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 the fairer 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 the dial 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 to mar.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 when you 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 with you.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 lent But a hare that is hoar Is too much for a score, When it hoars ere it be spent.
Romeo, will you come to your father's? we'll to 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 saucy merchant 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 stand to in a month.Nurse An a' speak any thing against me, I'll take him down, an a' were lustier than he is, and twenty such Jacks; and if I cannot, I'll find those that shall.
Scurvy knave! I am none of his flirt-gills; Iam none of his skains-mates.And thou must stand by too, and suffer every knave to use me at his pleasure? PETER I saw no man use you a pleasure; if Ihad, my weapon should quickly have been out, I warrant you:I dare draw as soon as another man, if I see occasion in a good quarrel, and the law on my side.Nurse Now, afore God, I am so vexed, that every part about me quivers.Scurvy knave! Pray you, sir, a word:and as I told you, my young lady bade me inquire you out; what she bade me say, I will keep to myself:but first let me tell ye, if ye should lead her into a fool's paradise, as they say, it were a very gross kind of behavior, as they say: for the gentlewoman is young; and, therefore, if you should deal double with her, truly it were an ill thing to be offered to any gentlewoman, and very weak dealing.ROMEO Nurse, commend me to thy lady and mistress.
I
protest 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, as I take it, is a gentlemanlike offer.ROMEO Bid her devise Some means to come to shrift this afternoon;And there she shall at Friar Laurence' cell Be 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 thee And bring thee cords made like a tackled stair;Which to the high top-gallant of my joy Must 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, there is a nobleman in town, one Paris, that would fain lay knife aboard; but she, good soul, had as lief see a toad, a very toad, as see him.I anger her sometimes and tell her that Paris is the properer man; but, I'll warrant you, when I say so, she looks as pale as any clout in the versal world.Doth not rosemary 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; Ris for the--No; I know it begins with some other letter:--and she hath the prettiest sententious of it, of you and rosemary, that it would do you good to 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.
