SCENE I.--3. _And I am nothing slow to slack his haste._ Paris here

seems to say the opposite of what he evidently means, and various attempts have been made to explain away the inconsistency. It appears to be one of the peculiar cases of "double negative" discussed by Schmidt in his Appendix, p. 1420, though he does not give it there. "The idea of negation was so strong in the poet's mind that he expressed it in more than one place, unmindful of his canon that 'your four negatives make your two affirmatives.'" Cf. _Lear_, ii. 4. 142:--

"You less know how to value her desert Than she to scant ["slack" in quartos] her duty;"

that is, you are more inclined to depreciate her than she to scant her duty.

5. _Uneven._ Indirect. Cf. the use of _even_ in _Ham._ ii. 2. 298: "be even and direct with me," etc. Sometimes the word is = perplexing, embarrassing; as in _1 Hen. IV._ i. 1. 50: "uneven and unwelcome news," etc.

11. _Marriage._ A trisyllable here; as in _M. of V._ ii. 9. 13, etc. So also in the quotation from Brooke in note on iii. 5. 212 above.

13. _Alone._ When alone; opposed to _society_ below.

16. _Slow'd._ The only instance of the verb in S.

18-36. This part of the scene evidently came from the first draft of the play.

20. _That may be must be._ That _may be_ of yours must be.

29. _Abus'd._ Marred, disfigured.

31. _Spite._ Cf. i. 5. 64 above.

38. _Evening mass._ Ritson and others say that Juliet means _vespers_, as there is no such thing as _evening mass_; and Staunton expresses surprise that S. has fallen into this error, since he elsewhere shows a familiarity with the usages of the Roman Catholic Church. It is the critics who are in error, not S. Walafrid Strabo (_De Rebus Eccles._ xxiii.) says that, while the time for mass is regularly before noon, it is sometimes celebrated in the evening ("aliquando _ad vesperam_"). Amalarius, Bishop of Trèves (_De Eccles. Off._ iv. 40), specifies Lent as the season for this hour. The _Generales Rubricæ_ allow this at other times in the year. In Winkles's _French Cathedrals_, we are told that, on the occasion of the marriage of Henrietta of France, daughter of Henry IV., with the Duke of Chevreuse, as proxy for Charles I. of England, celebrated in Notre Dame at Paris, May 11, 1625, "mass was celebrated in the evening." See _Notes and Queries_ for April 29 and June 3, 1876; also M'Clintock and Strong's _Biblical Cyclopædia_, under _Mass._

40. _We must entreat_, etc. We must beg you to leave us to ourselves. Cf. _Hen. VIII._ i. 4. 71:--

"Crave leave to view these ladies and entreat An hour of revels with them."

41. _God shield._ God forbid. Cf. _A.W._ i. 3. 74: "God shield you mean it not." So "Heaven shield," in _M. for M._ iii. 1. 141, etc. _Devotion_ is here a quadrisyllable.

45. _Past cure_, etc. Cf. _L. L. L._ v. 2. 28: "past cure is still past care."

48. _Prorogue._ See on ii. 2. 78 above.

54. _This knife._ It was the custom of the time in Italy as in Spain for ladies to wear daggers at their girdles.

57. _The label._ The seal appended by a slip to a deed, according to the custom of the day. In _Rich. II._ v. 2. 56, the Duke of York discovers, by the depending seal, a covenant which his son has made with the conspirators. In _Cymb._ v. 5. 430, _label_ is used for the deed itself.

62. _Extremes._ Extremities, sufferings. Cf. _R. of L._ 969:--

"Devise extremes beyond extremity, To make him curse this cursed crimeful night."

The meaning of the passage is, "This knife shall decide the struggle between me and my distresses" (Johnson).

64. _Commission._ Warrant, authority. Cf. _A.W._ ii. 3. 279: "you are more saucy with lords and honourable personages than the commission of your birth and virtue gives you heraldry."

66. _Be not so long to speak._ So slow to speak. Clarke remarks here: "The constraint, with sparing speech, visible in Juliet when with her parents, as contrasted with her free outpouring flow of words when she is with her lover, her father confessor, or her nurse--when, in short, she is her natural self and at perfect ease--is true to characteristic delineation. The young girl, the very young girl, the girl brought up as Juliet has been reared, the youthful Southern maiden, lives and breathes in every line by which S. has set her before us."

78. _Yonder._ Ulrici "cannot perceive why Juliet must designate a particular, actual tower, since all that follows is purely imaginary;" but to me the reference to a tower in sight seems both forcible and natural, and the transition to imaginary ordeals is equally natural.

83. _Reeky._ Reeking with foul vapours, or simply = foul, as if soiled with smoke or _reek_. Cf. _reechy_ (another form of the same word) in _Much Ado_, iii. 3. 143, _Ham._ iii. 4. 184, etc.

93. _Take thou this vial_, etc. Cf. Brooke's poem:--

"Receiue this vyoll small and keepe it as thine eye; And on the mariage day, before the sunne doe cleare the skye, Fill it with water full vp to the very brim, Then drinke it of, and thou shalt feele throughout eche vayne and lim A pleasant slumber slide, and quite dispred at length On all thy partes, from euery part reue all thy kindly strength; Withouten mouing thus thy ydle parts shall rest, No pulse shall goe, ne hart once beate within thy hollow brest, But thou shalt lye as she that dyeth in a traunce: Thy kinsmen and thy trusty frendes shall wayle the sodain chaunce; The corps then will they bring to graue in this church yarde, Where thy forefathers long agoe a costly tombe preparde, Both for them selfe and eke for those that should come after,[7] Both deepe it is, and long and large, where thou shalt rest, my daughter, Till I to Mantua sende for Romeus, thy knight; Out of the tombe both he and I will take thee forth that night."

97. _Surcease._ Cf. _R. of L._ 1766: "If they surcease to be that should survive;" and _Cor._ iii. 2. 121: "Lest I surcease to honour mine own truth." For the noun, see _Macb._ i. 7. 74.

100. _Paly._ Cf. _Hen. V._ iv. chor. 8: "paly flames;" and 2 _Hen. VI._ iii. 2. 141: "his paly lips."

105. _Two and forty hours._ It is difficult to make this period agree with the time of the events that follow. Maginn would read "two and fifty hours;" and "two and thirty" has been suggested, which is more in accordance with the dates given in the play. In iv. 1. 90 the Friar says to Juliet:--

"_Wednesday_ is to-morrow: To-morrow night look that thou lie alone," etc.

[Footnote 7: For the rhyme of _after_ and _daughter_, cf. _T. of S._ i. 1. 245, 246, _W.T._ iv. 1. 27, 28, and _Lear_, i. 4. 341, 344.]

This agrees with the preceding dates. The conversation in iii. 4 is late on Monday evening (cf. lines 5 and 18), and Lady Capulet's talk with Juliet about marrying Paris (iii. 5. 67 fol.) is early the next (Tuesday) morning. The visit to the Friar is evidently on the same day; and the next scene (iv. 2) is in the evening of that day. Juliet comes home and tells her father that she has been to the Friar's, and is ready to marry Paris. The old man at once decides to have the wedding "to-morrow morning" (that is, Wednesday) instead of Thursday. Lady Capulet objects, but finally yields to her husband's persistency; and so Juliet goes to her chamber, and drinks the potion on _Tuesday_ evening, or twenty-four hours earlier than the Friar had directed. He of course is notified of the change in the time for the wedding, as he is to perform the ceremony, and will understand that Juliet has anticipated the time of taking the potion, and that she will wake on _Thursday_ morning instead of Friday. If so, instead of extending the "two and forty hours," as Maginn does, we need rather to shorten the interval. We may suppose the time of v. 3 to be as early as three o'clock in the morning. It is summer, and before daylight. Paris and Romeo come with torches, and the Friar with a lantern. Romeo tells his servant to deliver the letter to his father "early in the morning." The night watchmen are still on duty. Since we can hardly send Juliet to bed before nine in the evening on Tuesday, _thirty_ hours is the most that can be allowed for the interval, unless we add another day and accept the fifty-two of Maginn. But this does not seem required by anything in