It stands as an edict in destiny: Then let us teach our trial patience, Because it is a customary cross; As due to love as thoughts and dreams and sighs, Lys. A good persuasion; therefore, hear me, Hermia. Of great revenue, and she hath no child; And she respects me as her only son. 155 From Athens is her house remote seven leagues: 160 154. due] dewe Q 1. 165 159, 160. And... leagues] transposed according to Johnson's conj., adopted by Keightley and Hudson; From: son Qq, Ff. 160. remote] Qq, remou'd Ff. 167. to a] Qq, Capell, etc.; for a Ff; to the Pope, etc. 160. remote] the reading of the Qq is adopted by almost all subsequent editors. Furness, however, prefers the Folio reading, and quotes Hamlet, I. iv. 61, "It waves you to a more removed ground"; and As You Like It, III. ii. 360, "so removed a dwelling." 167. observance] Cf. Iv. i. 29; and Chaucer, The Knightes Tale, 1500 (ed. Pollard), "and for to doon his observ. aunce to May"; and his Troilus and Creseide, ii. 112, "and lat us don to May some observaunce." an English poet from Chaucer to Tennyson is without a reference to the simple customs by which our ancestors celebrated the advent of the flowers," Wright. Scarcely Her. There will I stay for thee. My good Lysander! I swear to thee, by Cupid's strongest bow, By his best arrow with the golden head, By the simplicity of Venus' doves, By that which knitteth souls and prospers loves, By all the vows that ever men have broke, Enter HELENA. Her. God speed, fair Helena! Whither away? 170 175 180 171, 172. By the loves] transposed by Singer (ed. 2). 172. loves] QI; loue Q 2, Ff. 180. Scene III.] Pope; speed, fair] Theobald, speed fair F 1. 182. your fair] Qq, you fair Ff, you, fair Rowe (ed. 2). 169. Cupid's... bow] Cf. Venus and Adonis, 581, "by Cupid's bow he doth protest. 170. best arrow] alluding to the arrows of Ovid's Metam., i. 467, in Golding's translation, in which Shakespeare was well versed: "Therefrom his quiver full of shafts That chaseth loue is blunt, whose 161 (Bullen), "Thence flew Love's arrow with the golden head"; and Sidney's Arcadia, II., "But arrowes two and tipt with gold or lead." Cf. also Twelfth Night, 1. i. 35: "How will she love when the rich golden shaft Hath killed the flock of all affections else That live in her." 172.] The allusion is "most probably to the cestus of Venus," Keightley, Expositor, 1867. " of F I 174. Troyan] So Qq, F 1. 182. your fair] The "you" makes admirable sense; the first "fair" being then taken as an adjec Cf. Marlowe's Hero and Leander, i. tive, i.e. Demetrius loves you who are Your eyes are lode-stars; and your tongue's sweet air Yours would I catch, fair Hermia, ere I go; My ear should catch your voice, my eye your eye, The rest I'ld give to be to you translated. Her. I frown upon him, yet he loves me still. 190 186. so,] Qq, Ff; so! Theobald. 187. Yours would I] Hanmer; Your words I Qq, F1; Your words Ide F 2, 3, 4. 188. ear... voice] hair... hair Hudson (Lettsom conj.). 189. tongue] voice Cartwright conj. 191. I'ld] I'd Hanmer, White ii., Keightley, Hudson; ile Q 1 ; Ile Q 2, F1,2; Ï'le F 3, 4. Which must be lode-star to his and Chaucer, Knightes Tale, 2059: And after was sche maad the lode- 186. favour] "that is, feature, coun tenance," Steevens. It refers, I think, to the personal qualities of physical beauty enumerated 188 sqq. Cf. As You Like It, IV. iii. 87: "The boy is fair, Of female favour"; and the play upon the word in Love's Labour's Lost, V. ii. 33: "An if my face were but as fair as yours It is My favour were as great." 187. Yours would I catch] the excellent emendation of Hanmer. impossible to defend the reading of the Qq or Ff; and even Furness deserts the Folio here. 188, 189. My ear should catch. melody] There is no reason for any change of reading here. It was surely necessary for Helena's ear to catch Hermia's voice before her own tongue should catch the sweet melody of her rival's. For the rhyme of "eye" with "melody," cf. II. ii. 13, 14. 190. bated] excepted, lit. abated. 191. translated] transformed. III. i. 121. See Hel. O, that your frowns would teach my smiles such skill! Her. I give him curses, yet he gives me love. Hel. O, that my prayers could such affection move! 195 Hel. The more I love, the more he hateth me. Her. His folly, Helena, is no fault of mine. 200 Hel. None, but your beauty; would that fault were mine! Her. Take comfort; he no more shall see my face; Lysander and myself will fly this place. Before the time I did Lysander see, 205 O, then, what graces in my love do dwell, That he hath turn'd a heaven unto a hell! Lys. Helen, to you our minds we will unfold: 200. folly, Helena, is no fault] Q1; folly, Helena is none Q 2, Ff; fault, oh Helena, is none Hanmer; fault, faire Helena, is none Collier; Helena] Helen Dyce (ed. 2), Hudson. 201. beauty] F 1, beauty's Hudson (Daniel conj.). 207. unto a] Q 1; into Q 2, Ff; unto Boswell. 205. as] Q1; like Q 2, Ff. 200. no fault of mine] So Q 1, and the majority of editors; Q 2 and Ff having "none of mine." Furness adheres to the text of F 1, and remarks: "If we assume that Hermia is trying to comfort her dear friend with assurances of her enduring love, then there is a charm in this asseveration, in the Folio, that she does not share in Demetrius's folly, which gives hate for love, but that she returns love for love; and her words become sympathetic and caressing. But if we adopt the text of QI, Hermia's words have a faint tinge of acerbity (which, it must be confessed, is not altogether out of character), as though she were defending herself from some unkind imputation, and wished to close the discussion (which would also be not unnatural). It is again in favour of the Quarto that Helena replies, 'would that fault were mine.' The demonstrative 'that' seems clearly to refer to a 'fault' previously expressed. This weighs so heavily with Capell that he says the word 'fault' must of necessity have a place' in Hermia's line. Lastly, it is in favour of the Folio that Helena's first words are Hermia's last. 'It is none of mine,' says Hermia. 'It is none of yours,' assents Helena." 207. unto a hell!] Dyce, Remarks, 44, says: "The context, a heaven, is quite enough to determine that the reading of Fisher's 4to (i.e. Q 1), unto a hell, is the right one, excepting that unto should be into. Cf. a well-known passage of Milton: 'The mind in its own place and in itself Can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven,' Paradise Lost, i. 254.” To-morrow night, when Phoebe doth behold Upon faint primrose-beds were wont to lie, 1210 215 220 213. gates] Qq, F 1, 2; gate F 3, 4. 216. sweet] Theobald; sweld Qq, Ft. 219. stranger companies] Theobald, etc.; strange companions Qq, Ff. 221. thy] thine Rowe (ed. 2). 212. still always, constantly. "ever," 150, ante. Cf. 215. faint primrose-beds] "faint" is here, I think, an epithet of colour, hardly of smell. See Winter's Tale, IV. iv. 122, “pale primroses, That die unmarried"; and Cymbeline, IV. ii. 221, "the flower that's like thy face, pale primrose." Marshall points out that Shakespeare uses "pale" and "faint" together, namely, in King John, v. vii. 21, "I am the cygnet to this pale faint swan." 219. stranger companies] Theobald's happy conjecture for " strange companions." He remarks: "This whole scene is strictly in rhyme, and that it deviates... I am persuaded is owing to the ignorance of the first and the inaccuracy of the later editors; I have, therefore, ventured to restore the rhymes, as I make no doubt but the poet first gave them. 'Sweet' was easily corrupted into 'sweld,' because that uses But tread the stranger paths of banishment'; and in Henry V. I. i. 53, 'His companies unletter'd, rude and shallow.' And so in a parallel word, 'My riots past, my wild societies,' Merry Wives, III. iv. 8." Steevens and Halliwell adhere to the Folio readings. Dyce believes that more certain emendations were never made; Wright considers that the rhyme is decisive in favour of Theobald's conjecture; and Furness that in a modernised text Theobald's emendations should be adopted unquestionably. It is an example of the confusion of the final "e" and "er." |