Imagens das páginas
PDF
ePub

Yet put it out, for I would not be seen.
Under yon yew-trees1 lay thee all along,
Holding thine ear close to the hollow ground
So shall no foot upon the churchyard tread,
(Being loose, unfirm, with digging up of graves,)
But thou shalt hear it: whistle then to me,
As signal that thou hear'st something approach.
Give me those flowers. Do as I bid thee, go.-
PAGE. I am almost afraid to stand alone
Here in the churchyard; yet I will adventure.

[Retires. PAR. Sweet flower, with flowers I strew thy bridal bed: Sweet tomb, that in thy circuit dost contain

The perfect model of eternity;

Fair Juliet, that with angels dost remain,
Accept this latest favour at my hands;

That living honour'd thee, and, being dead,

With funeral praises do adorn thy tomb! (The Boy whistles.
The boy gives warning, something doth approach.
What cursed foot wanders this way to-night,
To cross my obsequies, and true-love's rites?
What, with a torch! - muffle2 me, night, a while.

[Retires.

Enter ROMEO and BALTHAZAR, with a Torch, Mattock, &c. ROM. Give me that mattock, and the wrenching iron. Hold, take this letter; early in the morning

See thou deliver it to my lord and father.

Give me the light: Upon thy life, I charge thee,
Whate'er thou hear'st or see'st stand all aloof,
And do not interrupt me in my course.
Why I descend into this bed of death,
Is, partly, to behold my lady's face,

But, chiefly, to take thence from her dead finger
A precious ring; a ring that I must use

In dear employment: 3 therefore hence, be gone: -
But if thou, jealous, dost return to pry 4

In what I further shall intend to do,

1) The yew, (in French if or yf; in German Eibe;) an evergreen tree of the genus of Taxus frequently found in British churchyards."

2) To muffle, to cover or conceal.
3) That is, action of importance.

Gems were supposed to have great powers and virtues. Johnson.

4) To pry, to peep narrowly; to inspect closely; as, to pry into the mysteries of nature.

By heaven, I will tear thee joint by joint,

And strew this hungry churchyard with thy limbs:
The time and my intents are savage-wild;
More fierce, and more inexorable far,

Than empty tigers, or the roaring sea.

BAL. I will be gone, sir, and not trouble you.
ROM. So shalt thou show me friendship. Take thou

that:

Live, and be prosperous; and farewell, good fellow.
BAL. For all this same, I'll hide me hereabout;
His looks I fear, and his intents I doubt.

[Retires.
ROM. Thou détestable maw, 1 thou womb of death,
Gorg'd2 with the dearest morsel of the earth,
Thus I enforce thy rotten jaws to open,

[Breaking open the Door of the Monument. And, in despite, I'll cram thee with more food! PAR. This is that banish'd haughty Montague, That murder'd my love's cousin; with which grief, It is supposed the fair creature died,

[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]

And here is come to do some villainous shame 4
To the dead bodies: I will apprehend him.
Stop thy unhallow'd toil,5 vile Montague;
Can vengeance be pursu'd further than death?
Condemned villain, I do apprehend thee:
Obey, and go with me; for thou must die.

[Advances.

ROM. I must, indeed; and therefore came I hither.
Good gentle youth, tempt not a desperate man,
Fly hence, and leave me; think upon these gone;"
Let them affright thee. I beseech thee, youth,
Heap not another sin upon my head,

By urging me to fury: O, be gone!
By heaven, I love thee better than myself:
For I come hither arm'd against myself:

1) Man, from the German Magen, properly the stomach of brutes; figuratively and contemptuously for abyss, gulf. Detestable, which is now accented on the second, was once accented on the first.

2) To gorge, to fill up the throat, to satiate.

3) To cram, to stuff, to fill with more than can conveniently be held.

4) Paris conceived Romeo to have burst open the monument for no other purpuse than to exercise magic arts, such as witches and necromancers are reported to have practised.

5) Unholy, impious labour.

6) To seize, in order for trial or punishment.

7) Gone, departed from life, dead.

Stay not, be gone; live, and hereafter say
A madman's mercy bade thee run away.
PAR. I do defy thy conjurations,
And do attach thee as a felon here.2

1

[ocr errors]

ROM. Wilt thou provoke me? then have at thee, boy.

[They fight.

PAGE. O heaven, they fight, I will go call the watch.

[Exit Page.

PAR. O, I am slain! [Falls.] If thou be merciful, Open the tomb, lay me with Juliet.

soul

[Dies.

ROM. In faith, I will: Let me peruse3 this face;
Mercutio's kinsman, noble county Paris: -
What said my man, when my betossed
Did not attend him as we rode? I think,
He told me Paris should have married Juliet:
Said he not so? or did I dream it so?

Or am I mad, hearing him talk of Juliet,
To think it was so? O, give me thy hand,
One writ with me5 in sour misfortune's book!
I'll bury thee in a triumphant grave, -
A grave? O, no; a lantern, slaughter'd youth,
For here lies Juliet, and her beauty makes
This vault a feasting presence' full of light.
Death, lie thou there, by a dead man interr'd.

6

[Laying PARIS in the Monument.

1) I refuse to do as thou conjurest | Ophelia says, speaking of Hamlet me to do, i. e. to depart. Some (Act III, sc. 2): "- - He fell to such commentators attribute this expres- perusal of my face." sion to the power of magic which Romeo was suspected to possess, and was about to practise.

2) To attach, to arrest, to lay hold on; to apprehend. A felon originally signifies a vassal who failed in his fidelity or allegiance to his lord, and committed an offence by which he forfeited his feud, his lands or goods. But the idea of felony has been so generally connected with that of capital punishment, that law and usage now confirm that connection. Thus, if a statute makes any new offence a felony, it is understood to mean a crime punishable with transportation.

3) To peruse, to examine. So,

4) To betoss, to disturb, to agitate. 5) That is, Thou who art written or inscribed together with me, etc.

6) A lantern may not, in this instance, signify an enclosure for a lighted candle, but a louvre, or what in ancient records is styled lanternium, i. e. a spacious round or octagonal turret full of windows by means of which cathedrals, and sometimes halls, are illuminated. Steevens.

7) A presence is a public room, which is at times the presencechamber of the sovereign.

8) Romeo being now determined to put an end to his life, considers himself as already dead. Malone. By therefore is not, by the side of

How oft when men are at the point of death,
Have they been merry, which their keepers1 call
A lightning before death; - O, how may I
Call this a lightning? O, my love, my wife!
Death, that hath suck'd the honey of thy breath,
Hath had no power yet upon thy beauty:
Thou art not conquer'd; beauty's ensign yet
Is crimson in thy lips, and in thy cheeks,
And death's pale flag is not advanced there. -
Tybalt, liest thou there in thy bloody sheet?
O, what more favour can I do to thee,
Than with that hand that cut thy youth in twain,
To sunder his that was thine enemy?
Forgive me, cousin! Ah, dear Juliet,
Why art thou yet so fair? Shall I believe
That unsubstantial death is amorous;
And that the lean abhorred monster keeps
Thee here in dark to be his paramour?
For fear of that, I will still stay with thee;
And never from this palace of dim night
Depart again; here, here will I remain

With worms that are thy chambermaids; O, here
Will I set up my everlasting rest; 3

And shake the yoke of inauspicious stars

[ocr errors]

From this world-wearied flesh. Eyes, look your last! Arms, take your last embrace! and lips, O you

[ocr errors]

The doors of breath, seal with a righteous kiss
A dateless bargain to engrossing death!
Come, bitter conduct,5 come, unsavoury guide!
Thou desperate pilot, now at once run on
The dashing rocks thy sea-sick weary bark!
Here's to my love!
Thy drugs are quick.

[ocr errors]

[Drinks.] O, true apothecary!
Thus with a kiss I die.

[blocks in formation]

[Dies.

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. Steevens.

undue quantities or degrees; engross4) To engross to take or assume in ing, greedy.

5) Conductor.

Enter, at the other End of the Churchyard, Friar Laurence, with a Lantern, Crow, and Spade.

FRI. Saint Francis be my speed! how oft to-night Have my old feet stumbled at graves? Who's there?

Who is it that consorts, so late, the dead?

BAL. Here's one, a friend, and one that knows you well. FRI. Bliss be upon you! Tell me, good my friend, What torch is yond', 2 that vainly lends his light To grubs and eyeless skulls? as I discern,

It burneth in the Capels' monument.

BAL. It doth so, holy sir; and there's my master,

One that you love.

FRI.

BAL.

Who is it?

Romeo.

Full half an hour.

FRI. How long hath he been there?
BAL.

FRI. Go with me to the vault.
BAL.

I dare not, sir:
My master knows not, but I am gone hence;
And fearfully did menace me with death,
If I did stay to look on his intents.
FRI. Stay then, I'll go alone:

Fear comes upon me:

O, much I fear some ill unlucky thing.

BAL. As I did sleep under this yew-tree here, I dreamt my master and another fought,

And that my master slew him.3

Romeo?

-

FRI.
Alack, alack, what blood is this, which stains
The stony entrance of this sepulchre?
What mean these masterless and gory swords
To lie discolour'd by this place of peace?

[Advances.

[Enters the Monument. Romeo! O, pale! -Who else? what, Paris, too? And steep'd in blood? Ah, what an unkind hour

1) This accident was reckoned | pens to a person while he is under ominous.

the manifest influence of fear, will 2) Yond', yonder, yond, yon, ad- from it, like a dream; for a man in seem to him, when he is recovered verbially.

3) This is one of the touches of nature that would have escaped the hand of any painter less attentive to it than Shakspeare. What hap

such a condition, says Mr. Pope, awakes no further than to see confusedly what environs him, and to think it not a reality, but a vision. Steevens.

« AnteriorContinuar »