The Tragedy Of Romeo And Juliet

1 Enter Benvolio and Mercutio.
2 MERCUTIO.
3 Where the devil should this Romeo be? Came he not home tonight?
4 BENVOLIO.
5 Not to his father’s; I spoke with his man.
6 MERCUTIO.
7 Why, that same pale hard-hearted wench, that Rosaline, torments him so
8 that he will sure run mad.
9 BENVOLIO.
10 Tybalt, the kinsman to old Capulet, hath sent a letter to his father’s
11 house.
12 MERCUTIO.
13 A challenge, on my life.
14 BENVOLIO.
15 Romeo will answer it.
16 MERCUTIO.
17 Any man that can write may answer a letter.
18 BENVOLIO.
19 Nay, he will answer the letter’s master, how he dares, being dared.
20 MERCUTIO.
21 Alas poor Romeo, he is already dead, stabbed with a white wench’s black
22 eye; run through the ear with a love song, the very pin of his heart
23 cleft with the blind bow-boy’s butt-shaft. And is he a man to encounter
24 Tybalt?
25 BENVOLIO.
26 Why, what is Tybalt?
27 MERCUTIO.
28 More than Prince of cats. O, he’s the courageous captain of
29 compliments. He fights as you sing prick-song, keeps time, distance,
30 and proportion. He rests his minim rest, one, two, and the third in
31 your bosom: the very butcher of a silk button, a duellist, a duellist;
32 a gentleman of the very first house, of the first and second cause. Ah,
33 the immortal passado, the punto reverso, the hay.
34 BENVOLIO.
35 The what?
36 MERCUTIO.
37 The pox of such antic lisping, affecting phantasies; these new tuners
38 of accent. By Jesu, a very good blade, a very tall man, a very good
39 whore. Why, is not this a lamentable thing, grandsire, that we should
40 be thus afflicted with these strange flies, these fashion-mongers,
41 these pardon-me’s, who stand so much on the new form that they cannot
42 sit at ease on the old bench? O their bones, their bones!
43 Enter Romeo.
44 BENVOLIO.
45 Here comes Romeo, here comes Romeo!
46 MERCUTIO.
47 Without his roe, like a dried herring. O flesh, flesh, how art thou
48 fishified! Now is he for the numbers that Petrarch flowed in. Laura, to
49 his lady, was but a kitchen wench,—marry, she had a better love to
50 berhyme her: Dido a dowdy; Cleopatra a gypsy; Helen and Hero hildings
51 and harlots; Thisbe a grey eye or so, but not to the purpose. Signior
52 Romeo, bonjour! There’s a French salutation to your French slop. You
53 gave us the counterfeit fairly last night.
54 ROMEO.
55 Good morrow to you both. What counterfeit did I give you?
56 MERCUTIO.
57 The slip sir, the slip; can you not conceive?
58 ROMEO.
59 Pardon, good Mercutio, my business was great, and in such a case as
60 mine a man may strain courtesy.
61 MERCUTIO.
62 That’s as much as to say, such a case as yours constrains a man to bow
63 in the hams.
64 ROMEO.
65 Meaning, to curtsy.
66 MERCUTIO.
67 Thou hast most kindly hit it.
68 ROMEO.
69 A most courteous exposition.
70 MERCUTIO.
71 Nay, I am the very pink of courtesy.
72 ROMEO.
73 Pink for flower.
74 MERCUTIO.
75 Right.
76 ROMEO.
77 Why, then is my pump well flowered.
78 MERCUTIO.
79 Sure wit, follow me this jest now, till thou hast worn out thy pump,
80 that when the single sole of it is worn, the jest may remain after the
81 wearing, solely singular.
82 ROMEO.
83 O single-soled jest, solely singular for the singleness!
84 MERCUTIO.
85 Come between us, good Benvolio; my wits faint.
86 ROMEO.
87 Swits and spurs, swits and spurs; or I’ll cry a match.
88 MERCUTIO.
89 Nay, if thy wits run the wild-goose chase, I am done. For thou hast
90 more of the wild-goose in one of thy wits, than I am sure, I have in my
91 whole five. Was I with you there for the goose?
92 ROMEO.
93 Thou wast never with me for anything, when thou wast not there for the
94 goose.
95 MERCUTIO.
96 I will bite thee by the ear for that jest.
97 ROMEO.
98 Nay, good goose, bite not.
99 MERCUTIO.
100 Thy wit is a very bitter sweeting, it is a most sharp sauce.
101 ROMEO.
102 And is it not then well served in to a sweet goose?
103 MERCUTIO.
104 O here’s a wit of cheveril, that stretches from an inch narrow to an
105 ell broad.
106 ROMEO.
107 I stretch it out for that word broad, which added to the goose, proves
108 thee far and wide a broad goose.
109 MERCUTIO.
110 Why, is not this better now than groaning for love? Now art thou
111 sociable, now art thou Romeo; now art thou what thou art, by art as
112 well as by nature. For this drivelling love is like a great natural,
113 that runs lolling up and down to hide his bauble in a hole.
114 BENVOLIO.
115 Stop there, stop there.
116 MERCUTIO.
117 Thou desirest me to stop in my tale against the hair.
118 BENVOLIO.
119 Thou wouldst else have made thy tale large.
120 MERCUTIO.
121 O, thou art deceived; I would have made it short, for I was come to the
122 whole depth of my tale, and meant indeed to occupy the argument no
123 longer.
124 Enter Nurse and Peter.
125 ROMEO.
126 Here’s goodly gear!
127 A sail, a sail!
128 MERCUTIO.
129 Two, two; a shirt and a smock.
130 NURSE.
131 Peter!
132 PETER.
133 Anon.
134 NURSE.
135 My fan, Peter.
136 MERCUTIO.
137 Good Peter, to hide her face; for her fan’s the fairer face.
138 NURSE.
139 God ye good morrow, gentlemen.
140 MERCUTIO.
141 God ye good-den, fair gentlewoman.
142 NURSE.
143 Is it good-den?
144 MERCUTIO.
145 ’Tis no less, I tell ye; for the bawdy hand of the dial is now upon the
146 prick of noon.
147 NURSE.
148 Out upon you! What a man are you?
149 ROMEO.
150 One, gentlewoman, that God hath made for himself to mar.
151 NURSE.
152 By my troth, it is well said; for himself to mar, quoth a? Gentlemen,
153 can any of you tell me where I may find the young Romeo?
154 ROMEO.
155 I can tell you: but young Romeo will be older when you have found him
156 than he was when you sought him. I am the youngest of that name, for
157 fault of a worse.
158 NURSE.
159 You say well.
160 MERCUTIO.
161 Yea, is the worst well? Very well took, i’faith; wisely, wisely.
162 NURSE.
163 If you be he, sir, I desire some confidence with you.
164 BENVOLIO.
165 She will endite him to some supper.
166 MERCUTIO.
167 A bawd, a bawd, a bawd! So ho!
168 ROMEO.
169 What hast thou found?
170 MERCUTIO.
171 No hare, sir; unless a hare, sir, in a lenten pie, that is something
172 stale and hoar ere it be spent.
173 [_Sings._]
174 An old hare hoar,
175 And an old hare hoar,
176 Is very good meat in Lent;
177 But a hare that is hoar
178 Is too much for a score
179 When it hoars ere it be spent.
180 Romeo, will you come to your father’s? We’ll to dinner thither.
181 ROMEO.
182 I will follow you.
183 MERCUTIO.
184 Farewell, ancient lady; farewell, lady, lady, lady.
185 [_Exeunt Mercutio and Benvolio._]
186 NURSE.
187 I pray you, sir, what saucy merchant was this that was so full of his
188 ropery?
189 ROMEO.
190 A gentleman, Nurse, that loves to hear himself talk, and will speak
191 more in a minute than he will stand to in a month.
192 NURSE.
193 And a speak anything against me, I’ll take him down, and a were lustier
194 than he is, and twenty such Jacks. And if I cannot, I’ll find those
195 that shall. Scurvy knave! I am none of his flirt-gills; I am none of
196 his skains-mates.—And thou must stand by too and suffer every knave to
197 use me at his pleasure!
198 PETER.
199 I saw no man use you at his pleasure; if I had, my weapon should
200 quickly have been out. I warrant you, I dare draw as soon as another
201 man, if I see occasion in a good quarrel, and the law on my side.
202 NURSE.
203 Now, afore God, I am so vexed that every part about me quivers. Scurvy
204 knave. Pray you, sir, a word: and as I told you, my young lady bid me
205 enquire you out; what she bade me say, I will keep to myself. But first
206 let me tell ye, if ye should lead her in a fool’s paradise, as they
207 say, it were a very gross kind of behaviour, as they say; for the
208 gentlewoman is young. And therefore, if you should deal double with
209 her, truly it were an ill thing to be offered to any gentlewoman, and
210 very weak dealing.
211 ROMEO. Nurse, commend me to thy lady and mistress. I protest unto
212 thee,—
213 NURSE.
214 Good heart, and i’faith I will tell her as much. Lord, Lord, she will
215 be a joyful woman.
216 ROMEO.
217 What wilt thou tell her, Nurse? Thou dost not mark me.
218 NURSE.
219 I will tell her, sir, that you do protest, which, as I take it, is a
220 gentlemanlike offer.
221 ROMEO.
222 Bid her devise
223 Some means to come to shrift this afternoon,
224 And there she shall at Friar Lawrence’ cell
225 Be shriv’d and married. Here is for thy pains.
226 NURSE.
227 No truly, sir; not a penny.
228 ROMEO.
229 Go to; I say you shall.
230 NURSE.
231 This afternoon, sir? Well, she shall be there.
232 ROMEO.
233 And stay, good Nurse, behind the abbey wall.
234 Within this hour my man shall be with thee,
235 And bring thee cords made like a tackled stair,
236 Which to the high topgallant of my joy
237 Must be my convoy in the secret night.
238 Farewell, be trusty, and I’ll quit thy pains;
239 Farewell; commend me to thy mistress.
240 NURSE.
241 Now God in heaven bless thee. Hark you, sir.
242 ROMEO.
243 What say’st thou, my dear Nurse?
244 NURSE.
245 Is your man secret? Did you ne’er hear say,
246 Two may keep counsel, putting one away?
247 ROMEO.
248 I warrant thee my man’s as true as steel.
249 NURSE.
250 Well, sir, my mistress is the sweetest lady. Lord, Lord! When ’twas a
251 little prating thing,—O, there is a nobleman in town, one Paris, that
252 would fain lay knife aboard; but she, good soul, had as lief see a
253 toad, a very toad, as see him. I anger her sometimes, and tell her that
254 Paris is the properer man, but I’ll warrant you, when I say so, she
255 looks as pale as any clout in the versal world. Doth not rosemary and
256 Romeo begin both with a letter?
257 ROMEO.
258 Ay, Nurse; what of that? Both with an R.
259 NURSE.
260 Ah, mocker! That’s the dog’s name. R is for the—no, I know it begins
261 with some other letter, and she hath the prettiest sententious of it,
262 of you and rosemary, that it would do you good to hear it.
263 ROMEO.
264 Commend me to thy lady.
265 NURSE.
266 Ay, a thousand times. Peter!
267 [_Exit Romeo._]
268 PETER.
269 Anon.
270 NURSE.
271 Before and apace.
272 [_Exeunt._]