able comedy, and most cruel death of Pyramus | Bot. A very good piece of work, I assure you, Quin. Answer as I call you.-Nick Bottom, the weaver. : Bot. Ready Name what part I am for, proceed. and Quin. You, Nick Bottom are set down for Pyramus. Bot. Well, I will undertake it. What beard were I best to play it in? Quin. Why, what you will. Bot. I will discharge it in either your strawcoloured beard, your orange-tawny beard, your purple-iu-grain beard, or your Frenchcrown-colour beard, your perfect yellow. Quin. Some of your French crowns have no hair at all, and then you will play bare-faced. -But, masters, here are your parts and I am to entreat you, request you, and desire you, to con them by to-morrow night; and meet me in Bot. What is Pyramus? a lover, or a tyrant? the palace wood, a mile without the town, by Quin. A lover, that kills himself most gallant-moon-light; there will we rehearse for if we ly for love. meet in the city, we shall be dog'd with company, and our devices known. In the mean time I will draw a bill of properties, such as our play wants. I pray you, fail me not. Bot. We will meet; and there we may rehearse more obscenely, and courageously. Take pains; be perfect; adieu. Bot. That will ask some tears in the true performing of it: If I do it, let the audience look to their eyes: I will move storms, I will condole in some measure. To the rest :-Yet my chief humour is for a tyrant: I could play Ercles rarely, or a part to tear a cat in, to make all split. "The raging rocks, "Of prison-gates: "And Phibbus' car "Shall shine from far, "And make and mar "The foolish fates." This was lofty!-Now, name the rest of the players.-This is Ercles' vein, a tyrant's vein; a lover is more condoling. Quin. Francis Flute, the bellows-mender. Quin. You must take Thisby on you. Quin. That's all one; you shall play it in a mask, and you may speak as small as you will. Bot. An I may hide my face, let me play Thisby too: I'll speak in a monstrous little Toice ;-Thisne, Thisne,-Ah! Pyramus, my lorer dear; thy Thisby dear! and lady dear! Quin. No, no; you must play Pyramus, and, Flute, you Thisby. Bot. Well, proceed. Quin. You, Pyramus' father; myself, This. by's father;-Snug, the joiner, you, the lion's part :-and, I hope, here is a play fitted. Snug. Have you the lion's part written? pray you, if it be, give it me, for I am slow of study. Quin. You may do it extempore, for it is nothing but roaring. Bot. Let me play the lion too: I will roar, that I will do any man's heart good to hear me; I will roar, that I will make the duke say, Let him roar again, Let him rour again. Quin. An you should do it too terribly, you would fright the duchess and the ladies, that they would shriek: and that were enough to bang us all. Quin. At the duke's oak we meet. ACT II. SCENE 1.-A Wood near Athens. Enter a FAIRY at one door, and Pvc at another. Puck. How now, spirit! whither wander you? Thorough bush, thorough brier, Thorough flood, thorough fire, Swifter than the moones sphere; To dew her orbs upon the green: Take heed, the queen come not within his sight, And now they never meet in grove, or greu, Creep into acorn cups, and hide them there. quite, Or else you are that shrewd and knavish sprite, All. That would hang us every mother's son. Bot. I grant you, friends, if that you should fright the ladies out of their wits, they would have no more discretion but to haug us: but I will aggravate my voice so, that I will roar And sometime make the drink to bear no you as gently as any sucking dove; I will rear you an 'twere any nightingale. barm; ++ [harm? Mislead night-wanderers, laughing at their Quin. You can play no part but Pyramus: Those that Hobgoblin call you, and sweet Puck, for Pyramus is a sweet-faced man; a proper You do their work, and they shall have good 30, as one shall see in a summer's day; a most lovely, gentleman-like man; therefore Are not you he? jou must needs play Pyramus. • As if. luck : • Articles required in performing a play. Quarrel. Puck. Thou speak'st aright; I am that merry wanderer of the night. Is, as in mockery, set: The spring, the summer, And this same progeny of evils comes Obe. Do you amend it then; it lies in you: Tita. Set your heart at rest, And waxen in their mirth, and neeze, and swear SCENE II. Enter OBERON, at one door, with his train, hence; I have forsworn his bed and company. Obe. Tarry, rash wanton: Am not I thy lord? Obe. How canst thou thus, for shame, Tita- Glance at my credit with Hyppolyta, Didst thou not lead him through the glimmer- From Perigenia, whom he ravish'd? And make him with fair Eglé break his faith, Tita. These are the forgeries of jealousy: our Therefore the winds piping to us in vain, corn Hath rotted, ere his youth attain'd a beard: • Wild apple. (Following her womb, then rich with my young Would imitate; and sail upon the land, Tita. Perchance, till after Theseus' wedding- If you will patiently dance in our round, thee. Tita. Not for thy kingdom.-Fairies, away: We shall chide down-right, if I longer stay. [Exeunt TITANIA, and her trein. Obe. Well, go thy way: thou shalt not from this grove, Till I torment thee for this injury. My gentle Puck, come hither: Thou remember's DREAM I'll watch Titania when she is asleep, And ere I take this charm off from her sight, Enter DEMETRIUS, HELENA following him. not. Where is Lysander, and fair Hermia? And here am I, and wood within this wood, Hence, get thee gone, and follow me no more. But yet you draw not iron, for my heart , and make a heaven of bell, To die upon the hand I love so well. [Exeunt DEM. and HEL. Thou shalt fly him, and he shall seek thy love.- Hast thou the flower there? Welcome, wan- Puck. Ay, there it is. Obe. I pray thee, give it me. I know a bank whereon the wild thyme blows, And there the snake throws her enamell'd skin, grove : is true as steel: Leave you your power to A sweet Athenian lady is in love draw, And I shall have no power to follow you. Dem. Do I entice you? Do I speak you fair? more, I am your spaniel; and, Demetrius, The more you beat me, I will fawn on you: me, Neglect me, lose me; only give me leave, What worser place can I beg in your love, With a disdainful youth: anoint his eyes; do so. SCENE III. 'Another part of the Wood. Enter TITANIA, with her train. song; Dem. Tempt not too much the hatred of my Then, for the third part of a minute, hence; spirit; For I am sick, when I do look on thee. Hel. And I am sick, when I look not on you. Dem. You do impeach your modesty too To leave the city, and commit yourself Hel. Your virtue is my privilege for that. brakes, And leave thee to the mercy of wild beasts. Hel. The wildest hath not such a beart as Ron when you will the story shall be chang'd; Dem. I will not stay thy questions; let me go: Or, if thou follow me, do not believe Hel. Ay, in the temple, in the town, the You do me mischief. Fie, Demetrius ! We should be woo'd, and were not made to Woo. • Mad, raving: Philomel, with melody, Sing in our sweet lullaby; Lulla, lulla, lullaby; lulla, lulla, lul laby: Never harm, nor spell nor charm, So, good night, with lullaby. Lys. Fair love, you faint with wandering in And to speak troth, I have forgot our way; Hel. Oh! I am out of breath in this fond The more my prayer, the lesser is my grace tears: If so, my eyes are oftener wash'd than ber's. sake. Her. Be it so, Lysander: find you out a Transparent Helena! Nature here show's art, For I upon this bank will rest my head. Lys. One turf shall serve as pillow for us One heart, one bed, two bosoms, and one troth. Lie further off yet, do not lie so near. Lys. O take the sense, sweet, of my inno pride, and my If Hermia meant to say, Lysander lied. Enter Puck. Puck. Through the forest have I gone, All the power this charm doth owe: + So awake, when I am gone; [Exit. Enter DEMETRIUS and HELENA, running. Where is Demetrius? Oh! how fit a word Hel. Do not say so, Lysander; say not so: The tedious minutes I with her have spent. Who will not change a raven for a dove? born? When, at your hands, did I deserve this scorn? Good troth, you do me wrong, good sooth, you In such disdainful manner me to woo. (Erit. Lys. She sees not Hermia:-Hermia,” sleep thon there; And never may'st thou come Lysander near! To honour Helen, and to be her knight! | Frit. Her. [starting.] Help me, Lysander, help me! do thy best, To pluck this crawling serpent from my breast! Hel. Stay, though thou kill me, sweet Deme-Lysander, look, how I do quake with fear: Pyramus and Thisby, says the story, did talk through the chinks of a wall. Snug. You never can bring in a wall. What say you, Bottom? Bot. Some man or other must present wall: and let him have some plaster, or some lome, or some rough-cast about him, to signify wall; or let him hold his fingers thus, and through SCENE I-The same.-The Queen of Fairies that cranny shall Pyramus and Thisby whisper. lying asleep. Quin. If that may be, then all is well. Come, sit down, every mother's son, and rehearse your Enter QUINCE, SNUG, BOTTOM, FLUTE, SNOUT, parts. Pyramus, you begin: when you have awd 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 tyringbouse; 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 Py. Tamus and Thisby, that will never please. First, Pyramus must draw his sword to kill himself; which the ladies cannot abide. How answer you that ? Snout. By'rlakin, ⚫ a parlous + fear. spoken your speech, enter into that brake and so every one according to his cue. Star. I believe, we must leave the killing out, But, hark, a voice! stay thou but here a when all is done. Bot. Not a whit: I have a device to make all 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. Bot. 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 it. Snout. Therefore, another prologue must tell, he is not a lion. Rot. Nay, you must name his name, and half his face must be seen through the lion's neck; and be 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 your's. 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 bim 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 moon-light into a chamber: for you know, Pyramus and Thisby meet by moon-light. Snug. Doth the moon shine, that night we play our play? Bot. A calendar, a calendar! look in the almanack; find out moon-shine, find out moon. shine. Quin. Yes, it doth shine that night. Bot. Why, then you may 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 bash of thorns and a lanthorn, and say, be comes to disfigure, or to present, the person of moon-shine. Then, there is another thing: we must have a wall in the great chamber; for while. And by and by I will to thee appear. [Exit. Puck. A strauger Pyramus than e'er play'd This. Must I speak now? This. Most radiant Pyramus, most lily white of hue, Of colour like the red rose on triumphant Most brisky juvenal, † and eke most lovely As true as truest horse, that yet would never tire, Pll meet thee, Pyramus, at Ninny's tomb. Quin. Ninus' tomb, man: Why you must not speak that yet; that you answer to Pyramus: you speak all your part at once, cues and all. Pyramus enter; your cue is past; it is, never tire. Re-enter PUCK, and BOTTOM with an ass' head. This. O-As true as truest horse, that yet would never tire. Pyr. If I were fair, Thisby, 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, Sometime a horse I'll be, sometimes a hound, Like horse, hound, hog, bear, fire, at every turn. Bot. Why do they run away? this is a klavery of them, to make me afeard. § Re-enter SNOUT. |