SC. V.
ROMEO AND JULIET
151
Life and these lips have long been separated: |
Nurse. | O lamentable day! |
Lady Cap. | O woeful time!30 |
Cap. | Death, that hath ta'en her hence to make me wail, Ties up my tongue, and will not let me speak.[E 2] |
Enter Friar Laurence and Paris, with Musicians.[C 1]
Fri. | Come,[E 3] is the bride ready to go to church? |
Cap. | Ready to go, but never to return. O son, the night before thy wedding-day35 Hath Death lain with thy wife:[C 2] see,[C 3][E 4] there she lies, Flower as she was, deflowered[C 4] by him. Death is my son-in-law, Death is my heir; My daughter he hath wedded: I will die, And leave him all; life, living,[C 5][E 5] all is Death's.40 |
Par. | Have I thought long[C 6][E 6] to see this morning's face, And doth it give me such a sight as this? |
Lady Cap. | Accurst, unhappy, wretched, hateful day! |
- ↑ 29. field] Pope and other editors add here from Q 1 the line "Accursed time! unfortunate old man!"
- ↑ 32. let me speak] In Brooke's poem Capulet cannot speak for grief; Shakespeare remembered this, but only to produce a dramatic touch of self-incongruity in the old man.
- ↑ 33. Fri. Come] Q 1 alone of early editions gives this line to Paris; it is followed by Staunton.
- ↑ 36. see] This added word of F 2 s also found in Q 1.
- ↑ 40. life, living,] From Capell onwards, various editors read life leaving. In the text living means possessions, the means of living, as where Antonio says to Portia (Merchant of Venice, V. 286): "Sweet lady, you have given me life and living."
- ↑ 41. thought long] desired. In Brooke's poem, anticipating his marriage, Paris' "longing hart thinkes long for theyr appoynted howre" (line 2274).