Lys. Stay, gentle Helena; hear my excuse; My love, my life, my soul, fair Helena ! Hel. O excellent! Her. Sweet, do not scorn her so. Dem. If she cannot entreat, I can compel. Lys. Thou canst compel no more than she entreat; Thy threats have no more strength, than her weak prayers. Helen, I love thee; by my life, I do ; I swear by that which I will lose for thee, Her. Lysander, whereto tends all this? Lys. Away, you Ethiop! Dem. No, no, sir :-he will Seem to break loose; take on, as you would follow; But yet come not: You are a tame man, go! Lys. Hang off, thou cat, thou burr: vile thing let loose; Or I will shake thee from me, like a serpent. Her. Why are you grown so rude? what change is this, Sweet love? Lys. Thy love? out, tawny Tartar, out! Out, loathed medicine! hated potion, hence! Hel. Yes, 'sooth; and so do you. Lys. Demetrius, I will keep my word with thee. Dem. I would, I had your bond; for, I perceive, A weak bond holds you; I'll not trust your word. Lys. What, should I hurt her, strike her, kill her dead? Although I hate her, I'll not harm her so. Her. What, can you do me greater harm, than hate? Hate me! wherefore? O me! what news, my love? Am not I Hermia? Are not you Lysander ? I am as fair now, as I was erewhile. Since night, you lov'd me; yet, since night you left me · Why, then you left me,-O, the gods forbid !— In earnest, shall I say? Lys. Ay, by my life; And never did desire to see thee more. Therefore, be out of hope, of question, doubt, Be certain, nothing truer; 'tis no jest, That I do hate thee, and love Helena. Her. O me! you juggler! you canker-blossom You thief of love! what, have you come by night, And stol'n my love's heart from him? Hel. Fine, i' faith! Have you no modesty, no maiden shame, Her. Puppet! why so? Ay, that way goes the game. How low am I, thou painted may-pole ? speak; But that my nails can reach unto thine eyes. Hel. I pray you, though you mock me, gentlemen, Let her not hurt me: I was never curst; I have no gift at all in shrewdness; I am a right maid for my cowardice ; Let her not strike me : You, perhaps, may think, Her. Lower! hark, again. Hel. Good Hermia, do not be so bitter with me. Did ever keep your counsels, never wrong'd you; I told him of your stealth unto this wood: He follow'd you; for love, I follow'd him. But he hath chid me hence; and threaten'd me To strike me, spurn me, nay, to kill me too: And follow you no further: Let me go : [8] The canker-blossom is not in this place the blossom of the canker or wild rose, which our author alludes to in Much Ado about Nothing, Act I. sc. iii. but a worm that preys on the leaves or buds of flowers, always beginning in the middle. So in the famous passage, "Like a worm i' the bud, Feed on her damask cheek." STEEVENS. You see how simple and how fond I am. Her. Why, get you gone: Who is't that hinders you? Hel. A foolish heart, that I leave here behind. Her. What, with Lysander? Hel. With Demetrius. Lys. Be not afraid she shall not harm thee, Helena. Dem. No, sir; she shall not, though you take her part. Hel. O, when she's angry, she is keen and shrewd: She was a vixen," when she went to school; And, though she be but little, she is fierce. Her. Little again? nothing but low and little ?~~ Why will you suffer her to flout me thus ? Let me come to her. Lys. Get you gone, you dwarf; You minimus, of hind'ring knot-grass made ;1 Dem. You are too officious, In her behalf that scorns your services. Let her alone; speak not of Helena ; Take not her part: for if thou dost intend Never so little show of love to her, Thou shalt aby it.' Lys. Now she holds me not; Now follow, if thou dar'st; to try whose right, Or thine or mine, is most in Helena. Dem. Follow? nay, I'll go with thee, cheek by jole. [Exe. LYSAN. and DEM. Her. You, mistress, all this coil is 'long of you: Nay, go not back. Hel. I will not trust you, I; Nor longer stay in your curst company. Your hands, than mine, are quicker for a fray; My legs are longer though, to run away. [Exit. [Exit, pursuing HELENA. [9] Vixen, or fixen, primitively signified a female fox. STEEVENS. [1] It appears that knot-grass was anciently supposed to prevent the growth of any atimal or child. Daisy-roots were supposed to have the same effect. That prince of verbose and pedantic coxcombs, Richard Tomlinson, apothecary, in bis translation of Renodaus his Dispensatory, 1657, informs us that knot-grass 18 a low reptant herb, with exile, copious, nodose, and geniculated branches." Perhaps no hypocondriac is to be found, who might not derive his cure from the perusal of any single chapter in this work. STEEVENS. [2] Aby it, is abide by it; i. e. stand to it, answer to it. So, in Psalm cxxx. v. in Common Prayer: "If thou, Lord, wilt be extreme to mark what is done amiss: Olord, who may abide it?" HARRIS. Ob. This is thy negligence: still thou mistak'st, Puck. Believe me, king of shadows, I mistook. As this their jangling I esteem a sport. Ob. Thou seest, these lovers seek a place to fight: The starry welkin cover thou anon With league, whose date till death shall never end. I'll to my queen, and beg her Indian boy; From monster's view, and all things shall be peace. At whose approach, ghosts, wandering here and there, [3] Salutiferous. So he calls, in The Tempest, poisonous dew, wicked dem. JOHNSON. [4] The ghosts of self-murderers, who are buried in cross-roads; and of those who being drowned, were condemned (according to the opinion of the ancients) to wander for a hundred years, as the rites of sepulture had never been regularly bestowed on their bodies. That the waters were sometimes the place of residence That in cross-ways and floods have burial, 1 with the morning's love have oft made sport ;* Puck. Up and down, up and down; I will lead them up and down : Here comes one. Enter LYSANDER. [Exit OB. Lys. Where art thou, proud Demetrius? speak thou now. Puck. Here, villain; drawn and ready. Where art thou? Lys. I will be with thee straight. Puck. Follow me then To plainer ground. [Exit Lys. as following the voice. Enter DEMETRIUS. Dem. Lysander! speak again. Thou runaway, thou coward, art thou fled? Speak. In some bush? Where dost thou hide thy head? Puck. Thou coward, art thou bragging to the stars, Telling the bushes that thou look'st for wars, And wilt not come ? Come, recreant; come, thou child ; I'll whip thee with a rod: He is defil'd, That draws a sword on thee. Dem. Yea; art thou there? Puck. Follow my voice; we'll try no manhood here. Re-enter LYSAnder. [Exeunt. Lys. He goes before me, and still dares me on; for damned spirits, we learn from the ancient bl. 1. romance of Syr Eglamoure of Artoys, no date: "Let some preest a gospel says, "For doute of fendes in the flode." STEEVENS [5] What the fairy monarch means to inform Puck of, is this. That he was not compelled, like meaner spirits, to vanish at the first appearance of the dawn. STEEVENS. |