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All Site ContentMidsummer Night's DreamAct 2Scene 1
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"pensioners"
Cultural Background
Act 2,
Scene 1
Lines 1-17

An explanation of the reference to “pensioners” in Act 2, Scene 1 of myShakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

[Enter two supernatural spirits from opposite sides of the stage. One is a typical female fairy; the other is a puck, a mischievous spirit, named Robin Goodfellow]

Robin 

How now, spirit? Whither wander you?

Fairy

Over hill, over dale,
Thorough bush, thorough brier,
Over park, over pale,
Thorough flood, thorough fire.
I do wander everywhere,
Swifter than the moon's sphere;
And I serve the Fairy Queen
To dew her orbs upon the green.
The cowslips tall her pensioners be;
In their gold coats spots you see,
Those be rubies, fairy favors;
In those freckles live their savors.
I must go seek some dewdrops here,
And hang a pearl in every cowslip's ear.
Farewell, thou lob of spirits; I'll be gone.
Our Queen and all her elves come here anon.

The Pensioners, or Gentlemen-Pensioners to be more precise, were a group of noblemen close to the king who formed his honor guard, and were always finely decked out in elegant uniforms. The fairy is imagining the tall cowslip flowers as the Fairy Queen's honor guard.

References: 

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Cowslip_flower.jpg