My heart with her but as guest-wise sojourn'd; And now to Helen it is home return'd,

There to remain.

Lys.

Helen, it is not so.

Dem. Disparage not the faith thou dost not
know,

Lest, to thy peril, thou aby it dear.—
Look, where thy love comes; yonder is thy dear.
Enter HERMIA.

Her. Dark night, that from the eye his func-
tion takes,

The ear more quick of apprehension makes;
Wherein it doth impair the seeing sense,
It pays the hearing double recompense:
Thou art not by mine eye, Lysander, found;
Mine ear, I thank it, brought me to thy sound.
But why unkindly didst thou leave me so?

Lys. Why should he stay whom love doth
press to go?

Her. What love could press Lysander from my side?

Lys. Lysander's love, that would not let him
bide;

Fair Helena; who more engilds the night
Than all yon fiery oes and eyes of light.
Why seek'st thou me? could not this make thee
know,

The hate I bare thee made me leave thee so? Her. You speak not as you think; it cannot be.

Hel. Lo, she is one of this confederacy! Now I perceive they have conjoin'd, all three, To fashion this false sport in spite of me. Injurious Hermia! most ungrateful maid! Have you conspir'd, have you with these contriv'd

To bait me with this foul derision?

Is all the counsel that we two have shar'd,
The sisters' vows, the hours that we have spent,
When we have chid the hasty-footed time
For parting us,-O, and is all forgot? 7
All school-days' friendship, childhood inno-

cence ? 7

We, Hermia, like two artificial gods,

Have with our needles' created both one flower,
Both on one sampler, sitting on one cushion,
Both warbling of one song, both in one key;
As if our hands, our sides, voices, and minds,
Had been incorporate. So we grew together,
Like to a double cherry, sceming parted;
But yet a union in partition,

Two lovely berries moulded on one stem:

a Oes-circles.

b Neelds in the old copies.

So, with two seeming bodies, but one heart;
Two of the first, like coats in heraldry,8
Due but to one, and crowned with one crest.
And will you rent our ancient love asunder,
To join with men in scorning your poor friend?
It is not friendly, 't is not maidenly:
Our sex, as well as I, may chide you for it;
Though I alone do feel the injury.

Her. I am amazed at your passionate words: I scorn you not; it seems that you scorn me. Hel. Have you not set Lysander, as in

scorn,

To follow me, and praise my eyes and face?
And made your other love, Demetrius,
(Who even but now did spurn me with his foot,)
To call me goddess, nymph, divine, and rare,
Precious, celestial? Wherefore speaks he this
To her he hates? and wherefore doth Lysander
Deny your love, so rich within his soul,
And tender me, forsooth, affection;
But by your setting on, by your consent?
What though I be not so in grace as you,
So hung upon with love, so fortunate;
But miserable most, to love unlov'd!
This you should pity, rather than despise.
Her. I understand not what you mean by
this?

Hel. Ay, do, persever, counterfeit sad looks, Make mouths upon me when I turn my back; Wink each at other; hold the sweet jest up: This sport, well carried, shall be chronicled.

If
you have any pity, grace, or manners,
You would not make me such an argument.
But, fare ye well: 't is partly mine own fault;
Which death, or absence, soon shall remedy.

Lys. Stay, gentle Helena; hear my excuse;
My love, my life, my soul, fair Helena !
Hel. O excellent!

Her.
Sweet, do not scorn her so.
Dem. If she cannot entreat, I can compel.
Lys. Thou canst compel no more than she
entreat;

Thy threats have no more strength, than her weak prayers."

Helen, I love thee; by my life I do;

I swear by that which I will lose for thee,
To prove him false that says I love thee not.
Dem. I say, I love thee more than he can do.
Lys. If thou say so, withdraw, and prove it
too.

Seem to break loose; take on as you would follow;

But yet come not: You are a tame man, go! Lys. Hang off, thou cat, thou burr: vile thing, let loose;

Or I will shake thee from me, like a serpent. Her. Why are you grown so rude? what change is this,

Sweet love?

Lys. Thy love? out, tawny Tartar, out! Out, loathed medicine! hated poison, hence! Her. Do you not jest? Hel.

Yes, 'sooth; and so do you. Lys. Demetrius, I will keep my word with thee.

Dem. I would I had your bond; for I perceive

A weak bond holds you; I'll not trust your word.

Lys. What, should I hurt her, strike her, kill her dead?

Although I hate her, I'll not harm her so. Her. What, can you do me greater harm than hate?

Hate me! wherefore? O me! what news, my love?

Am not I Hermia? Are not you, Lysander?
I am as fair now as I was erewhile.

Since night you lov'd me; yet, since night you

left me:

Why then you left me,-O, the gods forbid!— In earnest, shall I say?

Lys.

Ay, by my life; And never did desire to see thee more. Therefore, be out of hope, of question, of doubt, Be certain, nothing truer, 't is no jest, That I do hate thee, and love Helena.

Her. O me! you juggler! you canker-blossom!

You thief of love! what, have you come by night,
And stol'n my love's heart from him?
Hel.
Fine, i' faith!
Have you no modesty, no maiden shame,
No touch of bashfulness? What, will you tear
Impatient answers from my gentle tongue ?
Fic, fie! you counterfeit, you puppet, you!
Her. Puppet! why so? Ay, that way goes

the game.

Now I perceive that she hath made compare
Between our statures, she hath urg'd her height;
And with her personage, her tall personage,
Her height, forsooth, she hath prevail'd with
him.

And are you grown so high in his esteem,
Because I am so dwarfish, and so low?

How low am I, thou painted maypole ? speak;
How low am I? I am not yet so low,
But that my nails can reach unto thine eyes.
Hel. I pray you, though you mock me, gen-
tlemen,

Let her not hurt me: I was never curst;"
I have no gift at all in shrewishness;
I am a right maid for my cowardice;
Let her not strike me: You, perhaps, may think,
Because she's something lower than myself,
That I can match her.

Her.

Lower! hark, again.
Hel. Good Hermia, do not be so bitter with me.
I evermore did love you, Hermia,
Did ever keep your counsels, never wrong'd you;
Save that, in love unto Demetrius,

I told him of your stealth unto this wood:
He follow'd you; for love, I follow'd him.
But he hath chid me hence; and threaten'd me
To strike me, spurn me, nay, to kill me too:
And now, so you will let me quiet go,
To Athens will I bear my folly back,
And follow you no further: Let me go :
You see how simple and how fond I am.
Her. Why, get you gone: Who is 't that
hinders you?

Hel. A foolish heart that I leave here behind.
Her. What, with Lysander?

Hel.

With Demetrius. Lys. Be not afraid she shall not harm thee, Helena.

Dem. No, sir; she shall not, though you take her part.

Hel. O, when she's angry, she is keen and shrewd :

She was a vixen, when she went to school;
And, though she be but little, she is fierce.

Her. Little again? nothing but low and little?
Why will you suffer her to flout me thus ?
Let me come to her.
Lys.

Get you gone, you dwarf; You minimus, of hind'ring knot-grass made; You bead, you acorn.

Dem.
You are too officious
In her behalf that scorns your services.
Let her alone; speak not of Helena;
Take not her part: for if thou dost intend
Never so little show of love to her,
Thou shalt aby it

Lys. Now she holds me not; Now follow, if thou dar'st, to try whose right, Or thine or mine, is most in Helena.

Dem. Follow? nay, I'll go with thee, cheek by jole. [Exeunt Lys. and DEM. Her. You, mistress, all this coil is long of Nay, go not back.

Hel.

I will not trust you, 1;

you:

Nor longer stay in your curst company.
Your hands than mine are quicker for a fray;
My legs are longer though, to run away. [Exit.
Her. I am amaz'd, and know not what to say."
[Exit, pursuing HELENA.

Obe. This is thy negligence: still thou mis-
tak'st,

Or else committ'st thy knaveries willingly.b

Puck. Believe, me king of shadows, I mistook. Did not you tell me, I should know the man By the Athenian garments he had on? And so far blameless proves my enterprize, That I have 'nointed an Athenian's eyes: And so far am I glad it so did sort, As this their jangling I esteem a sport.

Obe. Thou seest, these lovers seek a place to

fight:

Hie therefore, Robin, overcast the night;
The starry welkin cover thou anon
With drooping fog, as black as Acheron;
And lead these testy rivals so astray,
As one come not within another's way.

Like to Lysander sometime frame thy tongue,
Then stir Demetrius up with bitter wrong;
And sometime rail thou like Demetrius ;
And from each other look thou lead them thus,
Till o'er their brows death-counterfeiting sleep
With leaden legs and batty wings doth creep:
Then crush this herb into Lysander's eye,
Whose liquor hath this virtuous property,
To take from thence all error, with his might,
And make his eye-balls roll with wonted sight.
When they next wake, all this derision
Shall seem a dream, and fruitless vision;9
And back to Athens shall the lovers wend,
With league, whose date till death shall never end.
Whiles I in this affair do thee employ,
I'll to my queen, and beg her Indian boy;
And then I will her charmed eye release
From monster's view, and all things shall be
peace.

Puck. My fairy lord, this must be done with haste;

For night's swift dragons cut the clouds full fast, 10 And yonder shines Aurora's harbinger;

a This line is not found in the folio of 1623, but is in the previous quartos.

b Willingly, in the folio; wilfully, in the quartos.

At whose approach, ghosts, wandering here and there,

Troop home to church-yards: damned spirits all,
That in cross-ways and floods have burial,
Already to their wormy beds are gone;
For fear lest day should look their shames upon,
They wilfully themselves exile from light,
And must for aye consort with black-brow'd night

Obe. But we are spirits of another sort:

I with the morning's love have oft made sport;11
And, like a forester, the groves may tread,
Even till the eastern gate, all fiery-red,
Opening on Neptune with fair blessed beams,
Turns into yellow gold his salt-green streams.12
But, notwithstanding, haste; make no delay :
We
may effect this business yet ere day.
[Exit OBERON.
Puck. Up and down, up and down;
I will lead them up and down:
I am fear'd in field and town;
Goblin, lead them up and down.

Here comes one.

1 SCENE I.-"A lion among ladies is a most dreadful thing."

THERE was an account published in 1594 of the ceremonies observed at the baptism of Henry, the eldest son of the King of Scotland. A triumphal chariot, according to this account, was drawn in by a "black-moor." The writer adds "This chariot should have been drawn in by a lion, but because his presence might have brought some fear to the nearest, or that the sight of the lighted torches might have commoved his tameness, it was thought meet that the moor should supply that room." It is not improbable that Shakspere meant to ridicule this incident, in-"there is not a more fearful wild-fowl than your lion, living."

2 SCENE I.-"Let him name his name; and tell them plainly he is Snug the joiner."

This passage will suggest to our readers Sir Walter Scott's description of the pageant at Kenilworth, when Lambourne, not knowing his part, tore off his vizard and swore, "Cogs-bones? he was none of Arion or Orion either, but honest Mike Lambourne, that had been drinking her Majesty's health from morning till midnight, and

was come to bid her heartily welcome to Kenilworth Castle." But a circumstance of this nature actually happened upon the Queen's visit to Kenilworth, in 1575; and is recorded in the 'Merry Passages and Jests,' compiled by Sir Nicholas Lestrange, which is published by the Camden Society from the Harleian MS.-"There was a spectacle presented to Queen Elizabeth upon the water, and, amongst others, Harry Goldingham was to represent Arion upon the dolphin's back, but finding his voice to be very hoarse and unpleasant when he came to perform it, he tears off his disguise and swears he was none of Arion not he, but e'en honest Harry Goldingham; which blunt discovery pleased the Queen better than if it had gone through in the right way; yet he could order his voice to an instrument exceeding well." It is by no means improbable that Shakspere was familiar with this local anecdote, and has applied it in the case of Snug the joiner. Bottom, and Quince, and the other "hard-handed men," must also have been exceedingly like the citizens of Coventry, who played their Hock play before the Queen, on the memorable occasion of her visit to their neighbourhood.