2:4

SCENE IV. A street.
Enter BENVOLIO and MERCUTIO
MERCUTIO
Where the devil should this Romeo be?Came he not home to-night?
BENVOLIO
Not to his father's; I spoke with his man.
MERCUTIO
Ah, that same pale hard-hearted wench, that Rosaline.Torments him so, that he will sure run mad.
BENVOLIO
Tybalt, the kinsman of old Capulet,Hath sent a letter to his father's house.
MERCUTIO
A challenge, on my life.
BENVOLIO
Romeo will answer it.
MERCUTIO
Any man that can write may answer a letter.
BENVOLIO
Nay, he will answer the letter's master, how hedares, being dared.
MERCUTIO
Alas poor Romeo! he is already dead; stabbed with awhite wench's black eye; shot through the ear with alove-song; the very pin of his heart cleft with theblind bow-boy's butt-shaft: and is he a man toencounter Tybalt?
BENVOLIO
Why, what is Tybalt?
MERCUTIO
More than prince of cats, I can tell you. O, he isthe courageous captain of compliments. He fights asyou sing prick-song, keeps time, distance, andproportion; rests me his minim rest, one, two, andthe third in your bosom: the very butcher of a silkbutton, a duellist, a duellist; a gentleman of thevery first house, of the first and second cause:ah, the immortal passado! the punto reverso! thehai!
BENVOLIO
The what?
MERCUTIO
The pox of such antic, lisping, affectingfantasticoes; these new tuners of accents! 'By Jesu,a very good blade! a very tall man! a very goodwhore!' Why, is not this a lamentable thing,grandsire, that we should be thus afflicted withthese strange flies, these fashion-mongers, theseperdona-mi's, who stand so much on the new form,that they cannot at ease on the old bench? O, theirbones, their bones!
Enter ROMEO
BENVOLIO
Here comes Romeo, here comes Romeo.
MERCUTIO
Without his roe, like a dried herring: flesh, flesh,how art thou fishified! Now is he for the numbersthat Petrarch flowed in: Laura to his lady was but akitchen-wench; marry, she had a better love tobe-rhyme her; Dido a dowdy; Cleopatra a gipsy;Helen and Hero hildings and harlots; Thisbe a greyeye or so, but not to the purpose. SigniorRomeo, bon jour! there's a French salutationto your French slop. You gave us the counterfeitfairly last night.
ROMEO
Good morrow to you both. What counterfeit did I give you?
MERCUTIO
The ship, sir, the slip; can you not conceive?
ROMEO
Pardon, good Mercutio, my business was great; and insuch a case as mine a man may strain courtesy.
MERCUTIO
That's as much as to say, such a case as yoursconstrains a man to bow in the hams.
ROMEO
Meaning, to court'sy.
MERCUTIO
Thou hast most kindly hit it.
ROMEO
A most courteous exposition.
MERCUTIO
Nay, I am the very pink of courtesy.
ROMEO
Pink for flower.
MERCUTIO
Right.
ROMEO
Why, then is my pump well flowered.
MERCUTIO
Well said: follow me this jest now till thou hastworn out thy pump, that when the single sole of itis worn, the jest may remain after the wearing sole singular.
ROMEO
O single-soled jest, solely singular for thesingleness.
MERCUTIO
Come between us, good Benvolio; my wits faint.
ROMEO
Switch and spurs, switch and spurs; or I'll cry a match.
MERCUTIO
Nay, if thy wits run the wild-goose chase, I havedone, for thou hast more of the wild-goose in one ofthy wits than, I am sure, I have in my whole five:was I with you there for the goose?
ROMEO
Thou wast never with me for any thing when thou wastnot there for the goose.
MERCUTIO
I will bite thee by the ear for that jest.
ROMEO
Nay, good goose, bite not.
MERCUTIO
Thy wit is a very bitter sweeting; it is a mostsharp sauce.
ROMEO
And is it not well served in to a sweet goose?
MERCUTIO
O here's a wit of cheveril, that stretches from aninch narrow to an ell broad!
ROMEO
I stretch it out for that word 'broad;' which addedto the goose, proves thee far and wide a broad goose.
MERCUTIO
Why, is not this better now than groaning for love?now art thou sociable, now art thou Romeo; now artthou what thou art, by art as well as by nature:for this drivelling love is like a great natural,that runs lolling up and down to hide his bauble in a hole.
BENVOLIO
Stop there, stop there.
MERCUTIO
Thou desirest me to stop in my tale against the hair.
BENVOLIO
Thou wouldst else have made thy tale large.
MERCUTIO
O, thou art deceived; I would have made it short:for I was come to the whole depth of my tale; andmeant, indeed, to occupy the argument no longer.
ROMEO
Here's goodly gear!
Enter Nurse and PETER
MERCUTIO
A sail, a sail!
BENVOLIO
Two, two; a shirt and a smock.
Nurse
Peter!
PETER
Anon!
Nurse
My fan, Peter.
MERCUTIO
Good Peter, to hide her face; for her fan's thefairer face.
Nurse
God ye good morrow, gentlemen.
MERCUTIO
God ye good den, fair gentlewoman.
Nurse
Is it good den?
MERCUTIO
'Tis no less, I tell you, for the bawdy hand of thedial is now upon the prick of noon.
Nurse
Out upon you! what a man are you!
ROMEO
One, gentlewoman, that God hath made for himself tomar.
Nurse
By my troth, it is well said; 'for himself to mar,'quoth a'? Gentlemen, can any of you tell me where Imay find the young Romeo?
ROMEO
I can tell you; but young Romeo will be older whenyou have found him than he was when you sought him:I am the youngest of that name, for fault of a worse.
Nurse
You say well.
MERCUTIO
Yea, is the worst well? very well took, i' faith;wisely, wisely.
Nurse
if you be he, sir, I desire some confidence withyou.
BENVOLIO
She will indite him to some supper.
MERCUTIO
A bawd, a bawd, a bawd! so ho!
ROMEO
What hast thou found?
MERCUTIO
No hare, sir; unless a hare, sir, in a lenten pie,that is something stale and hoar ere it be spent.
Sings
An old hare hoar,And an old hare hoar,Is very good meat in lentBut a hare that is hoarIs too much for a score,When it hoars ere it be spent.Romeo, will you come to your father's? we'llto dinner, thither.
ROMEO
I will follow you.
MERCUTIO
Farewell, ancient lady; farewell,
Singing
'lady, lady, lady.'
Exeunt MERCUTIO and BENVOLIO
Nurse
Marry, farewell! I pray you, sir, what saucymerchant was this, that was so full of his ropery?
ROMEO
A gentleman, nurse, that loves to hear himself talk,and will speak more in a minute than he will standto in a month.
Nurse
An a' speak any thing against me, I'll take himdown, an a' were lustier than he is, and twenty suchJacks; and if I cannot, I'll find those that shall.Scurvy knave! I am none of his flirt-gills; I amnone of his skains-mates. And thou must stand bytoo, and suffer every knave to use me at his pleasure?
PETER
I saw no man use you a pleasure; if I had, my weaponshould quickly have been out, I warrant you: I daredraw as soon as another man, if I see occasion in agood quarrel, and the law on my side.
Nurse
Now, afore God, I am so vexed, that every part aboutme quivers. Scurvy knave! Pray you, sir, a word:and as I told you, my young lady bade me inquire youout; what she bade me say, I will keep to myself:but first let me tell ye, if ye should lead her intoa fool's paradise, as they say, it were a very grosskind of behavior, as they say: for the gentlewomanis young; and, therefore, if you should deal doublewith her, truly it were an ill thing to be offeredto any gentlewoman, and very weak dealing.
ROMEO
Nurse, commend me to thy lady and mistress. Iprotest unto thee--
Nurse
Good heart, and, i' faith, I will tell her as much:Lord, Lord, she will be a joyful woman.
ROMEO
What wilt thou tell her, nurse? thou dost not mark me.
Nurse
I will tell her, sir, that you do protest; which, asI take it, is a gentlemanlike offer.
ROMEO
Bid her deviseSome means to come to shrift this afternoon;And there she shall at Friar Laurence' cellBe shrived and married. Here is for thy pains.
Nurse
No truly sir; not a penny.
ROMEO
Go to; I say you shall.
Nurse
This afternoon, sir? well, she shall be there.
ROMEO
And stay, good nurse, behind the abbey wall:Within this hour my man shall be with theeAnd bring thee cords made like a tackled stair;Which to the high top-gallant of my joyMust be my convoy in the secret night.Farewell; be trusty, and I'll quit thy pains:Farewell; commend me to thy mistress.
Nurse
Now God in heaven bless thee! Hark you, sir.
ROMEO
What say'st thou, my dear nurse?
Nurse
Is your man secret? Did you ne'er hear say,Two may keep counsel, putting one away?
ROMEO
I warrant thee, my man's as true as steel.
NURSE
Well, sir; my mistress is the sweetest lady--Lord,Lord! when 'twas a little prating thing:--O, thereis a nobleman in town, one Paris, that would fainlay knife aboard; but she, good soul, had as liefsee a toad, a very toad, as see him. I anger hersometimes and tell her that Paris is the propererman; but, I'll warrant you, when I say so, she looksas pale as any clout in the versal world. Doth notrosemary and Romeo begin both with a letter?
ROMEO
Ay, nurse; what of that? both with an R.
Nurse
Ah. mocker! that's the dog's name; R is forthe--No; I know it begins with some otherletter:--and she hath the prettiest sententious ofit, of you and rosemary, that it would do you goodto hear it.
ROMEO
Commend me to thy lady.
Nurse
Ay, a thousand times.
Exit Romeo
Peter!
PETER
Anon!
Nurse
Peter, take my fan, and go before and apace.
Exeunt