, masters, here<br> are your parts: and I am to entreat you, request<br> you and desire you, to con them by to-morrow night;<br> and meet me in the palace wood, a mile without the<br> town, by moonlight; there will we rehearse, for if<br> we meet in the city, we shall be dogged with<br> company, and our devices known. In the meantime I<br> will draw a bill of properties, such as our play<br> wants. I pray you, fail me not.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> We will meet; and there we may rehearse most<br> obscenely and courageously. Take pains; be perfect: adieu.<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> At the duke's oak we meet.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Enough; hold or cut bow-strings.<br> <h3>ACT II</h3> <h3>SCENE I. A wood near Athens.</h3> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> How now, spirit! whither wander you?<br> <p><b>Fairy</b></p> Over hill, over dale,<br> Thorough bush, thorough brier,<br> Over park, over pale,<br> Thorough flood, thorough fire,<br> I do wander everywhere,<br> Swifter than the moon's sphere;<br> And I serve the fairy queen,<br> To dew her orbs upon the green.<br> The cowslips tall her pensioners be:<br> In their gold coats spots you see;<br> Those be rubies, fairy favours,<br> In those freckles live their savours:<br> I must go seek some dewdrops here<br> And hang a pearl in every cowslip's ear.<br> Farewell, thou lob of spirits; I'll be gone:<br> Our queen and all our elves come here anon.<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> The king doth keep his revels here to-night:<br> Take heed the queen come not within his sight;<br> For Oberon is passing fell and wrath,<br> Because that she as her attendant hath<br> A lovely boy, stolen from an Indian king;<br> She never had so sweet a changeling;<br> And jealous Oberon would have the child<br> Knight of his train, to trace the forests wild;<br> But she perforce withholds the loved boy,<br> Crowns him with flowers and makes him all her joy:<br> And now they never meet in grove or green,<br> By fountain clear, or spangled starlight sheen,<br> But, they do square, that all their elves for fear<br> Creep into acorn-cups and hide them there.<br> <p><b>Fairy</b></p> Either I mistake your shape and making quite,<br> Or else you are that shrewd and knavish sprite<br> Call'd Robin Goodfellow: are not you he<br> That frights the maidens of the villagery;<br> Skim milk, and sometimes labour in the quern<br> And bootless make the breathless housewife churn;<br> And sometime make the drink to bear no barm;<br> Mislead night-wanderers, laughing at their harm?<br> Those that Hobgoblin call you and sweet Puck,<br> You do their work, and they shall have good luck:<br> Are not you he?<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> Thou speak'st aright;<br> I am that merry wanderer of the night.<br> I jest to Oberon and make him smile<br> When I a fat and bean-fed horse beguile,<br> Neighing in likeness of a filly foal:<br> And sometime lurk I in a gossip's bowl,<br> In very likeness of a roasted crab,<br> And when she drinks, against her lips I bob<br> And on her wither'd dewlap pour the ale.<br> The wisest aunt, telling the saddest tale,<br> Sometime for three-foot stool mistaketh me;<br> Then slip I from her bum, down topples she,<br> And 'tailor' cries, and falls into a cough;<br> And then the whole quire hold their hips and laugh,<br> And waxen in their mirth and neeze and swear<br> A merrier hour was never wasted there.<br> But, room, fairy! here comes Oberon.<br> <p><b>Fairy</b></p> And here my mistress. Would that he were gone!<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> Ill met by moonlight, proud Titania.<br> <p><b>TITANIA</b></p> What, jealous Oberon! Fairies, skip hence:<br> I have forsworn his bed and company.<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> Tarry, rash wanton: am not I thy lord?<br> <p><b>TITANIA</b></p> Then I must be thy lady: but I know<br> When thou hast stolen away from fairy land,<br> And in the shape of Corin sat all day,<br> Playing on pipes of corn and versing love<br> To amorous Phillida. Why art thou here,<br> Come from the farthest Steppe of India?<br> But that, forsooth, the bouncing Amazon,<br> Your buskin'd mistress and your warrior love,<br> To Theseus must be wedded, and you come<br> To give their bed joy and prosperity.<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> How canst thou thus for shame, Titania,<br> Glance at my credit with Hippolyta,<br> Knowing I know thy love to Theseus?<br> Didst thou not lead him through the glimmering night<br> From Perigenia, whom he ravished?<br> And make him with fair AEgle break his faith,<br> With Ariadne and Antiopa?<br> <p><b>TITANIA</b></p> These are the forgeries of jealousy:<br> And never, since the middle summer's spring,<br> Met we on hill, in dale, forest or mead,<br> By paved fountain or by rushy brook,<br> Or in the beached margent of the sea,<br> To dance our ringlets to the whistling wind,<br> But with thy brawls thou hast disturb'd our sport.<br> Therefore the winds, piping to us in vain,<br> As in revenge, have suck'd up from the sea<br> Contagious fogs; which falling in the land<br> Have every pelting river made so proud<br> That they have overborne their continents:<br> The ox hath therefore stretch'd his yoke in vain,<br> The ploughman lost his sweat, and the green corn<br> Hath rotted ere his youth attain'd a beard;<br> The fold stands empty in the drowned field,<br> And crows are fatted with the murrion flock;<br> The nine men's morris is fill'd up with mud,<br> And the quaint mazes in the wanton green<br> For lack of tread are undistinguishable:<br> The human mortals want their winter here;<br> No night is now with hymn or carol blest:<br> Therefore the moon, the governess of floods,<br> Pale in her anger, washes all the air,<br> That rheumatic diseases do abound:<br> And thorough this distemperature we see<br> The seasons alter: hoary-headed frosts<br> Far in the fresh lap of the crimson rose,<br> And on old Hiems' thin and icy crown<br> An odorous chaplet of sweet summer buds<br> Is, as in mockery, set: the spring, the summer,<br> The childing autumn, angry winter, change<br> Their wonted liveries, and the mazed world,<br> By their increase, now knows not which is which:<br> And this same progeny of evils comes<br> From our debate, from our dissension;<br> We are their parents and original.<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> Do you amend it then; it lies in you:<br> Why should Titania cross her Oberon?<br> I do but beg a little changeling boy,<br> To be my henchman.<br> <p><b>TITANIA</b></p> Set your heart at rest:<br> The fairy land buys not the child of me.<br> His mother was a votaress of my order:<br> And, in the spiced Indian air, by night,<br> Full often hath she gossip'd by my side,<br> And sat with me on Neptune's yellow sands,<br> Marking the embarked traders on the flood,<br> When we have laugh'd to see the sails conceive<br> And grow big-bellied with the wanton wind;<br> Which she, with pretty and with swimming gait<br> Following,--her womb then rich with my young squire,--<br> Would imitate, and sail upon the land,<br> To fetch me trifles, and return again,<br> As from a voyage, rich with merchandise.<br> But she, being mortal, of that boy did die;<br> And for her sake do I rear up her boy,<br> And for her sake I will not part with him.<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> How long within this wood intend you stay?<br> <p><b>TITANIA</b></p> Perchance till after Theseus' wedding-day.<br> If you will patiently dance in our round<br> And see our moonlight revels, go with us;<br> If not, shun me, and I will spare your haunts.<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> Give me that boy, and I will go with thee.<br> <p><b>TITANIA</b></p> Not for thy fairy kingdom. Fairies, away!<br> We shall chide downright, if I longer stay.<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> Well, go thy way: thou shalt not from this grove<br> Till I torment thee for this injury.<br> My gentle Puck, come hither. Thou rememberest<br> Since once I sat upon a promontory,<br> And heard a mermaid on a dolphin's back<br> Uttering such dulcet and harmonious breath<br> That the rude sea grew civil at her song<br> And certain stars shot madly from their spheres,<br> To hear the sea-maid's music.<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> I remember.<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> That very time I saw, but thou couldst not,<br> Flying between the cold moon and the earth,<br> Cupid all arm'd: a certain aim he took<br> At a fair vestal throned by the west,<br> And loosed his love-shaft smartly from his bow,<br> As it should pierce a hundred thousand hearts;<br> But I might see young Cupid's fiery shaft<br> Quench'd in the chaste beams of the watery moon,<br> And the imperial votaress passed on,<br> In maiden meditation, fancy-free.<br> Yet mark'd I where the bolt of Cupid fell:<br> It fell upon a little western flower,<br> Before milk-white, now purple with love's wound,<br> And maidens call it love-in-idleness.<br> Fetch me that flower; the herb I shew'd thee once:<br> The juice of it on sleeping eye-lids laid<br> Will make or man or woman madly dote<br> Upon the next live creature that it sees.<br> Fetch me this herb; and be thou here again<br> Ere the leviathan can swim a league.<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> I'll put a girdle round about the earth<br> In forty minutes.<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> Having once this juice,<br> I'll watch Titania when she is asleep,<br> And drop the liquor of it in her eyes.<br> The next thing then she waking looks upon,<br> Be it on lion, bear, or wolf, or bull,<br> On meddling monkey, or on busy ape,<br> She shall pursue it with the soul of love:<br> And ere I take this charm from off her sight,<br> As I can take it with another herb,<br> I'll make her render up her page to me.<br> But who comes here? I am invisible;<br> And I will overhear their conference.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> I love thee not, therefore pursue me not.<br> Where is Lysander and fair Hermia?<br> The one I'll slay, the other slayeth me.<br> Thou told'st me they were stolen unto this wood;<br> And here am I, and wode within this wood,<br> Because I cannot meet my Hermia.<br> Hence, get thee gone, and follow me no more.<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> You draw me, you hard-hearted adamant;<br> But yet you draw not iron, for my heart<br> Is true as steel: leave you your power to draw,<br> And I shall have no power to follow you.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> Do I entice you? do I speak you fair?<br> Or, rather, do I not in plainest truth<br> Tell you, I do not, nor I cannot love you?<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> And even for that do I love you the more.<br> I am your spaniel; and, Demetrius,<br> The more you beat me, I will fawn on you:<br> Use me but as your spaniel, spurn me, strike me,<br> Neglect me, lose me; only give me leave,<br> Unworthy as I am, to follow you.<br> What worser place can I beg in your love,--<br> And yet a place of high respect with me,--<br> Than to be used as you use your dog?<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> Tempt not too much the hatred of my spirit;<br> For I am sick when I do look on thee.<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> And I am sick when I look not on you.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> You do impeach your modesty too much,<br> To leave the city and commit yourself<br> Into the hands of one that loves you not;<br> To trust the opportunity of night<br> And the ill counsel of a desert place<br> With the rich worth of your virginity.<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> Your virtue is my privilege: for that<br> It is not night when I do see your face,<br> Therefore I think I am not in the night;<br> Nor doth this wood lack worlds of company,<br> For you in my respect are all the world:<br> Then how can it be said I am alone,<br> When all the world is here to look on me?<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> I'll run from thee and hide me in the brakes,<br> And leave thee to the mercy of wild beasts.<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> The wildest hath not such a heart as you.<br> Run when you will, the story shall be changed:<br> Apollo flies, and Daphne holds the chase;<br> The dove pursues the griffin; the mild hind<br> Makes speed to catch the tiger; bootless speed,<br> When cowardice pursues and valour flies.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> I will not stay thy questions; let me go:<br> Or, if thou follow me, do not believe<br> But I shall do thee mischief in the wood.<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> Ay, in the temple, in the town, the field,<br> You do me mischief. Fie, Demetrius!<br> Your wrongs do set a scandal on my sex:<br> We cannot fight for love, as men may do;<br> We should be wood and were not made to woo.<br> Exit DEMETRIUS I'll follow thee and make a heaven of hell,<br> To die upon the hand I love so well.<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> Fare thee well, nymph: ere he do leave this grove,<br> Thou shalt fly him and he shall seek thy love.<br> Re-enter PUCK Hast thou the flower there? Welcome, wanderer.<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> Ay, there it is.<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> I pray thee, give it me.<br> I know a bank where the wild thyme blows,<br> Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows,<br> Quite over-canopied with luscious woodbine,<br> With sweet musk-roses and with eglantine:<br> There sleeps Titania sometime of the night,<br> Lull'd in these flowers with dances and delight;<br> And there the snake throws her enamell'd skin,<br> Weed wide enough to wrap a fairy in:<br> And with the juice of this I'll streak her eyes,<br> And make her full of hateful fantasies.<br> Take thou some of it, and seek through this grove:<br> A sweet Athenian lady is in love<br> With a disdainful youth: anoint his eyes;<br> But do it when the next thing he espies<br> May be the lady: thou shalt know the man<br> By the Athenian garments he hath on.<br> Effect it with some care, that he may prove<br> More fond on her than she upon her love:<br> And look thou meet me ere the first cock crow.<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> Fear not, my lord, your servant shall do so.<br> <h3>SCENE II. Another part of the wood.</h3> <p><b>TITANIA</b></p> Come, now a roundel and a fairy song;<br> Then, for the third part of a minute, hence;<br> Some to kill cankers in the musk-rose buds,<br> Some war with rere-mice for their leathern wings,<br> To make my small elves coats, and some keep back<br> The clamorous owl that nightly hoots and wonders<br> At our quaint spirits. Sing me now asleep;<br> Then to your offices and let me rest.<br> The Fairies sing You spotted snakes with double tongue,<br> Thorny hedgehogs, be not seen;<br> Newts and blind-worms, do no wrong,<br> Come not near our fairy queen.<br> Philomel, with melody<br> Sing in our sweet lullaby;<br> Lulla, lulla, lullaby, lulla, lulla, lullaby:<br> Never harm,<br> Nor spell nor charm,<br> Come our lovely lady nigh;<br> So, good night, with lullaby.<br> Weaving spiders, come not here;<br> Hence, you long-legg'd spinners, hence!<br> Beetles black, approach not near;<br> Worm nor snail, do no offence.<br> Philomel, with melody, &c.<br> <p><b>Fairy</b></p> Hence, away! now all is well:<br> One aloof stand sentinel.<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> What thou seest when thou dost wake,<br> Do it for thy true-love take,<br> Love and languish for his sake:<br> Be it ounce, or cat, or bear,<br> Pard, or boar with bristled hair,<br> In thy eye that shall appear<br> When thou wakest, it is thy dear:<br> Wake when some vile thing is near.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Fair love, you faint with wandering in the wood;<br> And to speak troth, I have forgot our way:<br> We'll rest us, Hermia, if you think it good,<br> And tarry for the comfort of the day.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> Be it so, Lysander: find you out a bed;<br> For I upon this bank will rest my head.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> One turf shall serve as pillow for us both;<br> One heart, one bed, two bosoms and one troth.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> Nay, good Lysander; for my sake, my dear,<br> Lie further off yet, do not lie so near.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> O, take the sense, sweet, of my innocence!<br> Love takes the meaning in love's conference.<br> I mean, that my heart unto yours is knit<br> So that but one heart we can make of it;<br> Two bosoms interchained with an oath;<br> So then two bosoms and a single troth.<br> Then by your side no bed-room me deny;<br> For lying so, Hermia, I do not lie.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> Lysander riddles very prettily:<br> Now much beshrew my manners and my pride,<br> If Hermia meant to say Lysander lied.<br> But, gentle friend, for love and courtesy<br> Lie further off; in human modesty,<br> Such separation as may well be said<br> Becomes a virtuous bachelor and a maid,<br> So far be distant; and, good night, sweet friend:<br> Thy love ne'er alter till thy sweet life end!<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Amen, amen, to that fair prayer, say I;<br> And then end life when I end loyalty!<br> Here is my bed: sleep give thee all his rest!<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> With half that wish the wisher's eyes be press'd!<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> Through the forest have I gone.<br> But Athenian found I none,<br> On whose eyes I might approve<br> This flower's force in stirring love.<br> Night and silence.--Who is here?<br> Weeds of Athens he doth wear:<br> This is he, my master said,<br> Despised the Athenian maid;<br> And here the maiden, sleeping sound,<br> On the dank and dirty ground.<br> Pretty soul! she durst not lie<br> Near this lack-love, this kill-courtesy.<br> Churl, upon thy eyes I throw<br> All the power this charm doth owe.<br> When thou wakest, let love forbid<br> Sleep his seat on thy eyelid:<br> So awake when I am gone;<br> For I must now to Oberon.<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> Stay, though thou kill me, sweet Demetrius.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> I charge thee, hence, and do not haunt me thus.<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> O, wilt thou darkling leave me? do not so.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> Stay, on thy peril: I alone will go.<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> O, I am out of breath in this fond chase!<br> The more my prayer, the lesser is my grace.<br> Happy is Hermia, wheresoe'er she lies;<br> For she hath blessed and attractive eyes.<br> How came her eyes so bright? Not with salt tears:<br> If so, my eyes are oftener wash'd than hers.<br> No, no, I am as ugly as a bear;<br> For beasts that meet me run away for fear:<br> Therefore no marvel though Demetrius<br> Do, as a monster fly my presence thus.<br> What wicked and dissembling glass of mine<br> Made me compare with Hermia's sphery eyne?<br> But who is here? Lysander! on the ground!<br> Dead? or asleep? I see no blood, no wound.<br> Lysander if you live, good sir, awake.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Awaking And run through fire I will for thy sweet sake.<br> Transparent Helena! Nature shows art,<br> That through thy bosom makes me see thy heart.<br> Where is Demetrius? O, how fit a word<br> Is that vile name to perish on my sword!<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> Do not say so, Lysander; say not so<br> What though he love your Hermia? Lord, what though?<br> Yet Hermia still loves you: then be content.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Content with Hermia! No; I do repent<br> The tedious minutes I with her have spent.<br> Not Hermia but Helena I love:<br> Who will not change a raven for a dove?<br> The will of man is by his reason sway'd;<br> And reason says you are the worthier maid.<br> Things growing are not ripe until their season<br> So I, being young, till now ripe not to reason;<br> And touching now the point of human skill,<br> Reason becomes the marshal to my will<br> And leads me to your eyes, where I o'erlook<br> Love's stories written in love's richest book.<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> Wherefore was I to this keen mockery born?<br> When at your hands did I deserve this scorn?<br> Is't not enough, is't not enough, young man,<br> That I did never, no, nor never can,<br> Deserve a sweet look from Demetrius' eye,<br> But you must flout my insufficiency?<br> Good troth, you do me wrong, good sooth, you do,<br> In such disdainful manner me to woo.<br> But fare you well: perforce I must confess<br> I thought you lord of more true gentleness.<br> O, that a lady, of one man refused.<br> Should of another therefore be abused!<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> She sees not Hermia. Hermia, sleep thou there:<br> And never mayst thou come Lysander near!<br> For as a surfeit of the sweetest things<br> The deepest loathing to the stomach brings,<br> Or as tie heresies that men do leave<br> Are hated most of those they did deceive,<br> So thou, my surfeit and my heresy,<br> Of all be hated, but the most of me!<br> And, all my powers, address your love and might<br> To honour Helen and to be her knight!<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> Awaking Help me, Lysander, help me! do thy best<br> To pluck this crawling serpent from my breast!<br> Ay me, for pity! what a dream was here!<br> Lysander, look how I do quake with fear:<br> Methought a serpent eat my heart away,<br> And you sat smiling at his cruel pray.<br> Lysander! what, removed? Lysander! lord!<br> What, out of hearing? gone? no sound, no word?<br> Alack, where are you speak, an if you hear;<br> Speak, of all loves! I swoon almost with fear.<br> No? then I well perceive you all not nigh<br> Either death or you I'll find immediately.<br> <h3>ACT III</h3> <h3>SCENE I. The wood. TITANIA lying asleep.</h3> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Are we all met?<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> Pat, pat; and here's a marvellous convenient place<br> for our rehearsal. This green plot shall be our<br> stage, this hawthorn-brake our tiring-house; and we<br> will do it in action as we will do it before the duke.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Peter Quince,--<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> What sayest thou, bully Bottom?<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> There are things in this comedy of Pyramus and<br> Thisby that will never please. First, Pyramus must<br> draw a sword to kill himself; which the ladies<br> cannot abide. How answer you that?<br> <p><b>SNOUT</b></p> By'r lakin, a parlous fear.<br> <p><b>STARVELING</b></p> I believe we must leave the killing out, when all is done.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Not a whit: I have a device to make all well.<br> Write me a prologue; and let the prologue seem to<br> say, we will do no harm with our swords, and that<br> Pyramus is not killed indeed; and, for the more<br> better assurance, tell them that I, Pyramus, am not<br> Pyramus, but Bottom the weaver: this will put them<br> out of fear.<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> Well, we will have such a prologue; and it shall be<br> written in eight and six.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> No, make it two more; let it be written in eight and eight.<br> <p><b>SNOUT</b></p> Will not the ladies be afeard of the lion?<br> <p><b>STARVELING</b></p> I fear it, I promise you.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Masters, you ought to consider with yourselves: to<br> bring in--God shield us!--a lion among ladies, is a<br> most dreadful thing; for there is not a more fearful<br> wild-fowl than your lion living; and we ought to<br> look to 't.<br> <p><b>SNOUT</b></p> Therefore another prologue must tell he is not a lion.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Nay, you must name his name, and half his face must<br> be seen through the lion's neck: and he himself<br> must speak through, saying thus, or to the same<br> defect,--'Ladies,'--or 'Fair-ladies--I would wish<br> You,'--or 'I would request you,'--or 'I would<br> entreat you,--not to fear, not to tremble: my life<br> for yours. If you think I come hither as a lion, it<br> were pity of my life: no I am no such thing; I am a<br> man as other men are;' and there indeed let him name<br> his name, and tell them plainly he is Snug the joiner.<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> Well it shall be so. But there is two hard things;<br> that is, to bring the moonlight into a chamber; for,<br> you know, Pyramus and Thisby meet by moonlight.<br> <p><b>SNOUT</b></p> Doth the moon shine that night we play our play?<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> A calendar, a calendar! look in the almanac; find<br> out moonshine, find out moonshine.<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> Yes, it doth shine that night.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Why, then may you leave a casement of the great<br> chamber window, where we play, open, and the moon<br> may shine in at the casement.<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> Ay; or else one must come in with a bush of thorns<br> and a lanthorn, and say he comes to disfigure, or to<br> present, the person of Moonshine. Then, there is<br> another thing: we must have a wall in the great<br> chamber; for Pyramus and Thisby says the story, did<br> talk through the chink of a wall.<br> <p><b>SNOUT</b></p> You can never bring in a wall. What say you, Bottom?<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Some man or other must present Wall: and let him<br> have some plaster, or some loam, or some rough-cast<br> about him, to signify wall; and let him hold his<br> fingers thus, and through that cranny shall Pyramus<br> and Thisby whisper.<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> If that may be, then all is well. Come, sit down,<br> every mother's son, and rehearse your parts.<br> Pyramus, you begin: when you have spoken your<br> speech, enter into that brake: and so every one<br> according to his cue.<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> What hempen home-spuns have we swaggering here,<br> So near the cradle of the fairy queen?<br> What, a play toward! I'll be an auditor;<br> An actor too, perhaps, if I see cause.<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> Speak, Pyramus. Thisby, stand forth.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Thisby, the flowers of odious savours sweet,--<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> Odours, odours.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> --odours savours sweet:<br> So hath thy breath, my dearest Thisby dear.<br> But hark, a voice! stay thou but here awhile,<br> And by and by I will to thee appear.<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> A stranger Pyramus than e'er played here.<br> <p><b>FLUTE</b></p> Must I speak now?<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> Ay, marry, must you; for you must understand he goes<br> but to see a noise that he heard, and is to come again.<br> <p><b>FLUTE</b></p> Most radiant Pyramus, most lily-white of hue,<br> Of colour like the red rose on triumphant brier,<br> Most brisky juvenal and eke most lovely Jew,<br> As true as truest horse that yet would never tire,<br> I'll meet thee, Pyramus, at Ninny's tomb.<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> 'Ninus' tomb,' man: why, you must not speak that<br> yet; that you answer to Pyramus: you speak all your<br> part at once, cues and all Pyramus enter: your cue<br> is past; it is, 'never tire.'<br> <p><b>FLUTE</b></p> O,--As true as truest horse, that yet would<br> never tire.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> If I were fair, Thisby, I were only thine.<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> O monstrous! O strange! we are haunted. Pray,<br> masters! fly, masters! Help!<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> I'll follow you, I'll lead you about a round,<br> Through bog, through bush, through brake, through brier:<br> Sometime a horse I'll be, sometime a hound,<br> A hog, a headless bear, sometime a fire;<br> And neigh, and bark, and grunt, and roar, and burn,<br> Like horse, hound, hog, bear, fire, at every turn.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Why do they run away? this is a knavery of them to<br> make me afeard.<br> <p><b>SNOUT</b></p> O Bottom, thou art changed! what do I see on thee?<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> What do you see? you see an asshead of your own, do<br> you?<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> Bless thee, Bottom! bless thee! thou art<br> translated.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> I see their knavery: this is to make an ass of me;<br> to fright me, if they could. But I will not stir<br> from this place, do what they can: I will walk up<br> and down here, and I will sing, that they shall hear<br> I am not afraid.<br> Sings The ousel cock so black of hue,<br> With orange-tawny bill,<br> The throstle with his note so true,<br> The wren with little quill,--<br> <p><b>TITANIA</b></p> Awaking What angel wakes me from my flowery bed?<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Sings<br> The finch, the sparrow and the lark,<br> The plain-song cuckoo gray,<br> Whose note full many a man doth mark,<br> And dares not answer nay;--<br> for, indeed, who would set his wit to so foolish<br> a bird? who would give a bird the lie, though he cry<br> 'cuckoo' never so?<br> <p><b>TITANIA</b></p> I pray thee, gentle mortal, sing again:<br> Mine ear is much enamour'd of thy note;<br> So is mine eye enthralled to thy shape;<br> And thy fair virtue's force perforce doth move me<br> On the first view to say, to swear, I love thee.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Methinks, mistress, you should have little reason<br> for that: and yet, to say the truth, reason and<br> love keep little company together now-a-days; the<br> more the pity that some honest neighbours will not<br> make them friends. Nay, I can gleek upon occasion.<br> <p><b>TITANIA</b></p> Thou art as wise as thou art beautiful.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Not so, neither: but if I had wit enough to get out<br> of this wood, I have enough to serve mine own turn.<br> <p><b>TITANIA</b></p> Out of this wood do not desire to go:<br> Thou shalt remain here, whether thou wilt or no.<br> I am a spirit of no common rate;<br> The summer still doth tend upon my state;<br> And I do love thee: therefore, go with me;<br> I'll give thee fairies to attend on thee,<br> And they shall fetch thee jewels from the deep,<br> And sing while thou on pressed flowers dost sleep;<br> And I will purge thy mortal grossness so<br> That thou shalt like an airy spirit go.<br> Peaseblossom! Cobweb! Moth! and Mustardseed!<br> <p><b>PEASEBLOSSOM</b></p> Ready.<br> <p><b>COBWEB</b></p> And I.<br> <p><b>MOTH</b></p> And I.<br> <p><b>MUSTARDSEED</b></p> And I.<br> <p><b>ALL</b></p> Where shall we go?<br> <p><b>TITANIA</b></p> Be kind and courteous to this gentleman;<br> Hop in his walks and gambol in his eyes;<br> Feed him with apricocks and dewberries,<br> With purple grapes, green figs, and mulberries;<br> The honey-bags steal from the humble-bees,<br> And for night-tapers crop their waxen thighs<br> And light them at the fiery glow-worm's eyes,<br> To have my love to bed and to arise;<br> And pluck the wings from Painted butterflies<br> To fan the moonbeams from his sleeping eyes:<br> Nod to him, elves, and do him courtesies.<br> <p><b>PEASEBLOSSOM</b></p> Hail, mortal!<br> <p><b>COBWEB</b></p> Hail!<br> <p><b>MOTH</b></p> Hail!<br> <p><b>MUSTARDSEED</b></p> Hail!<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> I cry your worship's mercy, heartily: I beseech your<br> worship's name.<br> <p><b>COBWEB</b></p> Cobweb.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> I shall desire you of more acquaintance, good Master<br> Cobweb: if I cut my finger, I shall make bold with<br> you. Your name, honest gentleman?<br> <p><b>PEASEBLOSSOM</b></p> Peaseblossom.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> I pray you, commend me to Mistress Squash, your<br> mother, and to Master Peascod, your father. Good<br> Master Peaseblossom, I shall desire you of more<br> acquaintance too. Your name, I beseech you, sir?<br> <p><b>MUSTARDSEED</b></p> Mustardseed.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Good Master Mustardseed, I know your patience well:<br> that same cowardly, giant-like ox-beef hath<br> devoured many a gentleman of your house: I promise<br> you your kindred had made my eyes water ere now. I<br> desire your more acquaintance, good Master<br> Mustardseed.<br> <p><b>TITANIA</b></p> Come, wait upon him; lead him to my bower.<br> The moon methinks looks with a watery eye;<br> And when she weeps, weeps every little flower,<br> Lamenting some enforced chastity.<br> Tie up my love's tongue bring him silently.<br> <h3>SCENE II. Another part of the wood.</h3> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> I wonder if Titania be awaked;<br> Then, what it was that next came in her eye,<br> Which she must dote on in extremity.<br> Enter PUCK Here comes my messenger.<br> How now, mad spirit!<br> What night-rule now about this haunted grove?<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> My mistress with a monster is in love.<br> Near to her close and consecrated bower,<br> While she was in her dull and sleeping hour,<br> A crew of patches, rude mechanicals,<br> That work for bread upon Athenian stalls,<br> Were met together to rehearse a play<br> Intended for great Theseus' nuptial-day.<br> The shallowest thick-skin of that barren sort,<br> Who Pyramus presented, in their sport<br> Forsook his scene and enter'd in a brake<br> When I did him at this advantage take,<br> An ass's nole I fixed on his head:<br> Anon his Thisbe must be answered,<br> And forth my mimic comes. When they him spy,<br> As wild geese that the creeping fowler eye,<br> Or russet-pated choughs, many in sort,<br> Rising and cawing at the gun's report,<br> Sever themselves and madly sweep the sky,<br> So, at his sight, away his fellows fly;<br> And, at our stamp, here o'er and o'er one falls;<br> He murder cries and help from Athens calls.<br> Their sense thus weak, lost with their fears<br> thus strong,<br> Made senseless things begin to do them wrong;<br> For briers and thorns at their apparel snatch;<br> Some sleeves, some hats, from yielders all<br> things catch.<br> I led them on in this distracted fear,<br> And left sweet Pyramus translated there:<br> When in that moment, so it came to pass,<br> Titania waked and straightway loved an ass.<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> This falls out better than I could devise.<br> But hast thou yet latch'd the Athenian's eyes<br> With the love-juice, as I did bid thee do?<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> I took him sleeping,--that is finish'd too,--<br> And the Athenian woman by his side:<br> That, when he waked, of force she must be eyed.<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> Stand close: this is the same Athenian.<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> This is the woman, but not this the man.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> O, why rebuke you him that loves you so?<br> Lay breath so bitter on your bitter foe.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> Now I but chide; but I should use thee worse,<br> For thou, I fear, hast given me cause to curse,<br> If thou hast slain Lysander in his sleep,<br> Being o'er shoes in blood, plunge in the deep,<br> And kill me too.<br> The sun was not so true unto the day<br> As he to me: would he have stolen away<br> From sleeping Hermia? I'll believe as soon<br> This whole earth may be bored and that the moon<br> May through the centre creep and so displease<br> Her brother's noontide with Antipodes.<br> It cannot be but thou hast murder'd him;<br> So should a murderer look, so dead, so grim.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> So should the murder'd look, and so should I,<br> Pierced through the heart with your stern cruelty:<br> Yet you, the murderer, look as bright, as clear,<br> As yonder Venus in her glimmering sphere.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> What's this to my Lysander? where is he?<br> Ah, good Demetrius, wilt thou give him me?<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> I had rather give his carcass to my hounds.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> Out, dog! out, cur! thou drivest me past the bounds<br> Of maiden's patience. Hast thou slain him, then?<br> Henceforth be never number'd among men!<br> O, once tell true, tell true, even for my sake!<br> Durst thou have look'd upon him being awake,<br> And hast thou kill'd him sleeping? O brave touch!<br> Could not a worm, an adder, do so much?<br> An adder did it; for with doubler tongue<br> Than thine, thou serpent, never adder stung.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> You spend your passion on a misprised mood:<br> I am not guilty of Lysander's blood;<br> Nor is he dead, for aught that I can tell.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> I pray thee, tell me then that he is well.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> An if I could, what should I get therefore?<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> A privilege never to see me more.<br> And from thy hated presence part I so:<br> See me no more, whether he be dead or no.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> There is no following her in this fierce vein:<br> Here therefore for a while I will remain.<br> So sorrow's heaviness doth heavier grow<br> For debt that bankrupt sleep doth sorrow owe:<br> Which now in some slight measure it will pay,<br> If for his tender here I make some stay.<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> What hast thou done? thou hast mistaken quite<br> And laid the love-juice on some true-love's sight:<br> Of thy misprision must perforce ensue<br> Some true love turn'd and not a false turn'd true.<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> Then fate o'er-rules, that, one man holding troth,<br> A million fail, confounding oath on oath.<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> About the wood go swifter than the wind,<br> And Helena of Athens look thou find:<br> All fancy-sick she is and pale of cheer,<br> With sighs of love, that costs the fresh blood dear:<br> By some illusion see thou bring her here:<br> I'll charm his eyes against she do appear.<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> I go, I go; look how I go,<br> Swifter than arrow from the Tartar's bow.<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> Flower of this purple dye,<br> Hit with Cupid's archery,<br> Sink in apple of his eye.<br> When his love he doth espy,<br> Let her shine as gloriously<br> As the Venus of the sky.<br> When thou wakest, if she be by,<br> Beg of her for remedy.<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> Captain of our fairy band,<br> Helena is here at hand;<br> And the youth, mistook by me,<br> Pleading for a lover's fee.<br> Shall we their fond pageant see?<br> Lord, what fools these mortals be!<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> Stand aside: the noise they make<br> Will cause Demetrius to awake.<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> Then will two at once woo one;<br> That must needs be sport alone;<br> And those things do best please me<br> That befal preposterously.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Why should you think that I should woo in scorn?<br> Scorn and derision never come in tears:<br> Look, when I vow, I weep; and vows so born,<br> In their nativity all truth appears.<br> How can these things in me seem scorn to you,<br> Bearing the badge of faith, to prove them true?<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> You do advance your cunning more and more.<br> When truth kills truth, O devilish-holy fray!<br> These vows are Hermia's: will you give her o'er?<br> Weigh oath with oath, and you will nothing weigh:<br> Your vows to her and me, put in two scales,<br> Will even weigh, and both as light as tales.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> I had no judgment when to her I swore.<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> Nor none, in my mind, now you give her o'er.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Demetrius loves her, and he loves not you.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> Awaking O Helena, goddess, nymph, perfect, divine!<br> To what, my love, shall I compare thine eyne?<br> Crystal is muddy. O, how ripe in show<br> Thy lips, those kissing cherries, tempting grow!<br> That pure congealed white, high Taurus snow,<br> Fann'd with the eastern wind, turns to a crow<br> When thou hold'st up thy hand: O, let me kiss<br> This princess of pure white, this seal of bliss!<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> O spite! O hell! I see you all are bent<br> To set against me for your merriment:<br> If you we re civil and knew courtesy,<br> You would not do me thus much injury.<br> Can you not hate me, as I know you do,<br> But you must join in souls to mock me too?<br> If you were men, as men you are in show,<br> You would not use a gentle lady so;<br> To vow, and swear, and superpraise my parts,<br> When I am sure you hate me with your hearts.<br> You both are rivals, and love Hermia;<br> And now both rivals, to mock Helena:<br> A trim exploit, a manly enterprise,<br> To conjure tears up in a poor maid's eyes<br> With your derision! none of noble sort<br> Would so offend a virgin, and extort<br> A poor soul's patience, all to make you sport.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> You are unkind, Demetrius; be not so;<br> For you love Hermia; this you know I know:<br> And here, with all good will, with all my heart,<br> In Hermia's love I yield you up my part;<br> And yours of Helena to me bequeath,<br> Whom I do love and will do till my death.<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> Never did mockers waste more idle breath.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> Lysander, keep thy Hermia; I will none:<br> If e'er I loved her, all that love is gone.<br> My heart to her but as guest-wise sojourn'd,<br> And now to Helen is it home return'd,<br> There to remain.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Helen, it is not so.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> Disparage not the faith thou dost not know,<br> Lest, to thy peril, thou aby it dear.<br> Look, where thy love comes; yonder is thy dear.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> Dark night, that from the eye his function takes,<br> The ear more quick of apprehension makes;<br> Wherein it doth impair the seeing sense,<br> It pays the hearing double recompense.<br> Thou art not by mine eye, Lysander, found;<br> Mine ear, I thank it, brought me to thy sound<br> But why unkindly didst thou leave me so?<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Why should he stay, whom love doth press to go?<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> What love could press Lysander from my side?<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Lysander's love, that would not let him bide,<br> Fair Helena, who more engilds the night<br> Than all you fiery oes and eyes of light.<br> Why seek'st thou me? could not this make thee know,<br> The hate I bear thee made me leave thee so?<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> You speak not as you think: it cannot be.<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> Lo, she is one of this confederacy!<br> Now I perceive they have conjoin'd all three<br> To fashion this false sport, in spite of me.<br> Injurious Hermia! most ungrateful maid!<br> Have you conspired, have you with these contrived<br> To bait me with this foul derision?<br> Is all the counsel that we two have shared,<br> The sisters' vows, the hours that we have spent,<br> When we have chid the hasty-footed time<br> For parting us,--O, is it all forgot?<br> All school-days' friendship, childhood innocence?<br> We, Hermia, like two artificial gods,<br> Have with our needles created both one flower,<br> Both on one sampler, sitting on one cushion,<br> Both warbling of one song, both in one key,<br> As if our hands, our sides, voices and minds,<br> Had been incorporate. So we grow together,<br> Like to a double cherry, seeming parted,<br> But yet an union in partition;<br> Two lovely berries moulded on one stem;<br> So, with two seeming bodies, but one heart;<br> Two of the first, like coats in heraldry,<br> Due but to one and crowned with one crest.<br> And will you rent our ancient love asunder,<br> To join with men in scorning your poor friend?<br> It is not friendly, 'tis not maidenly:<br> Our sex, as well as I, may chide you for it,<br> Though I alone do feel the injury.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> I am amazed at your passionate words.<br> I scorn you not: it seems that you scorn me.<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> Have you not set Lysander, as in scorn,<br> To follow me and praise my eyes and face?<br> And made your other love, Demetrius,<br> Who even but now did spurn me with his foot,<br> To call me goddess, nymph, divine and rare,<br> Precious, celestial? Wherefore speaks he this<br> To her he hates? and wherefore doth Lysander<br> Deny your love, so rich within his soul,<br> And tender me, forsooth, affection,<br> But by your setting on, by your consent?<br> What thought I be not so in grace as you,<br> So hung upon with love, so fortunate,<br> But miserable most, to love unloved?<br> This you should pity rather than despise.<br> <p><b>HERNIA</b></p> I understand not what you mean by this.<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> Ay, do, persever, counterfeit sad looks,<br> Make mouths upon me when I turn my back;<br> Wink each at other; hold the sweet jest up:<br> This sport, well carried, shall be chronicled.<br> If you have any pity, grace, or manners,<br> You would not make me such an argument.<br> But fare ye well: 'tis partly my own fault;<br> Which death or absence soon shall remedy.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Stay, gentle Helena; hear my excuse:<br> My love, my life my soul, fair Helena!<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> O excellent!<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> Sweet, do not scorn her so.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> If she cannot entreat, I can compel.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Thou canst compel no more than she entreat:<br> Thy threats have no more strength than her weak prayers.<br> Helen, I love thee; by my life, I do:<br> I swear by that which I will lose for thee,<br> To prove him false that says I love thee not.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> I say I love thee more than he can do.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> If thou say so, withdraw, and prove it too.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> Quick, come!<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> Lysander, whereto tends all this?<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Away, you Ethiope!<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> No, no; he'll<br> Seem to break loose; take on as you would follow,<br> But yet come not: you are a tame man, go!<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Hang off, thou cat, thou burr! vile thing, let loose,<br> Or I will shake thee from me like a serpent!<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> Why are you grown so rude? what change is this?<br> Sweet love,--<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Thy love! out, tawny Tartar, out!<br> Out, loathed medicine! hated potion, hence!<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> Do you not jest?<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> Yes, sooth; and so do you.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Demetrius, I will keep my word with thee.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> I would I had your bond, for I perceive<br> A weak bond holds you: I'll not trust your word.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> What, should I hurt her, strike her, kill her dead?<br> Although I hate her, I'll not harm her so.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> What, can you do me greater harm than hate?<br> Hate me! wherefore? O me! what news, my love!<br> Am not I Hermia? are not you Lysander?<br> I am as fair now as I was erewhile.<br> Since night you loved me; yet since night you left<br> me:<br> Why, then you left me--O, the gods forbid!--<br> In earnest, shall I say?<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Ay, by my life;<br> And never did desire to see thee more.<br> Therefore be out of hope, of question, of doubt;<br> Be certain, nothing truer; 'tis no jest<br> That I do hate thee and love Helena.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> O me! you juggler! you canker-blossom!<br> You thief of love! what, have you come by night<br> And stolen my love's heart from him?<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> Fine, i'faith!<br> Have you no modesty, no maiden shame,<br> No touch of bashfulness? What, will you tear<br> Impatient answers from my gentle tongue?<br> Fie, fie! you counterfeit, you puppet, you!<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> Puppet? why so? ay, that way goes the game.<br> Now I perceive that she hath made compare<br> Between our statures; she hath urged her height;<br> And with her personage, her tall personage,<br> Her height, forsooth, she hath prevail'd with him.<br> And are you grown so high in his esteem;<br> Because I am so dwarfish and so low?<br> How low am I, thou painted maypole? speak;<br> How low am I? I am not yet so low<br> But that my nails can reach unto thine eyes.<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> I pray you, though you mock me, gentlemen,<br> Let her not hurt me: I was never curst;<br> I have no gift at all in shrewishness;<br> I am a right maid for my cowardice:<br> Let her not strike me. You perhaps may think,<br> Because she is something lower than myself,<br> That I can match her.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> Lower! hark, again.<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> Good Hermia, do not be so bitter with me.<br> I evermore did love you, Hermia,<br> Did ever keep your counsels, never wrong'd you;<br> Save that, in love unto Demetrius,<br> I told him of your stealth unto this wood.<br> He follow'd you; for love I follow'd him;<br> But he hath chid me hence and threaten'd me<br> To strike me, spurn me, nay, to kill me too:<br> And now, so you will let me quiet go,<br> To Athens will I bear my folly back<br> And follow you no further: let me go:<br> You see how simple and how fond I am.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> Why, get you gone: who is't that hinders you?<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> A foolish heart, that I leave here behind.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> What, with Lysander?<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> With Demetrius.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Be not afraid; she shall not harm thee, Helena.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> No, sir, she shall not, though you take her part.<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> O, when she's angry, she is keen and shrewd!<br> She was a vixen when she went to school;<br> And though she be but little, she is fierce.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> 'Little' again! nothing but 'low' and 'little'!<br> Why will you suffer her to flout me thus?<br> Let me come to her.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Get you gone, you dwarf;<br> You minimus, of hindering knot-grass made;<br> You bead, you acorn.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> You are too officious<br> In her behalf that scorns your services.<br> Let her alone: speak not of Helena;<br> Take not her part; for, if thou dost intend<br> Never so little show of love to her,<br> Thou shalt aby it.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Now she holds me not;<br> Now follow, if thou darest, to try whose right,<br> Of thine or mine, is most in Helena.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> Follow! nay, I'll go with thee, cheek by jole.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> You, mistress, all this coil is 'long of you:<br> Nay, go not back.<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> I will not trust you, I,<br> Nor longer stay in your curst company.<br> Your hands than mine are quicker for a fray,<br> My legs are longer though, to run away.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> I am amazed, and know not what to say.<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> This is thy negligence: still thou mistakest,<br> Or else committ'st thy knaveries wilfully.<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> Believe me, king of shadows, I mistook.<br> Did not you tell me I should know the man<br> By the Athenian garment be had on?<br> And so far blameless proves my enterprise,<br> That I have 'nointed an Athenian's eyes;<br> And so far am I glad it so did sort<br> As this their jangling I esteem a sport.<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> Thou see'st these lovers seek a place to fight:<br> Hie therefore, Robin, overcast the night;<br> The starry welkin cover thou anon<br> With drooping fog as black as Acheron,<br> And lead these testy rivals so astray<br> As one come not within another's way.<br> Like to Lysander sometime frame thy tongue,<br> Then stir Demetrius up with bitter wrong;<br> And sometime rail thou like Demetrius;<br> And from each other look thou lead them thus,<br> Till o'er their brows death-counterfeiting sleep<br> With leaden legs and batty wings doth creep:<br> Then crush this herb into Lysander's eye;<br> Whose liquor hath this virtuous property,<br> To take from thence all error with his might,<br> And make his eyeballs roll with wonted sight.<br> When they next wake, all this derision<br> Shall seem a dream and fruitless vision,<br> And back to Athens shall the lovers wend,<br> With league whose date till death shall never end.<br> Whiles I in this affair do thee employ,<br> I'll to my queen and beg her Indian boy;<br> And then I will her charmed eye release<br> From monster's view, and all things shall be peace.<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> My fairy lord, this must be done with haste,<br> For night's swift dragons cut the clouds full fast,<br> And yonder shines Aurora's harbinger;<br> At whose approach, ghosts, wandering here and there,<br> Troop home to churchyards: damned spirits all,<br> That in crossways and floods have burial,<br> Already to their wormy beds are gone;<br> For fear lest day should look their shames upon,<br> They willfully themselves exile from light<br> And must for aye consort with black-brow'd night.<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> But we are spirits of another sort:<br> I with the morning's love have oft made sport,<br> And, like a forester, the groves may tread,<br> Even till the eastern gate, all fiery-red,<br> Opening on Neptune with fair blessed beams,<br> Turns into yellow gold his salt green streams.<br> But, notwithstanding, haste; make no delay:<br> We may effect this business yet ere day.<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> Up and down, up and down,<br> I will lead them up and down:<br> I am fear'd in field and town:<br> Goblin, lead them up and down.<br> Here comes one.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Where art thou, proud Demetrius? speak thou now.<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> Here, villain; drawn and ready. Where art thou?<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> I will be with thee straight.<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> Follow me, then,<br> To plainer ground.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> Lysander! speak again:<br> Thou runaway, thou coward, art thou fled?<br> Speak! In some bush? Where dost thou hide thy head?<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> Thou coward, art thou bragging to the stars,<br> Telling the bushes that thou look'st for wars,<br> And wilt not come? Come, recreant; come, thou child;<br> I'll whip thee with a rod: he is defiled<br> That draws a sword on thee.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> Yea, art thou there?<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> Follow my voice: we'll try no manhood here.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> He goes before me and still dares me on:<br> When I come where he calls, then he is gone.<br> The villain is much lighter-heel'd than I:<br> I follow'd fast, but faster he did fly;<br> That fallen am I in dark uneven way,<br> And here will rest me.<br> Lies down Come, thou gentle day!<br> For if but once thou show me thy grey light,<br> I'll find Demetrius and revenge this spite.<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> Ho, ho, ho! Coward, why comest thou not?<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> Abide me, if thou darest; for well I wot<br> Thou runn'st before me, shifting every place,<br> And darest not stand, nor look me in the face.<br> Where art thou now?<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> Come hither: I am here.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> Nay, then, thou mock'st me. Thou shalt buy this dear,<br> If ever I thy face by daylight see:<br> Now, go thy way. Faintness constraineth me<br> To measure out my length on this cold bed.<br> By day's approach look to be visited.<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> O weary night, O long and tedious night,<br> Abate thy hour! Shine comforts from the east,<br> That I may back to Athens by daylight,<br> From these that my poor company detest:<br> And sleep, that sometimes shuts up sorrow's eye,<br> Steal me awhile from mine own company.<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> Yet but three? Come one more;<br> Two of both kinds make up four.<br> Here she comes, curst and sad:<br> Cupid is a knavish lad,<br> Thus to make poor females mad.<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> Never so weary, never so in woe,<br> Bedabbled with the dew and torn with briers,<br> I can no further crawl, no further go;<br> My legs can keep no pace with my desires.<br> Here will I rest me till the break of day.<br> Heavens shield Lysander, if they mean a fray!<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> On the ground<br> Sleep sound:<br> I'll apply<br> To your eye,<br> Gentle lover, remedy.<br> Squeezing the juice on LYSANDER's eyes When thou wakest,<br> Thou takest<br> True delight<br> In the sight<br> Of thy former lady's eye:<br> And the country proverb known,<br> That every man should take his own,<br> In your waking shall be shown:<br> Jack shall have Jill;<br> Nought shall go ill;<br> The man shall have his mare again, and all shall be well.<br> <h3>ACT IV</h3> <h3>SCENE I. The same. LYSANDER, DEMETRIUS, HELENA, and HERMIA lying asleep.</h3> <p><b>TITANIA</b></p> Come, sit thee down upon this flowery bed,<br> While I thy amiable cheeks do coy,<br> And stick musk-roses in thy sleek smooth head,<br> And kiss thy fair large ears, my gentle joy.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Where's Peaseblossom?<br> <p><b>PEASEBLOSSOM</b></p> Ready.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Scratch my head Peaseblossom. Where's Mounsieur Cobweb?<br> <p><b>COBWEB</b></p> Ready.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Mounsieur Cobweb, good mounsieur, get you your<br> weapons in your hand, and kill me a red-hipped<br> humble-bee on the top of a thistle; and, good<br> mounsieur, bring me the honey-bag. Do not fret<br> yourself too much in the action, mounsieur; and,<br> good mounsieur, have a care the honey-bag break not;<br> I would be loath to have you overflown with a<br> honey-bag, signior. Where's Mounsieur Mustardseed?<br> <p><b>MUSTARDSEED</b></p> Ready.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Give me your neaf, Mounsieur Mustardseed. Pray you,<br> leave your courtesy, good mounsieur.<br> <p><b>MUSTARDSEED</b></p> What's your Will?<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Nothing, good mounsieur, but to help Cavalery Cobweb<br> to scratch. I must to the barber's, monsieur; for<br> methinks I am marvellous hairy about the face; and I<br> am such a tender ass, if my hair do but tickle me,<br> I must scratch.<br> <p><b>TITANIA</b></p> What, wilt thou hear some music,<br> my sweet love?<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> I have a reasonable good ear in music. Let's have<br> the tongs and the bones.<br> <p><b>TITANIA</b></p> Or say, sweet love, what thou desirest to eat.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Truly, a peck of provender: I could munch your good<br> dry oats. Methinks I have a great desire to a bottle<br> of hay: good hay, sweet hay, hath no fellow.<br> <p><b>TITANIA</b></p> I have a venturous fairy that shall seek<br> The squirrel's hoard, and fetch thee new nuts.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> I had rather have a handful or two of dried peas.<br> But, I pray you, let none of your people stir me: I<br> have an exposition of sleep come upon me.<br> <p><b>TITANIA</b></p> Sleep thou, and I will wind thee in my arms.<br> Fairies, begone, and be all ways away.<br> Exeunt fairies So doth the woodbine the sweet honeysuckle<br> Gently entwist; the female ivy so<br> Enrings the barky fingers of the elm.<br> O, how I love thee! how I dote on thee!<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> Advancing Welcome, good Robin.<br> See'st thou this sweet sight?<br> Her dotage now I do begin to pity:<br> For, meeting her of late behind the wood,<br> Seeking sweet favours from this hateful fool,<br> I did upbraid her and fall out with her;<br> For she his hairy temples then had rounded<br> With a coronet of fresh and fragrant flowers;<br> And that same dew, which sometime on the buds<br> Was wont to swell like round and orient pearls,<br> Stood now within the pretty flowerets' eyes<br> Like tears that did their own disgrace bewail.<br> When I had at my pleasure taunted her<br> And she in mild terms begg'd my patience,<br> I then did ask of her her changeling child;<br> Which straight she gave me, and her fairy sent<br> To bear him to my bower in fairy land.<br> And now I have the boy, I will undo<br> This hateful imperfection of her eyes:<br> And, gentle Puck, take this transformed scalp<br> From off the head of this Athenian swain;<br> That, he awaking when the other do,<br> May all to Athens back again repair<br> And think no more of this night's accidents<br> But as the fierce vexation of a dream.<br> But first I will release the fairy queen.<br> Be as thou wast wont to be;<br> See as thou wast wont to see:<br> Dian's bud o'er Cupid's flower<br> Hath such force and blessed power.<br> Now, my Titania; wake you, my sweet queen.<br> <p><b>TITANIA</b></p> My Oberon! what visions have I seen!<br> Methought I was enamour'd of an ass.<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> There lies your love.<br> <p><b>TITANIA</b></p> How came these things to pass?<br> O, how mine eyes do loathe his visage now!<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> Silence awhile. Robin, take off this head.<br> Titania, music call; and strike more dead<br> Than common sleep of all these five the sense.<br> <p><b>TITANIA</b></p> Music, ho! music, such as charmeth sleep!<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> Now, when thou wakest, with thine<br> own fool's eyes peep.<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> Sound, music! Come, my queen, take hands with me,<br> And rock the ground whereon these sleepers be.<br> Now thou and I are new in amity,<br> And will to-morrow midnight solemnly<br> Dance in Duke Theseus' house triumphantly,<br> And bless it to all fair prosperity:<br> There shall the pairs of faithful lovers be<br> Wedded, with Theseus, all in jollity.<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> Fairy king, attend, and mark:<br> I do hear the morning lark.<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> Then, my queen, in silence sad,<br> Trip we after the night's shade:<br> We the globe can compass soon,<br> Swifter than the wandering moon.<br> <p><b>TITANIA</b></p> Come, my lord, and in our flight<br> Tell me how it came this night<br> That I sleeping here was found<br> With these mortals on the ground.<br> Exeunt <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> Go, one of you, find out the forester;<br> For now our observation is perform'd;<br> And since we have the vaward of the day,<br> My love shall hear the music of my hounds.<br> Uncouple in the western valley; let them go:<br> Dispatch, I say, and find the forester.<br> Exit an Attendant We will, fair queen, up to the mountain's top,<br> And mark the musical confusion<br> Of hounds and echo in conjunction.<br> <p><b>HIPPOLYTA</b></p> I was with Hercules and Cadmus once,<br> When in a wood of Crete they bay'd the bear<br> With hounds of Sparta: never did I hear<br> Such gallant chiding: for, besides the groves,<br> The skies, the fountains, every region near<br> Seem'd all one mutual cry: I never heard<br> So musical a discord, such sweet thunder.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> My hounds are bred out of the Spartan kind,<br> So flew'd, so sanded, and their heads are hung<br> With ears that sweep away the morning dew;<br> Crook-knee'd, and dew-lapp'd like Thessalian bulls;<br> Slow in pursuit, but match'd in mouth like bells,<br> Each under each. A cry more tuneable<br> Was never holla'd to, nor cheer'd with horn,<br> In Crete, in Sparta, nor in Thessaly:<br> Judge when you hear. But, soft! what nymphs are these?<br> <p><b>EGEUS</b></p> My lord, this is my daughter here asleep;<br> And this, Lysander; this Demetrius is;<br> This Helena, old Nedar's Helena:<br> I wonder of their being here together.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> No doubt they rose up early to observe<br> The rite of May, and hearing our intent,<br> Came here in grace our solemnity.<br> But speak, Egeus; is not this the day<br> That Hermia should give answer of her choice?<br> <p><b>EGEUS</b></p> It is, my lord.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> Go, bid the huntsmen wake them with their horns.<br> Horns and shout within. LYSANDER, DEMETRIUS, HELENA, and HERMIA wake and start up Good morrow, friends. Saint Valentine is past:<br> Begin these wood-birds but to couple now?<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Pardon, my lord.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> I pray you all, stand up.<br> I know you two are rival enemies:<br> How comes this gentle concord in the world,<br> That hatred is so far from jealousy,<br> To sleep by hate, and fear no enmity?<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> My lord, I shall reply amazedly,<br> Half sleep, half waking: but as yet, I swear,<br> I cannot truly say how I came here;<br> But, as I think,--for truly would I speak,<br> And now do I bethink me, so it is,--<br> I came with Hermia hither: our intent<br> Was to be gone from Athens, where we might,<br> Without the peril of the Athenian law.<br> <p><b>EGEUS</b></p> Enough, enough, my lord; you have enough:<br> I beg the law, the law, upon his head.<br> They would have stolen away; they would, Demetrius,<br> Thereby to have defeated you and me,<br> You of your wife and me of my consent,<br> Of my consent that she should be your wife.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> My lord, fair Helen told me of their stealth,<br> Of this their purpose hither to this wood;<br> And I in fury hither follow'd them,<br> Fair Helena in fancy following me.<br> But, my good lord, I wot not by what power,--<br> But by some power it is,--my love to Hermia,<br> Melted as the snow, seems to me now<br> As the remembrance of an idle gaud<br> Which in my childhood I did dote upon;<br> And all the faith, the virtue of my heart,<br> The object and the pleasure of mine eye,<br> Is only Helena. To her, my lord,<br> Was I betroth'd ere I saw Hermia:<br> But, like in sickness, did I loathe this food;<br> But, as in health, come to my natural taste,<br> Now I do wish it, love it, long for it,<br> And will for evermore be true to it.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> Fair lovers, you are fortunately met:<br> Of this discourse we more will hear anon.<br> Egeus, I will overbear your will;<br> For in the temple by and by with us<br> These couples shall eternally be knit:<br> And, for the morning now is something worn,<br> Our purposed hunting shall be set aside.<br> Away with us to Athens; three and three,<br> We'll hold a feast in great solemnity.<br> Come, Hippolyta.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> These things seem small and undistinguishable,<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> Methinks I see these things with parted eye,<br> When every thing seems double.<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> So methinks:<br> And I have found Demetrius like a jewel,<br> Mine own, and not mine own.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> Are you sure<br> That we are awake? It seems to me<br> That yet we sleep, we dream. Do not you think<br> The duke was here, and bid us follow him?<br> <p><b>HERMIA</b></p> Yea; and my father.<br> <p><b>HELENA</b></p> And Hippolyta.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> And he did bid us follow to the temple.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> Why, then, we are awake: let's follow him<br> And by the way let us recount our dreams.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Awaking When my cue comes, call me, and I will<br> answer: my next is, 'Most fair Pyramus.' Heigh-ho!<br> Peter Quince! Flute, the bellows-mender! Snout,<br> the tinker! Starveling! God's my life, stolen<br> hence, and left me asleep! I have had a most rare<br> vision. I have had a dream, past the wit of man to<br> say what dream it was: man is but an ass, if he go<br> about to expound this dream. Methought I was--there<br> is no man can tell what. Methought I was,--and<br> methought I had,--but man is but a patched fool, if<br> he will offer to say what methought I had. The eye<br> of man hath not heard, the ear of man hath not<br> seen, man's hand is not able to taste, his tongue<br> to conceive, nor his heart to report, what my dream<br> was. I will get Peter Quince to write a ballad of<br> this dream: it shall be called Bottom's Dream,<br> because it hath no bottom; and I will sing it in the<br> latter end of a play, before the duke:<br> peradventure, to make it the more gracious, I shall<br> sing it at her death.<br> <h3>SCENE II. Athens. QUINCE'S house.</h3> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> Have you sent to Bottom's house? is he come home yet?<br> <p><b>STARVELING</b></p> He cannot be heard of. Out of doubt he is<br> transported.<br> <p><b>FLUTE</b></p> If he come not, then the play is marred: it goes<br> not forward, doth it?<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> It is not possible: you have not a man in all<br> Athens able to discharge Pyramus but he.<br> <p><b>FLUTE</b></p> No, he hath simply the best wit of any handicraft<br> man in Athens.<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> Yea and the best person too; and he is a very<br> paramour for a sweet voice.<br> <p><b>FLUTE</b></p> You must say 'paragon:' a paramour is, God bless us,<br> a thing of naught.<br> <p><b>SNUG</b></p> Masters, the duke is coming from the temple, and<br> there is two or three lords and ladies more married:<br> if our sport had gone forward, we had all been made<br> men.<br> <p><b>FLUTE</b></p> O sweet bully Bottom! Thus hath he lost sixpence a<br> day during his life; he could not have 'scaped<br> sixpence a day: an the duke had not given him<br> sixpence a day for playing Pyramus, I'll be hanged;<br> he would have deserved it: sixpence a day in<br> Pyramus, or nothing.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Where are these lads? where are these hearts?<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> Bottom! O most courageous day! O most happy hour!<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Masters, I am to discourse wonders: but ask me not<br> what; for if I tell you, I am no true Athenian. I<br> will tell you every thing, right as it fell out.<br> <p><b>QUINCE</b></p> Let us hear, sweet Bottom.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Not a word of me. All that I will tell you is, that<br> the duke hath dined. Get your apparel together,<br> good strings to your beards, new ribbons to your<br> pumps; meet presently at the palace; every man look<br> o'er his part; for the short and the long is, our<br> play is preferred. In any case, let Thisby have<br> clean linen; and let not him that plays the lion<br> pair his nails, for they shall hang out for the<br> lion's claws. And, most dear actors, eat no onions<br> nor garlic, for we are to utter sweet breath; and I<br> do not doubt but to hear them say, it is a sweet<br> comedy. No more words: away! go, away!<br> <h3>ACT V</h3> <h3>SCENE I. Athens. The palace of THESEUS.</h3> <p><b>HIPPOLYTA</b></p> 'Tis strange my Theseus, that these<br> lovers speak of.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> More strange than true: I never may believe<br> These antique fables, nor these fairy toys.<br> Lovers and madmen have such seething brains,<br> Such shaping fantasies, that apprehend<br> More than cool reason ever comprehends.<br> The lunatic, the lover and the poet<br> Are of imagination all compact:<br> One sees more devils than vast hell can hold,<br> That is, the madman: the lover, all as frantic,<br> Sees Helen's beauty in a brow of Egypt:<br> The poet's eye, in fine frenzy rolling,<br> Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven;<br> And as imagination bodies forth<br> The forms of things unknown, the poet's pen<br> Turns them to shapes and gives to airy nothing<br> A local habitation and a name.<br> Such tricks hath strong imagination,<br> That if it would but apprehend some joy,<br> It comprehends some bringer of that joy;<br> Or in the night, imagining some fear,<br> How easy is a bush supposed a bear!<br> <p><b>HIPPOLYTA</b></p> But all the story of the night told over,<br> And all their minds transfigured so together,<br> More witnesseth than fancy's images<br> And grows to something of great constancy;<br> But, howsoever, strange and admirable.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> Here come the lovers, full of joy and mirth.<br> Enter LYSANDER, DEMETRIUS, HERMIA, and HELENA Joy, gentle friends! joy and fresh days of love<br> Accompany your hearts!<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> More than to us<br> Wait in your royal walks, your board, your bed!<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> Come now; what masques, what dances shall we have,<br> To wear away this long age of three hours<br> Between our after-supper and bed-time?<br> Where is our usual manager of mirth?<br> What revels are in hand? Is there no play,<br> To ease the anguish of a torturing hour?<br> Call Philostrate.<br> <p><b>PHILOSTRATE</b></p> Here, mighty Theseus.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> Say, what abridgement have you for this evening?<br> What masque? what music? How shall we beguile<br> The lazy time, if not with some delight?<br> <p><b>PHILOSTRATE</b></p> There is a brief how many sports are ripe:<br> Make choice of which your highness will see first.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> Reads 'The battle with the Centaurs, to be sung<br> By an Athenian eunuch to the harp.'<br> We'll none of that: that have I told my love,<br> In glory of my kinsman Hercules.<br> Reads 'The riot of the tipsy Bacchanals,<br> Tearing the Thracian singer in their rage.'<br> That is an old device; and it was play'd<br> When I from Thebes came last a conqueror.<br> Reads 'The thrice three Muses mourning for the death<br> Of Learning, late deceased in beggary.'<br> That is some satire, keen and critical,<br> Not sorting with a nuptial ceremony.<br> Reads 'A tedious brief scene of young Pyramus<br> And his love Thisbe; very tragical mirth.'<br> Merry and tragical! tedious and brief!<br> That is, hot ice and wondrous strange snow.<br> How shall we find the concord of this discord?<br> <p><b>PHILOSTRATE</b></p> A play there is, my lord, some ten words long,<br> Which is as brief as I have known a play;<br> But by ten words, my lord, it is too long,<br> Which makes it tedious; for in all the play<br> There is not one word apt, one player fitted:<br> And tragical, my noble lord, it is;<br> For Pyramus therein doth kill himself.<br> Which, when I saw rehearsed, I must confess,<br> Made mine eyes water; but more merry tears<br> The passion of loud laughter never shed.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> What are they that do play it?<br> <p><b>PHILOSTRATE</b></p> Hard-handed men that work in Athens here,<br> Which never labour'd in their minds till now,<br> And now have toil'd their unbreathed memories<br> With this same play, against your nuptial.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> And we will hear it.<br> <p><b>PHILOSTRATE</b></p> No, my noble lord;<br> It is not for you: I have heard it over,<br> And it is nothing, nothing in the world;<br> Unless you can find sport in their intents,<br> Extremely stretch'd and conn'd with cruel pain,<br> To do you service.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> I will hear that play;<br> For never anything can be amiss,<br> When simpleness and duty tender it.<br> Go, bring them in: and take your places, ladies.<br> <p><b>HIPPOLYTA</b></p> I love not to see wretchedness o'er charged<br> And duty in his service perishing.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> Why, gentle sweet, you shall see no such thing.<br> <p><b>HIPPOLYTA</b></p> He says they can do nothing in this kind.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> The kinder we, to give them thanks for nothing.<br> Our sport shall be to take what they mistake:<br> And what poor duty cannot do, noble respect<br> Takes it in might, not merit.<br> Where I have come, great clerks have purposed<br> To greet me with premeditated welcomes;<br> Where I have seen them shiver and look pale,<br> Make periods in the midst of sentences,<br> Throttle their practised accent in their fears<br> And in conclusion dumbly have broke off,<br> Not paying me a welcome. Trust me, sweet,<br> Out of this silence yet I pick'd a welcome;<br> And in the modesty of fearful duty<br> I read as much as from the rattling tongue<br> Of saucy and audacious eloquence.<br> Love, therefore, and tongue-tied simplicity<br> In least speak most, to my capacity.<br> <p><b>PHILOSTRATE</b></p> So please your grace, the Prologue is address'd.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> Let him approach.<br> <p><b>Prologue</b></p> If we offend, it is with our good will.<br> That you should think, we come not to offend,<br> But with good will. To show our simple skill,<br> That is the true beginning of our end.<br> Consider then we come but in despite.<br> We do not come as minding to contest you,<br> Our true intent is. All for your delight<br> We are not here. That you should here repent you,<br> The actors are at hand and by their show<br> You shall know all that you are like to know.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> This fellow doth not stand upon points.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> He hath rid his prologue like a rough colt; he knows<br> not the stop. A good moral, my lord: it is not<br> enough to speak, but to speak true.<br> <p><b>HIPPOLYTA</b></p> Indeed he hath played on his prologue like a child<br> on a recorder; a sound, but not in government.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> His speech, was like a tangled chain; nothing<br> impaired, but all disordered. Who is next?<br> <p><b>Prologue</b></p> Gentles, perchance you wonder at this show;<br> But wonder on, till truth make all things plain.<br> This man is Pyramus, if you would know;<br> This beauteous lady Thisby is certain.<br> This man, with lime and rough-cast, doth present<br> Wall, that vile Wall which did these lovers sunder;<br> And through Wall's chink, poor souls, they are content<br> To whisper. At the which let no man wonder.<br> This man, with lanthorn, dog, and bush of thorn,<br> Presenteth Moonshine; for, if you will know,<br> By moonshine did these lovers think no scorn<br> To meet at Ninus' tomb, there, there to woo.<br> This grisly beast, which Lion hight by name,<br> The trusty Thisby, coming first by night,<br> Did scare away, or rather did affright;<br> And, as she fled, her mantle she did fall,<br> Which Lion vile with bloody mouth did stain.<br> Anon comes Pyramus, sweet youth and tall,<br> And finds his trusty Thisby's mantle slain:<br> Whereat, with blade, with bloody blameful blade,<br> He bravely broach'd is boiling bloody breast;<br> And Thisby, tarrying in mulberry shade,<br> His dagger drew, and died. For all the rest,<br> Let Lion, Moonshine, Wall, and lovers twain<br> At large discourse, while here they do remain.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> I wonder if the lion be to speak.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> No wonder, my lord: one lion may, when many asses do.<br> <p><b>Wall</b></p> In this same interlude it doth befall<br> That I, one Snout by name, present a wall;<br> And such a wall, as I would have you think,<br> That had in it a crannied hole or chink,<br> Through which the lovers, Pyramus and Thisby,<br> Did whisper often very secretly.<br> This loam, this rough-cast and this stone doth show<br> That I am that same wall; the truth is so:<br> And this the cranny is, right and sinister,<br> Through which the fearful lovers are to whisper.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> Would you desire lime and hair to speak better?<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> It is the wittiest partition that ever I heard<br> discourse, my lord.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> Pyramus draws near the wall: silence!<br> <p><b>Pyramus</b></p> O grim-look'd night! O night with hue so black!<br> O night, which ever art when day is not!<br> O night, O night! alack, alack, alack,<br> I fear my Thisby's promise is forgot!<br> And thou, O wall, O sweet, O lovely wall,<br> That stand'st between her father's ground and mine!<br> Thou wall, O wall, O sweet and lovely wall,<br> Show me thy chink, to blink through with mine eyne!<br> Wall holds up his fingers Thanks, courteous wall: Jove shield thee well for this!<br> But what see I? No Thisby do I see.<br> O wicked wall, through whom I see no bliss!<br> Cursed be thy stones for thus deceiving me!<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> The wall, methinks, being sensible, should curse again.<br> <p><b>Pyramus</b></p> No, in truth, sir, he should not. 'Deceiving me'<br> is Thisby's cue: she is to enter now, and I am to<br> spy her through the wall. You shall see, it will<br> fall pat as I told you. Yonder she comes.<br> <p><b>Thisbe</b></p> O wall, full often hast thou heard my moans,<br> For parting my fair Pyramus and me!<br> My cherry lips have often kiss'd thy stones,<br> Thy stones with lime and hair knit up in thee.<br> <p><b>Pyramus</b></p> I see a voice: now will I to the chink,<br> To spy an I can hear my Thisby's face. Thisby!<br> <p><b>Thisbe</b></p> My love thou art, my love I think.<br> <p><b>Pyramus</b></p> Think what thou wilt, I am thy lover's grace;<br> And, like Limander, am I trusty still.<br> <p><b>Thisbe</b></p> And I like Helen, till the Fates me kill.<br> <p><b>Pyramus</b></p> Not Shafalus to Procrus was so true.<br> <p><b>Thisbe</b></p> As Shafalus to Procrus, I to you.<br> <p><b>Pyramus</b></p> O kiss me through the hole of this vile wall!<br> <p><b>Thisbe</b></p> I kiss the wall's hole, not your lips at all.<br> <p><b>Pyramus</b></p> Wilt thou at Ninny's tomb meet me straightway?<br> <p><b>Thisbe</b></p> 'Tide life, 'tide death, I come without delay.<br> <p><b>Wall</b></p> Thus have I, Wall, my part discharged so;<br> And, being done, thus Wall away doth go.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> Now is the mural down between the two neighbours.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> No remedy, my lord, when walls are so wilful to hear<br> without warning.<br> <p><b>HIPPOLYTA</b></p> This is the silliest stuff that ever I heard.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> The best in this kind are but shadows; and the worst<br> are no worse, if imagination amend them.<br> <p><b>HIPPOLYTA</b></p> It must be your imagination then, and not theirs.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> If we imagine no worse of them than they of<br> themselves, they may pass for excellent men. Here<br> come two noble beasts in, a man and a lion.<br> <p><b>Lion</b></p> You, ladies, you, whose gentle hearts do fear<br> The smallest monstrous mouse that creeps on floor,<br> May now perchance both quake and tremble here,<br> When lion rough in wildest rage doth roar.<br> Then know that I, one Snug the joiner, am<br> A lion-fell, nor else no lion's dam;<br> For, if I should as lion come in strife<br> Into this place, 'twere pity on my life.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> A very gentle beast, of a good conscience.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> The very best at a beast, my lord, that e'er I saw.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> This lion is a very fox for his valour.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> True; and a goose for his discretion.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> Not so, my lord; for his valour cannot carry his<br> discretion; and the fox carries the goose.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> His discretion, I am sure, cannot carry his valour;<br> for the goose carries not the fox. It is well:<br> leave it to his discretion, and let us listen to the moon.<br> <p><b>Moonshine</b></p> This lanthorn doth the horned moon present;--<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> He should have worn the horns on his head.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> He is no crescent, and his horns are<br> invisible within the circumference.<br> <p><b>Moonshine</b></p> This lanthorn doth the horned moon present;<br> Myself the man i' the moon do seem to be.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> This is the greatest error of all the rest: the man<br> should be put into the lanthorn. How is it else the<br> man i' the moon?<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> He dares not come there for the candle; for, you<br> see, it is already in snuff.<br> <p><b>HIPPOLYTA</b></p> I am aweary of this moon: would he would change!<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> It appears, by his small light of discretion, that<br> he is in the wane; but yet, in courtesy, in all<br> reason, we must stay the time.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Proceed, Moon.<br> <p><b>Moonshine</b></p> All that I have to say, is, to tell you that the<br> lanthorn is the moon; I, the man in the moon; this<br> thorn-bush, my thorn-bush; and this dog, my dog.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> Why, all these should be in the lanthorn; for all<br> these are in the moon. But, silence! here comes Thisbe.<br> <p><b>Thisbe</b></p> This is old Ninny's tomb. Where is my love?<br> <p><b>Lion</b></p> Roaring Oh--<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> Well roared, Lion.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> Well run, Thisbe.<br> <p><b>HIPPOLYTA</b></p> Well shone, Moon. Truly, the moon shines with a<br> good grace.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> Well moused, Lion.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> And so the lion vanished.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> And then came Pyramus.<br> <p><b>Pyramus</b></p> Sweet Moon, I thank thee for thy sunny beams;<br> I thank thee, Moon, for shining now so bright;<br> For, by thy gracious, golden, glittering gleams,<br> I trust to take of truest Thisby sight.<br> But stay, O spite!<br> But mark, poor knight,<br> What dreadful dole is here!<br> Eyes, do you see?<br> How can it be?<br> O dainty duck! O dear!<br> Thy mantle good,<br> What, stain'd with blood!<br> Approach, ye Furies fell!<br> O Fates, come, come,<br> Cut thread and thrum;<br> Quail, crush, conclude, and quell!<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> This passion, and the death of a dear friend, would<br> go near to make a man look sad.<br> <p><b>HIPPOLYTA</b></p> Beshrew my heart, but I pity the man.<br> <p><b>Pyramus</b></p> O wherefore, Nature, didst thou lions frame?<br> Since lion vile hath here deflower'd my dear:<br> Which is--no, no--which was the fairest dame<br> That lived, that loved, that liked, that look'd<br> with cheer.<br> Come, tears, confound;<br> Out, sword, and wound<br> The pap of Pyramus;<br> Ay, that left pap,<br> Where heart doth hop:<br> Stabs himself Thus die I, thus, thus, thus.<br> Now am I dead,<br> Now am I fled;<br> My soul is in the sky:<br> Tongue, lose thy light;<br> Moon take thy flight:<br> Exit Moonshine Now die, die, die, die, die.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> No die, but an ace, for him; for he is but one.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> Less than an ace, man; for he is dead; he is nothing.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> With the help of a surgeon he might yet recover, and<br> prove an ass.<br> <p><b>HIPPOLYTA</b></p> How chance Moonshine is gone before Thisbe comes<br> back and finds her lover?<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> She will find him by starlight. Here she comes; and<br> her passion ends the play.<br> <p><b>HIPPOLYTA</b></p> Methinks she should not use a long one for such a<br> Pyramus: I hope she will be brief.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> A mote will turn the balance, which Pyramus, which<br> Thisbe, is the better; he for a man, God warrant us;<br> she for a woman, God bless us.<br> <p><b>LYSANDER</b></p> She hath spied him already with those sweet eyes.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> And thus she means, videlicet:--<br> <p><b>Thisbe</b></p> Asleep, my love?<br> What, dead, my dove?<br> O Pyramus, arise!<br> Speak, speak. Quite dumb?<br> Dead, dead? A tomb<br> Must cover thy sweet eyes.<br> These My lips,<br> This cherry nose,<br> These yellow cowslip cheeks,<br> Are gone, are gone:<br> Lovers, make moan:<br> His eyes were green as leeks.<br> O Sisters Three,<br> Come, come to me,<br> With hands as pale as milk;<br> Lay them in gore,<br> Since you have shore<br> With shears his thread of silk.<br> Tongue, not a word:<br> Come, trusty sword;<br> Come, blade, my breast imbrue:<br> Stabs herself And, farewell, friends;<br> Thus Thisby ends:<br> Adieu, adieu, adieu.<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> Moonshine and Lion are left to bury the dead.<br> <p><b>DEMETRIUS</b></p> Ay, and Wall too.<br> <p><b>BOTTOM</b></p> Starting up No assure you; the wall is down that<br> parted their fathers. Will it please you to see the<br> epilogue, or to hear a Bergomask dance between two<br> of our company?<br> <p><b>THESEUS</b></p> No epilogue, I pray you; for your play needs no<br> excuse. Never excuse; for when the players are all<br> dead, there needs none to be blamed. Marry, if he<br> that writ it had played Pyramus and hanged himself<br> in Thisbe's garter, it would have been a fine<br> tragedy: and so it is, truly; and very notably<br> discharged. But come, your Bergomask: let your<br> epilogue alone.<br> A dance The iron tongue of midnight hath told twelve:<br> Lovers, to bed; 'tis almost fairy time.<br> I fear we shall out-sleep the coming morn<br> As much as we this night have overwatch'd.<br> This palpable-gross play hath well beguiled<br> The heavy gait of night. Sweet friends, to bed.<br> A fortnight hold we this solemnity,<br> In nightly revels and new jollity.<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> Now the hungry lion roars,<br> And the wolf behowls the moon;<br> Whilst the heavy ploughman snores,<br> All with weary task fordone.<br> Now the wasted brands do glow,<br> Whilst the screech-owl, screeching loud,<br> Puts the wretch that lies in woe<br> In remembrance of a shroud.<br> Now it is the time of night<br> That the graves all gaping wide,<br> Every one lets forth his sprite,<br> In the church-way paths to glide:<br> And we fairies, that do run<br> By the triple Hecate's team,<br> From the presence of the sun,<br> Following darkness like a dream,<br> Now are frolic: not a mouse<br> Shall disturb this hallow'd house:<br> I am sent with broom before,<br> To sweep the dust behind the door.<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> Through the house give gathering light,<br> By the dead and drowsy fire:<br> Every elf and fairy sprite<br> Hop as light as bird from brier;<br> And this ditty, after me,<br> Sing, and dance it trippingly.<br> <p><b>TITANIA</b></p> First, rehearse your song by rote<br> To each word a warbling note:<br> Hand in hand, with fairy grace,<br> Will we sing, and bless this place.<br> <p><b>OBERON</b></p> Now, until the break of day,<br> Through this house each fairy stray.<br> To the best bride-bed will we,<br> Which by us shall blessed be;<br> And the issue there create<br> Ever shall be fortunate.<br> So shall all the couples three<br> Ever true in loving be;<br> And the blots of Nature's hand<br> Shall not in their issue stand;<br> Never mole, hare lip, nor scar,<br> Nor mark prodigious, such as are<br> Despised in nativity,<br> Shall upon their children be.<br> With this field-dew consecrate,<br> Every fairy take his gait;<br> And each several chamber bless,<br> Through this palace, with sweet peace;<br> And the owner of it blest<br> Ever shall in safety rest.<br> Trip away; make no stay;<br> Meet me all by break of day.<br> <p><b>PUCK</b></p> If we shadows have offended,<br> Think but this, and all is mended,<br> That you have but slumber'd here<br> While these visions did appear.<br> And this weak and idle theme,<br> No more yielding but a dream,<br> Gentles, do not reprehend:<br> if you pardon, we will mend:<br> And, as I am an honest Puck,<br> If we have unearned luck<br> Now to 'scape the serpent's tongue,<br> We will make amends ere long;<br> Else the Puck a liar call;<br> So, good night unto you all.<br> Give me your hands, if we be friends,<br> And Robin shall restore amends.<br> </body> </html>