Dian's bud o'er Cupid's flower' Now, my Titania; wake you, my sweet queen. TITA. My Oberon! what visions have I seen! Methought, I was enamour'd of an ass. OBE. There lies your love. TITA. How came these things to pass ? O, how mine eyes do loath his visage now! OBE. Silence, a while. Robin, take off this head. Titania, musick call; and strike more dead Than common sleep, of all these five the sense.* TITA. Musick, ho! musick; such as charmeth sleep. Puck. Now, when thou wak'st, with thine own fool's eyes peep. OBE. Sound, musick. [Still musick.] Come, my queen, take hands with me, And rock the ground whereon these sleepers be. * Dian's bud o'er Cupid's flower-] The old copies read-or Cupid's. Corrected by Dr. Thirlby. The herb now employed is styled Diana's bud, because it is applied as an antidote to that charm which had constrained Titania to dote on Bottom with "the soul of love." MALONE. Dian's bud, is the bud of the Agnus Castus, or Chaste Tree. Thus, in "Macer's Herball, practysyd by Doctor Lynacre, translated out of Laten into Englysshe," &c. bl. 1. no date: "The vertue of this herbe is, that he wyll kepe man and woman chaste," &c. Cupid's flower, is the Viola tricolor, or Love in Idleness. STEEVENS. 8 - of all these five the sense.] The old copies read-these fine; but this most certainly is corrupt. My emendation needs no justification. The five, that lay asleep on the stage were Demetrius, Lysander, Hermia, Helena, and Bottom. - Dr. Thirlby likewise communicated this very correction. THEOBALD. |