Enter Friar Lawrence with lanthorn, crow, and spade.

Fri. St. Francis be my fpeed! how oft to night Have my old feet ftumbled at graves? who's there? Enter Balthafar.

Balth. Here's one, a friend, and one that knows you well.

Fri. Blifs be upon you! Tell me, good my friend,
What torch is yond, that vainly lends his light
To grubs and eyelefs fculls? as I discern,
It burneth in the Capulets' Monument.
Balth. It doth fo, holy Sir,

And there's my master, one you dearly love.
Fri. Who is it?

Balth. Romeo.

Fri. How long hath he been there?

Balth. Full half an hour.

Fri. Go with me to the vault.

Balth. I dare not, Sir.

My mafter knows not, but I am gone hence;
And fearfully did menace me with death,

If I did ftay to look on his intents.

Fri. Stay then, I'll go alone; fear comes upon me;

O, much I fear fome ill unlucky thing.

Balth. As I did fleep under this yew-tree here, I dreamt, my mafter and another fought,

And that my master slew him.

Fri. Romeo!

Alack, alack, what blood is this, which stains
The ftony entrance of this fepulchre ?

What mean these masterlefs and goary fwords,
To lye difcolour'd by this place of peace?

Romeo! oh pale! who elfe? what Paris too?
And steep'd in blood? ah, what an unkind hour
Is guilty of this lamentable chance ?

The lady ftirs.

Jul. [awaking.] Oh comfortable Friar, where is my lord?

I do remember well, where I should be ;

And

And there I am; but where is Romeo?

Fri. I hear some noife! Lady, come from that nest Of death, contagion, and unnatural fleep; A greater Power, than we can contradict, Hath thwarted our intents; come, come away; Thy husband in thy bosom there lyes dead, And Paris too - Come, I'll difpose of thee Among a fifterhood of holy Nuns:

Stay not to queftion, for the Watch is coming.
Come, go, good Juliet; I dare no longer stay. [Exit.
Jul. Go, get thee hence, for I will not away.
What's here? a cup, clos'd in my true love's hand ♪
Poison, I fee, hath been his timeless end.
Oh churl, drink all, and leave no friendly drop
To help me after? I will kifs thy lips;
Haply, fome poifon yet doth hang on them;
To make me dye with a Restorative.

Thy lips are warm.

Enter Boy and Watch.

Watch. Lead, boy, which way?

Jul. Yea, noife?

Then I'll be brief. O happy dagger!

[Finding a dagger.

This is thy fheath, there rust and let me die.

[Kills herself. Boy. This is the place; there, where the torch doth burn.

Watch. The ground is bloody. Search about the
church-yard;

Go, fome of you, whom e'er you find, attach.
Pitiful fight! here lyes the County flain,
And Juliet bleeding, warm, and newly dead,
Who here hath lain these two days buried.
Go, tell the Prince, run to the Capulets,
Raise up the Montagues; Some others, fearch
We fee the Ground whereon these Woes do lye:
But the true ground of all thefe piteous Woes
We cannot without Circumftance descry.

Enter

Enter fome of the Watch, with Balthafar.

2 Watch. Here's Romeo's man, we found him in the church-yard.

1 Watch. Hold him in fafety, 'till the Prince comes hither.

3

Enter another Watchman, with Friar Lawrence.

Watch. Here is a Friar that trembles, fighs and
weeps:

We took this mattock and this fpade from him,
As he was coming from this church-yard fide.
1 Watch. A great fufpicion: ftay the Friar too.
Enter the Prince, and attendants.

Prince. What misadventure is fo early up,
That calls our perfon from our morning's Reit?
Enter Capulet and lady Capulet.

Cap. What should it be, that they so shriek abroad? La Cap. The people in the street cry, Romeo; Some, Fuliet; and fome, Paris; and all run

With open out-cry tow'rd our Monument.

Prince. What fear is this, which startles in

ears?

your

Watch. Sovereign, here lyes the County Paris flain, And Romeo dead, and Juliet (dead before)

Warm and new kill'd.

Prince. Search, seek, and know, how this foul mur

ther comes.

Watch. Here is a Friar, and flaughter'd Romeo's man, With inftruments upon them, fit to open

These dead men's tombs.

Cap. Oh, heav'n! oh, wife! look how our daughter bleeds!

This dagger hath mifta'en; for, loe! the sheath
Lies empty on the back of Montague,
The point mif-fheathed in my daughter's bofom.
La. Cap. Oh me, this fight of death is as a bell,
That warns my old age to a fepulchre.

Enter

Enter Montague.

Prince. Come, Montague, for thou art early up,
To fee thy son and heir now early down.

Mon. Alas, my liege, my wife is dead to night;
Grief of my fon's exile hath ftopt her breath:
What further woe confpires against my age?
Prince. Look, and thou fhalt fee.

Mon. Oh, thou untaught! what manners is in this, To prefs before thy father to a Grave?

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

And know their fpring, their head, their true defcent;
And then will I be General of your woes,

And lead you ev'n to Death. Mean time forbear,
And let mischance be flave to patience.

Bring forth the parties of fufpicion.

Fri. I am the greatest, able to do leaft,
Yet moft fufpected; as the time and place
Doth make against me, of this direful murther;
And here I ftand both to impeach and purge
My felf condemned, and my felf excus'd.

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

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

Romeo, there dead, was husband to that Juliet;
And fhe, there dead, that Romeo's faithful wife:
I married them; and their ftoln marriage-day
Was Tybalt's dooms-day, whofe untimely death
Banifh'd the new-made bridegroom from this city;
For whom, and not for Tybalt, Juliet pined.
You, to remove that fiege of grief from her,
Betroth'd, and would have married her perforce
To County Paris. Then comes the to me,
And, with wild looks, bid me devise fome means
To rid her from this fecond marriage;
Or, in my Cell, there would she kill her self.
Then gave I her (fo tutor'd by my art)
A fleeping potion, which fo took effect
VOL. VIII.

E

As

As I intended; for it wrought on her

The form of death. Mean time I writ to Romeo,
That he should hither come, as this dire night,
To help to take her from her borrowed Grave;
Being the time the potion's force fhould ceafe.
But he which bore my letter, Friar John,
Was ftaid by accident; and yesternight
Return'd my letter back; then all alone,
At the prefixed hour of her awaking,
Came I to take her from her kindred's Vault;
Meaning to keep her closely at my Cell,
'Till I conveniently could fend to Romeo.
But when I came, (fome minute ere the time
Of her awaking) here untimely lay
The noble Paris, and true Romeo dead.
She wakes, and I intreated her come forth,
And bear this work of heav'n with patience:
But then a noife did scare me from the tomb,
And fhe, too defp'rate, would not go with me:
But, as it seems, did violence on her felf.
All this I know, and to the marriage
Her nurfe is privy; but if aught in this
Mifcarried by my fault, let my old life
Be facrific'd, some hour before the time,
Unto the rigour of fevereft law.

Prince. We still have known thee for an holy man. Where's Romeo's man? what can he fay to this? Balth. I brought my mafter news of Juliet's death, And then in poft he came from Mantua

To this fame place, to this fame Monument.
This letter he early bid me give his father,

And threatned me with death, going to the Vault,
If I departed not, and left him there.

Prince. Give me the letter, I will look on it. Where is the County's page, that rais'd the Watch? Sirrah, what made your mafter in this place?

Page. He came with flowers to ftrew his lady's Grave, And bid me ftand aloof, and fo I did:

Anon comes one with light to ope the tomb,
And, by and by, my mafter drew on him;

And