Folger Shakespeare Library.

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1 Folger Shakespeare Library

2 Contents Front Matter From the Director of the Folger Shakespeare Library Textual Introduction Synopsis Characters in the Play ACT 1 Scene 1 Scene 2 ACT 2 Scene 1 Scene 2 ACT 3 Scene 1 Scene 2 ACT 4 Scene 1 Scene 2 ACT 5 Scene 1

3 From the Director of the Folger Shakespeare Library It is hard to imagine a world without Shakespeare. Since their composition four hundred years ago, Shakespeare s plays and poems have traveled the globe, inviting those who see and read his works to make them their own. Readers of the New Folger Editions are part of this ongoing process of taking up Shakespeare, finding our own thoughts and feelings in language that strikes us as old or unusual and, for that very reason, new. We still struggle to keep up with a writer who could think a mile a minute, whose words paint pictures that shift like clouds. These expertly edited texts are presented to the public as a resource for study, artistic adaptation, and enjoyment. By making the classic texts of the New Folger Editions available in electronic form as Folger Digital Texts, we place a trusted resource in the hands of anyone who wants them. The New Folger Editions of Shakespeare s plays, which are the basis for the texts realized here in digital form, are special because of their origin. The Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, DC, is the single greatest documentary source of Shakespeare s works. An unparalleled collection of early modern books, manuscripts, and artwork connected to Shakespeare, the Folger s holdings have been consulted extensively in the preparation of these texts. The Editions also reflect the expertise gained through the regular performance of Shakespeare s works in the Folger s Elizabethan Theater. I want to express my deep thanks to editors Barbara Mowat and Paul Werstine for creating these indispensable editions of Shakespeare s works, which incorporate the best of textual scholarship with a richness of commentary that is both inspired and engaging. Readers who want to know more about Shakespeare and his plays can follow the paths these distinguished scholars have tread by visiting the Folger either in-person or online, where a range of physical and digital resources exist to supplement the material in these texts. I commend to you these words, and hope that they inspire. Michael Witmore Director, Folger Shakespeare Library

4 Textual Introduction By Barbara Mowat and Paul Werstine Until now, with the release of the Folger Digital Texts, readers in search of a free online text of Shakespeare s plays had to be content primarily with using the Moby Text, which reproduces a latenineteenth century version of the plays. What is the difference? Many ordinary readers assume that there is a single text for the plays: what Shakespeare wrote. But Shakespeare s plays were not published the way modern novels or plays are published today: as a single, authoritative text. In some cases, the plays have come down to us in multiple published versions, represented by various Quartos (Qq) and by the great collection put together by his colleagues in 1623, called the First Folio (F). There are, for example, three very different versions of Hamlet, two of King Lear, Henry V, Romeo and Juliet, and others. Editors choose which version to use as their base text, and then amend that text with words, lines or speech prefixes from the other versions that, in their judgment, make for a better or more accurate text. Other editorial decisions involve choices about whether an unfamiliar word could be understood in light of other writings of the period or whether it should be changed; decisions about words that made it into Shakespeare s text by accident through four hundred years of printings and misprinting; and even decisions based on cultural preference and taste. When the Moby Text was created, for example, it was deemed improper and indecent for Miranda to chastise Caliban for having attempted to rape her. (See The Tempest, 1.2: Abhorred slave,/which any print of goodness wilt not take,/being capable of all ill! I pitied thee ). All Shakespeare editors at the time took the speech away from her and gave it to her father, Prospero. The editors of the Moby Shakespeare produced their text long before scholars fully understood the proper grounds on which to make the thousands of decisions that Shakespeare editors face. The Folger Library Shakespeare Editions, on which the Folger Digital Texts depend, make this editorial process as nearly transparent as is possible, in contrast to older texts, like the Moby, which hide editorial interventions. The reader of the Folger Shakespeare knows where the text has been altered because editorial interventions are signaled by square brackets (for example, from Othello: If she in chains of magic were not bound, ), half-square brackets (for example from Henry V: With blood and sword and fire to win your

5 example, from Henry V: With blood and sword and fire to win your right, ), or angle brackets (for example, from Hamlet: O farewell, honest soldier. Who hath relieved/you? ). At any point in the text, you can hover your cursor over a bracket for more information. Because the Folger Digital Texts are edited in accord with twenty-first century knowledge about Shakespeare s texts, the Folger here provides them to readers, scholars, teachers, actors, directors, and students, free of charge, confident of their quality as texts of the plays and pleased to be able to make this contribution to the study and enjoyment of Shakespeare.

6 Synopsis In A Midsummer Night s Dream, residents of Athens mix with fairies from a local forest, with comic results. In the city, Theseus, Duke of Athens, is to marry Hippolyta, queen of the Amazons. Bottom the weaver and his friends rehearse in the woods a play they hope to stage for the wedding celebrations. Four young Athenians are in a romantic tangle. Lysander and Demetrius love Hermia; she loves Lysander and her friend Helena loves Demetrius. Hermia s father, Egeus, commands Hermia to marry Demetrius, and Theseus supports the father s right. All four young Athenians end up in the woods, where Robin Goodfellow, who serves the fairy king Oberon, puts flower juice on the eyes of Lysander, and then Demetrius, unintentionally causing both to love Helena. Oberon, who is quarreling with his wife, Titania, uses the flower juice on her eyes. She falls in love with Bottom, who now, thanks to Robin Goodfellow, wears an ass s head. As the lovers sleep, Robin Goodfellow restores Lysander s love for Hermia, so that now each young woman is matched with the man she loves. Oberon disenchants Titania and removes Bottom s ass s head. The two young couples join the royal couple in getting married, and Bottom rejoins his friends to perform the play.

7 Characters in the Play LYSANDER HELENA DEMETRIUS four lovers THESEUS, duke of Athens HIPPOLYTA, queen of the Amazons EGEUS, father to Hermia PHILOSTRATE, master of the revels to Theseus NICK BOTTOM, weaver PETER QUINCE, carpenter FRANCIS FLUTE, bellows-mender TOM SNOUT, tinker SNUG, joiner ROBIN STARVELING, tailor OBERON, king of the Fairies TITANIA, queen of the Fairies ROBIN GOODFELLOW, a puck, or hobgoblin, in Oberon s service A FAIRY, in the service of Titania PEASEBLOSSOM COBWEB MOTE MUSTARDSEED fairies attending upon Titania Lords and Attendants on Theseus and Hippolyta Other Fairies in the trains of Titania and Oberon

8 ACT 1 Scene 1 Enter Theseus, Hippolyta, and Philostrate, with others. THESEUS FTLN 0001 Now, fair Hippolyta, our nuptial hour FTLN 0002 Draws on apace. Four happy days bring in FTLN 0003 Another moon. But, O, methinks how slow FTLN 0004 This old moon wanes! She lingers my desires FTLN 0005 Like to a stepdame or a dowager 5 FTLN 0006 Long withering out a young man s revenue. FTLN 0007 HIPPOLYTA FTLN 0008 FTLN 0009 FTLN FTLN 0011 FTLN 0012 THESEUS FTLN 0013 FTLN 0014 FTLN FTLN 0016 Four days will quickly steep themselves in night; Four nights will quickly dream away the time; And then the moon, like to a silver bow New -bent in heaven, shall behold the night Of our solemnities. Go, Philostrate, Stir up the Athenian youth to merriments. Awake the pert and nimble spirit of mirth. Turn melancholy forth to funerals; The pale companion is not for our pomp. Philostrate exits. Hippolyta, I wooed thee with my sword And won thy love doing thee injuries, But I will wed thee in another key, With pomp, with triumph, and with reveling. 7 FTLN 0017 FTLN 0018 FTLN 0019 FTLN

9 9 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 1. SC. 1 Enter Egeus and his daughter Hermia, and Lysander and Demetrius. FTLN 0021 FTLN 0022 EGEUS Happy be Theseus, our renownèd duke! THESEUS Thanks, good Egeus. What s the news with thee? EGEUS Full of vexation come I, with complaint Against my child, my daughter Hermia. Stand forth, Demetrius. My noble lord, This man hath my consent to marry her. Stand forth, Lysander. And, my gracious duke, This man hath bewitched the bosom of my child. Thou, thou, Lysander, thou hast given her rhymes And interchanged love tokens with my child. Thou hast by moonlight at her window sung With feigning voice verses of feigning love And stol n the impression of her fantasy With bracelets of thy hair, rings, gauds, conceits, Knacks, trifles, nosegays, sweetmeats messengers Of strong prevailment in unhardened youth. With cunning hast thou filched my daughter s heart, Turned her obedience (which is due to me) To stubborn harshness. And, my gracious duke, Be it so she will not here before your Grace Consent to marry with Demetrius, I beg the ancient privilege of Athens: As she is mine, I may dispose of her, Which shall be either to this gentleman Or to her death, according to our law Immediately provided in that case. FTLN 0023 FTLN 0024 FTLN FTLN 0026 FTLN 0027 FTLN 0028 FTLN 0029 FTLN FTLN 0031 FTLN 0032 FTLN 0033 FTLN 0034 FTLN FTLN 0036 FTLN 0037 FTLN 0038 FTLN 0039 FTLN FTLN 0041 FTLN 0042 FTLN 0043 FTLN 0044 FTLN FTLN 0046 FTLN 0047 FTLN 0048 FTLN 0049 THESEUS What say you, Hermia? Be advised, fair maid. To you, your father should be as a god, One that composed your beauties, yea, and one

10 11 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 1. SC. 1 To whom you are but as a form in wax By him imprinted, and within his power To leave the figure or disfigure it. Demetrius is a worthy gentleman. FTLN FTLN 0051 FTLN 0052 FTLN 0053 FTLN 0054 So is Lysander. FTLN 0055 THESEUS 55 FTLN 0056 But in this kind, wanting your father s voice, FTLN 0057 FTLN 0058 FTLN 0059 THESEUS THESEUS In himself he is, The other must be held the worthier. I would my father looked but with my eyes. Rather your eyes must with his judgment look. I do entreat your Grace to pardon me. I know not by what power I am made bold, Nor how it may concern my modesty In such a presence here to plead my thoughts; But I beseech your Grace that I may know The worst that may befall me in this case If I refuse to wed Demetrius. FTLN FTLN 0061 FTLN 0062 FTLN 0063 FTLN 0064 FTLN FTLN 0066 Either to die the death, or to abjure Forever the society of men. Therefore, fair Hermia, question your desires, Know of your youth, examine well your blood, Whether (if you yield not to your father s choice) You can endure the livery of a nun, For aye to be in shady cloister mewed, To live a barren sister all your life, Chanting faint hymns to the cold fruitless moon. Thrice-blessèd they that master so their blood To undergo such maiden pilgrimage, But earthlier happy is the rose distilled Than that which, withering on the virgin thorn, Grows, lives, and dies in single blessedness. FTLN 0067 FTLN 0068 FTLN 0069 FTLN FTLN 0071 FTLN 0072 FTLN 0073 FTLN 0074 FTLN FTLN 0076 FTLN 0077 FTLN 0078 FTLN 0079 FTLN

11 13 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 1. SC. 1 FTLN 0081 FTLN 0082 FTLN 0083 FTLN 0084 So will I grow, so live, so die, my lord, Ere I will yield my virgin patent up Unto his lordship whose unwishèd yoke My soul consents not to give sovereignty. THESEUS Take time to pause, and by the next new moon (The sealing day betwixt my love and me For everlasting bond of fellowship), Upon that day either prepare to die For disobedience to your father s will, Or else to wed Demetrius, as he would, Or on Diana s altar to protest For aye austerity and single life. FTLN FTLN 0086 FTLN 0087 FTLN 0088 FTLN 0089 FTLN FTLN 0091 FTLN 0092 FTLN 0093 FTLN 0094 DEMETRIUS Relent, sweet Hermia, and, Lysander, yield Thy crazèd title to my certain right. LYSANDER You have her father s love, Demetrius. Let me have Hermia s. Do you marry him. FTLN FTLN 0096 EGEUS Scornful Lysander, true, he hath my love; And what is mine my love shall render him. And she is mine, and all my right of her I do estate unto Demetrius., to Theseus I am, my lord, as well derived as he, As well possessed. My love is more than his; My fortunes every way as fairly ranked (If not with vantage) as Demetrius ; And (which is more than all these boasts can be) I am beloved of beauteous Hermia. Why should not I then prosecute my right? Demetrius, I ll avouch it to his head, Made love to Nedar s daughter, Helena, And won her soul; and she, sweet lady, dotes, FTLN 0097 FTLN 0098 FTLN 0099 FTLN LYSANDER FTLN 0101 FTLN 0102 FTLN 0103 FTLN 0104 FTLN FTLN 0106 FTLN 0107 FTLN 0108 FTLN 0109 FTLN

12 15 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 1. SC. 1 FTLN 0111 FTLN 0112 Devoutly dotes, dotes in idolatry, Upon this spotted and inconstant man. THESEUS I must confess that I have heard so much, And with Demetrius thought to have spoke thereof; But, being overfull of self-affairs, My mind did lose it. But, Demetrius, come, And come, Egeus; you shall go with me. I have some private schooling for you both. For you, fair Hermia, look you arm yourself To fit your fancies to your father s will, Or else the law of Athens yields you up (Which by no means we may extenuate) To death or to a vow of single life. Come, my Hippolyta. What cheer, my love? Demetrius and Egeus, go along. I must employ you in some business Against our nuptial, and confer with you Of something nearly that concerns yourselves. FTLN 0113 FTLN 0114 FTLN FTLN 0116 FTLN 0117 FTLN 0118 FTLN 0119 FTLN FTLN 0121 FTLN 0122 FTLN 0123 FTLN 0124 FTLN FTLN 0126 FTLN 0127 FTLN 0128 FTLN 0129 EGEUS With duty and desire we follow you. All but Hermia and Lysander exit. LYSANDER How now, my love? Why is your cheek so pale? How chance the roses there do fade so fast? FTLN FTLN 0131 FTLN 0132 FTLN 0133 Belike for want of rain, which I could well Beteem them from the tempest of my eyes. LYSANDER Ay me! For aught that I could ever read, Could ever hear by tale or history, The course of true love never did run smooth. But either it was different in blood FTLN 0134 FTLN FTLN 0136 FTLN 0137 FTLN 0138 FTLN 0139 O cross! Too high to be enthralled to low. LYSANDER Or else misgraffèd in respect of years

13 17 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 1. SC. 1 FTLN FTLN 0141 FTLN 0142 O spite! Too old to be engaged to young. LYSANDER Or else it stood upon the choice of friends O hell, to choose love by another s eyes! LYSANDER Or, if there were a sympathy in choice, War, death, or sickness did lay siege to it, Making it momentany as a sound, Swift as a shadow, short as any dream, Brief as the lightning in the collied night, That, in a spleen, unfolds both heaven and earth, And, ere a man hath power to say Behold! The jaws of darkness do devour it up. So quick bright things come to confusion. FTLN 0143 FTLN 0144 FTLN FTLN 0146 FTLN 0147 FTLN 0148 FTLN 0149 FTLN FTLN 0151 If then true lovers have been ever crossed, It stands as an edict in destiny. Then let us teach our trial patience Because it is a customary cross, As due to love as thoughts and dreams and sighs, Wishes and tears, poor fancy s followers. FTLN 0152 FTLN 0153 FTLN 0154 FTLN FTLN 0156 FTLN 0157 LYSANDER A good persuasion. Therefore, hear me, Hermia: I have a widow aunt, a dowager Of great revenue, and she hath no child. From Athens is her house remote seven leagues, And she respects me as her only son. There, gentle Hermia, may I marry thee; And to that place the sharp Athenian law Cannot pursue us. If thou lovest me, then Steal forth thy father s house tomorrow night, And in the wood a league without the town (Where I did meet thee once with Helena To do observance to a morn of May), There will I stay for thee. FTLN 0158 FTLN 0159 FTLN FTLN 0161 FTLN 0162 FTLN 0163 FTLN 0164 FTLN FTLN 0166 FTLN 0167 FTLN 0168 FTLN 0169 FTLN

14 19 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 1. SC. 1 My good Lysander, I swear to thee by Cupid s strongest bow, By his best arrow with the golden head, By the simplicity of Venus doves, By that which knitteth souls and prospers loves, And by that fire which burned the Carthage queen When the false Trojan under sail was seen, By all the vows that ever men have broke (In number more than ever women spoke), In that same place thou hast appointed me, Tomorrow truly will I meet with thee. FTLN 0171 FTLN 0172 FTLN 0173 FTLN 0174 FTLN FTLN 0176 FTLN 0177 FTLN 0178 FTLN 0179 FTLN FTLN 0181 FTLN 0182 LYSANDER Keep promise, love. Look, here comes Helena. Enter Helena. FTLN 0183 Godspeed, fair Helena. Whither away? HELENA FTLN 0184 FTLN FTLN 0186 FTLN 0187 FTLN 0188 FTLN 0189 FTLN FTLN 0191 FTLN 0192 FTLN 0193 FTLN 0194 FTLN FTLN 0196 FTLN 0197 FTLN 0198 Call you me fair? That fair again unsay. Demetrius loves your fair. O happy fair! Your eyes are lodestars and your tongue s sweet air More tunable than lark to shepherd s ear When wheat is green, when hawthorn buds appear. Sickness is catching. O, were favor so! Yours would I catch, fair Hermia, ere I go. My ear should catch your voice, my eye your eye; My tongue should catch your tongue s sweet melody. Were the world mine, Demetrius being bated, The rest I d give to be to you translated. O, teach me how you look and with what art You sway the motion of Demetrius heart! I frown upon him, yet he loves me still. HELENA O, that your frowns would teach my smiles such skill! FTLN 0199 FTLN

15 21 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 1. SC. 1 FTLN 0201 FTLN 0202 FTLN 0203 FTLN 0204 I give him curses, yet he gives me love. HELENA O, that my prayers could such affection move! The more I hate, the more he follows me. HELENA The more I love, the more he hateth me. His folly, Helena, is no fault of mine. FTLN FTLN 0206 HELENA None but your beauty. Would that fault were mine! Take comfort: he no more shall see my face. Lysander and myself will fly this place. Before the time I did Lysander see Seemed Athens as a paradise to me. O, then, what graces in my love do dwell That he hath turned a heaven unto a hell! FTLN 0207 FTLN 0208 FTLN 0209 FTLN FTLN 0211 FTLN 0212 LYSANDER Helen, to you our minds we will unfold. Tomorrow night when Phoebe doth behold Her silver visage in the wat ry glass, Decking with liquid pearl the bladed grass (A time that lovers flights doth still conceal), Through Athens gates have we devised to steal. FTLN 0213 FTLN 0214 FTLN FTLN 0216 FTLN 0217 FTLN 0218 And in the wood where often you and I Upon faint primrose beds were wont to lie, Emptying our bosoms of their counsel sweet, There my Lysander and myself shall meet, And thence from Athens turn away our eyes To seek new friends and stranger companies. Farewell, sweet playfellow. Pray thou for us, And good luck grant thee thy Demetrius. FTLN 0219 FTLN FTLN 0221 FTLN 0222 FTLN 0223 FTLN 0224 FTLN FTLN 0226

16 23 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 1. SC. 1 FTLN 0227 FTLN 0228 Keep word, Lysander. We must starve our sight From lovers food till morrow deep midnight. LYSANDER I will, my Hermia. Helena, adieu. As you on him, Demetrius dote on you! HELENA How happy some o er other some can be! Through Athens I am thought as fair as she. But what of that? Demetrius thinks not so. He will not know what all but he do know. And, as he errs, doting on Hermia s eyes, So I, admiring of his qualities. Things base and vile, holding no quantity, Love can transpose to form and dignity. Love looks not with the eyes but with the mind; And therefore is winged Cupid painted blind. Nor hath Love s mind of any judgment taste. Wings, and no eyes, figure unheedy haste. And therefore is Love said to be a child Because in choice he is so oft beguiled. As waggish boys in game themselves forswear, So the boy Love is perjured everywhere. For, ere Demetrius looked on Hermia s eyne, He hailed down oaths that he was only mine; And when this hail some heat from Hermia felt, So he dissolved, and show rs of oaths did melt. I will go tell him of fair Hermia s flight. Then to the wood will he tomorrow night Pursue her. And, for this intelligence If I have thanks, it is a dear expense. But herein mean I to enrich my pain, To have his sight thither and back again. Hermia exits. FTLN 0229 FTLN FTLN 0231 Lysander exits. FTLN 0232 FTLN 0233 FTLN 0234 FTLN FTLN 0236 FTLN 0237 FTLN 0238 FTLN 0239 FTLN FTLN 0241 FTLN 0242 FTLN 0243 FTLN 0244 FTLN FTLN 0246 FTLN 0247 FTLN 0248 FTLN 0249 FTLN FTLN 0251 FTLN 0252 FTLN 0253 FTLN 0254 FTLN FTLN 0256 FTLN 0257 She exits.

17 25 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 1. SC. 2 FTLN 0258 FTLN 0259 FTLN 0260 Scene 2 Enter Quince the carpenter, and Snug the joiner, and Bottom the weaver, and Flute the bellows-mender, and Snout the tinker, and Starveling the tailor. QUINCE BOTTOM Is all our company here? You were best to call them generally, man by man, according to the scrip. Here is the scroll of every man s name which FTLN 0261 FTLN 0262 QUINCE is thought fit, through all Athens, to play in our 5 FTLN 0263 interlude before the Duke and the Duchess on his FTLN 0264 wedding day at night. FTLN 0265 BOTTOM First, good Peter Quince, say what the play FTLN 0266 treats on, then read the names of the actors, and so FTLN 0267 grow to a point. 10 FTLN 0268 QUINCE Marry, our play is The most lamentable FTLN 0269 comedy and most cruel death of Pyramus and FTLN 0270 Thisbe. FTLN 0271 BOTTOM A very good piece of work, I assure you, and a FTLN 0272 merry. Now, good Peter Quince, call forth your 15 FTLN 0273 actors by the scroll. Masters, spread yourselves. FTLN 0274 FTLN 0275 QUINCE BOTTOM Answer as I call you. Nick Bottom, the weaver. Ready. Name what part I am for, and FTLN 0276 proceed. FTLN 0277 FTLN 0278 FTLN 0279 FTLN 0280 QUINCE BOTTOM QUINCE BOTTOM You, Nick Bottom, are set down for Pyramus. What is Pyramus a lover or a tyrant? A lover that kills himself most gallant for love. That will ask some tears in the true performing 20 FTLN 0281 of it. If I do it, let the audience look to their FTLN 0282 eyes. I will move storms; I will condole in some 25 FTLN 0283 FTLN 0284 FTLN 0285 measure. To the rest. Yet my chief humor is for a tyrant. I could play Ercles rarely, or a part to tear a cat in, to make all split: The raging rocks And shivering shocks Shall break the locks FTLN 0286 FTLN FTLN 0288

18 27 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 1. SC. 2 Of prison gates. And Phibbus car Shall shine from far And make and mar The foolish Fates. FTLN 0289 FTLN 0290 FTLN 0291 FTLN FTLN 0293 FTLN 0294 FTLN 0295 FTLN 0296 This was lofty. Now name the rest of the players. This is Ercles vein, a tyrant s vein. A lover is more condoling. Francis Flute, the bellows-mender. FTLN 0297 QUINCE 40 FTLN 0298 FTLN 0299 FTLN 0300 FTLN 0301 FTLN 0302 FLUTE QUINCE FLUTE QUINCE FLUTE Here, Peter Quince. Flute, you must take Thisbe on you. What is Thisbe a wand ring knight? It is the lady that Pyramus must love. Nay, faith, let not me play a woman. I have a 45 FTLN 0303 beard coming. FTLN 0304 QUINCE That s all one. You shall play it in a mask, and FTLN 0305 you may speak as small as you will. FTLN 0306 BOTTOM An I may hide my face, let me play Thisbe too. FTLN 0307 I ll speak in a monstrous little voice: Thisne, 50 FTLN 0308 Thisne! Ah Pyramus, my lover dear! Thy Thisbe FTLN 0309 dear and lady dear! FTLN 0310 QUINCE No, no, you must play Pyramus and, Flute, FTLN 0311 you Thisbe. FTLN 0312 FTLN 0313 BOTTOM QUINCE Well, proceed. Robin Starveling, the tailor. 55 FTLN 0314 STARVELING Here, Peter Quince. FTLN 0315 QUINCE Robin Starveling, you must play Thisbe s FTLN 0316 mother. Tom Snout, the tinker. FTLN 0317 FTLN 0318 SNOUT QUINCE Here, Peter Quince. You, Pyramus father. Myself, Thisbe s 60 FTLN 0319 father. Snug the joiner, you the lion s part. FTLN 0320 And I hope here is a play fitted. FTLN 0321 SNUG Have you the lion s part written? Pray you, if it FTLN 0322 be, give it me, for I am slow of study. 65 FTLN 0323 QUINCE You may do it extempore, for it is nothing but FTLN 0324 roaring.

19 29 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 1. SC. 2 BOTTOM 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 roar again! QUINCE An you should do it too terribly, you would fright the Duchess and the ladies that they would shriek, and that were enough to hang us all. That would hang us, every mother s son. FTLN 0325 FTLN 0326 FTLN FTLN 0328 FTLN 0329 FTLN 0330 FTLN 0331 FTLN 0332 ALL 75 FTLN 0333 BOTTOM I grant you, friends, if you should fright the FTLN 0334 ladies out of their wits, they would have no more FTLN 0335 discretion but to hang us. But I will aggravate my FTLN 0336 voice so that I will roar you as gently as any sucking FTLN 0337 dove. I will roar you an twere any nightingale. 80 FTLN 0338 QUINCE You can play no part but Pyramus, for Pyramus FTLN 0339 is a sweet-faced man, a proper man as one FTLN 0340 shall see in a summer s day, a most lovely gentlemanlike FTLN 0341 man. Therefore you must needs play FTLN 0342 Pyramus. 85 FTLN 0343 BOTTOM Well, I will undertake it. What beard were I FTLN 0344 best to play it in? FTLN 0345 FTLN 0346 QUINCE BOTTOM Why, what you will. I will discharge it in either your straw-color FTLN 0347 beard, your orange-tawny beard, your purple-in-grain 90 FTLN 0348 beard, or your French-crown-color beard, FTLN 0349 your perfit yellow. FTLN 0350 QUINCE Some of your French crowns have no hair at FTLN 0351 all, and then you will play barefaced. But, masters, FTLN 0352 here are your parts, giving out the parts, and I am 95 FTLN 0353 to entreat you, request you, and desire you to con FTLN 0354 them by tomorrow night and meet me in the palace FTLN 0355 wood, a mile without the town, by moonlight. There FTLN 0356 will we rehearse, for if we meet in the city, we shall FTLN FTLN 0358 FTLN 0359 FTLN 0360 BOTTOM be dogged with company and our devices known. In the meantime I will draw a bill of properties such as our play wants. I pray you fail me not. We will meet, and there we may rehearse

20 31 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 1. SC. 2 most obscenely and courageously. Take pains. Be perfit. Adieu. At the Duke s Oak we meet. Enough. Hold, or cut bowstrings. FTLN 0361 FTLN FTLN 0363 QUINCE FTLN 0364 BOTTOM They exit.

21 ACT 2 Scene 1 Enter a Fairy at one door and Robin Goodfellow at another. FTLN 0365 ROBIN How now, spirit? Whither wander you? FAIRY Over hill, over dale, Thorough bush, thorough brier, Over park, over pale, Thorough flood, thorough fire; I do wander everywhere, Swifter than the moon s sphere. And I serve the Fairy Queen, To dew her orbs upon the green. The cowslips tall her pensioners be; In their gold coats spots you see; Those be rubies, fairy favors; In those freckles live their savors. I must go seek some dewdrops here And hang a pearl in every cowslip s ear. Farewell, thou lob of spirits. I ll be gone. Our queen and all her elves come here anon. FTLN 0366 FTLN 0367 FTLN 0368 FTLN FTLN 0370 FTLN 0371 FTLN 0372 FTLN 0373 FTLN FTLN 0375 FTLN 0376 FTLN 0377 FTLN 0378 FTLN FTLN 0380 FTLN 0381 FTLN 0382 FTLN 0383 ROBIN The King doth keep his revels here tonight. Take heed the Queen come not within his sight, 35

22 37 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 2. SC. 1 For Oberon is passing fell and wrath Because that she, as her attendant, hath A lovely boy stolen from an Indian king; She never had so sweet a changeling. And jealous Oberon would have the child Knight of his train, to trace the forests wild. But she perforce withholds the lovèd boy, Crowns him with flowers, and makes him all her joy. And now they never meet in grove or green, By fountain clear, or spangled starlight sheen, But they do square, that all their elves for fear Creep into acorn cups and hide them there. FTLN FTLN 0385 FTLN 0386 FTLN 0387 FTLN 0388 FTLN FTLN 0390 FTLN 0391 FTLN 0392 FTLN 0393 FTLN FTLN 0395 FTLN 0396 FAIRY Either I mistake your shape and making quite, Or else you are that shrewd and knavish sprite Called Robin Goodfellow. Are not you he That frights the maidens of the villagery, Skim milk, and sometimes labor in the quern And bootless make the breathless huswife churn, And sometime make the drink to bear no barm, Mislead night wanderers, laughing at their harm? Those that Hobgoblin call you, and sweet Puck, You do their work, and they shall have good luck. Are not you he? Thou speakest aright. FTLN 0397 FTLN 0398 FTLN FTLN 0400 FTLN 0401 FTLN 0402 FTLN 0403 FTLN FTLN 0405 FTLN 0406 FTLN 0407 FTLN 0408 ROBIN FTLN 0409 I am that merry wanderer of the night. 45 FTLN 0410 I jest to Oberon and make him smile FTLN 0411 When I a fat and bean-fed horse beguile, FTLN 0412 Neighing in likeness of a filly foal. FTLN 0413 And sometime lurk I in a gossip s bowl FTLN 0414 In very likeness of a roasted crab, 50 FTLN 0415 FTLN 0416 FTLN 0417 FTLN 0418 And, when she drinks, against her lips I bob And on her withered dewlap pour the ale. The wisest aunt, telling the saddest tale, Sometime for three-foot stool mistaketh me;

23 39 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 2. SC. 1 Then slip I from her bum, down topples she, And Tailor! cries, and falls into a cough, And then the whole choir hold their hips and loffe And waxen in their mirth and neeze and swear A merrier hour was never wasted there. But room, fairy. Here comes Oberon. FTLN FTLN 0420 FTLN 0421 FTLN 0422 FTLN 0423 FTLN FTLN 0425 FAIRY And here my mistress. Would that he were gone! Enter Oberon the King of Fairies at one door, with his train, and Titania the Queen at another, with hers. FTLN 0426 FTLN 0427 OBERON Ill met by moonlight, proud Titania. TITANIA What, jealous Oberon? Fairies, skip hence. I have forsworn his bed and company. FTLN 0428 FTLN 0429 OBERON Tarry, rash wanton. Am not I thy lord? 65 FTLN 0430 TITANIA Then I must be thy lady. But I know FTLN 0431 When thou hast stolen away from Fairyland FTLN 0432 And in the shape of Corin sat all day FTLN 0433 Playing on pipes of corn and versing love FTLN 0434 To amorous Phillida. Why art thou here, 70 FTLN 0435 Come from the farthest steep of India, FTLN 0436 But that, forsooth, the bouncing Amazon, FTLN 0437 Your buskined mistress and your warrior love, FTLN 0438 To Theseus must be wedded, and you come FTLN 0439 To give their bed joy and prosperity? 75 OBERON FTLN 0440 FTLN 0441 FTLN 0442 FTLN 0443 FTLN FTLN 0445 How canst thou thus for shame, Titania, Glance at my credit with Hippolyta, Knowing I know thy love to Theseus? Didst not thou lead him through the glimmering night From Perigouna, whom he ravishèd,

24 41 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 2. SC. 1 FTLN 0446 FTLN 0447 And make him with fair Aegles break his faith, With Ariadne and Antiopa? TITANIA These are the forgeries of jealousy; And never, since the middle summer s spring, Met we on hill, in dale, forest, or mead, By pavèd fountain or by rushy brook, Or in the beachèd margent of the sea, To dance our ringlets to the whistling wind, But with thy brawls thou hast disturbed our sport. Therefore the winds, piping to us in vain, As in revenge have sucked up from the sea Contagious fogs, which, falling in the land, Hath every pelting river made so proud That they have overborne their continents. The ox hath therefore stretched his yoke in vain, The plowman lost his sweat, and the green corn Hath rotted ere his youth attained a beard. The fold stands empty in the drownèd field, And crows are fatted with the murrain flock. The nine-men s-morris is filled up with mud, And the quaint mazes in the wanton green, For lack of tread, are undistinguishable. The human mortals want their winter here. No night is now with hymn or carol blessed. Therefore the moon, the governess of floods, Pale in her anger, washes all the air, That rheumatic diseases do abound. And thorough this distemperature we see The seasons alter: hoary-headed frosts Fall in the fresh lap of the crimson rose, And on old Hiems thin and icy crown An odorous chaplet of sweet summer buds Is, as in mockery, set. The spring, the summer, The childing autumn, angry winter, change Their wonted liveries, and the mazèd world FTLN 0448 FTLN FTLN 0450 FTLN 0451 FTLN 0452 FTLN 0453 FTLN FTLN 0455 FTLN 0456 FTLN 0457 FTLN 0458 FTLN FTLN 0460 FTLN 0461 FTLN 0462 FTLN 0463 FTLN FTLN 0465 FTLN 0466 FTLN 0467 FTLN 0468 FTLN FTLN 0470 FTLN 0471 FTLN 0472 FTLN 0473 FTLN FTLN 0475 FTLN 0476 FTLN 0477 FTLN 0478 FTLN FTLN 0480

25 43 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 2. SC. 1 By their increase now knows not which is which. And this same progeny of evils comes From our debate, from our dissension; We are their parents and original. FTLN 0481 FTLN 0482 FTLN 0483 FTLN FTLN 0485 FTLN 0486 FTLN 0487 FTLN 0488 OBERON Do you amend it, then. It lies in you. Why should Titania cross her Oberon? I do but beg a little changeling boy To be my henchman. FTLN 0489 TITANIA 125 FTLN 0490 The Fairyland buys not the child of me. FTLN 0491 His mother was a vot ress of my order, FTLN 0492 And in the spicèd Indian air by night FTLN 0493 Full often hath she gossiped by my side FTLN 0494 And sat with me on Neptune s yellow sands, 130 FTLN 0495 Marking th embarkèd traders on the flood, FTLN 0496 When we have laughed to see the sails conceive FTLN 0497 And grow big-bellied with the wanton wind; FTLN 0498 Which she, with pretty and with swimming gait, FTLN 0499 Following (her womb then rich with my young 135 FTLN 0500 squire), FTLN 0501 Would imitate and sail upon the land FTLN 0502 To fetch me trifles and return again, FTLN 0503 As from a voyage, rich with merchandise. FTLN 0504 But she, being mortal, of that boy did die, 140 FTLN 0505 And for her sake do I rear up her boy, FTLN 0506 FTLN 0507 OBERON TITANIA OBERON Set your heart at rest: And for her sake I will not part with him. How long within this wood intend you stay? Perchance till after Theseus wedding day. If you will patiently dance in our round And see our moonlight revels, go with us. If not, shun me, and I will spare your haunts. FTLN 0508 FTLN FTLN 0510 FTLN 0511 FTLN 0512 Give me that boy and I will go with thee.

26 45 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 2. SC. 1 TITANIA Not for thy fairy kingdom. Fairies, away. We shall chide downright if I longer stay. Titania and her fairies exit. FTLN 0513 FTLN OBERON FTLN 0515 Well, go thy way. Thou shalt not from this grove FTLN 0516 Till I torment thee for this injury. FTLN 0517 My gentle Puck, come hither. Thou rememb rest FTLN 0518 Since once I sat upon a promontory FTLN 0519 And heard a mermaid on a dolphin s back 155 FTLN 0520 Uttering such dulcet and harmonious breath FTLN 0521 That the rude sea grew civil at her song FTLN 0522 And certain stars shot madly from their spheres FTLN 0523 To hear the sea-maid s music. FTLN 0524 ROBIN OBERON I remember. 160 FTLN 0525 That very time I saw (but thou couldst not), FTLN 0526 Flying between the cold moon and the earth, FTLN 0527 Cupid all armed. A certain aim he took FTLN 0528 At a fair vestal thronèd by the west, FTLN 0529 And loosed his love-shaft smartly from his bow 165 FTLN 0530 As it should pierce a hundred thousand hearts. FTLN 0531 But I might see young Cupid s fiery shaft FTLN 0532 Quenched in the chaste beams of the wat ry moon, FTLN 0533 And the imperial vot ress passèd on FTLN 0534 In maiden meditation, fancy-free. 170 FTLN 0535 Yet marked I where the bolt of Cupid fell. FTLN 0536 It fell upon a little western flower, FTLN 0537 Before, milk-white, now purple with love s wound, FTLN 0538 And maidens call it love-in-idleness. FTLN 0539 Fetch me that flower; the herb I showed thee once. 175 FTLN 0540 The juice of it on sleeping eyelids laid FTLN 0541 Will make or man or woman madly dote FTLN 0542 Upon the next live creature that it sees. FTLN 0543 Fetch me this herb, and be thou here again FTLN 0544 Ere the leviathan can swim a league. 180

27 47 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 2. SC. 1 FTLN 0545 FTLN 0546 ROBIN I ll put a girdle round about the Earth In forty minutes. OBERON Having once this juice, I ll watch Titania when she is asleep And drop the liquor of it in her eyes. The next thing then she, waking, looks upon (Be it on lion, bear, or wolf, or bull, On meddling monkey, or on busy ape) She shall pursue it with the soul of love. And ere I take this charm from off her sight (As I can take it with another herb), I ll make her render up her page to me. But who comes here? I am invisible, And I will overhear their conference. Enter Demetrius, Helena following him. He exits. FTLN 0547 FTLN 0548 FTLN FTLN 0550 FTLN 0551 FTLN 0552 FTLN 0553 FTLN FTLN 0555 FTLN 0556 FTLN 0557 FTLN 0558 DEMETRIUS I love thee not; therefore pursue me not. Where is Lysander and fair Hermia? The one I ll stay; the other stayeth me. Thou told st me they were stol n unto this wood, And here am I, and wood within this wood Because I cannot meet my Hermia. Hence, get thee gone, and follow me no more. FTLN FTLN 0560 FTLN 0561 FTLN 0562 FTLN 0563 FTLN FTLN 0565 HELENA You draw me, you hard-hearted adamant! But yet you draw not iron, for my heart Is true as steel. Leave you your power to draw, And I shall have no power to follow you. FTLN 0566 FTLN 0567 FTLN 0568 FTLN FTLN 0570 FTLN 0571 FTLN 0572 FTLN 0573 DEMETRIUS Do I entice you? Do I speak you fair? Or rather do I not in plainest truth Tell you I do not, nor I cannot love you? HELENA And even for that do I love you the more.

28 49 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 2. SC. 1 I am your spaniel, and, Demetrius, The more you beat me I will fawn on you. Use me but as your spaniel: spurn me, strike me, Neglect me, lose me; only give me leave (Unworthy as I am) to follow you. What worser place can I beg in your love (And yet a place of high respect with me) Than to be usèd as you use your dog? FTLN FTLN 0575 FTLN 0576 FTLN 0577 FTLN 0578 FTLN FTLN 0580 FTLN 0581 FTLN 0582 FTLN 0583 DEMETRIUS Tempt not too much the hatred of my spirit, For I am sick when I do look on thee. HELENA And I am sick when I look not on you. FTLN DEMETRIUS You do impeach your modesty too much To leave the city and commit yourself Into the hands of one that loves you not, To trust the opportunity of night And the ill counsel of a desert place With the rich worth of your virginity. FTLN 0585 FTLN 0586 FTLN 0587 FTLN 0588 FTLN FTLN 0590 HELENA Your virtue is my privilege. For that It is not night when I do see your face, Therefore I think I am not in the night. Nor doth this wood lack worlds of company, For you, in my respect, are all the world. Then, how can it be said I am alone When all the world is here to look on me? FTLN 0591 FTLN 0592 FTLN 0593 FTLN FTLN 0595 FTLN 0596 FTLN 0597 DEMETRIUS I ll run from thee and hide me in the brakes And leave thee to the mercy of wild beasts. FTLN 0598 FTLN FTLN 0600 FTLN 0601 FTLN 0602 FTLN 0603 HELENA The wildest hath not such a heart as you. Run when you will. The story shall be changed: Apollo flies and Daphne holds the chase; The dove pursues the griffin; the mild hind

29 51 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 2. SC. 1 Makes speed to catch the tiger. Bootless speed When cowardice pursues and valor flies! FTLN FTLN 0605 FTLN 0606 FTLN 0607 FTLN 0608 DEMETRIUS I will not stay thy questions. Let me go, Or if thou follow me, do not believe But I shall do thee mischief in the wood. HELENA Ay, in the temple, in the town, the field, You do me mischief. Fie, Demetrius! Your wrongs do set a scandal on my sex. We cannot fight for love as men may do. We should be wooed and were not made to woo. Demetrius exits. I ll follow thee and make a heaven of hell To die upon the hand I love so well. Helena exits. FTLN FTLN 0610 FTLN 0611 FTLN 0612 FTLN 0613 FTLN FTLN 0615 FTLN 0616 FTLN 0617 FTLN 0618 OBERON Fare thee well, nymph. Ere he do leave this grove, Thou shalt fly him, and he shall seek thy love. ROBIN Ay, there it is. I pray thee give it me. Robin gives him the flower. I know a bank where the wild thyme blows, Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows, Quite overcanopied with luscious woodbine, With sweet muskroses, and with eglantine. There sleeps Titania sometime of the night, Lulled in these flowers with dances and delight. And there the snake throws her enameled skin, Weed wide enough to wrap a fairy in. And with the juice of this I ll streak her eyes And make her full of hateful fantasies. Take thou some of it, and seek through this grove. OBERON Enter Robin. Hast thou the flower there? Welcome, wanderer. FTLN FTLN 0620 FTLN 0621 FTLN 0622 FTLN 0623 FTLN FTLN 0625 FTLN 0626 FTLN 0627 FTLN 0628 FTLN FTLN 0630 FTLN 0631

30 53 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 2. SC. 2 He gives Robin part of the flower. A sweet Athenian lady is in love With a disdainful youth. Anoint his eyes, But do it when the next thing he espies May be the lady. Thou shalt know the man By the Athenian garments he hath on. Effect it with some care, that he may prove More fond on her than she upon her love. And look thou meet me ere the first cock crow. FTLN 0632 FTLN 0633 FTLN FTLN 0635 FTLN 0636 FTLN 0637 FTLN 0638 FTLN FTLN 0640 ROBIN Fear not, my lord. Your servant shall do so. They exit. Scene 2 Enter Titania, Queen of Fairies, with her train. TITANIA FTLN 0641 FTLN 0642 FTLN 0643 FTLN 0644 FTLN FTLN 0646 FTLN 0647 FTLN 0648 Come, now a roundel and a fairy song; Then, for the third part of a minute, hence Some to kill cankers in the muskrose buds, Some war with reremice for their leathern wings To make my small elves coats, and some keep back The clamorous owl that nightly hoots and wonders At our quaint spirits. Sing me now asleep. Then to your offices and let me rest. She lies down. CHORUS Fairies sing. FIRST FAIRY FTLN 0649 FTLN FTLN 0651 FTLN 0652 FTLN 0653 FTLN 0654 You spotted snakes with double tongue, Thorny hedgehogs, be not seen. Newts and blindworms, do no wrong, Come not near our Fairy Queen. Philomel, with melody Sing in our sweet lullaby.

31 55 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 2. SC. 2 SECOND FAIRY Lulla, lulla, lullaby, lulla, lulla, lullaby. Never harm Nor spell nor charm Come our lovely lady nigh. So good night, with lullaby. FTLN FTLN 0656 FTLN 0657 FTLN 0658 FTLN 0659 FTLN 0660 FIRST FAIRY Weaving spiders, come not here. 20 FTLN 0661 Hence, you long-legged spinners, hence. FTLN 0662 Beetles black, approach not near. FTLN 0663 Worm nor snail, do no offence. CHORUS FTLN 0664 FTLN FTLN 0666 FTLN 0667 FTLN 0668 FTLN 0669 FTLN FTLN 0671 FTLN 0672 Philomel, with melody Sing in our sweet lullaby. Lulla, lulla, lullaby, lulla, lulla, lullaby. Never harm Nor spell nor charm Come our lovely lady nigh. So good night, with lullaby. Titania sleeps. Hence, away! Now all is well. One aloof stand sentinel. Fairies exit. Enter Oberon, who anoints Titania s eyelids with the nectar. OBERON FTLN 0673 What thou seest when thou dost wake, FTLN 0674 Do it for thy true love take. FTLN 0675 Love and languish for his sake. 35 FTLN 0676 Be it ounce, or cat, or bear, FTLN 0677 Pard, or boar with bristled hair, FTLN 0678 In thy eye that shall appear FTLN 0679 When thou wak st, it is thy dear. FTLN 0680 Wake when some vile thing is near. 40 Enter Lysander and Hermia. He exits.

32 57 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 2. SC. 2 FTLN 0681 FTLN 0682 FTLN 0683 FTLN 0684 LYSANDER Fair love, you faint with wand ring in the wood. And, to speak troth, I have forgot our way. We ll rest us, Hermia, if you think it good, And tarry for the comfort of the day. Be it so, Lysander. Find you out a bed, For I upon this bank will rest my head. FTLN FTLN 0686 FTLN 0687 FTLN 0688 LYSANDER One turf shall serve as pillow for us both; One heart, one bed, two bosoms, and one troth. Nay, good Lysander. For my sake, my dear, Lie further off yet. Do not lie so near. FTLN 0689 FTLN FTLN 0691 FTLN 0692 FTLN 0693 LYSANDER O, take the sense, sweet, of my innocence! Love takes the meaning in love s conference. I mean that my heart unto yours is knit, So that but one heart we can make of it; Two bosoms interchainèd with an oath So then two bosoms and a single troth. Then by your side no bed-room me deny, For lying so, Hermia, I do not lie. FTLN 0694 FTLN FTLN 0696 FTLN 0697 FTLN 0698 Lysander riddles very prettily. Now much beshrew my manners and my pride If Hermia meant to say Lysander lied. But, gentle friend, for love and courtesy, Lie further off in human modesty. Such separation, as may well be said, Becomes a virtuous bachelor and a maid. So far be distant; and good night, sweet friend. Thy love ne er alter till thy sweet life end! FTLN 0699 FTLN FTLN 0701 FTLN 0702 FTLN 0703 FTLN 0704 FTLN FTLN 0706 FTLN 0707 LYSANDER Amen, amen to that fair prayer, say I, And then end life when I end loyalty! Here is my bed. Sleep give thee all his rest! FTLN 0708 FTLN 0709 FTLN

33 59 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 2. SC. 2 FTLN 0711 With half that wish the wisher s eyes be pressed! They sleep. Enter Robin. ROBIN Through the forest have I gone, But Athenian found I none On whose eyes I might approve This flower s force in stirring love. He sees Lysander. Night and silence! Who is here? Weeds of Athens he doth wear. This is he my master said Despisèd the Athenian maid. FTLN 0712 FTLN 0713 FTLN 0714 FTLN FTLN 0716 FTLN 0717 FTLN 0718 FTLN 0719 FTLN FTLN 0721 FTLN 0722 FTLN 0723 FTLN 0724 FTLN FTLN 0726 FTLN 0727 FTLN 0728 FTLN 0729 And here the maiden, sleeping sound On the dank and dirty ground. Pretty soul, she durst not lie Near this lack-love, this kill-courtesy. Churl, upon thy eyes I throw All the power this charm doth owe. He anoints Lysander s eyelids with the nectar. When thou wak st, let love forbid Sleep his seat on thy eyelid. So, awake when I am gone, For I must now to Oberon. Enter Demetrius and Helena, running. He exits. HELENA Stay, though thou kill me, sweet Demetrius. FTLN FTLN 0731 FTLN 0732 DEMETRIUS I charge thee, hence, and do not haunt me thus. HELENA O, wilt thou darkling leave me? Do not so.

34 61 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 2. SC. 2 FTLN 0733 DEMETRIUS Stay, on thy peril. I alone will go. HELENA LYSANDER HELENA LYSANDER Demetrius exits. O, I am out of breath in this fond chase. The more my prayer, the lesser is my grace. Happy is Hermia, wheresoe er she lies, For she hath blessèd and attractive eyes. How came her eyes so bright? Not with salt tears. If so, my eyes are oftener washed than hers. No, no, I am as ugly as a bear, For beasts that meet me run away for fear. Therefore no marvel though Demetrius Do as a monster fly my presence thus. What wicked and dissembling glass of mine Made me compare with Hermia s sphery eyne? But who is here? Lysander, on the ground! Dead or asleep? I see no blood, no wound. Lysander, if you live, good sir, awake., waking up And run through fire I will for thy sweet sake. Transparent Helena! Nature shows art, That through thy bosom makes me see thy heart. Where is Demetrius? O, how fit a word Is that vile name to perish on my sword! FTLN 0734 FTLN FTLN 0736 FTLN 0737 FTLN 0738 FTLN 0739 FTLN FTLN 0741 FTLN 0742 FTLN 0743 FTLN 0744 FTLN FTLN 0746 FTLN 0747 FTLN 0748 FTLN 0749 FTLN FTLN 0751 FTLN 0752 FTLN 0753 Do not say so. Lysander, say not so. What though he love your Hermia? Lord, what though? Yet Hermia still loves you. Then be content. FTLN 0754 FTLN FTLN 0756 FTLN 0757 Content with Hermia? No, I do repent The tedious minutes I with her have spent. Not Hermia, but Helena I love. Who will not change a raven for a dove? The will of man is by his reason swayed, And reason says you are the worthier maid. FTLN 0758 FTLN 0759 FTLN FTLN 0761 FTLN 0762 FTLN 0763

35 63 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 2. SC. 2 Things growing are not ripe until their season; So I, being young, till now ripe not to reason. And touching now the point of human skill, Reason becomes the marshal to my will And leads me to your eyes, where I o erlook Love s stories written in love s richest book. FTLN 0764 FTLN FTLN 0766 FTLN 0767 FTLN 0768 FTLN 0769 HELENA Wherefore was I to this keen mockery born? When at your hands did I deserve this scorn? Is t not enough, is t not enough, young man, That I did never, no, nor never can Deserve a sweet look from Demetrius eye, But you must flout my insufficiency? Good troth, you do me wrong, good sooth, you do, In such disdainful manner me to woo. But fare you well. Perforce I must confess I thought you lord of more true gentleness. O, that a lady of one man refused Should of another therefore be abused! She exits. FTLN FTLN 0771 FTLN 0772 FTLN 0773 FTLN 0774 FTLN FTLN 0776 FTLN 0777 FTLN 0778 FTLN 0779 FTLN FTLN 0781 LYSANDER She sees not Hermia. Hermia, sleep thou there, And never mayst thou come Lysander near. For, as a surfeit of the sweetest things The deepest loathing to the stomach brings, Or as the heresies that men do leave Are hated most of those they did deceive, So thou, my surfeit and my heresy, Of all be hated, but the most of me! And, all my powers, address your love and might To honor Helen and to be her knight., waking up Help me, Lysander, help me! Do thy best To pluck this crawling serpent from my breast. Ay me, for pity! What a dream was here! Lysander, look how I do quake with fear. Methought a serpent ate my heart away, FTLN 0782 FTLN 0783 FTLN 0784 FTLN FTLN 0786 FTLN 0787 FTLN 0788 FTLN 0789 FTLN FTLN 0791 He exits. FTLN 0792 FTLN 0793 FTLN 0794 FTLN FTLN 0796

36 65 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 2. SC. 2 And you sat smiling at his cruel prey. Lysander! What, removed? Lysander, lord! What, out of hearing? Gone? No sound, no word? Alack, where are you? Speak, an if you hear. Speak, of all loves! I swoon almost with fear. No? Then I well perceive you are not nigh. Either death or you I ll find immediately. She exits. FTLN 0797 FTLN 0798 FTLN 0799 FTLN FTLN 0801 FTLN 0802 FTLN 0803

37 ACT 3 Scene 1 With Titania still asleep onstage, enter the Clowns, Bottom, Quince, Snout, Starveling, Snug, and Flute. Are we all met? Pat, pat. And here s a marvels convenient place for our rehearsal. This green plot shall be FTLN 0804 BOTTOM FTLN 0805 QUINCE FTLN 0806 FTLN 0807 FTLN FTLN 0809 our stage, this hawthorn brake our tiring-house, and we will do it in action as we will do it before the Duke. Peter Quince? What sayest thou, bully Bottom? FTLN 0810 FTLN 0811 FTLN 0812 BOTTOM QUINCE BOTTOM There are things in this comedy of Pyramus FTLN 0813 and Thisbe that will never please. First, Pyramus 10 FTLN 0814 must draw a sword to kill himself, which the ladies FTLN 0815 cannot abide. How answer you that? FTLN 0816 SNOUT By r lakin, a parlous fear. FTLN 0817 STARVELING I believe we must leave the killing out, FTLN 0818 when all is done. 15 FTLN 0819 BOTTOM Not a whit! I have a device to make all well. FTLN 0820 Write me a prologue, and let the prologue seem to FTLN 0821 say we will do no harm with our swords, and that FTLN 0822 Pyramus is not killed indeed. And, for the more FTLN 0823 better assurance, tell them that I, Pyramus, am not 20 FTLN 0824 FTLN 0825 Pyramus, but Bottom the weaver. This will put them out of fear. 69

38 71 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 3. SC. 1 FTLN 0826 FTLN 0827 QUINCE Well, we will have such a prologue, and it shall be written in eight and six. No, make it two more. Let it be written in FTLN 0828 FTLN 0829 BOTTOM eight and eight. 25 FTLN 0830 SNOUT Will not the ladies be afeard of the lion? FTLN 0831 STARVELING I fear it, I promise you. FTLN 0832 BOTTOM Masters, you ought to consider with yourself, FTLN 0833 to bring in (God shield us!) a lion among ladies is a 30 FTLN 0834 most dreadful thing. For there is not a more fearful FTLN 0835 wildfowl than your lion living, and we ought to look FTLN 0836 to t. FTLN 0837 SNOUT Therefore another prologue must tell he is not FTLN 0838 a lion. 35 FTLN 0839 BOTTOM Nay, you must name his name, and half his FTLN 0840 face must be seen through the lion s neck, and he FTLN 0841 himself must speak through, saying thus, or to the FTLN 0842 same defect: Ladies, or Fair ladies, I would FTLN 0843 wish you, or I would request you, or I would 40 FTLN 0844 entreat you not to fear, not to tremble! My life for FTLN 0845 yours. If you think I come hither as a lion, it were FTLN 0846 pity of my life. No, I am no such thing. I am a man as FTLN 0847 other men are. And there indeed let him name his FTLN 0848 name and tell them plainly he is Snug the joiner. 45 FTLN 0849 QUINCE Well, it shall be so. But there is two hard FTLN 0850 things: that is, to bring the moonlight into a chamber, FTLN 0851 for you know Pyramus and Thisbe meet by FTLN 0852 moonlight. FTLN 0853 SNOUT Doth the moon shine that night we play our 50 FTLN 0854 play? FTLN 0855 BOTTOM A calendar, a calendar! Look in the almanac. FTLN 0856 Find out moonshine, find out moonshine. Quince takes out a book. Yes, it doth shine that night. Why, then, may you leave a casement of the great chamber window, where we play, open, and the moon may shine in at the casement. FTLN 0857 FTLN 0858 QUINCE BOTTOM 55 FTLN 0859 FTLN 0860

39 73 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 3. SC. 1 QUINCE Ay, or else one must come in with a bush of thorns and a lantern and say he comes to disfigure or to present the person of Moonshine. Then there is another thing: we must have a wall in the great chamber, for Pyramus and Thisbe, says the story, did talk through the chink of a wall. You can never bring in a wall. What say you, FTLN 0861 FTLN 0862 FTLN FTLN 0864 FTLN 0865 FTLN 0866 FTLN 0867 FTLN 0868 SNOUT Bottom? 65 FTLN 0869 BOTTOM Some man or other must present Wall. And FTLN 0870 let him have some plaster, or some loam, or some FTLN 0871 roughcast about him to signify wall, or let him FTLN 0872 hold his fingers thus, and through that cranny shall FTLN 0873 Pyramus and Thisbe whisper. 70 FTLN 0874 QUINCE If that may be, then all is well. Come, sit down, FTLN 0875 every mother s son, and rehearse your parts. Pyramus, FTLN 0876 you begin. When you have spoken your FTLN 0877 speech, enter into that brake, and so everyone FTLN FTLN 0879 FTLN 0880 FTLN 0881 FTLN 0882 ROBIN according to his cue. Enter Robin invisible to those onstage., aside What hempen homespuns have we swagg ring here So near the cradle of the Fairy Queen? What, a play toward? I ll be an auditor An actor too perhaps, if I see cause. Speak, Pyramus. Thisbe, stand forth. FTLN 0883 FTLN 0884 QUINCE BOTTOM, as Pyramus Thisbe, the flowers of odious savors sweet 80 FTLN 0885 QUINCE Odors, odors! BOTTOM, as Pyramus FTLN 0886 odors savors sweet. FTLN 0887 So hath thy breath, my dearest Thisbe dear. FTLN 0888 But hark, a voice! Stay thou but here awhile, 85 FTLN 0889 And by and by I will to thee appear. He exits. ROBIN, aside FTLN 0890 A stranger Pyramus than e er played here. He exits.

40 75 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 3. SC. 1 FTLN 0891 FLUTE Must I speak now? Ay, marry, must you, for you must understand FTLN 0892 QUINCE FTLN 0893 he goes but to see a noise that he heard and is to 90 FTLN 0894 FLUTE BOTTOM come again., as Thisbe Most radiant Pyramus, most lily-white of hue, Of color like the red rose on triumphant brier, Most brisky juvenal and eke most lovely Jew, FTLN 0895 FTLN 0896 FTLN 0897 FTLN FTLN 0899 FTLN 0900 QUINCE FTLN 0901 FTLN 0902 FTLN FTLN 0904 FLUTE FTLN 0905 FTLN 0906 FTLN 0907 As true as truest horse, that yet would never tire. I ll meet thee, Pyramus, at Ninny s tomb. 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. O! As Thisbe. As true as truest horse, that yet would never tire. Enter Robin, and Bottom as Pyramus with the ass-head., as Pyramus If I were fair, fair Thisbe, I were only thine. O monstrous! O strange! We are haunted. Pray, masters, fly, masters! Help! Quince, Flute, Snout, Snug, and Starveling exit. FTLN 0908 QUINCE 105 FTLN 0909 ROBIN FTLN 0910 FTLN 0911 FTLN 0912 FTLN FTLN 0914 FTLN 0915 FTLN 0916 I ll follow you. I ll lead you about a round, Through bog, through bush, through brake, through brier. Sometime a horse I ll be, sometime a hound, A hog, a headless bear, sometime a fire, And neigh, and bark, and grunt, and roar, and burn, Like horse, hound, hog, bear, fire, at every turn. He exits. Why do they run away? This is a knavery of them to make me afeard. FTLN 0917 BOTTOM FTLN

41 77 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 3. SC. 1 Enter Snout. FTLN 0919 FTLN 0920 FTLN 0921 FTLN 0922 SNOUT BOTTOM O Bottom, thou art changed! What do I see on thee? What do you see? You see an ass-head of your own, do you? Snout exits. FTLN 0923 QUINCE 120 FTLN 0924 translated! He exits. FTLN 0925 BOTTOM I see their knavery. This is to make an ass of FTLN 0926 me, to fright me, if they could. But I will not stir FTLN 0927 from this place, do what they can. I will walk up FTLN 0928 and down here, and I will sing, that they shall hear 125 FTLN 0929 I am not afraid. FTLN 0930 TITANIA BOTTOM TITANIA Enter Quince. Bless thee, Bottom, bless thee! Thou art He sings. The ouzel cock, so black of hue, With orange-tawny bill, The throstle with his note so true, FTLN 0931 FTLN 0932 FTLN FTLN 0934 The wren with little quill, waking up What angel wakes me from my flow ry bed? sings The finch, the sparrow, and the lark, The plainsong cuckoo gray, Whose note full many a man doth mark FTLN 0935 FTLN 0936 FTLN 0937 FTLN FTLN 0939 FTLN 0940 FTLN 0941 And dares not answer nay for, indeed, who would set his wit to so foolish a bird? Who would give a bird the lie though he cry cuckoo never so? I pray thee, gentle mortal, sing again. Mine ear is much enamored of thy note, So is mine eye enthrallèd to thy shape, And thy fair virtue s force perforce doth move me On the first view to say, to swear, I love thee. Methinks, mistress, you should have little FTLN 0942 FTLN FTLN 0944 FTLN 0945 FTLN 0946 FTLN 0947 BOTTOM

42 79 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 3. SC. 1 TITANIA BOTTOM TITANIA reason for that. And yet, to say the truth, reason and love keep little company together nowadays. The more the pity that some honest neighbors will not make them friends. Nay, I can gleek upon occasion. FTLN FTLN 0949 FTLN 0950 FTLN 0951 FTLN 0952 Thou art as wise as thou art beautiful. Not so neither; but if I had wit enough to get out of this wood, I have enough to serve mine own turn. FTLN FTLN 0954 FTLN 0955 FTLN 0956 Out of this wood do not desire to go. Thou shalt remain here whether thou wilt or no. I am a spirit of no common rate. The summer still doth tend upon my state, And I do love thee. Therefore go with me. I ll give thee fairies to attend on thee, And they shall fetch thee jewels from the deep And sing while thou on pressèd flowers dost sleep. And I will purge thy mortal grossness so That thou shalt like an airy spirit go. Peaseblossom, Cobweb, Mote, and Mustardseed! FTLN 0957 FTLN FTLN 0959 FTLN 0960 FTLN 0961 FTLN 0962 FTLN FTLN 0964 FTLN 0965 FTLN 0966 FTLN 0967 Enter four Fairies: Peaseblossom, Cobweb, Mote, and Mustardseed. Ready. FTLN 0968 PEASEBLOSSOM 165 FTLN 0969 FTLN 0970 COBWEB MOTE And I. And I. FTLN 0971 MUSTARDSEED And I. FTLN 0972 ALL TITANIA Where shall we go? FTLN FTLN 0974 FTLN 0975 FTLN 0976 FTLN 0977 Be kind and courteous to this gentleman. Hop in his walks and gambol in his eyes; Feed him with apricocks and dewberries, With purple grapes, green figs, and mulberries; The honey-bags steal from the humble-bees,

43 81 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 3. SC. 1 And for night-tapers crop their waxen thighs And light them at the fiery glowworms eyes To have my love to bed and to arise; And pluck the wings from painted butterflies To fan the moonbeams from his sleeping eyes. Nod to him, elves, and do him courtesies. Hail, mortal! FTLN FTLN 0979 FTLN 0980 FTLN 0981 FTLN 0982 FTLN FTLN 0984 PEASEBLOSSOM FTLN 0985 FTLN 0986 COBWEB MOTE Hail! Hail! FTLN 0987 MUSTARDSEED Hail! FTLN 0988 BOTTOM I cry your Worships mercy, heartily. I beseech 185 FTLN 0989 your Worship s name. FTLN 0990 FTLN 0991 COBWEB BOTTOM Cobweb. I shall desire you of more acquaintance, good FTLN 0992 Master Cobweb. If I cut my finger, I shall make FTLN 0993 bold with you. Your name, honest gentleman? 190 FTLN 0994 PEASEBLOSSOM Peaseblossom. FTLN 0995 BOTTOM I pray you, commend me to Mistress Squash, FTLN 0996 your mother, and to Master Peascod, your father. FTLN 0997 Good Master Peaseblossom, I shall desire you of FTLN 0998 more acquaintance, too. Your name, I beseech 195 FTLN 0999 you, sir? FTLN 1000 MUSTARDSEED Mustardseed. FTLN 1001 BOTTOM Good Master Mustardseed, I know your patience FTLN 1002 well. That same cowardly, giantlike ox-beef FTLN 1003 hath devoured many a gentleman of your house. I 200 FTLN 1004 FTLN 1005 FTLN 1006 TITANIA promise you, your kindred hath made my eyes water ere now. I desire you of more acquaintance, good Master Mustardseed. Come, wait upon him. Lead him to my bower. The moon, methinks, looks with a wat ry eye, And when she weeps, weeps every little flower, Lamenting some enforcèd chastity. Tie up my lover s tongue. Bring him silently. They exit. FTLN 1007 FTLN FTLN 1009 FTLN 1010 FTLN 1011

44 83 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 3. SC. 2 Scene 2 Enter Oberon, King of Fairies. FTLN 1012 FTLN 1013 FTLN 1014 OBERON I wonder if Titania be awaked; Then what it was that next came in her eye, Which she must dote on in extremity. Enter Robin Goodfellow. Here comes my messenger. How now, mad spirit? What night-rule now about this haunted grove? FTLN 1015 FTLN ROBIN FTLN 1017 FTLN 1018 FTLN 1019 FTLN 1020 FTLN FTLN 1022 FTLN 1023 FTLN 1024 FTLN 1025 FTLN FTLN 1027 FTLN 1028 FTLN 1029 FTLN 1030 FTLN FTLN 1032 FTLN 1033 FTLN 1034 FTLN 1035 FTLN FTLN 1037 FTLN 1038 FTLN 1039 FTLN 1040 My mistress with a monster is in love. Near to her close and consecrated bower, While she was in her dull and sleeping hour, A crew of patches, rude mechanicals, That work for bread upon Athenian stalls, Were met together to rehearse a play Intended for great Theseus nuptial day. The shallowest thick-skin of that barren sort, Who Pyramus presented in their sport, Forsook his scene and entered in a brake. When I did him at this advantage take, An ass s noll I fixèd on his head. Anon his Thisbe must be answerèd, And forth my mimic comes. When they him spy, As wild geese that the creeping fowler eye, Or russet-pated choughs, many in sort, Rising and cawing at the gun s report, Sever themselves and madly sweep the sky, So at his sight away his fellows fly, And, at our stamp, here o er and o er one falls. He Murder cries and help from Athens calls. Their sense thus weak, lost with their fears thus strong, Made senseless things begin to do them wrong;

45 85 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 3. SC. 2 For briers and thorns at their apparel snatch, Some sleeves, some hats, from yielders all things catch. I led them on in this distracted fear And left sweet Pyramus translated there. When in that moment, so it came to pass, Titania waked and straightway loved an ass. FTLN FTLN 1042 FTLN 1043 FTLN 1044 FTLN 1045 FTLN FTLN 1047 FTLN 1048 FTLN 1049 FTLN 1050 OBERON This falls out better than I could devise. But hast thou yet latched the Athenian s eyes With the love juice, as I did bid thee do? ROBIN I took him sleeping that is finished, too And the Athenian woman by his side, That, when he waked, of force she must be eyed. FTLN FTLN 1052 FTLN 1053 Enter Demetrius and Hermia. FTLN 1054 FTLN 1055 OBERON Stand close. This is the same Athenian. ROBIN This is the woman, but not this the man. DEMETRIUS O, why rebuke you him that loves you so? Lay breath so bitter on your bitter foe! They step aside. FTLN FTLN 1057 Now I but chide, but I should use thee worse, For thou, I fear, hast given me cause to curse. If thou hast slain Lysander in his sleep, Being o er shoes in blood, plunge in the deep And kill me too. The sun was not so true unto the day As he to me. Would he have stolen away From sleeping Hermia? I ll believe as soon This whole Earth may be bored, and that the moon May through the center creep and so displease FTLN 1058 FTLN 1059 FTLN 1060 FTLN FTLN 1062 FTLN 1063 FTLN 1064 FTLN 1065 FTLN FTLN 1067

46 87 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 3. SC. 2 FTLN 1068 FTLN 1069 FTLN 1070 Her brother s noontide with th Antipodes. It cannot be but thou hast murdered him. So should a murderer look, so dead, so grim. DEMETRIUS So should the murdered look, and so should I, Pierced through the heart with your stern cruelty. Yet you, the murderer, look as bright, as clear, As yonder Venus in her glimmering sphere. FTLN FTLN 1072 FTLN 1073 FTLN 1074 What s this to my Lysander? Where is he? Ah, good Demetrius, wilt thou give him me? FTLN 1075 FTLN FTLN 1077 DEMETRIUS I had rather give his carcass to my hounds. Out, dog! Out, cur! Thou driv st me past the bounds Of maiden s patience. Hast thou slain him, then? Henceforth be never numbered among men. O, once tell true! Tell true, even for my sake! Durst thou have looked upon him, being awake? And hast thou killed him sleeping? O brave touch! Could not a worm, an adder, do so much? An adder did it, for with doubler tongue Than thine, thou serpent, never adder stung. FTLN 1078 FTLN 1079 FTLN 1080 FTLN FTLN 1082 FTLN 1083 FTLN 1084 FTLN 1085 FTLN FTLN 1087 FTLN 1088 FTLN 1089 FTLN 1090 DEMETRIUS You spend your passion on a misprised mood. I am not guilty of Lysander s blood, Nor is he dead, for aught that I can tell. I pray thee, tell me then that he is well. DEMETRIUS An if I could, what should I get therefor? FTLN FTLN 1092 FTLN 1093 FTLN 1094 A privilege never to see me more. And from thy hated presence part I so. See me no more, whether he be dead or no. She exits.

47 89 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 3. SC. 2 DEMETRIUS There is no following her in this fierce vein. Here, therefore, for a while I will remain. So sorrow s heaviness doth heavier grow For debt that bankrout sleep doth sorrow owe, Which now in some slight measure it will pay, If for his tender here I make some stay. He lies down and falls asleep., to Robin What hast thou done? Thou hast mistaken quite And laid the love juice on some true-love s sight. Of thy misprision must perforce ensue Some true-love turned, and not a false turned true. FTLN 1095 FTLN FTLN 1097 FTLN 1098 FTLN 1099 FTLN 1100 OBERON FTLN FTLN 1102 FTLN 1103 FTLN 1104 ROBIN FTLN 1105 Then fate o errules, that, one man holding troth, FTLN 1106 A million fail, confounding oath on oath. 95 FTLN 1107 OBERON FTLN 1108 FTLN 1109 FTLN 1110 FTLN FTLN 1112 FTLN 1113 ROBIN FTLN 1114 About the wood go swifter than the wind, And Helena of Athens look thou find. All fancy-sick she is and pale of cheer With sighs of love that costs the fresh blood dear. By some illusion see thou bring her here. I ll charm his eyes against she do appear. I go, I go, look how I go, Swifter than arrow from the Tartar s bow. He exits., applying the nectar to Demetrius eyes Flower of this purple dye, Hit with Cupid s archery, Sink in apple of his eye. When his love he doth espy, Let her shine as gloriously As the Venus of the sky. When thou wak st, if she be by, Beg of her for remedy. OBERON FTLN 1115 FTLN FTLN 1117 FTLN 1118 FTLN 1119 FTLN 1120 FTLN FTLN 1122 Enter Robin.

48 91 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 3. SC. 2 ROBIN OBERON ROBIN Captain of our fairy band, Helena is here at hand, And the youth, mistook by me, Pleading for a lover s fee. Shall we their fond pageant see? Lord, what fools these mortals be! FTLN 1123 FTLN 1124 FTLN 1125 FTLN FTLN 1127 FTLN 1128 FTLN 1129 FTLN 1130 Stand aside. The noise they make Will cause Demetrius to awake. Then will two at once woo one. That must needs be sport alone. And those things do best please me That befall prepost rously. They step aside. FTLN FTLN 1132 FTLN 1133 FTLN 1134 Enter Lysander and Helena. LYSANDER FTLN 1135 FTLN FTLN 1137 FTLN 1138 FTLN 1139 FTLN 1140 Why should you think that I should woo in scorn? Scorn and derision never come in tears. Look when I vow, I weep; and vows so born, In their nativity all truth appears. How can these things in me seem scorn to you, Bearing the badge of faith to prove them true? HELENA You do advance your cunning more and more. When truth kills truth, O devilish holy fray! These vows are Hermia s. Will you give her o er? Weigh oath with oath, and you will nothing weigh. Your vows to her and me, put in two scales, Will even weigh, and both as light as tales. FTLN FTLN 1142 FTLN 1143 FTLN 1144 FTLN 1145 FTLN FTLN 1147 FTLN 1148 FTLN 1149 LYSANDER I had no judgment when to her I swore. HELENA Nor none, in my mind, now you give her o er.

49 93 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 3. SC. 2 FTLN 1150 LYSANDER Demetrius loves her, and he loves not you., waking up O Helen, goddess, nymph, perfect, divine! To what, my love, shall I compare thine eyne? Crystal is muddy. O, how ripe in show Thy lips, those kissing cherries, tempting grow! That pure congealèd white, high Taurus snow, Fanned with the eastern wind, turns to a crow When thou hold st up thy hand. O, let me kiss This princess of pure white, this seal of bliss! DEMETRIUS FTLN FTLN 1152 FTLN 1153 FTLN 1154 FTLN 1155 FTLN FTLN 1157 FTLN 1158 HELENA O spite! O hell! I see you all are bent To set against me for your merriment. If you were civil and knew courtesy, You would not do me thus much injury. Can you not hate me, as I know you do, But you must join in souls to mock me too? If you were men, as men you are in show, You would not use a gentle lady so, To vow and swear and superpraise my parts, When, I am sure, you hate me with your hearts. You both are rivals and love Hermia, And now both rivals to mock Helena. A trim exploit, a manly enterprise, To conjure tears up in a poor maid s eyes With your derision! None of noble sort Would so offend a virgin and extort A poor soul s patience, all to make you sport. FTLN 1159 FTLN 1160 FTLN FTLN 1162 FTLN 1163 FTLN 1164 FTLN 1165 FTLN FTLN 1167 FTLN 1168 FTLN 1169 FTLN 1170 FTLN FTLN 1172 FTLN 1173 FTLN 1174 FTLN 1175 LYSANDER You are unkind, Demetrius. Be not so, For you love Hermia; this you know I know. And here with all goodwill, with all my heart, In Hermia s love I yield you up my part. And yours of Helena to me bequeath, Whom I do love and will do till my death. FTLN FTLN 1177 FTLN 1178 FTLN 1179 FTLN 1180 FTLN

50 95 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 3. SC. 2 FTLN 1182 HELENA Never did mockers waste more idle breath. DEMETRIUS Lysander, keep thy Hermia. I will none. If e er I loved her, all that love is gone. My heart to her but as guest-wise sojourned, And now to Helen is it home returned, There to remain. FTLN 1183 FTLN 1184 FTLN 1185 FTLN FTLN 1187 FTLN 1188 LYSANDER DEMETRIUS Helen, it is not so. Disparage not the faith thou dost not know, Lest to thy peril thou aby it dear. Look where thy love comes. Yonder is thy dear. FTLN 1189 FTLN 1190 FTLN LYSANDER LYSANDER Enter Hermia., to Lysander Dark night, that from the eye his function takes, The ear more quick of apprehension makes; Wherein it doth impair the seeing sense, It pays the hearing double recompense. Thou art not by mine eye, Lysander, found; Mine ear, I thank it, brought me to thy sound. But why unkindly didst thou leave me so? FTLN 1192 FTLN 1193 FTLN 1194 FTLN 1195 FTLN FTLN 1197 FTLN 1198 FTLN 1199 FTLN 1200 Why should he stay whom love doth press to go? What love could press Lysander from my side? Lysander s love, that would not let him bide, Fair Helena, who more engilds the night Than all yon fiery oes and eyes of light. Why seek st thou me? Could not this make thee know The hate I bear thee made me leave thee so? FTLN FTLN 1202 FTLN 1203 FTLN 1204 FTLN 1205 FTLN FTLN 1207 You speak not as you think. It cannot be.

51 97 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 3. SC. 2 HELENA Lo, she is one of this confederacy! Now I perceive they have conjoined all three To fashion this false sport in spite of me. Injurious Hermia, most ungrateful maid, Have you conspired, have you with these contrived, To bait me with this foul derision? Is all the counsel that we two have shared, The sisters vows, the hours that we have spent When we have chid the hasty-footed time For parting us O, is all forgot? All schooldays friendship, childhood innocence? We, Hermia, like two artificial gods, Have with our needles created both one flower, Both on one sampler, sitting on one cushion, Both warbling of one song, both in one key, As if our hands, our sides, voices, and minds Had been incorporate. So we grew together Like to a double cherry, seeming parted, But yet an union in partition, Two lovely berries molded on one stem; So with two seeming bodies but one heart, Two of the first, like coats in heraldry, Due but to one, and crownèd with one crest. And will you rent our ancient love asunder, To join with men in scorning your poor friend? It is not friendly; tis not maidenly. Our sex, as well as I, may chide you for it, Though I alone do feel the injury. FTLN 1208 FTLN 1209 FTLN 1210 FTLN FTLN 1212 FTLN 1213 FTLN 1214 FTLN 1215 FTLN FTLN 1217 FTLN 1218 FTLN 1219 FTLN 1220 FTLN FTLN 1222 FTLN 1223 FTLN 1224 FTLN 1225 FTLN FTLN 1227 FTLN 1228 FTLN 1229 FTLN 1230 FTLN FTLN 1232 FTLN 1233 FTLN 1234 FTLN 1235 I am amazèd at your words. I scorn you not. It seems that you scorn me. FTLN FTLN 1237 FTLN 1238 FTLN 1239 FTLN 1240 HELENA Have you not set Lysander, as in scorn, To follow me and praise my eyes and face, And made your other love, Demetrius,

52 99 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 3. SC. 2 Who even but now did spurn me with his foot, To call me goddess, nymph, divine and rare, Precious, celestial? Wherefore speaks he this To her he hates? And wherefore doth Lysander Deny your love (so rich within his soul) And tender me, forsooth, affection, But by your setting on, by your consent? What though I be not so in grace as you, So hung upon with love, so fortunate, But miserable most, to love unloved? This you should pity rather than despise. FTLN FTLN 1242 FTLN 1243 FTLN 1244 FTLN 1245 FTLN FTLN 1247 FTLN 1248 FTLN 1249 FTLN 1250 FTLN FTLN 1252 I understand not what you mean by this. HELENA Ay, do. Persever, counterfeit sad looks, Make mouths upon me when I turn my back, Wink each at other, hold the sweet jest up. This sport, well carried, shall be chronicled. If you have any pity, grace, or manners, You would not make me such an argument. But fare you well. Tis partly my own fault, Which death or absence soon shall remedy. FTLN 1253 FTLN 1254 FTLN 1255 FTLN FTLN 1257 FTLN 1258 FTLN 1259 FTLN 1260 LYSANDER Stay, gentle Helena. Hear my excuse, My love, my life, my soul, fair Helena. FTLN FTLN 1262 FTLN 1263 FTLN 1264 FTLN 1265 HELENA O excellent!, to Lysander Sweet, do not scorn her so., to Lysander If she cannot entreat, I can compel. DEMETRIUS LYSANDER Thou canst compel no more than she entreat. Thy threats have no more strength than her weak prayers. Helen, I love thee. By my life, I do. FTLN FTLN 1267 FTLN 1268 FTLN 1269

53 101 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 3. SC. 2 I swear by that which I will lose for thee, To prove him false that says I love thee not. FTLN 1270 FTLN FTLN 1272 FTLN 1273 FTLN 1274 FTLN 1275 DEMETRIUS I say I love thee more than he can do. LYSANDER If thou say so, withdraw and prove it too. DEMETRIUS Quick, come. Lysander, whereto tends all this? She takes hold of Lysander. LYSANDER FTLN FTLN 1277 FTLN 1278 FTLN 1279 FTLN 1280 Away, you Ethiop!, to Hermia No, no. He ll Seem to break loose. To Lysander. Take on as you would follow, But yet come not. You are a tame man, go! DEMETRIUS LYSANDER FTLN 1281 Hang off, thou cat, thou burr! Vile thing, let loose, 270 FTLN 1282 FTLN 1283 FTLN 1284 FTLN 1285 LYSANDER FTLN FTLN 1287 FTLN 1288 FTLN 1289 HELENA LYSANDER DEMETRIUS LYSANDER, to Hermia Or I will shake thee from me like a serpent. Why are you grown so rude? What change is this, Sweet love? Thy love? Out, tawny Tartar, out! Out, loathèd med cine! O, hated potion, hence! Do you not jest? Yes, sooth, and so do you. Demetrius, I will keep my word with thee. I would I had your bond. For I perceive A weak bond holds you. I ll not trust your word. FTLN 1290 FTLN FTLN 1292 FTLN 1293 What? Should I hurt her, strike her, kill her dead? Although I hate her, I ll not harm her so.

54 103 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 3. SC. 2 What, can you do me greater harm than hate? Hate me? Wherefore? O me, what news, my love? Am not I Hermia? Are not you Lysander? I am as fair now as I was erewhile. Since night you loved me; yet since night you left me. Why, then, you left me O, the gods forbid! In earnest, shall I say? LYSANDER Ay, by my life, And never did desire to see thee more. Therefore be out of hope, of question, of doubt. Be certain, nothing truer, tis no jest That I do hate thee and love Helena. Hermia turns him loose. FTLN 1294 FTLN 1295 FTLN FTLN 1297 FTLN 1298 FTLN 1299 FTLN 1300 FTLN FTLN 1302 FTLN 1303 FTLN 1304 FTLN 1305 FTLN FTLN 1307 FTLN 1308 FTLN 1309 O me! To Helena. You juggler, you cankerblossom, You thief of love! What, have you come by night And stol n my love s heart from him? FTLN 1310 HELENA FTLN 1311 Have you no modesty, no maiden shame, 300 FTLN 1312 No touch of bashfulness? What, will you tear FTLN 1313 Impatient answers from my gentle tongue? FTLN 1314 Fie, fie, you counterfeit, you puppet, you! Fine, i faith. Puppet? Why so? Ay, that way goes the game. Now I perceive that she hath made compare Between our statures; she hath urged her height, And with her personage, her tall personage, Her height, forsooth, she hath prevailed with him. And are you grown so high in his esteem Because I am so dwarfish and so low? How low am I, thou painted maypole? Speak! How low am I? I am not yet so low But that my nails can reach unto thine eyes. FTLN 1315 FTLN FTLN 1317 FTLN 1318 FTLN 1319 FTLN 1320 FTLN FTLN 1322 FTLN 1323 FTLN 1324

55 105 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 3. SC. 2 FTLN 1325 HELENA I pray you, though you mock me, gentlemen, Let her not hurt me. I was never curst; I have no gift at all in shrewishness. I am a right maid for my cowardice. Let her not strike me. You perhaps may think, Because she is something lower than myself, That I can match her. Lower? Hark, again! FTLN FTLN 1327 FTLN 1328 FTLN 1329 FTLN 1330 FTLN FTLN 1332 HELENA Good Hermia, do not be so bitter with me. I evermore did love you, Hermia, Did ever keep your counsels, never wronged you FTLN 1333 FTLN 1334 FTLN 1335 FTLN 1336 FTLN 1337 FTLN 1338 FTLN 1339 FTLN 1340 Save that, in love unto Demetrius, I told him of your stealth unto this wood. He followed you; for love, I followed him. But he hath chid me hence and threatened me To strike me, spurn me, nay, to kill me too. 325 FTLN FTLN 1342 FTLN 1343 FTLN 1344 FTLN 1345 And now, so you will let me quiet go, To Athens will I bear my folly back And follow you no further. Let me go. You see how simple and how fond I am. Why, get you gone. Who is t that hinders you? HELENA A foolish heart that I leave here behind. FTLN FTLN 1347 FTLN 1348 FTLN 1349 FTLN 1350 What, with Lysander? HELENA LYSANDER DEMETRIUS HELENA With Demetrius. Be not afraid. She shall not harm thee, Helena. No, sir, she shall not, though you take her part. O, when she is angry, she is keen and shrewd. She was a vixen when she went to school, And though she be but little, she is fierce. FTLN FTLN 1352 FTLN 1353

56 107 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 3. SC. 2 FTLN 1354 Little again? Nothing but low and little? Why will you suffer her to flout me thus? Let me come to her. LYSANDER Get you gone, you dwarf, You minimus of hind ring knotgrass made, You bead, you acorn FTLN 1355 FTLN FTLN 1357 FTLN 1358 FTLN 1359 FTLN 1360 FTLN 1361 DEMETRIUS In her behalf that scorns your services. 350 FTLN 1362 Let her alone. Speak not of Helena. FTLN 1363 Take not her part. For if thou dost intend FTLN 1364 Never so little show of love to her, FTLN 1365 Thou shalt aby it. FTLN 1366 LYSANDER Now she holds me not. 355 FTLN 1367 Now follow, if thou dar st, to try whose right, FTLN 1368 FTLN 1369 FTLN 1370 DEMETRIUS Follow? Nay, I ll go with thee, cheek by jowl. Demetrius and Lysander exit. You, mistress, all this coil is long of you. Helena retreats. Nay, go not back. I will not trust you, I, Nor longer stay in your curst company. Your hands than mine are quicker for a fray. My legs are longer though, to run away. She exits. HELENA FTLN OBERON ROBIN You are too officious Of thine or mine, is most in Helena. FTLN FTLN 1372 FTLN 1373 FTLN 1374 FTLN 1375 FTLN 1377 FTLN 1378 I am amazed and know not what to say., to Robin This is thy negligence. Still thou mistak st, Or else committ st thy knaveries willfully. Believe me, king of shadows, I mistook. Did not you tell me I should know the man By the Athenian garments he had on? She exits. FTLN 1379 FTLN 1380 FTLN

57 109 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 3. SC. 2 FTLN 1382 FTLN 1383 FTLN 1384 FTLN 1385 And so far blameless proves my enterprise That I have nointed an Athenian s eyes; And so far am I glad it so did sort, As this their jangling I esteem a sport. OBERON Thou seest these lovers seek a place to fight. Hie, therefore, Robin, overcast the night; The starry welkin cover thou anon With drooping fog as black as Acheron, And lead these testy rivals so astray As one come not within another s way. Like to Lysander sometime frame thy tongue; Then stir Demetrius up with bitter wrong. And sometime rail thou like Demetrius. And from each other look thou lead them thus, Till o er their brows death-counterfeiting sleep With leaden legs and batty wings doth creep. Then crush this herb into Lysander s eye, He gives a flower to Robin. Whose liquor hath this virtuous property, To take from thence all error with his might And make his eyeballs roll with wonted sight. When they next wake, all this derision Shall seem a dream and fruitless vision. And back to Athens shall the lovers wend, With league whose date till death shall never end. Whiles I in this affair do thee employ, I ll to my queen and beg her Indian boy; And then I will her charmèd eye release From monster s view, and all things shall be peace. FTLN FTLN 1387 FTLN 1388 FTLN 1389 FTLN 1390 FTLN FTLN 1392 FTLN 1393 FTLN 1394 FTLN 1395 FTLN FTLN 1397 FTLN 1398 FTLN 1399 FTLN 1400 FTLN FTLN 1402 FTLN 1403 FTLN 1404 FTLN 1405 FTLN FTLN 1407 FTLN 1408 FTLN 1409 ROBIN My fairy lord, this must be done with haste, For night s swift dragons cut the clouds full fast, And yonder shines Aurora s harbinger, At whose approach, ghosts wand ring here and there FTLN 1410 FTLN FTLN 1412 FTLN 1413 FTLN 1414

58 111 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 3. SC. 2 Troop home to churchyards. Damnèd spirits all, That in crossways and floods have burial, Already to their wormy beds are gone. For fear lest day should look their shames upon, They willfully themselves exile from light And must for aye consort with black-browed night. FTLN 1415 FTLN FTLN 1417 FTLN 1418 FTLN 1419 FTLN 1420 FTLN 1421 OBERON But we are spirits of another sort. 410 FTLN 1422 I with the Morning s love have oft made sport FTLN 1423 And, like a forester, the groves may tread FTLN 1424 Even till the eastern gate, all fiery red, FTLN 1425 Opening on Neptune with fair blessèd beams, FTLN 1426 Turns into yellow gold his salt-green streams. 415 FTLN 1427 But notwithstanding, haste! Make no delay. FTLN 1428 We may effect this business yet ere day. He exits. ROBIN FTLN 1429 FTLN 1430 FTLN FTLN 1432 FTLN 1433 Up and down, up and down, I will lead them up and down. I am feared in field and town. Goblin, lead them up and down. Here comes one. Enter Lysander. FTLN 1434 FTLN 1435 LYSANDER Where art thou, proud Demetrius? Speak thou now., in Demetrius voice Here, villain, drawn and ready. Where art thou? I will be with thee straight., in Demetrius voice Follow me, then, to plainer ground. Lysander exits. ROBIN FTLN 1436 LYSANDER 425 FTLN 1437 FTLN 1438 FTLN 1439 FTLN 1440 ROBIN DEMETRIUS Enter Demetrius. Lysander, speak again. Thou runaway, thou coward, art thou fled? Speak! In some bush? Where dost thou hide thy head? FTLN FTLN 1442

59 113 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 3. SC. 2 ROBIN, in Lysander s voice Thou coward, art thou bragging to the stars, Telling the bushes that thou look st for wars, And wilt not come? Come, recreant! Come, thou child! I ll whip thee with a rod. He is defiled That draws a sword on thee. FTLN 1443 FTLN 1444 FTLN 1445 FTLN FTLN 1447 FTLN 1448 FTLN 1449 DEMETRIUS ROBIN FTLN 1450 Yea, art thou there?, in Lysander s voice Follow my voice. We ll try no manhood here. They exit. Enter Lysander. LYSANDER FTLN 1451 He goes before me and still dares me on. 440 FTLN 1452 When I come where he calls, then he is gone. FTLN 1453 The villain is much lighter-heeled than I. FTLN 1454 I followed fast, but faster he did fly, FTLN 1455 That fallen am I in dark uneven way, FTLN 1456 And here will rest me. Come, thou gentle day, 445 FTLN 1457 For if but once thou show me thy gray light, FTLN 1458 FTLN 1459 I ll find Demetrius and revenge this spite. He lies down and sleeps. ROBIN DEMETRIUS ROBIN DEMETRIUS Enter Robin and Demetrius., in Lysander s voice Ho, ho, ho! Coward, why com st thou not? Abide me, if thou dar st, for well I wot Thou runn st before me, shifting every place, And dar st not stand nor look me in the face. Where art thou now?, in Lysander s voice Come hither. I am here. FTLN 1460 FTLN FTLN 1462 FTLN 1463 FTLN 1464 Nay, then, thou mock st me. Thou shalt buy this dear FTLN 1465 FTLN

60 115 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 3. SC. 2 FTLN 1467 FTLN 1468 FTLN 1469 FTLN 1470 If ever I thy face by daylight see. Now go thy way. Faintness constraineth me To measure out my length on this cold bed. By day s approach look to be visited. He lies down and sleeps. Enter Helena. HELENA FTLN 1471 O weary night, O long and tedious night, 460 FTLN 1472 Abate thy hours! Shine, comforts, from the east, FTLN 1473 That I may back to Athens by daylight FTLN 1474 From these that my poor company detest. FTLN 1475 And sleep, that sometimes shuts up sorrow s eye, FTLN Steal me awhile from mine own company. She lies down and sleeps. ROBIN FTLN 1477 FTLN 1478 FTLN 1479 FTLN 1480 FTLN Yet but three? Come one more. Two of both kinds makes up four. Here she comes, curst and sad. Cupid is a knavish lad Thus to make poor females mad. Enter Hermia. FTLN 1482 FTLN 1483 FTLN 1484 FTLN 1485 FTLN FTLN 1487 Never so weary, never so in woe, Bedabbled with the dew and torn with briers, I can no further crawl, no further 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! She lies down and sleeps. ROBIN FTLN 1488 FTLN 1489 FTLN 1490 FTLN FTLN 1492 On the ground Sleep sound. I ll apply To your eye, Gentle lover, remedy.

61 117 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 3. SC. 2 Robin applies the nectar to Lysander s eyes. 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. He exits. FTLN 1493 FTLN 1494 FTLN 1495 FTLN FTLN 1497 FTLN 1498 FTLN 1499 FTLN 1500 FTLN FTLN 1502 FTLN 1503 FTLN 1504

62 ACT 4 Scene 1 With the four lovers still asleep onstage, enter Titania, Queen of Fairies, and Bottom and Fairies, and Oberon, the King, behind them unseen by those onstage. FTLN 1505 FTLN 1506 FTLN 1507 FTLN 1508 TITANIA Come, sit thee down upon this flow ry bed, While I thy amiable cheeks do coy, And stick muskroses in thy sleek smooth head, And kiss thy fair large ears, my gentle joy. FTLN 1509 BOTTOM 5 FTLN 1510 PEASEBLOSSOM Ready. FTLN 1511 BOTTOM Scratch my head, Peaseblossom. Where s FTLN 1512 Monsieur Cobweb? FTLN 1513 FTLN 1514 COBWEB BOTTOM Ready. Monsieur Cobweb, good monsieur, get you 10 FTLN 1515 your weapons in your hand and kill me a red-hipped FTLN 1516 humble-bee on the top of a thistle, and, good FTLN 1517 monsieur, bring me the honey-bag. Do not fret FTLN 1518 yourself too much in the action, monsieur, and, FTLN 1519 good monsieur, have a care the honey-bag break 15 FTLN 1520 FTLN 1521 FTLN 1522 FTLN 1523 MUSTARDSEED Where s Peaseblossom? not; I would be loath to have you overflown with a honey-bag, signior. Cobweb exits. Where s Monsieur Mustardseed? Ready. 121

63 123 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 4. SC. 1 BOTTOM Give me your neaf, Monsieur Mustardseed. Pray you, leave your courtesy, good monsieur. MUSTARDSEED What s your will? BOTTOM Nothing, good monsieur, but to help Cavalery Cobweb to scratch. I must to the barber s, monsieur, for methinks I am marvels hairy about the face. And I am such a tender ass, if my hair do but tickle me, I must scratch. FTLN FTLN 1525 FTLN 1526 FTLN 1527 FTLN 1528 FTLN FTLN 1530 FTLN 1531 FTLN 1532 FTLN 1533 TITANIA What, wilt thou hear some music, my sweet love? I have a reasonable good ear in music. Let s have the tongs and the bones. BOTTOM FTLN FTLN 1535 FTLN 1536 FTLN 1537 FTLN 1538 TITANIA Or say, sweet love, what thou desirest to eat. 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. BOTTOM FTLN FTLN 1540 FTLN 1541 FTLN 1542 FTLN 1543 TITANIA I have a venturous fairy that shall seek The squirrel s hoard and fetch thee new nuts. 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. BOTTOM FTLN FTLN 1545 FTLN 1546 FTLN 1547 FTLN 1548 TITANIA Sleep thou, and I will wind thee in my arms. Fairies, begone, and be all ways away. Fairies exit. So doth the woodbine the sweet honeysuckle Gently entwist; the female ivy so Enrings the barky fingers of the elm. O, how I love thee! How I dote on thee! Bottom and Titania sleep. FTLN FTLN 1550 Enter Robin Goodfellow. FTLN 1551 OBERON Welcome, good Robin. Seest thou this sweet sight?

64 125 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 4. SC. 1 Her dotage now I do begin to pity. For, meeting her of late behind the wood, Seeking sweet favors 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 flouriets eyes, Like tears that did their own disgrace bewail. When I had at my pleasure taunted her, And she in mild terms begged my patience, I then did ask of her her changeling child, Which straight she gave me, and her fairy sent To bear him to my bower in Fairyland. And now I have the boy, I will undo This hateful imperfection of her eyes. And, gentle Puck, take this transformèd scalp From off the head of this Athenian swain, That he, awaking when the other do, 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. He applies the nectar to her eyes. 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 blessèd power. Now, my Titania, wake you, my sweet queen., waking My Oberon, what visions have I seen! Methought I was enamored of an ass. FTLN 1552 FTLN 1553 FTLN FTLN 1555 FTLN 1556 FTLN 1557 FTLN 1558 FTLN FTLN 1560 FTLN 1561 FTLN 1562 FTLN 1563 FTLN FTLN 1565 FTLN 1566 FTLN 1567 FTLN 1568 FTLN FTLN 1570 FTLN 1571 FTLN 1572 FTLN 1573 FTLN FTLN 1575 FTLN 1576 FTLN 1577 FTLN 1578 FTLN FTLN 1580 FTLN 1581 FTLN 1582 FTLN 1583 TITANIA OBERON There lies your love. How came these things to pass? O, how mine eyes do loathe his visage now! FTLN 1584 TITANIA 80 FTLN 1585

65 127 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 4. SC. 1 FTLN 1586 FTLN 1587 FTLN 1588 OBERON Silence awhile. Robin, take off this head. Titania, music call; and strike more dead Than common sleep of all these five the sense. TITANIA FTLN FTLN 1590 FTLN 1591 FTLN 1592 Music, ho, music such as charmeth sleep!, removing the ass-head from Bottom Now, when thou wak st, with thine own fool s eyes peep. ROBIN OBERON Sound music. Music. Come, my queen, take hands with me, And rock the ground whereon these sleepers be. Titania and Oberon dance. Now thou and I are new in amity, And will tomorrow midnight solemnly Dance in Duke Theseus house triumphantly, And bless it to all fair prosperity. There shall the pairs of faithful lovers be Wedded, with Theseus, all in jollity. FTLN 1593 FTLN FTLN 1595 FTLN 1596 FTLN 1597 FTLN 1598 FTLN FTLN 1600 FTLN 1601 FTLN 1602 ROBIN OBERON TITANIA Fairy king, attend and mark. I do hear the morning lark. Then, my queen, in silence sad Trip we after night s shade. We the globe can compass soon, Swifter than the wand ring moon. FTLN 1603 FTLN FTLN 1605 FTLN 1606 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. Oberon, Robin, and Titania exit. FTLN 1607 FTLN 1608 FTLN FTLN 1610 Wind horn. Enter Theseus and all his train, Hippolyta, Egeus.

66 129 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 4. SC. 1 THESEUS Go, one of you, find out the Forester. For now our observation is performed, 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. Dispatch, I say, and find the Forester. A Servant exits. We will, fair queen, up to the mountain s top And mark the musical confusion Of hounds and echo in conjunction. FTLN 1611 FTLN 1612 FTLN 1613 FTLN FTLN 1615 FTLN 1616 FTLN 1617 FTLN 1618 FTLN HIPPOLYTA FTLN 1620 FTLN 1621 FTLN 1622 FTLN 1623 FTLN FTLN 1625 FTLN 1626 I was with Hercules and Cadmus once, When in a wood of Crete they bayed the bear With hounds of Sparta. Never did I hear Such gallant chiding, for, besides the groves, The skies, the fountains, every region near Seemed all one mutual cry. I never heard So musical a discord, such sweet thunder. THESEUS My hounds are bred out of the Spartan kind, So flewed, so sanded; and their heads are hung With ears that sweep away the morning dew; Crook-kneed, and dewlapped like Thessalian bulls; Slow in pursuit, but matched in mouth like bells, Each under each. A cry more tunable Was never holloed to, nor cheered with horn, In Crete, in Sparta, nor in Thessaly. Judge when you hear. But soft! What nymphs are these? FTLN 1627 FTLN 1628 FTLN FTLN 1630 FTLN 1631 FTLN 1632 FTLN 1633 FTLN FTLN 1635 FTLN 1636 FTLN 1637 EGEUS 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. FTLN 1638 FTLN FTLN 1640

67 131 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 4. SC. 1 THESEUS 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? FTLN 1641 FTLN 1642 FTLN 1643 FTLN FTLN 1645 FTLN 1646 EGEUS THESEUS It is, my lord. FTLN 1647 Go, bid the huntsmen wake them with their horns. THESEUS A Servant exits. Shout within. Wind horns. They all start up. Good morrow, friends. Saint Valentine is past. Begin these woodbirds but to couple now? Demetrius, Helena, Hermia, and Lysander kneel. FTLN 1648 FTLN FTLN 1650 FTLN 1651 LYSANDER Pardon, my lord. THESEUS LYSANDER EGEUS 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? My lord, I shall reply amazèdly, 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 Hermia hither. Our intent Was to be gone from Athens, where we might, Without the peril of the Athenian law 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, They rise. FTLN 1652 FTLN 1653 FTLN FTLN 1655 FTLN 1656 FTLN 1657 FTLN 1658 FTLN FTLN 1660 FTLN 1661 FTLN 1662 FTLN 1663 FTLN FTLN 1665 FTLN 1666 FTLN 1667

68 133 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 4. SC. 1 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. FTLN 1668 FTLN FTLN 1670 DEMETRIUS My lord, fair Helen told me of their stealth, Of this their purpose hither to this wood, And I in fury hither followed them, Fair Helena 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 gaud 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 betrothed ere I saw Hermia. But like a sickness did I loathe this food. But, as in health, come to my natural taste, Now I do wish it, love it, long for it, And will forevermore be true to it. FTLN 1671 FTLN 1672 FTLN 1673 FTLN FTLN 1675 FTLN 1676 FTLN 1677 FTLN 1678 FTLN FTLN 1680 FTLN 1681 FTLN 1682 FTLN 1683 FTLN FTLN 1685 FTLN 1686 FTLN 1687 THESEUS Fair lovers, you are fortunately met. Of this discourse we more will hear 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 purposed hunting shall be set aside. Away with us to Athens. Three and three, We ll hold a feast in great solemnity. Come, Hippolyta. Theseus and his train, including Hippolyta and Egeus, exit. FTLN 1688 FTLN FTLN 1690 FTLN 1691 FTLN 1692 FTLN 1693 FTLN FTLN 1695 FTLN 1696 FTLN 1697 DEMETRIUS FTLN 1698 These things seem small and undistinguishable, FTLN 1699 Like far-off mountains turnèd into clouds. 195

69 135 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 4. SC. 1 Methinks I see these things with parted eye, When everything seems double. HELENA So methinks. And I have found Demetrius like a jewel, Mine own and not mine own. DEMETRIUS Are you sure That we are awake? It seems to me That yet we sleep, we dream. Do not you think The Duke was here and bid us follow him? FTLN 1700 FTLN 1701 FTLN 1702 FTLN 1703 FTLN FTLN 1705 FTLN 1706 FTLN 1707 FTLN 1708 Yea, and my father. FTLN FTLN 1710 FTLN 1711 FTLN 1712 FTLN 1713 HELENA LYSANDER DEMETRIUS And Hippolyta. And he did bid us follow to the temple. Why, then, we are awake. Let s follow him, And by the way let us recount our dreams. Lovers exit., waking up When my cue comes, call me, FTLN 1714 BOTTOM 210 FTLN 1715 and I will answer. My next is Most fair Pyramus. FTLN 1716 Hey-ho! Peter Quince! Flute the bellows-mender! FTLN 1717 Snout the tinker! Starveling! God s my life! Stolen FTLN 1718 hence and left me asleep! I have had a most rare FTLN 1719 vision. I have had a dream past the wit of man to say 215 FTLN 1720 FTLN 1721 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 FTLN 1722 FTLN 1723 FTLN 1724 FTLN 1725 FTLN 1726 FTLN 1727 FTLN 1728 he will offer to say what methought I had. The eye of man hath not heard, the ear of man hath not seen, man s hand is not able to taste, his tongue to conceive, nor his heart to report what my dream was. I will get Peter Quince to write a ballad of this 220 FTLN FTLN 1730 dream. It shall be called Bottom s Dream because it hath no bottom; and I will sing it in the

70 137 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 4. SC. 2 FTLN 1731 FTLN 1732 FTLN 1733 latter end of a play, before the Duke. Peradventure, to make it the more gracious, I shall sing it at her death. He exits. FTLN 1734 FTLN 1735 FTLN 1736 FTLN 1737 QUINCE STARVELING Scene 2 Enter Quince, Flute, Snout, and Starveling. Have you sent to Bottom s house? Is he come home yet? He cannot be heard of. Out of doubt he is transported. If he come not, then the play is marred. It goes FTLN 1738 FTLN 1739 FLUTE not forward, doth it? 5 FTLN 1740 QUINCE It is not possible. You have not a man in all FTLN 1741 Athens able to discharge Pyramus but he. FTLN 1742 FLUTE No, he hath simply the best wit of any handicraftman FTLN 1743 in Athens. 10 FTLN 1744 QUINCE Yea, and the best person too, and he is a very FTLN 1745 paramour for a sweet voice. FTLN 1746 FLUTE You must say paragon. A paramour is (God FTLN 1747 bless us) a thing of naught. Enter Snug the joiner. 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. FTLN 1748 SNUG 15 FTLN 1749 FTLN 1750 FTLN 1751 O, sweet bully Bottom! Thus hath he lost six FTLN 1752 FLUTE FTLN 1753 pence a day during his life. He could not have 20 FTLN 1754 FTLN 1755 FTLN 1756 FTLN 1757 scaped six pence a day. An the Duke had not given him six pence a day for playing Pyramus, I ll be hanged. He would have deserved it. Six pence a day in Pyramus, or nothing! Enter Bottom.

71 139 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 4. SC. 2 BOTTOM Where are these lads? Where are these hearts? QUINCE Bottom! O most courageous day! O most happy hour! Masters, I am to discourse wonders. But ask FTLN FTLN 1759 FTLN 1760 FTLN 1761 FTLN 1762 FTLN 1763 BOTTOM me not what; for, if I tell you, I am not true 30 FTLN 1764 Athenian. I will tell you everything right as it fell FTLN 1765 out. FTLN 1766 FTLN 1767 QUINCE BOTTOM Let us hear, sweet Bottom. Not a word of me. All that I will tell you is that FTLN 1768 the Duke hath dined. Get your apparel together, 35 FTLN 1769 good strings to your beards, new ribbons to your FTLN 1770 pumps. Meet presently at the palace. Every man FTLN 1771 look o er his part. For the short and the long is, our FTLN 1772 play is preferred. In any case, let Thisbe have clean FTLN 1773 linen, and let not him that plays the lion pare his 40 FTLN 1774 nails, for they shall hang out for the lion s claws. FTLN 1775 And, most dear actors, eat no onions nor garlic, for FTLN 1776 we are to utter sweet breath, and I do not doubt but FTLN 1777 to hear them say it is a sweet comedy. No more FTLN words. Away! Go, away! They exit.

72 ACT 5 Scene 1 Enter Theseus, Hippolyta, and Philostrate, Lords, and Attendants. FTLN 1779 HIPPOLYTA Tis strange, my Theseus, that these lovers speak of. THESEUS 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. 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. The poet s eye, in a fine frenzy rolling, Doth glance from heaven to Earth, from Earth to heaven, And as imagination bodies forth The forms of things unknown, the poet s pen Turns them to shapes and gives to airy nothing A local habitation and a name. Such tricks hath strong imagination That, if it would but apprehend some joy, 143 FTLN 1780 FTLN 1781 FTLN 1782 FTLN FTLN 1784 FTLN 1785 FTLN 1786 FTLN 1787 FTLN FTLN 1789 FTLN 1790 FTLN 1791 FTLN 1792 FTLN FTLN 1794 FTLN 1795 FTLN 1796 FTLN 1797 FTLN

73 145 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 5. SC. 1 FTLN 1799 FTLN 1800 FTLN 1801 It comprehends some bringer of that joy. Or in the night, imagining some fear, How easy is a bush supposed a bear! HIPPOLYTA But all the story of the night told over, And all their minds transfigured so together, More witnesseth than fancy s images And grows to something of great constancy, But, howsoever, strange and admirable. FTLN 1802 FTLN FTLN 1804 FTLN 1805 FTLN 1806 Enter Lovers: Lysander, Demetrius, Hermia, and Helena. THESEUS Here come the lovers full of joy and mirth. Joy, gentle friends! Joy and fresh days of love Accompany your hearts! More than to us Wait in your royal walks, your board, your bed! FTLN 1807 FTLN FTLN 1809 FTLN 1810 LYSANDER FTLN 1811 THESEUS Come now, what masques, what dances shall we have To wear away this long age of three hours Between our after-supper and bedtime? Where is our usual manager of mirth? What revels are in hand? Is there no play To ease the anguish of a torturing hour? Call Philostrate., coming forward Here, mighty Theseus. FTLN 1812 FTLN FTLN 1814 FTLN 1815 FTLN 1816 FTLN 1817 FTLN FTLN 1819 FTLN 1820 PHILOSTRATE THESEUS Say what abridgment have you for this evening, What masque, what music? How shall we beguile The lazy time if not with some delight?, giving Theseus a paper There is a brief how many sports are ripe. Make choice of which your Highness will see first. FTLN 1821 FTLN 1822 FTLN FTLN 1824 FTLN 1825 PHILOSTRATE

74 147 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 5. SC. 1 THESEUS The battle with the Centaurs, to be sung By an Athenian eunuch to the harp. We ll none of that. That have I told my love In glory of my kinsman Hercules. The riot of the tipsy Bacchanals, Tearing the Thracian singer in their rage. That is an old device, and it was played When I from Thebes came last a conqueror. The thrice-three Muses mourning for the death Of learning, late deceased in beggary. That is some satire, keen and critical, Not sorting with a nuptial ceremony. A tedious brief scene of young Pyramus And his love Thisbe, very tragical mirth. Merry and tragical? Tedious and brief? That is hot ice and wondrous strange snow! How shall we find the concord of this discord? FTLN 1826 FTLN 1827 FTLN FTLN 1829 FTLN 1830 FTLN 1831 FTLN 1832 FTLN FTLN 1834 FTLN 1835 FTLN 1836 FTLN 1837 FTLN FTLN 1839 FTLN 1840 FTLN 1841 FTLN 1842 PHILOSTRATE A play there is, my lord, some ten words long (Which is as brief as I have known a play), But by ten words, my lord, it is too long, Which makes it tedious; for in all the play, There is not one word apt, one player fitted. And tragical, my noble lord, it is. For Pyramus therein doth kill himself, Which, when I saw rehearsed, I must confess, Made mine eyes water; but more merry tears The passion of loud laughter never shed. FTLN FTLN 1844 FTLN 1845 FTLN 1846 FTLN 1847 FTLN FTLN 1849 FTLN 1850 FTLN 1851 FTLN 1852 THESEUS What are they that do play it? FTLN FTLN 1854 FTLN 1855 FTLN 1856 FTLN 1857 PHILOSTRATE Hard-handed men that work in Athens here, Which never labored in their minds till now, And now have toiled their unbreathed memories With this same play, against your nuptial.

75 149 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 5. SC. 1 THESEUS FTLN FTLN 1859 PHILOSTRATE FTLN 1860 FTLN 1861 FTLN 1862 FTLN FTLN 1864 FTLN 1865 THESEUS FTLN 1866 FTLN 1867 FTLN FTLN 1869 FTLN 1870 FTLN 1871 FTLN 1872 And we will hear it. No, my noble lord, It is not for you. I have heard it over, And it is nothing, nothing in the world, Unless you can find sport in their intents, Extremely stretched and conned with cruel pain To do you service. I will hear that play, For never anything can be amiss When simpleness and duty tender it. Go, bring them in and take your places, ladies. Philostrate exits. HIPPOLYTA I love not to see wretchedness o ercharged, And duty in his service perishing. THESEUS Why, gentle sweet, you shall see no such thing. HIPPOLYTA He says they can do nothing in this kind. THESEUS The kinder we, to give them thanks for nothing. Our sport shall be to take what they mistake; And what poor duty cannot do, noble respect Takes it in might, not merit. Where I have come, great clerks have purposèd To greet me with premeditated welcomes, Where I have seen them shiver and look pale, Make periods in the midst of sentences, Throttle their practiced accent in their fears, And in conclusion dumbly have broke off, Not paying me a welcome. Trust me, sweet, Out of this silence yet I picked a welcome, And in the modesty of fearful duty, I read as much as from the rattling tongue Of saucy and audacious eloquence. FTLN FTLN 1874 FTLN 1875 FTLN 1876 FTLN 1877 FTLN FTLN 1879 FTLN 1880 FTLN 1881 FTLN 1882 FTLN FTLN 1884 FTLN 1885 FTLN 1886 FTLN 1887

76 151 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 5. SC. 1 Love, therefore, and tongue-tied simplicity In least speak most, to my capacity. FTLN FTLN 1889 Enter Philostrate. FTLN 1890 FTLN 1891 PHILOSTRATE So please your Grace, the Prologue is addressed. Let him approach. THESEUS Enter the Prologue. PROLOGUE If we offend, it is with our goodwill. That you should think we come not to offend, But with goodwill. To show our simple skill, That is the true beginning of our end. Consider, then, we come but in despite. We do not come, as minding to content you, Our true intent is. All for your delight We are not here. That you should here repent you, The actors are at hand, and, by their show, You shall know all that you are like to know. Prologue exits. This fellow doth not stand upon points. He hath rid his prologue like a rough colt; he knows not the stop. A good moral, my lord: it is not enough to speak, but to speak true. Indeed he hath played on this prologue like a child on a recorder a sound, but not in government. His speech was like a tangled chain nothing impaired, but all disordered. Who is next? FTLN 1892 FTLN FTLN 1894 FTLN 1895 FTLN 1896 FTLN 1897 FTLN FTLN 1899 FTLN 1900 FTLN 1901 FTLN 1902 FTLN 1903 FTLN 1904 FTLN 1905 THESEUS LYSANDER 125 FTLN 1906 FTLN 1907 FTLN 1908 HIPPOLYTA 130 FTLN 1909 FTLN 1910 THESEUS FTLN 1911 Enter Pyramus (Bottom), and Thisbe (Flute), and Wall (Snout), and Moonshine (Starveling), and Lion (Snug), and Prologue (Quince). FTLN 1912, as Prologue Gentles, perchance you wonder at this show. QUINCE

77 153 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 5. SC. 1 But wonder on, till truth make all things plain. This man is Pyramus, if you would know. This beauteous lady Thisbe is certain. This man with lime and roughcast doth present Wall, that vile wall which did these lovers sunder; And through Wall s chink, poor souls, they are content To whisper, at the which let no man wonder. This man, with lantern, dog, and bush of thorn, Presenteth Moonshine, for, if you will know, By moonshine did these lovers think no scorn To meet at Ninus tomb, there, there to woo. This grisly beast (which Lion hight by name) The trusty Thisbe coming first by night Did scare away, or rather did affright; And, as she fled, her mantle she did fall, Which Lion vile with bloody mouth did stain. Anon comes Pyramus, sweet youth and tall, And finds his trusty Thisbe s mantle slain. Whereat, with blade, with bloody blameful blade, He bravely broached his boiling bloody breast. And Thisbe, tarrying in mulberry shade, His dagger drew, and died. For all the rest, Let Lion, Moonshine, Wall, and lovers twain At large discourse, while here they do remain. I wonder if the lion be to speak. No wonder, my lord. One lion may when many asses do. Lion, Thisbe, Moonshine, and Prologue exit., as Wall In this same interlude it doth befall That I, one Snout by name, present a wall; FTLN FTLN 1914 FTLN 1915 FTLN 1916 FTLN 1917 FTLN FTLN 1919 FTLN 1920 FTLN 1921 FTLN 1922 FTLN FTLN 1924 FTLN 1925 FTLN 1926 FTLN 1927 FTLN FTLN 1929 FTLN 1930 FTLN 1931 FTLN 1932 FTLN FTLN 1934 FTLN 1935 FTLN 1936 FTLN 1937 FTLN FTLN 1939 THESEUS FTLN 1940 DEMETRIUS FTLN 1941 SNOUT FTLN 1942 FTLN FTLN 1944 FTLN 1945 FTLN 1946 And such a wall as I would have you think That had in it a crannied hole or chink, Through which the lovers, Pyramus and Thisbe,

78 155 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 5. SC. 1 Did whisper often, very secretly. This loam, this roughcast, and this stone doth show That I am that same wall. The truth is so. And this the cranny is, right and sinister, Through which the fearful lovers are to whisper. Would you desire lime and hair to speak FTLN 1947 FTLN FTLN 1949 FTLN 1950 FTLN 1951 FTLN 1952 FTLN 1953 THESEUS better? 175 FTLN 1954 DEMETRIUS It is the wittiest partition that ever I heard FTLN 1955 discourse, my lord. FTLN 1956 THESEUS BOTTOM Pyramus draws near the wall. Silence., as Pyramus O grim-looked night! O night with hue so black! O night, which ever art when day is not! O night! O night! Alack, alack, alack! I fear my Thisbe s promise is forgot. And thou, O wall, O sweet, O lovely wall, That stand st between her father s ground and FTLN 1957 FTLN FTLN 1959 FTLN 1960 FTLN 1961 FTLN 1962 FTLN 1963 FTLN 1964 FTLN 1965 FTLN 1966 FTLN 1967 mine, Thou wall, O wall, O sweet and lovely wall, Show me thy chink to blink through with mine eyne. Thanks, courteous wall. Jove shield thee well for 185 FTLN FTLN 1969 FTLN 1970 FTLN 1971 this. But what see I? No Thisbe do I see. O wicked wall, through whom I see no bliss, Cursed be thy stones for thus deceiving me! The wall, methinks, being sensible, should FTLN 1972 FTLN 1973 THESEUS curse again. 195 FTLN 1974 BOTTOM No, in truth, sir, he should not. Deceiving FTLN 1975 FTLN 1976 FTLN 1977 me is Thisbe s cue. She is to enter now, and I am to spy her through the wall. You shall see it will fall pat as I told you. Yonder she comes., as Thisbe Enter Thisbe (Flute). FLUTE FTLN 1978 O wall, full often hast thou heard my moans 200

79 157 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 5. SC. 1 For parting my fair Pyramus and me. My cherry lips have often kissed thy stones, Thy stones with lime and hair knit up in thee., as Pyramus I see a voice! Now will I to the chink To spy an I can hear my Thisbe s face. Thisbe?, as Thisbe My love! Thou art my love, I think., as Pyramus Think what thou wilt, I am thy lover s grace, And, like Limander, am I trusty still., as Thisbe And I like Helen, till the Fates me kill., as Pyramus Not Shafalus to Procrus was so true., as Thisbe As Shafalus to Procrus, I to you., as Pyramus O kiss me through the hole of this vile wall., as Thisbe I kiss the wall s hole, not your lips at all., as Pyramus Wilt thou at Ninny s tomb meet me straightway?, as Thisbe Tide life, tide death, I come without delay. Bottom and Flute exit., as Wall Thus have I, Wall, my part dischargèd so, And, being done, thus Wall away doth go. He exits. Now is the wall down between the two neighbors. No remedy, my lord, when walls are so willful to hear without warning. This is the silliest stuff that ever I heard. The best in this kind are but shadows, and FTLN 1979 FTLN 1980 FTLN 1981 BOTTOM FTLN 1982 FTLN FTLN 1984 FTLN 1985 FTLN 1986 FTLN 1987 FLUTE BOTTOM FLUTE FTLN FTLN 1989 FTLN 1990 FTLN 1991 FTLN 1992 BOTTOM FLUTE BOTTOM FLUTE BOTTOM FTLN FTLN 1994 FTLN 1995 FTLN 1996 FLUTE SNOUT FTLN 1997 THESEUS FTLN FTLN 1999 DEMETRIUS FTLN 2000 FTLN 2001 FTLN 2002 HIPPOLYTA THESEUS

80 159 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 5. SC. 1 the worst are no worse, if imagination amend them. It must be your imagination, then, and not theirs. If we imagine no worse of them than they of FTLN FTLN 2004 FTLN 2005 FTLN 2006 HIPPOLYTA FTLN 2007 THESEUS FTLN 2008 themselves, they may pass for excellent men. Here 230 FTLN 2009 come two noble beasts in, a man and a lion. Enter Lion (Snug) and Moonshine (Starveling)., as Lion You ladies, you whose gentle hearts do fear The smallest monstrous mouse that creeps on floor, May now perchance both quake and tremble here, When lion rough in wildest rage doth roar. Then know that I, as Snug the joiner, am A lion fell, nor else no lion s dam; For if I should as lion come in strife Into this place, twere pity on my life. A very gentle beast, and of a good conscience. The very best at a beast, my lord, that e er I saw. This lion is a very fox for his valor. SNUG FTLN 2010 FTLN 2011 FTLN 2012 FTLN FTLN 2014 FTLN 2015 FTLN 2016 FTLN 2017 FTLN FTLN 2019 THESEUS FTLN 2020 FTLN 2021 DEMETRIUS FTLN 2022 FTLN 2023 LYSANDER 245 FTLN 2024 FTLN 2025 THESEUS DEMETRIUS True, and a goose for his discretion. Not so, my lord, for his valor cannot carry FTLN 2026 his discretion, and the fox carries the goose. FTLN 2027 THESEUS His discretion, I am sure, cannot carry his FTLN 2028 valor, for the goose carries not the fox. It is well. 250 FTLN 2029 Leave it to his discretion, and let us listen to the FTLN 2030 FTLN 2031 Moon., as Moonshine This lanthorn doth the hornèd moon present. He should have worn the horns on his STARVELING FTLN 2032 FTLN 2033 DEMETRIUS head. 255 FTLN 2034 THESEUS He is no crescent, and his horns are invisible FTLN 2035 within the circumference.

81 161 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 5. SC. 1 FTLN 2036 FTLN 2037 STARVELING, as Moonshine This lanthorn doth the hornèd moon present. Myself the man i th moon do seem to be. FTLN 2038 FTLN 2039 THESEUS man should be put into the lanthorn. How is it else 260 FTLN 2040 the man i th moon? FTLN 2041 DEMETRIUS He dares not come there for the candle, FTLN 2042 for you see, it is already in snuff. FTLN 2043 FTLN 2044 HIPPOLYTA change. I am aweary of this moon. Would he would 265 FTLN 2045 THESEUS It appears by his small light of discretion that FTLN 2046 he is in the wane; but yet, in courtesy, in all reason, FTLN 2047 we must stay the time. FTLN 2048 LYSANDER Proceed, Moon. 270 FTLN 2049 FTLN 2050 STARVELING, as Moonshine All that I have to say is to tell you that the lanthorn is the moon, I the man i th FTLN 2051 moon, this thornbush my thornbush, and this dog FTLN 2052 my dog. FTLN 2053 DEMETRIUS Why, all these should be in the lanthorn, 275 FTLN 2054 FTLN 2055 FTLN 2056 FTLN 2057, as Thisbe This is old Ninny s tomb. Where is my love?, as Lion O! The Lion roars. Thisbe runs off, dropping her mantle. Well roared, Lion. Well run, Thisbe. Well shone, Moon. Truly, the Moon shines with a good grace. Lion worries the mantle. Well moused, Lion. FLUTE SNUG FTLN 2058 FTLN 2059 FTLN 2060 DEMETRIUS THESEUS HIPPOLYTA 280 FTLN 2061 FTLN 2062 THESEUS This is the greatest error of all the rest; the for all these are in the moon. But silence. Here comes Thisbe. Enter Thisbe (Flute). Enter Pyramus (Bottom).

82 163 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 5. SC. 1 DEMETRIUS And then came Pyramus. FTLN FTLN 2064 And so the lion vanished., as Pyramus Sweet Moon, I thank thee for thy sunny beams. I thank thee, Moon, for shining now so bright, For by thy gracious, golden, glittering gleams, LYSANDER BOTTOM Thus die I, thus, thus, thus. Now am I dead; Lion exits. FTLN 2065 FTLN 2066 FTLN 2067 FTLN 2068 I trust to take of truest Thisbe sight. 290 FTLN 2069 But stay! O spite! FTLN 2070 But mark, poor knight, FTLN 2071 What dreadful dole is here! FTLN 2072 Eyes, do you see! FTLN 2073 How can it be! 295 FTLN 2074 O dainty duck! O dear! FTLN 2075 Thy mantle good FTLN 2076 What, stained with blood? FTLN 2077 Approach, ye Furies fell! FTLN 2078 O Fates, come, come, 300 FTLN 2079 Cut thread and thrum, FTLN 2080 Quail, crush, conclude, and quell! FTLN 2081 THESEUS This passion, and the death of a dear friend, FTLN 2082 would go near to make a man look sad. FTLN 2083 HIPPOLYTA Beshrew my heart but I pity the man. 305 BOTTOM, as Pyramus FTLN 2084 O, wherefore, Nature, didst thou lions frame, FTLN 2085 Since lion vile hath here deflowered my dear, FTLN 2086 Which is no, no which was the fairest dame FTLN 2087 That lived, that loved, that liked, that looked with FTLN 2088 cheer? 310 FTLN 2089 Come, tears, confound! FTLN 2090 Out, sword, and wound FTLN 2091 The pap of Pyramus; FTLN 2092 Ay, that left pap, FTLN 2093 Where heart doth hop. Pyramus stabs himself. 315 FTLN 2094 FTLN 2095

83 165 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 5. SC. 1 Now am I fled; My soul is in the sky. Tongue, lose thy light! Moon, take thy flight! Moonshine exits. Now die, die, die, die, die. Pyramus falls. No die, but an ace for him, for he is but one. Less than an ace, man, for he is dead, he is nothing. With the help of a surgeon he might yet recover and yet prove an ass. How chance Moonshine is gone before Thisbe comes back and finds her lover? She will find him by starlight. FTLN 2096 FTLN 2097 FTLN FTLN 2099 FTLN 2100 FTLN 2101 FTLN 2102 DEMETRIUS FTLN 2103 FTLN 2104 LYSANDER 325 FTLN 2105 FTLN 2106 THESEUS FTLN 2107 FTLN 2108 HIPPOLYTA 330 FTLN 2109 THESEUS FTLN 2110 FTLN 2111 FTLN 2112 HIPPOLYTA Enter Thisbe (Flute). Here she comes, and her passion ends the play. Methinks she should not use a long one for such a Pyramus. I hope she will be brief. A mote will turn the balance, which Pyramus, FTLN 2113 FTLN 2114 DEMETRIUS which Thisbe, is the better: he for a man, God 335 FTLN 2115 warrant us; she for a woman, God bless us. FTLN 2116 LYSANDER She hath spied him already with those FTLN 2117 sweet eyes. FTLN 2118 DEMETRIUS And thus she means, videlicet 340 FLUTE, as Thisbe FTLN 2119 Asleep, my love? FTLN 2120 What, dead, my dove? FTLN 2121 O Pyramus, arise! FTLN 2122 Speak, speak. Quite dumb? FTLN 2123 Dead? Dead? A tomb 345 FTLN 2124 Must cover thy sweet eyes. FTLN 2125 These lily lips, FTLN 2126 This cherry nose, FTLN 2127 These yellow cowslip cheeks FTLN 2128 Are gone, are gone! 350

84 167 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 5. SC. 1 Lovers, make moan; His eyes were green as leeks. O Sisters Three, Come, come to me FTLN 2129 FTLN 2130 FTLN 2131 FTLN 2132 FTLN FTLN 2134 FTLN 2135 FTLN 2136 FTLN 2137 FTLN FTLN 2139 FTLN 2140 FTLN 2141 FTLN 2142 With hands as pale as milk. Lay them in gore, Since you have shore With shears his thread of silk. Tongue, not a word! Come, trusty sword, Come, blade, my breast imbrue! Thisbe stabs herself. And farewell, friends. Thus Thisbe ends. Adieu, adieu, adieu. Thisbe falls. Moonshine and Lion are left to bury the FTLN 2143 THESEUS 365 FTLN 2144 dead. FTLN 2145 DEMETRIUS Ay, and Wall too. Bottom and Flute arise. No, I assure you, the wall is down that parted their fathers. Will it please you to see the Epilogue or to hear a Bergomask dance between two of our company? No epilogue, I pray you. For your play needs no excuse. Never excuse. For when the players are all dead, there need none to be blamed. Marry, if he that writ it had played Pyramus and hanged himself in Thisbe s garter, it would have been a fine tragedy; and so it is, truly, and very notably discharged. But, come, your Bergomask. Let your epilogue alone. Dance, and the players exit. The iron tongue of midnight hath told twelve. FTLN 2146 BOTTOM FTLN 2147 FTLN FTLN 2149 FTLN 2150 THESEUS FTLN 2151 FTLN 2152 FTLN FTLN 2154 FTLN 2155 FTLN 2156 FTLN 2157 FTLN FTLN 2159 FTLN 2160 FTLN 2161 Lovers, to bed! Tis almost fairy time. I fear we shall outsleep the coming morn As much as we this night have overwatched.

85 169 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 5. SC. 1 This palpable-gross play hath well beguiled The heavy gait of night. Sweet friends, to bed. A fortnight hold we this solemnity In nightly revels and new jollity. FTLN 2162 FTLN FTLN 2164 FTLN 2165 Enter Robin Goodfellow. They exit. FTLN 2166 ROBIN Now the hungry lion roars, And the wolf behowls the moon, Whilst the heavy plowman snores, All with weary task fordone. Now the wasted brands do glow, Whilst the screech-owl, screeching loud, Puts the wretch that lies in woe In remembrance of a shroud. Now it is the time of night That the graves, all gaping wide, Every one lets forth his sprite In the church-way paths to glide. And we fairies, that do run By the triple Hecate s team From the presence of the sun, Following darkness like a dream, Now are frolic. Not a mouse Shall disturb this hallowed house. I am sent with broom before, To sweep the dust behind the door. FTLN 2167 FTLN FTLN 2169 FTLN 2170 FTLN 2171 FTLN 2172 FTLN FTLN 2174 FTLN 2175 FTLN 2176 FTLN 2177 FTLN FTLN 2179 FTLN 2180 FTLN 2181 FTLN 2182 FTLN FTLN 2184 FTLN 2185 Enter Oberon and Titania, King and Queen of Fairies, with all their train. OBERON FTLN 2186 FTLN 2187 FTLN FTLN 2189 FTLN 2190 FTLN 2191 Through the house give glimmering light, By the dead and drowsy fire. Every elf and fairy sprite, Hop as light as bird from brier, And this ditty after me, Sing and dance it trippingly.

86 171 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 5. SC. 1 TITANIA First rehearse your song by rote, To each word a warbling note. Hand in hand, with fairy grace, Will we sing and bless this place. Oberon leads the Fairies in song and dance. FTLN 2192 FTLN FTLN 2194 FTLN 2195 OBERON FTLN 2196 FTLN 2197 FTLN FTLN 2199 FTLN 2200 FTLN 2201 FTLN 2202 FTLN FTLN 2204 FTLN 2205 FTLN 2206 FTLN 2207 FTLN FTLN 2209 FTLN 2210 FTLN 2211 FTLN 2212 FTLN FTLN 2214 FTLN 2215 FTLN 2216 FTLN 2217 Now, until the break of day, Through this house each fairy stray. To the best bride-bed will we, Which by us shall blessèd be, And the issue there create Ever shall be fortunate. So shall all the couples three Ever true in loving be, And the blots of Nature s hand Shall not in their issue stand. Never mole, harelip, nor scar, Nor mark prodigious, such as are Despisèd in nativity, Shall upon their children be. With this field-dew consecrate Every fairy take his gait, And each several chamber bless, Through this palace, with sweet peace. And the owner of it blest, Ever shall in safety rest. Trip away. Make no stay. Meet me all by break of day. All but Robin exit. ROBIN FTLN 2218 If we shadows have offended, 440 FTLN 2219 FTLN 2220 FTLN 2221 FTLN 2222 Think but this and all is mended: That you have but slumbered here While these visions did appear. And this weak and idle theme,

87 173 A Midsummer Night s Dream ACT 5. SC. 1 No more yielding but a dream, Gentles, do not reprehend. If you pardon, we will mend. And, as I am an honest Puck, If we have unearnèd luck Now to scape the serpent s tongue, We will make amends ere long. Else the Puck a liar call. So good night unto you all. Give me your hands, if we be friends, And Robin shall restore amends. FTLN FTLN 2224 FTLN 2225 FTLN 2226 FTLN 2227 FTLN FTLN 2229 FTLN 2230 FTLN 2231 FTLN 2232 FTLN He exits.