SCENE V.--_Juliet's Chamber._ The scene is variously given by the

editors as "The Garden," "Anti-room of Juliet's Chamber," "Loggia to Juliet's Chamber," "An open Gallery to Juliet's Chamber overlooking the Orchard," "Juliet's Bedchamber; a Window open upon the Balcony," "Capulet's Orchard," etc. As Malone remarks, Romeo and Juliet probably appeared in the balcony at the rear of the old English stage. "The scene in the poet's eye was doubtless the large and massy projecting balcony before one or more windows, common in Italian palaces and not unfrequent in Gothic civil architecture. The _loggia_, an open gallery, or high terrace [see cut on p. 85], communicating with the upper apartments of a palace, is a common feature in Palladian architecture, and would also be well adapted to such a scene" (Verplanck).

4. _Nightly._ It is said that the nightingale, if undisturbed, sits and sings upon the same tree for many weeks together (Steevens). This is because the male bird sings near where the female is sitting. "The preference of the nightingale for the _pomegranate_ is unquestionable. 'The nightingale sings from the pomegranate groves in the daytime,' says Russel in his account of Aleppo. A friend ... informs us that throughout his journeys in the East he never heard such a choir of nightingales as in a row of pomegranate-trees that skirt the road from Smyrna to Boudjia" (Knight).

8. _Lace._ Cf. _Macb._ ii. 3. 118: "His silver skin lac'd with his golden blood;" _Cymb._ ii. 2. 22:--

"white and azure lac'd With blue of heaven's own tinct," etc.

See on ii. 4. 44 above. We have the word used literally in _Much Ado_, iii. 4. 20: "laced with silver." On _the severing clouds_, cf. _J.C._ ii. 1. 103:--

"yon grey lines That fret the clouds are messengers of day;"[6]

and _Much Ado_, v. 3. 25: "Dapples the drowsy east with spots of grey."

9. _Night's candles_, etc. Cf. _Macb._ ii. 1. 5.: "Their candles are all out." See also _M. of V._ v. 1. 220 and _Sonn._ 21. 12.

13. _Some meteor_, etc. Cf. _1 Hen. IV._ ii. 4. 351: "My lord, do you see these meteors? do you behold these exhalations?" and _Id._ v. 1. 19: "an exhal'd meteor."

14. _Torch-bearer._ See on i. 4. 11 above.

[Footnote 6: At the meeting of the new Shakspere Society, Oct. 11, 1878, the chairman read a paper by Mr. Ruskin on the word _fret_ in this passage. The following is from the report in the London _Academy_:--

"_Fret_ means primarily the rippling of the cloud--as sea by wind; secondarily, the breaking it asunder for light to come through. It implies a certain degree of vexation, some dissolution, much order, and extreme beauty. The reader should have seen 'Daybreak,' and think what is broken and by what. The cloud of night is broken up, by Day, which breaks out, breaks in, as from heaven to earth, with a breach in the cloud wall of it. The thing that the day breaks up is partly a garment _rent_, the blanket of the dark torn to be peeped through...."]

19. _Yon grey._ See on ii. 4. 44 above.

20. _The pale reflex of Cynthia's brow._ That is, the pale light of the moon shining through or reflected from the breaking clouds _Brow_ is put for face, as in _M.N.D._ v. 1. 11: "Helen's beauty in a brow of Egypt," etc. Some critics have thought that a setting moon was meant; but only a rising moon could light up "the severing clouds" in the way described. The _reflection_ (if we take _reflex_ in that literal sense) is from their _edges_, as the light from behind falls upon them. Have these critics never seen--

"a sable cloud Turn forth her silver lining on the night"

when the moon was behind it?

21. _Nor that is not._ Double negatives are common in S.

22. _The vaulty heaven._ Cf. _K. John_, v. 2. 52: "the vaulty top of heaven;" and _R. of L._ 119: "her vaulty prison" (that is, Night's).

29. _Division._ "The breaking of a melody, or its descant, into small notes. The modern musician would call it variation" (Elson). Cf. _1 Hen. IV._ iii. 1. 210:--

"Sung by a fair queen in a summer's bower, With ravishing division, to her lute."

The word is a quadrisyllable here.

31. _The lark_, etc. The toad having beautiful eyes, and the lark very ugly ones, it was a popular tradition that they had changed eyes. (Warburton).

33. _Affray._ Startle from sleep; as Chaucer in _Blaunche the Duchess_ (296) is _affrayed_ out of his sleep by "smale foules" (Dowden).

34. _Hunt's-up._ The tune played to wake and collect the hunters (Steevens). Cf. Drayton, _Polyolbion_: "But hunts-up to the morn the feather'd sylvans sing;" and again in _Third Eclogue_: "Time plays the hunts-up to thy sleepy head." We have the full form in _T.A._ ii. 2. 1: "The hunt is up, the morn is bright and grey." The term was also applied to any morning song, and especially one to a new-married woman. Cotgrave (ed. 1632) defines _resveil_ as "a Hunts-up, or morning song, for a new-maried wife, the day after the mariage."

43. _My lord_, etc. From 1st quarto; the other quartos and 1st folio have "love, Lord, ay husband, friend," for which Dowden reads: "love-lord, ay, husband-friend." _Friend_ was sometimes = lover; as in _Much Ado_, v. 2. 72, _Oth._ iv. 1. 3, _A. and C._ iii. 12. 22, _Cymb._ i. 4. 74, etc. Cf. Brooke's poem, where Juliet referring to Romeo, says:--

"For whom I am becomme vnto my selfe a foe, Disdayneth me, his steadfast frend, and scornes my frendship so;"

and of their parting the poet says:--

"With solemne othe they both theyr sorowfull leaue do take; They sweare no stormy troubles shall theyr steady friendship shake."

44. _Day in the hour._ The hyperbole is explained by what follows.

53. _I have an ill-divining soul._ "This miserable prescience of futurity I have always regarded as a circumstance particularly beautiful. The same kind of warning from the mind Romeo seems to have been conscious of, on his going to the entertainment at the house of Capulet" (Steevens). See i. 4. 48 and 103 fol. above.

54. _Below._ From 1st quarto; the other early eds. have "so lowe," which is preferred by some of the modern editors.

58. _Dry sorrow drinks our blood._ An allusion to the old notion that sorrow and sighing exhaust the blood. Cf. _M.N.D._ iii. 2. 97, _Ham._ iv. 7. 123, _Much Ado_, iii. 1. 78, etc.

65. _Down._ Lying down, abed (Dowden).

66. _Procures her._ Leads her to come. Cf. ii. 2. 145 above. See also _M.W._ iv. 6. 48: "procure the vicar To stay for me," etc.

67. _Why, how now, Juliet!_ Mrs. Jameson remarks: "In the dialogue between Juliet and her parents, and in the scenes with the Nurse, we seem to have before us the whole of her previous education and habits: we see her, on the one hand, kept in severe subjection by her austere parents; and, on the other, fondled and spoiled by a foolish old nurse--a situation perfectly accordant with the manners of the time. Then Lady Capulet comes sweeping by with her train of velvet, her black hood, her fan, and rosary--the very beau-ideal of a proud Italian matron of the fifteenth century, whose offer to poison Romeo, in revenge for the death of Tybalt, stamps her with one very characteristic trait of the age and the country. Yet she loves her daughter, and there is a touch of remorseful tenderness in her lamentations over her, which adds to our impression of the timid softness of Juliet and the harsh subjection in which she has been kept."

69. _Wash him from his grave_, etc. The hyperbole may remind us of the one in _Rich. II._ iii. 3. 166 fol.

72. _Wit._ See on iii. 3. 122 above.

73. _Feeling._ Heartfelt. Cf. "feeling sorrows" in _W.T._ iv. 2. 8 and _Lear_, iv. 6. 226.

82. _Like he._ The inflections of pronouns are often confounded by S.

84. _Ay, madam_, etc. Johnson remarks that "Juliet's equivocations are rather too artful for a mind disturbed by the loss of a new lover." To this Clarke well replies: "It appears to us that, on the contrary, the evasions of speech here used by the young girl-wife are precisely those that a mind, suddenly and sharply awakened from previous inactivity, by desperate love and grief, into self-conscious strength, would instinctively use. Especially are they exactly the sort of shifts and quibbles that a nature rendered timid by stinted intercourse with her kind, and by communion limited to the innocent confidences made by one of her age in the confessional, is prone to resort to, when first left to itself in difficulties of situation and abrupt encounter with life's perplexities."

87. _In Mantua_, etc. No critic, so far as I am aware, has noted the slip of which S. is guilty here. Romeo is said to be _living_ in Mantua, but an hour has hardly elapsed since he started for that city; and how can the lady know of the plan for his going there which was secretly suggested by the friar the afternoon before?

89. _Shall give._ The ellipsis of the relative is not uncommon.

92. _I never shall be satisfied_, etc. Daniel remarks: "The several interpretations of which this ambiguous speech is capable are, I suppose: 1. I never shall be satisfied with Romeo; 2. I never shall be satisfied with Romeo till I behold him; 3. I never shall be satisfied with Romeo till I behold him dead; 4. Till I behold him, dead is my poor heart; 5. Dead is my poor heart, so for a kinsman vext."

96. _Temper._ Compound, mix. Cf. _Ham._ v. 2. 339: "It is a poison temper'd by himself;" _Cymb._ v. 250: "To temper poisons for her," etc.

97. _That._ So that; as often. _Receipt_ is not elsewhere applied by S. to the _receiving_ of food or drink, though it is used of _what is received_ in _R. of L._ 703 and _Cor._ i. 1. 116.

100. _Cousin._ Some editors add "Tybalt" (from 2d folio) to fill out the measure.

104. _Needy._ Joyless. The word is = needful in _Per._ i. 4. 95: "needy bread."

105. _They._ S. makes _tidings_, like _news_ (cf. ii. 5. 22 with ii. 5. 35), either singular or plural. Cf. _J.C._ iv. 3. 155: "That tidings;" _Id._ v. 3. 54: "These tidings," etc.

108. _Sorted out._ Cf. _1. Hen. VI._ ii. 3. 27: "I'll sort some other time to visit you," etc.

109. _Nor I look'd not._ See on iii. 5. 21 above.

110. _In happy time._ Schmidt explains this as here = "_à propos_, pray tell me." Elsewhere it is = just in time; as in _A.W._ v. 1. 6, _Ham._ v. 2. 214, _Oth._ iii. 1. 32, etc.

113. _County._ See on i. 3. 83 above.

120. _I swear._ Collier thinks these words "hardly consistent with Juliet's character;" but, as Ulrici remarks, "they seem necessary in order to show her violent excitement, and thereby explain her conduct." They appear to crowd the measure, but possibly "I will not marry yet" ("I'll not marry yet") may count only as two feet.

122. _These are news._ See on 105 above.

125. _The air._ The reading of the 4th and 5th quartos; the other early eds. have "the earth," which is adopted by many editors. Hudson remarks: "This is scientifically true; poetically, it would seem better to read _air_ instead of _earth_." It happens, however, that science and poetry agree here; for it is the watery vapour in the _air_ that is condensed into dew. Malone, who also says that the reading _earth_ is "philosophically true," cites _R. of L._ 1226: "But as the earth doth weep, the sun being set;" but this only means that the earth is wet with dew. To speak of the earth as _drizzling_ dew is nonsense; we might as well say that it "drizzles rain" (_Much Ado_, iii. 3. 111). Elsewhere S. refers to the "falling" dew; as in _K. John_, ii. 1. 285, _Hen. VIII._ i. 3. 57, _Cymb._ v. 5. 351, etc.

128. _Conduit._ Probably alluding to the human figures that spouted water in fountains. Cf. _R. of L._ 1234:--

"A pretty while these pretty creatures stand, Like ivory conduits coral cisterns filling."

See also _W.T._ v. 2. 60.

129-136. _Evermore ... body._ This long-drawn "conceit" is evidently from the first draught of the play.

134. _Who._ See on i. 1. 109 above.

138. _She will none._ Cf. _M.N.D._ iii. 2. 169: "Lysander, keep thy Hermia; I will none," etc.

140. _Take me with you._ Let me understand you. Cf. _1 Hen. IV._ ii. 4. 506: "I would your grace would take me with you; whom means your grace?"

143. _Wrought._ "Not = induced, prevailed upon, but brought about, effected" (Schmidt). Cf. _Henry VIII._ iii. 2. 311: "You wrought to be a delegate;" _Cor._ ii. 3. 254: "wrought To be set high in place," etc.

144. _Bridegroom._ The 2d quarto has "Bride." This was used of both sexes in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, but S. never makes it masculine. _The New Eng. Dict._ quotes Sylvester, _Du Bartas_ (1598): "Daughter dear ... Isis bless thee and thy Bride," etc.

148. _Chop-logic._ Sophist; used by S. only here.

150. _Minion._ Originally = favourite, darling (as in _Temp._ iv. 1. 98, _Macb._ i. 2. 19, etc.), then a spoiled favourite, and hence a pert or saucy person.

151. _Thank me no thankings_, etc. Cf. _Rich. II._ ii. 3. 87: "Grace me no grace, nor uncle me no uncle," etc.

152. _Fettle._ Prepare, make ready. It is the reading of the quartos and 1st folio; the later folios have "settle," which may be what S. wrote. He does not use _fettle_ elsewhere, and the long _s_ and _f_ were easily confounded in printing.

155. _Out_, etc. "Such was the indelicacy of the age of S. that authors were not contented only to employ these terms of abuse in their own original performances, but even felt no reluctance to introduce them in their versions of the most chaste and elegant of the Greek or Roman poets. Stanyhurst, the translator of Virgil, in 1582, makes Dido call Æneas _hedge-brat_, _cullion_, and _tar-breech_ in the course of one speech. Nay, in the interlude of _The Repentance of Mary Magdalene_, 1567, Mary Magdalene says to one of her attendants, '_Horeson_, I beshrowe your heart, are you here?'" (Steevens).

164. _Lent._ The 1st quarto has "sent," which some editors adopt. Clarke thinks it may be a misprint for "left," as Capulet (i. 2. 14) speaks as if he had had other children; but S. is careless in these minor matters. See on i. 5. 30 and v. 3. 207.

167. _Hilding._ See on ii. 4. 43 above.

171. _God ye god-den._ See on i. 2. 57 above.

172. _Peace._ Theobald repeated the word for the sake of the measure. _Peace_ may perhaps be metrically a dissyllable, as in _A.Y.L._ ii. 4. 70.

175-177. _God's bread!_ etc. The text of the early eds. is evidently corrupt here. The reading in the text is Malone's, and perhaps gives very nearly what S. wrote on the revision of the play.

181. _Stuff'd_, etc. Cf. _Much Ado_, i. 1. 56: "stuffed with all honourable virtues," etc. For _parts_, cf. iii. 3. 2 above.

184. _Mammet._ Puppet, doll. Cf. _1 Hen. IV._ ii. 3. 95: "To play with mammets." The word is also written _mawmet_, and is a contraction of _Mahomet_. _In her fortune's tender_ = when good fortune presents itself. Cf. iii. 4. 12 above.

189. _Use._ See on ii. chor. 10 above.

190. _Lay hand on heart, advise._ Consider it seriously. Cf. Brooke's poem:--

"Aduise thee well, and say that thou art warned now, And thinke not that I speake in sporte, or mynd to breake my vowe."

198. _Sweet my mother._ Cf. iii. 2. 98: "Ah, poor my lord," etc.

209. _Should practise stratagems_, etc. Should, as it were, entrap me into so painful and perplexing a situation. Schmidt makes _stratagem_ sometimes = "anything amazing and appalling," and cites this passage as an instance.

212. _Faith, here 'tis_, etc. S. here follows Brooke:--

"She setteth foorth at large the fathers furious rage, And eke she prayseth much to her the second mariage; And County Paris now she praiseth ten times more, By wrong, then she her selfe by right had Romeus praysde before," etc.

Mrs. Jameson remarks: "The old woman, true to her vocation, and fearful lest her share in these events should be discovered, counsels her to forget Romeo and marry Paris; and the moment which unveils to Juliet the weakness and baseness of her confidante is the moment which reveals her to herself. She does not break into upbraidings; it is no moment for anger; it is incredulous amazement, succeeded by the extremity of scorn and abhorrence, which takes possession of her mind. She assumes at once and asserts all her own superiority, and rises to majesty in the strength of her despair."

220. _Green._ We have green eyes again in _M.N.D._ v. 1. 342: "His eyes were green as leeks." Cf. _The Two Noble Kinsmen_, v. 1: "With that rare green eye." Clarke remarks: "The brilliant touch of green visible in very light hazel eyes, and which gives wonderful clearness and animation to their look, has been admiringly denoted by various poets from time immemorial." In a sonnet by Drummond of Hawthornden, the gods are represented as debating of what colour a beauty's eyes shall be. Mars and Apollo vote for black:--

"Chaste Phœbe spake for purest azure dyes, But Jove and Venus green about the light, To frame thought best, as bringing most delight, That to pin'd hearts hope might for aye arise."

Cf. Longfellow, _The Spanish Student_: "Ay, soft emerald eyes;" and again:--

"in her tender eyes Just that soft shade of green we sometimes see In evening skies."

In a note on the former passage, the poet says: "The Spaniards, with good reason, consider this colour of the eyes as beautiful, and celebrate it in song.... Dante speaks of Beatrice's eyes as emeralds (_Purgat._ xxxi. 116). Lami says in his _Annotazioni_, 'Erano i suoi occhi d' un turchino verdiccio, simile a quel del mare.'"

221. _Beshrew._ See on ii. 5. 52 above.

225. _Here._ Not referring to Verona, but = "in this world" (Johnson).

233. _Ancient damnation._ The abstract for the concrete, explained by what follows. Steevens cites _The Malcontent_, 1604: "out, you ancient damnation!"

234. _Is it more sin_, etc. Mrs. Jameson remarks: "It appears to me an admirable touch of nature, considering the master-passion which, at this moment, rules in Juliet's soul, that she is as much shocked by the nurse's dispraise of her lover as by her wicked, time-serving advice. This scene is the crisis in the character; and henceforth we see Juliet assume a new aspect. The fond, impatient, timid girl puts on the wife and the woman: she has learned heroism from suffering, and subtlety from oppression. It is idle to criticise her dissembling submission to her father and mother; a higher duty has taken place of that which she owed to them; a more sacred tie has severed all others. Her parents are pictured as they are, that no feeling for them may interfere in the slightest degree with our sympathy for the lovers. In the mind of Juliet there is no struggle between her filial and her conjugal duties, and there ought to be none."

236. _Compare._ See on ii. 5. 43 above.