That we have had no time to move our daughter: Look you, she lov'd her kinsman Tybalt dearly, And so did I;-Well; we were born to die.'Tis very late, she 'll not come down to-night : promise you, but for your company,

I would have been a-bed an hour ago.

Par. These times of woe afford no time to Woo;

Madam, good night: commend me to your daughter.

La. Cap. I will, and know her mind early to

O' Thursday let it be;-o' Thursday, tell her,
She shall be married to this noble earl :-
:-
Will you be ready? do you like this haste?
We'll keep no great ado;—a friend, or two :-
For hark you, Tybalt being slain so late,
It may be thought we held him carelessly,
Being our kinsman, if we revel much :

Therefore we'll have some half a dozen friends, And there an end. But what say you to Thursday ?

Par. My lord, I would that Thursday were

to-morrow.

Cap. Well, get you gone :-O' Thursday be it then :

Go you to Juliet ere you go to bed,
Prepare her, wife, against this wedding-day.—
Farewell, my lord.-Light to my chamber, ho!
Afore me, it is so very late, that we
May call it early by and by :-Good night.

[Exeunt.

SCENE V.-Loggia to Juliet's Chamber.*

Enter ROMEO and JULIET.

Jul. Wilt thou be gone? it is not yet near day:

It was the nightingale, and not the lark,
That pierc'd the fearful hollow of thine ear;
Nightly she sings on yon pomegranate-tree : 5
Believe me, love, it was the nightingale.

a Another term of falconry. The mew is the hawk's cage.

Rom. It was the lark, the herald of the morn," No nightingale: look, love, what envious streaks Do lace the severing clouds in yonder east: Night's candles are burnt out, and jocund day Stands tiptoe on the misty mountain's tops; I must be gone and live, or stay and die.

Jul. Yon light is not day-light, I know it, I: It is some meteor that the sun exhales, To be to thee this night a torch-bearer, And light thee on thy way to Mantua: Therefore stay yet, thou need's not to be gone. Rom. Let me be ta'en. let me be put to death; I am content, so thou wilt have it so. I'll say, yon grey is not the morning's eye, "Tis but the pale reflex of Cynthia's brow; Nor that is not the lark, whose notes do beat The vaulty heaven so high above our heads: I have more care to stay than will to go ;Come, death, and welcome!-Juliet wills it so.— How is 't, my soul? let's talk, it is not day.

Jul. It is, it is, hie hence, be gone, away; It is the lark that sings so out of tune, Straining harsh discords, and unpleasing sharps. Some say, the lark makes sweet division;a

This doth not so, for she divideth us:

Some say, the lark and loathed toad change

Jul. O fortune, fortune! all men call thee fickle:

If thou art fickle, what dost thou with him. That is renown'd for faith? Be fickle, fortune; For then, I hope, thou wilt not keep him long, But send him back.

La. Cap. [Within.] Ho, daughter! are you up?

Jul. Who is 't that calls? is it my lady mother?

Is she not down so late, or up so early?
What unaccustom'd cause procures her hither?

Enter Lady CAPUlet.

La. Cap. Why, how now, Juliet?
Jul.

Madam, I am not well. La. Cap. Evermore weeping for your cousin's death?

What, wilt thou wash him from his grave with tears?

An if thou couldst, thou couldst not make him live:

Therefore, have done some grief shows much of love;

But much of grief shows still some want of wit. Jul. Yet let me weep for such a feeling loss. La. Cap. So shall you feel the loss, but not the friend

Jul. Villain and he be many miles asunder. God pardon him! I do, with all my heart; And yet no man, like he, doth grieve my heart. La. Cap. That is, because the traitor lives. Jul. Ay, madam, from the reach of these my hands.

'Would, none but I might venge my cousin's death!

La. Cap. We will have vengeance for it, fear thou not:

Then weep no more. I'll send to one in
Mantua,-

Where that same banish'd runagate doth live,-
Shall give him such an unaccustom'd dram,a
That he shall soon keep Tybalt company :
And then I hope thou wilt be satisfied

Jul. Indeed, I never shall be satisfied.
With Romeo, till I behold him-dead-
Is my poor heart, so for a kinsman vex'd:
Madam, if you could find out but a man
To bear a poison, I would temper it;
That Romeo should, upon receipt thereof,
Soon sleep in quiet. O, how my heart abhors
To hear him nam'd,-and cannot come to him,-
To wreak the love I bore my cousin
Upon his body that hath slaughter'd him!

La. Cap. Find thou the means, and I'll find such a man.

But now I'll tell thee joyful tidings, girl.

Jul. And joy comes well in such a needy b time:

What are they, I beseech your ladyship?
La. Cap. Well, well, thou hast a careful
father, child;
One, who, to put thee from thy heaviness,
Hath sorted out a sudden day of joy,

That thou expect'st not, nor I look'd not for.
Jul. Madam, in happy time, what day is that?
La. Cap. Marry, my child, early next Thurs-

a (4) (the other lines being different) has,

"That shall bestow on him so sure a draught." b (A), needful.

How now? a conduit, girl? what, still in tears?
Evermore showering? In one little body
Thou counterfeit'st a bark, a sea, a wind:
For still thy eyes, which I may call the sea,
Do ebb and flow with tears; the bark thy body is,
Sailing in this salt flood; the winds, thy sighs;
Who,-raging with thy tears, and they with
them,-

Without a sudden calm, will overset

Thy tempest-tossed body.-How now, wife?
Have delivered to her our decree?

you

Proud can I never be of what I hate;
But thankful even for hate, that is meant love.b
Cap. How now! how now, chop-logic! What
is this ?

Proud, and, I thank you,-and, I thank you not; -°

Thank me no thankings, nor proud me no prouds,

But fettle your fine joints 'gainst Thursday next, To go with Paris to St. Peter's church,

Or I will drag thee on a hurdle thither. Out, you green-sickness carrion! out, you baggage!

I tell thee what,-get thee to church o' Thursday,
Or never after look me in the face:
Speak not, reply not, do not answer me;
My fingers itch.-Wife, we scarce thought us
bless'd

That God had lent" us but this only child;
But now I see this one is one too much,
And that we have a curse in having her;
Out on her, hilding!

Nurse.
God in heaven bless her!-
You are to blame, my lord, to rate her so.
Cap. And why, my lady wisdom? hold your

La. Cap.

You are too hot. Cap. God's bread! it makes me mad. Day, night, hour, tide, time, work, play, Alone, in company, still my care hath been To have her match'd; and having now provided A gentleman of noble parentage,

b

Of fair demesnes, youthful, and nobly train❜d,*
Stuff'd (as they say,) with honourable parts,
Proportion'd as one's thought would wish a man,—
And then to have a wretched puling fool,
A whining mammet, in her fortune's tender,
To answer-I'll not wed,-I cannot love,
I am too young,-I pray you, pardon me ;—
But, an you will not wed, I'll pardon you:
Graze where you will, you shall not house with me:
Look to't, think on 't, I do not use to jest.
Thursday is near; lay hand on heart, advise:
An you be mine, I'll give you to my friend;

An

you be not, hang, beg, starve, die i' the streets, For, by my soul, I'll ne'er acknowledge thee, Nor what is mine shall never do thee good: Trust to 't, bethink you, I'll not be forsworn.

[Exit.

Jul. Is there no pity sitting in the clouds, That sees into the bottom of my grief? O, sweet my mother, cast me not away! Delay this marriage for a month, a week; Or, if you do not, make the bridal bed In that dim monument where Tybalt lies.

a (A), sent.

b Thus (C) and folio. (A), which has been partially followed, has

"God's blessed mother! Wife, it mads me.
Day, night, early, late, at home, abroad,
Alone, in company, waking or sleeping,
Still my care hath been to see her match'd."

c (4) gives train'd. (C) and folio, allied.

La. Cap. Talk not to me, for I'll not speak a word;

Do as thou wilt, for I have done with thee. [Exit. Jul. O God!-0 nurse! how shall this be prevented?

My husband is on earth, my faith in heaven;
How shall that faith return again to earth,
Unless that husband send it me from heaven
By leaving earth ?-comfort me, counsel me.—
Alack, alack, that heaven should practise stra-
tagems

Upon so soft a subject as myself!

Nurse. Is banished; and all the world to nothing, That he dares ne'er come back to challenge you; Or, if he do, it needs must be by stealth. Then, since the case so stands as now it doth, I think it best you married with the county. O, he's a lovely gentleman!

'Faith, here 't is : Romeo

Romeo's a dishclout to him; an eagle, madam,
Hath not so green, so quick, so fair an eye,
As Paris hath. Beshrew my very heart,

To make confession, and to be absolv'd.

Nurse. Marry, I will; and this is wisely

1 SCENE I.-" Affection makes him false." THERE is a slight particle of untruth in Benvolio's statement, which, to a certain degree, justifies this charge of Lady Capulet. Tybalt was bent upon quarrelling with Romeo, but Mercutio forced on his own quarrel with Tybalt. Dr. Johnson's remark upon this circumstance is worthy his character as a moralist :-"The charge of falsehood on Benvolio, though produced at hazard, is very just. The author, who seems to intend the character of Benvolio as good, meant, perhaps, to show how the best minds, in a state of faction and discord, are detorted to criminal partiality."

2 SCENE II." God save the mark!"

This expression occurs in the First Part of Henry IV., in Hotspur's celebrated speech defending the denial of his prisoners. In Othello, we have God bless the mark. In these cases, as in the instance before us, the commentators leave the expression in its original obscurity. May we venture a conjecture? The mark which persons who are unable to write are required to make, instead of their signature, is in the form of a cross; but anciently the use of this mark was not confined to illiterate persons, for, amongst the Saxons, the mark of the cross, as an attestation of the good faith of the person signing, was required to be attached to the signature of those who could write, and to stand in the place of the signature of those who could not write. (See Blackstone's Commentaries.) The ancient use of the mark was universal; and the word mark was, we believe, thus taken to signify the cross. God save the mark was, therefore, a form of ejaculation approaching to the character of an oath; in the same manner as assertions were made emphatic by the addition of "by the rood," or, "by the holy rood."

3 SCENE III." Like powder in a skill less soldier's flask."

The force and propriety of this comparison are manifest; but, fully to understand it, we must know how the soldier of Shakspere's time was accoutred. His heavy gun was fired with a match, his powder was carried in a flask; and the match and the powder, in unskilful hands, were doubtless sometimes productive of accidents; so that the man-at-arins was, like Romeo in his passion "dismembered with his own defence."

4 SCENE V.-"Juliet's chamber."

The stage direction in the folio edition of 1623 is, "Enter Romeo and Juliet aloft." In the first quarto, 1597, the direction is, "Enter Romeo and Juliet at the window." To understand these directions, we must refer to the construction of the

old theatres. "Towards the rear of the stage," says Malone," there appears to have been a balcony or upper stage; the platform of which was probably eight or nine feet from the ground. I suppose it to have been supported by pillars. From hence, in many of our old plays, part of the dialogue was spoken; and in the front of it curtains likewise were hung, so as occasionally to conceal the persons in it from the view of the audience. At each side of this balcony was a box very inconveniently situated, which was sometimes called the private box. In these boxes, which were at a lower price, some persons sate, either from economy or singularity." The balcony probably served a variety of purposes. Malone says, "When the citizens of Angiers are to appear on the walls of their town, aud young Arthur to leap from the battlements, suppose our ancestors were contented with seeing them in the balcony already described; or, perhaps, a few boards tacked together, and painted so as to resemble the rude discoloured walls of an old town, behind which the platform might have been placed near the top, on which the citizens stood." It appears to us probable that even in these cases the balcony served for the platform, and that a few painted boards in front supplied the illusion of wall and tower. There was still another use of the balcony. According to Malone, when a play was exhibited within a play, as in Hamlet, the court, or audience, before whom the interlude was performed, sate in the balcony. To Malone's historical account of the English stage, and to Mr. Collier's valuable details regarding theatres (Annals of the Stage, vol. iii.), the reader is referred for

I