Enter the Prince and Attendants.

Prince. What misadventure is so early up, That calls our person from our morning rest?

Enter CAPULET, Lady CAPULET, and others.

Cap. What should it be, that they so shriek abroad? La. Cap. Oh! the people in the street cry Romeo, Some Juliet, and some Paris; and all run

With open outcry toward our monument.

10

Prince. What fear is this which startles in our ears 1o ? 1 Watch. Sovereign, here lies the county Paris slain ; And Romeo dead; and Juliet, dead before,

Warm and new kill'd.

Prince. Search, seek, and know how this foul murder

comes.

1 Watch. Here is a friar, and slaughter'd Romeo's man, With instruments upon them, fit to open

These dead men's tombs.

Cap. Oh, heaven! Oh, wife! look how our daughter bleeds! This dagger hath mista'en,-for, lo! his house

Is empty on the back of Montague',

And is mis-sheathed in my daughter's bosom.

La. Cap. Oh me! this sight of death is as a bell, That warns my old age to a sepulchre.

Enter MONTAGUE and others.

Prince. Come, Montague; for thou art early up, To see thy son and heir more early down'.

10 What fear is this which startles in OUR ears?] Johnson properly substituted "our" for your of the early editions.

1 Is empty on the back of Montague,] It would only be waste of space to reproduce Steevens's misquoted instances, to show that the dagger was commonly turned behind, and worn at the back. The fact was so.

2

in my daughter's bosom.] The following are the corresponding lines in the 4to, 1597:

46

'See, wife, this dagger hath mistook;

For, lo! the back is empty of young Montague,

And it is sheathed in our daughter's breast."

To prove how carelessly the commentators sometimes quote, we may mention that Steevens asserts (Malone's Shakespeare, by Boswell, Vol. vi. p. 253) that the 4to, 1597, reads the last line "erroneously" thus :

"And it mis-sheathed in my daughter's bosom."

3 To see thy son and heir MORE early down.] We do not find that the com

Mon. Alas, my liege, my wife is dead to-night'; Grief of my son's exile hath stopp'd her breath. What farther woe conspires against mine age? Prince. Look, and thou shalt see.

Mon. Oh thou untaught! what manners is in this, To press before thy father to a grave?

Prince. Seal up the mouth of outcry for a while',
Till we can clear these ambiguities,

And know their spring, their head, their true descent;
And then will I be general of your woes,

And lead you even unto death. Mean time forbear,
And let mischance be slave to patience.—

Bring forth the parties of suspicion.

Fri. I am the greatest, able to do least,
Yet most suspected, as the time and place
Doth make against me, of this direful murder;
And here I stand, both to impeach and purge,
Myself condemned, and myself excus'd.

Prince. Then, say at once what thou dost know in this.
Fri. I will be brief, for my short date of breath

Is not so long as is a tedious tale.

Romeo, there dead, was husband to that Juliet;
And she, there dead, that Romeo's faithful wife:
I married them; and their stolen marriage-day
Was Tybalt's dooms-day, whose untimely death
Banish'd the new-made bridegroom from this city;
For whom, and not for Tybalt, Juliet pin'd.
You, to remove that siege of grief from her,
Betroth'd, and would have married her perforce,
To county Paris: then, comes she to me,

mentators have remarked upon a difference here in the old copies. The 4to, 1597, has "more early down," while the other 4tos. and the folios read "now early down:" the corr. fo. 1632 also has "more early down," and we adhere to the most ancient, and, as we think, most natural text.

Alas, my liege, my wife is dead to-night;] After this line the 4to, 1597, adds,

"And young Benvolio is deceased too."

5 Seal up the mouth of OUTCRY for a while,] So the corr. fo. 1632: to "seal up the mouth of outrage" (as constantly misprinted) is almost nonsense, and Lady Capulet has spoken just before of the "open outcry" which had aroused her the mouth of this "open outcry " the Prince wished to be sealed.

6 I will be brief,] As Steevens observes, in the old poem of “Romeus and Juliet," by Brooke, the dead bodies are placed upon a raised scaffold, from which the narrative of Friar Laurence is delivered. A similar course is pursued at the close of "Hamlet."

And, with wild looks, bid me devise some means
To rid her from this second marriage,

Or in my cell there would she kill herself.
Then gave I her, (so tutor'd by my art)
A sleeping potion; which so took effect
As I intended, for it wrought on her

The form of death: meantime, I writ to Romeo,
That he should hither come, as this dire night,
To help to take her from her borrow'd grave,
Being the time the potion's force should cease.
But he which bore my letter, friar John,
Was stay'd by accident, and yesternight
Return'd my letter back. Then, all alone,
At the prefixed hour of her waking,
Came I to take her from her kindred's vault,
Meaning to keep her closely at my cell,
Till I conveniently could send to Romeo:
But, when I came, (some minute ere the time
Of her awakening) here untimely lay
The noble Paris, and true Romeo, dead.
She wakes; and I entreated her come forth,
And bear this work of heaven with patience :
But then a noise did scare me from the tomb,
And she, too desperate, would not go with me,
But (as it seems) did violence on herself.
All this I know, and to the marriage
Her nurse is privy; and, if aught in this
Miscarried by my fault, let my old life
Be sacrific'd some hour before his time,
Unto the rigour of severest law.

Prince. We still have known thee for a holy man.-
Where's Romeo's man? what can he say in this?
Bal. I brought my master news of Juliet's death,
And then in post he came from Mantua

To this same place, to this same monument.
This letter he early bid me give his father;
And threaten'd me with death, going in the vault,
If I departed not and left him there.

Prince. Give me the letter, I will look on it.— Where is the County's page, that rais'd the watch ?— Sirrah, what made your master in this place?

Page. He came with flowers to strew his lady's grave, And bid me stand aloof, and so I did:

Anon, comes one with light to ope the tomb,
And, by and by, my master drew on him;
And then I ran away to call the watch.

Prince. This letter doth make good the friar's words,
Their course of love, the tidings of her death:
And here he writes, that he did buy a poison

Of a poor 'pothecary; and therewithal

Came to this vault to die, and lie with Juliet.-
Where be these enemies? Capulet! Montague!
See, what a scourge is laid upon your hate,
That heaven finds means to kill your joys with love;
And I, for winking at your discords too,
Have lost a brace of kinsmen :-all are punish'd.
Cap. Oh, brother Montague! give me thy hand:
This is my daughter's jointure; for no more
Can I demand.

Mon.

[They shake hands'.

But I can give thee more;

For I will raise her statue in pure gold,

That, while Verona by that name is known,
There shall no figure at such rate be set,
As that of true and faithful Juliet".

Cap. As rich shall Romeo by his lady lie;

Poor sacrifices of our enmity!

Prince. A glooming peace' this morning with it brings;
The sun for sorrow will not show his head.

Go hence, to have more talk of these sad things:
Some shall be pardon'd, and some punished;

For never was a story of more woe,
Than this of Juliet and her Romeo.

[Exeunt.

They shake hands.] We might infer that they shook hands, or embraced, but the corr. fo. tells it to us in so many words, in order to make sure that this part of the business of the scene was not neglected by the actors.

* There shall no figure at SUCH rate be set,] So the 4to, 1599. The folio, 1623, copied the 4to, 1609, and reads, "at that rate be set." The 4to, 1597, gave the passage as follows:

"There shall no statue at such price be set,

As that of Romeo's loved Juliet."

As that of TRUE and faithful Juliet.] So all the copies excepting the first; but perhaps all wrongly, though we do not run the risk of altering words which the poet may have used: at the same time the tautology of "true and faithful" is evident, and the emendation in the corr. fo. 1632 plausible:

"As that of fair and faithful Juliet."

Even the alliteration in this line may possibly have recommended the words to Shakespeare.

1 A GLOOMING peace] So all the editions subsequent to the first in 1597, which alone has "gloomy peace."