The Complete Works of William Shakespeare Part 455

Nurse. Go, girl, seek happy nights to happy days.

Exeunt.

Scene IV.

A street.

Enter Romeo, Mercutio, Benvolio, with five or six other Maskers; Torchbearers.

Rom. What, shall this speech be spoke for our excuse?

Or shall we on without apology?

Ben. The date is out of such prolixity.

We'll have no Cupid hoodwink'd with a scarf, Bearing a Tartar's painted bow of lath, Scaring the ladies like a crowkeeper; Nor no without-book prologue, faintly spoke After the prompter, for our entrance; But, let them measure us by what they will, We'll measure them a measure, and be gone.

Rom. Give me a torch. I am not for this ambling.

Being but heavy, I will bear the light.

Mer. Nay, gentle Romeo, we must have you dance.

Rom. Not I, believe me. You have dancing shoes With nimble soles; I have a soul of lead So stakes me to the ground I cannot move.

Mer. You are a lover. Borrow Cupid's wings And soar with them above a common bound.

Rom. I am too sore enpierced with his shaft To soar with his light feathers; and so bound I cannot bound a pitch above dull woe.

Under love's heavy burthen do I sink.

Mer. And, to sink in it, should you burthen love- Too great oppression for a tender thing.

Rom. Is love a tender thing? It is too rough, Too rude, too boist'rous, and it p.r.i.c.ks like thorn.

Mer. If love be rough with you, be rough with love.

p.r.i.c.k love for p.r.i.c.king, and you beat love down.

Give me a case to put my visage in.

A visor for a visor! What care I What curious eye doth quote deformities?

Here are the beetle brows shall blush for me.

Ben. Come, knock and enter; and no sooner in But every man betake him to his legs.

Rom. A torch for me! Let wantons light of heart Tickle the senseless rushes with their heels; For I am proverb'd with a grandsire phrase, I'll be a candle-holder and look on; The game was ne'er so fair, and I am done.

Mer. Tut! dun's the mouse, the constable's own word!

If thou art Dun, we'll draw thee from the mire Of this sir-reverence love, wherein thou stick'st Up to the ears. Come, we burn daylight, ho!

Rom. Nay, that's not so.

Mer. I mean, sir, in delay We waste our lights in vain, like lamps by day.

Take our good meaning, for our judgment sits Five times in that ere once in our five wits.

Rom. And we mean well, in going to this masque; But 'tis no wit to go.

Mer. Why, may one ask?

Rom. I dreamt a dream to-night.

Mer. And so did I.

Rom. Well, what was yours?

Mer. That dreamers often lie.

Rom. In bed asleep, while they do dream things true.

Mer. O, then I see Queen Mab hath been with you.

She is the fairies' midwife, and she comes In shape no bigger than an agate stone On the forefinger of an alderman, Drawn with a team of little atomies Athwart men's noses as they lie asleep; Her wagon spokes made of long spinners' legs, The cover, of the wings of gra.s.shoppers; Her traces, of the smallest spider's web; Her collars, of the moonshine's wat'ry beams; Her whip, of cricket's bone; the lash, of film; Her wagoner, a small grey-coated gnat, Not half so big as a round little worm p.r.i.c.k'd from the lazy finger of a maid; Her chariot is an empty hazelnut, Made by the joiner squirrel or old grub, Time out o' mind the fairies' coachmakers.

And in this state she 'gallops night by night Through lovers' brains, and then they dream of love; O'er courtiers' knees, that dream on cursies straight; O'er lawyers' fingers, who straight dream on fees; O'er ladies' lips, who straight on kisses dream, Which oft the angry Mab with blisters plagues, Because their breaths with sweetmeats tainted are.

Sometime she gallops o'er a courtier's nose, And then dreams he of smelling out a suit; And sometime comes she with a t.i.the-pig's tail Tickling a parson's nose as 'a lies asleep, Then dreams he of another benefice.

Sometimes she driveth o'er a soldier's neck, And then dreams he of cutting foreign throats, Of breaches, ambuscadoes, Spanish blades, Of healths five fadom deep; and then anon Drums in his ear, at which he starts and wakes, And being thus frighted, swears a prayer or two And sleeps again. This is that very Mab That plats the manes of horses in the night And bakes the elflocks in foul s.l.u.ttish, hairs, Which once untangled much misfortune bodes This is the hag, when maids lie on their backs, That presses them and learns them first to bear, Making them women of good carriage.

This is she- Rom. Peace, peace, Mercutio, peace!

Thou talk'st of nothing.

Mer. True, I talk of dreams; Which are the children of an idle brain, Begot of nothing but vain fantasy; Which is as thin of substance as the air, And more inconstant than the wind, who wooes Even now the frozen bosom of the North And, being anger'd, puffs away from thence, Turning his face to the dew-dropping South.

Ben. This wind you talk of blows us from ourselves.

Supper is done, and we shall come too late.

Rom. I fear, too early; for my mind misgives Some consequence, yet hanging in the stars, Shall bitterly begin his fearful date With this night's revels and expire the term Of a despised life, clos'd in my breast, By some vile forfeit of untimely death.

But he that hath the steerage of my course Direct my sail! On, l.u.s.ty gentlemen!

Ben. Strike, drum.

They march about the stage. [Exeunt.]

Scene V.

Capulet's house.

Servingmen come forth with napkins.

1. Serv. Where's Potpan, that he helps not to take away?

He shift a trencher! he sc.r.a.pe a trencher!

2. Serv. When good manners shall lie all in one or two men's hands, and they unwash'd too, 'tis a foul thing.

1. Serv. Away with the join-stools, remove the court-cubbert, look to the plate. Good thou, save me a piece of marchpane and, as thou loves me, let the porter let in Susan Grindstone and Nell.

Anthony, and Potpan!

2. Serv. Ay, boy, ready.

1. Serv. You are look'd for and call'd for, ask'd for and sought for, in the great chamber.

3. Serv. We cannot be here and there too. Cheerly, boys!

Be brisk awhile, and the longer liver take all. Exeunt.

Enter the Maskers, Enter, [with Servants,] Capulet, his Wife, Juliet, Tybalt, and all the Guests and Gentlewomen to the Maskers.

Cap. Welcome, gentlemen! Ladies that have their toes Unplagu'd with corns will have a bout with you.

Ah ha, my mistresses! which of you all Will now deny to dance? She that makes dainty, She I'll swear hath corns. Am I come near ye now?

Welcome, gentlemen! I have seen the day That I have worn a visor and could tell A whispering tale in a fair lady's ear, Such as would please. 'Tis gone, 'tis gone, 'tis gone!

You are welcome, gentlemen! Come, musicians, play.

A hall, a hall! give room! and foot it, girls.

Music plays, and they dance.

More light, you knaves! and turn the tables up, And quench the fire, the room is grown too hot.

Ah, sirrah, this unlook'd-for sport comes well.

Nay, sit, nay, sit, good cousin Capulet, For you and I are past our dancing days.

How long is't now since last yourself and I Were in a mask?

2. Cap. By'r Lady, thirty years.

Cap. What, man? 'Tis not so much, 'tis not so much!

'Tis since the nuptial of Lucentio, Come Pentecost as quickly as it will, Some five-and-twenty years, and then we mask'd.

2. Cap. 'Tis more, 'tis more! His son is elder, sir; His son is thirty.

Cap. Will you tell me that?

His son was but a ward two years ago.

Rom. [to a Servingman] What lady's that, which doth enrich the hand Of yonder knight?

Serv. I know not, sir.

Rom. O, she doth teach the torches to burn bright!

It seems she hangs upon the cheek of night Like a rich jewel in an Ethiop's ear- Beauty too rich for use, for earth too dear!

So shows a snowy dove trooping with crows As yonder lady o'er her fellows shows.

The measure done, I'll watch her place of stand And, touching hers, make blessed my rude hand.