Capulet.
Send for the county; go tell him of this:
I’ll have this knot knit up to-morrow morning.
Juliet.
I met the youthful lord at Lawrence’ cell;
And gave him what becomed love I might,
Not stepping o’er the bounds of modesty.
Capulet.
Why, I am glad on’t; this is well,—stand up,—
This is as’t should be.—Let me see the county;
Ay, marry, go, I say, and fetch him hither.—
Now, afore God, this reverend holy friar,
All our whole city is much bound to him.
Juliet.
Nurse, will you go with me into my closet,
To help me sort such needful ornaments
As you think fit to furnish me to-morrow?
Lady Capulet.
No, not till Thursday; there is time enough.
Capulet.
Go, nurse, go with her.—We’ll to church to-morrow.
[Exeunt Juliet and Nurse.]
Lady Capulet.
We shall be short in our provision:
‘Tis now near night.
Capulet.
Tush, I will stir about,
And all things shall be well, I warrant thee, wife:
Go thou to Juliet, help to deck up her;
I’ll not to bed to-night;—let me alone;
I’ll play the housewife for this once.—What, ho!—
They are all forth: well, I will walk myself
To County Paris, to prepare him up
Against to-morrow: my heart is wondrous light
Since this same wayward girl is so reclaim’d.
[Exeunt.]
Scene III. Juliet’s Chamber.
[Enter Juliet and Nurse.]
Juliet.
Ay, those attires are best:—but, gentle nurse,
I pray thee, leave me to myself to-night;
For I have need of many orisons
To move the heavens to smile upon my state,
Which, well thou know’st, is cross and full of sin.
[Enter Lady Capulet.]
Lady Capulet.
What, are you busy, ho? need you my help?
Juliet.
No, madam; we have cull’d such necessaries
As are behoveful for our state to-morrow:
So please you, let me now be left alone,
And let the nurse this night sit up with you;
For I am sure you have your hands full all
In this so sudden business.
Lady Capulet.
Good night:
Get thee to bed, and rest; for thou hast need.
[Exeunt Lady Capulet and Nurse.]
Juliet.
Farewell!—God knows when we shall meet again.
I have a faint cold fear thrills through my veins
That almost freezes up the heat of life:
I’ll call them back again to comfort me;—
Nurse!—What should she do here?
My dismal scene I needs must act alone.—
Come, vial.—
What if this mixture do not work at all?
Shall I be married, then, to-morrow morning?—
No, No!—this shall forbid it:—lie thou there.—
[Laying down her dagger.]
What if it be a poison, which the friar
Subtly hath minister’d to have me dead,
Lest in this marriage he should be dishonour’d,
Because he married me before to Romeo?
I fear it is: and yet methinks it should not,
For he hath still been tried a holy man:—
I will not entertain so bad a thought.—
How if, when I am laid into the tomb,
I wake before the time that Romeo
Come to redeem me? there’s a fearful point!
Shall I not then be stifled in the vault,
To whose foul mouth no healthsome air breathes in,
And there die strangled ere my Romeo comes?
Or, if I live, is it not very like
The horrible conceit of death and night,
Together with the terror of the place,—
As in a vault, an ancient receptacle,
Where, for this many hundred years, the bones
Of all my buried ancestors are pack’d;
Where bloody Tybalt, yet but green in earth,
Lies festering in his shroud; where, as they say,
At some hours in the night spirits resort;—
Alack, alack, is it not like that I,
So early waking,—what with loathsome smells,
And shrieks like mandrakes torn out of the earth,
That living mortals, hearing them, run mad;—
O, if I wake, shall I not be distraught,
Environed with all these hideous fears?
And madly play with my forefathers’ joints?
And pluck the mangled Tybalt from his shroud?
And, in this rage, with some great kinsman’s bone,
As with a club, dash out my desperate brains?—
O, look! methinks I see my cousin’s ghost
Seeking out Romeo, that did spit his body
Upon a rapier’s point:—stay, Tybalt, stay!— Romeo,
I come! this do I drink to thee.
[Throws herself on the bed.]
Scene IV. Hall in Capulet’s House.
[Enter Lady Capulet and Nurse.]
Lady Capulet.
Hold, take these keys and fetch more spices, nurse.
Nurse.
They call for dates and quinces in the pastry.
[Enter Capulet.]
Capulet.
Come, stir, stir, stir! The second cock hath crow’d,
The curfew bell hath rung, ‘tis three o’clock:—
Look to the bak’d meats, good Angelica;
Spare not for cost.
Nurse.
Go, you cot-quean, go,
Get you to bed; faith, you’ll be sick to-morrow
For this night’s watching.
Capulet.
No, not a whit: what! I have watch’d ere now
All night for lesser cause, and ne’er been sick.
Lady Capulet.
Ay, you have been a mouse-hunt in your time;
But I will watch you from such watching now.
[Exeunt Lady Capulet and Nurse.]
Capulet.
A jealous-hood, a jealous-hood!—
Now, fellow,
[Enter Servants, with spits, logs and baskets.]
What’s there?
1 Servant.
Things for the cook, sir; but I know not what.
Capulet.
Make haste, make haste.
[Exit 1 Servant.]
Sirrah, fetch drier logs:
Call Peter, he will show thee where they are.
2 Servant.
I have a head, sir, that will find out logs
And never trouble Peter for the matter.
[Exit.]
Capulet.
Mass, and well said; a merry whoreson, ha!
Thou shalt be logger-head.—Good faith, ‘tis day.
The county will be here with music straight,
For so he said he would:—I hear him near.
[Music within.]
Nurse!—wife!—what, ho!—what, nurse, I say!
[Re-enter Nurse.]
Go, waken Juliet; go and trim her up;
I’ll go and chat with Paris:—hie, make haste,
Make haste; the bridegroom he is come already:
Make haste, I say.
[Exeunt.]
Scene V. Juliet’s Chamber; Juliet on the bed.
[Enter Nurse.]
Nurse.
Mistress!—what, mistress!—Juliet!—fast,
I warrant her, she:—
Why, lamb!—why, lady!—fie, you slug-abed!—
Why, love, I say!—madam! sweetheart!—why, bride!—
What, not a word?—you take your pennyworths now;
Sleep for a week; for the next night, I warrant,
The County Paris hath set up his rest
That you shall rest but little.—God forgive me!
Marry, and amen, how sound is she asleep!
I needs must wake her.—Madam, madam, madam!—
Ay, let the county take you in your bed;
He’ll fright you up, i’ faith.—Will it not be?
What, dress’d! and in your clothes! and down again!