Scene 1
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[With Titania still asleep onstage, enter the Clowns,
Bottom, Quince, Snout, Starveling, Snug, and Flute.]


BOTTOM  Are we all met?

QUINCE  Pat, pat. And here's a marvels convenient
place for our rehearsal. This green plot shall be
our stage, this hawthorn brake our tiring-house,
and we will do it in action as we will do it before
the Duke.

BOTTOM  Peter Quince?

QUINCE  What sayest thou, bully Bottom?

BOTTOM  There are things in this comedy of Pyramus
and Thisbe that will never please. First, Pyramus
must draw a sword to kill himself, which the ladies
cannot abide. How answer you that?

SNOUT  By 'r lakin, a parlous fear.

STARVELING  I believe we must leave the killing out,
when all is done.

BOTTOM  Not a whit! I have a device to make all well.
Write me a prologue, and let the prologue seem to
say we will do no harm with our swords and that
Pyramus is not killed indeed. And, for the more
better assurance, tell them that I, Pyramus, am not
Pyramus, but Bottom the weaver. This will put them
out of fear.

QUINCE  Well, we will have such a prologue, and it shall
be written in eight and six.

BOTTOM  No, make it two more. Let it be written in
eight and eight.

SNOUT  Will not the ladies be afeard of the lion?

STARVELING  I fear it, I promise you.

BOTTOM  Masters, you ought to consider with yourself,
to bring in (God shield us!) a lion among ladies is a
most dreadful thing. For there is not a more fearful
wildfowl than your lion living, and we ought to look
to 't.

SNOUT  Therefore another prologue must tell he is not
a lion.

BOTTOM  Nay, you must name his name, and half his
face must be seen through the lion's neck, and he
himself must speak through, saying thus, or to the
same defect: "Ladies," or "Fair ladies, I would
wish you," or "I would request you," or "I would
entreat you not to fear, not to tremble! My life for
yours. If you think I come hither as a lion, it were
pity of my life. No, I am no such thing. I am a man as
other men are." And there indeed let him name his
name and tell them plainly he is Snug the joiner.

QUINCE  Well, it shall be so. But there is two hard
things: that is, to bring the moonlight into a chamber,
for you know Pyramus and Thisbe meet by
moonlight.

SNOUT  Doth the moon shine that night we play our
play?

BOTTOM  A calendar, a calendar! Look in the almanac.
Find out moonshine, find out moonshine.
[Quince takes out a book.]

QUINCE  Yes, it doth shine that night.

BOTTOM  Why, then, may you leave a casement of the
great chamber window, where we play, open, and
the moon may shine in at the casement.

QUINCE  Ay, or else one must come in with a bush of
thorns and a lantern and say he comes to disfigure
or to present the person of Moonshine. Then there
is another thing: we must have a wall in the great
chamber, for Pyramus and Thisbe, says the story,
did talk through the chink of a wall.

SNOUT  You can never bring in a wall. What say you,
Bottom?

BOTTOM  Some man or other must present Wall. And
let him have some plaster, or some loam, or some
roughcast about him to signify wall, or let him
hold his fingers thus, and through that cranny shall
Pyramus and Thisbe whisper.

QUINCE  If that may be, then all is well. Come, sit down,
every mother's son, and rehearse your parts. Pyramus,
you begin. When you have spoken your
speech, enter into that brake, and so everyone
according to his cue.

[Enter Robin invisible to those onstage.]


ROBIN, [aside]
What hempen homespuns have we swagg'ring here
So near the cradle of the Fairy Queen?
What, a play toward? I'll be an auditor--
An actor too perhaps, if I see cause.

QUINCE  Speak, Pyramus.--Thisbe, stand forth.

BOTTOM, [as Pyramus]
	Thisbe, the flowers of odious savors sweet--

QUINCE  Odors, odors!

BOTTOM, [as Pyramus]
		...odors savors sweet.
	So hath thy breath, my dearest Thisbe dear.--
	But hark, a voice! Stay thou but here awhile,
	And by and by I will to thee appear.	[He exits.]

ROBIN, [aside]
A stranger Pyramus than e'er played here.	[He exits.]

FLUTE  Must I speak now?

QUINCE  Ay, marry, must you, for you must understand
he goes but to see a noise that he heard and is to
come again.

FLUTE, [as Thisbe]
	Most radiant Pyramus, most lily-white of hue,
	Of color like the red rose on triumphant brier,
	Most brisky juvenal and eke most lovely Jew,
	As true as truest horse, that yet would never tire.
	I'll meet thee, Pyramus, at Ninny's tomb.

QUINCE  "Ninus' tomb," man! Why, you must not
speak that yet. That you answer to Pyramus. You
speak all your part at once, cues and all.--Pyramus,
enter. Your cue is past. It is "never tire."

FLUTE  O!
[As Thisbe.] As true as truest horse, that yet would never
tire.

[Enter Robin, and Bottom as Pyramus with the
ass-head.]


BOTTOM, [as Pyramus]
	If I were fair, fair Thisbe, I were only thine.

QUINCE  O monstrous! O strange! We are haunted. Pray,
masters, fly, masters! Help!
[Quince, Flute, Snout, Snug, and Starveling exit.]

ROBIN
I'll follow you. I'll lead you about a round,
   Through bog, through bush, through brake,
   through brier.
Sometime a horse I'll be, sometime a hound,
   A hog, a headless bear, sometime a fire,
And neigh and bark and grunt and roar and burn,
Like horse, hound, hog, bear, fire, at every turn.
[He exits.]

BOTTOM  Why do they run away? This is a knavery of
them to make me afeard.

[Enter Snout.]


SNOUT  O Bottom, thou art changed! What do I see on
thee?

BOTTOM  What do you see? You see an ass-head of your
own, do you?	[Snout exits.]

[Enter Quince.]


QUINCE  Bless thee, Bottom, bless thee! Thou art
translated!	[He exits.]

BOTTOM  I see their knavery. This is to make an ass of
me, to fright me, if they could. But I will not stir
from this place, do what they can. I will walk up
and down here, and I will sing, that they shall hear
I am not afraid.
[He sings.]	The ouzel cock, so black of hue,
	   With orange-tawny bill,
	The throstle with his note so true,
	   The wren with little quill--

TITANIA, [waking up]
What angel wakes me from my flow'ry bed?

BOTTOM [sings]
	The finch, the sparrow, and the lark,
	   The plainsong cuckoo gray,
	Whose note full many a man doth mark
	   And dares not answer "nay"--
for, indeed, who would set his wit to so foolish a
bird? Who would give a bird the lie though he cry
"cuckoo" never so?

TITANIA
I pray thee, gentle mortal, sing again.
Mine ear is much enamored of thy note,
So is mine eye enthralled to thy shape,
And thy fair virtue's force perforce doth move me
On the first view to say, to swear, I love thee.

BOTTOM  Methinks, mistress, you should have little
reason for that. And yet, to say the truth, reason
and love keep little company together nowadays.
The more the pity that some honest neighbors will
not make them friends. Nay, I can gleek upon
occasion.

TITANIA
Thou art as wise as thou art beautiful.

BOTTOM  Not so neither; but if I had wit enough to get
out of this wood, I have enough to serve mine own
turn.

TITANIA
Out of this wood do not desire to go.
Thou shalt remain here whether thou wilt or no.
I am a spirit of no common rate.
The summer still doth tend upon my state,
And I do love thee. Therefore go with me.
I'll give thee fairies to attend on thee,
And they shall fetch thee jewels from the deep
And sing while thou on pressed flowers dost sleep.
And I will purge thy mortal grossness so
That thou shalt like an airy spirit go.--
Peaseblossom, Cobweb, Mote, and Mustardseed!

[Enter four Fairies: Peaseblossom, Cobweb,
Mote, and Mustardseed.]


PEASEBLOSSOM  Ready.

COBWEB  And I.

MOTE  And I.

MUSTARDSEED  And I.

ALL  Where shall we go?

TITANIA
Be kind and courteous to this gentleman.
Hop in his walks and gambol in his eyes;
Feed him with apricocks and dewberries,
With purple grapes, green figs, and mulberries;
The honey-bags steal from the humble-bees,
And for night-tapers crop their waxen thighs
And light them at the fiery glowworms' eyes
To have my love to bed and to arise;
And pluck the wings from painted butterflies
To fan the moonbeams from his sleeping eyes.
Nod to him, elves, and do him courtesies.

PEASEBLOSSOM  Hail, mortal!

COBWEB  Hail!

MOTE  Hail!

MUSTARDSEED  Hail!

BOTTOM  I cry your Worships mercy, heartily.--I beseech
your Worship's name.

COBWEB  Cobweb.

BOTTOM  I shall desire you of more acquaintance, good
Master Cobweb. If I cut my finger, I shall make
bold with you.--Your name, honest gentleman?

PEASEBLOSSOM  Peaseblossom.

BOTTOM  I pray you, commend me to Mistress Squash,
your mother, and to Master Peascod, your father.
Good Master Peaseblossom, I shall desire you of
more acquaintance too.--Your name, I beseech
you, sir?

MUSTARDSEED  Mustardseed.

BOTTOM  Good Master Mustardseed, I know your patience
well. That same cowardly, giantlike ox-beef
hath devoured many a gentleman of your house. I
promise you, your kindred hath made my eyes
water ere now. I desire you of more acquaintance,
good Master Mustardseed.

TITANIA
Come, wait upon him. Lead him to my bower.
   The moon, methinks, looks with a wat'ry eye,
And when she weeps, weeps every little flower,
   Lamenting some enforced chastity.
Tie up my lover's tongue. Bring him silently.
[They exit.]