meo, Romeo!" said
she, "wherefore art thou Romeo? Deny thy father, and refuse thy name,
for my sake; or if thou wilt not, be but my sworn love, and I no
longer will be a Capulet." Romeo, having this encouragement, would
fain have spoken, but he was desirous of hearing more; and the lady
continued her passionate discourse with herself (as she thought),
still chiding Romeo for being Romeo and a Mountague, and wishing him
some other name, or that he would put away that hated name, and for
that name, which was no part of himself, he should take all herself.
At this loving word Romeo could no longer refrain, but taking up the
dialogue as if her words had been addressed to him personally, and not
merely in fancy, he bade her call him Love, or by whatever other name
she pleased, for he was no longer Romeo, if that name was displeasing
to her. Juliet, alarmed to hear a man's voice in the garden, did not
at first know who it was, that by favour of the night and darkness
had thus stumbled upon the discovery of her secret; but when he
spoke again, though her ears had not yet drunk a hundred words of
that tongue's uttering, yet so nice is a lover's hearing, that she
immediately knew him to be young Romeo, and she expostulated with him
on the danger to which he had exposed himself by climbing the orchard
walls, for if any of her kinsmen should find him there, it would be
death to him, being a Mountague. "Alack," said Romeo, "there is more
peril in your eye, than in twenty of their swords. Do you but look
kind upon me, lady, and I am proof against their enmity. Better my
life should be ended by their hate, than that hated life should be
prolonged, to live without your love." "How came you into this place,"
said Juliet, "and by whose direction?" "Love directed me," answered
Romeo: "I am no pilot, yet wert thou as far apart from me, as that
vast shore which is washed with the farthest sea, I should adventure
for such merchandize." A crimson blush came over Juliet's face, yet
unseen by Romeo by reason of the night, when she reflected upon the
discovery which she had made, yet not meaning to make it, of her
love to Romeo. She would fain have recalled her words, but that was
impossible: fain would she have stood upon form, and have kept her
lover at a distance, as the custom of discreet ladies is, to frown and
be perverse, and give their suitors harsh denials at first; to stand
off, and affect a coyness or indifference, where they most lov