448 THE RAVEN. 



Also in that lewd play " Troilus and Cressida " Thersites 

 cries — 



Ther.— " Would I could meet that rogue Diomid ! 



/ would croak like a raven — I would bode, I would bode I" 



And in that forbidding play "Titus Andronicus," it is 

 mentioned four times in one scene. When the Queen is found 

 with the Moor, Lavinia says — 



Lav. — " Let her enjoy her raven-coloured love ; 



This valley fits the purpose passing well." 



In the dismal scene and wood the Queen says to her two sons— 



Queen—" Here never shines the sun, here nothing breeds, 

 Unless the nightly owl or fatal raven." 



And just before poor Lavinia is outraged and her tongue cut out 

 she pleads — 



Lav. — " Tis true the raven doth not hatch a lark, 



Yet I have heard (oh, could I find it now) 

 Some sail that ravens foster forlorn children, 

 The whilst their own birds famish in their nests." 



We turn from this revolting tragedy to one sweeter, but little 

 more wholesome, " Borneo and Juliet," in which Juliet, in her 

 sudden full-blown love, exclaims — 



Jul.— "Come, night ! come, Eomeo ! come, thou day in night, 

 for thou wilt lie upon the wings of night 

 Whiter than new snoiv on the raven's back. 

 Come, gentle night — come, black-brow'd night, 

 Give me my Romeo, and when he shall die, 

 Take him and cut him out in little stars 

 And he will make the face of the heavens so fine 

 That all the world will be in love with night, 

 And pay no worship to the garish sun." 



Yet in the same scene, when her nurse tells that Romeo had 

 killed her cousin Tybalt, she exclaims against him — 



Jul. — " What devil art thou that dost torment me thus ? 

 This torture should be roar'd in dismal hell. 

 O serpent heart ! hid with a flow'ring face ! 

 Did ever dragon keep so fair a cave ? 

 Beautiful tyrant ! fiend angelical ! 

 Dove- feathered raven J wolfish ravening lamb J 

 A damned saint, an honourable villain ! 

 O Nature ! what hadst thou to do in hell 

 When thou didst bower the spirit of a fiend 

 In mortal paradise of such sweet flesh? 

 Was ever book, containing such vile matter, 

 So fairly bound ? Oh, that deceit should dwell 

 In such a gorgeous palace !" 



