Puck. On the ground Sleep sound: I'll apply To your eye, Gentle lover, remedy. Squeezing the juice on LYSANDER's eye. Thou tak'st True delight In the sight Of thy former lady's eye: And the country proverb known, Jack shall have Jill; Nought shall go ill; The man shall have his mare again,and all shall be well. [Exit PUCK.-DEM. HEL. &c. sleep. SCENE I.-The same. ACT IV. Enter TITANIA and BOTTOM, Fai ries attending; OBERON behind unseen. Titania. COME, sit thee down upon this flowery bed, And stick musk-roses in thy sleek smooth head, Peas. Ready. Bot. Scratch my head, Peas-blossom. Where's monsieur Cobweb? Cob. Ready. Bot. Monsieur Cobweb; good monsieur, get your weapons in your hand, and kill me a red-hipped humblebee on the top of a thistle; and, good monsieur, bring me the honey-bag. Do not fret yourself too much in the action, monsieur; and, good monsieur, have a care the honey-bag break not; I would be loath to have you overflown with a honey-bag, signior.-Where's monsieur Mustard-seed? Must. Ready. Bot. Give me your nief, monsieur Mustard-seed. Pray you, leave your courtesy, good monsieur. Must. What's your will? Bot. Nothing, good monsieur, but to help cavalere Cobweb to scratch.7 I must to the barber's, monsieur; for, methinks, I am marvellous hairy about the face: and I am such a tender ass, if my hair do but tickle me, I must scratch. Tita. What, wilt thou hear some music, my sweet love? Bot. I have a reasonable good ear in music: let us have the tongs and the bones. 8 Tita. Or, say, sweet love, what thou desir'st to eat. Bot. Truly, a peck of provender; I could munch your good dry oats. Methinks, I have a great desire to a bottle of hay good hay, sweet hay, hath no fellow. Tita. I have a venturous fairy that shall seek The squirrel's hoard, and fetch thee new nuts. Bot. I had rather have a handful, or two, of dried peas. But, I pray you, let none of your people stir me; I have an exposition of sleep come upon me. Tita. Sleep thou, and I will wind thee in my arms.➡ Fairies, be gone, and be all ways away. So doth the woodbine, the sweet honey suckle, Enrings the barky fingers of the elm. O, how I love thee! how I dote on thee! [They sleeft. [7] Without doubt it should be cavalero Peas-blossom as for cavalero Cobweb, he had just been despatched upon a perilous adventure. GREY. [8] The old rustic music of the tongs and key. This rough music is likewise mentioned by Marston, in an address ad rithmum prefixed to the second Book of his Satires, 1598: "Yee wel-match'd twins (whose like-tun'd tongs affords [9] What Shakspeare seems to mean, is this-So the woodbine, i. e. the Sweet honey-suckle, doth gently entwist the barky fingers of the elm, and so does the female ivy enring the same fingers. It is not unfrequent in the poets, as well as other writers, to explain one word by another which is better known. The reason why Shakspeare thought woodbine wanted illustration, perhaps is this. In some counties, by woodbine or woodbind would have been generally understood the ivy, which he had occasion to mention in the very next line. STEEVENS, [1] Shakspeare calls it female ivy, because it always requires some sup port, which is poetically called its husband. So Milton: "led the vine "To wed her elm: she spous'd, about him twines "Her marriageable arms-. "Ulmo conjuncta marito." Catull. "Platanusque calebs "Evincet ulmos." Hor. STEEVENS. Ob. Welcome,good Robin. See'st thou this sweet sight? Her dotage now I do begin to pity. For meeting her of late, behind the wood, And, gentle Puck, take this transformed scalp [Touching her eyes with an herb. See, as thou wast wont to see : power. Now, my Titania; wake you, my sweet queen. Ob. There lies your love. Tita. How came these things to pass? O, how mine eyes do loath his visage now! Ob. Silence a-while.-Robin, take off this head. STEEV [2] The eye of a flower is the technical term for its centre. [3] Dian's bud, is the bud of the Agnus Castus, or Chaste Tree. Thus, in "Macer's Herball, practysyd by Doctor Lynacre, translated out of Laten into Englyshe," &c. bl. 1. no date: "The vertue of this herbe is, that he wyll kepe a man and woman chaste," &c. Cupid's flower, is the Viola tricolor, Or Love in Idleness. STEEVENS. Titania, music call; and strike more dead Than common sleep, of all these five the sense. eyes peep. Ob. Sound, music. [Still music.] Come, my queen, take hand with me, And rock the ground whereon these sleepers be. And will, to-morrow midnight, solemnly, There shall the pairs of faithful lovers be Puck. Fairy king, attend, and mark; Ob. Then, my queen, in silence sad, Tita. Come, my lord; and in our flight, [Exeunt. [Horns sound within. -We will, fair queen, up to the mountain's top, Of hounds and echo in conjunction. [4] The honours due to the morning of May, I know not why Shakspeare calls this play A Midsummer-Night's Dream, when he so carefully informs us that it happened on the night preceding May day. JOHNSON. I imagine that the title of this play was suggested by the time it was first introduced on the stage, which was probably at Midsummer. "A Dream for the entertainment of a Midsummer-night." Twelfth-Night and The Winter's Tale had probably their titles from a similar circumstance. MALONE. In Knolle's Edin. Mag. STEEVENS. [5] Vaward is compounded of van and ward, the forepart. History of the Turks, the word vayvod is used in the same sense. Hip. I was with Hercules, and Cadmus, once, The. My hounds are bred out of the Spartan kind, Was never holla'd to, nor cheer'd with horn, In Crete, in Sparta, nor in Thessaly : Judge, when you hear.-But, soft; what nymphs are these? This Helena, old Nedar's Helena : I wonder at their being here together. The. No doubt, they rose up early, to observe The rite of May; and, hearing our intent, But, speak, Egeus; is not this the day That Hermia should give answer of her choice? Ege. It is, my lord. The. Go bid the huntsmen wake them with their horns. Horns, and shout within. DEMETRIUS, LYSANDER, HERMIA, and HELENA, wake and start up. The. Good-morrow, friends. Saint Valentine is past ;* Begin these wood-birds but to couple now? Lys. Pardon, my lord. [He and the rest kneel to THESEUS. The. I pray you all, stand up. I know you are two rival enemies ; [7] So few'd,] Sir T. Hanmer justly remarks, that flews are the large chaps of a deep-mouth'd hound. T. WARTON. [8] Sanded means of a sandy colour, which is one of the true denotements of a blood-hound. STEEVENS. [9] The rite of this month was once so universally observed, that even authors thought that their works would obtain a more favourable reception, if published on May-Day. STEEVENS. [1] Alluding to the old saying, that birds begin to couple on St. Valentine's day. STEEVENS. |