But, gentle friend, for love and courtesy
Lie further off; in human modesty,
Such separation, as, may well be said,
Becomes a virtuous bachelor and a maid:
So far be distant, and good night, sweet friend;
Thy love ne'er alter, till thy sweet life end!

Lys. Amen, Amen, to that fair prayer say I, And then end life, when I end loyalty! Here is my bed: Sleep give thee all his rest! HER. With half that wish the wisher's eyes be press'd! [They sleep.

Enter PUCK.

PUCK. Through the forest have I gone,
But Athenian found* I none,
On whose eyes I might approve
This flower's force in stirring love.
Night and silence! who is here?
Weeds of Athens he doth wear:
This is he my master said

(*) First folio, find..

Doth owe:] That is, doth own, possess.

O, wilt thou darkling love me?] Darkling is, in the dark. Shakespeare uses this word again in "King Lear," Act 1. Sc. 4:

HEL. O, I am out of breath in this fond chase! The more my prayer, the lesser is my grace. Happy is Hermia, wheresoe'er she lies, For she hath blessed and attractive eyes:

How came her eyes so bright? Not with salt tears;

If so, my eyes are oftener wash'd than hers.
No, no, I am as ugly as a bear,

For beasts that meet me run away for fear;
Therefore, no marvel, though Demetrius
Do, as a monster, fly my presence thus.
What wicked and dissembling glass of mine
Made me compare with Hermia's sphery eyne?
But who is here ?-Lysander! on the ground!
Dead? or asleep? I see no blood, no wound !—
Lysander, if you live, good sir, awake.

Lys. [Waking.] And run through fire I will, for thy sweet sake:

Transparent Helena! Nature shows her art,a That through thy bosom makes me see thy heart.

Where is Demetrius? O, how fit a word

Is that vile name to perish on my sword!
HEL. Do not say so, Lysander; say not so:
What though he love your Hermia? Lord, what
though?

Yet Hermia still loves you; then be content.
Lys. Content with Hermia?

repent

No: I do

The tedious minutes I with her have spent.
Not Hermia, but Helena* I love:
Who will not change a raven for a dove?
The will of man is by his reason sway'd,
And reason says you are the worthier maid.
Things growing are not ripe until their season,
So I, being young, till now ripe not to reason;
And touching now the point of human skill,
Reason becomes the marshal to my will,
And leads me to your eyes; where I o'erlook
Love's stories, written in love's richest book.

HEL. Wherefore was I to this keen mockery born?

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

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

In such disdainful manner me to woo.

But fare you well: perforce I must confess,
I thought you lord of more true gentleness.
O, that a lady, of one man refus'd,
Should of another therefore be abus'd!
Lys. She sees not Hermia:-Hermia, sleep
thou there;

And never mayst thou come Lysander near!
For, as a surfeit of the sweetest things
The deepest loathing to the stomach brings;
Or, as the heresies that men do leave,

Are hated most of those they* did deceive;
So thou, my surfeit, and my heresy,
Of all be hated, but the most, of me!

[Exit.

And all my powers address your love and might, To honour Helen, and to be her knight.

[Exit. HER. [starting.] Help me, Lysander, help me! do thy best,

To pluck this crawling serpent from my breast!
Ah me, for pity!-what a dream was here!
Lysander, look how I do quake with fear!
Methought a serpent ate my heart away,
And you sat smiling at his cruel prey:
Lysander! what, remov'd? Lysander! lord!
What, out of hearing? gone? no sound, no
word?

Alack, where are you? speak, an if you hear;
Speak, of all loves; I swoon almost with fear.
No?-then I well perceive you are not nigh:
Either death, or you, I'll find immediately.

[Exit.

(*) First folio, now I.

a Nature shows her art,-] The quartos have,-" Nature shows art;" the folio, "Nature her shows art."

b Speak, of all loves;] This pretty imploration, with the sense of, for love's sake, is found again in "The Merry Wives of Windsor," Act II. Sc. 2:-"But Mistress Page would desire

(*) First folio, that.

(+) First folio, yet.

you to send her your little page, of all loves." And in "Othello," Act III. Sc. 1:-"But, Masters, here's money for you: and the general so likes your music, that he desires you, of all loves, to make no more noise with it."

Enter QUINCE, SNUG, BOTTOM, FLUTE, SNOUT, and STARVELING."

BOT. Are we all met?

QUIN. Pat, pat; and here's a marvellous convenient place for our rehearsal. This green plot shall be our stage, this hawthorn brake our tyringhouse; and we will do it in action, as we will do it before the duke.

BOT. Peter Quince,

QUIN. What say'st thou, bully Bottom?

BOT. There are things in this comedy of Pyramus and Thisbe that will never please. First, Pyramus must draw a sword to kill himself; which the ladies cannot abide. How answer you that?

SNOUT. By 'rlakin, a parlous fear.b

STAR. I believe we must leave the killing out, when all is done.

Bor. Not a whit; I have a device to make all

a Enter QUINCE, &c.] The old stage direction is simply, "Enter the Clownes."

b By 'rlakin, a parlous fear.] By our lady kin, or little lady. Par'lous, a popular corruption of perilous, occurs again in

well.

Write me a prologue: and let the prologue seem to say, we will do no harm with our swords; and that Pyramus is not killed indeed: and, for the more better assurance, tell them, that I Pyramus am not Pyramus, but Bottom the weaver: this will put them out of fear.

QUIN. Well, we will have such a prologue: and it shall be written in eight and six.

BOT. No, make it two more; let it be written in eight and eight.

SNOUT. Will not the ladies be afeard of the lion?

STAR. I fear it, I promise you.

Bor. Masters, you ought to consider with yourselves to bring in, God shield us! a lion among ladies, is a most dreadful thing; for there is not a more fearful wild-fowl than your lion, living; and we ought to look to 't.

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

"Richard III," Act II. Sc. 4; in "Romeo and Juliet," Act I. Sc. 3; and in "As You Like It," Act III. Sc. 2.

And it shall be written in eight and six.] In fourteen-syllable measure, which was frequently divided into two lines of eighs and six syllables.

Bor. Nay, you must name his name, and half his face must be seen through the lion's neck; and he himself must speak through, saying thus, or to the same defect,-Ladies, or, fair ladies, I would wish you, or, I would request you, or, I would entreat you, not to fear, not to tremble: my life for yours. If you think I come hither as a lion, it were pity of my life: no, I am no such thing; I am a man as other men are: and there, indeed, let him name his name; and tell them* plainly he is Snug the joiner.

QUIN. Well, it shall be so. But there is two hard things; that is, to bring the moonlight into a chamber: for, you know, Pyramus and Thisbe meet by moonlight.

SNUG. Doth the moon shine that night we play our play?

BOT. A calendar, a calendar! look in the almanac; find out moonshine, find out moonshine. QUIN. Yes, it doth shine that night.

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

QUIN. Ay; or else one must come in with a bush of thorns and a lantern, and say, he comes to disfigure, or to present, the person of Moonshine. Then there is another thing: we must have a wall in the great chamber; for Pyramus and Thisbe, says the story, did talk through the chink of a wall.

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

Bor. Some man or other must present wall: and let him have some plaster, or some loam, or some rough-cast, about him, to signify wall; or let him hold his fingers thus, and through that cranny shall Pyramus and Thisbe whisper.

QUIN. If that may be, then all is well. Come, sit down, every mother's son, and rehearse your parts. Pyramus, you begin: when you have spoken your speech, enter into that brake; and so every one according to his cue.

Enter Puck behind.

PUCK. What hempen homespuns have we swaggering here,

So near the cradle of the fairy queen?
What, a play toward? I'll be an auditor;

First folio, him.

a You speak all your part at once, cues and all.-] A cue is the stage technical for the last words of a speech, which serve as an indication to an actor of when he is to enter, and when to speak. To appreciate the importance of cues, it must be borne in mind that when the "parts," or written language of a new play, are distributed, each performer receives only what he has himself to recite; consequently, if this were unaccompanied by cues, or

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

b

PYR. If I were fair, Thisbe I were only thine:

QUIN. O monstrous! O strange! we are haunted. Pray, masters! fly, masters! help!

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

Through bog, through bush, through brake, through brier;

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

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

BOT. Why do they run away? this is a knavery of them to make me afeard.

catchwords, from the other parts, he would be utterly at a loss to know either when to make his entrance on the scene, or to join in the dialogue.

b If I were fair, Thisbe-] "Perhaps," Malone remarks, "we ought to point thus: If I were, [i.e. as true, &c.] fair Thisbe, I were only thine." There cannot be a doubt of it. if we absolutely insist upon making bully Bottom speak sensibly, which Shakespeare has taken some pains to show he vas never designed

to do.

Re-enter SNOUT.

SNOUT. O Bottom, thou art changed! what do I see on thee?

Bor. What do you see? you see an ass-head of your own; do you?

Re-enter QUINCE.

QUIN. Bless thee, Bottom! bless thee! thou art translated. [Exeunt Snout and Quince. Bor. I see their knavery: this is to make an ass of me; to fright me, if they could. But I will not stir from this place, do what they can: I will walk up and down here, and I will sing, that they shall hear I am not afraid. [Sings.

The oosel-cock, so black of hue,"
With orange-tawny bill,
The throstle with his note so true,
The wren with little quill;

*

(*) First folio, and.

a The oosel-cock,-] That is, the blackbird. Florio explains merlo to be "the birde called an owsell, a mearle, or a blacke-birde;" and Minshew has, "blackbird, or blacke-ousell."

b Nay, I can gleek upon occasion ] The ordinary sense of gleek is, to jest, or joke, and it is with this meaning the word is

TITA. [Waking.] What angel wakes me from
my flowery bed?

Bor. The finch, the sparrow, and the lark,
The plain-song cuckoo gray,

Whose note full many a man doth mark, And dares not answer, nayfor, indeed, who would set his wit to so foolish a Gird? who would give a bird the lie, though he cry cuckoo never so?

TITA. I pray thee, gentle mortal, sing again: Mine ear is much enamour'd of thy note, So is mine eye enthralled to thy shape; And thy fair virtue's force perforce doth move me, On the first view, to say, to swear, I love thee.

BOT. Methinks, mistress, you should have little reason for that: and yet, to say the truth, reason and love keep little company together now-a-days. The more the pity, that some honest neighbours will not make them friends. Nay, I can gleek upon occasion.b

used here. The all-accomplished Bottom is boasting of his versatility. He has shown, by his last profound observation on the disunion of love and reason, that he possesses a pretty turn for the didactic and sententious; but he wishes Titania to understand that, upon fitting occasion, he can be as waggish as he has just been grave.