It were a grief, so brief to part with thee: Farewel. SCENE IV2. A Room in Capulet's Houfe. [Exeunt. Enter CAPULET, Lady CAPULET, and PARIS. I would have been a-bed an hour ago. Par. Thefe times of woe afford no time to woo : Cap. Sir Paris, I will make a defperate tender And bid her, mark you me, on wednesday next→→→ Par. Monday, my lord. Cap. Monday? ha! ha! Well, wednesday is too foon, O'thursday let it be ;-o' thursday, tell her, 2 Some few unnecessary verfes are omitted in this scene according to the oldeft editions. POPE. Mr. Pope means, as appears from his edition, that be has followed the oldeft copy, and omitted fome unneceffary verfes which are not found there, but inferted in the enlarged copy of this play. But he has expressed himself so loosely, as to have been misunderstood by Mr. Steevens. In the text these unnecessary verles, as Mr. Pope calls them, are preferved, conformably to the enlarged copy of 1599. MALONE. 3-mew'd up-] This is a phrafe from falconry. A mew was a place of confinement for hawks STEEVENS. 4 Sir Paris, I will make a defperate tender Of my child's love:-] Defperate means only bold, adventurous, as if he had said in the vulgar phrafe, I will speak a bold word, and venture to promife you my daughter. JOHNSON. So, in The Weakest goes to the Wall, 1600: " Witness this desperate tender of mine honour." STEEVENS. I 2 She She shall be married to this noble earl :- Therefore we'll have fome half a dozen friends, Prepare her, wife, againft this wedding day. May call it early by and by :-Good night. SCENE V. Juliet's Chambers. Enter ROMEO, and JULIET. [Exeunt. Jul. Wilt thou be gone? it is not yet near day: It was the nightingale, and not the lark, That 5 SCENE V. Juliet's chamber.] The stage-direction in the first edition is "Enter Romeo and Juliet, at the window." In the fecond quarto, "Enter Romeo and Juliet aloft." They appeared probably in the balcony which was erected on the old English ftage. See the Account of the Ancient Theatres in Vol. I. MALONE. Wilt thou be gone? it is not yet near day, &c.] This fcene is formed on the following hints in the poem of Romeus and Juliet, 1562: "The golden fun was gone to lodge him in the west, "The full moon eke in yonder fouth had fent most men to reft; "When reftlefs Romeus and restless Juliet, In wonted fort, by wonted mean, in Juliet's chamber met, &c. * "Thus thefe two lovers pafs away the weary night "In pain, and plaint, not, as they wont, in pleafure and delight. "But now, fomewhat too foon, in farthest east arose Fair Lucifer, the golden ftar that lady Venus chofe; "Whofe courfe appointed is with speedy race to run, "A mefienger of dawning day and of the rifing fun."When thou ne lookeft wide, ne clofely doft thou wink, "When Phoebus from our hemifphere in western wave doth fink, "What That pierc'd the fearful hollow of thine ear; Rom. It was the lark, the herald of the morn, I'll fay yon grey is not the morning's eye, Jul. It is, it is, hie hence, be gone, away; "What colour then the heavens do fhew unto thine eyes, “With equal force decreasing dark fought with increasing light. "Then Romeus in arms his lady gan to fold, "With friendly kifs, and ruthfully the 'gan her knight behold." MALONE. 7 Nightly befings on yon pomegranate tree:] This is not merely a poetical fuppofition. It is obferved of the nightingale, that, if undisturbed, the fits and fings upon the fame tree for many weeks together. STEEVENS. 8 -the pale reflex-] The appearance of a cloud oppofed to the moon. JOHNSON. 9 I baue more care to stay,] Care was frequently used in Shakfpeare's age for inclination. MALONE. I 3 Some Some fay, the lark makes fweet divifion'; O, now -fweet divifion;] Divifion feems to have been the technical term for the paufes or parts of a mufical compofition. So, in K. Hen. IV. P. 1: "Sung by a fair queen in a fummer's bower, "With ravishing divifion to her lute." STEEVENS. 2 Some fay, the lark and loathed toad change eyes; O, now I would they bad chang'd voices too!] I wish the lark and toad had changed voices; for then the noife which I hear would be that of the toad, not of the lark; it would confequently be evening, at which time the toad croaks; not morning, when the lark fings; and we should not be under the neceffity of feparation. A. C. If the toad and lark had changed voices, the unnatural croak of the latter would have been no indication of the appearance of day, and confequently no fignal for her lover's departure. This is apparently the aim and purpofe of Juliet's with. HEATH. The road having very fine eyes, and the lark very ugly ones, was the occafion of a common faying amongst the people, that the toad and lark bad changed eyes. To this the fpeaker alludes. WARE. This tradition of the toad and lark I have heard expreffed in a ruftick rhyme: -To heav'n I'd fly, But that the toad beguil'd me of mine eye. JOHNSON. 3 Since arm m from arm, &c.] Thefe two lines are omitted in the modern editions, and do not deferve to be replaced, but as they may fiew the danger of critical temerity. Dr. Warburton's change of I would to I wet was fpecious enough, yet it is evidently erroneous. The fenfe is this: The lark, they say, bas left ber eyes to the toad, and now I would the toad bad her voice too, fince fhe ufes it to the disturbance of lovers. JOHNSON. 4 Hunting thee bence with hunts-up to the day.] The buntjup was the name of the tune anciently played to wake the hunters, and collect them together. So, in the Return from Parnaffus, 1606: "Yet will I play a bunts-up to my Mufe." Again, in Drayton's Polyolbion, fong 13th: "But bunts-up to the morn the feather'd fylvans fing." STEEVENS. A buntfup allo fignified a morning fong to a new-married woman, the O, now be gone; more light and light it grows. woes. Nurse. Madam! Jul. Nurfe? Enter Nurfe. Nurfe. Your lady mother's coming to your chamber: I must hear from thee every day i' the hour, Rom. Farewel! I will omit no opportunity That may convey my greetings, love, to thee. Jul. O, think'ft thou, we fhall ever meet again? Rom. I doubt it not; and all thefe woes fhall ferve For sweet difcourfes in our time to come. Jul. O God! I have an ill-divining foul: Methinks, the day after her marriage, and is certainly used here in that sense. See Cotgrave's Dictionary, in v. Refveil. MALONE. Puttenham in his Art of English Poefy, 1589, fpeaking of one Gray, fays, "what good estimation did he grow unto with the fame King Henry [the Eighth,] and afterward with the duke of Somerset, Protectour, for making certaine merry ballades, whereof one chiefly was, The bunte is up, the bunte is up." ANONYMUS. *Art thou gone fo? my love, my lord, my friend!] Thus the quarto 1597. That of 1599, and the folio, read: Art thou gone fo? love, lord, ay busband, friend! MALONE, 50! by this count I shall be much in years, Ere I again bebold my Romeo.] 60 God! I have an ill-divining foul: &c.] This miferable prefcience of futurity I have always regarded as a circumftance particularly beautiful. The fame kind of warning from the mind Romeo feems to have been conscious of, on his going to the entertainment at the houfe of Capulet : I 4 |