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I do remember well where I should be,
And there I am :-Where is my Romeo?

[Noise within.

Fri. I hear some noise.-Lady, come from that

nest

Of death, contagion, and unnatural sleep;

A greater Power than we can contradict

Hath thwarted our intents; come, come away:
Thy husband in thy bosom there lies dead;

And Paris too; come, I'll dispose of thee
Among a sisterhood of holy nuns :

Stay not to question, for the watch is coming;
Come, go, good Juliet,-[Noise again.] I dare stay

no longer.

:

[Exit.

Jul. Go, get thee hence, for I will not away.What's here? a cup, clos'd in my true love's hand? Poison, I see, hath been his timeless end :O churl! drink all; and leave no friendly drop, To help me after?—I will kiss thy lips; Haply, some poison yet doth hang on them, To make me die with a restorative.

Thy lips are warm!

[Kisses him.

1 Watch. [Within.] Lead, boy:-Which way? Jul. Yea, noise?-then I'll be brief.-O happy dagger! [Snatching ROMEO's Dagger. This is thy sheath; [Stabs herself.] there rust, and let me die.

[Falls on ROMEO's Body, and dies.

Enter Watch, with the Page of PARIS.

Page. This is the place; there, where the torch doth burn.

1 Watch. The ground is bloody; Search about the

churchyard:

Go, some of you, who e'er you find, attach.

[Exeunt some.

Pitiful sight! here lies the county slain ;-
And Juliet bleeding; warm, and newly dead,
Who here hath lain these two days buried.-
Go, tell the prince,-run to the Capulets,-
Raise up the Montagues,-some others search;-

[Exeunt other Watchmen.

We see the ground whereon these woes do lie;
But the true ground of all these piteous woes,
We cannot without circumstance descry.

Enter some of the Watch, with BALTHASAR.

2 Watch. Here's Romeo's man, we found him in the churchyard.

1 Watch. Hold him in safety, till the prince come hither.

Enter another Watchman, with Friar LAURENCE.

3 Watch. Here is a friar, that trembles, sighs, and weeps:

We took this mattock and this spade from him,
As he was coming from this churchyard side.

1 Watch. A great suspicion; Stay the friar too.

Enter the Prince and Attendants.

Prince. What misadventure is so early up, That calls our person from our morning's rest? Enter CAPULET, Lady CAPULET, and Others. Cap. What should it be, that they so shriek abroad?

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La. Cap. The people in the street cry-Romeo, Some-Juliet, and some-Paris; and all run, With open outcry toward our monument.

Prince. What fear is this, which startles in our ears? 1 Watch. Sovereign, here lies the county Paris slain;

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And Romeo dead; and Juliet, dead before,

Warm and new kill'd.

Prince. Search, seek, and know how this foul murder comes.

1 Watch. Here is a friar, and slaughter'd Romeo's

man;

With instruments upon them, fit to open

These dead men's tombs.

Cap. O, heavens !-O, wife! look how our daugh-
ter bleeds!

This dagger hath mista'en,-for lo! his house 7
Is empty on the back of Montague,-

And is mis-sheathed in my daughter's bosom.
La. Cap. O me! this sight of death is as a bell,
That warns my old age to a sepulchre.

Enter MONTAGUE and Others.

Prince. Come, Montague; for thou art early up, To see thy son and heir more early down.

Mon. Alas, my liege, my wife is dead to-night; Grief of my son's exile hath stopp'd her breath: What further woe conspires against mine age? Prince. Look, and thou shalt see.

To

Mon. O thou untaught! what manners is in this, press before thy father to a grave?

7i. e. The scabbard.

8 The dagger.

Prince. Seal up the mouth of outrage for a while, "Till we can clear these ambiguities,

And know their spring, their head, their true descent;
And then will I be general of your woes,
And lead you even to death: Mean time forbear,
And let mischance be slave to patience.-
Bring forth the parties of suspicion.

Fri. I am the greatest, able to do least,
Yet most suspected, as the time and place
Doth make against me, of this direful murder;
And here I stand, both to impeach and purge
Myself condemned and myself excus'd.

Prince. Then say at once what thou dost know in
this.

Fri. I will be brief, for my short date of breath Is not so long as is a tedious tale.

Romeo, there dead, was husband to that Juliet ;
And she, there dead, that Romeo's faithful wife:
I married them; and their stolen-marriage-day
Was Tybalt's dooms-day, whose untimely death
Banish'd the new-made bridegroom from this city;
For whom, and not for Tybalt, Juliet pin'd.
You-to remove that siege of grief from her,-
Betroth'd, and would have married her perforce,
To county Paris :-Then comes she to me;
And, with wild looks, bid me devise some means
To rid her from this second marriage,

Or, in my cell there would she kill herself.
Then gave I her, so tutor'd by my art,
A sleeping potion; which so took effect
As I intended, for it wrought on her

9 Seat.

The form of death: meantime I writ to Romeo,
That he should hither come as this dire night,
To help to take her from her borrow'd grave,
Being the time the potion's force should cease.
But he which bore my letter, friar John,
Was staid by accident; and yesternight
Return'd my letter back: Then all alone,
At the prefixed hour of her waking,
Came I to take her from her kindred's vault;
Meaning to keep her closely at my cell,
Till I conveniently could send to Romeo:
But, when I came, (some minute ere the time
Of her awakening,) here untimely lay
The noble Paris, and true Romeo, dead.
She wakes; and I entreated her come forth,'
And bear this work of heaven with patience :
But then a noise did scare me from the tomb;
And she, too desperate, would not go with me,
But, (as it seems,) did violence on herself.
All this I know; and to the marriage
Her nurse is privy: And, if aught in this
Miscarried by my fault, let my old life
Be sacrific'd, some hour before his time,
Unto the rigour of severest law.

Prince. We still have known thee for a holy man.→ Where's Romeo's man? what can he say in this? Bal. I brought my master news of Juliet's death; And then in post he came from Mantua,

To this same place, to this same monument.

This letter he early bid me give his father;
And threaten'd me with death, going in the vault,
If I departed not, and left him there.

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