SCENE IV. CAPULET'S Hall. Enter Lady CAPULET and Nurse. LA. CAP. Hold, take these keys, and fetch more spices, nurse. NURSE. They call for dates and quinces in the pastry'. Enter CAPULET. CAP. Come, stir, stir, stir! the second cock hath crow'd, The curfeu bell 2 hath rung, 'tis three o'clock:- "My cousin Tybalt weltering in his blood, "Seeking for Romeo:-Stay, Tybalt, stay!- 66 66 [She falls upon her bed, within the curtains.” BOSWELL. I They call for DATES and quinces in the PASTRY.] i. e. in the room where paste was made. So laundry, spicery, &c. On the books of the Stationers' Company, in the are the following entries : 66 Item payd for iiii pound of dates iiii s. MALONE. year 1560, " Item payd for xxiiii pounde of prunys iii. s. viii d." STEEVENS. 2 The CURFEU bell-] I know not that the morning-bell is called the curfeu in any other place. JOHNSON. The curfew bell was rung at nine in the evening, as appears from a passage in The Merrry Devil of Edmonton, 1608: well 'tis nine o'clock, 'tis time to ring curfew." STEEVENS. 3 Look to the bak'd meats, good Angelica:] Shakspeare has here imputed to an Italian nobleman and his lady all the petty solicitudes of a private house concerning a provincial entertainment. To such a bustle our author might have been witness at home; but the like anxieties could not well have occurred in the (I) Spare not for cost. () NURSE. Go, go, you cot-quean, go. Get you to bed; 'faith, you'll be sick to-morrow * For this night's watching. CAP. No, not a whit; What! I have watch'd ere now All night for lesser cause, and ne'er been sick. LA. CAP. Ay, you have been a mouse-hunt in your time; (I) But I will watch you from such watching now. (II) [Exeunt LADY CAPULET and Nurse. CAP. A jealous-hood, a jealous-hood!-Now, fellow, What's there? Enter Servants, with Spits, Logs, and Baskets. 1 SERV. Things for the cook, sir; but I know not what. CAP. Make haste, make haste. [Exit 1 Serv.]Sirrah, fetch drier logs ; Call Peter, he will show thee where they are. * Quarto 1597, anone. family of Capulet, whose wife, if Angelica be her name, is here directed to perform the office of a housekeeper. STEEVENS. Such were the simple manners of our poet's time, that, without doubt, in many families much superior to Shakspeare's, the lady of the house gave directions concerning the baked meats. MALONE. 4 a MOUSE-HUNT in your time;] In my original attempt to explain this passage, I was completely wrong, for want of knowing that in Norfolk, and many other parts of England, the cant term for a weasel is—a mouse-hunt. The intrigues of this animal, like those of the cat kind, are usually carried on during the night. This circumstance will account for the appellation which Lady Capulet allows her husband to have formerly deserved. STEEVENS. The animal called the mouse-hunt is the martin. HENLEY. "Cat after kinde, good mouse-hunt," is a proverb in Heywood's Dialogue, 1598, 1st pt. c. 2. HOLT WHITE. 2 SERV. I have a head, sir, that will find out logs, () And never trouble Peter for the matter. () [Exit. CAP. 'Mass, and well said; A merry whoreson ! ha, Thou shalt be logger-head.-Good 'faith, 'tis day: The county will be here with musick straight, [Musick within. For so he said he would. 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, SCENE V. JULIET'S Chamber; JULIET on the Bed. Enter Nurse. NURSE. Mistress !-what, mistress !-Juliet !— fast, I warrant her, she : Why, lamb !—why, lady !—fye, you slug-a-bed!— Why, love, I say!-madam! sweet-heart!-why, bride! s Make haste, I say!] For this speech the quarto 1597 has only four lines: "Well, go thy way, thou shalt be logger-head. BOSWELL. What, not a word ?-you take your pennyworths now; Sleep for a week; for the next night, I warrant, That you shall rest but little.-God forgive me, 6-set up his rest,] This expression, which is frequently employed by the old dramatick writers, is taken from the manner of firing the harquebuss. This was so heavy a gun, that the soldiers were obliged to carry a supporter called a rest, which they fixed in the ground before they levelled to take aim. Decker uses it in his comedy of Old Fortunatus, 1600: “ set your heart at rest, for I have set up my rest, that unless you can run swifter than a hart, home you go not." The same expression occurs in Beaumont and Fletcher's Elder Brother: 66 My rest is up, "Nor will I go less Again, in The Roaring Girl, 1611: "Like a musket on a rest." See Montfaucon's Monarchie Françoise, tom. v. plate 48. STEEVENS. The above expression may probably be sometimes used in the sense already explained; it is, however, oftener employed with a reference to the game at primero, in which it was one of the terms then in use. In the second instance above quoted it is certainly so. To avoid loading the page with examples, I shall refer to Dodsley's Collection of Old Plays, vol. x. p. 364, edit. 1780, where several are brought together. REED. "To set up one's rest," is, in fact, a gambling expression, and means that the gamester has determined what stake he should play for. In the passage quoted by Steevens from Fletcher's Elder Brother, when Eustace says: 66 My rest is up, and I will go no less ;" he means to say, my stake is laid, and I will not play for a smaller. The same phrase very frequently occurs in the plays of Beaumont and Fletcher. It is also used by Lord Clarendon, in his History, as well as in the old comedy of Supposes, published in the year 1587. M. MASON. Nash quibbles upon this word, in his Terrors of the Night: "You that are married and have wives of your owne, and yet hold too nere frendship with your neighbours, set up your rests, that the Night will be an il neighbour to your rest, and that you shall have as little peace of minde as the rest." BOSWELL. Ay, let the county take you in your bed': Enter Lady CAPULET. LA. CAP. What noise is here? NURSE. LA. CAP. What is the matter! NURSE. O lamentable day! Look, look! O heavy day! LA. CAP. O me, O me!—my child, my only life, Revive, look up, or I will die with thee! Help, help!-call help. Enter CAPULET. CAP. For shame, bring Juliet forth; her lord is come. NURSE. She's dead, deceas'd, she's dead; alack the day! LA. CAP. Alack the day! she's dead, she's dead, she's dead. CAP. 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. Accursed time ! unfortunate old man! 7 why LADY!-fye, you SLUG-A-BED! Ay, let the county take you in your bed ;] So, in The Tragicall Hystory of Romeus and Juliet : 66 66 First softly did she call, then louder did she cry, by.' MALO 8 Accursed time! &c.] This line is taken from the first quarto, |