Romeo and Juliet
William Shakespeare
[Exit a Servingman.]
Sirrah, go hire me twenty cunningdeg cooks.
Servingman. You shall have none ill, sir; for I'll trydeg
if they can lick their fingers.
113 against before 114 drift purpose 119 inconstant toy whim 4.2.2 cunning skillful 3 try test
Capulet. How canst thou try them so?
Servingman. Marry, sir, 'tis an ill cook that cannot
lick his own fingers.deg Therefore he that cannot lick
his fingers goes not with me.
Capulet. Go, begone. [Exit Servingman.]
We shall be much unfurnisheddeg for this time.
What, is my daughter gone to Friar Lawrence?
Nurse. Ay, forsooth.
Capulet. Well, he may chance to do some good on her.
A peevish self-willed harlotry it is.deg
Enter Juliet.
Nurse. See where she comes from shrift with merry
look.
Capulet. How now, my headstrong? Where have you
been gadding?
Juliet. Where I have learnt me to repent the sin
Of disobedient opposition
To you and your behests, and am enjoined
By holy Lawrence to fall prostrate here
To beg your pardon. Pardon, I beseech you!
Henceforward I am ever ruled by you.
Capulet. Send for the County. Go tell him of this.
I'll have this knot knit up tomorrow morning.
Juliet. I met the youthful lord at Lawrence' cell
And gave him what becomeddeg love I might,
Not stepping o'er the bounds of modesty.
Capulet. Why, I am glad on't. This is well. Stand up.
This is as't should be. Let me see the County.
Ay, marry, go, I say, and fetch him hither.
Now, afore God, this reverend holy friar,
All our whole city is much bound to him.
6-7 cannot lick his own fingers i.e., cannot taste his own cooking 10 unfurnished unprovisioned 14 A peevish self-willed harlotry it is she's a silly good-for-nothing 26 becomed proper
Juliet. Nurse, will you go with me into my closetdeg
To help me sort such needful ornaments
As you think fit to furnish me tomorrow?
Lady Capulet. No, not till Thursday. There is time
enough.
Capulet. Go, nurse, go with her. We'll to church
tomorrow. Exeunt [Juliet and Nurse].
Lady Capulet. We shall be short in our provision.
'Tis now near night.
Capulet. Tush, I will stir about,
And all things shall be well, I warrant thee, wife.
Go thou to Juliet, help to deck up her.
I'll not to bed tonight; let me alone.
I'll play the housewife for this once. What, ho!
They are all forth; well, I will walk myself
To County Paris, to prepare up him
Againstdeg tomorrow. My heart is wondrous light,
Since this same wayward girl is so reclaimed.
Exit [with Mother].
[Scene 3. Juliet's chamber.]
Enter Juliet and Nurse.
Juliet. Ay, those attires are best; but, gentle nurse,
I pray thee leave me to myself tonight;
For I have need of many orisonsdeg
To move the heavens to smile upon my state,deg
Which, well thou knowest, is crossdeg and full of sin.
Enter Mother.
Lady Capulet. What, are you busy, ho? Need you my
help?
33 closet private chamber 46 Against in anticipation of 4.3.3 orisons prayers 4 state condition 5 cross perverse
Juliet. No, madam; we have culled such necessaries
As are behovefuldeg for our statedeg tomorrow.
So please you, let me now be left alone,
And let the nurse this night sit up with you;
For I am sure you have your hands full all
In this so sudden business.
Lady Capulet. Good night.
Get thee to bed, and rest; for thou hast need.
Exeunt [Mother and Nurse].
Juliet. Farewell! God knows when we shall meet again.
I have a faintdeg cold fear thrills through my veins
That almost freezes up the heat of life.
I'll call them back again to comfort me.
Nurse!--What should she do here?
My dismal scene I needs must act alone.
Come, vial.
What if this mixture do not work at all?
Shall I be married then tomorrow morning?
No, no! This shall forbid it. Lie thou there.
[Lays down a dagger.]
What if it be a poison which the friar
Subtly hath minist'reddeg to have me dead,
Lest in this marriage he should be dishonored
Because he married me before to Romeo?
I fear it is; and yet methinks it should not,
For he hath stilldeg been trieddeg a holy man.
How if, when I am laid into the tomb,
I wake before the time that Romeo
Come to redeem me? There's a fearful point!
Shall I not then be stifled in the vault,
To whose foul mouth no healthsome air breathes in,
And there die strangled ere my Romeo comes?
Or, if I live, is it not very like
The horrible conceitdeg of death and night,
Together with the terror of the place--
As in a vault, an ancient receptacle 8 behoveful expedient 8 state pomp 15 faint causing faintness 25 minist'red provided 29 still always 29 tried proved 37 conceit thought
Where for this many hundred years the bones
Of all my buried ancestors are packed;
Where bloody Tybalt, yet but green in earth,deg
Lies fest'ring in his shroud; where, as they say,
At some hours in the night spirits resort--
Alack, alack, is it not like that I,
So early waking--what with loathsome smells,
And shrieks like mandrakesdeg torn out of the earth,
That living mortals, hearing them, run mad--
O, if I wake, shall I not be distraught,deg
Environed with all these hideous fears,
And madly play with my forefathers' joints,
And pluck the mangled Tybalt from his shroud,
And, in this rage, with some great kinsman's bone
As with a club dash out my desp'rate brains?
O, look! Methinks I see my cousin's ghost
Seeking out Romeo, that did spit his body
Upon a rapier's point. Stay, Tybalt, stay!
Romeo, Romeo, Romeo, I drink to thee.
[She falls upon her bed within the curtains.]
[Scene 4. Hall in Capulet's house.]
Enter Lady of the House and Nurse.
Lady Capulet. Hold, take these keys and fetch more
spices, nurse.
Nurse. They call for dates and quinces in the pastry.deg
Enter old Capulet.
Capulet. Come, stir, stir, stir! The second cock hath
crowed,
The curfew bell hath rung, 'tis three o'clock.
42 green in earth newly entombed 47 mandrakes plant with forked root, resembling the human body (supposed to shriek when uprooted and drive the hearer mad) 49 distraught driven mad 4.4.2 pastry pastry cook's room
Look to the baked meats,deg good Angelica;deg
Spare not for cost.
Nurse. Go, you cotquean,deg go,
Get you to bed! Faith, you'll be sick tomorrow
For this night's watching.deg
Capulet. No, not a whit. What, I have watched ere now
All night for lesser cause, and ne'er been sick.
Lady Capulet. Ay, you have been a mouse huntdeg in
your time;
But I will watch you from
such watching now.
Exit Lady and Nurse.
Capulet. A jealous hood,deg a jealous hood!
Enter three or four [Fellows] with spits and
logs and baskets.
Now, fellow,
What is there?
First Fellow. Things for the cook, sir; but I know not
what.
Capulet. Make haste, make haste. [Exit first Fellow.]
Sirrah, fetch drier logs.
Call Peter; he will show thee where they are.
Second Fellow. I have a head, sir, that will find out
logsdeg
And never trouble Peter for the matter.
Capulet. Mass,deg and well said; a merry whoreson,deg ha!
Thou shalt be loggerhead.deg [Exit second Fellow,
with the others.] Good faith, 'tis day.
The County will be here with music straight,
For so he said he would. Play music.
5 baked meats meat pies 5 Angelica (the Nurse's name) 6 cotquean man who does woman's work 8 watching staying awake 11 mouse hunt night prowler, woman chaser 13 A jealous hood i.e., you wear the cap of a jealous person 18 will find out logs has an affinity for logs (i.e., is wooden also) 20 Mass by the Mass 20 whoreson rascal 21 loggerhead blockhead
I hear him near.
Nurse! Wife! What, ho! What, nurse, I say!
Enter Nurse.
Go waken Juliet; go and trim her up.
I'll go and chat with Paris. Hie, make haste,
Make haste! The bridegroom he is come already:
Make haste, I say. [Exit.]
[Scene 5. Juliet's chamber.]
Nurse.deg Mistress! What, mistress! Juliet! Fast,deg I war-
rant her, she.
Why, lamb! Why, lady! Fie, you slugabed.deg
Why, love, I say! Madam; Sweetheart! Why, bride!
What, not a word? You take your pennyworthsdeg
now;
Sleep for a week; for the next night, I warrant,
The County Paris hath set up his restdeg
That you shall rest but little. God forgive me!
Marry, and amen. How sound is she asleep!
I needs must wake her. Madam, madam, madam!
Ay, let the County take you in your bed;
He'll fright you up, i' faith. Will it not be?
[Draws aside the curtains.]
What, dressed, and in your clothes, and downdeg
again?
I must needs wake you. Lady! Lady! Lady!
Alas, alas! Help, help! My lady's dead!
4.5.1 Nurse (at the conclusion of the last scene the nurse presumably did not go offstage but remained on the forestage, and after Capulet's departure she now walks to the rear to open the curtains, revealing Juliet) 1 Fast fast asleep 2 slugabed sleepyhead 4 pennyworths small portions (i.e., short naps) 6 set up his rest firmly resolved (with bawdy suggestion of having a lance in readiness) 12 down gone back to bed
O weradaydeg that ever I was born!
Some aqua vitae,deg ho! My lord! My lady!
[Enter Mother.]
Lady Capulet. What noise is here?
Nurse. O lamentable day!
Lady Capulet. What is the matter?
Nurse. Look, look! O heavy day!
Lady Capulet. O me, O me! My child, my only life!
Revive, look up, or I will die with thee!
Help, help! Call help.
Enter Father.
Capulet. For shame, bring Juliet forth; her lord is
come.
Nurse. She's dead, deceased; she's dead, alack the day!
Lady Capulet. Alack the day, she's dead, she's dead,
she's dead!
Capulet. Ha! Let me see her. Out alas! She's cold,
Her blood is settled, and her joints are stiff;
Life and these lips have long been separated.
Death lies on her like an untimely frost.
Upon the sweetest flower of all the field.
Nurse. O lamentable day!
Lady Capulet. O woeful time!
Capulet. Death, that hath ta'en her hence to make me
wail,
Ties up my tongue and will not let me speak.
Enter Friar [Lawrence] and the County [Paris,
with Musicians].
Friar. Come, is the bride ready to go to church?
Capulet. Ready to go, but never to return.
15 weraday welladay, alas 16 aqua vitae spirits
O son, the night before thy wedding day
Hath Death lain with thy wife. There she lies,
Flower as she was, deflowered by him.
Death is my son-in-law, Death is my heir;
My daughter he hath wedded. I will die
And leave him all. Life, living, all is Death's.
Paris. Have I thought, love, to see this morning's face,
And doth it give me such a sight as this?
Lady Capulet. Accursed, unhappy, wretched, hateful
day!
Most miserable hour that e'er time saw
In lasting labor of his pilgrimage!
But one, poor one, one poor and loving child,
But one thing to rejoice and solace in,
And cruel Death hath catched it from my sight.
Nurse. O woe! O woeful, woeful, woeful day!
Most lamentable day, most woeful day
That ever ever I did yet behold!
O day, O day, O day! O hateful day!
Never was seen so black a day as this.
O woeful day! O woeful day!
Paris. Beguiled, divorced, wronged, spited, slain!
Most detestable Death, by thee beguiled,
By cruel, cruel thee quite overthrown.
O love! O life!--not life, but love in death!
Capulet. Despised, distressed, hated, martyred, killed!
Uncomfortabledeg time, why cam'st thou now
To murder, murder our solemnity?
O child, O child! My soul, and not my child!
Dead art thou--alack, my child is dead,
And with my child my joys are buried!
Friar. Peace, ho, for shame! Confusion's cure lives not
In these confusions. Heaven and yourself
Had part in this fair maid--now heaven hath all,
And all the better is it for the maid.
60 Uncomfortable discomforting
Your part in her you could not keep from death,
But heaven keeps his part in eternal life.
The most you sought was her promotion,
For 'twas your heaven she should be advanced;
And weep ye now, seeing she is advanced
Above the clouds, as high as heaven itself?
O, in this love, you love your child so ill
That you run mad, seeing that she is well.deg
She's not well married that lives married long,
But she's best married that dies married young.
Dry up your tears and stick your rosemarydeg
On this fair corse, and, as the custom is,
And in her best array bear her to church;
For though fond naturedeg bids us all lament,
Yet nature's tears are reason's merriment.
Capulet. All things that we ordained festival
Turn from their office to black funeral--
Our instruments to melancholy bells,
Our wedding cheer to a sad burial feast;
Our solemn hymns to sullen dirges change;
Our bridal flowers serve for a buried corse;
And all things change them to the contrary.
Friar. Sir, go you in; and, madam, go with him;
And go, Sir Paris. Everyone prepare
To follow this fair corse unto her grave.
The heavens do low'rdeg upon you for some ill;
Move them no more by crossing their high will.
Exeunt [casting rosemary on her and shutting the curtains].
Manetdeg [the Nurse
with Musicians].
First Musician. Faith, we may put up our pipes and
be gone.
Nurse. Honest good fellows, ah, put up, put up!
For well you know this is a pitiful case.deg [Exit.]
76 well i.e., in blessed condition, in heaven 79 rosemary an evergreen, signifying remembrance 82 fond nature foolish human nature 94 low'r frown 95 s.d. Manet remains (Latin) 99 case (1) situation (2) instrument case
First Musician. Ay, by my troth, the case may be
amended.
Enter [Peter].
Peter. Musicians, O, musicians, "Heart's ease,"
"Heart's ease"! O, and you will have me live, play
"Heart's ease."
First Musician. Why "Heart's ease"?
Peter. O, musicians, because my heart itself plays
"My heart is full." O, play me some merry dumpdeg
to comfort me.
First Musician. Not a dump we! 'Tis no time to play
now.
Peter. You will not then?
First Musician. No.
Peter. I will then give it you soundly.
First Musician. What will you give us?
Peter. No money, on my faith, but the gleek.deg I will give youdeg the minstrel.
First Musician. Then will I give you the serving-creature.
Peter. Then will I lay the serving-creature's dagger
on your pate. I will carrydeg no crotchets.deg I'll re
you, I'll fadeg you. Do you notedeg me?
First Musician. And you re us and fa us, you note
us.deg
Second Musician. Pray you put up your dagger, and
put outdeg your wit. Then have at you with my wit!
107 dump sad tune 115 gleek gibe 116 give you call you 120 carry endure 120 crotchets (1) whims (2) quarter notes 120-21 re . . . fa (musical notes, but used perhaps with puns on "ray," or "bewray" ["befoul"], and "fay" ["polish"]; see H. Kokeritz, Shakespeare's Pronunciation, pp. 105-06) 121 note understand 122-23 note us set us to music 125 put out set out, display
Peter. I will dry-beat you with an iron wit, and put
up my iron dagger. Answer me like men.
"When griping grief the heart doth wound,
And doleful dumps the mind oppress,
Then music with her silver sound"deg--
Why "silver sound"? Why "music with her silver sound"? What say you, Simon Catling?deg
First Musician. Marry, sir, because silver hath a sweet
sound.
Peter. Pretty! What say you, Hugh Rebeck?deg
Second Musician. I say "silver sound" because mu-
sicians sound for silver.
Peter. Pretty too! What say you, James Soundpost?deg
Third Musician. Faith, I know not what to say.
Peter. O, I cry you mercy,deg you are the singer. I will
say for you. It is "music with her silver sound" be-
cause musicians have no gold for sounding.
"Then music with her silver sound
With speedy help doth lend redress." Exit.
First Musician. What a pestilent knave is this same!
Second Musician. Hang him, Jack! Come, we'll in here,
tarry for the mourners, and stay dinner.
Exit [with others].
