So thon, my surfeit, and my heresy,
Of all be hated; but the most of me!

And all my powers, address your love and' might,
To honour Helen, and to be her knight! [Exit.
Her. [starting.] Help me, Lysander, help me!
do thy best,

To pluck this crawling serpent from my breast!
Ah me, for pity! what a dream was here?
Lysander, look, how I do quake with fear:
Methought, a serpent eat my heart away,
And you sat smiling at his cruel prey:
Lysander! what, remov'd? Lysander! Lord!
What, out of hearing? gone? no sound, no word?
Alack, where are you? speak, an if you hear;
Speak, of all loves; I swoon almost with fear.

No?

then I well perceive you are not nigh: Either death, or you, I'll find immediately. [Exit.

ACT III.

SCENE I.

The same. The Queen of Fairies lying asleep.

Enter QUINCE, SNUG, BOTTOM, FLUTE, Snout, and STARVELING.

Bot. Are we all met?

Quin. Pat, pat; and here's a marvellous convenient place for our rehearsal: This green plot shall be our stage, this hawthorn brake our tyringhouse; and we will do it in action, as we will do it in before the Duke.

Quin. What say'st thou, bully Bottom?

Bot. There are things in this comedy of Pyramus and Thisby, hat will never please. First, Pyramus must draw a sword to kill himself; which the ladies cannot abide. How answer you

that ?

Snout. By'rlaking, a parlous fear.

Star. I believe, we must leave the killing out, when all is done.

Bol. Not a whit; I have a device to make allwell. Write me a prologue: and let the prologue seem to say, we will do no harm with our swords; and that Pyramus is not killed indeed and, for the more better assurance, tell them, that I Pyramus am not Pyramus, but Bottom the weaver: This will put them out of fear.

Quin. Well, we will have such a prologue; and it shall be written in eight and six.

Bot. No, make it two more; let it be written in eight and eight.

Snout. Will not the ladies be afeard of the lion?

Star. I fear it, I promise you.

Bot. Masters, you ought to consider with yourselves to bring in, God shield us! a lion among ladies, is a most dreadful thing: for there is, not a more fearful wild-fowl than your lion, living; and we ought to look to it.

Snout. Therefore, another prologue must tell, he is not a lion.

Bot. Nay, you must name his name, and half his face must be seen through the lion's neck; and he himself must speak through, saying thus, or to the same defect, Ladies, or fair Ladies, I would wish you, or, I would request you, or, I

would entreat you, my life for yours.

not to fear, not to tremble: If you think I come hither as a lion, it were pity of my life: No, I am no such thing; I am a man as other men are: and there, indeed, let him name his name; and tell them plainly, he is Snug the joiner.

Quin. Well, it shall be so. But there is two hard things; that is, to bring the moon- - light into a chamber: for you know, Pyramus and Thisby meet by moon-light.

Snug. Doth the moon shine, that night we play our play?

Bot. A calendar, a calendar! look in the almanack; find out moon-shine, find out moonshine.

Quin. Yes, it doth shine that night.

Bot. Why, then you may leave a casement of the great chamber window, where we play, open; and the moon may shine in at the casement.

Quin. Ay; or else one must come in with a bush of thorns and a lanthorn, and say, he comes to disfigure, or present, the person of moon-shine. Then, there is another thing: we must have a wall in the great chamber; for Pyramus and Thisby, says the story, did talk through the chînk of a wall.

Snug. You never can bring in a wall. say you, Bottom?

- What

Bot. Some man ΟΙ other must present wall: and let him have some plaster, or some lome, or some rough cast about him, to signify wall; let him hold his fingers thus, and through that cranny shall Pyramus and Thisby whisper.

or

Quin. If that may be, then all is well. Come, sit down, every mother's son, and rehearse your parts. Pyramus you begin: when you have

spoken your speech, enter into that brake; and so every one according to his cue.

Enter Puck behind.

Puck. What hempen, home - spuns

swaggering here,

have We

So near the cradle of the fairy Queen?
What, a play toward? I'll be an auditor;
An actor too, perhaps, if I see cause.
Quin. Speak, Pyramus:

Thisby, stand forth, Pyr. Thisby, the flowers of odious savours sweet,

Quin. Odours, odours.

Pyr.

odours savours sweet: So doth thy breath,

dear.

my dearest Thisby

But, hark, a voice! stay thou but here a while, And by and by I will to thee appear. [Exit. Puck. A stranger Pyramus than e'er play'd here!

This. Must I speak now?

Quin. Ay, marry, must you for you must understand, he goes but to see a noise that he heard, and is to come again.

This. Most radiant Pyramus, most lilly-white of hue,

Of colour like the red rose on triumphant brier,

Most brisky juvenal, and eke most lovely Jew, As true as truest horse, that yet would never tire,

I'll meet thee, Pyramus, at Ninny's tomb.

Quin. Ninus' tomb, man: Why you must not speak that yet; that you answer to Pyramus: you

Py

speak all your part at once, cues and all. ramus enter; your cue is past; it is, never tiré.

Re-enter PUCK, and BOTTOM with an ass's

head.

As true as truest horse, that yet

This. O, would never tire.

Pyr. If I were fair, Thisby, I were only thine. Quin. O monstrous! O strange! we are haunted. Pray, masters! fly, masters! help!

[Exeunt Clowns. Fuck. I'll follow you, I'll lead you about a

round,

Through bog, through bush, through brake,
through brier;

Sometime a horse I'll be, sometime a hound,
A hóg, a headless bear, sometime a fire;
And neigh, and bark, and grunt, and roar, and

burn,

Like horse, hound, hog, bear, fire, at every turn. [Exit. Bot. Why do they run away? this is a knavery of them, to make me afeard.

Re-enter SNOUT.

Snout. O Bottom, thou art changed! what do I see on thee?

Bot. What do you see? you see an ass' head of your own; Do you?

Re-enter QUINCE.

Quin. Bless thee, Bottom! bless thee! thou art translated.

Bot. I see their knavery: this is to ass of me; to fright me, if they could.

[Exit. make an

But I