A whining mammet,1 in her fortune's tender,
To answer I'll not wed, I cannot love,
I am too young, I pray you, pardon me;
But, an you will not wed, I'll pardon you:
Graze where you will, you shall not house with me;
Look to't, think on't, I do not use to jest.
Thursday is near; lay hand on heart, advise:
An you be mine, I'll give you to my friend;
An you be not, hang, beg, starve, die i' the streets,
For, by my soul, I'll n'er acknowledge thee,
Nor what is mine shall never do thee good:
Trust to't, bethink you, I'll not be forsworn.
JUL. Is there no pity sitting in the clouds,
That sees into the bottom of my grief?
O, sweet my mother, cast me not away!
Delay this marriage, for a month, a week:
Or, if you do not, make the bridal bed
In that dim monument where Tybalt lies.

[Exil.

LA. CAP. Talk not to me, for I'll not speak a word: Do as thou wilt, for I have done with thee.

Exit.

JUL. O heaven! O nurse! how shall this be prevented?

My husband is on earth, my faith in heaven;

How shall that faith return again to earth,
Unless that husband send it me from heaven

By leaving earth? Comfort me, counsel me. -
Alack, alack, that heaven should practise stratagems
Upon so soft a subject as myself!—

What say's thou? hast thou not a word of joy?
Some comfort, nurse.

NURSE.

Faith, here 'tis: Romeo

Is banish'd; and all the world to nothing,3
That he dares ne'er come back to challenge1 you;
Or, if he do, it needs must be by stealth.
Then, since the case so stands as now it doth,
I think it best you married with the county.
O, he's a lovely gentleman!

Romeo is naught to him; an eagle, madam,
Hath not so green, 5
so quick, so fair an eye,
As Paris hath. Beshrew my very heart,

1) A puppet.

6

2) To graze, to eat. To house, to

reside, to live.

3) That is, I wager.

4) To claim as due.
5) Fresh, flourishing.
6) To wish a curse to.

I think you are happy in this second match,
For it excels your first: or if it did not,
Your first is dead; or 'twere as good he were,
As living here1 and you no use of him.
JUL. Speakest thou from thy heart?
NURSE.

Or else beshrew them both.

JUL.

NURSE.

From my soul too,

Amen!

To what?

JUL. Well, thou hast comforted me marvellous much. Go in; and tell my lady I am gone,

Having displeas'd my father, to Laurence' cell,
To make confession, and to be absolv'd.

NURSE. Marry, I will; and this is wisely done.
JUL. Is it more sin to wish me thus forsworn,
Or to dispraise my lord with that same tongue
Which she hath prais'd him with above compare
So many thousand times? Go, counsellor;
Thou and my bosom henceforth shall be twain.2
I'll to the friar, to know his remedy?

If all else fail, myself have power to die.

[Exit.

[Exit.

Enter FRIAR LAURENCE and PARIS.

FRI. On Thursday, sir? the time is very short.
PAR. My father Capulet will have it so;

And I am nothing slow, to slack his haste. 3

FRI. You say you do not know the lady's mind;

Uneven is the course, I like it not.

1) Here may signify, in this world. | very clear; he does not wish to

restrain Capulet, or to delay his own marriage; but the words which the poet has given him, import the reverse of this and seem rather to mean, I am not backward in restraining his haste; I endeavour to retard him as much as I can. Every one sees the impropriety of this expression, but Shakspeare must answer for his own peculiarities,

PAR. Immoderately she weeps for Tybalt's death,
And therefore have I little talk'd of love,
For Venus smiles not in a house of tears.
Now, sir, her father counts it dangerous,
That she doth give her sorrow so much sway; 1
And, in his wisdom, hastes our marriage,
To stop the inundation of her tears;
Which, too much minded by herself alone,
May be put from her by society:

Now do you know the reason of this haste.

FRI. I would I knew not why it should be slow'd. [Aside. Look, sir, here comes the lady towards my cell.

Enter JULIET.

PAR. Happily met, my lady, and my wife!
JUL. That may be, sir, when I may be a wife.

PAR. That may be, must be, love, on Thursday next.
JUL. What must be shall be.

FRI. That's a certain text. PAR. Come you to make confession to this father? JUL. To answer that, were to confess to you. PAR. Do not deny to him, that you love me. JUL. I will confess to you, that I love him. PAR. So will you, I am sure, that you love me. JUL. If I do so, it will be of more price, Being spoke behind your back, than to your face. PAR. Poor soul, thy face is much abus'd with tears. JUL. The tears have got small victory by that;

For it was bad enough, before their spite.

2

PAR. Thou wrong'st it, more than tears, with that report. JUL. That is no slander, sir, that is a truth;

And what I spake, I spake it to my face.

PAR. Thy face is mine, and thou hast slander'd it.
JUL. It may be so, for it is not mine own.

Are you at leisure, holy father, now;
Or shall I come to you at evening mass?3

FRI. My leisure serves me, pensive daughter, now: My lord, we must entreat the time alone. 4

1) Preponderation, influence, force; sway meaning properly, the swing or sweep of a weapon.

2) That is, before they vexed or injured the face.

3) Juliet means vespers, as there is no such thing as evening mass.

4) We must beseech you to leave us alone.

PAR. Now heaven forbid, I should disturb devotion!
Juliet, on Thursday early will I rouse you:
Till then, adieu! and keep this holy kiss.

[Exit PARIS.

JUL. O, shut the door! and when thou hast done so, Come weep with me; Past hope, past cure, past help! FRI. Áh, Juliet, I already know thy grief;

It strains me past the compass of my wits:1
I hear thou must, and nothing must prorogue it,
On Thursday next be married to this county.

JUL. Tell me not, friar, that thou hear'st of this,
Unless thou tell me how I may prevent it:
If, in thy wisdom, thou canst give no help,
Do thou but call my resolution wise,
And with this knife I'll help it presently.

God join'd my heart and Romeo's, thou our hands,
And ere this hand, by thee to Romeo seal'd,
Shall be the label to another deed, 2

Or my true heart with treacherous revolt
Turn to another, this shall slay them both:
Therefore, out of thy long-experienc'd time,
Give me some present counsel; or, behold,
'Twixt my extremes and me this bloody knife
Shall play the umpire; 3 arbitrating that
Which the commission of thy years and art
Could to no issue of true honour bring.
Be not so long to speak; I long to die,
If what thou speak'st speak not of remedy.

FRI. Hold, daughter; I do spy a kind of hope,
Which craves as desperate an execution

As that is desperate which we would prevent.
If, rather than to marry county Paris,
Thou hast the strength of will to slay thyself,
Then is it likely, thou wilt undertake

A thing like death to chide away this shame,

1) Beyond the boundary or limit 3) This knife shall decide the of my intellect; beyond the reach of my comprehension.

2) The seals of deeds in our author's time were not impressed on the parchment itself on which the deed was written, but were appended on distinct slips or labels affixed to the deed. Malone.

struggle between me and my distress. Umpire, in law, signifies a third person called in to decide a controversy or question submitted to arbitrators, when the arbitrators are not unanimous.

4) Authority or power.

That cop'st with death himself to scape from it;
And, if thou dar'st, I'll give thee remedy.

JUL. O, bid me leap, rather than marry Paris,
From off the battlements of yonder tower;
Or walk in thievish ways; or bid me lurk
Where serpents are; chain me with roaring bears;
Or shut me nightly in a charnel - house, 2
O'er-cover'd quite with dead men's rattling bones,
With reeky shanks, and yellow chapless skulls; 3
Or bid me go into a new-made grave,

And hide me with a dead man in his shroud; 4
Things that, to hear them told, have made me tremble;
And I will do it without fear or doubt,

To live an ustain'd wife to my sweet love.

FRI. Hold, then; go home, be merry, give consent
To marry Paris: Wednesday is to-morrow;
To-morrow night look that thou lie alone,
Let not thy nurse lie with thee in thy chamber:
Take thou this phial, being then in bed,
And this distilled liquor drink thou off:
When, presently, through all thy veins shall run
A cold and drowsy humour, which shall seize
Each vital spirit; for no pulse shall keep
His natural progress, but surcease to beat:
No warmth, no breath, shall testify thou liv'st;
The roses in thy lips and cheeks shall fade
To paly ashes; thy eyes' windows fall,
Like death, when he shuts up the day of life;
Each part, depriv'd of supples government,
Shall stiff, and stark, and cold, appear like death:

6) This word is precisely synonymous with cease, to stop or leave off, and it is nearly obsolete.

7) We have had already in a former scene-"Pale, pale as ashes."

8) Supple, flexible, easily bent, the French souple; as, supple joints, supple fingers.

9) Stark, stubborn, stiff; but no modern author would use this word, unless it were in imitation of ancient language. It was also used adverbially; as, stark mad, stark blind,