Moon-shine.
Li.
You Ladies, you (whose gentle Hearts do fear,
The smallest monstrous Mouse that creeps on Floor)
May now perchance both quake and tremble here,
When Lion rough in wildest Rage doth roar.
Then know that I one Snug the Joyner am;
No Lion fell, nor else no Lion's Dam.
For if I shou'd as Lion, come in strife
Into this Place, 'twere pity of my Life.
-- 10 --
Ladies don't fright you,
I will delight you.
With gentle Roar.
Let not a Creature,
Tho' fierce in Nature,
Change any Feature,
I do Implore.
Who can say fy on
So Tame a Lion,
So full of Breeding,
So far exceeding
Lions before.
Crot.
A very gentle Beast, and of a good Conscience.
Gam.
The very best at a Beast, truly, that e'er I saw.
Crot.
This Lion is a very Fox for his Valour.
Gam.
True, and a Goose for his Discretion.
Sem.
Not so, my Friend! for his Valour cannot
carry his Discretion, and the Fox carries the Goose.
Gam.
His Discretion I am sure cannot carry his
Valour, for the Goose carries not the Fox.
Crot.
It is well: leave it to his Discretion, and
let us hearken to the Moon.
Moon.
This Lanthorn doth the horned Moon present,
My self the Man i'th' Moon doth seem to be.
Gam.
This is the greatest Error of all the rest:
the Man shou'd be put into the Lanthorn: How is
it else the Man i'th' Moon?
Crot.
He dares not come there for the Candle,
for you see it is already in Snuff.
Moon.
The Man in Moon am I, Sir,
And hither come down from the Sky, Sir,
To tell how we People above
Enjoy our Pleasures, and Love.
Ever Ranging,
Ever Changing,
Bumpers Drinking,
Never Thinking,
Thus we Riot, thus we Rove.
-- 11 --
Gam.
I am weary of this Moon, wou'd he wou'd
Change.
Crot.
It appears by his small light of Discretion
that he is in the wane: but yet in courtesie, in all
reason, we must stay the time. Proceed Moon.
Moon.
All that I have to say, is to tell you,
That the Lanthorn is the Moon:
I the Man in the Moon;
This Thorn-bush, my Thorn-bush,
And this Bumper my Bumper.
Sem.
Silence, silence Moon, here comes Thisbe.
Richard Leveridge [1716], The comick masque of Pyramus and Thisbe. As it is Perform'd at the Theatre in Lincoln's-Inn Fields (Printed for W. Mears [etc.], London) [word count] [S36300].
