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Romeo and Juliet: Act IV, Scene 5

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Romeo and Juliet
Act IV, Scene 5

Juliet’s chamber.

Maude Adams as Juliet

Maude Adams as Juliet

Maude Adams; Sarony and Joseph Byron, photographers; 1899

  1. Enter Nurse

Nurse

1 - 16
  1. Mistress! What, mistress! Juliet!—Fast, I warrant her, she.—
  2. Why, lamb! Why, lady! Fie, you slug-a-bed!
  3. Why, love, I say! Madam! Sweet heart! Why, bride!
  4. What, not a word? You take your pennyworths now;
  5. Sleep for a week, for the next night, I warrant,
  6. The County Paris hath set up his rest
  7. That you shall rest but little. God forgive me!
  8. Marry and amen! How sound is she asleep!
  9. I needs must wake her. Madam, madam, madam!
  10. Ay, let the County take you in your bed,
  11. He’ll fright you up, i’ faith. Will it not be?
  12. Draws back the curtains.
  13. What, dress’d, and in your clothes, and down again?
  14. I must needs wake you. Lady, lady, lady!
  15. Alas, alas! Help, help! My lady’s dead!
  16. O, weraday, that ever I was born!
  17. Some aqua-vitae ho! My lord! My lady!
  1. Enter Mother, Lady Capulet.

Lady Capulet

17
  1. What noise is here?

Nurse

18
  1.                     O lamentable day!

Lady Capulet

19
  1. What is the matter?

Nurse

20
  1.                     Look, look! O heavy day!

Lady Capulet

21 - 23
  1. O me, O me, my child, my only life!
  2. Revive, look up, or I will die with thee!
  3. Help, help! Call help.
  1. Enter Father Capulet.

Capulet

24
  1. For shame, bring Juliet forth, her lord is come.

Nurse

25
  1. She’s dead, deceas’d, she’s dead, alack the day!

Lady Capulet

26
  1. Alack the day, she’s dead, she’s dead, she’s dead!

Capulet

27 - 31
  1. Hah, let me see her. Out alas, she’s cold,
  2. Her blood is settled, and her joints are stiff;
  3. Life and these lips have long been separated.
  4. Death lies on her like an untimely frost
  5. Upon the sweetest flower of all the field.

Nurse

32
  1. O lamentable day!

Lady Capulet

33
  1.                   O woeful time!

Capulet

34 - 35
  1. Death, that hath ta’en her hence to make me wail,
  2. Ties up my tongue and will not let me speak.
  1. Enter Friar Lawrence and the County Paris with the
  2. Musicians.

Friar Lawrence

36
  1. Come, is the bride ready to go to church?

Capulet

37 - 43
  1. Ready to go, but never to return.—
  2. O son, the night before thy wedding-day
  3. Hath Death lain with thy wife. There she lies,
  4. Flower as she was, deflowered by him.
  5. Death is my son-in-law. Death is my heir,
  6. My daughter he hath wedded. I will die,
  7. And leave him all; life, living, all is Death’s.

Paris

44 - 45
  1. Have I thought long to see this morning’s face,
  2. And doth it give me such a sight as this?

Lady Capulet

46 - 51
  1. Accurs’d, unhappy, wretched, hateful day!
  2. Most miserable hour that e’er time saw
  3. In lasting labor of his pilgrimage!
  4. But one, poor one, one poor and loving child,
  5. But one thing to rejoice and solace in,
  6. And cruel Death hath catch’d it from my sight!

Nurse

52 - 57
  1. O woe! O woeful, woeful, woeful day!
  2. Most lamentable day, most woeful day
  3. That ever, ever, I did yet behold!
  4. O day, O day, O day, O hateful day!
  5. Never was seen so black a day as this.
  6. O woeful day, O woeful day!

Paris

58 - 61
  1. Beguil’d, divorced, wronged, spited, slain!
  2. Most detestable Death, by thee beguil’d,
  3. By cruel cruel thee quite overthrown!
  4. O love, O life! Not life, but love in death!

Capulet

62 - 67
  1. Despis’d, distressed, hated, martyr’d, kill’d!
  2. Uncomfortable time, why cam’st thou now
  3. To murder, murder our solemnity?
  4. O child, O child! My soul, and not my child!
  5. Dead art thou! Alack, my child is dead,
  6. And with my child my joys are buried.

Friar Lawrence

68 - 86
  1. Peace ho, for shame! Confusion’s cure lives not
  2. In these confusions. Heaven and yourself
  3. Had part in this fair maid, now heaven hath all,
  4. And all the better is it for the maid.
  5. Your part in her you could not keep from death,
  6. But heaven keeps his part in eternal life.
  7. The most you sought was her promotion,
  8. For ’twas your heaven she should be advanc’d,
  9. And weep ye now, seeing she is advanc’d
  10. Above the clouds, as high as heaven itself?
  11. O, in this love, you love your child so ill
  12. That you run mad, seeing that she is well.
  13. She’s not well married that lives married long,
  14. But she’s best married that dies married young.
  15. Dry up your tears, and stick your rosemary
  16. On this fair corse, and as the custom is,
  17. And in her best array, bear her to church;
  18. For though fond nature bids us all lament,
  19. Yet nature’s tears are reason’s merriment.
Romeo and Juliet

Musicians, O musicians, “Heart’s ease,” “Heart’s ease”! O, and you will have me live, play “Heart’s ease.”

Romeo and Juliet

1901

Capulet

87 - 93
  1. All things that we ordained festival,
  2. Turn from their office to black funeral:
  3. Our instruments to melancholy bells,
  4. Our wedding cheer to a sad burial feast;
  5. Our solemn hymns to sullen dirges change;
  6. Our bridal flowers serve for a buried corse;
  7. And all things change them to the contrary.

Friar Lawrence

94 - 98
  1. Sir, go you in, and, madam, go with him;
  2. And go, Sir Paris. Every one prepare
  3. To follow this fair corse unto her grave.
  4. The heavens do low’r upon you for some ill;
  5. Move them no more by crossing their high will.
  1. They all, but the Nurse and the Musicians, go forth, casting
  2. rosemary on her, and shutting the curtains.

First Musician

99
  1. Faith, we may put up our pipes and be gone.

Nurse

100 - 101
  1. Honest good fellows, ah, put up, put up,
  2. For well you know this is a pitiful case.
  1. Exit.

First Musician

102
  1. Ay, by my troth, the case may be amended.
  1. Enter Peter.

Peter

103 - 104
  1. Musicians, O musicians, “Heart’s ease,” “Heart’s ease”! O,
  2. and you will have me live, play “Heart’s ease.”

First Musician

105
  1. Why “Heart’s ease”?

Peter

106 - 107
  1. O musicians, because my heart itself plays “My heart is
  2. full.” O, play me some merry dump to comfort me.

First Musician

108
  1. Not a dump we, ’tis no time to play now.

Peter

109
  1. You will not then?

First Musician

110
  1. No.

Peter

111
  1. I will then give it you soundly.

First Musician

112
  1. What will you give us?

Peter

113 - 114
  1. No money, on my faith, but the gleek; I will give you the
  2. minstrel.

First Musician

115
  1. Then will I give you the serving-creature.

Peter

116 - 118
  1. Then will I lay the serving-creature’s dagger on your pate.
  2. I will carry no crotchets, I’ll re you, I’ll fa you. Do you
  3. note me?

First Musician

119
  1. And you re us and fa us, you note us.

Second Musician

120
  1. Pray you put up your dagger, and put out your wit.

Peter

121 - 127
  1. Then have at you with my wit! I will dry-beat you with an
  2. iron wit, and put up my iron dagger. Answer me like men:
  3. “When griping griefs the heart doth wound,
  4. And doleful dumps the mind oppress,
  5. Then music with her silver sound”—
  6. Why “silver sound”? Why “music with her silver sound”? What
  7. say you, Simon Catling?

First Musician

128
  1. Marry, sir, because silver hath a sweet sound.

Peter

129
  1. Pretty! What say you, Hugh Rebeck?

Second Musician

130
  1. I say, “silver sound,” because musicians sound for silver.

Peter

131
  1. Pretty too! What say you, James Sound-post?

Third Musician

132
  1. Faith, I know not what to say.

Peter

133 - 137
  1. O, I cry you mercy, you are the singer; I will say for you;
  2. it is “music with her silver sound,” because musicians have
  3. no gold for sounding:
  4. “Then music with her silver sound
  5. With speedy help doth lend redress.”
  1. Exit.

First Musician

138
  1. What a pestilent knave is this same!

Second Musician

139 - 140
  1. Hang him. Jack! Come, we’ll in here, tarry for the mourners,
  2. and stay dinner.
  1. Exeunt.

Alack, my child is dead, And with my child my joys are buried.

1824

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