SCENE III.

A Church Yard: in it a Monument belonging to the Capulets.

Enter PARIS, and his Page, bearing Flowers and a Torch.

Par. Give me thy torch, boy: Hence, and stand
aloof;-

Yet put it out, for I would not be seen.
Under yon yew-trees 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 remain1,
Accept this latest favour at my hands;

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

With funeral praises do adorn thy tomb!

1 The folio has these lines:

[The Boy whistles.

'Sweet flow'r, with flow'rs thy bridal bed I strew;
O woe! thy canopy is dust and stones,
Which with sweet water I will nightly dew;

Or, wanting that, with tears distill'd by moans:
The obsequies that I for thee will keep

Nightly shall be, to strew thy grave and weep.' In the text the seven lines are printed as they appear in the quarto of 1597.

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 !-muffle me, night, a while 2.

[Retires.

Enter ROMEO and BALTHASAR, 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 seest, 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 dear3 employment: therefore hence, be gone:-
But if thou, jealous, dost return to pry
In what I further shall intend to do,
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.

2 Thus in Drayton's Polyolbion:

'But suddenly the clouds which on the winds do fly
Do muffle him again.'

The word was not deemed unpoetical by Milton; the Elder
Brother in Comus uses it:-

Unmuffle, ye faint stars,' &c.

A muffler was a part of female dress, described in vol. i. p. 261. 3 That is, in action of importance. The sense of the word dear has been explained in vol. i. p. 382. So Ben Jonson, in Catiline, Act i.:-

'Put your known talents on so dear a business.'

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 détestable1 maw, thou womb of death,
Gorg'd 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,—

And here is come to do some villanous shame
To the dead bodies: I will apprehend him.—
[Advances.

Stop thy unhallow'd toil, 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.

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:
Stay not, begone;-live, and hereafter say-
A madman's mercy bade thee run away.

4 Detestable was formerly accented on the first syllable, as in the present instance. So Spenser, Faerie Queene, b. i. can. i. st. 26:

'That détestable sight him much amaz'd.'

Par. I do defy thy conjurations 5, And do attach thee as a felon here.

Rom. Wilt thou provoke me? then have at thee, boy. [They fight. Page. Olord! 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.

[Dies. Rom. In faith, I will:-Let me peruse this face; Mercutio's kinsman, noble county Paris: What said my man, when my betossed soul 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 me in sour misfortune's book! I'll bury thee in a triumphant grave,

A grave? O, no; a lantern", slaughter'd youth,

5 I refuse to do as thou conjurest me to do, i. e. depart. So Constance, in King John, says :

'No, I defy all counsel, all redress.'

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. See the beautiful lantern at Ely Minster.

The same word, with the same sense, occurs in Churchyard's Siege of Edinbrough Castle:—

This lofty seat and lantern of that land

Like lodestarre stode, and lokte o'er ev'ry streete.'

And in Holland's translation of Pliny's Nat. Hist. b. xxxv. :— Hence came the louvers and lanternes reared over the roofes of temples.'

A presence is a public room, which is at times the presencechamber of a sovereign. This thought, extravagant as it is, is borrowed by Middleton in his Blurt Master Constable :

'The darkest dungeon which spite can devise
To throw this carcase in, her glorious eyes
Can make as lightsome as the fairest chamber
In Paris Louvre.'

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.

[Laying PARIS in the Monument. How oft when men are at the point of death Have they been merry? which their keepers call A lightning before death: O, how may Ì7 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 beauty3: 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

7 The first quarto reads, ' But how,' &c. This idea very frequently occurs in our old dramas. So in the Second Part of The Downfall of Robert Earl of Huntingdon, 1601:

'I thought it was a lightning before death,

Too sudden to be certain.'

8 So in Sidney's Arcadia, b. iii. :—' Death being able to divide the soule, but not the beauty from her body.' And in Daniel's Complaint of Rosamond, 1594 :

Decayed roses of discoloured cheeks

Do yet retain some notes of former grace,
And ugly death sits fair within her face.'

'Death's pale flag,' in the subsequent line, has also its prototype in Daniel's Complaint of Rosamond, 1594 :—

'And nought respecting death (the last of paines)

Plac'd his pale colours (th' ensign of his might)
Upon his new-got spoil,' &c.

A passage in Marini's Rime Lugubri, 1604, p. 149, bears a very strong resemblance to this; but Daniel could not have borrowed it, as Malone suggests:

VOL. X.

'Morte la'nsegna sua, pallida e bianca,
Vincitrice spiegò su'l volto mio.'