Scene + 

I + 

Athens. Before a temple. + 

Enter Hymen with a torch burning; a Boy, in a white robe, before, singing and strewing flowers; after Hymen, a Nymph, encompassed in her tresses, bearing a wheaten garland; then Theseus, between two other Nymphs with wheaten chaplets on their heads; then Hippolyta, the bride, led by Pirithous, and another holding a garland over her head, her tresses likewise hanging; after her, Emilia, holding up her train; Artesius and Attendants. + 

Song. + 

Music. + 

Roses, their sharp spines being gone, + 

Not royal in their smells alone, + 

But in their hue. + 

Maiden pinks, of odour faint, + 

Daisies smell-less, yet most quaint, + 

And sweet thyme true. + 

Primrose, first-born child of Ver, + 

Merry spring-time’s harbinger + 

With her bells dim. + 

Oxlips in their cradles growing, + 

Marigolds on deathbeds blowing, + 

Larks’-heels trim. + 

All dear Nature’s children sweet, + 

Lie ’fore bride and bridegroom’s feet, + 

Blessing their sense! Strewing flowers. + 

Not an angel of the air, + 

Bird melodious, or bird fair, + 

Be absent hence! + 

The crow, the slanderous cuckoo, nor + 

The boding raven, nor chough hoar + 

Nor chatt’ring pie, + 

May on our bride-house perch or sing, + 

Or with them any discord bring, + 

But from it fly! + 

Enter three Queens, in black, with veils stained, and wearing imperial crowns. The First Queen falls down at the foot of Theseus; the Second falls down at the foot of Hippolyta; the Third before Emilia. + 

First Queen + 

For pity’s sake and true gentility’s, + 

Hear, and respect me! + 

Second Queen + 

For your mother’s sake, + 

And as you wish your womb may thrive with fair ones, + 

Hear, and respect me! + 

Third Queen + 

Now, for the love of him whom Jove hath mark’d + 

The honour of your bed, and for the sake + 

Of clear virginity, be advocate + 

For us and our distresses! This good deed + 

Shall raze you out o’ the book of trespasses + 

All you are set down there. + 

Theseus + 

Sad lady, rise. + 

Hippolyta + 

Stand up. + 

Emilia + 

No knees to me: + 

What woman I may stead that is distress’d, + 

Does bind me to her. + 

Theseus + 

What’s your request? deliver you for all. + 

First Queen + 

We are three queens, whose sovereigns fell before + 

The wrath of cruel Creon; who endure + 

The beaks of ravens, talons of the kites, + 

And pecks of crows, in the foul fields of Thebes: + 

He will not suffer us to burn their bones, + 

To urn their ashes, nor to take th’ offence + 

Of mortal loathsomeness from the blest eye + 

Of holy Phoebus, but infects the winds + 

With stench of our slain lords. O, pity, duke! + 

Thou purger of the earth, draw thy fear’d sword + 

That does good turns to the world; give us the bones + 

Of our dead kings, that we may chapel them; + 

And, of thy boundless goodness, take some note + 

That for our crowned heads we have no roof + 

Save this, which is the lion’s and the bear’s, + 

And vault to everything! + 

Theseus + 

Pray you, kneel not: + 

I was transported with your speech, and suffer’d + 

Your knees to wrong themselves. I’ve heard the fortunes + 

Of your dead lords, which gives me such lamenting + 

As wakes my vengeance and revenge for ’em. + 

King Capaneus was your lord: the day + 

That he should marry you, at such a season + 

As now it is with me, I met your groom + 

By Mars’s altar; you were that time fair, + 

Not Juno’s mantle fairer than your tresses, + 

Nor in more bounty spread her; your wheaten wreath + 

Was then nor thrash’d nor blasted; Fortune at you + 

Dimpled her cheek with smiles; Hercules our kinsman⁠— + 

Then weaker than your eyes⁠—laid by his club; + 

He tumbled down upon his Nemean hide, + 

And swore his sinews thaw’d. O, grief and time, + 

Fearful consumers, you will all devour! + 

First Queen + 

O, I hope some god, + 

Some god hath put his mercy in your manhood, + 

Whereto he’ll infuse power, and press you forth + 

Our undertaker! + 

Theseus + 

O, no knees, none, widow! + 

Unto the helmeted Bellona use them, + 

And pray for me, your soldier.⁠— + 

Troubled I am. Turns away. + 

Second Queen + 

Honour’d Hippolyta, + 

Most dreaded Amazonian, that hast slain + 

The scythe-tusk’d boar; that, with thy arm as strong + 

As it is white, wast near to make the male + 

To thy sex captive, but that this thy lord⁠— + 

Born to uphold creation in that honour + 

First Nature styl’d it in⁠—shrunk thee into + 

The bound thou wast o’erflowing, at once subduing + 

Thy force and thy affection; soldieress, + 

That equally canst poise sternness with pity; + 

Who now, I know, hast much more power on him + 

Than e’er he had on thee; who ow’st his strength + 

And his love too, who is a servant for + 

The tenor of thy speech; dear glass of ladies, + 

Bid him that we, whom flaming War doth scorch, + 

Under the shadow of his sword may cool us; + 

Require him he advance it o’er our heads; + 

Speak’t in a woman’s key, like such a woman + 

As any of us three; weep ere you fail; + 

Lend us a knee; + 

But touch the ground for us no longer time + 

Than a dove’s motion when the head’s pluck’d off; + 

Tell him, if he i’ the blood-siz’d field lay swoln, + 

Showing the sun his teeth, grinning at the moon, + 

What you would do! + 

Hippolyta + 

Poor lady, say no more: + 

I had as lief trace this good action with you + 

As that whereto I’m going, and nev’r yet + 

Went I so willing, way. My lord is taken + 

Heart-deep with your distress: let him consider; + 

I’ll speak anon. + 

Third Queen + 

To Emilia. O, my petition was + 

Set down in ice, which, by hot grief uncandied, + 

Melts into drops; so sorrow, wanting form, + 

Is press’d with deeper matter. + 

Emilia + 

Pray, stand up: + 

Your grief is written in your cheek. + 

Third Queen + 

O, woe! + 

You cannot read it there; there through my tears, + 

Like wrinkled pebbles in a glassy stream, + 

You may behold ’em. Lady, lady, alack! + 

He that will all the treasure know o’ th’ earth + 

Must know the centre too; he that will fish + 

For my least minnow, let him lead his line + 

To catch one at my heart. O, pardon me! + 

Extremity, that sharpens sundry wits, + 

Makes me a fool. + 

Emilia + 

Pray you, say nothing; pray you: + 

Who cannot feel nor see the rain, being in’t, + 

Knows neither wet nor dry. If that you were + 

The ground-piece of some painter, I would buy you + 

T’instruct me ’gainst a capital grief indeed;⁠— + 

Such heart-pierc’d demonstration!⁠—but, alas, + 

Being a natural sister of our sex, + 

Your sorrow beats so ardently upon me, + 

That it shall make a counter-reflect ’gainst + 

My brother’s heart, and warm it to some pity, + 

Though it were made of stone: pray have good comfort. + 

Theseus + 

Forward to th’ temple! leave not out a jot + 

O’ the sacred ceremony. + 

First Queen + 

O, this celebration + 

Will longer last, and be more costly, than + 

Your suppliant’s war! Remember that your fame + 

Knolls in th’ ear o’ the world: what you do quickly + 

Is not done rashly; your first thought is more + 

Than others’ labour’d meditance; your premeditating + 

More than their actions; but⁠—O Jove!⁠—your actions, + 

Soon as they move, as asprayes do the fish, + 

Subdue before they touch: think, dear duke, think + 

What beds our slain kings have! + 

Second Queen + 

What griefs our beds, + 

That our dear lords have none! + 

Third Queen + 

None fit for the dead! + 

Those that with cords, knives, drams, precipitance, + 

Weary of this world’s light, have to themselves + 

Been death’s most horrid agents, humane grace + 

Affords them dust and shadow. + 

First Queen + 

But our lords + 

Lie blistering ’fore the visitating sun, + 

And were good kings when living. + 

Theseus + 

It is true; + 

And I will give you comfort, + 

To give your dead lords graves: the which to do + 

Must make some work with Creon. + 

First Queen + 

And that work + 

Presents itself to the doing: + 

Now ’twill take form; the heats are gone to-morrow; + 

Then bootless toil must recompense itself + 

With its own sweat; now he is secure, + 

Not dreams we stand before your puissance, + 

Wrinching our holy begging in our eyes, + 

To make petition clear. + 

Second Queen + 

Now you may take him + 

Drunk with his victory. + 

Third Queen + 

And his army full + 

Of bread and sloth. + 

Theseus + 

Artesius, that best know’st + 

How to draw out fit to this enterprise + 

The prim’st for this proceeding, and the number + 

To carry such a business; forth and levy + 

Our worthiest instruments; whilst we despatch + 

This grand act of our life, this daring deed + 

Of fate in wedlock. + 

First Queen + 

Dowagers, take hands; + 

Let us be widows to our woes; delay + 

Commends us to a famishing hope. + 

All Queens + 

Farewell! + 

Second Queen + 

We come unseasonably; but when could grief + 

Cull forth, as unpang’d judgment can, fitt’st time + 

For best solicitation? + 

Theseus + 

Why, good ladies, + 

This is a service, whereto I am going, + 

Greater than any war; it more imports me + 

Than all the actions that I have foregone, + 

Or futurely can cope. + 

First Queen + 

The more proclaiming + 

Our suit shall be neglected: when her arms, + 

Able to lock Jove from a synod, shall + 

By warranting moonlight corslet thee, O, when + 

Her twinning cherries shall their sweetness fall + 

Upon thy tasteful lips, what wilt thou think + 

Of rotten kings or blubber’d queens? what care + 

For what thou feel’st not, what thou feel’st being able + 

To make Mars spurn his drum? O, if thou couch + 

But one night with her, every hour in’t will + 

Take hostage of thee for a hundred, and + 

Thou shalt remember nothing more than what + 

That banquet bids thee to! + 

Hippolyta + 

Though much unlike kneeling + 

You should be so transported, as much sorry + 

I should be such a suitor; yet I think, + 

Did I not by th’ abstaining of my joy, + 

Which breeds a deeper longing, cure their surfeit + 

That craves a present medicine, I should pluck + 

All ladies’ scandal on me: therefore, sir, + 

As I shall here make trial of my prayers, + 

Either presuming them to have some force, + 

Or sentencing for aye their vigour dumb, + 

Prorogue this business we are going about, and hang + 

Your shield afore your heart, about that neck + 

Which is my fee, and which I freely lend + 

To do these poor queens service. + 

All Queens + 

To Emilia. O, help now! + 

Our cause cries for your knee. + 

Emilia + 

If you grant not kneeling + 

My sister her petition, in that force, + 

With that celerity and nature, which + 

She makes it in, from henceforth I’ll not dare + 

To ask you anything, nor be so hardy + 

Ever to take a husband. + 

Theseus + 

Pray, stand up: + 

I am entreating of myself to do + 

That which you kneel to have me.⁠—Pirithous, + 

Lead on the bride: get you and pray the gods + 

For success and return; omit not anything + 

In the pretended celebration.⁠—Queens, + 

Follow your soldier.⁠—To Artesius. As before, hence you, + 

And at the banks of Aulis meet us with + 

The forces you can raise, where we shall find + 

The moiety of a number, for a business + 

More bigger look’d.⁠—Since that our theme is haste, + 

I stamp this kiss upon thy currant lip; Kisses Hippolyta. + 

Sweet, keep it as my token.⁠—Set you forward; + 

For I will see you gone.⁠—Exit Artesius. + 

Farewell, my beauteous sister.⁠—Pirithous, + 

Keep the feast full; bate not an hour on’t. + 

Pirithous + 

Sir, + 

I’ll follow you at heels: the feast’s solemnity + 

Shall want till your return. + 

Theseus + 

Cousin, I charge you + 

Budge not from Athens; We shall be returning + 

Ere you can end this feast, of which, I pray you, + 

Make no abatement. Once more, farewell all. + 

First Queen + 

Thus dost thou still make good + 

The tongue o’ the world. + 

Second Queen + 

And earn’st a deity + 

Equal with Mars. + 

Third Queen + 

If not above him; for + 

Thou, being but mortal, mak’st affections bend + 

To godlike honours; they themselves, some say, + 

Groan under such a mastery. + 

Theseus + 

As we are men, + 

Thus should we do; being sensually subdu’d, + 

We lose our humane title. Good cheer, ladies! + 

Now turn we towards your comforts. Flourish. Exeunt. + 