Within this hour my man shall be with thee;
And bring thee cords made like a tackled stair 26,

Which to the high top-gallant of my joy
Must be my convoy in the secret night.

Farewell! Be trusty, and I'll quit thy pains.

Farewell!-Commend me to thy mistress.

1

Nurse. Now God in heaven bless thee!-Hark

you, sir.

Rom. What say'st thou, my dear nurse?

Nurse. Is your man secret? Did you ne'er hear

say

Two may keep counsel, putting one away?

Rom. I warrant thee; my man's as true as steel. Nurse. Well, sir; my mistress is the sweetest lady, -lord, lord!-when 'twas a little prating thing 27,-O, there's a nobleman in town, one Paris, that would fain lay knife aboard: but she, good soul, had as lieve see a toad, a very toad, as see him. I anger her sometimes, and tell her that Paris is the properer man: but, I'll warrant you, when I say so, she looks as pale as any clout in the varsal world. Doth not rosemary and Romeo begin both with a letter 28?

Rom. Ay, nurse; What of that? both with an R..

26 i. e. like stairs of rope in the tackle of a ship. A stair, for a flight of stairs, is still the language of Scotland, and was once common to both kingdoms.

27 So in Arthur Brooke's poem :

A pretty babe, quoth she, it was, when it was young, Lord, how it could full prettily have prated with its tongue.' 28 The Nurse is represented as a prating, silly creature; she says that she will tell Romeo a good joke about his mistress, and asks him whether rosemary and Romeo do not both begin with a letter: he says, Yes, an R. She, whom we must suppose could not read, thought he mocked her, and says, No, sure I know better, R is the dog's name, your's begins with some other letter. This is natural enough, and in character. R put her in mind of that sound which dogs make when they snarl. Ben

Nurse. Ah, mocker! that's the dog's name. R is for the dog. No; I know it begins with some other letter: and she hath the prettiest sententious of it, of you and rosemary, that it would do you good to hear it.

Rom. Commend me to thy lady.

Nurse. Ay, a thousand times. Peter!
Pet. Anon?

Nurse. Peter, take my fan, and go before.

SCENE V. Capulet's Garden.

Enter JULIET.

[Exit.

[Exeunt.

Jul. The clock struck nine, when I did send the

nurse;

In half an hour she promis'd to return.
Perchance, she cannot meet him: that's not so.-
O, she is lame! love's heralds should be thoughts1,
Jonson, in his English Grammar, says 'R is the dog's letter, and
hirreth in the sound.'

'Irritata canis quod R. R. quam plurima dicat.'

Lucil.

Nashe, in Summer's Last Will and Testament, 1600, speaking of dogs, says:

They arre and barke at night against the moone.' And Barclay, in his Ship of Fooles, pleasantly exemplifies it:'This man malicious which troubled is with wrath, Nought els soundeth but the hoorse letter R, Though all be well, yet he none aunswere hath, Save the dogges letter glowming with nar, nar.'

Erasmus, in explaining the adage 'Canina facundia,' says, ' R, litera quæ in rixando prima est, canina vocatur.' It is used more than once in this sense in Rabelais. And in the Alchemist, Subtle says, in making out Abel Drugger's name, 'And right anenst him a dog snarling er.'

1

1 The speech is thus continued in the quarto, 1597 :

should be thoughts,

And run more swift than hasty powder fir'd
Doth hurry from the fearful cannon's mouth.
Oh, now she comes! Tell me, gentle nurse,
What says my love?'

The greatest part of this scene is likewise added since that

Which ten times faster glide than the sun's beams,
Driving back shadows over louring hills:
Therefore do nimble-pinion'd doves draw love,
And therefore hath the wind-swift Cupid wings.
Now is the sun upon the highmost hill
Of this day's journey; and from nine till twelve
Is three long hours, yet she is not come.
Had she affections, and warm youthful blood,
She'd be as swift in motion as a ball;
My words would bandy her to my sweet love,
And his to me:

But old folks, many feign as they were dead;
Unwieldy, slow, heavy and pale as lead.

Enter Nurse and PETER.

O God, she comes! O honey nurse, what news?
Hast thou met with him? Send thy man away.
Nurse. Peter, stay at the gate. [Exit PETER.
Jul. Now, good sweet nurse,-
lord! why

look'st thou sad?

Though news be sad, yet tell them merrily;
If good, thou sham'st the musick of sweet news
By playing it to me with so sour a face.

Nurse. I am weary, give me leave awhile ;Fye, how my bones ache! What a jaunt have I had! Jul. I would, thou hadst my bones, and I thy news: Nay, come, I pray thee, speak ;-good, good nurse,

speak.

Nurse. Jesu, what haste? can you not stay awhile?

Do you not see, that I am out of breath?

edition. Shakspeare, however, seems to have thought one of the ideas comprised in the foregoing quotation from the earliest quarto too valuable to be lost. He has, therefore, inserted it in Romeo's first speech to the Apothecary, in Act v.:

'As violently as hasty powder fir'd

Doth hurry from the fatal cannon's womb.'

Jul. How art thou out of breath, when thou hast

breath

To say to me that thou art out of breath?
The excuse, that thou dost make in this delay,
Is longer than the tale thou dost excuse.
Is thy news good, or bad? answer to that;
Say either, and I'll stay the circumstance :
Let me be satisfied, Is't good or bad?

Nurse. Well, you have made a simple choice; you know not how to choose a man: Romeo! no, not he; though his face be better than any man's, yet his leg excels all men's; and for a hand, and a foot, and a body, -though they be not to be talked on, yet they are past compare: He is not the flower of courtesy, -but, I'll warrant him, as gentle as a lamb. Go thy ways, wench; serve God.What, have you dined at home?

Jul. No, no: But all this did I know before ; What says he of our marriage? what of that? Nurse. Lord, how my head akes! what a head have I?

It beats as it would fall in twenty pieces.
My back o't'other side,-O, my back, my back!-
Beshrew your heart, for sending me about,
To catch my death with jaunting up and down!

Jul. I'faith, I am sorry that thou art not well: Sweet, sweet, sweet nurse, tell me, what says my

love?

Nurse. Your love says like an honest gentleman, And a courteous, and a kind, and a handsome, And, I warrant, a virtuous:- Where is your mother?

Jul. Where is my mother?-why, she is within ; Where should she be? How oddly thou repliest? Your love says like an honest gentleman,

Where is your mother?
Nurse.

O, god's lady dear!

Are you so hot? Marry, come up, I trow;..

Is this the poultice for my aking bones?
Henceforward do your messages yourself.

Jul. Here's such a coil, come, what says Romeo?
Nurse. Have you got leave to go to shrift to-day?
Jul. I have.

Nurse. Then hie you hence to friar Laurence' cell, There stays a husband to make you a wife: Now comes the wanton blood up in your cheeks, They'll be in scarlet straight at any news. Hie you to church; I must another way, To fetch a ladder, by the which your love Must climb a bird's nest soon, when it is dark : I am the drudge, and toil in your delight; But you shall bear the burden soon at night. Go, I'll to dinner; hie you to the cell.

Jul. Hie to high fortune!-honest nurse, farewell. [Exeunt.

SCENE VI. Friar Laurence's Cell.

Enter FRIAR LAURENCE and ROMEO 1. Fri. So smile the heavens upon this holy act, That after-hours with sorrow chide us not!

Rom. Amen, amen! but come what sorrow can, It cannot countervail the exchange of joy That one short minute gives me in her sight: Do thou but close our hands with holy words, Then love-devouring death do what he dare, It is enough I may but call her mine.

Fri. These violent delights have violent ends2,

1 This scene is exhibited in quite another form in the first quarto, 1597. But it is hardly worth exhibiting here in its original state. The reader may see it in the variorum Shakspeare, or in the play as published by Steevens among the twenty quartos. 2 So in Shakspeare's Rape of Lucrece :

• These violent vanities can never last.'