Enter Prince, Montague, Capulet, their Wives, &c. Prin. Where are the vile beginners of this fray? Ben. O noble Prince, I can discover all Th' unlucky manage of this fatal brawl : There lies the man, flain by young Romeo, That flew thy kinfman, brave Mercutio.

La. Cap. Tybalt, my coufin ! O my brother's child!Unhappy fight! alas, the blood is fpill'd

Of my dear kinfman-Prince, as thou art true,
For blood of ours, fhed blood of Montague.
Prin. Benvolio, who began this fray?

Ben. Tybalt, here flain, whom Romeo's hand did flay:
Romeo, that fpoke him fair, bid him bethink
How nice the quarrel was, and urg'd withal
Your high difpleafure: all this uttered

With gentle breath, calm look, knees humbly bow'd,
Could not take truce with the unruly spleen
Of Tybalt, deaf to peace; but that he tilts
With piercing fteel at bold Mercutio's breast;
Who, all as hot, turns deadly point to point,
And with a martial scorn, with one hand beats
Cold death afide, and with the other fends
It back to Tybalt, whofe dexterity

Retorts it: Romeo he cries aloud,

Hold, friends! friends, part! and, fwifter than his tongue, His agile arm beats down their fatal points,

And 'twixt them rufhes; underneath whofe arm

An envious thrust from Tybalt hit the life
Of flout Mercutio, and then Tybalt fled;
But by and by comes back to Romeo,
Who had but newly entertain'd revenge,
And to't they go like lightning: for ere I
Could draw to part them, was ftout Tybalt flain;
And as he fell, did Romeo turn to fly :
This is the truth, or let Benvolio die.

La. Cap. He is a kinfman to the Montague.
Affection makes him falfe, he speaks not true.
Some twenty of them fought in this black ftrife,
And all thofe twenty could but kill one life.

C 4

I beg

I beg for juftice, which thou, Prince, must give;
Romeo flew Tybalt, Romeo must not live.

Prin. Romeo flew him, he flew Mercutio;
Who now the price of his dear blood doth owe?
La. Mont. Not Romeo, Prince, he was Mercutio's friend;
His fault concludes but what the law fhould end,
The life of Tybalt.

Prin. And for that offence,

Immediately we do exile him hence:

I have an intereft in your hearts' proceeding,
My blood for your rude brawls doth lie a bleeding į
But I'll amerce you with fo ftrong a fine,
That you fhall all repent the lofs of mine.
I will be deaf to pleading and excufes,

Nor tears nor prayers fhall purchase out abuses;
Therefore ufe none; let Romeo hence in haste,
Elfe, when he's found, that hour is his laft. (21)
Bear hence this body, and attend our will:
"Mercy but murders, pardoning thofe that kill."

[Exeunt.

SCENE changes to an Apartment in Capulet's

Jul. G

Houfe.

Enter Juliet alone.

ALLOP apace, you fiery-footed fteeds,
Tow'rds Phabus' manfion; fuch a waggoner,

As Phaeton, would whip you to the weft,

And bring in cloudy night immediately.

(21) Elfe, when he is found, that hour is bis laft.] It is wonderful that Mr. Pope fhould retort the want of ear upon any body, and pass fuch an inharmonious unscanning verse in his own ear: a verse, that cannot run off from the tongue with any cadence of mufick, the short and long fyllables ftand fo perverfely. We must read,

Elfe, when he's found, that hour is his laft.

Every diligent and knowing reader of our Poet must have obferv'd, that bour and fire are almoft perpetually disyllables in the pronounci ation and fcanfion of his verfes,

Spread

Spread thy close curtain, love-performing Night, (22)
That th' Run-away's eyes may wink; and Romeo
Leap to thefe arms, untalkt of and unfeen.
Lovers can fee to do their am'rous rites
By their own beauties: or, if love be blind,
It beft agrees with night. Come, civil night,
Thou fober-fuited matron, all in black,
And learn me how to lofe a winning match,
Play'd for a pair of stainless maidenheads.
Hood my

unmann'd blood baiting in my cheeks, With thy black mantle; till ftrange love, grown bold, Thinks true love acted, fimple modefty.

Come night, come, Romeo! come, thou day in night!
For thou wilt lie upon the wings of night,
Whiter than fnow upon a raven's back:

Come, gentle night; come loving, black-brow'd night!
Give me my Romeo, and, when he shall die,
Take him and cut him out in little ftars,
And he will make the face of heav'n fo fine,
That all the world fhall be in love with night,
And pay no worship to the garifh fun.
O, I have bought the manfion of a love,
But not poffefs'd it; and though I am fold,
Not yet enjoy'd; fo tedious is this day,
As is the night before fome feftival,

To an impatient child that hath new robes,

And may not wear them: O, here comes my nurfe!

(22) Spread thy clofe curtain, love-performing Night,

That runaways eyes may wink;] What runaways are thefe, whose eyes Juliet is wishing to have flopt? Macbeth, we may remember, makes an invocation to Night, much in the fame strain :

Come, feeling Night,

Scarf up the tender eye of pitiful day, &c.

So Juliet here would have night's darkness obfcure the great eye of the day, the Sun; whom confidering in a poetical light as Phabus, drawn in his car with fiery-footed stee's, and pofting thro' the Heav'ns, the very properly calls him, with regard to the fwiftnefs of his course, the Runaway. In the like manner our Poet speaks of the night, in the Merchant of Venice.

For the clofe Night doth play the runaway,

C 5

Mr. Warburton.

Enter

Enter Nurfe with cords.

And the brings news; and every tongue, that speaks
But Romeo's name, fpeaks heav'nly eloquence;
Now, nurse, what news? what haft thou there?
The cords that Romeo bid thee fetch?
Nurfe. Ay, ay, the cords.

Jul. Ah me, what news?

Why doft thou wring thy hands?

Nurfe. Ah well-a-day, he's dead, he's dead, he's dead! We are undone, lady, we are undone.

Alack the day! he's gone, he's kill'd, he's dead.
Jul. Can heav'n be fo envious ?

Nurfe. Romeo can.

Though heav'n cannot.

O Romeo! Romeo!

Who ever would have thought it, Romeo?

Jul. What devil art thou, that dost torment me thus? This torture fhould be roar'd in difmal hell.

Hath Romeo flain himself? fay thou but, I;
And that bare vowel, I, fhall poifon more (23)
Than the death darting eye of cockatrice.

Nurfe. I faw the wound, I faw it with mine eyes,
(God fave the mark) here on his manly breast.
A piteous coarfe, a bloody piteous coarse;
Pale, pale as afhes, all bedaub'd in blood,
All in gore blood; I fwooned at the fight.

[once!

Jul. O break, my heart!-poor bankrupt, break at

To prifon, eyes! ne'er look on liberty;
Vile earth to earth refign, end motion here,
And thou and Romeo prefs one heavy bier!

Nurfe. O Tybalt, Tybalt, the best friend I had :
O courteous Tybalt, honeft gentleman,
That ever I fhould live to fee thee dead!

(23) And that bare vowel, ay, fhall poifon mere

Than the death darting eye of cockatrice.] queftion much, whether the grammarians will take this new vowel on truft from Mr. Pope, without fufpecting it rather for a diphthong. In fhort, we must reftore the fpelling of the old books, or we lofe the Poet's conceit. At his time of day, the affirmative adverb Ay was generally written, I: and by this means it both becomes a vowel, and anfwers in found to ye, upon which the conceit turns in the fecond line.

Jul.

Jul. What ftorm is this, that blows fo contrary? Is Romeo flaughter'd? and is Tybalt dead? My dear-lov'd coufin, and my dearer Lord? Then let the trumpet found the general doom, For who is living, if thofe two are gone? Nurfe. Tybalt is dead, and Romeo banished, Romeo, that kill'd him, he is banished.

ful. O God! did Romeo's hand fhed Tybalt's blood? Nurse. It did, it did, alas, the day! it did. Jul. O ferpent-heart, hid with a flow'ring face! Did ever dragon keep fo fair a cave?

Beautiful tyrant, fiend angelical!

Dove-feather'd raven! wolvish-rav'ning lamb! (24)
Defpifed fubftance, of divinest show!
Juft oppofite to what thou justly feem'st,
A damned faint, an honourable villain!
O Nature! what haft thou to do in hell,
When thou didst bower the fpirit of a fiend
In mortal paradife of fuch fweet flesh?
Was ever book, containing fuch vile matter,
So fairly bound? O, that deceit should dwell
In fuch a gorgeous palace!

Nurfe. There's no trust,

No faith, no honesty, in men; all perjur'd;
All, all forfworn; all naught; and all diffemblers.
Ah, where's my man? give me fome Aqua vita.
These griefs, these woes, these forrows make me old!
Shame come to Romeo!

(24) Ravenous dove, feather'd raven,

Wolvib ravening lamb.] This paffage Mr. Pope has thrown out of the text, partly, I prefume, because these two noble bemiftichs are, indeed, inharmonious: [but chiefly, because they are obfcure and unintelligible at the first view.] But is there no fuch thing as a crutch for a labouring, halting, veríe? I'll venture to restore to the Poet a line that was certainly his, that is in his own mode of thinking, and truly worthy of him. The first word, ravenous, I have no doubt, was blunderingly coin'd out of raven and ravening, which follow and if we only throw it out, we gain at once an harmonious verse, and a proper contraft of epithets and images.

Dove feather'd raven! wolvish-rav'ning lamb §

C 6

Jul.