More torches here!-Come on, then let's to bed. Ah, sirrah [To 2 Cap.], by my fay, it waxes late; I'll to my rest. [Exeunt all but JULIET and Nurse. Jul. Come hither, nurse: What is yon gentleman? Nurse. The son and heir of old Tiberio. Jul. What's he, that now is going out of door? Nurse. Marry, that, I think, be young Petruchio. Jul. What's he, that follows there, that would not dance? Nurse. I know not. Jul. Go, ask his name:—if he be married, My grave is like to be my wedding bed. Nurse. His name is Romeo, and a Montague; The only son of your great enemy. Jul. My only love sprung from my only hate! Too early seen unknown, and known too late! Prodigious birth of love it is to me, That I must love a loathed enemy. Jul. one I danc'd withal. Of Nurse. A rhyme I learn'd even now [One calls within, Juliet. Anon, anon:— Come, let's away; the strangers all are gone. Enter CHORUS 17. [Exeunt. Now old desire doth in his deathbed lie, And young affection gapes to be his heir; That fair 18, which love groan'd for, and would die, With tender Juliet match'd is now not fair. 17 This chorus is not in the first edition, quarto, 1597. Its use is not easily discovered; it conduces nothing to the progress of the play; but relates what is already known, or what the next scene will show; and relates it without adding the improvement of any moral sentiment.'-Johnson. 18 Fair, it has been already observed, was formerly used as a VOL. X. F Now Romeo is belov'd, and loves again, Alike bewitched by the charm of looks; But to his foe suppos'd he must complain, And she steal love's sweet bait from fearful hooks: Being held a foe, he may not have access To breathe such vows as lovers use to swear; And she as much in love, her means much less To meet her new-beloved any where: But passion lends them power, time means to meet, Temp'ring extremities with extreme sweet. [Exit. АСТ II. SCENE I. An open Place, adjoining Capulet's Garden. Enter ROMEO. Rom. Can I go forward, when my heart is here? Turn back, dull earth, and find thy centre out. [He climbs the Wall, and leaps down within it. Enter BENVOLIO, and MERCUTIO. Mer. He is wise; And, on my life, hath stolen him home to bed. Ben. He ran this way, and leap'd this orchard1 wall: Call, good Mercutio. substantive, and was synonymous with beauty. See vol. i. p. 228. The old copies read - That fair for which love groan'd for,' &c. This reading Malone defends. Steevens treats it as a corruption; and says, that fair, in the present instance, is used as a dissyllable. See vol. iii. p. 148, note 20. 1 See note on Julius Cæsar, vol. viii. p. 295. Mer. Nay, I'll conjure too.— Romeo! humours! madman! passion! lover! Appear thou in the likeness of a sigh, Speak but one rhyme, and I am satisfied; 4 Ben. An if he hear thee, thou wilt anger him. Mer. This cannot anger him: 'twould anger him To raise a spirit in his mistress' circle 2 This is the reading of the quarto of 1597. Those of 1599 and 1609 and the folio read provaunt, an evident corruption. The folio of 1632 has couply, meaning couple, which has been the reading of many modern editions. Steevens endeavours to persuade himself and his readers that provant may be right, and mean provide, furnish. 3 All the old copies read, Abraham Cupid. The alteration was proposed by Mr. Upton. It evidently alludes to the famous archer Adam Bell. So in Decker's Satiromastix :-' He shoots his bolt but seldom; but when Adam lets go, he hits.'' He shoots at thee too, Adam Bell; and his arrows stick here.' The ballad alluded to is King Cophetua and the Beggar-Maid, or, as it is called in some copies, 'The Song of a Beggar and a King.' It may be seen in the first volume of Percy's Reliques of Ancient Poetry. The following stanza Shakspeare had particularly in view : The blinded boy that shoots so trim, From heaven down did hie; He drew a dart and shot at him, In place where he did lie.' This phrase in Shakspeare's time was used as an expression of tenderness, like poor fool, &c. Of some strange nature, letting it there stand Is fair and honest, and, in his mistress' name, Ben. Come, he hath hid himself among those trees, To be consorted with the humorous 5 night: Blind is his love, and best befits the dark. Mer. If love be blind, love cannot hit the mark. Now will he sit under a medlar tree, And wish his mistress were that kind of fruit, Come, shall we go? Ben. Go, then; for 'tis in vain To seek him here, that means not to be found. SCENE II. Capulet's Garden. Enter ROMEO. [Exeunt. Rom. He jests at scars, that never felt a wound.[JULIET appears above, at a Window. But, soft! what light through yonder window breaks! 5 i. e. the humid, the moist dewy night. Chapman uses the word in this sense in his translation of Homer, b. ii. edit. 1598: 'The other gods and knights at arms slept all the humorous night.' And Drayton, in the thirteenth Song of his Polyolbion which late the humorous night Bespangled had with pearl.' And in The Baron's Wars, canto i.:- The humorous fogs deprive us of his light.' Shakspeare uses the epithet, vaporous night,' in Measure for Measure. 6 After this line in the old copies are two lines of ribaldry, which have justly been degraded to the margin : 'O Romeo, that she were, ah that she were It is the east, and Juliet is the sun!- And none but fools do wear it; cast it off.- O, that she knew she were! Her eye She speaks, yet she says nothing; What of that? Jul. Rom. Ah me! She speaks: O, speak again, bright angel! for thou art ri.e. be not a votary to the moon, to Diana. 2 The old copies read, to this night.' Theobald made the emendation, which appears to be warranted by the context. |