... “Here will I lie to-night;
[Soldiers begin to set up the King’s tent.
But where to-morrow?—Well, all’s one for that.”
To the meanest private in rank and file the to-morrow that shall bring on a battle cannot but be a momentous thought. As his grace of York says, on the eve of Hotspur’s encounter with the king’s forces at Shrewsbury,—
“To-morrow, good Sir Michael, is a day
Wherein the fortune of ten thousand men
Must ’bide the touch.”
While there’s life there’s hope, and hope is, by the nature of it, intent on to-morrow. As with hopes, so with fears. And hopes and fears together make up the sum of what has interest in life. No wonder, then, if to-morrow is a frequent word with the poet-philosopher of human life; and that in comedy and in tragedy alike, it serves his turn. Be it a wedding for to-morrow or an execution for to-morrow, Shakspeare iterates and reiterates the phrase, with all the dramatic realism that informs and vivifies his creations. Is it the wedding of Hero with Claudio, for instance? “When are you married, madam?” asks Ursula of the bride; who, with affected levity, replies,—
“Why, every day; to-morrow. Come, go in;
I’ll show thee some attires; and have thy counsel,