Romeo and Juliet : II.II : II.IV


Act I, Scene III - A street

Enter BENVOLIO and MERCUTIO

MERCUTIO

Where the devil should this Romeo be?
Came he not home tonight?

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 he
dares, being dared.

MERCUTIO

Alas poor Romeo! he is already dead - stabbed with a
white wench's black eye, run through the ear with a
love song, the very pin of his heart cleft with the
blind bow-boy's butt-shaft; and is he a man to
encounter Tybalt?

BENVOLIO

Why, what is Tybalt?

MERCUTIO

More than prince of cats, I can tell you. O, he is
the courageous captain of compliments. He fights as
you sing pricksong, keeps time, distance, and
proportion; rests me his minim rest, one, two, and
the third in your bosom; the very butcher of a silk
button, a duellist, a duellist; a gentleman of the
very first house, of the first and second cause:
ah, the immortal passado! The punto reverso! the
hai!

BENVOLIO

The what?

MERCUTIO

The pox of such antic, lisping, affecting
phantasims, these new tuners of accents! 'By Jesu,
a very good blade, a very tall man, a very good
whore.' Why, is not this a lamentable thing,
grandsire, that we should be thus afflicted with
these strange flies, these fashion-mongers, these
'pardon me's, who stand so much on the new form,
that they cannot at ease on the old bench? O, their
bones, their bones!

Enter ROMEO

BENVOLIO

Here comes Romeo, here comes Romeo!

MERCUTIO

Without his roe, like a dried herring. O flesh,
flesh, how art thou fishified! Now is he for the numbers
that Petrarch flowed in. Laura to his lady was but a
kitchen-wench - marry, she had a better love to be-rhyme her -
Dido a dowdy; Cleopatra a gypsy; Helen and Hero
hildings and harlots; Thisbe a grey eye or so, but not
to the purpose. Signior Romeo, bonjour!
There's a French salutation to your French slop.
You gave us the counterfeit fairly last night.

ROMEO

Good morrow to you both. What counterfeit did I give you?

MERCUTIO

The slip, sir, the slip. Can you not conceive?

ROMEO

Pardon, good Mercutio, my business was great; and in
such a case as mine a man may strain courtesy.

MERCUTIO

That's as much as to say, such a case as yours
constrains a man to bow in the hams.

ROMEO

Meaning, to curtsy.

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

Sure wit, follow me this jest now till thou hast
worn out thy pump, that when the single sole of it
is worn, the jest may remain after the wearing sole singular.

ROMEO

O single-soled jest, solely singular for the
singleness!

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 have
done, for thou hast more of the wild goose in one of
thy 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 wast
not 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 most
sharp sauce.

ROMEO

And is it not then well served in to a sweet goose?

MERCUTIO

O here's a wit of cheverel, that stretches from an
inch narrow to an ell broad!

ROMEO

I stretch it out for that word 'broad.' Which added
to 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 art
thou 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, and
meant, indeed, to occupy the argument no longer.

Enter NURSE and PETER

ROMEO

Here's goodly gear!

BENVOLIO

A sail, a sail!

MERCUTIO

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 e'en, fair gentlewoman.

NURSE

Is it good e'en?

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 I
may 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

(To ROMEO) If you be he, sir, I desire some confidence with
you.

BENVOLIO

She will endite him to some supper.

MERCUTIO

A bawda 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

Romeo and Juliet : II.II : II.IV