58 The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, by
58 The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, by William Shakespeare
ACT III
SCENE I. The Wood.
The Queen of Fairies still lying asleep.
Enter Bottom, Quince, Snout,
Starveling, Snug and Flute.
BOTTOM.
Are we all met?
QUINCE.
Pat, pat; and here’s a marvellous 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 yourselves, to bring in (God shield us!) a
lion among ladies is a most dreadful thing. For there is not a more fearful
wild-fowl than your lion living; and we ought to look to it.
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 almanack; find out moonshine, find out
moonshine.
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,