My master knows not but I am gone hence;
And fearfully did menace me with death,
If I did stay to look on his intents.
Fri. L. Stay, then; I'll go alone: fear comes upon me; O, much I fear some ill unlucky thing.
Bal. As I did sleep under this yew-tree here,
I dreamt my master and another fought, And that my master slew him.
Alack, alack, what blood is this, which stains The stony entrance of this sepulchre ? What mean these masterless and gory swords To lie discolour'd by this place of peace?
[Enters the tomb. Romeo! O, pale! Who else? what, Paris too? And steep'd in blood? Ah, what an unkind hour Is guilty of this lamentable chance! The lady stirs.
Jul. O comfortable friar! where is my lord?
I do remember well where I should be,
And there I am: where is my Romeo? [Noise within. Fri. L. I hear some noise. Lady, come from that nest Of death, contagion and unnatural sleep:
A greater power than we can contradict
Hath thwarted our intents: come, come away : Thy husband in thy bosom there lies dead And Paris too: come, I'll dispose of thee Among a sisterhood of holy nuns :
Stay not to question, for the watch is coming; Come, go, good Juliet; I dare no longer stay.
Jul. Go, get thee hence, for I will not away.
What's here? a cup, closed in my true love's hand? Poison, I see, hath been his timeless end: O churl! drunk all, and left no friendly drop To help me after? I will kiss thy lips; Haply some poison yet doth hang on them, To make me die with a restorative. Thy lips are warm.
First Watch. [Within] Lead, boy: which way ? Jul. Yea, noise? then I'll be brief. O happy dagger!
[Snatching Romeo's dagger. This is thy sheath [Stabs herself]; there rust, and let [Falls on Romeo's body, and dies.
Enter Watch, with the Page of Paris.
Page. This is the place; there, where the torch doth
First Watch. The ground is bloody; search about the
Go, some of you, whoe'er you find attach. Pitiful sight! here lies the county slain; And Juliet bleeding, warm, and newly dead, Who here hath lain this two days buried. Go, tell the prince: run to the Capulets: Raise up the Montagues: some others search: We see the ground whereon these woes do lie; But the true ground of all these piteous woes We cannot without circumstance descry.
Re-enter some of the Watch, with Balthasar.
Sec. Watch. Here's Romeo's man; we found him in the
First Watch. Hold him in safety, till the prince come hither.
Re-enter Friar Laurence, and another Watchman.
Third Watch. Here is a friar, that trembles, sighs and weeps: We took this mattock and this spade from him, As he was coming from this churchyard's side. First Watch A great suspicion: stay the friar too.
Enter the Prince and Attendants.
Prince. What misadventure is so early up, That calls our person from our morning rest?
Enter Capulet, Lady Capulet, and others. Cap. What should it be that they so shriek abroad? La. Cap. The people in the street cry Romeo,
Some Juliet, and some Paris, and all run
With open outcry toward our monument.
Prince. What fear is this which startles in our ears? First Watch. Sovereign, here lies the County Paris slain; And Romeo dead: and Juliet, dead before,
Prince. Search, seek, and know how this foul murder comes. First Watch. Here is a friar, and slaughter'd Romeo's man, With instruments upon them fit to open
Cap. O heavens! O wife, look how our daughter bleeds! This dagger hath mista'en, for, lo, his house Is empty on the back of Montague,
And it mis-sheathed in my daughter's bosom ! La. Cap. O me! this sight of death is as a bell That warns my old age to a sepulchre.
Enter Montague and others.
Prince Come, Montague; for thou art early up, To see thy son and heir more early down.
Mon. Alas, my liege, my wife is dead to-night;
Grief of my son's exile hath stopp'd her breath: What further woe conspires against mine age? Prince. Look, and thou shalt see.
Mon. O thou untaught! what manners is in this, To press before thy father to a grave?
Prince. Seal up the mouth of outrage for a while, Till we can clear these ambiguities,
And know their spring, their head, their true descent; And then will I be general of your woes,
And lead you even to death: meantime forbear, And let mischance be slave to patience. Bring forth the parties of suspicion.
Fri. L. I am the greatest, able to do least, Yet most suspected, as the time and place Doth make against me, of this direful murder; And here I stand, both to impeach and purge Myself condemned and myself excused. Prince. Then say at once what thou dost know in this. Fri. L. I will be brief, for my short date of breath Is not so long as is a tedious tale.
Romeo, there dead, was husband to that Juliet ; And she, there dead, that Romeo's faithful wife: I married them; and their stol'n marriage-day Was Tybalt's dooms-day, whose untimely death Banish'd the new-made bridegroom from this city; For whom, and not for Tybalt, Juliet pined. You, to remove that siege of grief from her, Betroth'd and would have married her perforce To County Paris: then comes she to me, And with wild looks bid me devise some means To rid her from this second marriage,
Or in my cell there would she kill herself. Then gave I her, so tutor'd by my art, A sleeping potion; which so took effect As I intended, for it wrought on her
The form of death: meantime I writ to Romeo, That he should hither come as this dire night, To help to take her from her borrow'd grave, Being the time the potion's force should cease. But he which bore my letter, Friar John, Was stay'd by accident, and yesternight Return'd my letter back. Then all alone At the prefixed hour of her waking
Came I to take her from her kindred's vault, Meaning to keep her closely at my cell Till I conveniently could send to Romeo: But when I came, some minute ere the time Of her awaking, here untimely lay
The noble Paris and true Romeo dead.
She wakes, and I entreated her come forth, And bear this work of heaven with patience: But then a noise did scare me from the tomb, And she too desperate would not go with me, But, as it seems, did violence on herself. All this I know; and to the marriage Her nurse is privy: and, if aught in this Miscarried by my fault, let my old life Be sacrificed some hour before his time Unto the rigour of severest law.
Prince. We still have known thee for a holy man.
Where's Romeo's man? what can he say in this ?
Bal. I brought my master news of Juliet's death, And then in post he came from Mantua
« PreviousContinue » |