ACT 2
Scene 1

...he were gone!
Enter Oberon the King of Fairies at one door, with his train, and Titania the Queen at another, with hers.

...moonlight, proud Titania.
What, jealous Oberon? Fairies, skip hence.
I have forsworn his bed and company.

...I thy lord?
Then I must be thy lady. But I know
When thou hast stolen away from Fairyland
And in the shape of Corin sat all day
Playing on pipes of corn and versing love
To amorous Phillida. Why art thou here,
Come from the farthest steep of India,
But that, forsooth, the bouncing Amazon,
Your buskined mistress and your warrior love,
To Theseus must be wedded, and you come
To give their bed joy and prosperity?

...Ariadne and Antiopa?
These are the forgeries of jealousy;
And never, since the middle summer’s spring,
Met we on hill, in dale, forest, or mead,
By pavèd fountain or by rushy brook,
Or in the beachèd margent of the sea,
To dance our ringlets to the whistling wind,
But with thy brawls thou hast disturbed our sport.
Therefore the winds, piping to us in vain,
As in revenge have sucked up from the sea
Contagious fogs, which, falling in the land,
Hath every pelting river made so proud
That they have overborne their continents.
The ox hath therefore stretched his yoke in vain,
The plowman lost his sweat, and the green corn
Hath rotted ere his youth attained a beard.
The fold stands empty in the drownèd field,
And crows are fatted with the murrain flock.
The nine-men’s-morris is filled up with mud,
And the quaint mazes in the wanton green,
For lack of tread, are undistinguishable.
The human mortals want their winter here.
No night is now with hymn or carol blessed.
Therefore the moon, the governess of floods,
Pale in her anger, washes all the air,
That rheumatic diseases do abound.
And thorough this distemperature we see
The seasons alter: hoary-headed frosts
Fall in the fresh lap of the crimson rose,
And on old Hiems’ thin and icy crown
An odorous chaplet of sweet summer buds
Is, as in mockery, set. The spring, the summer,
The childing autumn, angry winter, change
Their wonted liveries, and the mazèd world
By their increase now knows not which is which.
And this same progeny of evils comes
From our debate, from our dissension;
We are their parents and original.

...be my henchman.
Set your heart at rest:
The Fairyland buys not the child of me.
His mother was a vot’ress of my order,
And in the spicèd Indian air by night
Full often hath she gossiped by my side
And sat with me on Neptune’s yellow sands,
Marking th’ embarkèd traders on the flood,
When we have laughed to see the sails conceive
And grow big-bellied with the wanton wind;
Which she, with pretty and with swimming gait,
Following (her womb then rich with my young squire),
Would imitate and sail upon the land
To fetch me trifles and return again,
As from a voyage, rich with merchandise.
But she, being mortal, of that boy did die,
And for her sake do I rear up her boy,
And for her sake I will not part with him.

...intend you stay?
Perchance till after Theseus’ wedding day.
If you will patiently dance in our round
And see our moonlight revels, go with us.
If not, shun me, and I will spare your haunts.

...go with thee.
Not for thy fairy kingdom. Fairies, away.
We shall chide downright if I longer stay.
Titania and her fairies exit.

Scene 2

...shall do so.
Enter Titania, Queen of Fairies, with her train.
Come, now a roundel and a fairy song;
Then, for the third part of a minute, hence—
Some to kill cankers in the muskrose buds,
Some war with reremice for their leathern wings
To make my small elves coats, and some keep back
The clamorous owl that nightly hoots and wonders
At our quaint spirits. Sing me now asleep.
Then to your offices and let me rest.
She lies down.

...night, with lullaby.
Titania sleeps.

...aloof stand sentinel.
who anoints Titania’s eyelids with the nectar.

ACT 3
Scene 1

...with little quill—
waking up
What angel wakes me from my flow’ry bed?

...“cuckoo” never so?
I pray thee, gentle mortal, sing again.
Mine ear is much enamored of thy note,
So is mine eye enthrallèd to thy shape,
And thy fair virtue’s force perforce doth move me
On the first view to say, to swear, I love thee.

...gleek upon occasion.
Thou art as wise as thou art beautiful.

...mine own turn.
Out of this wood do not desire to go.
Thou shalt remain here whether thou wilt or no.
I am a spirit of no common rate.
The summer still doth tend upon my state,
And I do love thee. Therefore go with me.
I’ll give thee fairies to attend on thee,
And they shall fetch thee jewels from the deep
And sing while thou on pressèd flowers dost sleep.
And I will purge thy mortal grossness so
That thou shalt like an airy spirit go.—
Peaseblossom, Cobweb, Mote, and Mustardseed!

...shall we go?
Be kind and courteous to this gentleman.
Hop in his walks and gambol in his eyes;
Feed him with apricocks and dewberries,
With purple grapes, green figs, and mulberries;
The honey-bags steal from the humble-bees,
And for night-tapers crop their waxen thighs
And light them at the fiery glowworms’ eyes
To have my love to bed and to arise;
And pluck the wings from painted butterflies
To fan the moonbeams from his sleeping eyes.
Nod to him, elves, and do him courtesies.

...good Master Mustardseed.

Come, wait upon him. Lead him to my bower.

The moon, methinks, looks with a wat’ry eye,

And when she weeps, weeps every little flower,

Lamenting some enforcèd chastity.
Tie up my lover’s tongue. Bring him silently.
They exit.

ACT 4
Scene 1

...be well.
With the four lovers still asleep onstage, enter Titania, Queen of Fairies, and Bottom and Fairies, and Oberon, the King, behind them unseen by those onstage.

Come, sit thee down upon this flow’ry bed,

While I thy amiable cheeks do coy,

And stick muskroses in thy sleek smooth head,

And kiss thy fair large ears, my gentle joy.

...I must scratch.
What, wilt thou hear some music, my sweet love?

...and the bones.
Or say, sweet love, what thou desirest to eat.

...hath no fellow.
I have a venturous fairy that shall seek
The squirrel’s hoard and fetch thee new nuts.

...come upon me.
Sleep thou, and I will wind thee in my arms.—
Fairies, begone, and be all ways away.
So doth the woodbine the sweet honeysuckle
Gently entwist; the female ivy so
Enrings the barky fingers of the elm.
O, how I love thee! How I dote on thee!
Bottom and Titania sleep.

...the Fairy Queen.
He applies the nectar to her eyes.

...my sweet queen.
waking
My Oberon, what visions have I seen!
Methought I was enamored of an ass.

...lies your love.
How came these things to pass?
O, how mine eyes do loathe his visage now!

...five the sense.
Music, ho, music such as charmeth sleep!

...these sleepers be.
Titania and Oberon dance.

...the wand’ring moon.
Come, my lord, and in our flight
Tell me how it came this night
That I sleeping here was found
With these mortals on the ground.
Oberon, Robin, and Titania exit.

ACT 5
Scene 1

...behind the door.
Enter Oberon and Titania, King and Queen of Fairies, with all their train.

...dance it trippingly.

First rehearse your song by rote,

To each word a warbling note.

Hand in hand, with fairy grace,

Will we sing and bless this place.
Oberon leads the Fairies in song and dance.

...break of day.
All but Robin exit.