Have been deceived; for they swore you did.
Beat. Do not you love me?
Bene.

Troth, no, no more than reason.
Beat. Why, then my cousin, Margaret, and
Ursula,

Are much deceiv'd; for they did swear you did. Bene. They swore that you were almost sick for mc.

Beat. They swore that you were well-nigh dead for me.

Bene. 'Tis no such matter:-Then you do not
love me ?

Beat. No, truly, but in friendly recompense.
Leon. Come, cousin, I am sure you love the

gentleman.

Claud. And I'll be sworn upon't, that he loves her;
For here's a paper, written in his hand,
A halting sonnet of his own pure brain,
Fashion'd to Beatrice.

And here's another,

Hero
Writ in my cousin's hand, stolen from her pocket,
Containing her affection unto Benedick.

Bene. A miracle! here's our own hands against our hearts!-Come, I will have thee; but, by this light, I take thee for pity.

Beat. I would not deny you; but, by this good day, I yield upon great persuasion; and, partly, to save your life, for I was told you were in a consumption.

Bene. Peace, I will stop your mouth. [Kissing her. D. Pedro. How dost thou, Benedick the married man?

Bene. I'll tell thee what, prince; a college of wit-crackers cannot flout me out of my humour: Dost thou think, I care for a satire, or an epigram? No: if a man will be beaten with brains, he shall wear nothing handsome about him: In brief, since I do propose to marry, I will think nothing to any purpose that the world can say against it; and therefore never flout at me for what I have said against t; for man is a giddy thing, and this is my conclusion. For thy part, Claudio, I did think to have beaten thee; but in that thou art like to be my kinsman, live unbruised and love my cousin.

Claud. I had well hoped, thou wouldst have

1 Because.

nied Beatrice, that I might have cudgelled thee out of thy single life, to make thee a double dealer; which, out of question, thou wilt be, if my cousin do not look exceeding narrowly to thee.

Bene. Come, come, we are friends:-let's have a dance ere we are married, that we may lighten our own hearts, and our wives' heels.

Leon. We'll have dancing afterwards.

Bene. First o'my word: therefore play, musicPrince, thou art sad; get thee a wife, get thee z wife: there is no staff more reverend "than one tipped with horn.2

Enter a Messenger.

Mess. My lord, your brother John is ta'en in flight And brought with armed men back to Messina. Bene. Think not on him till to-morrow; I'll devise thee brave punishments for him.-Strike up, pipers. [Dance. Exeunt.

THIS play may be justly said to contain two of the most sprightly characters that Shakspeare ever drew. The wit, the humourist, the gentleman, and the soldier are combined in Benedick. It is to be lamented, indeed, that the first and most splendid of these distinctions is disgraced by unnecessary profaneness; for the goodness of his heart is hardly sufficient to atone for the liflashes out in the conversation of Beatrice, may be excence of his tongue. The too sarcastic levity, which cused on account of the steadiness and friendship so apparent in her behaviour, when she urges her lover to risk his life by a challenge to Claudio. In the conduct of the fable, however, there is an imperfection similar to that which Dr. Johnson has pointed out in The Merry Wives of Windsor :-the second contrivance is less ingenious than the first :-or, to speak more plainly, the same incident is become stale by repetition. I wish some other method had been found to entrap Beatrice, than that very one which before had been successfully practised on Benedick.3

Much Ado about Nothing, (as I understand from one of Mr. Vertue's MSS.) formerly passed under the title on the 20th of May, 1613, the sum of forty pounds, and of Benedick and Beatrix. Heming the player received, twenty pounds more as his Majesty's gratuity, for exde-hibiting six plays at Hampton Court, among which was this comedy.

STEEVENS.

2 Steevens, Malone, and Reed, conceive that there 3 Mr. Pye thus answers the objection of Steevens. is an allusion here to the staff used in the ancient trialThe intention of the poet was to show that persons of by wager of battle; but Mr. Douce thinks it is more either sex might be made in love with each other by probable the walking stick or staff of elderly persons was supposing themselves beloved, though they were before intended, such sticks were often tipped or headed with enemies; and how he could have done this by any other horn, sometimes crosswise, in imitation of the crutched means I do not know. He wanted to show the sexes sticks or potences of the friars, which were borrowed were alike in this case, and to have employed different from the celebrated tau of St. Anthony. motives would have counteracted his own design.'

MIDSUMMER-NIGHT'S DREAM.

PRELIMINARY REMARKS.

WE may presume the plot of this play to have been the invention of Shakspeare, as the diligence of his commentators has failed to trace the sources from whence it is derived. Steevens says that the hint for it was probably received from Chaucer's Knight's Tale.

In the Midsummer Night's Dream,' says Schlegel, 'there flows a luxuriant vein of the boldest and most fantastical invention; the most extraordinary combination of the most dissimilar ingredients seems to have arisen without effort by some ingenious and lucky accident, and the colours are of such clear transparency that we think that the whole of the variegated fabric may be blown away with a breath. The fairy world here described resembles those elegant pieces of Arabesque, where little Genii, with butterfly wings, rise half embodied above the flower cups. Twilight, moonshine,

dew, and spring-perfumes are the element of these ten der spirits; they assist nature in embroidering her carpet with green leaves, many coloured flowers, and daz źling insects; in the human world they merely sport in a childish and wayward manner with their beneficent or noxious influences. Their most violent rage dissolves in good-natured raillery; their passions, stripped of all earthly matter, are merely an ideal dream. To corres. pond with this, the loves of mortals are painted as a poetical enchantment, which, by a contrary enchantment, may be immediately suspended, and then renew. ed again. The different parts of the plot; the wedding of Theseus, the disagreement of Oberon and Titania, the flight of the two pair of lovers, and the theatrical operations of the mechanics, are so lightly and happily interwoven, that they seem necessary to each other for

the formation of a whole. Oberon is desirous of reliev- | Hippolita are, as it were, a splendid frame for the picing the lovers trom their perplexities, and greatly adds ture; they take no part in the action, but appear with a to them through the misapprehension of his servant, till stately pomp. The discourse of the hero and his Amahe at last comes to the aid of their fruitless amorous zon, as they course through the forest with their noisy pain, their inconstancy and jealousy, and restores fide-hunting train, works upon the imagination like the fresh lity to its old rights. The extremes of fanciful and vul breath of morning, before which the shapes of night gar are united when the enchanted Titania awakes and disappear.'* falls in love with a coarse mechanic with an ass's head, This is a production of the youthful and vigourous who represents, or rather disfigures the part of a tragi-imagination of the poet. Malone places the date of its cal lover. The droll wonder of the transmutation of composition in 1594. There are two quarto editions, Bottom is merely the transmutation of a metaphor in its both printed in 1600: one by Thomas Fisher, the other literal sense; but, in his behaviour during the tender by James Roberts. homage of the Fairy Queen, we have a most amusing proof how much the consciousness of such a head-dress heightens the effect of his usual folly. Theseus and

* Lectures on Dramatic Literature, vol. ii. p. 176.

Ege. Happy be Theseus, our renowned duke !2 The. Thanks, good Egeus: What's the news with thee?

Ege. Full of vexation come I, with complaint Against my child, my daughter Hermia

1 A triumph was a public show, such as a mask, pageant, procession, &c.

2 Duke, in our old language, was used for a leader or chief, as the Latin Dux.

3 The old copies read, 'This man hath bewitched.' The alteration was made in the second folio for the sake of the metre; but a redundant syllable at the commence ment of a verse perpetually occurs in our old dramas,

Stand forth, Demetrius ;-My noble lord,
Stand forth, Lysander;-and, my gracious duke,
This man hath my consent to marry her :-

This hath bewitch'd3 the bosom of my child :
Thou, thou, Lysander, thou hast given her rhymes
And interchang'd love tokens with my child:
Thou hast by moon-light at her window sung,
With feigning voice, verses of feigning love;
And stol'n the impression of her fantasy
With bracelets of thy hair, rings, gawds,4 conceits,
Knacks, trifles, nosegays, sweet-meats; messengers
Of strong prevailment in unharden'd youth:
With cunning hast thou filch'd my daughter's heart;
Turn'd her obedience, which is due to me,
To stubborn harshness:-And, my gracious duke,
Be it so she will not here before your grace
Consent to marry with Demetrius,

I beg the ancient privilege of Athens;
As she is mine, I may dispose of her:
Which shall be either to this gentleman,
Or to her death; according to our law,
Immediately provided in that case.5

To

The. What say you, Hermia? be advis'd, fau
maid :

you your father should be as a god;
One that compos'd your beauties; yea, and one
To whom you are but as a form in wax,
By him imprinted, and within his power
To leave the figure, or disfigure it.
Demetrius is a worthy gentleman.
Her. So is Lysander.
The.

In himself he is:
But, in this kind, wanting your father's voice,
The other must be held the worthier.
Her. I would my father look'd but with my eyes.
The. Rather your eyes must with his judgmen
look.

Her. I do entreat your grace to pardon me.
I know not by what power I am made bold;
Nor how it may concern my modesty,

In such a presence here, to plead my thoughts:
But I beseech your grace that I may know
The worst that may befall me in this case,
If I refuse to wed Demetrius.

The. Either to die the death, or to abjure
For ever the society of men.

Therefore, fair Hermia, question your desires,
Know of your youth, examine well your blood,
Whether, if you yield not to your father's choice,
You can endure the livery of a nun ;
For aye1 to be in shady cloister mew'd,
To live a barren sister all your life,
Chanting faint hymns to the cold fruitless moon.
Thrice blessed they, that master so their blood,
To undergo such maiden pilgrimage:
But earthlier happy2 is the rose distill'd,
Than that, which, withering on the virgin thorn,
Grows, lives, and dies, in single blessedness.

Her. So will I grow, so live, so die, my lord,
Ere I will yield my virgin patent up

Unto his lordship, whose unwished yoke
My soul consents not to give sovereignty.

Lys. How now, my love! Why is your cheek so pale ?

How chance the roses there do fade so fast?

Her. Belike, for want of rain; which I could well
Beteem them from the tempest of mine eyes.
Lys. Ah me! for aught that ever I could read,
Could ever hear by tale or history,

The course of true love never did run smooth:
But, either it was different in blood
;

Her. O cross! too high to be enthrall'd to low
Lys. Or else misgraffed, in respect of years;
Her. O spite! too old to be engaged to young!
Lys. Or else it stood upon the choice of friends:
Her. O hell! to choose love by another's eye!
Lys. Or, if there were a sympathy in choice,
War, death, or sickness did lay siege to it;
Making it momentany3 as a sound,
Swift as a shadow, short as any dream;
Brief as the lightning in the collied night,
That, in a spleen, unfolds both heaven and earth,
And ere a man hath power to say,-Behold!
The jaws of darkness do devour it up;

So quick bright things come to confusion.

Her. If then true lovers have been ever cross'd, It stands as an edict in destiny:

The. Take time to pause: and, by the next new Then let us teach our trial patience,

moon,

{The sealing-day betwixt my love and me,

For everlasting bond of fellowship,)
Upon that day either prepare to die,

For disobedience to your father's will;

Or else to wed Demetrius, as he would:

Dr on Diana's altar to protest,

For aye, austerity and single life.

Because it is a customary cross

As due to love, as thoughts, and dreams, and sighs,
Wishes, and tears, poor fancy's" followers.

Lys. A good persuasion; therefore, hear me,
Hermia.

I have a widow aunt, a dowager

Of great revenue, and she hath no child:
From Athens is her house remote seven leagues;

Dem. Relent, sweet Hermia ;-And, Lysander, And she respects me as her only son.

yield

Thy crazed title to my certain right.

Lys. You have her father's love, Demetrius ;
Let me have Hermia's: do you marry him.
Ege. Scornful Lysander! true, he hath my love,
And what is mine my love shall render him ;
And she is mine; and all my right of her
■ do estate unto Demetrius.

Lys. I am, my lord, as well deriv'd as he,
As well possess'd; my love is more than his;
My fortunes every way as fairly rank❜d,
If not with vantage, as Demetrius';

And, which is more than all these boasts can be,
I am belov'd of beauteous Hermia:
Why should not I then prosecute my right?
Demetrius, I'll avouch it to his head,
Made love to Nedar's daughter, Helena,
And won her soul; and she, sweet lady, dotes,
Devoutly dotes, dotes in idolatry,

Upon this spotted3 and inconstant man.

The. I must confess, that I have heard so much,
And with Demetrius thought to have spoke thereof;
But, being over-full of self-affairs,

My mind did lose it. But, Demetrius, come:
And come, Egeus; you shall go with me,
I have some private schooling for you both.-
For you, fair Hermia, look you arm yourself
To fit your fancies to your father's will;
Or else the law of Athens yields you up
(Which by no means we may extenuate)
To death, or to a vow of single life.--
Come, my Hippolyta: What cheer, my love?---
Demetrius, and Egeus, go along:

I must employ you in some business
Against our nuptial; and confer with you
Of something nearly that concerns yourselves.
Ege. With duty and desire we follow
[Exeunt THESEUS, HIPPOLYTA, EGEUS,
DEMETRIUS, and Train.

1 Ever.

you.

There, gentle Hermia, may I marry thee;
And to that place the sharp Athenian law
Cannot pursue us: If thou lov'st me then,
Steal forth thy father's house to-morrow night;
And in the wood, a league without the town
Where I did meet thee once with Helena,
To do observance to a morn of May,
There will I stay for thee

Her.

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;
And by that fire which burn'd the Carthage queen,
When the false Trojan under sail was seen;
By all the vows that ever men have broke,
In number more than women ever spoke ;-
In that same place thou hast appointed me,
To-morrow truly will I meet with thee.
Lys. Keep promise, love: Look, here comes
Helena.

lody.

Were the world mine, Demetrius being bated,
The rest I'll give to be to you translated.12

7 Fancy is love. So afterwards in this play:
'Fair Helena in fancy following me.'

9 Shakspeare forgot that Theseus performed his ex ploits before the Trojan war, and consequently long before the death of Dido.

9 Fair for fairness, beauty. Very common in writers of Shakspeare's age.

10 The lode-star is the leading or guiding star, that is the polar star. The magnet is for the same reason called the lode-stone.

11 Countenance, feature.
12 i e. changed, transformed