Enter Nurfe.

Nurfe. O holy friar, O, tell me, holy friar, Where is my lady's lord, where's Romeo?

Fri. There, on the ground, with his own tears made drunk.

Nurfe. O, he is even in my miftrefs' cafe, Juft in her cafe!

Fri. O woeful fympathy !
Piteous predicament!
Narfe. Even fo lies fhe,

Blubbering and weeping, weeping and blubbering :--
Stand up, ftand up; ftand, an you be a man:
For Juliet's fake, for her fake, rife and ftand;
'Why should you fall into fo deep an O?

Rom. Nurfe!

Nurfe. Ah fir! ah fir !-death is the end of all. Rom. Spak'ft thou of Juliet? how is it with her? Doth fhe not think me an old murderer, Now I have ftain'd the childhood of our joy With blood remov'd but little from her own? Where is the? and how doth fhe? and what fays My conceal'd lady to our cancell'd love?

Nurfe. O, fhe fays nothing, fir, but weeps and

weeps ;

And now falls on her bed; and then starts up,
And Tybalt calls; and then on Romeo cries,
And then down falls again.

90 woeful fympathy!

Piteous predicament!] One may wonder the editors did not fee that this language must neceffarily belong to the Friar.

FARMER.

Dr. Farmer's emendation may justly claim that place in the text to which I have now advanced it. STEEVENS.

Why Should you fall into fo deep an ob?] Hanmer reads:
Why Should you full into fo deep an—

Rom. Ob nurfe! JOHNSON.

2-cancell'd love ] The folio reads conceal'd love. JOHNSON. The quarto, cancell d ́love.

STEEVENS.

Rom.

Rom. As if that name,

Shot from the deadly level of a gun,
Did murder her; as that name's curfed hand
Murder'd her kinfman.-O tell me, friar, tell me,
In what vile part of this anatomy

Doth my name lodge? tell me, that I my fack
The hateful manfion.
[Drawing his fword.

Fri. Hold thy defperate hand :
3 Art thou a man? thy form cries out, thou art?
Thy tears are womanish; thy wild acts denote
The unreasonable fury of a beaft:

+ Unfeeming woman, in a feeming man!
Or ill befeeming beaft, in feeming both!
Thou haft amaz'd me: by my holy order,
I thought thy difpofition better temper'd.
Haft thou flain Tybalt? wilt thou flay thyself?
And flay thy lady too that lives in thee,

3 Art thou a man? thy form cries out, thou art;

Thy tears are womanish ;] Shakspeare has here closely followed his original:

"Art thou, quoth he, a man? thy fhape faith, fo thou art ;
"Thy crying and thy weeping eyes denote a woman's heart.
"For manly reafon is quite from off thy mind outchafed,
"And in her ftead affections lewd, and fancies highly
placed;

"So that I ftood in doubt this hour at the leaft

"If thou a man or woman wert, or else a brutish beaft." Tragicall Hyftory of Romeus aud Juliet, 1562. ' MALONE.

4 Unfeemly woman, &c.] This ftrange nonfenfe Mr. Pope threw out of his edition for defperate. But it is easily restored as Shakspeare wrote it into good pertinent fenfe.

Unfeemly woman in a feeming man!

An ill-befeeming beaft in seeming groth.

i. e. you have the ill-befceming paffions of a brute beast in the wellfeeming fhape of a rational creature. For having in the first line faid he was a woman in the fhape of man, he aggravates the thought in the fecond, and fays, he was even a brute in the fhape of a rational creature. Seeming is used in both places for Jeemly. WARBURTON.

The old reading is probable. Thou art a beat of ill qualities, under the appearance both of a woman and a man. JOHNSON.

By doing damned hate upon thyfelf?

Why rail'ft thou on thy birth, the heaven, and earth?
Since birth, and heaven, and earth, all three do meet
In thee at once; which thou at once would't lofe.
Fie, fic thou fham'ft thy fhape, thy love, thy wit;
Which like an ufurer, abound'ft in all,
And useft none in that true ufe indeed
Which fhould bedeck thy fhape, thy love, thy wit.
Thy noble fhape is but a form of wax,
Digreffing from the valour of a man:
Thy dear love, fworn, but hollow perjury,
Killing that love which thou haft vow'd to cherish.
Thy wit, that ornament to fhape and love,,
Mif-fhapen in the conduct of them both,
Like powder in the fkill-lefs foldier's flafk,
Is fet on fire by thine own ignorance,

And thou difmember'd with thine own defence.
What, roufe thee, man! thy Julict is alive,

5 Why railst thou on thy birth, the heaven and earth] Romeo has not here railed on his birth, &c though in his interview with the friar as deferibed in The Tragicall Hyflory of Romeus and Juliet, he is made to do fo:

"First Nature did he blame the author of his life,

In which his joys had been fo fcant, and forrows aye fo rife;

"The time and place of birth he fiercely did reprove, "He cryed out with open mouth against the fars above. 37 On Fortune eke he rail'd--Shakspeare copied the remonstrance of the friar, without review. ing the former part of his fcene. MALONE.

86

Like powder in the fkill-lefs foldier's faf, &c.] To understand the force of this allufion, it would be remembered that the ancient English foldiers, ufing match-locks, instead of locks with flints as at prefent, were obliged to carry a lighted match hanging at their belts, very near to the wooden fak in which they kept their powder. The fame allufion occurs in Humour's Ordinary, an old Colicction of English epigrams:

"When the his flak and touch-box fet on fire,

"And ill this hour the burning is not out." STEEVENS. And thou difmember'd with thine own defence.] And thou torn to pieces with thine own weapons. JOHNSON,

For whofe dear fake thou waft but lately dead;
There art thou happy: Tybalt would kill thee,
But thou flew'ft Tybalt; there too art thou happy:
The law, that threaten'd death, becomes thy friend,
And turns it to exile; there art thou happy:
A pack of bleffings lights upon thy back;
Happiness courts thee in her beft array;
But like a mis-hav'd and a fullen wench,
Thou pout'ft upon thy fortune and thy love:
Take heed, take heed, for fuch die miferable.
Go, get thee to thy love, as was decreed,
Afcend her chamber, hence and comfort her;
But, look, thou ftay not, 'till the watch be fet,
For then thou canft not pafs to Mantua;
Where thou fhalt live, 'till we can find a time
To blaze your marriage, reconcile your friends,
Beg pardon of the prince, and call thee back
With twenty hundred thousand times more joy
Than thou went'ft forth in lamentation.-
Go before, nurfe: commend me to thy lady;
And bid her haften all the house to bed,
Which heavy forrow makes them apt unto :
Romeo is coming

Nurfe. O Lord, I could have ftaid here all the night,

To hear good counfel: O, what learning is !--
My lord, I'll tell my lady you will come.

Rom. Do fo, and bid my fweet prepare to chide. Nurfe. Here, fir, a ring the bid me give you, fir: Hie you, make hafte, for it grows very late.

Rom. How well my comfort is reviv'd by this! Fri. Go hence. Good night :-and 'here stands all your state.

8 Romeo is coming.] Much of this fpeech has likewife been added fince the first edition. STEEVENS.

9 Go bence. Good night, &c.] These three lines are omitted in all the modern editions. JOHNSON.

1

—here Alands all your flate ;] The whole of your fortune depends on this. JOHNSON.

VOL. X.

I

Either

Either be gone before the watch be fet,
Or by the break of day difguis'd from hence:
Sojourn in Mantua: I'll find out your man,
And he fhall fignify from time to time
Every good hap to you, that chances here:
Give me thy hand; 'tis late: farewel; good night.
Rom. But that a joy past joy calls out on me,
It were a grief, so brief to part with thee :
Farewel.

[Exeunt.

2S CENE IV.

A room in Capulet's houfe.

Enter Capulet, Lady Capulet, and Paris.

Cap. Things have fallen out, fir, fo unluckily, That we have had no time to move our daughter: Look you, fhe lov'd her kinfman Tybalt dearly, And fo did I;-Well, we were born to die."Tis very late, fhe'll not come down to-night: I promife you, but for your company, I would have been a-bed an hour ago.

Par. Thefe times of woe afford no time to woo :Madam, good night: commend me to your daughter. La. Cap. I will, and know her mind early to

morrow;

3

To-night fhe's mew'd up to her heaviness.
Cap. Sir Paris, I will make a defperate tender

2 SCENE IV. Some few unneceffary verfes are omitted in this fcene according to the oldeft editions. POPE.

These verses are fuch as will by no means connect with the last and most improved copy of the play.

STEEVENS.

A mero was a

3 mew'd up.] This is a phrafe from falconry. place of confinement for hawks. STEEVENS.

4 Sir Paris, I will make a defperate tender

Of my child's love.] Defperate means only bold, advent'rous, as if he had faid in the vulgar phrafe, I will speak a bold words and venture to promife you my daughter. JOHNSON.

So, in The Weakest goes to the Wall, 1618 :

"Witness this defperate tender of mine honour. STEEVENS.

Of