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Hel. O weary night! O long and tedious night! Abate thy hours: shine, comforts, from the east, That I may back to Athens, by day-light,

From these that my poor company detest:
And sleep, that sometimes shuts up sorrow's eye,
Steal me a while from mine own company.
[Lies down and sleeps.
Puck. Yet but three? Come one more;
Two of both kinds make up four.
Here she comes, curst and sad :-
Cupid is a knavish lad,

Thus to make poor females mad.
Re-enter HERMIA.

Her. Never so weary, never so in woe;
Bedabbled with the dew, and torn with briers;

I can no farther crawl, no farther go;

My legs can keep no pace with my desires. Here will I rest me till the break of day. Heavens shield Lysander, if they mean a fray! [Lies down and sleeps. Puck. On the ground sleep sound:

I'll apply to your eye,

Gentle lover, remedy.

Bot. Where's Peas-blossom? Peas. Ready.

Bot. Scratch my head, Peas-blossom.-Where's monsieur Cobweb? Cob. Ready.

Bot. Monsieur Cobweb, good monsieur, get your weapons in your hand, and kill me a red-hipped humble-bee on the top of a thistle; and, good monsieur, bring me the honey-bag. Do not fret yourself too much in the action, monsieur; and, good monsieur, have a care the honey-bag break not; I would be loath to have you overflown with a honeybag, signior.-Where's monsieur Mustard-seed? Must. Ready.

Bot. Give me your neif, monsieur Mustard-seed. Pray you, leave your courtesy, good monsieur. Must. What's your will?

Bot. Nothing, good monsieur, but to help cavalery Cobweb to scratch. I must to the barber's, monsieur; for methinks I am marvellous hairy about the face; and I am such a tender ass, if my hair do but tickle me, I must scratch.

Tita. What, wilt thou hear some music, my sweet love?

Bot. I have a reasonable good ear in music: let us have the tongs and the bones.

Tita. Or say, sweet love, what thou desir'st to

eat.

Bot. Truly, a peck of provender: I could munch your good dry oats. Methinks I have a great desire to a bottle of hay: good hay, sweet hay, hath no fellow.

Tita. I have a venturous fairy that shall seek The squirrel's hoard, and fetch thee new nuts.

Bot. I had rather have a handful or two of dried peas. But, I pray you, let none of your people stir me: I have an exposition of sleep come upon me.

Tita. Sleep thou, and I will wind thee in my

arms.

Fairies, be gone, and be all ways away.

[Exeunt Fairies.
So doth the woodbine the sweet honeysuckle
Gently entwist: the female ivy so
Enrings the barky fingers of the elm.

[Squeezing the herb on LYSANDER's eyelids. O, how I love thee, how I dote on thee!

When thou wak'st, thou tak'st

True delight in the sight

Of thy former lady's eye:

And the country proverb known,

That every man should take his own,
In your waking shall be shown

Jack shall have Jill;
Naught shall go ill;

The man shall have his mare again,
And all shall be well.

ACT IV.

SCENE I.-The Wood.

[Exit.

Enter TITANIA and BOTTOM; LYSANDER, DEMETRIUS, HERMIA, and HELENA, still lying asleep. PEASBLOSSOM, COBWEB, MOTH, MUSTARD-SEED, and other Fairies attending: OBERON behind unseen.

Tita. Come, sit thee down upon this flowery bed, While I thy amiable cheeks do coy, And stick musk-roses in thy sleek smooth head, And kiss thy fair large ears, my gentle joy.

Enter PUCK.

[They sleep.

Obe. [Advancing.] Welcome, good Robin, Seest thou this sweet sight?

Her dotage now I do begin to pity:
For, meeting her of late behind the wood,
Seeking sweet savours for this hateful fool,
I did upbraid her, and fall out with her;
For she his hairy temples then had rounded
With coronet of fresh and fragrant flowers;
And that same dew, which sometime on the buds
Was wont to swell, like round and orient pearls,
Stood now within the pretty flow'rets' eyes,
Like tears, that did their own disgrace bewail.
When I had at my pleasure taunted her,
And she in mild terms begg'd my patience,
I then did ask of her her changeling child;
Which straight she gave me; and her fairies sent
To bear him to my bower in fairy land.
And now I have the boy, I will undo
This hateful imperfection of her eyes:
And, gentle Puck, take this transformed scalp
From off the head of this Athenian swain;
That he, awaking when the other do,

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THE NEW YOR! PUBLIC LIBRARI

ASTOR, LENOX

TYLDEN FOUNDATIONS

May all to Athens back again repair,
And think no more of this night's accidents,
But as the fierce vexation of a dream.
But first I will release the fairy queen.

[Touching her eyes with a herb.

Be, as thou wast wont to be;
See, as thou wast wont to see:

Dian's bud o'er Cupid's flower

Hath such force and blessed power.
Now, my Titania; wake you, my sweet queen,
Tita. My Oberon! what visions have I seen!
Methought I was enamour'd of an ass.

Obe. There lies your love.
Tita.
How came these things to pass?
O, how mine eyes do loathe his visage now!
Obe. Silence, awhile.-Robin, take off this head.-
Titania, music call; and strike more dead
Than common sleep, of all these five the sense.
Tita. Music, ho! music! such as charmeth sleep.

[Still music.]

Puck. Now, when thou wak'st, with thine own fool's eyes peep.

Obe. Sound, music! Come, my queen, take hands with me,

And rock the ground whereon these sleepers be.
Now thou and I are new in amity,
And will to-morrow midnight solemnly
Dance in Duke Theseus' house triumphantly,
And bless it to all fair prosperity.

Obe.

There shall the pairs of faithful lovers be
Wedded, with Theseus, all in jollity.
Puck. Fairy king, attend, and mark:
I do hear the morning lark.
Then, my queen, in silence sad,
Trip we after the night's shade:
We the globe can compass soon,
Swifter than the wandering moon.
Tita, Come, my lord; and in our flight,
Tell me how it came this night,
That I sleeping here was found
With these mortals on the ground.
[Exeunt. Horns sound within.

Enter THESEUS, HIPPOLYTA, EGEUS, and train.
The. Go, one of you, find out the forester;
For now our observation is perform'd;
And since we have the vaward of the day,
My love shall hear the music of my hounds:
Uncouple in the western valley; let them go:
Despatch, I say, and find the forester.---

[Exit an Attendant.
We will, fair queen, up to the mountain's top,
And mark the musical confusion
Of hounds and echo in conjunction.

Hip. I was with Hercules and Cadmus once,
When in a wood of Crete they bay'd the bear
With hounds of Sparta: never did I hear
Such gallant chiding; for, besides the groves,
The skies, the fountains, every region near
Seem'd all one mutual cry: I never heard
So musical a discord, such sweet thunder.

The. My hounds are bred out of the Spartan kind,
So flew'd, so sanded; and their heads are hung
With ears that sweep away the morning dew;
Crook-knee'd, and dew-lapp'd like Thessalian bulls;
Slow in pursuit, but match'd in mouth like bells,
Each under each. A cry more tuneable
Was never holla'd to, nor cheer'd with horn,
In Crete, in Sparta, nor in Thessaly:

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Ege. My lord, this is my daughter here asleep; And this, Lysander; this Demetrius is; This Helena, old Nedar's Helena:

I wonder of their being here together.

The. No doubt they rose up early to observe
The rite of May; and, hearing our intent,
Came here in grace of our solemnity.-
But speak, Egeus; is not this the day

That Hermia should give answer of her choice?
Ege. It is, my lord.

[horns. The. Go, bid the huntsmen wake them with their [Exit an Attendant. Horns, and shout within. LYSANDER, DEMETRIUS, HERMIA, and HELENA, awake and start up. Good morrow, friends. Saint Valentine is past: Begin these wood-birds but to couple now? Lys. Pardon, my lord. [He and the rest kneel. The. I pray you all, stand up.

I know you two are rival enemies:
How comes this gentle concord in the world,
That hatred is so far from jealousy,
To sleep by hate, and fear no enmity?

Lys. My lord, I shall reply amazedly,
Half sleep, half waking: but as yet, I swear,
I cannot truly say how I came here;
But, as I think, (for truly would I speak,-
And now I do bethink me, so it is)

I came with Mermia hither: our intent

Was to be gone from Athens, where we might,
Without the peril of the Athenian law-

Ege. Enough, enough, my lord; you have enough:
I beg the law, the law, upon his head.-
They would have stol'n away; they would, Demetrius,
Thereby to have defeated you and me,
You of your wife, and me of my consent,-
Of my consent that she should be your wife.
Dem. My lord, fair Helen told me of their stealth,
Of this their purpose hither to this wood;
And I in fury hither follow'd them,
Fair IIelena in fancy following me.
But, my good lord, I wot not by what power,
(But by some power it is,) my love to Hermia,
Melted as the snow, seems to me now
As the remembrance of an idle gawd,
Which in my childhood I did dote upon;
And all the faith, the virtue of my heart,
The object, and the pleasure of mine eye,
Is only Helena. To her, my lord,
Was I betroth'd ere I saw Hermia:
But, like in sickness, did I loathe this food,
But, as in health, come to my natural taste,
Now do I wish it, love it, long for it,
And will for evermore be true to it.

The. Fair lovers, you are fortunately met:
Of this discourse we more will here anon,-
Egeus, I will overbear your will;
For in the temple, by and by, with us,
These couples shall eternally be knit.
And, for the morning now is something worn,
Our purpos'd hunting shall be set aside.
Away, with us, to Athens: three and three,
We'll hold a feast in great solemnity.-
Come, Hippolyta.

[Exeunt THESEUS, HIPPOLYTA, EGEUS, and
train.

Dem. These things seem small and undistinguishLike far-off mountains turnèd into clouds. [able,

MIDSUMMER-NIGHT'S DREAM.

Her. Methinks I see these things with parted eye,
When every thing seems double.

Hel.

So methinks:

And I have found Demetrius, like a jewel,
Mine own, and not mine own.

Dem.

That we are awake? It seems to me
Are you sure
That yet we sleep, we dream.-Do not you think
The duke was here, and bid us follow him?
Her. Yea; and my father.
Hel.

Lys. And he did bid us follow to the temple.
And Hippolyta.
Dem. Why then, we are awake: let's follow him;
And by the way let us recount our dreams.

[Exeunt Lys. DEM. HER. and HEL.
Bot. [Awaking.] When my cue comes, call me,
and I will answer:-my next is, "Most fair Pyra-
mus."-Hey, ho!-Peter Quince! Flute, the bel-
lows-mender! Snout, the tinker! Starveling!—
God's my life! stolen hence, and left me asleep! I
have had a most rare vision. I have had a dream,
-past the wit of man to say what dream it was:
man is but an ass, if he go about to expound this
dream. Methought I was there is no man can tell
what. Methought I was, and methought I had,-
but man is but a patched fool, if he will offer to say
what methought I had.
heard, the ear of man hath not seen, man's hand is
The eye of man hath not
not able to taste, his tongue to conceive, nor his
heart to report, what my dream was.
Peter Quince to write a ballad of this dream: it
I will get
shall be called Bottom's Dream, because it hath no
bottom; and I will sing it in the latter end of a
play, before the duke: peradventure, to make it
the more gracious, I shall sing it at her death.

[Exit.

SCENE II. ATHENS. A Room in QUINCE'S

House.

Enter QUINCE, FLUTE, SNOUT, and STARVELING. Quin. Have you sent to Bottom's house? is he come home yet?

Star. He cannot be heard of. Out of doubt, he is transported.

Flu. If he come not, then the play is marred: it goes not forward, doth it?

Quin. It is not possible: you have not a man in all Athens able to discharge Pyramus but he.

Flu. No, he hath simply the best wit of any handycraft man in Athens.

Quin. Yea, and the best person too; and he is a very paramour for a sweet voice.

Flu. You must say, paragon: a paramour is, God bless us! a thing of naught.

Enter SNUG.

Snug. Masters, the duke is coming from the temple, and there is two or three lords and ladies more married: if our sport had gone forward, we had all been made men.

Flu. O sweet bully Bottom! Thus hath he lost sixpence a-day during his life; he could not have 'scaped sixpence a-day: an the duke had not given him sixpence a-day for playing Pyramus, I'll be hanged; he would have deserved it: sixpence a-day in Pyramus, or nothing.

Enter BOTTOM.

Bot. Where are these lads? where are these hearts?

[ACT V.

Quin. Bottom!-O most courageous day! O most happy hour!

you

Bot. Masters, I am to discourse wonders: but ask me not what; for if I tell you, I am no true Athenian. I will tell you every thing, right as it fell out. Quin. Let us hear, sweet Bottom. Bot. Not a word of me. is, that the duke hath dined. Get your apparel toAll that I will tell gether, good strings to your beards, new ribbons to your pumps; meet presently at the palace; every man look o'er his part; for the short and the long is, our play is preferred. have clean linen; and let not him that plays the In any case, let Thisby lion pare his nails, for they shall hang out for the lion's claws. And, most dear actors, eat no onions nor garlick, for we are to utter sweet breath; and I do not doubt but to hear them say, it is a sweet comedy. No more words: away! go; away!

ACT V.

[Exeunt.

SCENE I. ATHENS. An Apartment in the Palace
of THESEUS.

Enter THESEUS, HIPPOLYTA, PHILOSTRATE, Lords, and
Attendants.

Hip. 'Tis strange, my Theseus, that these lovers
speak of

The. More strange than true: I never may believe
These antique fables, nor these fairy toys.
Lovers and madmen, have such seething brains,
Such shaping fantasies, that apprehend
More than cool reason ever comprehends.
The lunatic, the lover, and the poet,
Are of imagination all compact:-

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One sees more devils than vast hell can hold,-
That is, the madman: the lover, all as frantic,
Sees Helen's beauty in a brow of Egypt:
And, as imagination bodies forth
The poet's eye, in a fine frenzy rolling,
Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to
The forms of things unknown, the poet's pen
Turns them to shapes, and gives to airy nothing
[heaven;
A local habitation and a name.
It comprehends some bringer of that joy;
Such tricks hath strong imagination,
That, if it would but apprehend some joy,
Or in the night, imagining some fear,
How easy is a bush suppos'd a bear!

Hip. But all the story of the night told over,
And all their minds transfigur'd so together,
More witnesseth than fancy's images,
And grows to something of great constancy;
But, howsoever, strange and admirable.

The. Here comes the lovers, full of joy and mirth.
Enter LYSANDEer, Demetrius, HERMIA, and HELENA.
Accompany your hearts!
Joy, gentle friends! joy, and fresh days of love,
Lys.
Wait in your royal walks, your board, your bed!
More than to us
The. Come now; what masks, what dances shall

we have,

To wear away this long age of three hours,
Between our after-supper, and bed-time?
Where is our usual manager of mirth?
What revels are in hand? Is there no play,

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