Act 4, Scene 2

[Enter Quince, Flute, Snout, and Starveling]

Quince

Have you sent to Bottom's house? Is he come
home yet?

Starveling

He cannot be heard of. Out of doubt he is
transported.

Flute

If he come not, then the play is marred. It goes not
Forward, doth it?

Quince

It is not possible. You have not a man in all
Athens able to discharge Pyramus but he.

Flute

No, he hath simply the best wit of any handicraftman
in Athens.

Quince

Yea, and the best person, too; and he is a very
paramour for a sweet voice.

Flute

You must say “paragon”. A paramour is – God bless
Us – a thing of naught.
[Enter Snug the joiner]

Snug

Masters, the Duke is coming from the temple, and
there is two or three lords and ladies more married. If
our sport had gone forward we had all been made men.

Flute

O sweet bully Bottom! Thus hath he lost sixpence a
day during his life; he could not have scaped sixpence a
day. An the Duke had not given him sixpence a day for
playing Pyramus, I'll be hanged. He would have
deserved it. Sixpence a day in Pyramus, or nothing.
[Enter Bottom]

Bottom

Where are these lads? Where are these hearts?

Quince

Bottom! O most courageous day! O most happy
hour!

Bottom

Masters, I am to discourse wonders – but ask me
not what, for if I tell you, I am no true Athenian – I will
tell you everything, right as it fell out.

Quince

Let us hear, sweet Bottom.

Bottom

Not a word of me. All that I will tell you is that
the Duke hath dined. Get your apparel together, good
strings to your beards, new ribbons to your pumps.
Meet presently at the palace. Every man look o'er his
part. For the short and the long is, our play is preferred.
In any case let Thisbe have clean linen, and let not him
that plays the lion pare his nails, for they shall hang out
for the lion's claws. And most dear actors, eat no
onions nor garlic, for we are to utter sweet breath, and
I do not doubt but to hear them say it is a sweet comedy.
No more words. Away, go, away!
[Exit all]