150: _you_] Qq. _yet_ Ff. 154: _swoon_] _swoune_ Q1. _swound_ Q2 F2 F3 F4. _sound_ F1. 156: _Either_] _Or_ Pope. ~~~~~ ACT III. SCENE I. _The wood. Titania lying asleep._ _Enter_ QUINCE, SNUG, BOTTOM, FLUTE, SNOUT, _and_ STARVELING. _Bot._ Are we all met? _Quin._ Pat, pat; and here’s a marvellous convenient place for our rehearsal. This green plot shall be our stage, this hawthorn-brake our tiring-house; and we will do it in action as we will do it before the duke. 5 _Bot._ Peter Quince,— _Quin._ What sayest thou, bully Bottom? _Bot._ There are things in this comedy of Pyramus and Thisby that will never please. First, Pyramus must draw a sword to kill himself; which the ladies cannot abide. 10 How answer you that? _Snout._ By’r lakin, a parlous fear. _Star._ I believe we must leave the killing out, when all is done. _Bot._ Not a whit: I have a device to make all well. 15 Write me a prologue; and let the prologue seem to say, we will do no harm with our swords, and that Pyramus is not killed indeed; and, for the more better assurance, tell them that I Pyramus am not Pyramus, but Bottom the weaver: this will put them out of fear. 20 _Quin._ Well, we will have such a prologue; and it shall be written in eight and six. _Bot._ No, make it two more; let it be written in eight and eight. _Snout._ Will not the ladies be afeard of the lion? 25 _Star._ I fear it, I promise you. _Bot._ Masters, you ought to consider with yourselves: to bring in,—God shield us!—a lion among ladies, is a most dreadful thing; for there is not a more fearful wild-fowl than your lion living; and we ought to look to ’t. 30 _Snout._ Therefore another prologue must tell he is not a lion. _Bot._ Nay, you must name his name, and half his face must be seen through the lion’s neck; and he himself must speak through, saying thus, or to the same defect,—‘Ladies,’ 35 —or, ‘Fair ladies,—I would wish you,’—or, ‘I would request you,’—or, ‘I would entreat you,—not to fear, not to tremble: my life for yours. If you think I come hither as a lion, it were pity of my life: no, I am no such thing; I am a man as other men are:’ and there indeed let him 40 name his name, and tell them plainly, he is Snug the joiner. _Quin._ Well, it shall be so. But there is two hard things; that is, to bring the moonlight into a chamber; for, you know, Pyramus and Thisby meet by moonlight. _Snout._ Doth the moon shine that night we play our play? 45 _Bot._ A calendar, a calendar! look in the almanac; find out moonshine, find out moonshine. _Quin._ Yes, it doth shine that night. _Bot._ Why, then may you leave a casement of the great chamber window, where we play, open, and the moon may 50 shine in at the casement.