* A MIDSUMMER-NIGHT'S DREAM.] This play was entered at Stationers' Hall, Oct. 8, 1600, by Thomas Fisher. It is probable that the hint for it was received from Chaucer's Knight's Tale.

There is an old black letter pamphlet by W. Bettie, called Titana and Theseus, entered at Stationers' Hall, in 1608; but Shakspeare has taken no hints from it. Titania is also the name of the Queen of the Fairies in Decker's Whore of Babylon, 1607. STEEVENS.

The Midsummer-Night's Dream I suppose to have been writ ten in 1592. See An Attempt to ascertain the Order of Shakspeare's Plays, Vol. II. MALONE.

Theseus, Duke of Athens.

Egeus, Father to Hermia.

Lysander,

Demetrius,

in love with Hermia.

Philostrate, Master of the Revels to Theseus.

Quince, the Carpenter.

Snug, the Joiner.

Bottom, the Weaver.

Flute, the Bellows-mender.
Snout, the Tinker.

Starveling, the Tailor.

Hippolyta, Queen of the Amazons, betrothed to Theseus.

Hermia, Daughter to Egeus, in love with Lysander. Helena, in love with Demetrius.

Oberon, King of the Fairies.

Titania, Queen of the Fairies.

Puck, or Robin-goodfellow, a Fairy.

Peas-blossom,

Cobweb,

Fairies.

Moth,

Mustard-seed,,

Pyramus,

Thisbe,

Wall,

Characters in the Interlude performed by the Clowns.

Moonshine,

Lion,

Other Fairies attending their King and Queen.
Attendants on Theseus and Hippolyta.
SCENE, Athens, and a Wood not far from it.

'The enumeration of persons was first made by Mr. Rowe.

STEEVENS.

MIDSUMMER-NIGHT'S DREAM.

ACT I. SCENE 1.

Athens. A Room in the Palace of Theseus.

Enter THESEUS, HIPPOLYTA, PHILOSTRATE, and
Attendants.

THE. Now, fair Hippolyta, our nuptial hour
Draws on apace; four happy days bring in
Another moon: but, oh, methinks, how slow
This old moon wanes! she lingers my desires,
Like to a step-dame, or a dowager,

Long withering out a young man's revenue."
HIP. Four days will quickly steep themselves in
nights; 3

2 Like to a step-dame, or a dowager,

Long withering out a young man's revenue.] The authenticity of this reading having been questioned by Dr. Warburton, I shall exemplify it from Chapman's translation of the 4th Book of Homer:

there the goodly plant lies withering out his grace." STEEVENS.

Ut piget annus

Pupillis, quos dura premit custodia matrum,

"Sic mihi tarda fluunt ingrataque tempora." Hor.

MALONE.

·steep themselves in nights;] So, in Cymbeline, Act V.

neither deserve,

"And yet are steep'd in favours." STEEVENS.

Four nights will quickly dream away the time;
And then the moon, like to a silver bow
New bent in heaven, shall behold the night
Of our solemnities.

THE.

Go, Philostrate,

Stir up the Athenian youth to merriments;
Awake the pert and nimble spirit of mirth;
Turn melancholy forth to funerals,
The pale companion is not for our pomp.-
[Exit PHILOSTrate.
Hippolyta, I woo'd thee with my sword,
And won thy love, doing thee injuries;
But I will wed thee in another key,

With pomp, with triumph, and with revelling.5

New bent] The old copies read-Now bent. Corrected by Mr. Rowe. MALONE.

5

• With pomp, with triumph, and with revelling.] By triumph, as Mr. Warton has observed in his late edition of Milton's Poems, p. 56, we are to understand shows, such as masks, revels, &c. So, again in King Henry VI. P. III:

"And now what rests, but that we spend the time
"With stately triumphs, mirthful comick shows,
"Such as befit the pleasures of the court?"

Again, in the preface to Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy, 1624: "Now come tidings of weddings, maskings, mummeries, entertainments, trophies, triumphs, revels, sports, playes." Jonson, as the same gentleman observes, in the title of his masque called Love's Triumph through Callipolis, by triumph seems to have meant a grand procession; and in one of the stage-directions, it is said, "the triumph is seen far off." MALONE.

Thus also, (and more satisfactorily,) in the Duke of Anjou's Entertainment at Antwerp, 1581: "Yet notwithstanding, their triumphes [those of the Romans] have so borne the bell above all the rest, that the word triumphing, which commeth thereof, hath beene applied to all high, great, and statelie dooings."

STEEVENS.

Enter EGEUS, HERMIA, LYSANDER, and DEME

TRIUS.

EGE. Happy be Theseus, our renowned duke !6 THE. Thanks, good Egeus: What's the news with thee?

EGE. Full of vexation come I, with complaint Against my child, my daughter Hermia.Stand forth, Demetrius ;-My noble lord, This man hath my consent to marry her :Stand forth, Lysander ;-and, my gracious duke This hath bewitch'd" the bosom of my child:

6

Tale:

our renowned duke!] Thus, in Chaucer's Knight's

"Whilom as olde stories tellen us,

"There was a Duk that highte Theseus,

"Of Athenes he was lord and governour," &c.

Mr. Tyrwhitt's edit. v. 861. Lidgate too, the monk of Bury, in his translation of the Tragedies of John Bochas, calls him by the same title, ch. xii. l. 21 :1 "Duke Theseus had the victorye."

Creon, in the tragedy of Jocasta, translated from Euripides in 1566, is called Duke Creon.

So likewise Skelton:

"Not like Duke Hamilcar,

"Nor like Duke Asdruball.”

Stanyhurst, in his translation of Virgil, calls Eneas, Duke Æneas; and in Heywood's Iron Age, Part II. 1632, Ajax is styled Duke Ajax, Palamedes, Duke Palamedes, and Nestor, Duke Nestor, &c.

Our version of the Bible exhibits a similar misapplication of a modern title; for in Daniel iii. 2, Nebuchadnezzar, King of Babylon, sends out a summons to the Sheriffs of his provinces. STEEVENS

See also the 1st Book of The Chronicles, ch. i. v. 51, & seqq. a list of the Dukes of Edam. HARRIS.

This hath bewitch'd-] The old copies read-This man hath bewitch'd. The emendation was made for the sake of the metre, by the editor of the second folio. It is very probable that the compositor caught the word man from the line above. MALONE.