Romeo and Juliet

ROMEO AND JULIET

Enter Nurse and PETER

O honey nurse, what news?

Hast thou met with him? Send thy man away.

Nurse

Peter, stay at the gate.

Exit PETER

JULIET

Now, good sweet nurse, – O Lord, why look’st thou sad? Though news be sad, yet tell them merrily;

If good, thou shamest the music of sweet news By playing it to me with so sour a face.

Nurse

I am a-weary, give me leave awhile:

Fie, how my bones ache! what a jaunt have I had!

JULIET

I would thou hadst my bones, and I thy news:

Nay, come, I pray thee, speak; good, good nurse, speak.

Nurse

Jesu, what haste? can you not stay awhile? Do you not see that I am out of breath?

JULIET

How art thou out of breath, when thou hast breath To say to me that thou art out of breath?

The excuse that thou dost make in this delay Is longer than the tale thou dost excuse.

Is thy news good, or bad? answer to that; Say either, and I’ll stay the circumstance: Let me be satisfied, is’t good or bad?

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WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

Nurse

Well, you have made a simple choice; you know not how to choose a man: Romeo! no, not he; though his face be better than any man’s, yet his leg excels

all men’s; and for a hand, and a foot, and a body, though they be not to be talked on, yet they are past compare: he is not the flower of courtesy, but, I’ll warrant him, as gentle as a lamb. Go thy

ways, wench; serve God. What, have you dined at home?

JULIET

No, no: but all this did I know before.

What says he of our marriage? what of that?

Nurse

Lord, how my head aches! what a head have I! It beats as it would fall in twenty pieces.

My back o’ t’ other side, – O, my back, my back! Beshrew your heart for sending me about,

To catch my death with jaunting up and down!

JULIET

I’ faith, I am sorry that thou art not well.

Sweet, sweet, sweet nurse, tell me, what says my love?

Nurse

Your love says, like an honest gentleman, and a courteous, and a kind, and a handsome, and, I warrant, a virtuous, – Where is your mother?

JULIET

Where is my mother! why, she is within; Where should she be? How oddly thou repliest! ‘Your love says, like an honest gentleman, Where is your mother?’

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ROMEO AND JULIET

Nurse

O God’s lady dear!

Are you so hot? marry, come up, I trow;

Is this the poultice for my aching bones?

Henceforward do your messages yourself.

JULIET

Here’s such a coil! come, what says Romeo?

Nurse

Have you got leave to go to shrift to-day?

JULIET

Ihave.

Nurse

Then hie you hence to Friar Laurence’ cell; There stays a husband to make you a wife:

Now comes the wanton blood up in your cheeks, They’ll be in scarlet straight at any news.

Hie you to church; I must another way, To fetch a ladder, by the which your love

Must climb a bird’s nest soon when it is dark:

Iam the drudge and toil in your delight,

But you shall bear the burden soon at night. Go; I’ll to dinner: hie you to the cell.

JULIET

Hie to high fortune! Honest nurse, farewell.

Exeunt

SCENE VI. FRIAR LAURENCE’S CELL.

Enter FRIAR LAURENCE and ROMEO

FRIAR LAURENCE

So smile the heavens upon this holy act,

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WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

That after hours with sorrow chide us not!

ROMEO

Amen, amen! but come what sorrow can, It cannot countervail the exchange of joy

That one short minute gives me in her sight: Do thou but close our hands with holy words, Then love-devouring death do what he dare; It is enough I may but call her mine.

FRIAR LAURENCE

These violent delights have violent ends

And in their triumph die, like fire and powder, Which as they kiss consume: the sweetest honey Is loathsome in his own deliciousness

And in the taste confounds the appetite: Therefore love moderately; long love doth so; Too swift arrives as tardy as too slow.

Enter JULIET

Here comes the lady: O, so light a foot Will ne’er wear out the everlasting flint: A lover may bestride the gossamer

That idles in the wanton summer air, And yet not fall; so light is vanity.

JULIET

Good even to my ghostly confessor.

FRIAR LAURENCE

Romeo shall thank thee, daughter, for us both.

JULIET

As much to him, else is his thanks too much.

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ROMEO AND JULIET

ROMEO

Ah, Juliet, if the measure of thy joy

Be heap’d like mine and that thy skill be more To blazon it, then sweeten with thy breath This neighbour air, and let rich music’s tongue Unfold the imagined happiness that both Receive in either by this dear encounter.

JULIET

Conceit, more rich in matter than in words, Brags of his substance, not of ornament:

They are but beggars that can count their worth; But my true love is grown to such excess

I cannot sum up sum of half my wealth.

FRIAR LAURENCE

Come, come with me, and we will make short work; For, by your leaves, you shall not stay alone

Till holy church incorporate two in one.

Exeunt

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ACT III

SCENE I. A PUBLIC PLACE.

Enter MERCUTIO, BENVOLIO, Page, and Servants

BENVOLIO

I pray thee, good Mercutio, let’s retire: The day is hot, the Capulets abroad,

And, if we meet, we shall not scape a brawl;

For now, these hot days, is the mad blood stirring.

MERCUTIO

Thou art like one of those fellows that when he enters the confines of a tavern claps me his sword upon the table and says ‘God send me no need of thee!’ and by the operation of the second cup draws it on the drawer, when indeed there is no need.

BENVOLIO

Am I like such a fellow?

MERCUTIO

Come, come, thou art as hot a Jack in thy mood as any in Italy, and as soon moved to be moody, and as soon moody to be moved.

BENVOLIO

And what to?

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ROMEO AND JULIET

MERCUTIO

Nay, an there were two such, we should have none shortly, for one would kill the other. Thou! why, thou wilt quarrel with a man that hath a hair more, or a hair less, in his beard, than thou hast: thou

wilt quarrel with a man for cracking nuts, having no other reason but because thou hast hazel eyes: what eye but such an eye would spy out such a quarrel?

Thy head is as fun of quarrels as an egg is full of meat, and yet thy head hath been beaten as addle as an egg for quarrelling: thou hast quarrelled with a man for coughing in the street, because he hath wakened thy dog that hath lain asleep in the sun: didst thou not fall out with a tailor for wearing

his new doublet before Easter? with another, for tying his new shoes with old riband? and yet thou wilt tutor me from quarrelling!

BENVOLIO

An I were so apt to quarrel as thou art, any man

should buy the fee-simple of my life for an hour and a quarter.

MERCUTIO

The fee-simple! O simple!

BENVOLIO

By my head, here come the Capulets.

MERCUTIO

By my heel, I care not.

Enter TYBALT and others

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WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

TYBALT

Follow me close, for I will speak to them. Gentlemen, good den: a word with one of you.

MERCUTIO

And but one word with one of us? couple it with something; make it a word and a blow.

TYBALT

You shall find me apt enough to that, sir, an you will give me occasion.

MERCUTIO

Could you not take some occasion without giving?

TYBALT

Mercutio, thou consort’st with Romeo, –

MERCUTIO

Consort! what, dost thou make us minstrels? an thou make minstrels of us, look to hear nothing but discords: here’s my fiddlestick; here’s that shall make you dance. ‘Zounds, consort!

BENVOLIO

We talk here in the public haunt of men: Either withdraw unto some private place, And reason coldly of your grievances,

Or else depart; here all eyes gaze on us.

MERCUTIO

Men’s eyes were made to look, and let them gaze; I will not budge for no man’s pleasure, I.

Enter ROMEO

TYBALT

Well, peace be with you, sir: here comes my man.

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ROMEO AND JULIET

MERCUTIO

But I’ll be hanged, sir, if he wear your livery: Marry, go before to field, he’ll be your follower; Your worship in that sense may call him ‘man.’

TYBALT

Romeo, the hate I bear thee can afford

No better term than this, – thou art a villain.

ROMEO

Tybalt, the reason that I have to love thee Doth much excuse the appertaining rage To such a greeting: villain am I none;

Therefore farewell; I see thou know’st me not.

TYBALT

Boy, this shall not excuse the injuries

That thou hast done me; therefore turn and draw.

ROMEO

I do protest, I never injured thee,

But love thee better than thou canst devise, Till thou shalt know the reason of my love: And so, good Capulet, – which name I tender As dearly as my own, – be satisfied.

MERCUTIO

O calm, dishonourable, vile submission! Alla stoccata carries it away.

Draws

Tybalt, you rat-catcher, will you walk?

TYBALT

What wouldst thou have with me?

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WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

MERCUTIO

Good king of cats, nothing but one of your nine lives; that I mean to make bold withal, and as you shall use me hereafter, drybeat the rest of the eight. Will you pluck your sword out of his pitcher by the ears? make haste, lest mine be about your ears ere it be out.

TYBALT

I am for you.

Drawing

ROMEO

Gentle Mercutio, put thy rapier up.

MERCUTIO

Come, sir, your passado.

They fight

ROMEO

Draw, Benvolio; beat down their weapons. Gentlemen, for shame, forbear this outrage! Tybalt, Mercutio, the prince expressly hath Forbidden bandying in Verona streets: Hold, Tybalt! good Mercutio!

TYBALT under ROMEO’s arm stabs MERCUTIO, and flies with his followers

MERCUTIO

I am hurt.

A plague o’ both your houses! I am sped. Is he gone, and hath nothing?

BENVOLIO

What, art thou hurt?

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