A Midsummer Night’s Dream

upon this flowery bed,
While I thy amiable cheeks do coy,
And stick musk-roses in thy sleek smooth head,
And kiss thy fair large ears, my gentle joy. Bottom Where’s Peaseblossom? Peaseblossom Ready. Bottom Scratch my head, Peaseblossom. Where’s Mounsieur Cobweb? Cobweb Ready. Bottom Mounsieur Cobweb, good mounsieur, get you your weapons in your hand, and kill me a red-hipped humble-bee on the top of a thistle; and, good mounsieur, bring me the honey-bag. Do not fret yourself too much in the action, mounsieur; and, good mounsieur, have a care the honey-bag break not; I would be loath to have you overflown with a honey-bag, signior. Where’s Mounsieur Mustardseed? Mustardseed Ready. Bottom Give me your neaf, Mounsieur Mustardseed. Pray you, leave your courtesy, good mounsieur. Mustardseed What’s your will? Bottom Nothing, good mounsieur, but to help Cavalery Cobweb to scratch. I must to the barber’s, mounsieur; for methinks I am marvellous hairy about the face; and I am such a tender ass, if my hair do but tickle me, I must scratch. Titania What, wilt thou hear some music, my sweet love? Bottom I have a reasonable good ear in music. Let’s have the tongs and the bones. Titania Or say, sweet love, what thou desirest to eat. Bottom Truly, a peck of provender: I could munch your good dry oats. Methinks I have a great desire to a bottle of hay: good hay, sweet hay, hath no fellow. Titania

I have a venturous fairy that shall seek
The squirrel’s hoard, and fetch thee new nuts.

Bottom I had rather have a handful or two of dried peas. But, I pray you, let none of your people stir me: I have an exposition of sleep come upon me. Titania

Sleep thou, and I will wind thee in my arms.
Fairies, be gone, and be all ways away. Exeunt Fairies.
So doth the woodbine the sweet honeysuckle
Gently entwist; the female ivy so
Enrings the barky fingers of the elm.
O, how I love thee! how I dote on thee! They sleep.

Enter Puck. Oberon

Advancing. Welcome, good Robin. See’st thou this sweet sight?
Her dotage now I do begin to pity:
For, meeting her of late behind the wood,
Seeking sweet favours for this hateful fool,
I did upbraid her and fall out with her;
For she his hairy temples then had rounded
With coronet of fresh and fragrant flowers;
And that same dew, which sometime on the buds
Was wont to swell like round and orient pearls,
Stood now within the pretty flowerets’ eyes
Like tears that did their own disgrace bewail.
When I had at my pleasure taunted her
And she in mild terms begg’d my patience,
I then did ask of her her changeling child;
Which straight she gave me, and her fairy sent
To bear him to my bower in fairy land.
And now I have the boy, I will undo
This hateful imperfection of her eyes:
And, gentle Puck, take this transformed scalp
From off the head of this Athenian swain;
That, he awaking when the other do,
May all to Athens back again repair
And think no more of this night’s accidents
But as the fierce vexation of a dream.
But first I will release the fairy queen.
Be as thou wast wont to be;
See as thou wast wont to see:
Dian’s bud o’er Cupid’s flower
Hath such force and blessed power.
Now, my Titania; wake you, my sweet queen.

Titania

My Oberon! what visions have I seen!
Methought I was enamour’d of an ass.

Oberon There lies your love. Titania

How came these things to pass?
O, how mine eyes do loathe his visage now!

Oberon

Silence awhile. Robin, take off this head.
Titania, music call; and strike more dead
Than common sleep of all these five the sense.

Titania Music, ho! music, such as charmeth sleep! Music, still. Puck Now, when thou wakest, with thine own fool’s eyes peep. Oberon

Sound, music! Come, my queen, take hands with me,
And rock the ground whereon these sleepers be.
Now thou and I are new in amity
And will tomorrow midnight solemnly
Dance in Duke Theseus’ house triumphantly
And bless it to all fair prosperity:
There shall the pairs of faithful lovers be
Wedded, with Theseus, all in jollity.

Puck

Fairy king, attend, and mark:
I do hear the morning lark.

Oberon

Then, my queen, in silence sad,
Trip we after night’s shade:
We the globe can compass soon,
Swifter than the wandering moon.

Titania

Come, my lord, and in our flight
Tell me how it came this night
That I sleeping here was found
With these mortals on the ground. Exeunt. Horns sound within.

Enter Theseus, Hippolyta, Egeus, and train. Theseus

Go, one of you, find out the forester;
For now our observation is perform’d;
And since we have the vaward of the day,
My love shall hear the music of my hounds.
Uncouple in the western valley; let them go:
Dispatch, I say, and find the forester. Exit an Attendant.
We will, fair queen, up to the mountain’s top
And mark the musical confusion
Of hounds and echo in conjunction.

Hippolyta

I was with Hercules and Cadmus once,
When in a wood of Crete they bay’d the bear
With hounds of Sparta: never did I hear
Such gallant chiding; for, besides the groves,
The skies, the fountains, every region near
Seem’d all one mutual cry: I never heard
So musical a discord, such sweet thunder.

Theseus

My hounds are bred out of the Spartan kind,
So flew’d, so sanded, and their heads are hung
With ears that sweep away the morning dew;
Crook-knee’d and dew-lapp’d like Thessalian bulls;
Slow in pursuit, but match’d in mouth like bells,
Each under each. A cry more tuneable
Was never holla’d to, nor cheer’d with horn,
In Crete, in Sparta, nor in Thessaly:
Judge when you hear. But, soft! what nymphs are these?

Egeus

My lord, this is my daughter here asleep;
And this, Lysander; this Demetrius is;
This Helena, old Nedar’s Helena:
I wonder of their being here together.

Theseus

No doubt they rose up early to observe
The rite of May, and, hearing our intent,
Came here in grace of our solemnity.
But speak, Egeus; is not this the day
That Hermia should give answer of her choice?

Egeus It is, my lord. Theseus

Go, bid the huntsmen wake them with their horns. Horns and shout within. Lysander, Demetrius, Helena, and Hermia, wake and start up.
Good morrow, friends. Saint Valentine