was your I came to talk of:-Tell me, daughter Juliet, Jul. It is an honour that I dream not of. Nurse. An honour! were not I thine only nurse, I'd say, thou hadst suck'd wisdom from thy teat. La. Cap. Well, think of marriage now ; younger than you, Here in Verona, ladies of esteem, Are made already mothers : by my count, I mother much upon these years That you are now a maid. Thus then, in brief; The valiant Paris seeks you for his love. Nurse. A man, young lady! lady, such a man, As all the world—Why, he's a man of wax.4 La. Cap. Verona's summer hath not such a flower. man? 4 Well made, as if he had been modelled in wax. 5 The comments on ancient books were always printed in the margin. 6i, e. Is not yet caught, whose skin was wanted to bind him. That book in many's eyes doth share the glory, Nurse. No less ? nay, bigger ; women grow by La. Cap. Speak briefly, can you like of Paris' love? Jul. I'll look to like, if looking liking move : Enter a Servant. Serv. Madam, the guests are come, supper served up, you called, my young lady asked for, the nurse cursed in the pantry, and every thing in extremity, I must hence to wait; I beseech you, follow straight. La. Cap. We follow thee.-Juliet, the county stays. [Ereunt. SCENE IV. A Street. Enter ROMEO, MERCUTIO, BENVOLIO, with fire or sir Maskers, Torch-Bearers, and Others. cuse ? Ben. The date is out of such prolixity :7 7 j. e. Long speeches are out of fashion, Bearing a Tartar's painted bow of lath, bling; dance, Mer. You are a lover; borrow Cupid's wings, Rom. I am too sore enpierced with his shaft, Mer. And, to sink in it, should you burden love; Rom. Is love a tender thing? it is too rough, love; [Putting on a Mask. 8 A scare-crow, a figure made up to frighten crows. 9 A dance. i A torch-bearer was a constant appendage to every troop of maskers. A visor for a visor!-what care I, in, Rom. A torch for me: let wantons, light of heart, Tickle the senseless rushes 3 with their heels; For I am proverb’d with a grandsire phrase, I'll be a candle-holder, and look onThe game was ne'er so fair, and I am done. 4 Mer. Tut! dun's the mouse, the constable's own word : Rom. Nay, that's not so. 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 mask; Why, may one ask? And so did I. That dreamers often lie. 2 Observe. 3 It was anciently the custom to strew rooms with rushes. 4 This is equivalent to phrases in common use--am done for, it is over with me. 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 fore-finger of an alderman, Drawn with a team of little atomies 5 Athwart men's noses as they lie asleep : Her waggon-spokes made of long spinners' legs ; The cover, of the wings of grashoppers ; The traces, of the smallest spider's web; The collars, of the moonshine's watry beams : Her whip, of cricket’s bone; the lash, of film: Her waggoner, a small grey-coated gnat, Not half so big as a round little worm Prick'd from the lazy finger of a maid : Her chariot is an empty hazel-nut, Made by the joiner squirrel, or old grub, Time out of mind the fairies coach-makers. And in this state she gallops night by night Through lovers' brains, and then they dream of love : On courtiers' knees, that dream on court’sies 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 sweet-meats tainted are. Sometime she gallops o'er a courtier's nose, ! And then dreams he of smelling out a suit: And sometimes comes she with a tithe-pig's tail, 5 Atoms. 6 A place in court, D VOL. X. |