Page:Midsummer Night's Dream (1918) Yale.djvu/23

Night's Dream, I. ii  

Bot. That will ask some tears in the true per- forming of it: if I do it, let the audience look to their eyes; I will move storms, I will condole in some measure. To the rest: yet my chief humour is for a tyrant. I could play Ercles rarely, or a part to tear a cat in, to make all split. 'The raging rocks And shivering shocks Shall break the locks Of prison gates: And Phibbus' car Shall shine from far And make and mar The foolish Fates.' This was lofty! Now name the rest of the players. This is Ercles' vein, a tyrant's vein; a lover is more condoling.

Quin. Francis Flute, the bellows-mender.

Flu. Here, Peter Quince.

Quin. You must take Thisby on you.

Flu. What is Thisby? a wandering knight?

Quin. It is the lady that Pyramus must love.

Flu. Nay, faith, let not me play a woman; I have a beard coming.

Quin. That's all one: you shall play it in a mask, and you may speak as small as you will.

Bot. An I may hide my face, let me play Thisby too. I'll speak in a monstrous little voice, 'Thisne, Thisne!' 'Ah, Pyramus, my lover dear; thy Thisby dear, and lady dear!'  31 Ercles: Hercules 32 tear a cat: rant 38 Phibbus': Phœbus', the sun-god's 54 An: if 56 Thisne; cf. n. 