Which ten times faster glide than the sun's beams, Of this day's journey; and from nine till twelve My words would bandy her to my sweet love, But old folks, many feign as they were dead; Enter Nurse and PETER. O God, she comes!-O honey nurse, what news? Exit. PET. Jul. Now, good sweet nurse,-O lord! why look'st thou sad? Though news be sad, yet tell them merrily; Nurse. I am aweary, give me leave a while;— Oh, now she comes! Tell me, gentle Nurse, What says my love? The greatest part of the scene is likewise added since that edition. Shakspeare, however, seems to have thought one of the ideas comprised in the foregoing quotation from the earliest quarto, too valuable to be lost. He has therefore inserted it in Romeo's first speech to the Apothecary, in Act V: "As violently, as hasty powder fir'd "Doth hurry from the fatal cannon's womb." Steevens 4 If good, thou sham'st the musick of sweet news By playing it to me with so sour a face.] So, in Antony and Cle 5 66 - if it be summer-news, "Smile to it before." Malone. · What a jaunt have I had!] This is the reading of the folio. The quarto reads: What a jaunce have I had!" Jul. I would, thou hadst my bones, and I thy news: Nay, come, I pray thee, speak;-good, good nurse, . speak. Nurse. Jesu, What haste? can you not stay awhile? Do you not see, that I am out of breath? Jul. How art thou out of breath, when thou hast breath To say to me that thou art out of breath? The excuse, that thou dost make in this delay, Nurse. Well, you have made a simple choice; you know not how to choose a man: Romeo! no, not he; though his face be better than any man's, yet his leg excels all men's; and for a hand, and a foot, and a body, though they be not to be talked on, yet they are past compare: He is not the flower of courtesy,-but, I 'll warrant him, as gentle as a lamb.-Go thy ways, wench; serve God, What, have you dined at home? Jul. No, no: But all this did I know before; What says he of our marriage? what of that?6 Nurse. Lord, how my head akes! what a head have I? It beats as it would fall in twenty pieces. My back o' t' other side,-O, my back, my back!— To catch my death with jaunting up and down! The two words appear to have been formerly synonymous. See King Richard II: “Spur-gall❜d and tir'd by jauncing Bolingbroke.” Malone. 6 No, ho: But all this did I know before; What says he of our marriage? what of that?] So, in The Tragicall History of Romeus and Juliet, 1562: "Tell me else what, quod she, this evermore I thought; "But of our marriage, say at once, what answer have you brought?" Malone. Your love says like an honest gentleman, Where is your mother? Nurse. O, God's lady dear! Are you so hot? Marry, come up, I trow; Is this the poultice for my aking bones? Jul. Here 's such a coil;--Come, what says Romeo? Nurse. Then hie you hence to friar Laurence' cell, Jul. Hie to high fortune!-honest nurse, farewel. SCENE VI. Friar Laurence's Cell. Enter Friar LAURENCE and ROMEO.7 [Exeunt. Fri. So smile the heavens upon this holy act, That after-hours with sorrow chide us not! 7 This scene was entirely new formed: the reader may be pleased to have it as it was at first written: "Rom. Now, father Laurence, in thy holy grant "Consists the good of me and Juliet. "Friar. Without more words, I will do all I may "To make you happy, if in me it lie. "Rom. This morning here she 'pointed we should meet, "And consummate those never-parting bands, "Witness of our hearts' love, by joining hands; "And come she will. "Friar. I guess she will indeed: "Youth's love is quick, swifter than swiftest speed. "So light a foot ne'er hurts the trodden flower; Rom. Amen, amen! but come what sorrow can, Fri. These violent delights have violent ends, And in the taste confounds the appetite: Enter JULIET. Here comes the lady:1-O, so light a foot "Jul. Romeo! 66 "Rom. My Juliet, welcome! As do waking eyes "And thou art come, Jul. I am (if I be day) "Come to my sun; shine forth, and make me fair. "Rom. All beauteous fairness dwelleth in thine eyes. Jul. Romeo, from thine all brightness doth arise. "Friar. Come, wantons, come, the stealing hours do pass; "Defer embracements to some fitter time; "Part for a time, you shall not be alone, 'Till holy church hath join'd you both in one.' "Rom. Lead, holy father, all delay seems long. "Jul. Make haste, make haste, this ling'ring doth us wrong. "Friar. O, soft and fair makes sweetest work they say; 8 These violent delights have violent ends,] So, in our author's Rape of Lucrece: "These violent vanities can never last." Malone. 9 Too swift arrives —] He that travels too fast is as long before he comes to the end of his journey, as he that travels slow. Precipitation produces mishap. Johnson. 1 Here comes the lady: &c.] However the poet might think the alteration of this scene on the whole to be necessary, I am afraid, in respect of the passage before us, he has not been very successful. The violent hyperbole of never wearing out the everlasting flint appears to me not only more reprehensible, but even less beautiful than the lines as they were originally written, where the light Will ne'er wear out the everlasting flint: Jul. Good even to my ghostly confessor. Fri. Romeo shall thank thee, daughter, for us both. Be heap'd like mine, and that thy skill be more Jul. Conceit, more rich in matter than in words,3 They are but beggars that can count their worth;4 I cannot sum up half my sum of wealth.5 ness of Juliet's motion is accounted for from the cheerful effects the passion of love produced in her mind. Steevens. 2 A lover may bestride the gossomers-] The gossomer is the long white filament which flies in the air in summer. So, in Hannibal and Scipio, 1637, by Nabbes: "Fine as Arachne's web, or gossamer "Whose curls when garnish'd by their dressing, shew "Like that spun vapour when 'tis pearl'd with dew?" See King Lear, Act IV, sc. vi, Vol. XIV. Steevens. See Bullokar's English Expositor, 1616: "Gossomor. Things that flye like cobwebs in the ayre." Malone. 3 Conceit, more rich &c.] Conceit here means imagination. So, in The Rape of Lucrece: which the conceited painter drew so proud," &c. See Vol. XI, p, 101, n. 6. Malone. Thus, in the title-page to the first quarto edition of The Merry Wives of Windsor: "A most pleasant and excellent conceited comedy" &c. Again, in the title, &c. to King Henry IV, P. I, quarto, 1599: " with the humorous conceits of Sir John Falstaffe —.” Steevens. 4 They are but beggars that can count their worth ;] So, in Antony and Cleopatra: "There's beggary in the love that can be reckon'd." See Antony and Cleopatra, Act I, sc. i, Vol. XIII. Steevens. So, in Much Ado about Nothing: "I were but little happy, if I could say how much." Malone. 5 I cannot sum up half my sum of wealth.] The quarto, 1599, reads: |