Page:A Midsummer-Nights Dream (Rackham).djvu/169

Rh My lord, I shall reply amazedly,

Half sleep, half waking: but as yet, I swear,

I cannot truly say how I came here;

But, as I think,for truly would I speak,

And now do I bethink me, so it is,

I came with Hermia hither: our intent

Was to be gone from Athens, where we might,

Without the peril of the Athenian law.

Enough, enough, my lord; you have enough:

I beg the law, the law, upon his head.

They would have stolen away; they would, Demetrius,

Thereby to have defeated you and me,

You of your wife and me of my consent,

Of my consent that she should be your wife.

My lord, fair Helen told me of their stealth,

Of this their purpose hither to this wood;

And I in fury hither follow’d them,

Fair Helena in fancy following me.

But, my good lord, I wot not by what power,

But by some power it is,my love to Hermia,

Melted as the snow, seems to me now

As the remembrance of an idle gaud

Which in my childhood I did dote upon;